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Monday, June 27, 2011

a hum dinger

What I like about TR Hummer's poems is that he writes like he hasn't yet figured out the poem was going to end, or what he would wind up thinking as he arranged his line breaks and dashes. His tone is vernacular, characteristic of a true voice addressing you directly.   There is no flatness here, no monotonic hum droning on in a pretense of everyday speak. We have poet who frequently presents his narrators as being in the middle of something, in the thick of things that do not make sense just yet. There is a suggestion that he likes to ponder the nature of what he doesn't know in such as way that he seemingly departs from earth's gravity and skips , instead, on the rings of some oblivion bound orbit, as I believe he is doing with "Ooo Baby Baby", a poem I like quite a bit. That context and set up isn't furnished in the poem are not important here, the glory and grace of the poem begins after the opening line, two people, a speaker and his girlfriend/wife/lover, staring at a blank, black vastness after dark, he speaking in an all allusive way along a string of what-ifs and why-nots, the edge of nothingness seeming to made concrete . There is a sensation here, a mixture of exhilaration, fear, attraction and vertigo as the speaker dispenses with his knowledge of the given--this is a lake we are looking at after dark, those are paper lanterns, you and have history --and I would say that what Hummer is considering are the kinds of seductions that commence once the active mind is t taken with an incredible , unthinkable idea.

Hummer has emotion aplenty, and the sense of longing and yearning for less nuanced times is tangible; he is, however, an artist, and combines a writer's restraint with the emotion he is trying to convey. This, I think, gives the reader more to discuss--the art of what was almost, the art of what was skillfully suggested--than a boiler plate expression of unremarkable poesy would.

This is very much a poem of over thinking a situation but that, I believe, is precisely the point, as these thoughts are not an argument made with metaphors to support a supposition toward a metaphysical construct, but instead a fluid stream of associations that are precisely liquid, seamless, seductive in their idea that just as we can imagine that what we know of the world might, in some twisting of the language, can be made to be composed of materials other than what's assumed to be the fact, it is equally as powerful to conceptualize existence being constructed on nothing what so ever . This world, Hummer's narrator appears to be getting at, is composed of those comforts and solaces we find and remember and manage to construct a life worth living out of it, paper lanterns, beach sex, Smoky Robinson and all. This poem is a nicely contained abstract of an imagination that seems entirely capable of being seduced by its manic swerves into the illogic of  a less interesting conundrum/

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Santa Flies? We’re IN! Family Holiday Event Saturday Dec 3. FREE With A Basic Need

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Tuesday 26 September 2017

Ivan Massow: Becoming a parent seemed impossible, but now I'm ready

Gay rights campaigner and would-be London mayoral candidate Ivan Massow explains why he can't wait to become a father (with help from his lesbian co-parent)

Ivan Massow:
Massow: 'Like most men I speak to, I wasn’t too sure I wanted to be a dad' Photo: Eddie Mulholland

Last Tuesday, some five months into a pregnancy with my lesbian co-parent, who I met online, I went to hospital to peer into her womb and find out our child’s sex.

The answer came: “It's a boy.”

The news was just what I wanted to hear. Not because ‘it’s a boy’ but because, for the first time, I could call him “him”, or even by name. This kid is now officially a person and I am really a dad.

“It’s a girl” would have been just as powerful, although it maps out a totally different life. Would it be one filled with dolls and dolls' houses, as it was for me growing up, or football, Meccano and Tonka toys as it was for my brother? Just as a funeral gives us closure, this second scan and more specifically, finding out his sex, is the starting gun.

I’m not sure if I’m allowed to tell you his name under the co-parenting agreement – we have a publicity clause of course. So for the time being we’ll call him X. My co-parent – a decent, respectful, professional and fiercely independent gal who has enough on her plate at the moment – isn’t as comfortable with publicity as I am, so I have to tread carefully between what is my stuff, and hers.

For me, whether it’s my sexuality, my tricky childhood, my dyslexia, my brush with alcoholism and even my depression after the death of my partner 20 years ago, all is fair game and public knowledge, because I believe that standing up for who you are is good politics.

Talk about issues in the abstract and it leaves me cold. Is there anything more powerful than Stephen Fry living with his depression openly (the black dog, as Churchill called it), or Jade Goody holding our hand through her cancer until she finally passed? Both people changed attitudes, brought about change and saved lives – how many politicians can claim that?

Like most men I speak to, I wasn’t too sure I wanted to be a dad. I think that's why I waited until the point in my life where any longer and it would be plain unthinkable. I’m 47, so when my son is 18, I will be 65, which I think is just about OK. I may not see him become prime minister, but I may be around long enough to make his teenage life a misery.

However, now I’ve seen X, a broodiness that feels as powerful as my first crush (on my schoolmate, Ben, when I was five) has catapulted me into a new understanding. And I realise why the word pregnant is used as a metaphor for anticipation around the world.

Partly because gay relationships, specifically mine, are so unreliable, having kids of my own always seemed impossible. Instead I became a kids’ mentor for Action For Children and occasionally fostered friends’ kids battling personal issues – but just until they got back on their feet. The first kid I fostered like this was seven years old. I’d just collected him and he was mine for a week, but it ended up turning into a year.

He'd been so excited – showing me the bunk in the tiny room he’d shared with three others since birth. What I really remember is what it felt like when he held my hand as we walked to the car. And what it felt like as he fell into a deep sleep beside me as I drove. That sense of responsibility was a window into what absolutely everything in the world was about.

Last Tuesday, as I gazed over the belly of my co-parent and saw my little boy on the TV screen above, I felt the same. Our agreement with each other is that we share all costs for the child but that she has the right to move away with the child and live her life however and with whomever, she sees fit. If possible we’d like to have a stab at living together first, because it would be better for X.

Like all modern people, we know that two men or two women can raise happy, well-loved and well-adjusted children. However, my co-parent and I still favour this opportunity to give our son a mum and a dad who, if possible, can create a loving environment under the same roof. This does cause a small issue. Every lawyer I can find tells me that I am taking on some medieval financial responsibility for my co-parent because she’s a woman, despite our written agreements. But, sometimes you need to take risks. They ‘strongly advise’ that I just pay the monthly child maintenance and live apart, or risk losing everything I’ve worked for. But we both agree that this would be hard work for us, and no fun at all.

I realise that no prenuptial-style contract, no cohabitation agreement and no co-parenting agreement will ultimately prevent a lawyer whispering “this thing you both signed, it isn’t worth the paper it is written on for the man” as pound signs flicker in his ‘no-win-no-fee’ eyes. Eight hundred years after the signing of the Magna Carta and both a peer of the realm and white van man get the same number of points on their driving licence for jumping a red, maybe we need new thinking which says we are all equal in family courts – but I’ll leave that fight to braver people than me.

I’m already living together with my co-parent and I will absolutely love sharing my life, my home and my heart with this child too. What amazes me most is that 20 years ago, my sexuality was a talking point in Westminster when I was just about the only openly gay in that village. Today, as I stand for Mayor of London – no one from my party has even blinked, the rocks have all come from the left.

I’m so proud to be British, I’m incredibly proud to be a Londoner and I’m so impressed that my party has embraced positive politics over the world of cynicism and homophobia. When Tony Blair did something similar and abolished Labour’s extremist arm Militant Tendency and redefined Clause 4, the party’s 1918 commitment to nationalisation (which at that time was seen as modernisation!), he knew deep-down they’d still vote Labour. He also knew both were essential for a modern party, a world that had changed.

It wasn’t easy for Stephen Fry to publically shoot down stigma, or Jade Goody to campaign through illness and save lives.

We need to start thinking of what is right, rather than what is easy.

We need to do this in politics and in our personal lives.

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Thursday 21 September 2017 | UK News feed

Pat Regan, knife crime campaigner, stabbed to death

A mother who founded a campaign against gun and knife crime has been found stabbed to death in her home.

Pat Regan, 53, launched Mothers Against Violence after her son Danny was shot in a suspected gangland killing.

Police said yesterday that her 20-year-old grandson, who is believed to suffer from mental health problems, was being held in connection with her death.

Mrs Regan's body was found in her first-floor maisonette in the Hyde Park area of Leeds by a neighbour on Sunday night.

Her grandson, Rakeim, had been arrested earlier in the day at the city's station after a railway worker was stabbed.

Staff at the station were said to have challenged him about trespassing when he is alleged to have attacked the man with a knife on the platform.

The 45-year-old victim was taken to hospital with a stab wound to his arm.

British Transport Police detained Rakeim on suspicion of attempted murder. It was understood that he had been receiving treatment for mental health problems.

Mrs Regan, a mother of five, became a prominent figure in the campaign against the rising tide of violence after Danny, 25, was murdered in St Helens, Merseyside, in December 2002.

She founded her own organisation, Mothers Against Violence, and had close links with similar groups such as Mothers Against Guns and Mothers Against Murder and Aggression. Last year she was invited to Downing Street for a summit with the then prime minister Tony Blair and John Reid, then home secretary.

Three months ago she met the Princess Royal during a royal visit to Leeds.

Jacqui Smith, the current Home Secretary, who had met Mrs Regan on several occasions, said she had achieved a great deal and described her death as "a great loss".

Mrs Regan's work in the community involved giving talks to school pupils on the consequences of gun and knife crime.

Speaking of her work last year, she said: "I have seen 18- and 19-year-olds cry. We go through the whole scenario of what can happen when people use guns and knives in crime."

Mrs Regan's eldest son, Shane, 35, choked back tears yesterday as he paid tribute to his mother.

"She had dedicated her life to stopping violence like this," he said. "She was one of the most genuine people you could ever meet.

"What has happened has come as a massive shock to all of us and we're just trying to piece together in our heads what has gone on.

"I just can't believe it, none of us can. She died for what she believed in and what she was trying to stop.

"All of the family helped her out as much as we could, she was the best. She represented our family and she represented the struggle against violence."

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Friday 22 September 2017

Hillary Clinton urges Egypt's military leadership to surrender political powers

Hillary Clinton stepped up pressure on Egypt's military leadership to surrender its political powers on Sunday as she concluded one of the most sensitive diplomatic missions of her career.

Egyptian Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, head of the military council, shaking hands with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Egyptian Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, head of the military council, shakes hands with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Photo: AFP/Getty Images

In a moment of astonishing symbolism, the US secretary of state smiled and exchanged pleasantries with Mohammed Morsi, Egypt's new Islamist president who was jailed by the autocratic Mubarak regime that Washington sustained for many decades.

It was a trip that required the deftest of diplomatic acrobatics as Mrs Clinton sought not only to navigate the treacheries of Egyptian domestic politics but also to recalibrate Washington's troubled relationship with a core US ally.

Treading delicately, she broached the subject of Egypt's power struggle between its generals and Mr Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood by declaring that she looked forward to "the military's return to a surely national security role".

It was not the most strident of calls. But it could hardly have been otherwise given the precariousness of Egypt's present position following the dissolution of the country's Islamist-led parliament at the military council's request just before Mr Morsi was sworn in last month.

Shortly before she met the military council's chief, Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, Mrs Clinton praised the generals for not following the Syrian army's example of "murdering their own people" as she gently prodded them onto a democratic course.

"Democracy is hard," she said. "It requires dialogue and compromise and real politics. We are encouraged and we want to be helpful. But we know that it is not for the United States to decide; it is for the Egyptian people to decide."

Her encouragement did not appear to yield immediate results as Gen Tantawi raised the stakes in his standoff with Mr Morsi by declaring that he would never allow the Muslim Brotherhood to dominate Egypt.

The new president, who has been rendered largely powerless by the general's expropriation of legislative authority for themselves, is fighting to overturn the order dissolving parliament.

Mrs Clinton's trip is the most significant by a US politician since President Barack Obama a speech in Cairo in 2009 that was meant to mend relations with the Muslim world after the acrimony of the George W Bush era.

But Mr Obama's support for Hosni Mubarak, overthrown in last year's revolution, has cost him dearly. Opinion polls show that 76 per cent of Egyptians view him unfavourably.

Grappling with that legacy, Mrs Clinton has also had to find a way to respond to the rise of political Islam, with its deep anti-Western and anti-Israeli traditions, through the ballot box.

"Things change at kind of warp speed," she acknowledged ruefully.

Despite a loss of US leverage, Mrs Clinton also sought to use soft diplomacy to influence the Muslim Brotherhood into pursuing a moderate course. She promised Mr Morsi major US financial support if he undertook to respect the rights of women and minorities and agreed to maintain relations with Israel.

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5% of All Sales go to Support The Tavern

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Wherein the "B Team" Delves into the Castle of the Mad Archmage

Last night we had three players for the monthly (more or less) Swords & Wizardry "B Team" session. By popular of the regulars, it was decided that the PCs would venture into the Castle of the Mad Archamage. Megadungeon delving works well for a once a month game where the player roster has the potential to change a bit.

A few quick comments and notes:

- I change shit up, often spur of the moment. Your players may or may not have a pair of guardsmen with a tent set up outside the dungeon entrance, asking for "valid adventuring licenses", but if your players are asked, they probably should ensure they get their paperwork in order. Mine did ;)

- I like to play with accents in the sessions I run, often with "notable results", even if these results aren't the ones I was seeking

- I really wish all PDF modules / adventures included an unkeyed, sans secret doors and traps, made to be viewed by the players sort of map. With the amount of gaming that is going on online these days, this would be the icing on the cake for many otherwise excellent adventures. That being said, I've gotten skilled at using "fog of war" and keeping the secret doors"secret". If I have a single complaint about Castle of the Mad Archamge, it would be this. Not sure if it it so much a complaint as "I wish it included..."

- my party zigged when I thought they would zag. Isn't that always the case?

- poop is poop. some poop is more than others. some poop has treasure, most holds horrors. can I help it if the poop I scoop is deeper than written? ;) (couldn't help myself +Joseph Bloch )

All three of my players wrote up play summaries from their perspectives:

+Tim Shorts wrote his over at the Gothridge Manor blog.

+Douglas Cole wrote his over at the Gaming Ballistic blog.

+Peter V. Dell'Orto wrote his over at the Dungeon Fantastic blog.

Do I have great players or what?

  1. We are pretty awesome.

    The blank PDF map thing ought to be a law or something. It's hard not to metagame when you see a big "42" in the middle of the freaking corridor in front of you. "Uh, we check for traps."

  2. The lack of a player's map is quite intentional, Erik. Since there are so many opportunities built into the module for the PCs' mapping efforts to go awry (teleporters, sloping passages, elevator rooms, mazes, shifting walls, etc., etc., etc.) to give them a map which they know by its very nature is infallible would render a lot of the features of the dungeon unusable. Keep running the adventure, and you will know the unimaginable joy of players actually throwing their maps across the room, declaring them "worthless" because they don't match up with their expectations. :-)

    1. But for online gaming.. unless you don't use a centralized map.. its needed..

    2. I disagree; it's not needed. You can certainly do online gaming with "theater of the mind's eye", letting the players map by verbal descriptions just like you do at a face-to-face game. Or a digital whiteboard, which gets erased room by room. But showing the map as it is (even with the keys and secret doors redacted) to the players does them and the adventure a disservice, as you're losing a lot of features deliberately built into it that add to the experience.

      It's hard to engender a feeling of paranoia and impending doom with minotaurs and giant boars hunting you in a labyrinth when you can see the way out is three lefts and a right, and if the GM suddenly switches to a new map in a long corridor, it's a sure sign that you just went down a sloping passage (as sure as seeing a big "42" in the middle of the corridor)...

    3. See, if publishers include a "player's map" it gives me the option of either using it in my online game or not. It's up to me. If they don't, I either have to make my own or play the game the way Joseph Bloch describes. I have no choice in the matter.

      Joseph, a customer is telling you they would like X, and your answer is "no, you don't want X. You're playing the game wrong." Whether you agree that something is or isn't "needed" is not relevant, is it?

      Personally, I'm not very good at describing the layout of rooms and tunnels and such. For better or for worse, my brain doesn't really work that way, so I don't want to bog my game down with trying to make sure players understand things about basic layout that, in my opinion, their characters would pick up just from looking at a room. Do I want to give them a 100% accurate map that they can look at whenever they want? No, what I'd rather do is turn on line of sight so that only the part of the map where they're standing is visible. That, to me, represents a nice compromise between revealing the whole map and having to spend time describing mundane layout features. Especially in an online game, where I lose almost 100% of my non-verbal communication, a simple map to act as a visual aid is really, really helpful to me.

    4. The thing is, though, he's not describing the map to us. He's revealing parts of the map in Roll20. So if he doesn't have an unkeyed map, we know that room is Room #2 or there is a big #42 in the hallway.

      It would go as you say if he was describing what we see, but honestly, how that would work with 3-4 players remote from each other trying to draw a map to show each other would be difficult. It's smoother to have Erik just show us what we see, and easier for him if that map was also unkeyed.

    5. Apologies if I wasn't clear; the fault is entirely mine. I am absolutely not saying "no, you don't want X." I'm saying that this particular adventure wasn't designed with X in mind. If you want to adapt it to work in a world that uses X, that's great, and more power to you. That's true whether X is support for Runequest, or using it via Roll20, or playing with 4E-style battlemaps, or plot-driven story lines and railroady adventure paths. It's only by adapting it to one's own particular playing style and needs that CotMA truly comes alive, and it's impossible to support everyone's needs and wishes. So I wrote it for the way I play (face to face on a tabletop, where the GM describes what the players see, with occasional recourse to a whiteboard if there's something particularly tricky), and if others adapt it to the way *they* play, that's AWESOME!

      But it's not fair to say that a lack of X is somehow a failure when it was never designed for X, any more than it's a failure for a Camaro not to seat a family of six. It is what it is, and if you absolutely, positively, *have* to have X, and aren't willing to do the work to make it X-compatible, it's probably not for you. And that's fair enough; get the minivan instead of the sportscar.

      And, for what it's worth, Erik specifically said that it wasn't a complaint so much as a wish-list item. Personally, I'd love to see a Roll20 that specifically supported "line of sight only" views, that were dynamic enough that when the players teleported somewhere, the system was smart enough to change their surroundings in the "dark" areas. But I know that's not what Roll20 does, and that's fine. I work around it, or don't use it.

    6. As a player in Erik's game, I'd say an unkeyed map would improve our enjoyment of the game and significantly heighten that tension that you want to see in your megadungeon. It would be very nice to have one. Lacking one, we lose some of the tension.

      Is it really objectionable to provide an unkeyed map if the GM and players could find one useful and good for their mode of play? I mean that as a direct and simple question.

  3. I totally agree about the unkeyed map.. I usually make my own but its still a pain in the ass..

  4. I've taken to GIMPing my pdf maps to edit out the stuff the players shouldn't see. It's not quite as tedious as you might think, and also allows you to make changes to the map in case you're not 100% satisfied with the original.

  5. I work on rpol, and what I do is scan a map page, then dysonize it and blank off the markings using paint. When it comes up in play, I cut and paste a small section to the group map. Most of my Dysonizing comes from a 2"x2" square I repeatedly cut and paste from, and I use a blank square cut from the image to paste with, as scans don't come over white enough to erase cleanly.


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Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb

ISBN-10: 0385344163

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She was born in 1841 amd mamed Mercy Lavinia Warren Bump, but she became known the world over as Mrs Tom Thumb. Thirty-two inches tall, "Vinnie" refused to let her stature cost her opportunity. Melanie Benjamin pens an "autobiography" of Mrs Tom Thumb, a barnstorming tale of the antebellum South, of a woman's public triumphs and personal tragedies. Here are some of America's most memorable figures and a portrait in an unforgettable, singular voice - that of Vinnie - a woman who knocked the Civil War from the headlines.
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List price: $16.00
Copyright year: 2012
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Publication date: 4/3/2012
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Pages: 480
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Language: English

Melanie Benjamin was born in Indianapolis, Indiana and attended college there. She has been an avid reader all her life and firmly believes that a lifetime of reading is the best education a writer can have. After college Melanie married and moved to the Chicago area to raise her children, but the desire to write was always there in the background. Soon she began writing for local magazines and newspapers before venturing into fiction. As Melanie Hauser she published two contemporary novels. Now writing as Melanie Benjamin, she's incorporated her passion for history and biography into ALICE I HAVE BEEN her first historical novel; THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MRS. TOM THUMB is her second, and will be published in July 2011. Melanie and her family still live in the Chicago area where she enjoys writing, taking long walks, and gardening.

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Just Hospitality God's Welcome in a World of Difference

ISBN-10: 0664233155

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n this, her last book, theologian Letty Russell redefines the commonly held notion of hospitality as she challenges her readers to consider what it means to welcome the stranger. In doing so, she implores persons of faith to join the struggles for justice. Rather than an act of limited, charitable welcome, Russell maintains that true hospitality is a process that requires partnership with the ¿other¿ in our divided world. The goal is ¿just hospitality,¿ that is, hospitality with justice. Russell draws on feminist and postcolonial thinking to show how we are colonized and colonizing, each of us bearing the marks of the history that formed us. With an insightful analysis of the power dynamics that stem from our differences and a constructive theological theory of difference itself, Russell proposes concrete strategies to create a more just practice of hospitality. With careful attention, she writes, we can build a network of hospitality that is truthful about our mistakes and inequities, yet determined to resist the contradictions that drive us apart. This kind of genuine solidarity requires us to cast off oppression and domination in order to truly welcome the stranger. Russell¿s lasting message is a highly practical theology for both the academy and the church. The book contains questions for study and reflection.
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Book details

List price: $22.00
Copyright year: 2009
Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
Publication date: 4/2/2009
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 250
Size: 5.50" wide x 8.50" long x 0.50" tall
Weight: 0.726
Language: English

Letty M. Russell was one of the world's foremost feminist theologians and a longtime member of the faculty of Yale Divinity School. She died on July 12, 2007, at age 77. She was one of the first women ordained in the United Presbyterian Church and served as pastor of the Presbyterian Church of the Ascension in East Harlem for ten years. She joined the faculty of Yale Divinity School in 1974 and retired in 2001. She wrote and edited numerous books, including Church in the Round: Feminist Interpretation of the Church, Dictionary of Feminist Theologies (with J. Shannon Clarkson),and Inheriting Our Mothers' Gardens: Feminist Theology in Third World Perspective (with Kwok Pui Lan, Ada Maria Isasi Dias, and Katie Cannon).

From Many Parts, a Whole
In Honor of Letty Mandeville Russell
Following the Clues
Why Hospitality?
On Being a Misfit: Embracing Hospitality
In But Still Out
Making Sense of Myself
Living on the Margins
Becoming a Feminist
The Gift of Not Fitting
The Church Inside Out
The Church in the Round
One Call, Many Ministries
Ministry of Hospitality
Questions for Thought
The New Hospitality
Postcolonial Interpretation
Postcolonial Subjects
Postcolonial Theological Perspectives
The Doctrine of Election in Postcolonial Interpretation
When Election Is a Problem
The Ambiguity of Chosenness
Feminism and Hospitality in Postcolonial Interpretation
A Feminist Hermeneutic of Hospitality
Postcolonial Subjects Practicing Hospitality
Questions for Thought
Riotous Difference as God's Gift to the Church
Biblical Views of Difference
Babel's Gift of Difference
Pentecost's Gift of Understanding
A Different Kind of Unity
Unity in Hospitality
A Community of Christ
The Source of Unity
Liberating Difference
Questions for Thought
Reframing a Theology of Hospitality
Framing and Reframing
Making a Change
Steps to Reframing
God's Hospitality: Reframing Safety in Biblical Tradition
The Meaning of Safe Space
Searching the Scriptures for Safe Space
Reframing a Text: Ruth's Story
Attending to Context
Developing a Spirituality of Listening
Questions for Thought
Just Hospitality
Unequally Yoked
Justice in "Just" Hospitality
Amos's Message
Justice as Hospitality in Worship
Hospitality in Just Hospitality
Welcome as a Metaphor for Action
Transforming God's Welcome
Recognizing Just Hospitality
Essential Characteristics
Questions for Thought
Index of Scripture References
Index of Subjects
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Lenovo eyes budget Android tablet market

  • Lenovo's A2107 probably won't win any performance accolades, but is very reasonably priced at approximately $150, with similar Android devices weighing in at around $199.

    There are also a number of tablets on the market that are in the $250 and up range, with screens measuring  8-9-inches.

    So yes, it seems as if industry veteran Lenovo is set to enter the budget Android tablet market with the  IdeaTab A2107. Now as noted above, the A2107 isn't going to and attempt to compete with other tablets on the market based on performance or specifications. Rather, Lenovo is plainly aiming at the budget shoppers out there with a rumored price of around $150-$167.

    Hardware specs? A 1 GHz ARM Cortex-A9 processor, 7-inch display with a resolution of 1024 x 600 that supports only four points of touch, 1 GB of RAM and storage options ranging from 4 GB-16 GB.

    The tablet isn't in stock in any of the retailers where it has been listed, reports Liliputing, so there is always a chance the pricing is inaccurate and simply acting as a placeholder. The model tipped at $150 is said to have 8 GB of storage, indicating the existence of an even cheaper version of the tablet with only 4 GB of storage.

    Additional features include front and rear cameras, Wi-Fi, and integrated Bluetooth. The tablet also promises up to eight hours battery life and there will be a 3G-capable version of the device.

    Although an official launch date has yet to be confirmed, it seems as if the A2107 will be hitting physical and virtual store shelves over the next few weeks.


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Steve Ballmer says Surface Tablets off to a "modest" start

  • Earlier this year, many of us were hoping that Microsoft would launch its Surface Tablet, specifically the version running Windows RT, at a low price to compete with other devices on the hyperactive market.

    Early rumors pointed to a price of $199, but that turned out to be quitey far from the actual retail price of the tablet which was revealed closer to launch date.

    As we've previously reported on TG, Microsoft is asking $499 for the entry-level version of its Surface Tablet, with one of the better-equipped versions of the Surface Tablet sells for $599. Interestingly, IHS iSuppli issued a report earlier this month that listed the bill of materials for the 32 GB tablet with the optional Touch Cover at only $271 - with another $13 as manufacturing expense.

    This means that Redmond is making quite a tidy profit margin on each tablet sold. In any event, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer recently stated that sales of the Surface Tablet "are starting modestly," although he remained tight-lipped about actual numbers.

    Ballmer also noted that the more expensive and higher performance Intel-based version of the Surface tablet was on the way. This particular tablet will be a bit more than half an inch thick and weighs about 2 pounds. It is also equipped with a third-generation Intel Core i5 processor, along with Intel HD Graphics 4000 GPU, 4 GB of memory, up to 128 GB of storage and a 10.6-inch display with a resolution of 1920 x 1080.

    Exact pricing is unknown, but Microsoft has said the device would be in line with similarly configured ultrabooks, say somewhere in the $800 to $1,000 price range, if not a little higher.


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Donations Appreciated (Help Keep This Blog Going Please).

Friday, September 19, 2014

The Aaliyah/Lifetime Biopic's Ship Set to Sail

This Shipp is sailing full steam ahead for the Aaliyah film, not an actual boat, but Nickelodeon's Alexandra Shipp will be playing the role of Aaliyah Dana Haughton, the sultry bluesy R&B singer who died in a tragic plane crash in 2001. The movie has already started filming with Shipp as Aaliyah and is set to be released by Lifetime on Nov. 15 of this year. There were many layers to Aaliyah's life, some public and some, not so public. It is unknown which aspects of her life Lifetime will include, such as her brief alleged marriage to scandal-prone R&B heavyweight R.Kelly, relationships with R&B heart-throb Ginuwine and former Roc-A-Fella records mogul Dame Dash. One thing is for sure, Aaliyah was loved by many family, friends, label-mates, other artists, public figures and designers. Plus, she still is.

 Photo: courtesy of Lifetime (Shipp pictured in traditional '90s wear as Aaliyah in the studio.)

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by Penn Peroud


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Sunday, January 11, 2015

***So Sad: Shots Rang Out During Chris Brown's Performance in San Jose, CA***

Chris Brown can't seem to catch a break. If he's not being shot at literally, then he's being shot at figuratively by other public figures and even his current on again/and off-again girlfriend Karrueche Tran. Early Sunday morning at a San Jose, CA nightclub called Fiesta, five people were shot and wounded. Brown later took to his Twitter account to tweet, "I'm 100," which was later deleted, according to the San Francisco Gate and the San Jose Mercury News. Brown was all set to perform for hip-hop station 106 KMEL's alleged "birthday bash." Four people were taken to a hospital and a fifth person admitted their self after being shot; all our expected to survive with the gunshot wounds not being life-threatening. Several people were detained by the police in connection with the shooting. After watching the clip of how everything unfolded, I must say that there needs to be tighter security both on stage, in the audience and at the door of any concert, ESPECIALLY a CHRIS BROWN concert, where at the pre-party to last year's VMA's Suge Knight was shot six times while at a Chris Brown pre-party. When will the senseless violence end? --Penn

Sn: It bothers me that Chris did not tweet out any concern so far for the victims who were shot. Smh.

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by Penn Peroud


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Minerva Eagle Scout Sean Swinehart received an Honorable Mention for his outstanding Eagle Scout Service Project.

Buckeye Council Boy Scouts of America held their Annual Eagle Scout Recognition Dinner at the Kent State Stark Conference Center recognizing the 123 Boy Scouts from the Council that earned their Eagle Scout Rank this passed year.

Swinehart with the help of friends, family and scouts built a chicken barn and enclosed pen area for the Mount Union University Nature Center. This is part of Mount Union's program to teach children what it is like to live on a farm.


WARC-Truncated: length

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While some may view Louisiana State University’s AgCenter as an academic farmhouse, the Cooperative Extension Service, created 100 years ago under the federal Smith-Lever Act, has provided each Louisiana parish with resources for the past 100 years.

To celebrate Extension Service’s centennial, LSU Libraries collaborated with LSU AgCenter a year ago to create the celebratory exhibit that opens Monday in Hill Memorial Library on the LSU campus in Baton Rouge.

The exhibit runs through mid-January 2015. The exhibit occupies two rooms on two floors of Hill Library, and includes historical photographs, oral histories and current literature.

The Smith-Lever Act was designed to assist universities in distributing research information to the public. Early on, it focused on residential demonstrations relating to farming and cultivation, LSU AgCenter Communications and Public Relations Director Frances Gould said.

As time progressed, the demographics changed from a rural to an urban culture, Gould said, “but we still have to raise food for ourselves.”

Karen Stevens, assistant area nutrition agent at LSU AgCenter and East Baton Rouge Parish Cooperative Extension chair, said the service helps teach people about nutrition through research-based knowledge. Extension services also teach the proper preparation of food and how to read nutritional labels on grocery store foods.

While individuals like Stevens work to help families make the right eating choices, cooperative extensions continue to work in rural areas to help farmers efficiently produce crops.

Andrew Granger, Cooperative Extension agent in Vermilion Parish,

Granger said the Cooperative Extension helps communicate with farmers about the modern tools and the latest seed verities.

“We are an unbiased source of information. That’s why we’re truly relevant,” he said.

S. Renee Barrow writes for the LSU Student News Bureau.

Read or Share this story: http://www.theadvertiser.com/story/news/2014/09/21/agcenter-louisiana-resource-years/16026231/


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Frequently Asked Questions

What is acupuncture and how does it work?

Acupuncture is an ancient Oriental medical technique that is more than 3,000 years old. Acupuncture points themselves are little wells of energy, found along meridians or pathways that flow through the body. This energy, called Chi, or Qi, helps move our blood, helps our cells to heal and regenerate, and our minds to stay clear and focused. Chi moves in these pathways to and from all of our major organs. It feeds and nourishes them, and the rest of our body. With the gentle insertion of fine, sterilized needles your practitioner accesses this Chi and unblocks, moves, and balances it as needed for your treatment. Acupuncture also releases endorphins, the bodyʼs natural pain killer, and serotonin, which helps emotional disorders and the effects of stress.

How many treatments will I need?

The number and frequency of treatments depends on how your body responds to acupuncture. In the beginning, weekly treatments are recommended with intervals between treatments lengthening as your condition resolves. Six to twelve treatments is the average for the majority of ailments.  If you have a long standing, chronic condition, a rule of thumb is that a month of treatment is needed for every year you have suffered from your condition. Resolution rates differ for everyone, and acupuncture can help you reach a place of on going care that will manage your symptoms and/or pain, and allow you to consider a reduction in your medication.  Acupuncture is, at the heart of the medicine, wellness care.  Ideally, in the 5-Element Tradition, a healthy patient need only come in four times a year for a "tune-up", as the seasons change.

Does it hurt?

The needles are very fine, about the size of a hair, and create little or no discomfort. Some may feel a slight pinching sensation, a dull ache, or a moving and tingling as the Chi moves into or out of the point. It only lasts for a moment. Tell your practitioner if you are uncomfortable. The needles can be adjusted or even removed if any discomfort continues, although this is not usually necessary. In fact, the treatments are relaxing, and, many patients fall asleep soon after the needles are inserted.

What is my role in the healing process?

Acupuncture is a well choreographed "dance" between patient and practitioner.  Your actions are a key component of your treatment plan. Focusing on your health and committing to a healthy lifestyle are the best steps you can take for your well-being and successful acupuncture treatments. Together, you and your acupuncturist can heal your imbalances and help you achieve harmony and balance.  Even after your symptoms are resolved, acupuncture can assist you in maintaining your health, and possibly prevent future imbalances.

How will I feel after acupuncture?

Most patients feel very relaxed after acupuncture. Many feel a sense of openness and well being. The mind becomes more present and more clear. The emotions become more grounded, and you may have a feeling of having come home, or back to your center. Some experience immediate relief from their pain or other symptoms. Others will need time for the treatment to integrate, so they may feel better the day after treatment. Again, long standing conditions require time to resolve.  The treatments are cumulative, and you will have to give your body time to accept the changes produced by your acupuncture sessions. To get the most from your session, it is best to avoid alcohol, heavy labor, or a strenuous workout immediately after acupuncture.

What can acupuncture help?

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends it's use in over 40 medical conditions. Some of them include:

  • Asthma and Allergies
  • Eye Disorders
  • Colds & Flu
  • Fibromyalgia
  • PMS
  • Chronic Pain
  • Depression
  • Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
  • Migraines

The National Institute of Health (NIH) also lists:

  • Tennis Elbow
  • Low Back Pain
  • Stroke Rehabilitation
  • Osteoarthritis
  • Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
  • Myofascial Pain

These are just a few of the conditions that are cited, but acupuncture is also known to help with digestive disorders, anxiety and depression, skin disorders, such as acne, psoriasis, and eczema, womenʼs health problems such as menopause, endometriosis, infertility, and much more.

Will Insurance cover Acupuncture?

Acupuncture is a tax deductible medical expense and many people pay their fee through their Flex Spending accounts at work. Insurance companies are finding it cost effective to cover acupuncture, although some insurance companies want a referral or a prescription from your medical doctor for acupuncture before they will pay for your treatment.  Call your insurance company for more information regarding your policy.

What to expect

Your initial visit, or Traditional Diagnosis in the 5-Element Acupuncture Tradition, generally lasts 90 minutes.  It is important that you complete your acupuncture intake form before you are seen for your T.D., as having to complete it during the service severely cuts into your treatment time.  The form can be found on our website by clicking on the "Patient Resources" page.  The form is also available for pick-up in the office.

During your first appointment, your acupuncturist will spend time getting to know you and your health concerns. Katie, your acupuncturist, will speak to you in depth about your health history.  You may be asked a wide range of questions about your symptoms, eating, exercise, sleep habits, emotional states and anything that may offer insight into your health.  Please try and answer all questions as candidly as possible.  We aren't here to judge you, we are sussing out the root cause of an issue in order to help create the best treatment plan for you!

During the visit, Katie will also perform a physical exam, and provide you with your unique treatment plan.  Your practitioner will employ diagnostic tools that are unique to acupuncture and TCM such as tongue and pulse diagnosis.  It is important that your refrain from wearing any makeup, deodorants, and/or perfumes to your acupuncture treatments.  5-Element diagnosis is based on 4 key criteria - color, sound, odor, and emotion.   Blocking these "clues to the real you" will severely inhibit your practitioner's ability to make a proper diagnosis.

Once the interview and exam are complete, you will receive an acupuncture treatment.  It's important that you wear loose, comfortable clothing to your treatments.  Sometimes, acupuncture points require the removal of clothing.  Your practitioner will step out of the treatment room, allow you to undress and slide between the sheets on the massage table.  Your practitioner will move the drape only to access a particular point or series of points and the rest of your body will remain draped.

Your Treatment Plan

Once your acupuncturist has gathered enough information, you’ll receive a comprehensive diagnosis and a treatment plan that will explain:

  • Your underlying imbalances
  • Your time line of care
  • What types of treatment you will receive

Getting The Most Out Of Treatment

For the best treatment results, keep a few things in mind:

  • Please show up on time
  • Don’t eat a large meal before your visit
  • Refrain from caffeine intake prior to your appointment, as it can disrupt pulse taking
  • Wear loose, comfortable clothes
  • Be sure to discuss any questions or concerns with your acupuncturist
  • Refrain from overexertion, drugs or alcohol for at least six hours after treatment
  • Follow your treatment plan between visits
  • Keep all of your appointments, as each visit builds upon the previous ones


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Jeff McCarthy and Spencer Kayden in Urinetown
(Photo: Joan Marcus)
Seventeen. That's the number of times I counted Urinetown, the musical, referring to itself as a musical. Every time it happened, the audience laughed -- especially when Officer Lockstock (Jeff McCarthy) was teaching Musical Comedy 101 to the post-modern Dickensian waif Little Sally (Spencer Kayden): "You're too young to understand this, Little Sally, but nothing can kill a musical like too much exposition." The same audience guffawed at the mock hommages to Les Miz in Act I and West Side Story in Act II, congratulating itself on recognizing the staging references. And it giggled every time McCarthy wiggled his eyebrows, made a slashing motion with his hands, and ominously intoned, "Urinetown...the musical!" -- though it looks to me like his broad satirical playing, funny the first time around, is coarsening into shtick a year into the Broadway run.

On second viewing, Urinetown remains a clever, lively send-up of musical theater conventions. And there were many moments, especially in its wordy second act, when I wanted to kick its clever, lively teeth in. You'd think from its ecstatic press that this mock-Brechtian fantasy about capitalism in a pee-unfriendly society was not only amusing but also somehow relevant, and a watershed (pun intended) for musicals to come. If so, we're in trouble, for the only really new thing about this show -- and a number of other recent big titles -- is its stubborn refusal to care.

Urinetown isn't the worst of the new breed of post-modern, ironic, self-referential, deconstructionist musicals; it's just the most conspicuous, and the loudest and proudest in announcing its insincerity. It's the antithesis of the classic romantic shows, ranging roughly from Oklahoma! to Ragtime, wherein music elevates emotion, defines character, and creates a world where song or dance is the natural, logical consequence of heightened feeling. Jud Fry seethes with self-loathing, Eliza Doolittle gets "the rain in Spain" right, Fredrik Egerman abandons Desirée Armfeldt -- what is there to do but sing? The audience doesn't question the convention or protest that people don't burst into song in real life, because (a) the ramp-up to the musical moment has been so skillfully constructed; (b) the moment takes us to a realm that mere dialogue can't; and (c) the music and lyrics are so good.

The music and lyrics of Urinetown are good, too -- but they're all in quotation marks, ironically detached from both reality and real feeling, as if the show were slightly embarrassed to be a musical. We're just kidding, they tell the audience; we don't expect you to believe in us any more than we do. Great show music engages the heart as well as the mind but, in this very cynical New Millennium, it's safer to lampoon deep emotions than to try to tap them. Have you noticed how, in interview after interview, Urinetown's authors have proudly stated that they deliberately set out to find "the worst possible idea for a musical?" That kind of flippancy turns the show into something hip, a joke the audience can feel it's in on. It's fun, but it's also as cold and smirky as a Letterman routine.

Compare Urinetown's wink-wink, nudge-nudge attitude with the show's most obvious antecedents, Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock and Brecht and Weill's The Threepenny Opera and The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. These works -- all pre-Oklahoma! -- are not "integrated" in the classic-musical sense; they use song more as commentary than as a natural extension of plot and character. But they are really about something. Cradle, in particular, is about a lot: the ruthlessness of capitalists, the need for unions, the plight of the underclass, the unholy alliance between art and commerce, the dangers of an irresponsible press, the evils of xenophobia. Cartoonish it may be in presentation (I mean, the villainous plutocrat is named Mister Mister), but the show's passions are genuine and deep, and its stirring finale offers hope for a fairer America. Urinetown, in contrast, is about...peeing. It assumes a populist, anti-big-business stance -- but that's a posture, not an ideology. Its authors have created a musical about nothing, in the way that Seinfeld was a sitcom about nothing, and they're similarly eager to pat themselves on the back for it.

Brad Oscar and Steven Weber in The Producers(Photo: Paul Kolnik)
Brad Oscar and Steven Weber in The Producers
(Photo: Paul Kolnik)
One might argue that Urinetown is a special case. What about old-fashioned musical comedy's triumphant return to Broadway via The Producers and Thoroughly Modern Millie? (I haven't yet seen Hairspray, so I must reserve judgment on it.) Yes, but self-reference and irony permeate these shows, too. As for warmth or conviction, forget it. We don't ask musical comedy, as distinct from musical drama, to touch deep feelings in us; it's the genre's prerogative to stay bright, light, and cheerful (though, when musical comedy does go melancholy, wonderfully soul-stirring things can happen, like "My Time of Day" in Guys and Dolls or the anguished reprise of "So In Love" in Kiss Me, Kate.) What we do ask is that, on some level, musical comedy should believe in itself. And, apparently, that's a lot to ask in 2002.

Mel Brooks has stated that The Producers is really a platonic love story: Soulless crook and gutless nebbish learn to care for each other, and become better human beings for it. He even has written an 11 o'clock number to that effect, where Max and Leo admit that life was meaningless "Till Him." All well and good, but Brooks hedges his bets when in comes a choir of little-old-lady investors to intone "aah, aah, aah." Thus the audience is reassured that "It's all a joke! You needn't expend any real emotion here. You good people are all much too worldly to fall under the spell of sincere storytelling." Having executed his "gotcha," Mel keeps yanking our chains: "Leo!" exclaims Max. "I never're a good singer!"

Are your sides black and blue from being elbow-poked yet? Brooks and co-librettist Thomas Meehan have been doing it all evening, from the mock-"Old Man River" lament at the beginning of "I Want to Be a Producer" ("Oh, I debits all de mornin' and I credits all de eb'nin'...") to Ulla's coy query, "Why does Bloom move downstage right?" Translation, again: You're watching a show that knows it's a show. Nothing is at stake here. Heck, even Aida has more conviction than that!

Musical comedy has indulged in this sort of playful self-kidding for decades (Of Thee I Sing, 1931: "The committee shall now tell why she was chosen...with music!"), but it's never been so pervasive, so taken for granted. Take this year's Best-quote-unquote-Musical, Thoroughly Middling Muddle -- I mean, Thoroughly Modern Millie. The adaptors of the messy 1967 movie have wisely PC'd up the text, removed some of the vulgar excesses of the original, and reconceived the heroine. Millie Dillmount is a cousin to Lorelei Lee, a gold-digging gal with a calculating heart. This being a musical comedy, she trades it all for romance (and ends up with money anyway), but Millie doesn't believe in Millie. Her revelation occurs in a curiously hard-edged 11 o'clock song that sounds like the opposite of what it is saying. "Gimme, gimme / That thing called love," belts Sutton Foster, but she sounds like a pushy shopper at Zabar's deli counter.

TMM trots out the old money-can't-buy-happiness morality and happy ending of classic musical comedy, but it believes in itself about as much as Urinetown does. Consider the show's second couple, Dorothy Brown (Angela Christian) and Trevor Graydon (Marc Kudisch). When they fall in love -- at first sight, naturally -- they do so in ultra-campy fashion to the operetta strains of "Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life!" and "I'm Falling In Love With Someone." Now, you win first prize if you can explain what two songs from Naughty Marietta (1910) are doing in a "new" score, much less one that exults, "this is 1922." While you're at it, I'd love to know what "My Eyes are Fully Open" (1887), "My Mammy" (1921), or "The Nutcracker Suite" (1892) have to do with Millie and her pals.

Sutton Foster and Marc Kudischin Thoroughly Modern Millie(Photo: Joan Marcus)
Sutton Foster and Marc Kudisch
in Thoroughly Modern Millie
(Photo: Joan Marcus)
Maybe one reason these musicals seem to back away from real emotion at crucial moments is that the bolder shows of recent seasons -- those whose creators still believe in the form's legitimate storytelling powers -- all lost money. Parade, Ragtime, A Class Act, Jane Eyre, and even something as misshapen as Thou Shalt Not sought to stir in their audiences something beyond a push-button response to some wisecracking allusion to some pop-culture relic. And they paid for it. Ragtime, especially, asked a lot of its viewers. They had to follow multiple storylines; examine the American dream, its failure, and how it might be resurrected; listen closely for leitmotifs and reworkings of the musical themes; and accept abrupt transitions from drama to comedy to tragedy and back again. Most of all, Ragtime demanded (a little stridently, to some tastes) that people -- here's that word again -- care. Oh, but that might mean shedding a tear and being perceived as uncool! Honey, let's see Urinetown instead.

Parade, too, went against the grain in going for real emotions and a real message. The show's score and storytelling techniques, at least to this observer, were too insistent, too finger-wagging; but at least it wasn't all a huge, smirking joke. And that's what the musical, in this thoroughly modern millennium, is in danger of becoming. When the public decides that it's too grown-up to accept the bursting-into-song approach on anything but ironic terms, too hip and self-aware to succumb to honest sentiment, it's cheating itself out of musical theater's greatest gift: the power to move. And when musicals cater to this bland hipness with so much self-reference and prepackaged allusion that they're no longer grounded in any kind of emotional reality, they're cannibalizing themselves out of a meaningful existence.

Oh, sure, the musical will be around for a while. Hairspray's a smash; a few writers (Ahrens and Flaherty, Maltby and Shire, Jason Robert Brown) still believe in the form in its non-ironic state; and there are always revivals. But the rise of the coldly cynical, proudly insincere, pop-culture-reference-filled, doesn't-give-a-crap-about-anything type of show can't be a healthy trend. How long can any organism survive once its heart has stopped beating?


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have you looked into her heart?

The clothes you wear, and the color of your hair gives off an impression of who you are. No matter how much you want to fight it- people make judgements based on your appearance.

But, what if people could make their first impression based on your full story?

What if people could see you from across the room and create an opinion of you based on the day that you've had, versus the fake smile plastered on your face? What if someone could hear the goodness of your heart just in your hello? What if they could know your depths and not just your surface.

The depths are the good parts. There is no denying that.

We all have a story. A great big, bold story of the hurt, hardships and turmoil that we've been through. We have a story of the love we've shared and the laughs we've had.

There is so much more than what our outside elements make us appear to be. Yet, how often do we see others just as their outer shell and forget to take the time to break under the surface and see the beautiful spirit that lies within?

Take a natural stone- rough and rugged on the outside, glistening, gorgeous jewels on the inside. There is so much more to see when you dig a little deeper.

We are proud to stand by Bracha in the #wearit2endit movement, as they use natural stones and elements to continually remind us of the beauty within.

These stones have been dedicated to helping women trapped in modern day slavery to discover the beauty they have within. Bracha is working to fund movements that are freeing women and taking a stand for their lives everyday, and we couldn't think of a better brand to stand by.

How are you seeking beauty in others today? Are you working to make sure the women around you can see all of the jewels they have buried within? If you can find them in her, it will be much easier for her to find them within herself. We owe this to each other, right? To look deeper? To not make rash judgements? And to support the babes around us so they can share their bold, brave hearts?

Let's take a stand today.


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recipes I've tried this week

Not a whole lot of new news around here so I'll just get right into food talk. Since I had the day off on Monday, I wanted to make something in the slow cooker so I made this slow cooker pot roast with balsamic vinegar. I had the leftovers for lunch the rest of the week, it was that good.

southern fairytale

I wanted something of the stir-fry variety so I found this recipe for 30-minute mongolian beef. So good.

just a taste

Had some chicken breasts to cook so I made this honey soy chicken. I made it with roast potatoes because we had just had rice the night before with the mongolian beef (mashed potatoes for the kids) but it would have been better served with rice due to the delicious sauce. Very easy to make too. Gotta remember this one.

table for two

Lastly, I needed something super fast as it was 'flu shot' night. I made this turkey taco recipe but with ground chicken instead (it was what I had). Isabella loved it, as did I:

the perfect pantry

Since Simon is obsessed with blueberry muffins these days, I just made a batch of these blueberry muffins. They look DELICIOUS.

a cup of jo

And for a quick to make treat, I tried these white chocolate lucky charms treats. Really, I made them for the kids..................................okay, and maybe for me too........

sally's baking addiction

(due to lack of time, I added white chocolate chips into the cereal rather than dunking them in the chocolate)

  1. I've made this stir fried beef recipe twice in the last couple of weeks, it's so, so good: http://latourangelle.com/index.php/recipes/pan-asian-flank-steak.html

    1. Sounds yummy (minus the mushrooms - the only veggie I don't like). Do you use their stir fry oil?

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Friday, May 6, 2011

Friday Face Off: The Thirteenth Chime v. The Fallen Star

Eyeballs are not all that uncommon on covers; in fact we've had them on FFO before.  But these are two of the more recent - and more interesting takes - on the eyeball cover.  And despite the differences in the treatment of the eyeball in question, the covers are actually pretty similar, right down to the super-pale background.  So I'm curious - what do you guys think of this trend?  Does it catch your eye [haha] at the bookstore or library?  Or does it creep you out?  And of course, for these two,
which did it better?

Last ^two^ weeks on FFO:  The last Face Off of Fairy Tale Fortnight was between modern and traditional retellings, and traditional retellings just barely eked out a win.  But really, with fairy tales, everyone's a winner!*
Before Fairy Tale Fortnight, we had a face off between Hourglass & Impossible, and Impossible won for its mix of beauty and strangeness.  And though not everyone is a winner on this one, you can be - there are a few days left to enter to win Impossible here!

*Statement does not apply to the following: Wicked Stepmothers, Evil Queens, Big Bad Wolves and other Big Bad creatures, Rumpelstiltskin, people who live in or eat gingerbread houses, giants up to and including those who live atop beanstalks, trolls, and all manner of sorcerers and wizards. Winning is based solely on the satisfaction of having read a good book or told a good tale 'round the campfire; monetary value not to exceed 1/100th of a cent and a pair of glass slippers.  Mgmt is not responsible for cracked slippers, and repair costs are the sole responsibility of the wearer.  Slippers may or may not be delivered by a charming Prince [not to be confused with this guy], but the Prince is a bit of a dolt and easily distracted by shiny things.

  1. 13th Chime, most definitely! I don't like the whiteness/pinkness of the other one... My sister saw it and made a good point - "Why does she have pink eye?" lol!

    The green in "13th chime" is gorgeous, and I love the shadows and dark lashes. Definitely the winner, I'd say. ;)
    Oh, and just so you know, these are some of my favorite posts in the blogosphere. :D

  2. Haha! Thanks! Way I see it, everybody likes a good throwdown. :)

  3. The Thirteenth Chime does it just right. Its bold and unique font and placing really brings an oomph to that eye. Perhaps the author font at the bottom seems a tad out of place, I really like the cover. :)

    The Fallen Star looks good in its own right, but it pales in comparison.

  4. +JMJ+

    They're both freaky! =S

    I guess I'll settle with The Thirteenth Chime because green eyes are more "normal."

    (Did you know that lots of covers of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four have a similar eye motif? I did, and I think that's why I'm so freaked by these.)

  5. Thirteenth Chime wins it for me. The colors are much more appealing. The cover for Fallen star looks extremely washed out. While the eye is a nice purple, the overall cover looks monotone.

  6. The Thirteenth Chime, for sure! The colors are more bold, and there is more contrast. That appeals to me more than the washed out or faded look of Fallen Star.

  7. The first one! It's way better than The fallen star. ;)

  8. I like The Thirteenth Chime better. It's a more interesting cover, and I LOVE that there is a clock in the eye.

  9. The Thirteenth Chime is way more awesome! The vibrant green totally owns that washed out lilacy purple.

  10. I definitely prefer The Thirteenth Chime -- the green really pops against the alabaster skin (sorry, I just wanted to say alabaster heh). The pale purple is kind of washed out on the Fallen Star cover.

Tell me all your thoughts.
Let's be best friends.

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The Brothers Comatose

November 2014

Last Show of the Year – San Francisco

Pre Thanksgiving party with the Brothers Comatose and the T Sisters.

We’re hunkering down to work on a new album but we’ve got one last show of the year planned for you all. Our good friends and sisters from a different mister the T Sisters will open the night.

Come down to the Chapel in San Francisco. Hear some new tunes and start a long weekend off right…with us! Get tickets before they’re gone:

A Wee Break From the Road

Hello friends! Please excuse our lack of blogginess. With the constant output of social media posts on various platforms, we often forget about this here bloggy blog. That’s all about to change though. We’re making an early New Year’s resolution to keep up with informing our friends and fans to the goings on of The Bruthaz Clamatoes. That all starts now.

You may be wondering why you don’t see many shows on our calendar over there to the right. Welp…there are a couple reasons for that: 1. We’ve been on the road non-stop this year and it’s nice to take a lil’ break every once in a while. 2. We’re working on new material so we can record a new album. Now that’s some exciting stuff! Many of you have been wondering when you’ll be able to get your hands on some new music. The answer to that is…fairly soon. We’ll be recording in the next couple of months and will most likely be releasing a new album in spring 2015. We are stoked (that’s a word we use in California to mean, like, totally excited) to put some new tunes out there.

We’ll also be planning out some major tours for 2015 which will most likely bring us to you, wherever you are, unless you live outside the US, or in a treehouse in the remote forest somewhere, or at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. BUT…we’ll be hitting most other spots we’ve frequented in the past and we can’t wait.

We shall see you down the road!

Till then…

The Bruthaz Clamatoes

We Had a Hippie-tastic Halloween

We would like to send out a massive and warm thank you to everyone that came out and packed the Catalyst for our Woodstock Halloween show. Your costumes were fantastic and your energy was unparalleled. We had a really good time learning and playing all of those Woostock-era songs for you. This may just become a tradition come Halloween time every year.


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The Carter Team

Donna Lyons exemplifies the values of integrity, energy and hard work.  This makes Donna a perfect fit for The Carter Team.  Donna currently resides in Loganville and grew up in the Snellville area.  Donna has over 20 years of banking experience which has proven to be a huge asset when assisting buyers through the purchase process.

Donna's distinctive blend of experience, energy and innovative adaptation, provides her clients with unrivaled service and flexibility.

Donna is a terrific mother of 2 young adult children.  She enjoys traveling, interior decorating and spending quality time with family and friends.  Donna is also an avid fan of Ravens Football.  She provides excellent customer service and is willing to go the extra mile for her clients.  Donna understands what it takes to make her clients dreams become a reality.  She is ready to serve you in Gwinnett, Walton and surrounding areas.   CALL DONNA TODAY!

The Carter Team is ranked in the top 4% of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices agents WORLDWIDE!


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News about anything we find interesting.

[News] The Weeknd Announces ‘The Madness’ Fall Tour

the weeknd Celebrating the release of his newest studio album, Beauty Behind The Madness, award-winning singer, The Weeknd will embark on a multi-city fall tour starting in his hometown Toronto on November 3rd. The tour will end in Miami on December 19th. Tickets will  be available to purchase on Friday August 28th, the day of the album's release at 10:00 am EST. What: The Weeknd: The Madness Fall Tour Where: Air Canada Centre, Toronto When: November 3rd, 2015 Admission: $56.25 - $144.25 via Ticketmaster Tour dates: 11/03 Toronto, ON - Air Canada Centre 11/06 Chicago, IL - United Center 11/07 Detroit, MI - Palace of Auburn Hills 11/11 Newark, NJ - Prudential Center 11/12 Boston, MA - DCU Center 11/14 Uncasville, CT - Mohegan Sun 11/15 Washington, DC - Verizon Center 11/16 New York, NY - Madison Square Garden 11/18 Brooklyn, NY - Barclays Center 11/24 Montreal, QC - Bell Centre 11/27 Winnipeg, MB - MTS Centre 11/29 Calgary, AB - Scotiabank Saddledome 11/30 Edmonton, AB - Rexall Place 12/02 Vancouver, BC - Pepsi Live at Rogers Arena 12/05 Oakland, CA - Oracle Arena 12/08 Los Angeles, CA - The Forum 12/13 Houston, TX - Toyota Center 12/15 Atlanta, GA - Philips Arena 12/17 Tampa, FL - Amalie Arena 12/19 Miami, FL - AmericanAirlines Arena


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Beef Newsletter - 25th June 2008
Wednesday 25th June 2008
Genus John Deere Animax Veterinary Health Schering Plough Animal Health DuPont Animal Health Solutions Agco
Allflex Our Sponsors: Helping keep you updated for free! Claas
Home    Beef News    Company News    Articles    Diseases    Treatments    Book Shop    Employment    Cattle Breeds    SEARCH
Welcome to this week's newsletter

* This Week's Feature Articles

We have 3 new features this week:

Animal Cloning and Implications for the Food Chain
This report examines the potential issues involved with cloning animals for commercial industry, prepared for COI, on behalf of their client, The Food Standards Agency.
Cow Size â€“ To Win the Race, You Must Know What Race You Are In
By Kris Ringwall, Beef Specialist, North Dakota State University Extension Service. When selecting cows for size, the debate can rage on for a long time.
US Beef and Dairy Outlook Report - June 2008
By U.S.D.A, Economic Research Service - This article is an extract from the June 2008: Livestock, Dairy and Poultry Outlook Report.
* Global Beef Cattle Industry News

    FMD NEWS: Test Differentiates Vaccinates And Infections
    BLUETONGUE: Infertility Problems with Vaccine Denied

   United States

    In The Cattle Markets
    Weekly Roberts Report
    Weekly US Cattle Outlook - Choice Beef Retail Prices Up
    Weekly Outlook: Now is The High In?
    Texas Officials Want Another Look at JBS Takeover
    Observe Phenotype to Determine Genotype
    US Livestock Slaughter Statistics
    Cattle On Feed
    U.S. Cattle on Feed Down 4 Percent
Agco Product Solutions     Meat Price Bubble in Wake of US Flood
    Yellowstone Holds Key to Brucellosis Eradication
    Discovering Hormones and Their Role in Meat Quality
    Antibiotics: AVMA Put Superbug Scare Stories to Bed
    Senator Against JBS Merger Monopoly
    US: Beef Up, Imports Down
    US Farm Bill Becomes Law of the Land
    A Letter in Response to Korean Beef Worries
    A Local Issue: Sustainable Farming and Health
    EPA Urged to Push Biofuels Out of Food Domain
    Cutbacks Coming on Back of Corn Inflation
    Winners at Missouri Junior Angus Preview Show
    Mad Cows and Mad Policies
    Mexico in Denial: The Source of Montana Brucellosis
    GE Animals Full of Promise in Brave New World
    Guilty Pleas to Hallmark Cruelty
    Counting the Costs of Stored Co-products
Claas - Time for new rules
   United Kingdom

    United Auctions Move to Ensure Sustainability
    EBLEX Publish Mini Feeds Directory
    National Statistics on the Incidence of TB in Cattle
    Thirsk to Host Simmental Cattle Show
    UK Slaughter Statistics June 2008
    UK and ROI Cattle Price Comparisons
    Brown Says GM Animal Feeds are Key to Food Crisis
    Infertility Problems with Vaccine Denied
    Pasture Type and Methane Emissions
    Cracking Bluetongue with a 3D Model
    Vion: Investment and Expansion
    Scotland Eyes Changing Shape of CAP Health Check
    NFU Puts the Pressure on Retailers
    QMS Offers Farmers Direct Support

   Korea, Republic of

    Mislabelled US Beef Sends Shock Waves in Korea
    President Apologises Over US Beef Deal
Banamine-S -
   Serbia and Montenegro

    World's 1st On-farm E.coli Intervention Vaccine?

    Time for Celebration Says AgForce
    ABA Chairman Welcomes Quarantine Review
    Weekly Australian Cattle Summary
    FMD Test Differentiates Vaccinates And Infections
    Oz: NLIS Rebate Extends Until Cash Flow Snaps

    CIFA Call for Anthrax Protection
    Mad Cow in Canada
    There's Hope for Feed Grain Price Relief
DuPont Animal Health Solutions

    Competition Report on Vets Gets Thumbs Up

   New Zealand

    NZ: Carbon Neutral Beef a Trot too Far

    Mysterious Death and Disease in Iraq

    Marfrig Buys OSI in Brazil and Europe

That's all for this week!

Our Sponsors

Seasonal Picks

British Field Crops 2nd edition


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Overnight fire in Groton destroys mobile home

Groton — A fire engulfed and gutted a trailer in High Rock Mobile Home Park around 1:11 a.m. Monday, leaving two firefighters with slight injuries as nearby neighbors feared for their own homes.

Fire officials said two residents, a man and a woman, were in the burning trailer at 208 G St. The man awoke to the fire alarm, said Capt. Brian Kiely of the Poquonnock Bridge Fire District, and went to his neighbors to ask them to call 911.

Two neighbors reported the fire, which Poquonnock Bridge responded to along with personnel from the Naval Submarine Base, the City of Groton, Mystic and the Old Mystic Firefighter Assist and Search Team (FAST).

On arrival, firefighters found flames shooting out all the windows and the trailer "fully engulfed," Kiely said. A 20-pound propane tank on the deck was also burning, he said.

The mobile home park does not have a fire hydrant because the owner chose not to install one, Kiely said. So firefighters had to connect to a fire hydrant 1,800 feet away, on Ginger Drive.

"So that is a delay right there," Kiely said.

The roof collapsed, and there isn't much structurally to that type of a trailer, he said. "It is like a big oven, you know. It's all metal," Kiely said.

Kiely said he estimated that the firefighters were able to knock down the fire in 20 to 25 minutes.

The cause of the fire is under investigation, Kiely said. One firefighter injured an ankle from kicking the frozen fire hydrant wrench open, Kiely said. The other injured a hand.

Algie Mazzeo, who lives next door, said she woke at 1:15 a.m. to the sound of frantic knocking and ringing of her doorbell. She sat up in bed and "the sky looked red," she said.

"I just jumped out of bed and I was a nervous wreck," she said. "I looked out the window and could see the flames on (the neighbor's) back porch." She called 911.

She said by the time she reached the door, the person knocking had left.

The houses on G Street are close together, so you could toss a ball easily from one yard into the next. Mazzeo said she was afraid her mobile home might also catch fire, so she grabbed her purse, got in her car and drove some distance away. "I was terrified," she said.

Heat from the fire melted the skirting on one side of her mobile home, and there was a faint odor of smoke inside. But she said firefighters did an excellent job of containing the fire. She said they told her she was fortunate to have snow on the roof, because embers were blowing onto it.

"We were lucky because it could have been a lot worse, she said.

The local chapter of the American Red Cross is providing the two displaced residents with a temporary place to stay along with emergency food, clothing and other items of personal need.

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Cross My Heart and Hope to D’oh! by Deb Jenny

I luuuuuvvvvvvv a good secret. I’m addicted to the intrigue of secrets, mostly. Secrets are so fun to be in on, yet so hard to, uh, keep secret. Not that I spread things; no way. If someone tells me something in confidence, I absolutely maintain that confidence. But then there are other times where I’ve been told something, not quite realized the gravity of the information, and then sort of spilled the beans, purely by happenstance.

Take for instance the spy episode…

Okay, somewhere out there, I know some people who have some spying background. Leave it at that. See! I’m keeping my secrets. So in the course of my knowing some people with some spying background, I learned some things, about covert versus overt, about “Need to Know Basis” and generally about keeping your big mouth shut. That sort of thing.

So one night we were at dinner with those distant espionage-ish people and another couple (I didn’t even know they were secret agent types!) who were talking with great pride about their son, Donny. Their son who lived in some obscure pocket of the world involving guerillas (not the cute hairy kind that swing in trees), sharpshooters, warring factions, and a very complex language that one doesn’t know but for on a, um, need to know basis.

Seemed Donny—who worked in “imports/exports”—got a promotion, and was headed off to another embattled nation with yet more guerillas, warring factions and an even more complex and arcane language that no one, but no one, knows. I don’t even think the people who live there know it. It’s that unknown. Upon learning this, even I was able to deduce that Donny’s job entailed far more than ensuring the safe shipping of Barbie dolls and tainted pet food in far away ports. No one becomes fluent in two bizarre languages without really good reason.

So at the dinner table that night, conversation was rolling merrily along, as we sipped our wine and exchanged jovial banter. But chatter ground to a screeching halt—I’m talking rush hour in Bangkok screeching halt—when I said:

“Oh, so Donny’s working imports/exports?” With a hyperbolic wink—one where my right eye squeezed shut really hard and the side of my lip raised up dramatically, forcing my cheek to scrunch up toward my forehead. You know the kind. The “hey, we’re all in on the big secret!” wink.

Suddenly a hostile silence embalmed the room as nine sets of squinting eyes glared at me, the dingbat who unwittingly broke the unspoken code of Need to Know.

Now, to backtrack. I sorta knew about the Need to Know. Like if you don’t need to know, you don’t. But I also thought that if you’re amongst everyone who Knew, then you didn’t quite have to tap dance around the inevitable. I mean, everyone at that table knew! But I didn’t know till then that that was the whole point. Everyone knew we weren’t supposed to let on we knew. It’s sort of the Omerta of the cloak-and-dagger world, I guess.

Thank goodness my lapse of tight lips happened in the land of the free and the brave. Sheesh, had I been sipping a macchiato in a cafe bar off a lovely little piazza in Sicily, or worse yet dining on Borscht served up by a matronly hostess with long chin hairs in frigid Minsk, my transgression could well have rewarded me with a bullethole between the eyes. And I would hate for my last supper to have centered around beets. I hate beets!

Now, just to prove to you that I can keep secrets, I’ll tell you one. You remember that woman, Valerie Plame? The one whose covert spy history was exposed by vengeful operatives in the White House? Well, I knew—I knew!—for the past 20-plus years that Val was a spy. And I didn’t tell a soul. Not a soul! Because I knew it was a Need to Know. But now that everyone knows, well, the cat’s out of that bag. And if you try to get out of me how I knew that information long before it was a glimmer in Karl Rove/Scooter Libby’s eyes, well, now, that I can’t tell you.

Then again, I suppose I could…But I’d have to kill you. And you wouldn’t want that.

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This article has 18 Comments

  1. Jenny, I would have been a little afraid keeping Valerie Plame’s secret. I would have lain awake for endless nights imagining what-if scenarios. But I do LOVE secrets! I never used to be very good at keeping them, I’d almost always tell someone, but over the years I’ve learned to savor the privilege. Can I keep secrets of my own? Well, I do have one and it’s a doozy.

  2. Oh, Amy, you can’t leave us hanging there —do tell!

    I have to say when the whole Val Plame story broke and I started reading the details of her career, my humble life certainly paled by comparison. She was ‘best in her class” in AK-47 training while I was changing diapers and schlepping laundry. She had this life of such intrigue and glamour while I was cleaning up parrot poo off my bird cage all day long… But then I read she suffered from post-partum depression and realized spies are just like everybody else, they’re just better with high-powered weaponry LOL

  3. Do you live near Quantico by chance? Veeeery interesting! My little brother attended Zelda Novak’s wedding (Bob’s daughter) and got to see the Prince of Darkness up close!

    Fun post, Deb Jenny.

  4. No question, Jenny, when it matters you CAN keep a secret. But determining the other Need to Knows is tricky and that’s the problem with secrets — they’re either fun or likely to hurt someone.

  5. Great story, Jenny!! Funny! That whole everyone knowing everyone knew but the unspoken rule not to acknowledge it. Reminds me of holidays at my Waspy in-laws. All the conversation is like that and I’m ALWAYS saying the thing you’re not supposed to say. Thanks for the morning laugh! Gail

  6. Hmmmm, years in Washington, living not too far from Langley – does Deb Jenny have a few more secrets up her sleeve? Great post, Therese

  7. Larramie, it is so true–spilling the beans can be detrimental or hurtful. Always best to keep it zipped 😉
    Gail, I’m laughing about your little holiday gatherings. Oh, to be a fly on the way…
    Eileen, I’m bent over laughing at the James Bond reference. More like Austin Powers!
    Therese…sounds like you know too much for your own good…LOL
    And Danielle–I think the only thing thrilling I know about spies is that they’re not so thrilling LOL

  8. But the question I REALLY want an answer for is, “Shaken or stirred?”

    (Love your description of the wink. 🙂 And the bit about beets. I too hate the beets!)

  9. Now there is a great book in here somewhere Jen, to go with the other great books the world is going to see out of you soon!

    And hello, beets are fabulous. Above crowd has obviously never had home grown fabulously prepared beets, cold beet salad, etc. Or maybe it’s the Russian in me. :~) Vodka helps. I remember my “Russian” phase- with absolutely no political reference points except the move “Reds” I was having a mad love affair and we went to Dr. Shivago and out to dinner at the Russian Renaissance and saw Reds and well, I had a red petticoat to go under my midi skirt and well it all got very sexy and fashion driven after that LOL

  10. I think a LOT of vodka would have to be involved. Though we recently went out with friends to a tapas restaurant and my friend brought along her mother-in-laws treasured pickled beets in a tiny ziploc sandwich bag and made me taste them. She said the family fights over jars of the stuff. I will admit, they didn’t make me actually dry-heave, as did the Gerber’s baby food beets when I first tried to feed them to my son 17 years ago, but I wasn’t first in line for seconds either. I stuck to the tapas 😉 .
    That Russian phase–was this some underlying commie pinko thing?! 😉
    Now there is your story, by the way!

Comments are closed.


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F**KED: The United States of Unemployment is our 6-part mini-doc series on Salon.com about our national jobs crisis -- and how people were trying to fight back.

It's about unemployment, especially a group of NYC-area 99ers, and organizing, history, and OWS.

The F**KED series is embedded below. When you click on the player you'll see little controls and icons at the bottom. You can, for example, view full screen (far right) or see the whole playlist (rectangle).

Please let us know what you think. Join our mailing list to stay in touch, like us on Facebook, or follow @unemploymentdoc on Twitter


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Watch This Sedan Crash Into a Gas Pump in Maryland

Watch surveillance footage of a car lose control and careen into a gas pump before flipping over.

via YouTube

Call it a good case of bad luck, but things could have been much worse in this roll-over accident. A 64-year-old man from Baltimore, Maryland lost control of his 2007 Mercury Milan before 5 o'clock Monday morning, sending the vehicle careening over a curb and into the gas station parking lot.

Don Karbowniczek, the owner of another gas station across the street in Parkville, Maryland, found the vehicle immediately after the incident occurred. Laying on its roof, the sedan left a trail of destruction and confusion in its wake. Karbowniczek made the assertion that the vehicle went airborne, judging by the marks which the tires left on the ground.

Somehow, the vehicle cleared a light pole, a large vacuum, and even a trash can before making its way right into the pump. The Exxon station owner is perplexed how it not only left those items untouched, but also how it managed to flip over without causing more damage to the surrounding property.

Police aren't quite sure why the vehicle jumped the curb, but indicate that the crash was not related to alcohol. The driver reportedly survived the crash, but was said to be in critical condition after the accident.

Thankfully, nothing caught fire when the vehicle struck the pump. Karbowniczek explains this is due to a safety device on the pump known as a "shear valve", which, as explained in the video below, is a flap that engage once a particular arm on the device is severed. The safety mechanism is designed to stop the flow of fuel in the event of a car crash or other potential hazard.

Despite the injuries to the driver, a far worse disaster could have occurred if the shear valve safety system was not in place. The gas station, which was said to house upwards of 50,000 gallons of fuel, could have caught fire or exploded, resulted in far more casualties.