I just love getting to pull a completed quilt off the frame! I washed and dried it today so now it is ready for binding.
This quilt top started out as a Breakfast Club project, a fat quarter pattern called "Perfect Ten." From the start I envisioned quilting each little section with a different quilt pattern. There are 10 fat quarters for this pattern so I came up with 10 different fills for each fabric box...keeping with the same fill for a particular fabric...more practice at perfecting my fill options.
Sew much fun...I'm going to have to do some more practice quilts to work on my "fill" options.
Also pecking away at my patriotic log cabin quilt.
We've been spending most evenings in the sewing studio since I have a fenced dog run outside my studio door. We have a few black bears that are regularly coming through the yard now and since evenings are the time we see them the most I have moved to the studio after 7 p.m. Sorry...no pictures....two dogs, barking their most ferocious snarls, are keeping the bears out of good photographic distance.
Thought I would share a little "Alasakana." When the snow melts it is prime time to hunt for antler sheds. Artists purchase them for carving. Usually you find one side of a pair of sheds...then walk around a bit...and if you are lucky you find the other half. It is rare to find a skull with the antlers intact. This moose died but the skull and antlers weren't destroyed by other animals. My son will try to sell this to an artist for a few hundred dollars. The perks of growing up in a family with airplanes.
Here's the family Piper Super Cub...kind of like a flying VW bug. My son lands on the sides of river beds or small open areas and then hikes to the antler sheds he saw from the air.
I have a quilt top loaded on the quilting frame that lends itself well to being a good canvas for working on my repertoire of "fillers."
Deciding "what" to quilt is always the toughest part.
I'm going with a clam shell variation in this space. I did a little practice on my plexiglass panel. It is cloudy and gloomy outside so I just might get some time to quilt today.
Tomorrow is May's Breakfast Club. The theme is patriotic mini quilts. Last month I decided to start my own project separate from the group and lucky me...it fits into May's theme.
I bought a set of Moda's Fire and Ice fat quarter batiks last year but didn't use them for the project I intended after I actually got them. Then I saw a log cabin chain pattern done in those fabrics.
So last Breakfast Club I did all the preliminary cutting. I am ready to start sewing tomorrow. I feel like I am ahead of the game for once!
Have to share the wonderful progress I made on my treadle machine refurbishing. The cabinet looks so wonderful.
My family actually seems to like my little vignette display. The pilots in my life surprise me sometimes.
My next step is to get the machine working.
This was the year I finally made it to the annual premier Bush Flying event in Alaska, the Valdez Fly-In and Airshow. My son flew us to the event in my husband's Cessna 185. It was a gorgeous day for flying over mountains.
A view of the Turnagain Arm through the increasing elevation as we made our way out of Anchorage.
More snow-covered mountains...glaciers...and the water of Prince William Sound.
In the above photo there is a tiny sight-seeing boat viewing a glacier edge jutting into the water.
As we get closer to Valdez, there is more open water of Prince William Sound.
Heading up the Valdez arm of Prince William Sound is the termination of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline which starts at Prudhoe Bay and traverses 800 miles to the Port of Valdez.
We made a hairpin turn over the turquoise water from the hidden Valdez Glacier.
Parked on the runway is our white with blue trim 185. We are surrounded by beautiful mountains.
We rode a shuttle into the town. The gorgeous views continued. We ate dinner outside at the "Fat Mermaid," which had this spectacular view. It was a bit chilly but we had on our coats.
We woke up to a layer of marine clouds covering the mountains and blocking the sun.
The weather forecast was dropping temperatures with snow expected in the evening.
This ancient looking aircraft, a C-46, is a major source of fuel for Bush communities in Alaska. It has been featured on Alaska reality television shows like, "Life Below Zero."
The main part of the Fly-In is a bush pilot contest where planes vie for the shortest take-off and landing distances. By the time we got to the competitions it was windy and getting colder by the minute. We hung around as long as we could to watch two of my son's friends do their runs and then we loaded up our plane and skedaddled home. All the mountain passes were becoming shrouded in clouds so we had to take a longer route home. We had planned to stay a second night and leave Sunday morning but with snow in the forecast we could have been stuck for a few days. We had not brought our engine cover or flap covers to protect the plane from ice. We really didn't have room for our bags, four people and winter provisions for the plane! Darn it....winter weather was not in our plans!
I wish there was a quilt retreat every month! I had a grand time. We stayed at the Pioneer Ridge B & B which started out as a dairy barn. It is a fantastic space for retreats and I hear the place is booked during the non-tourist season with other quilting groups and crafters like scrapbookers. You can click the name to visit their official website.
I stayed two nights and three days. I tackled some boring projects that I have wanted to finish for seven years. Pillowcases and shams to match quilts I use regularly. I am thrilled they are done and I will no longer be shuffling those fabrics around my sewing room.
Here are the first new pillowcases, two kings and two standards.
And I got two shams pieced...the quilting part might take me a little while to finish. I had two blocks leftover from the original quilt...which by the way...was a Breakfast Club project the first year we started meeting, 2009. I used to finish the quilt tops and quilting before the next breakfast club. Not anymore! I've got an extensive "backlog" of quilt tops.
I also made a set of pillowcases and shams to go with my winter quilt, Iditaquilt. A few years ago a batik with snow dogs was released and I decided it was the perfect fabric for companion pillowcases to my existing quilt.
After being a good girl and mucking through the tedious projects I got to work piecing my "Bloom" quilt blocks together. I had to finish the final border at home but what a delightful design. I think some projects in the quilting queue are going to get bumped.
A few more fun projects to share. Years ago I had my handyman build huge quilt frame to hang quilts in our master suite. I have finally got three quilts with hanging sleeves sewn into place. I adore the quilt below that started out as an online BOM. I took the 12 blocks and came up with my own setting. I've shown it before, "Sweet Peas in the Meadow." I'm so happy to see her everyday when I wake up.
And I also just got another project done and delivered from my handyman a large console/cabinet that I will use for storing my quilts. I drew out the design and gave it to my handyman. He is amazing. He does metal fabrication work and he made the barn door railing from scratch. I LOVE IT! I am going to add a darker stain before I do the polyurethane coating.
And one last silly picture. My first morning home from retreat. I woke up to both dogs on the bed after my husband got up to make coffee. Logan was actually laying on my legs. Kinley rarely gets on the bed when Logan is already in place. I missed them, too.
Our club leader, Marcia, made a mystery from a pattern in this book.
She encouraged the group to exchange colorful batiks, 2 1/2 x 5-inches for the three monthly meetings before our mystery in December. She also suggested we have 4 yards of a dark background fabric. On mystery day, she had us construct one block.
Then she revealed her class sample of how the blocks would come together with one-inch sashing.
We also got to see the original designer's pattern. The book has lots of great quilts and was a nice little Christmas present to ourselves.
My favorite part of Breakfast Club is seeing the individual interpretations of the patterns we make. There was a lot of piecing to this particular project so it has taken several months for the finished and partially finished projects to start appearing at our Show and Tell sessions.
Marge went small and made a runner.
Joyce was one of the first to finish her piecing and get it quilted. She made hers smaller also, 42 blocks instead of the quilt pattern's 80 blocks.
Megan went completely different with her color options. She chose a bubble gum pink background with turquoise blues and bright yellows. She dropped the sashing and created diagonal rows of stars where her blocks met. She also downsized the number of blocks.
We have a second Joyce in the club and I think she is the only one making the 80 block size. She has all her blocks together and is planning to add borders. This quilt has a beautiful rosy tone to it.
Jackie has her blocks sewn together. She downsized to 42 blocks. Borders are her next step too.
Kathy downsized but also went with a completely different colorway. Hers is completely done and gorgeous.
Erin was inspired by Megan's version without the sashing so that's how her blocks were put together. Her strips were cut from a set of state flower fabrics. This picture doesn't do it justice.
It is always fun to see how Rona with change up a pattern. She used a multi-color background with a second dark sashing.
My version is smaller also, 35 blocks. I made a piano key border with a "sashing" piece inserted to line up with the quilt's center. I love to use scrappy borders on scrappy quilt centers and piano keys is the option I most often use. My colors came from a "Splash," Bali pop and layer cake. My background is one of Hoffman's 1895 batiks, Blacklight.
All my scraps were put together to make this little quilt I am calling, "Extra Credit." It is just shy of 40-inches square. I am going to write up a pattern for it. Maybe the ladies in Breakfast Club will save those little half square triangles from their future projects. I usually incorporate the scrappy HSTs into a border but this time I turned them into a quilt. I might just be on the cusp of becoming a small quilt lover.
There are a few more Mystery quilt versions to be revealed at our Show and Tell sessions.
We had lots of great projects for show and tell at Breakfast Club last week.
April's official project was a pattern using panels. Rona had her's started before class. This wolf panel will be turned into a king-sized quilt.
May's Breakfast Club will feature red, white and blue, patriotic projects. I think Rona has a head start on May's project, too.
So hard to tell in this photo but the runner below is big and meant to lay across the bottom of a bed.
Joyce's quilt shopping bag...great way to use those fun license plates so many quilt shops are featuring. Seams Like Home is our host for our Breakfast Club meetings.
Don't miss the moose silhouette on the bottom right of Joyce's quilt from our last breakfast club gathering.
Jackie just whipped this little Easter banner together. Love the contemporary design.
And another project from Jackie, also from last month's Breakfast Club. Our projects featured the laser cut silhouettes from a Fairbanks quilt shop, Northern Threads. Here's the link to their website for their fantastic selection of laser cuts and patterns to feature them.
Jackie was on a roll, a Breakfast Club project finished. "Horizon Charm," is the pattern from the Modern Quilts Unlimited magazine, Winter 2015 issue.
And back from the quilter's, Jackie's "Fall Frolic," also a magazine project from Quilter's World, Autumn 2016.
and a gorgeous finish for her daughter's friend, "Diamond Drop."
she was quilting this little Christmas quilt during our Breakfast Club.
Marge made this adorable tote for her iron. I need this pattern.
Finally, our official April class sample from Marcia. The pattern is, "Spotlight," from Mountain Peak Creations.


Creator: Unknown. May 28, 1917.
The Lampasas Daily Leader. (Lampasas, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 71, Ed. 1 Monday, May 28, 1917, newspaper, May 28, 1917; Lampasas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth906960/: accessed April 19, 2019), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Lampasas Public Library.


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Reading, PA, March 5 – BlueStar® proudly introduces an all new line of commerical-style cooktops that offer incomparable power and performance for discerning home chefs who demand restaurant-quality results at home.
The all new cooktop, with its enhanced design, represents the ultimate tool for the serious home chef. It delivers BlueStar's signature power and performance while consuming minimal kitchen space. These cooktops have been designed to deliver restaurant quality performance – from searing heat to the gentlest of simmers, with burners reaching 22K BTUs of power and a simmer that can turn down to 130 degrees.
The all nwe cooktops feature a streamlined design and a sleeker size. With a reduced depth, the new cooktop can now be installed above a BlueStar Electric Wall Oven, giving home chefs even more options to create a restaurant quality kitchen at home. The redesigned cooktop includes brushed stainless steel knobs (that are offered standard), adding to the polished look of the cooktop surface. For the first time, customers will also have the option of customizing the knobs in any one of the 750+ colors and finishes in BlueStar's extraordinary color palette.
In addition, the cooktop's new innovative design inspires even more design possibilities when customizing a kitchen. The all gas cooktop – available in 30″ and 36″ width sizes – combines commerical-style design with a number of sleek and practical touches suitable for the home. It features heavy-duty commercial stainless steel construction with durable control knobs and full-motion grates. The addition of cast iron burner bowls that match the matte finish of the grates completes the brand new design. The new model is easy-to-clean – the one piece top can be effortlessly removed to clean up any messes that may fall below the cooktop surface.


The book's chapters each focus on a specific type of task that a System Administrator might need to do. Some chapters covered topics that I could have written about. They covered creating a few small Django apps in the GUIs chapter. It was a very well done section, but since I've worked with Django for two years, and this covered Django 0.96, I just skimmed it.
Some chapters covered things I was aware of, but didn't know a lot about. I've used iPython before, but I had no idea that it was just as powerful as it is. I've never read the iPython-specific help manuals, so I've only used it as a regular Python interactive shell. iPython can be used as a shell replacement. It's wonderful!
This book covers almost every corner of a System Administrator's job that could be done in Python. Everything is covered from creating backup systems, processing data, network and process monitoring, to parallel computing, and more.
I enjoyed the parts that covered network programming, and process management/threading. These two topics are my weak spots, and I feel like I understand the concept better after having seen a few Python implementations in this book.
I've never read a technical book cover to cover like a novel. After reading the introduction, there was nothing but simple elegant ideas and example code that solve problems that system administrators are faced with every day.
I highly suggest this book if you do any kind of *nix administration. If you manage your own home network of two machines you will find something in this book to make your life easier by using Python.
If you've managed a large network for a long time, this book will probably help you make your job easier by using Python. Some problems traditionally solved by shell scripts can definitely be solved using a few lines of Python code.
The authors' experience make them both highly qualified to give suggestions as to what works, and what doesn't work. I always appreciate the advice of experienced individuals, and this book has a very high concentration of good advice.


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Kathryn McDarrah, Staff Reporter|December 15, 2020
Photo Credit/Wikimedia Commons
President-elect Joseph Biden
President-Elect Joe Biden has begun to select officials for his Cabinet, including a groundbreaking all female communications team. Here's who he has chosen so far.
With his latest selection, President-Elect Biden has nominated retired Army General Lloyd Austin to serve as U.S. Secretary of Defense. If he is confirmed, this will be another groundbreaking pick as General Austin would be the first African American to serve as Secretary of Defense.
Starting with members who do not need to be confirmed by the House or Senate, Biden has chosen Ron Klain to serve as his Chief of Staff. An important role in the White House, the Chief of Staff has daily interactment with the President, and is a trusted counselor and advisor. Klain served as Chief of Staff to two Vice Presidents, Al Gore and Joe Biden. For Deputy Chief of Staff, Biden has chosen Jen O'Malley Dillon, a political strategist who also served as Campaign Manager for Biden's presidential campaign.
As for the groundbreaking communications staff, Biden has chosen Kate Bedingfield as his Communications Director. She served as his Communications Director whilst he was Vice President, and was deputy campaign manager in the most recent presidential election. For Press Secretary, Biden has chosen Jen Psaki, another former Obama Administration member, who served as White House Communications Director from 2015 to 2017. Next, Biden has chosen Karine Jean-Pierre to serve as Principal Deputy Press Secretary. Jean-Pierre is a political campaign organizer, activist, political commentator, author, and lecturer. For Deputy White House Communications Director, Pili Tobar, who has previously worked as the deputy director of America's Voice, has been chosen.
As for the Vice President's Team, Tina Flournoy has been chosen for Chief of Staff. Flournoy is current the Chief of Staff for former President Bill Clinton. For her Communications Director, Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris has chosen Ashley Etienne to fulfill the role. Etienne served the same role for Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and is well seasoned in the role of Communications Director. Symone Sanders has been named a Senior Advisor and Chief Spokesperson for the Vice President. Sanders served as a Senior Advisor on the Biden-Harris Campaign, and became the youngest presidential press secretary while working on Bernie Sander's presidential campaign.
For First Lady Jill Biden, Elizabeth E. Alexander has been named Communications Director, while Julissa Reynoso Pantaleon has been chosen as her Chief of Staff.
For economic policy officials, Janet Yellen has been chosen as Secretary of Treasury, and Adewale "Wally" Adeyemo chosen as Deputy Secretary of Treasury. Cecilia Rouse was chosen to serve as Chairperson on the Council of Economic Advisors. All these nominations will need confirmation.
As for National Security, Antony Blinken was chosen as Secretary of State. He served as Deputy Secretary of State under President Obama. For Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas has been named. Avril Haynes has been chosen to serve as Director of National Intelligence. As for Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield has been selected. All these nominees need to be confirmed by the senate. Lastly, John Kerry, who does not need to b confirmed, has been chosen as Special Presidential Envoy for Climate. Kerry served as the 68th U.S. Secretary of State from 2013 to 2017.
Other positions that have been filled include Director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is Dr. Rochelle Walensky. She is an infectious disease expert and a teacher at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Vivek Murthy has been chosen as Surgeon General, but his pick will need confirmation in the Senate. Two members for the Counsel of Economic Advisors have been chosen, Jared Bernstein and Heather Boushey. Both will require no confirmation.
The final cabinet pick so far is Xavier Bercerra as Secretary of Health and Human Services. He currently serves as Attorney General of California, and his nomination will need confirmation. The rest of the cabinet will be decided in the next few weeks, with positions like Attorney General, Secretary of Labor, and Secretary of Education still available.
mcdarrah
Kathryn McDarrah, Staff Reporter
Kathryn is a first-year staff member and a senior. Kathryn is an extremely ambitious young woman. She is involved with various clubs such as Ambassadors,...

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


A really nice signature and getting him to sign was rare. Double matted and framed with a great photo of this iconic actor. Framed to 11x14. Comes with a certificate of authenticity from a board certified and court approved forensic examiner.We only accept second opinions from forensic handwriting examiners.


text:
35-Year-Old Mother and Her Two Children Die After She Allegedly Drove The Car Into a Lake
An eyewitness said she was shocked to see the car take a deliberate u-turn and head toward the lake.
Cover Image Source: YouTube | Fox 13 Tampa Bay
By Umeza Peera
Trigger warning: This article contains graphic descriptions and, themes of grief and suicide that some readers may find distressing
The Lakeland Police Department reported a tragic accident that involved the death of a woman and her two children. The mother and her two children were found dead in a drowned car in Lakeland. The woman was named Ortilla Zamora and hailed from Wauchula and as per IndependentNewsForLakeland. She was believed to be mentally ill. Officers went to Lake Wire at 5.25 a.m. after hearing reports of the submerged car to conduct an investigation into the matter. In order to help remove and search the car, the Lakeland Fire Department and Dive Team were also called to the scene, ABCnews reported.
We're hearing from an eyewitness after a mother and her 2 young sons were found dead in submerged car in #LakeWire in #Lakeland. The eyewitness, who called @LakelandPD, says the car made a "deliberate" turn into the downtown lake. Details: https://t.co/ON79BRp7Te @abcactionnews pic.twitter.com/TpG8QuHhne
— Chad K. Mills (@ChadKMills) December 31, 2022
The front driver's side window was down when the search team began looking for the submerged car, and at least one adult was discovered inside, based on the Lakeland Police reports. Sadly, when the car was pulled out of the lake, two kids were also found inside. A preliminary investigation stated that there was no evidence suggesting an accident. They said all evidence pointed to it being done on purpose. No one inside the submerged car displayed any signs of trauma. The police revealed that the people found in the car were a 35-year-old woman and her two sons, aged four and nine years old. Police are still investigating how and why the vehicle ended up in the lake. Eyewitness Kim Seaboldt, who was present at the scene and claims to have seen the incident while driving to work.
@LakelandPD releases the identity of the woman who killed herself and her two young sons. They just don't know why she did it. If you're experiencing a mental health issue, please call the national mental health hotline at 988.@NMHC https://t.co/WBDzYNdFqW
— KimberlyMoore (@KMooreTheLedger) January 5, 2023
The witness Kim Seaboldt said, "There weren't a lot of cars on the road. It was maybe me, and I only saw like two other cars. I see a car in front of me doing a u-turn at Lake Wire (Drive). As I'm going south, they turn around and go north." The witness says it looked like the driver in the car took an intentional turn. She said "the car made a "deliberate" right turn off Sikes Blvd. and into the lake." She further added "I thought for a second, maybe they just decided to park there to look at the view. But then, I didn't see any braking or anything going on."
Ortilla Zamora, 35, died in the incident, as did her sons, ages 4 and 9, the Lakeland Police Department said in an update Thursday. https://t.co/a3h4qn0CUN
— The Ledger (@theledger) January 5, 2023
Seaboldt isn't a strong swimmer so she called 911, reports suggest. She was shocked to see the incident. As the witness recalled the incident, she couldn't believe that she witnessed such a heartbreaking incident. Seaboldt said, "I told them, 'I believe I just saw a car go into the water, because I'd never, you know — I was like, 'Man, it's early in the morning. Am I really seeing this?' You know." The lake wire isn't the same for the witness anymore. The witness said she feels sad when she looks at the lake now. Recalling how she felt about it before she said, "My husband and I like to go fishing a lot, and as I'm looking at the lake, usually, I'm like, 'Man, I want to be out there on the water.' And today, it's a different feeling. You know, I feel sad when I look at the lake now."
https://www.abcactionnews.com/news/region-polk/mother-2-children-found-dead-in-submerged-vehicle-in-lakeland
https://www.lkldnow.com/police-identify-woman-who-intentionally-drove-into-lake-wire/


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Livestreams now reward people just for paying attention
The Blizzcon Facebook stream took the attention economy to a whole new level.
By Eleanor Cummins | Published Nov 9, 2018 11:30 PM
For at-home viewers, BlizzCon looked a little different this year. The annual Anaheim, California convention for video game developer Blizzard had all the usual sessions: previews of new Overwatch releases, Q&As on everything from character development to sound mixing, and the global finals for competitive gaming in the company's key franchises like Warcraft and Hearthstone. But the livestream, offered through a Gaming Creators Platform in collaboration with Facebook, offered in-stream rewards. There were discounts on merch purchases and tickets to watch premium streams that typically require a fee.
Blizzard isn't the first company to test this attention-seeking strategy—especially in the world of gaming. In September, Rockstar Games announced some participants in its Grand Theft Auto livestream series would be eligible to win in-app cash if they participated in a Facebook chat. Both Rockstar and Blizzard were encouraged in this effort by the social media giant, which added viewer rewards to its software development kit in March. The move, which appears to be paying off, was seen by many as a blatant challenge to game-streaming giants like Twitch, which has its own in-stream gamification scheme called "drops", and YouTube.
In some ways, Blizzard's decision to incorporate in-stream prizes seems like a logical extension of both the convention and gaming experiences. After all, attendees on-site in Anaheim were probably getting blasted by t-shirt cannons. But it also marks a new tool in the attention economy's ever-growing belt. When everyone has 20 tabs, three screens, and a home assistant running at all times, keeping eyeballs on your content is harder—and more important—than ever.
Earlier this year, Facebook gave game developers the tools they need to add in-stream rewards. Facebook
Unless you're one of the competitive gamers, the last two days of Blizzcon (in this case, Nov. 2 and 3) are all that really matter. That's when the fandom crowds into the convention center, often in costume, to attend one of dozens of informational sessions. But this year, people were encouraged to start watching on Oct. 25, when the only thing to stream was the early stages of the Heroes of the Storm championship. If participants logged in and actually paid attention, Blizzard offered them a shot at tickets to the physical convention, discounts on goody bags, and 20 percent off all convention merchandise. The gamification continued into the convention's peak as Blizzard announced new characters in Overwatch, and the launch of a Diablo mobile game. TK.
If you already wanted to watch sweaty gamers battle it out as electronic elves and insectoid aliens, these may have been welcome perks. But they could also be seen as a clever ploy to draw—and keep—attention where it otherwise wouldn't be.
The translation of digital experiences to physical rewards is rather novel, but other platforms have been trying similar gambits for years. Designers carefully deploy bright colors, casino-style graphics, and all manner of bings and dings to keep us hooked. Facebook-owned Instagram has become a cesspool of visually and literally loud features; a misplaced thumb pad can launch a thousand inane features, none worse than IGTV, an in-app streaming service for vertical videos.
It's no coincidence this onslaught comes at a time when device ownership has plateaued. According to Pew Research Center, the number of Americans with cell phones (95 percent) has changed since 2016. Computer ownership has actually dwindled, down to 73 from 78 percent two years ago. Without new ways to reach people—or new people to reach—companies must double down on existing mediums.
Not every commodification strategy is as seamless as the gaming industry's. Outside of Warcraft or Grand Theft Auto, where in-app or mid-stream prizes and prices are common, such programming can be jarring. YouTube, for example, regularly runs mid-roll ads in longer videos. Unlike commercial breaks on traditional TV, which may appear one or more times in a video longer than 10 minutes, these intrusions have no natural entry-point. The content isn't paused—it's interrupted. While it certainly earns the platform buckets of money, it effectively punishing people for paying attention.
Despite these obvious problems, it seems likely gamification will continue to spill over from Blizzard and Rockstar and into the rest of our online content. Instagram may be reviled, but its users can't seem to quit. Mid-roll ads and gold coins spraying across the screen are hard to stomach, but these strategies work against our best efforts. Our attention is divided into a 1,000 slices, but companies will continue pursuing their razor-thin piece of this lucrative pie.


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Tag: The Black Keys
weekly recap: two hundred thirty nine
Ada Lea shared a video for "damn," a tune off her forthcoming release, one hand on the steering wheel the other sewing a garden, out 9/24. Angel Olsen shared a new tune, "Safety Dance," off her forthcoming covers EP, Aisles, out 8/20. Billie Eilish shared a video for "Happier Than Ever," the title track off… Read More weekly recap: two hundred thirty nine
July 31, 2021 August 7, 2021 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: two hundred twenty eight
Andy Shauf shared a video for "Living Room," a tune off his 2020 release, The Neon Skyline. The Black Keys performed "Going Down South" on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Caribou announced some upcoming tour dates, which include a Chicago show on 11/19 at The Riv. Cautious Clay shared a new tune, "Wildfire," off… Read More weekly recap: two hundred twenty eight
May 15, 2021 May 30, 2021 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: two hundred twenty seven
The Black Keys shared a video for "Going Down South," a tune off the forthcoming release, Delta Kream, out 5/14. Caveman shared a new tune, "Like Me." Coldplay shared a new tune, "Higher Power." Course shared a new tune, "Nick of Time," off the forthcoming release, A Late Hour, out 5/23. Empress Of shared a… Read More weekly recap: two hundred twenty seven
May 8, 2021 May 9, 2021 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: two hundred twenty four
The Black Keys shared a video for "Crawling Kingsnake," a tune off the forthcoming release, Delta Kream, out 5/14. BLK JKS shared a video for "Harare," a tune off the forthcoming release, Abantu/Before Humans, out 5/21. Cale Tyson shared a video for a new tune, "Alone." Cautious Clay shared a video for "Karma & Friends,"… Read More weekly recap: two hundred twenty four
April 17, 2021 May 28, 2021 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: one hundred sixty five
The Black Keys announced some upcoming tour dates, which include a Chicago show on 7/25 at Hollywood Casino Amphitheater. Car Seat Headrest shared a lyric video for "Can't Cool Me Down," a tune off the forthcoming release, Making A Door Less Open, out 5/1. Some upcoming tour dates were also announced, which include two Chicago… Read More weekly recap: one hundred sixty five
February 29, 2020 March 31, 2020 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: one hundred fifty one
The 1975 shared a video for "Frail State of Mind," a tune off the forthcoming release, Notes On A Conditional Form, out 2/21. They also performed this tune on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Basia Bulat shared a video for "Your Girl," a tune off her forthcoming release, Are You in Love?, out 3/27. The… Read More weekly recap: one hundred fifty one
November 23, 2019 December 3, 2019 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: one hundred thirty
Aldous Harding performed "The Barrel" on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. The Appleseed Cast shared another tune, "The Journey," off the new release, The Fleeting Light Of Impermanence. The Black Keys shared a video for "Sit Around And Miss You," a tune off the new release, Let's Rock. Boy Scouts shared a video for… Read More weekly recap: one hundred thirty
June 29, 2019 July 13, 2019 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: one hundred twenty four
Angel Olsen announced some upcoming tour dates, which include a Chicago show on 11/14 at the Riv. The Black Keys shared a video for "Go," a tune off the forthcoming release, Let's Rock, out 6/28. Carly Rae Jepsen shared a video for "Too Much," a tune off her new release, Dedicated. She also performed "Too… Read More weekly recap: one hundred twenty four
May 18, 2019 tessituramusicblog
weekly recap: one hundred twenty one
A.A. Bondy shared a video for "Fentanyl Freddy," a tune off his forthcoming release, Enderness, out 5/10. Bedouine shared a video for "Echo Park," a tune off the forthcoming release, Bird Songs Of A Killjoy, out 5/31. Better Oblivion Community Center had a recent Tiny Desk session with NPR. The Black Keys shared a new… Read More weekly recap: one hundred twenty one
April 27, 2019 August 17, 2019 tessituramusicblog
monthly mix: twenty seven
Here are some tunes that I enjoyed this month. Kevin Morby – No Halo Michael Nau – No Quit Mac DeMarco – Nobody Warm Human – Dog Years The Wild Reeds – Lose My Mind Sam Evian – Cherry Tree Talk Talk – The Rainbow The Head And The Heart – Missed Connection Willie J… Read More monthly mix: twenty seven
March 31, 2019 tessituramusicblog


This research will undertake a sociological investigation into current practices of repairing the function and replacement of the human heart.
The aim of the project revolves around the idea of creating narratives or biographies of the implanted heart from three case studies working initially on two conceptual levels: the 'technological transitions' from working valve implants to devices to whole organ replacement and the biological transitions between animal and mechanical and human implants. These biographies will be stories of ethics too – values embedded in and constructed through these developments and implicated in patient experience. The biographies constructed can therefore make the links from patient experience to technological developments to the broader societal/institutional contexts of such developments.
1) to conduct a sociological study of the experiences and everyday ethics of individuals whose hearts have been augmented or replaced with animal or mechanical implants.
2) an exploration of factors that affect developments in artificial whole organ replacement (which will include economic, political, social, scientific, cultural, ethical and technological analysis).
Organ replacement and repair is a highly significant area for sociological and ethical exploration as more of us continue to live longer; estimates suggest that 30% of babies born today will live to 100 years (Christensen K, Doblhammer G, Rau R, & Vaupel J W., 2009). Statistics from the British Heart Foundation, suggest that "over one and a half million people currently living in the UK have had a heart attack, and over two million people have angina and/or heart failure" (Scarborough, Wickramasinghe, Bhatnagar P., & Rayner, 2011). The demand for heart repair and replacement will therefore continue to rise whilst the availability of sources from humans remain limited.
It is little wonder that medical and scientific practice has focussed on the repair and replacement of the heart given its status as the 'pump' or 'engine' of the human body and this is why 'Animal, Mechanical and Me' focuses upon the implanted heart. Culturally the heart is resonant with symbolism and everyday discourse is replete with examples of the heart being tied to emotion and personhood.
what effects (if any) replacing body parts has for ideas of human identity.
In some way, if our body parts represent who we are then how do changes or additions to the interiors of the body then alter our sense of self? That is, if the use of different animal / mechanical implants is progressive and science and technology gives the capability to use animal or mechanical organs, what can we learn from recipients, their families and those who seek to develop or implant the technology? Are there lessons that we can take more broadly from the specifics of the current situation around pinpointing the ethical limits to what is acceptable in the future; for example the existence of an ethical 'slippery replacement slope'? If we completely rebuild the body through replacement is it still the same person, in the same way that if we replace the blade and handle of an axe is it the same axe?
How are decisions reached whether or not to implant an animal tissue or mechanical valve? What are the lived experience of their consequences for subjectivity and the ethics of survival/longevity following terminal heart disease (therefore answering Objective 1).
What effects do permanent 'intrusive' implants that emit electric shocks to the heart of individuals have on the quality of life? For example, how does it affect their relationships with others? (again, addressing Objective 1).
These may become the answer to a full heart replacement. What are the views of those involved or interested in the (re)development and construction of the future of the technology? (relating to Objective 2).
How can an understanding of the context of current animal/mechanical repair enrich ethical discussions about what should be replaced in the human body, to what extent, with what material and for what reasons? (and also addressing Objective 2).
I will reflect on these questions informed by the voices of those 1) who have been implanted, 2) those who develop, regulate, and implant the technology and other interested groups, and 3) those who eventually may be affected by replacement technology of the heart.
The project will provide narratives or 'biographies' of the heart linking two different transitions: the biological of animal, human and machine and the technological from implants to devices to organs.
To some extent we already accept spare part technology, for example, mechanical, porcine and bovine tissue have been commonly used to successfully replace failing aortic heart valves since the early sixties. Mechanical heart valves are likely to last a person's lifetime, however, due to an increased risk of blood clotting (as well as cellular damage) recipients need to take blood thinning medication which carries with it other risks. Porcine replacements last approximately 10 to 15 years; less in younger recipients although the reasons for the shorter life span of the valves in this cohort are not well understood.
Not enough is known about how the choice of treatment is made between using animal or mechanical valves and the decision does not appear to be entirely clinically based, for example, noises that mechanical valve implants emit might irritate and annoy the recipient (A., Blome-Eberwein, Mrowinski, Hofmeister, & Hetzer, 1996). An early study with recipients who were implanted with pig heart valves showed some concern about the transference of animal qualities (Lundin, 1999; Lundin, 2002; Lundin & Widner, 2000). Quantitative research found the Swedish public more willing to accept an artificial organ (63%) with animal organs (40%) least favoured (Sanner, 1998, 2001a; Sanner, 2001b; Sanner, 2003, 2006).
The contemporary need for naturalness can be better understood as a response to the fact that technology makes reality more and more makeable and, consequently, more contingent. Advancing technology changes everything that is, into our object of choice…[I]f human nature itself becomes makeable, it can no longer naively be laid down as the norm (Swierstra, Van Est, & Boenink, 2009).
I will also draw upon the experiences of those who have an Implantable cardio-vector defibrillator (ICD) permanently fitted. This is a mechanical device used to treat an irregular heartbeat. It is a more 'active' implant when compared to valve replacement as it has the ability to emit electric shocks in patients who are at risk from death caused by an irregular heart beat.
Such devices are used as a permanent intervention and are viewed as a successful, even underused, therapy (Burns JL, Serber ER, Keim S, & SF., 2005). A qualitative exploration (from data from 200 phone interviews of people with ICDs) of perceptions, experience and decision-making of ICD patients discusses patients' perceptions of their decision-making, categorised as 'physical, psychological, social reasons driving agency in the decision, or no agency regarding the decision'; as well as the shape of a 'trust relationship' with the doctor informing the decision.
The authors cite the 'desire to save their life (integrity of the self)' as a significant factor in decision-making (see also Gal, et al (2011b) for quantitative results, which found a correlation between shock administered and perceived benefits of the implant). Yet others have found ICDs to cause a variety of issues for their recipients including anxiety, depression and avoidance of physical or sexual contact as well as effecting family relationships (Ahmad M., Bloomstein L., Roelke M., Bernstein A.D., & Parsonnet V., 2000; Dunbar S.B., Warner C.D., & Purcell J.A., 1993; Heller, Ormont, Lidagoster, Sciacca, & Steinberg, 1998; Luderitz B., Jung W., Deister A., & M., 1994); it is not known what causes the anxiety in patients and therefore this is a knowledge gap that this project will directly address. Further patients' experiences of having an ICD implanted can also inform future developments relating to full mechanical heart replacement.
Full heart replacement does exist but is used only as temporary measure or a 'bridge' until a human heart for transplantation is found. Further investigation into the TAH's past will help reconstruct the technological transitions involved in the development of the implantable heart complimenting and updating an earlier ethnographic account of, for example, the Jarvick 7 (Fox RC & Swazey JP., 1992).


When I saw this, I laughed and laughed at the star actors and actresses involved in the production of this movie. Nigerian students are fed up,stressed and tired of ASUU strike but a movie? Nollywood? I have not the words to describe this.


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Canadian Weed Science Society/Société canadienne de malherbologie
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The organizational structure of the fifteen-member government-appointed Canada Weed Committee and its subsidiaries, the Eastern and Western Sections, continued to be fuzzy (at least in the minds of some), and a small committee was appointed in 1970 to provide more clarity. The 1971 minutes record that the fifteen-member committee henceforth would be known as the National Executive, with the names of the two sections to remain the same. To these authors the name always sounded a bit mysterious and inappropriate, describing as it did a most peculiar agency with almost a non-structure. It probably was a committee. And it was kind of national. But it was not really an executive of anything. And not all its members were experts on weeds.
Further change was to come shortly. A memorandum from Assistant Deputy Minister B.B. Migicovsky dated 16 September 1977 was presented by Jim Hay (chairman of the Canada Weed Committee from 1969 to 1977): 'Effective September 1978, the Canada Weed Committee will become the Expert Committee on Weeds and will report to CASCC (Canadian Agricultural Services Coordinating Committee) through the (new) Canada Committee on Crop Production Services.' It had been so decreed. The minutes of the meeting reflect disagreement with the Expert Committee nomenclature from both the Eastern and the Western Section. Hay stated that he would forward the views of the Eastern and Western Sections to CASCC but he doubted that this would have any effect.' And indeed it did not. The 'Expert Committee' name stayed for twenty-five years.
Despite the occasional cynicism expressed on these pages, it is abundantly clear that the operation of the Expert Committee on Weeds with its western and eastern sections was held in high regard by representatives of other Expert Committees, as reported at meetings of the Canada Committee on Crop Production Services. The setup of the Expert Committee on Weeds made it possible to deal with many types of information exchange, assessment of research results, and research plans and coordination, at the level of the personnel actually doing the work.
The first computer-generated reports of weed control research summaries ('abstracts') saw the light of day in 1978, and many pages of experimental data were accumulated. The 1983 Research Report from the Eastern Section, for example, was 558 pages long, and the report from the Western Section was 1044 pages long, in three volumes.
Many other things happened during the seventies and the eighties, but there were no major changes in structure or operation. Position statements on herbicide use were prepared and published, in response to concerns expressed via public hearings. The Wild Oat Action Committee was appointed in 1973 and served for ten years. It distributed some research grant funds and organized workshops and symposia. The paper series The Biology of Canadian Weeds was started, largely overseen by Paul Cavers (University of Western Ontario). As of January, 2003, 117 individual papers in this series have been published, plus two updates, and an additional seven papers are in press. The first two collections of papers were re-published in 1980 and 1984. By 1995, 104 papers had been re-published, and the most recent fourth volume was published in 1999. The Quackgrass Action Committee organized a workshop in 1987 and a symposium in 1990. A report that listed all the accepted common names of weeds in Canada was prepared and published in 1969 as Agriculture Canada Publication 1397, Common and Botanical Names of Weeds, through the work of the Nomenclature and Terminology Subcommittee, to standardize that important component of working with weeds.
During 1990, pressure was exerted by the parental authorities to have the Expert Committee on Weeds merge with the Expert Committee on Pest Management (renamed from the Expert Committee on Pesticide Use in Agriculture, and focused mainly on insect pest control). The Weeds group politely declined and suggested, instead, that some joint meetings for the two groups be organized. The first such (partially) joint meeting took place in Victoria in December 1991, and served to establish a measure of communication between the two groups. Two more such joint meetings followed, in 1992 and 1993. The year 1991 also was the first time since 1946 that someone who was not a federal government (Agriculture Canada) employee was appointed as chairman of the National Executive (William Vanden Born, University of Alberta).
During all the preceding years, contact between weed research and extension personnel from the Eastern and Western Sections had been poor. Costs of travel undoubtedly had contributed to this situation. By 1991, however, the differences in cost between short and long-distance air travel had shrunk considerably, and the idea of joint meetings of the two sections began to take shape. The first such joint meeting was duly organized, and took place in Edmonton in December 1993, in conjunction with a well-attended symposium on herbicide resistance in weeds. Attendance at the joint meeting consisted of 78 people from the Eastern Section and 174 from the Western Section. One feature of the joint session was the demonstration of HERB, a computer search system that could extract from the Research Report data base all the accumulated research data for the efficacy of a particular herbicide treatment on a particular weed in a particular crop. A later version of a data retrieval system was named WEEDTRIEV, and the most recent version is called ASKSAM.
At the 1993 meeting of the National Executive, a decision was made to explore the possibility of merging the western and eastern sections and to have national meetings only. A 'Joint Meeting Committee' was appointed, with representatives from both the Eastern and the Western Section, to consider the question and to prepare suitable recommendations. The merging idea, and the expressed desire for more independence from the parental authority, were given significant support through public and private comments by Brian Morrissey, Assistant Deputy Minister, who spoke at the Edmonton conference. There had been a growing feeling of frustration for some time with a structure that allowed for making recommendations at a national level only to a parent committee that was perceived more as a black hole by some than as an avenue to action. The frustration led to the view that more could be accomplished on the national front, on behalf of the discipline of weed science, as an independent, free-standing organization of weed science workers across Canada.
The Joint Meeting Committee prepared a survey form that was sent to some 500 people, 166 of whom responded, with 83 per cent in favour of the proposed merger. The merger would see only a single national meeting each year, alternating between east/central and western locations, with the first regular joint meeting scheduled for Montreal in December 1995. Approval was duly confirmed by the Western and Eastern Sections in December 1994 and January 1995, respectively, and the real work of joining the two essentially separate (though parallel) organizations into one could begin. The new joint life was to mean much more than simply joint meetings-there had to be a redefinition of purposes, roles, and relationships.
All of that began to happen during and after the 1995 meeting in Montreal, where the merger report and its recommendations, including a draft statement of purpose, were approved unanimously. The new organization was to have a twelve-member executive board. The existing National Executive had its last meeting on 28 November 1995 and was promptly replaced by a newly elected interim board for 1995-96 (with considerable overlap from the just discontinued body). Its main responsibility was the development of operational guidelines for the new organization (though still bearing the same name, that of Expert Committee on Weeds, and still with the expectation of bringing a report and recommendations to what by this time was known as the Canada Committee on Crops).
Project summarizers no longer existed, and the nature of the meetings began to be shaped along the lines of Action Committees or Working Groups in a range of areas. These got off the ground in 1997, and in 2000 nine such groups were active.
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"Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus," Cincinnati Art Museum
October 31st, 2014	| Published in October 2014
In 1838 the Prussian-born Édouard Baldus (1813-1889) arrived in Paris with an eye to becoming a painter but met with little success. Instead his "eye" along with a lens led him to create what Malcolm Daniel of The Metropolitan Museum of Art's department of photographs called "the model for (architectural) photographic representation in genres that barely existed before him."1 Daniel goes on to write, Baldus's "views of historic monuments presented the vestiges of the past with unromanticized clarity for the architect, archaeologist, historian, and armchair traveler."2
Daniel noted that Baldus approached "his subjects with a rigor that banished precisely those picturesque elements and anecdotal details traditionally considered necessary to topographic prints of the period."3
Baldus began experimenting with photography in the late 1840s, and Daniel asserts, "By 1851, he was recognized as one of the few photographers to combine aesthetic sensitivity with an astonishing technical prowess in the still experimental and handcrafted medium."4
Édouard Baldus, Pont du Gard, Provence, c. 1861, albumen print, printed late 1860s. Collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum. Museum Purchase: Gift of H. Tracy Balcom, by exchange 1978.250.
The dozen or so images in "Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus"5 at the Cincinnati Art Museum represent his mastery of the medium both technically6 and aesthetically.
"Building Pictures" (a title I particularly like for its chaste double-entendre) features photos from several of Baldus's projects, but primarily from Les Villes de France, 1852, architectural views intended to link contemporary France with its rich Roman and medieval past. Baldus won this governmental commission because of his 1851 work as one of five photographers documenting the country's architectural heritage, focusing especially on monuments in need of restoration, in Missions Héliographiques, sponsored by the Commission des Monuments Historiques.
Brian Sholis, associate curator of photography,brbr believes that it is the Villes de France photographs that first demonstrated Baldus's "style of architectural photography that would become the classic model for its genre. These images are carefully composed, exquisitely printed, and shot from an elevated vantage point." He continues, "The views taken from closer in offer a sensuous play of light and shadow, with each architectural feature described in stunning detail. The photographs made from a distance demonstrate the contours of urban space."7
All of this can be seen in Place du Carrousel [Tuilleries (sic) from Pavillon de l'Horloge, Louvre, Paris] from the early 1850s. Taken from a great distance, he's focused on the courtyard – the Place du Carrousel8 — in front of the Tuileries Palace, which was destroyed in 1871 by members of the Paris Commune.9
Baldus bisects the composition with the palace sitting on the horizon line, a device that he'll turn to again and again. He's framed the composition with blocky buildings on the left and right. It's easy to miss the two tiny, almost silhouetted, figures in the foreground. One appears to be a top-hatted dandy and the other a military man, appropriately since the place would have been used for equine military presentations.
In the images in this exhibition, the human presence is more implied than present. This is particularly notable in Baldus's photographs documenting the devastating flooding in June 1856 in Lyon, Avignon, and Tarascon. There are no people, just the damage caused by the rising rivers. He undertook this assignment in the middle of documenting the building of the New Louvre.
Daniel writes, "From a world of magnificent man-made construction, he set out for territory devastated by natural disaster; from the task of recreating the whole of a building in a catalogue of its thousand parts . . . Baldus created a moving record of the flood without explicitly depicting the human suffering left in its wake (30,000 were left homeless in Avignon) . . . as if the destruction had been of biblical proportions, leaving behind only remnants of a destroyed civilization."10
In Baldus's Ramparts of Avignon photograph, the 14th-century fortification against marauders is under siege by the floodwaters surrounding it. The rushing water has begun to recede; the fury of the rushing waters is spent, leaving an eerily placid flat mirror surface.
I think the power of Baldus's photographs lies in his ability to meticulously record a moment in time without revealing exactly when that moment is. By eliminating the human element that would betray it with a fashion of the time, his images become timeless. He's given us a stage set so that we can easily insert ourselves into the scene.
Édouard Baldus, Notre Dame (façade), 1860s, albumen print. Collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum. Bequest of Elizabeth Haven Appleton, 1891 (Library Transfer) 1981.331.
There are two images of Notre-Dame made in the 1860s that show the cathedral with scaffolding. It might be possible to more closely date the photographs if one could determine the stage of its more than 20-year restoration, begun in 1844 by Jean-Baptiste-Antoine Lassus and Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc. In addition to building a new sacristy in the Gothic style, the spire was reconstructed, decorative sculptures restored, new windows installed, the central portal refurbished, and the organ repaired.
In one of the photographs, Baldus gives us a straight-on shot of the cathedral's western face. It appears so flat that it could be a stage backdrop. Sholis says, Its "frontal orientation, elevated vantage point, and clean line, the photograph is typical of the artist's mature style."11
Baldus intended his images to be straightforward records, the opposite of romantic. But perhaps all architectural images carry a certain romantic air, even Hilla and Bernd Becher's blast furnaces, grain elevators, cooling towers, and other industrial structures of the second half of the 20th century.
Édouard Baldus, Notre Dame, Paris, 1860s, albumen print. Collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum. Bequest of Elizabeth Haven Appleton, 1891 (Library Transfer) 1981.332.
Baldus's images evoke both the past and the present since the church still stands. In fact, I've stood where Baldus must have set up his camera for this view of Notre-Dame as well as for the one taken from across the Seine on the Left Bank and have my own memories of the great cathedral.
Baldus has captured a moment in time for all time, and, in the process, has given us a chance to experience in our own time.
–Karen S. Chambers
"Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus," through October 26, 2014. Cincinnati Art Museum, 953 Eden Park Drive, Cincinnati, OH 45202. Tues.-Sun., 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. (513) 639-2995, www.cincinnatiartmuseum.org.
FOOTNOTES: *
1 Malcolm Daniel, "Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History: Édouard Baldus (1813-1880)." www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/bald/hd_bald.htm.
5 The Cincinnati Art Museum is fortunate to have a small cache of Baldus photographs. Seven of the albumen prints were originally part of the library collection gifted by Elizabeth Haven Appleton in 1891. They, along with another four whose source cannot be determined, were transferred to the museum's collection in 1981. As Kristin Spangenberg, currently curator of prints, recalls, "The Baldus images were study photographs used by researchers in the library. Around 1980 the library decided they no longer needed the photographs, I as then curator of prints, drawings, and photographs reviewed the photographs and decided to keep some of them to catalogue to the permanent collection." (October 14, 2014, e-mail from Jessica Stringfield, marketing and communications associate, Cincinnati Art Museum, to the author.) Spangenberg also explains, "Those that could not be retrieved because they were badly scratched or had faded beyond retrieval (albumen photographs fade in dark storage as well as in the light) were sent to an art history library where they could still potentially be of use." (October 15, 2014, e-mail from Kristin Spangenberg, curator of prints, Cincinnati Art Museum, to the author.)
6 Baldus used a large-format camera that made paper negatives that he then contact printed on albumen-coated photographic paper. The quality he achieved with the paper negative was astonishing. The contemporary critic and photographer Stéphane Geoffray wrote in 1855, "Who has not asked himself upon considering the admirable prints of Notre-Dame, the Panthéon, and many others by M. Baldus, if they were not obtained on glass! [. . . ] A total absence of grain, a strength and transparency of shadow, a brilliance of light – such are the qualities that record the beautiful prints of this skilled photographer." Brian Sholis, "What Is An Albumen Print?" wall text, "Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus."
7 Brian Sholis, "Les Villes de France Photographiées" wall text, "Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus."
8 Carrousel does not refer to a merry-go-round, but rather it is "a type of military dressage, an equine demonstration now commonly called military drill." "Place du Carrousel," http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Place_du_Carrousel.
9 Jules Bergeret, the former chief military commander of the Commune, ordered that the Tuileries Palace be destroyed. On May 23, 1871, 12 men set the palace ablaze at 7 p. m. using petroleum, liquid tar, and turpentine. Explosives placed in the central pavilion were detonated by the fires, which raged for 48 hours, completely gutting the building except for the southernmost part, the Pavillon de Flore. Encyclopædia Britannica 17 (14th ed.). Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. 1956. P. 293.
10 "Heilbrunn Timeline."
11 Brian Sholis, "Notre Dame (façade)" wall label, "Building Pictures: Architectural Photographs by Édouard Baldus."


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The Broadcast, a Psychological Thriller by Liam Fialkov
By BestThrillers Staff on February 24, 2019 in New Book Releases, Psychological Thriller Books, Techno Thriller Books, Thriller Book Reviews, Thriller Reviews
The Bottom Line: The Man in the High Castle meets The Circle. A truly innovative sci-fi thriller that should make for lively book club discussion.
What if a technological breakthrough could allow people to view video footage of historical events going back thousands of years?
That is the promise of a fascinating technology at the center of The Broadcast, a novel about a television network called TXB that produces believable footage of contemporary events, as well as historically significant ones, such as the Battle of Gettysburg, without so much as a set, a production crew, actors or animators. The footage appears to be, for lack of a better term, authentic. Is it real, or some kind of hoax?
Meanwhile, TXB fan Sarah, a psychologist who lives with her husband in a small central California town directly on the San Andreas Fault, is perpetually haunted by the forced adoption of her newborn son when she was just sixteen. While she and her husband appear to build a life together – complete with three dogs, eleven cats, the chickens, ducks, and geese – it's really a house of cards on the verge of collapse. The circumstances surrounding her pregnancy and the mystery over her son's whereabouts have left a void in her life that proves impossible to satiate, leading to increasingly provocative behavior that threatens to turn her life upside down. Author Liam Fialkov takes his time building Sarah's character arc, and the payoff is worth the wait.
In terms of sheer real estate, one could argue that this is Sarah's story, but the concept itself is truly the star. When religious groups become concerned about whether TXB can reach back 2000 years, and what future episodes might reveal, Liam Fialkov's fascinating concept becomes a bonafide page-turner. Like Dave Eggers' The Circle, The Broadcast also evokes important questions about society's relationship to media, surveillance and personal privacy.
BestThrillers Staff
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Liam Fialkov
Ranking The Best of Vince Flynn's Mitch Rapp Books
Project Purple, a Dystopian Page-Turner by Michael Greco


Enjoy today's update! I'll be taking a break this weekend to enjoy both my birthday as well as Thanksgiving. So don't be alarmed if I don't respond to any e-mails until Monday!
Happy Birthday, Savvy! May there be cake!
Hey. Doesn't Derras look a hell of a lot like Felix?
Holy crap I just realized that 'Deras' may be Felix! If so, what a twist!
Right and when she turns around he's gone like he teleported.


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Torc self-driving car travels coast-to-coast in Washington State's First certified pilot test
BLACKSBURG, VA—Barely a month after Washington State instituted its permit program for self-driving car testing, its first enrollee rolled into Seattle this week. The Torc Robotics' self-driving car had traveled from Washington D.C., completing 2,500+ autonomous miles in six days —successfully maneuvering heavy urban traffic, aggressive tailgating, heavy rains, and highway detours.
Torc unveiled its complete self-driving consumer car system last week. For the past decade, the company has been implementing its self-driving technology in safety-critical environments like defense and mining. Torc's consumer car prototypes have been on public roads since February of this year. Earlier this year, a Torc vehicle completed a trip from its headquarters in Blacksburg, Virginia, to Detroit, Michigan.
The Washington-Washington test was the first leg of a round-trip, cross-country journey and a testing milestone, according to Michael Fleming, Torc co-founder and CEO. "Cross-country testing and experiencing different driving styles is critical to the success of any self-driving consumer system," he said. "I'm very happy with how our system performed," he said. The trip took six days across 13 states and logged 2551 autonomous miles.
The coast-to-coast trip was highway focused and presented a variety of challenging scenarios for autonomous driving. The car successfully drove through heavy traffic on the narrow streets of D.C. It navigated a highway detour through heavy rains on the winding roads of West Virginia. In Wyoming, it maneuvered through aggressive traffic and frequent tailgating. It also successfully handled obstacles such as tire pieces and left lane merges.
"In the worst of the West Virginia downpour, the car could see better than we could," said one of Torc's safety drivers, who participated in the trip.
Torc chose Seattle, Washington, as its destination because of the state's recent encouragement of autonomous vehicle testing. On June 7, Governor Jay Inslee signed an executive order allowing driverless cars to test-drive on Washington roads, with or without a human behind the wheel.
Charles Knutson, Inslee's senior policy adviser for transportation and economic development, met with the Torc team after their arrival in Seattle. Knutson said Torc was the first company that registered with the newly created Autonomous Vehicle Pilot Program permit to test their self-driving car in Washington.
"The motivation behind the order was to cultivate and nurture innovation and maintain our state's leadership role in AV technology," Knutson said. "The first certified pilot test occurring a month afterwards shows how quickly the executive order had an effect."
Torc plans to complete the round-trip cross-country test next week, one of many demonstrations planned this year.
Torc self-driving team in Seattle, Washington.
The Torc self-driving car was met by Charles Knutson, Washington Governor Jay Inslee's executive policy adviser, celebrating Washington's first certified autonomous vehicle pilot test since the governor issued an executive order in June 2017.
Torc vehicle driving past the United States Capitol Building.
The Torc cross-country trip in July 2017 began in Washington D.C., where the car successfully drove through heavy traffic on narrow streets.
Torc vehicle driving in heavy rains.
During heavy rains in West Virginia (July 2017), the Torc self-driving car could see better than the people in the car, reported the safety driver.
Torc vehicle driving in Seattle.
The Torc self-driving car arrived Seattle via busy I-5 on July 12, 2017, completing its first cross-country trip.
Torc Robotics, headquartered in Blacksburg, Virginia, provides unmanned and autonomous vehicle solutions for multiple industries, including defense, agriculture, automotive, and mining. Founded in 2005, Torc has integrated its components and systems on ground vehicles ranging from two-ton SUVs to 300-ton mining trucks—in safety-critical environments. Torc first gained notice when its vehicle was one of the three winners of the 2007 DARPA Urban Challenge. The firm also made history in 2011 when it developed a vehicle with Virginia Tech that enabled a blind person to independently drive on the Daytona International Speedway, as part of the National Institute of the Blind's Blind Driver Challenge.