College Gymnasts List (2 of 4): The All-Stars

March Madness is actually not just going on in college basketball, but women's college gymnastics as well. We imagine if Dick Vitale of ESPN were announcing gymnastics meets, he would call these collegiate athletes PTP'ers (Prime Time Players):

1) Rheagan Courville. LSU. Junior (pictured top)

2) Lindsay Mable. Minnesota. Sophomore (pictured middle)

3) Katerhine Grable. Arkansas. Senior (pictured bottom)

4) Kassidy Stauder. Penn State. Senior.

5) Stephanie Ouellette. North Carolina State. Senior.

6) Tory Wilson. Utah. Junior.

7) Kim Jacob. Alabama. Senior (She is originally from Raleigh, NC)

8) Kytra Hunter. Florida. Junior.

9) Danusia Francis. UCLA. Sophomore (Francis recorded a perfect 10 over the weekend)

10) Hope Sloanhoffer. West Virginia. Senior.

http://www.collegegymfans.com

Happy Birthday William Shakespeare

Today happens to the 449th birthday of one William Shakespeare, from Starford on Avon, England.

In America and perhaps in other remote parts of the globe, like Canada, the day is being celebrated as National Talk Like Shakespeare Day as well.

Many Shakespeare plays are currently in production or will be soon around the country.

The Folger Theatre in Washington, DC, which specializes in Shakespeare plays, will be performing "12th Night" from April 30-June9th.

The Colorado Shakespeare Festival in Boulder, Colo., will be performing "Midsummer Night's Dream," among other plays from June 7th-Aug 11.

And, in Conway, Ark., where we gather that they joking refer to the Bard as Willy Shakespeare, the Arkansas Shakespeare Festival will be performing "Much Ado About Nothing" in addition to other plays starting on June 6th.

"Whereth outh thou Nutella?" "Whereth outh thou cat food?" "Whereth out though paper towels?"

 Well, we couldn't resist.
http://www.folger.edu

http://www.talklikeshakespeareday.org

http://www.coloradoshakes.org

http://www.arkshakes.com

10 People Who Will Decide Election(1 of 10)- Fiddle Player in Missouri

Name: Gary Tate

Hometown: Branson, Missouri

Occupation: Fiddle Player

Age: 72

Will Likely Vote For: Mitt Romney

Wow! We are having lots of tech glitches with this entry. At any rate, this is the start of our series on how one person can decide a state, which can in turn determine the winner of the presidential election. Places like Beckley, West Virginia (George W. Bush 2000), Elko, Nevada (Bush 2004) and Cary, NC (Barack Obama, 2008) have helped determine the last three winners of very close presidential elections.

Today, we focus on the tourist mecca of Branson, Missouri, located off Highway 76. Branson has a population of 10,520, but more importantly the town in southern Missouri near the Arkansas border has popular theatres with mostly country musicians and old-time crooners, such as Roy Clark, Andy Williams,  and Lee Greenwood. Branson also has a theatre run by Russian emigre comic Yakov Smirnoff, who like Greenwood, is known for his conservative politics.

We expect that since Missouri will once again go Republican as John McCain narrowly won the Show Me state in 2008, but President Barack Obama should perform strongly in St.Louis and Kansas City.

DISCLAIMER: Though he shares his name with a pastor in England, Gary Tate is a ficticious person. The image is actually of North Carolina bluegrass legend Hubert W. Watts (1885-1976).

Ending the Year with Willy Shakespeare

If one is looking on ahead on this New Year's Eve/New Year's Day, then there will be at least two performances of the famed William Shakespeare play "The Twelfth Night" in two different parts of the United States this summer.

The Arkansas Shakespeare Company in Conway will be performing the play from June 1-July 12 and there will be a production of the same play along with "Richard III" this summer at Colorado Shakespeare Festival in Boulder.

On that note, we end 2011 with a quote from the Bard himself:

"Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage."

Republican Humor- Dear Casey

The following is meant to be political satire. Just so everyone in Generation Z or those of you from Belarus get the joke, Dear Casey or The Long Distance Dedication was a segment that was "Casey's Top 40," an American fm-radio music show when I was a teenager in the 1980s.


"Dear Casey:


I know that even though you are a political liberal like myself and a fellow person of Middle-Eastern heritage, you may hesitate to play this song for a truck driver I don't know in Sioux City, Iowa, as I am making this request for poltical reasons. Casey, I am afraid that the Republicans will nominate another execution-happy evangelist governor of Texas for their presidential candidate, and should Rick Perry actually become president I would have to flee America for Costa Rica or Iceland. Even though I'm sure those countries are wonderful places, I am not fluent in either Spanish or Icelandic, and I imagine this would make life very difficult for me. So, Casey, it is for these reasons that I am dedicating Conway Twitty's 1973 smash hit "You've Never Been This Far Before" to that truck driver I don't know in Sioux City, Iowa, in the hopes that_ and I never thought I'd say this_ vote for Mitt Romney in his town straw poll."

Conway Twitty (1933-1993) is alas no longer with us. I am actually a fan of his music (believe it or not) even though I'm not usually a listener of country music. Twitty was originally from Helena, Arkansas, and he is also known for his "Hello Darlin'" which was a big hit for him in 1971. Anyone living in the Chapel Hill, NC, area (not where I reside) may find vinyl records of his albums at All Day Records in nearby Carrboro, NC.

Casey Kasem is thankfully alive and well at age 79, which means that if Twitty were still alive they would be about the same age. Kasem was born in Detroit, and is active in both politically liberal and Arab-American causes (I am actually a Turkish-American). In addition to the famous radio show he hosted, Kasem was the voice of Shaggy on the original "Scooby-Doo," which first aired in 1969.

Bonus Road Trip (2 of 10)- From Conway, Ark, to Twitty, Tex.

Today, we are looking at the distances between the two cities that were the basis for the stage name of country-music legend Conway Twitty (1933-1993), who alas died during or shortly a performance in Branson, Missouri.

Twitty's real name was Harold Lloyd Jenkins, and his biggest was perhaps "Hello Darlin," which was number one for four weeks on the country charts in 1970, the year I was born. Recently, I found a vinyl copy of "Conway Twitty Greatest Hits, Volume One" at All Day Records in Carrboro (Chapel Hill Hill), NC.

Conway, Ark., is a college town that is home to Central Arkansas University and where the great Southern literary magazine "Oxford American" is based. It is also where one can find Mike's Place on Front Street, which offers (according to its web sites) lots of good steaks.

While there were plenty of places to choose from for Conway, Ark., the same could not be said for Twitty, Tex., as it has a population of 60 people! But, it does have its own zip code which is 79079.

So, we were able to figure out how far apart these two towns that made Conway Twitty's name are.

Is the answer:

A) 6 hours, 30 minutes

B) 6 hours, 50 minutes

C) 7 hours, 10 minutes

D) 7 hours, 30 minutes

Top 10 Favorite Songs from John Lennon

Since yesterday was the 30th anniversary of the murder of John Lennon, we thought it would be neat to list our ten favorite songs by him. The fact that our intern Javier from Honduras* is inept at remembering song titles made this a bit challenging, but I'd like to think we pulled it off.

We wonder if some of these songs are played on Oldies KVID in Russellville, Ark., but Javier had to arrange an interview with Olympic gymnast Shawn Johnson in her hometown of West Des Moines, Iowa, so he is not able to confirm that and we are too busy (or lazy) to fool with, really.

Amazingly enough, Yoko Ono--- of all people, follows us on Twitter (this true!). Ono herself chose "Oh My Love" as her favorite Lennon song for a 'lists' issue in "Rolling Stone."

*-Javier is not an actual person. The joke is that if something is factually wrong in the contents of this blog, we blame him! BTW, since he is fictional, he is not interviewing any Olympic gymnasts.

Here are our favorite Lennon tunes (either solo or with The Plastic Ono Band):

1. "Instant Karma"

2. "No. 9 Dream"

3. "Watching the Wheels"

4. "Imagine"

5. "Nobody Told Me"

6. "Jealous Guy"

7. "Woman is the N of the World"

8. "Oh Yoko"

9. "Mind Games"

10. "Cold Turkey"

High School of the Week- Central High School (Little Rock, Ark)

I must profess to enjoying the irony that we are featuring a photograph of former president Bill Clinton that was posted on a right-wing blog (of all places!) with our High School of Week which is the famous Central High School in the state capital of Little Rock.

It should be pointed out that Clinton actually graduated from Hot Springs High School in Hot Springs, Ark., but Central is actually the most recognized high school in the state, if not the nation, because it was the site of a major desegregation incident in 1957 that is considered to be a cornerstone in the Civil Rights movement.

One of the first black students involved with the desesgregation (also called "The Little Rock Nine") Jefferson Thomas recently died in Ohio at age 68 on Sept. 5.
Thomas was cited by President Barack Obama for his civic courage.

Clinton, who was then in office as president, celebrated the 40th anniversary of Central's desegregation with then Republican governor Mike Huckabee, who unsucessfully sought the GOP presidential nomination for 2008, in 1997.

Central HS has been cited nationally for academic excellence, and it has an enrollment of circa 2,422 students. Nancy Rousseau is principal of the school whose famous alumnus in recent years includes Green Day guitarist Jason White.

The school nickname is The Tigers, and in recent years they had the dubious distinction of losing 23 football games in a row.

But that certainly does not change the school's place in American history.

Things We Learned on Twitter Today- The White House Soup de Jour Is...

In case you were wondering, today The White House is offering Tuscan Chicken Soup as its soup of the day, according to a tweet from WashDCNews.

The tweeters gathered this info from Chuck and Todd with the MSNBC show "The Morning Rundown."

Recipes for the dish can be found at cooks.com

Alas, President Barack Obama will miss out on the soup as he is giving a talk today in Seattle, which is more than 3,000 miles away from Washington, DC, but hopefully Michelle Obama will get to sample the soup.

We have no info on what Bo the White House Dog will be eating today, but as we find out, we will pass it along to you!


SIDEBAR: Some unique films are showing this week at college town cinemas in Virginia. The Vinegar Hill Theatre in Charlottesville is currently showing "Winter's Bone," a thriller set in Arkansas in which a young girl tries to track down her deadbeat father who put the family home up for sale so he could make bail before vanishing.

At the Lyric Theatre in Blacksburg, "Cyrus" will begin its week-long run on Friday. The independent mumble-core comedy starring Marisa Tomei, John C. Reilly and Jonah Hill deals with an average Joe who gets very lucky when he makes love to a gorgeous woman out of his league only to discover that she has a psychopathic 21-year-old son who happens to live with her.