Wild, Thin, Mercury Sound

Should be required reading for anyone thinking of volunteering for the Army: Bảo Ninh (Bao Ninh), The Sorrow of War (1991). Life during wartime in Vietnam, fighting for the winning side. A grim take, even grimmer than American novels about the war. Ninh's unit lost more than ninety percent of its young men through fighting and attrition. Briefly banned in Vietnam, now accepted as a deep contemplation on reality.


Lee Harvey Oswald's birthday. Joined the United States Marine Corps at seventeen and derided as "Ozzie Rabbit." A disturbed man, his very existence still haunts us.


Wild man Klaus Kinski (1926-1991) was also born on this day. Here he is with Lee Van Cleef. Some of his best work was completed with Werner Herzog. An interesting documentary on their rough and tumble collaboration is: My Best Fiend / Mein liebster Feind (literally My Dearest Enemy, 1999).


All Kinski needed was love! His memoir is as scary as he looks on screen. It was first released as All I Need Is Love in 1988, then re-released in 1997 as Kinski Uncut: The Autobiography of Klaus Kinski. It is, frankly, compelling.


Candy Lo. Are those permanent tattoos?

Freja Beha Erichsen just being playful. An informal ambassador for Denmark. In Iraq, the fewer than 500 Danish troops who had been stationed near Basra have been downsized to about fifty. Denmark has lost seven killed during the occupation. Denmark has a battalion-sized presence in Afghanistan, too. In that conflict, another seven Danish soldiers have been killed.

Today's Rune: Flow.

Birthdays: Lotte Lenya (Karoline Wilhelmine Blamauer), Miriam Hopkins, Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau, Melina Mercouri, Jesse Helms, Chuck Berry, Klaus Kinski, Inger Stevens, Peter Boyle, Dawn Wells, Mike Ditka, Lee Harvey Oswald, Laura Nyro (Nigro), Wendy Wasserstein, Bảo Ninh (Hoàng Ấu Phương), Martina Navratilova (b. Šubertová), Milčo Mančevski, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Wynton Marsalis, Rick Moody, Candy Lo, Freja Beha Erichsen.

Vi Ses Senere!