text:
I wrote a thing! It got published!
Since quietly moving my blog over to Egypt Titchenal, I have been trying my hand at writing pieces for publication by online magazines, and I'm proud to announce that yesterday I was published over on Mutha Magazine! Maybe head on over there and show me some love? I'm hoping to write more pieces like this in the future!
And while you're at it, go ahead and follow my new blog!
Adoptee, Adoption
adoptee, adoptee stories, adoption, adoptive family, author, biological family, biological motherhood, blogging, flip the script, magazine, motherhood, mothering, publication, self conscious, webzine, writer, writing
Introverted Adoptee Parent
I was sitting on the couch talking with Boof about my being an introvert, and how it effects me as a mother. And he said, "I can see it. I can see when he's sleeping so close to you, touching you all the time, how it effects you, how it drains you." We had been talking about our space bubbles, and how children don't seem to have a space bubble, which he so beautifully described as:
This kid was just inside you a few years ago. He doesn't have a concept of your own space, that you have your own space. He's starting to have a concept that he has HIS own space, meaning there are times when he doesn't want us in his space bubble, but it's not going to be until he's like…a pre-tween…when will realize that you or I have our own space, too. That we need to have our own space. For now, our space is his space, but his space isn't always our space.
I loved that description, though it doesn't make the physical nervous system overload that I experience as an introvert any easier. But there's been something more than being an introverted biologically, and I was talking with Boof about how, now, as a mother, I am never alone. I know that this phenomenon isn't uncommon to motherhood, this feeling like once you've born a child you are connected to them. The worry, and love, and thinking about their every little move. And I guess it bothers some women, and others not so much. Maybe it's a neutral energy. But I was explaining to Boof that it feels like my soul, or psyche, is introverted, and that there is the lingering energy of Potamus that is within my psyche. I can't escape this energy. And therefore, my soul is never alone. My soul is never alone, and that sometimes makes me feel agitated on an energetic level. I can't escape. I feel agitated on the soul level, because my soul is not alone.
My girlfriend Anne hypothesized that perhaps this feeling comes from being adopted. That since my connection to my biological mother happened so early on that my soul has felt alone since. That this connection to Potamus is one that is foreign to me, and it's good, and beautiful, but unexpected and could feel agitating because I lived for 29 years without that feeling. Because I had talked to Boof about how my fear of adding another child into the family someday is not only due to the logistics of having another kid around, as an introverted parent might be afraid of that, but that my soul would then energetically be agitated by two soulish energies existing within my psyche.
I was telling Anne that I feel this need to expand. I used this motion of pushing out a bubble from myself, that I wonder if I am able to expand my soul energy, to not be so close to my body (at least that's the image in my mind), that I could maybe feel less agitation, that I would somehow be able to expand and find that I was big enough to hold not just one soul energy, but another as well. That the connection is okay, and good, albeit uncomfortable sometimes, and that I am big enough to handle it.
Adoptee, Adoption, Parenting
adoptee, adoption, advice, introversion, introvert, introverted parenting, parenting, parenting and our adoption, parenting as an adoptee, psyche, soul
Alcohol as Mindfulness?
When I met my biological mom, she was wearing a bathing suit and a skirt. It was 10am and she was clearly drunk and had a beer in her purse. I had been warned that she was an alcoholic, couldn't function without it in her system, and hadn't held down a job forever because of the detoxing seizures and her inability to drive.
Last year my biological dad got a DUI, and felt shitty about it because I had recently told him that I was so glad that he was a 'normal' grandparent for Brewer. His daily drinking of a few beers was more on par with a blue collar norm than a 'problem,' though maybe there's some justification going on…because anyone can have a problem once and not have an overall disease. But, I digress.
They say alcoholism is genetic.
I didn't drink until I was 21 because of my ultra religious upbringing and my fear of the adoption unknown. I actually remember telling someone when I was younger that the reason I wouldn't do drugs or alcohol is because I think I would like it too much. That's deep for a tween, ya know?
All across time and space, people have been using substances to alter their experience. Beer has been around since cavemen, and has its place historically in so many ways. Little kids spin around and get dizzy, altering their experience, and we daydream or smoke pot or take peyote or chew chat or sniff poppies (yes, I know that's not exactly how it works) to alter our experience.
And then there's mindfulness. Meditation. To alter our experience of the moment, our relationship to the future and the past and our thoughts. It's a mind altering way of being in the world. And one that I really intend to embrace in my life.
But can I be honest here? It's busy season in the accounting world, and I haven't seen my husband for close to 8 weeks because of it. He leaves at 6:30 and gets home at 8, except on Saturdays when he's home by 6. I'm exhausted. And with only 1 kid, and a full-time(ish) job, I am often one straw away from the camel's back breaking and crumbling all over itself.
The other day, Boof was teasing me about all the mimosas I've been drinking. And I got butthurt. Because it's a sore spot for me. When I started drinking in college I had zero tolerance and would get blackout drunk. But I hated the feeling and so it only happened a handful of times. It's been years trying to figure out how much is enough to just have a buzz and not obsess about wanting more and more and more.
His comment hit a nerve. I don't like that I am excited to pour the OJ and champagne on a Friday morning with Potamus. I know enough about mental illness and alcoholism to know that I should be careful. And I am. I think. The nervousness and monitoring of my level of tolerance, desire, defensiveness as a coping mechanism are healthy. But it's hard. Because alcohol is like mindfulness. There's that sweet spot, when I haven't overindulged, and I can focus on the present moment. I tell my students about the 'beer goggle' effect, and how more suicides and other issues happen under the influence, because we don't have the ability to long-range think. But honestly, that's kinda what I'm going for. Because I don't want to sit on my couch watching another episode of toddler TV and think "3 more weeks of this." That's so fucking overwhelming to me. The fact that he was running 45 minutes late last night was so fucking overwhelming to me.
And mindfulness is good and all, but honestly, alcohol is quicker. Maybe someday I'll be a mindful yogi who doesn't have a glass of wine, or a few beers, at night to try and hang on for the next few hours until bedtime and daddy's home. I know I've been there before. I know this is a difficult time for us as a family.
Drinking is a hot topic among the parenting community. Do you imbibe? Know others who do? What influences your decisions to drink or not?
Adoption, Parenting
alcohol, alcoholism, coping, drinking, meditation, mental health, mimosas, mindfulness, motherhood, mothers, parenting, working mom
You Wanna Know About My Stance on Adoption?
My friends are often surprised that someone like me (aka a 'successful' adoption story) is anti adoption. Especially since I worked with foster youth, and fucked up families in crisis, and at-risk teenagers gettin' knocked up with their meth-head boyfriends (maybe a tad exaggerated there). And so I usually bumble along in my explanation, but then I came across this piece and thought "holy shit, yeah" and so I'm just going to quote the whole damn thing, or you can click over and read it in it's entirety on their site…
Meet the New Anti-Adoption Movement:
The surprising next frontier in reproductive justice
For a long time, Claudia Corrigan D'Arcy thought of herself as an adoption success story. Pregnant at 18 from an affair with her boss, she denied the pregnancy until her coworkers began to notice. Too far along to get an abortion, she looked up an adoption agency in the Yellow Pages and found herself agreeing to move to Boston and live with a host family until she gave birth. Her son, who she calls Max (his adoptive parents gave him a different name), was born in November of 1987 and handed over to a couple Corrigan D'Arcy had only seen in photos. And that was that.
She told herself she'd done the smart thing. She'd given her son a two-parent family of means. It wasn't until more than a decade later that Corrigan D'Arcy, by then married and the mother of three more children, began to rethink what had happened.
By having her move to a new state while pregnant, she felt the agency was purposely isolating her from friends and family who might have helped her. Though she knew who her baby's father was, the agency told her not to tell him she was pregnant. She could have sued him for child support—he was a wealthy lawyer—but the adoption agency didn't talk about that, only about the hardships she would face as a "welfare mom," should she keep her child. They called her a "family-building angel" and a "saint" for considering adoption. "It was crazy subtle, subtle, subtle brainwashing," she told me recently.
Adoption has long been perceived as the win-win way out of a a difficult situation. An unwed mother gets rid of the child she's not equipped to care for; an adoptive family gets a much-wanted child. But people are increasingly realizing that the industry is not nearly as well-regulated and ethical as it should be. There are issues of coercion, corruption, and lack of transparency that are only now being fully addressed.
The past decade has seen the rise of a broad and loose coalition of activists out to change the way adoption works in America. This coalition makes bedfellows of people who would ordinarily have nothing to do with each other: Mormon and fundamentalist women who feel they were pressured by their churches, progressives who believe adoption is a classist institution that takes the children of the young and poor and gives them to the wealthier and better-educated, and adoptive parents who have had traumatic experiences with corrupt adoption agencies.
Some women, like Corrigan D'Arcy, blog their stories. They run message boards with names like "First Mother Forum" and "Pound Pup Legacy," full of tales of bitterly regretted adoptions. They hold retreats for birthmothers and adoptees. They've formed several grassroots activist organizations, including Parents for Ethical Adoption Reform, Origins-USA, and Concerned United Birthparents. Some call themselves adoption reformers. Others prefer terms such as "adoption truth advocate." A few will come straight out and say they're anti-adoption.
They want, among other things, a ban on adoption agencies offering monetary support to pregnant women. They want to see laws put in place guaranteeing that "open" adoptions (where birthparents have some level of contact with their children) stay open. They want women to have more time after birth to decide whether to terminate their parental rights. These activists have become increasingly loud of late, holding prominent rallies, organizing online, and winning several recent legislative victories.
Reproduce justice activists tend to focus on rights to contraception and abortion. But these adoption reforms are equally important when it comes to men and women having full control of their destinies.
Adoption in America has changed vastly since the end of the so-called "Baby Scoop Era" in the early 1970s, when many pregnant young women were "sent away" and their babies offered up for adoption as a matter of course. Thanks to legalized abortion and a drastic lessening of the stigma against unwed mothers, the number of babies available domestically has been shrinking since the mid-'70s. Fifty years ago, about 9 percent of babies born to unmarried women were placed for adoption. Today that number is 1 percent. All in all, there are about 14,000 domestic infant adoptions a year, comprising only about 15 percent of U.S. adoptions. (The rest are from the foster care system, or are international.)
But for young women who do find themselves pregnant and unmarried, the pressure to choose adoption is still present. Much of this pressure still comes from organized religion. Andrea Mills, 38, has placed four of her children for adoption through the Mormon Church's LDS Family Services program over the past 13 years. Mormonism forbids abortion, considers premarital sex taboo, and frowns upon single parenthood. When Mills initially voiced uncertainty about adoption, the counselor handling her case insisted it was her best option, saying "This is what God wanted." The nation's4,000-odd "crisis pregnancy centers," anti-choice organizations, are often affiliated with evangelical Christian maternity homes and Christian adoption agencies. "Pregnant? Scared?" their ads ask on billboards and in bar bathroom posters; "We can help."
Even non-religious adoption agencies practice what some say is subtle coercion. Agencies offer pregnant women financial assistance—for rent, groceries, medical bills, maternity clothes, even cellphones. Some even offer college scholarships for women who go through with adoptions. Agencies frequently warn women about a "post-abortion syndrome" of lasting depression and guilt, though mainstream medical organizations dismissed these warnings. (Adoption, on the other hand, is known to cause "a sense of loss that is all-encompassing," says the U.S. Administration for Children and Families.) Adoption counselors are frequently adoptive parents themselves, which puts them in a less-than-neutral position.
While the ubiquity of open adoption—today 95 percent of all adoptions include some kind of contact between birthparents and children—is universally seen as a step forward, it can present its own challenges. Pregnant women, encouraged to choose and bond with an adoptive couple before the baby is born, often get the impression that they and the couple are going to be "kind of co-parents," says Kathryn Joyce, the author of The Child Catchers, an expose on corruption in the adoption industry. But then, when the baby is born and relinquished, the couple closes ranks, wanting—understandably enough—to cocoon as a family. The birthmother is left feeling like, in Joyce's words, "'you were all over me when I was pregnant, but now that you have the baby you don't want anything to do with me.'"
Responding to all this, adoption reformers have been lobbying state governments for a number of specific changes.
First, there's the matter of timing. In some states, such as Utah, a woman can sign papers irrevocably terminating her parental rights 24 hours after giving birth. At this point, a woman is still in the hospital, exhausted and possibly under the influence of painkillers. In more than half of all states, irrevocable termination of parental rights can be established in fewer than four days. "We believe that this is by no means a sufficient time period to make an irreversible, life-altering decision with consequences for many people," says Concerned United Birthparents, an adoption reform group, which would like to extend the period to 30 days.
But public opinion tends to favor shorter waiting times, sympathetic to the pain of adoptive parents who have babies taken away after a birthmother changes her mind. (A reality show on Logo TV called "The Baby Wait" focuses on this limbo period, its allegiances clearly lying with the prospective adoptive couples.) In April, Kansas eliminated its 30-day post-birth waiting period, allowing adoptions to be finalized within the first 24 hours. This act was generally reported as an uncontroversial good.
There has been a bit more progress on open adoption. Fewer than half of U.S. states regulate open adoption agreements. In the rest, openness depends on the whim of the adoptive parents, many of whom soon tire of feeling they're sharing their child. In Mills's case, a supposedly open adoption became "don't call us, we'll call you," she says. Georgia enacted a law in May that makes open adoption contracts legally binding, meaning birthparents are guaranteed access to their children as often as their agreed-upon contracts specify. Utah passed a similar measure earlier this year, but only for children adopted from state custody.
In August, the Adoptee Rights Coalition rallied around the issue of access to birth certificates. Currently, only a handful of states allow unrestricted access to original birth certificates. But the recent phenomenon of adoptees searching for, and sometimes finding, their birthparents via Facebook has highlighted the need for action. Though people imagine that birth mothers want their privacy, Adam Pertman, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, says that only a tiny minority actually want to withhold their identifying details from their children permanently. In May, Washington Governor Jay Inslee signed a new law giving some, but not all, adoptees access to their original birth certificates, a partial win for reformers that left many unhappy. Pennsylvania's legislature will likely vote on a similar bill this fall, as will Ohio's, after numerous failed attempts by adoption reform groups in both states to pass such legislation. Another bill was passed by the New Jersey legislature, but conditionally vetoed by Governor Chris Christie in 2011.
Very few activists are claiming that adoption shouldn't be an option, but the activists currently involved in the issue recognize that adoption is far from the perfect solution it was so long perceived to be. It's a difficult, life-changing decision with ramifications that last a lifetime. As such, it needs to be treated with the utmost transparency and a much higher degree of ethical oversight, legal and otherwise.
"I would rather see us live in a society where we say to struggling pregnant women, 'OK you have a problem, we should try to fix the whole situation,'" says Corrigan D'Arcy, "rather than remove the child and leave the mother in crisis." One of the most important events of her recent life was locating her now-teenage son via MySpace. "Every portion of finding him, whether it was just finding that he was alive or finding where he is, I felt one step lighter, one step closer to being who I was really supposed to be."
Image via Shutterstock.
Emily Matchar has written for The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and Salon. She's the author of Homeward Bound (Simon & Schuster, 2013).
I'd be interested to hear what you think of this article…
activist, adoptee, adoptee advocacy, adoptee rights, adoption, adoption activism, foster care, human rights, reproductive justice, social justice, unplanned pregnancy
Genetic Mirroring
Potamus with pigtails?
I am pre-occupied with looks, specifically the looks of my child in relation to my own and my husband's. When Potamus was born, everyone was shocked by his blonde hair and blue eyes. At almost two his eyes have turned hazel, but he's still blonde as the day he was born. But most people think that he looks like Boof, which is hard for me…and I think it all goes back to being adopted, and being raised in a family where my looks weren't reflected back and nobody said "oh, she looks like great aunt millie."
I think my son actually looks quite a bit like me. His personality is quite a bit like my own, with his little mischievous side, but his sweetness is reminiscent of stories I've heard about Boof as a child. Every once in awhile Potamus will give a look, make an expression, that makes me think of his dad, but for the most part, when I look at my sweet child I see myself as a baby looking back. So why am I so surprised or frustrated when people don't notice the way he resembles me?
biological family, family, genes, genetic mirroring, genetics, looks, motherhood, parenting
Is Being Adopted Shaping my Career?
My psychologist is kicking my butt. She basically accused me of thinking too much and not letting myself feel (totally true. totally nailed it in session #4 people!), but I don't really know HOW to feel. I do know how to think, how to over-think, and how to think some more. I also know how to catastrophize like nobody's business.
At any rate, in an attempt to avoid feeling all the feelings about that early trauma of separation from my safe place (mom) and being raised by genetic strangers, I decided to think about my job. And it made me wonder…I am working with 16-20 year old "at-risk youth" in a community college setting. I am teaching them skills to succeed at school. And my biological mother was 16 when she got pregnant, and my biological dad was 20 when I was born. My biological mom did not finish high school, but did complete her GED, and my dad completed HS but had a 3.9 GPA and NOBODY suggested he go to college. And, my maternal half siblings did not finish high school (and my half bro got his GED…I think). I guess my question is….am I trying to work with my biological family?
Am I throwing myself into a situation, a passion, in some sort of karmic attempt at rescuing my parents? Do I see these vulnerable young ones and want to spark a fire for education in their life, to empower them toward greatness, so they don't end up in a situation where they have to give their firstborn away as atonement for their "sins"? Am I somehow trying to connect with my family in this choice of career?
Or (or maybe an) am I trying to distance myself from my family? Do I like sitting on the other side of the desk, seeing that I have "made it," that I am "not like them," as if my life is somehow a proof that my biological parents made the right decision in letting me be raised by strangers. Because, see, I am not like them anymore. I am educated. I am in the middle-class. I am…fill in the blank.
Or, do I do it to prove something to my adoptive family? To protect myself from further abandonment by both excelling in education and also working in a compassion field to show my humility?
Could all of those reasons be true? Or not true? And does it matter? Does the motivations, or the impetus, or the reason that I end up in a job really matter? Or is what matters that I feel like I fit here, that I belong, that I was actually made for this type of work? Does me trying to work out my own identity or story take away from the "goodness" of doing this type work?
And how can I just let myself feel, instead of always just thinking about things?
adoptee, adoption, anxiety, biological family, career, CBT, college, community college, education, job, mindfulness, therapy, thinking, thoughts
Both Sides Now- Joni Mitchell is a birthmother
Sometimes my emotions run so deep that words, written, or said verbally, cannot even begin to touch the depth. And in those moments I turn to music, and have been known to listen to the same song (or set of songs) again-and again-and again, until something changes or I cannot cry anymore.
I can't write more about it. My heart is hurting too much, so I'm sharing my go-to song to express the depth of emotions that I am feeling at the news of a sweet 4 year old being ripped from her tribe, her daddy, her sister and extended family, and thrust into the confusing world of being raised by genetic strangers with a reality that doesn't match the reality that you know in your heart.
This is a song I grew up with. My dad sang it to me as a little girl, because I loved the imagery of bows and flows of angels hair. I listened to it a thousand times before I knew that Joni Mitchell was a birthmother in reunion with her daughter. And while we may dicker about whether it was really written with adoption or reunion in mind, I'll say that it cuts to my very soul and makes me feel the complexity of life and confusion seeing the world from the perspective of innocence, and the eyes of the 'old soul' who has witnessed far too much in such a short amount of time.
And so, this song is for Veronica.
-Joni Mitchell
Bows and flows of angel hair
And ice cream castles in the air
And feather canyons everywhere
I've looked at clouds that wayBut now they only block the sun
They rain and snow on everyone
So many things I would have done
But clouds got in my wayI've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all
Moons and Junes and Ferris wheels
The dizzy dancing way you feel
As every fairy tale comes real
I've looked at love that way
But now it's just another show
You leave 'em laughing when you go
And if you care, don't let them know
Don't give yourself away
I've looked at love from both sides now
From give and take, and still somehow
It's love's illusions I recall
I really don't know love at all
Tears and fears and feeling proud
To say "I love you" right out loud
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds
I've looked at life that way
Oh but now old friends are acting strange
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost but something's gained
In living every day
I've looked at life from both sides now
From WIN and LOSE and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all
From up and down and still somehow
What music can you listen to repeatedly? Any mood music (sad/happy/angry/depressed) that is your go to?
adoptee, adoption, birthmother, both sides now, family preservation, Joni Mitchell, music, news, opinion, sadness, song lyrics, songs, Veronica Brown
The Runaway Bunny
The Runaway Bunny is staple children's book, one that was read to me as a kid, and one that I read recently to Potamus. Though he was mostly uninterested in it, which I believe due to the less-than-exciting pictures on each page (because how can books really compete with TV these days, anyway?)
But reading the book made me remember my childhood, and all of these conflicted emotions came flooding back. Of course it relates to being adopted, because what doesn't these days? I recently mentioned this book in an online thread, that was about the story I Love You Forever (one I mentioned in my last blog post), where I see it as "creepy" that the mom climbs into her grown son's room to watch him sleep. The online poster said that I was reading the story as an adult and projecting adult feelings onto it, rather than understanding the toddler's need for a story to show something outlandish but driving home the point "I will always be your mom, no matter how big you get."
I understood, in theory, and think that it works for many families and toddlers. But not for me. Because this story, of The Runaway Bunny, was actually frightening and made me sad as a kid. But I wasn't able to articulate my feelings at the time. In case you don't remember, here's an excerpt from the story:
Once there was a little bunny who wanted to run away.
So he said to his mother, "I am running away."
"If you run away," said his mother, "I will run after you.
For you are my little bunny."
"If you run after me," said the little bunny,
"I will become a fish in a trout stream
and I will swim away from you."
"If you become a fish in a trout stream," said his mother,
"I will become a fisherman and I will fish for you."
As an adult I could read all sorts of things into this story, making it about control, and not letting a child have autonomy. Though I know the message is supposed to be 'I love you, I will not let you get too far away from me," I see it is "you can't hid from me, ever, I will find you. Which feels creepy. It doesn't say "if you are a trout in a stream, I will be sad and miss you."
And the message felt so mixed up as an adopted kid. Because, on one hand, I desperately wanted to believe that no matter what I did my parents would be there for me. But, I, of course, knew that wasn't the case. Because if parents, or mothers in particular, would go to the ends of the earth to find their 'little bunny' then where was my mom? Not my adoptive mom, I knew she was right there, but where was my other mom? And what was wrong with this little bunny that she wasn't coming to find me? And, if she didn't do it, then what would my adoptive mom do if I ran away? So there was sadness.
The other thought was "oh my gosh, she's going to come find me," in a too-terrified-to-articulate way. This idea that the mother character would change shape (become a fisherman, a mountain climber, a gardener) in order to find the bunny made me question everything around me. Was that grocery store checker my mom? Was the school bus driver my mom in secret? Who was she? When would she pop out of hiding and tell me she had found her little bunny?
Of course life isn't like the Runaway Bunny. I hadn't run away. I had been given away. The Giveaway Bunny hasn't been written yet, but perhaps it needs to have its own story someday. And it wasn't until I was an adult, reading the story to my son, did I realize "this book is full of shit, and traumatized me, and I need to find something different."
And I have.
In the book, No Matter What, by Debi Glilori.
The book is gender-neutral, with a Large and Small fox characters, and the sentiment is 'no matter what' I will love you. But instead of the freaky-find-you-at-all-cost-if-you-run-away, the message at the end is"We may be close, we may be far,/ but our love still surrounds us…/ wherever we are." I've read this one 100 times to Potamus, so many that I almost have it memorized. And it feels good to find a book that fits his needs while doesn't trigger my own history. I highly recommend it to little ones in your life.
It's funny, though, to be triggered by random memories from childhood. And to have words, now, to explain how I was feeling then. It makes me wish and hope for many more children's advocates to help kids give voice to their experiences. Or even to ask the questions about how a book, or TV program, or conversation makes a kiddo feel. While I don't know if I would have felt safe enough to say how I felt about that story, I think it would have been interesting to at least have been asked.
Have there been any books that you've read to your kids now that have brought back memories (good or bad) from your own childhood? Is there a story that you definitely want to pass down to your child? One you want to avoid? Tell me!
Adoption, Books, Parenting
adoptee, adoption, books, books for kids, children's books, family, literature, love, memories, no matter what, runaway bunny, trauma
When You Were Inside Mommy
I bought this book awhile ago, in hopes to start the readings early with Potamus. I also bought a book about having another baby, but loaned that to a friend, since there's no need for me to read a story about something that's not happening lately. And it's a book that Potamus has asked me to read a few times, sitting through the whole story, and patting my belly when I talk about how he used to live inside me. This is a very easy and sweet book for little ones to understand, but I have noticed so many feelings as I read it.
Because I never had books read to me like this. In fact, it wasn't until I was an adult, and working with a gal who was pregnant, did I really come into close contact with pregnancy. Nobody I knew was pregnant, nobody talked about pregnancy other than "don't get pregnant before you're married." So reading this story, and seeing how connected Potamus is to it, it made me think about my childhood. How I was the kid who answered "offices" when asked "where do babies come from?" How I felt growing up that I had just sorta 'dropped from the sky' and had no physical connection to my mom. It feels so different with Potamus. I am sitting there, reading a generic story about pregnancy, and I'm nodding along like "yes, you were as small as a dot. yes, you were inside mommy's womb, right there," as I point where my belly button is. I just wonder if I had been read stories like this as a child if I would have felt less…hatched. And then I wonder if I would have just been even more confused, as to why I grew in someone else's belly.
I know, now, that there are more books for young adoptees, though I'm often put off by the 'special chosen child that God put in someone else's belly for us' storyline that they seem to follow. But who's going to write a children's book about a teen who gets knocked up and they decide to give the kid to adoption because they don't want their families fighting over custody? Yeah, that one might be hard to pitch…
I guess I was surpised. I though that since I had been pregnant, and enjoyed it, and am bonded and love having had Potamus naturally, that I would have been peaceful and love reading that story. But it makes me wistfully sad for the connection in stories that I didn't have growing up.
Any children's books do you read that make you feel emotions you were unprepared for?
Adoptee, Adoption, Books
adoptee, adoption, adoptive families, biological families, books, pregnancy, reading, reading to toddlers, stories, where do babies come from
Fall=Fair Tradition with Bio family!!
**I was going to write a lovely post about how much I freaking love the Fall, and that while I'm somewhat sad that I'm not going to be a stay-at-home mom anymore (okay, who am I kidding, I'm thrilled I get to use my adult brain again), but I read Karen's post on the subject (see link earlier in post) and resonated so much with it that I thought writing my own would be redundant. So go read her post, imagine it's me, and then come back and read this post about how Fall brings about a fair tradition! 🙂
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Mama and Potamus
Five years ago I went to the Puyallup Fair for the first time with my biological dad and little sisters. It was a tradition in their family and I was so excited to get to be a part of it. My little sisters were 4 and 9 at the time, and like my bio dad says "she'll never know a time without you," as we pulled the littlest in the wagon behind us. It was there, at the Puyallup Fair, that I taught my little sister to tie her shoes. And she fell asleep in the wagon after a long, hard, day of riding rides and seeing animals, and miles of walking. Miles. Seriously. My legs hurt so bad the next morning that I had to crawl to the bathroom.
So, this year, with Potamus approaching 2 and our schedules magically coinciding, we headed on down to the Washington State Fair (previously named the Puyallup Fair, don't get me started on the politics of this name change. SO ANNOYING!) and Potamus was ushered into the fair family tradition. It's things like this that make me step back and see how adoption has really colored my life…I am forming family traditions for my son, with a family I didn't know until I was 25. My heart feels both bursting with love at the traditions and memories to come and sad about the time we missed. And yet, I also temper that with the strange soul knowledge that the time we missed would have been different, possibly harder?, or just different had he been taking me to the fair since I was a child.
Potamus loved it. Rather than bore you with the details, here are a few pictures to highlight the revelry:
petting zoo fun
MOM LOOK AT THAT GOAT!
milk cows
I learned that my bio-grandad, at age 13, drove a team of horses like this to dig the basement of a fish hatchery in Eastern Washington!!!
mama's little rebel
grandpa telling Potamus about the horses
Grandpa. Grandson. Love.
My son will always know my bio-dad as grandpa. This makes me happy.
What Fall traditions does your family have? Do you enjoy going county or state fairs?
Adoptee, Adoption, Seattle
adoptee, adoptee in reunion, adoption, biological dad, biological families, biological father, Fall, family traditions, grandparents, parenting as an adoptee, photography, Puyallup Fair, reunion, seattle, Washington State Fair


text:
Friday, 26. August 2011 - 3:22
Science Talk with Dr. Akito Arima
By Kaoru Natori
On August 23, seven students from the Okinawa National College of Technology, accompanied by Professor Hideyuki Yamashiro, visited the OIST campus for a "Science Talk" with Dr. Akito Arima, Co-chair of the OIST Board of Governors (BOG), Chairman of the Japan Science Foundation and the President and Chair of the Board of Trustees at the Human Frontier Science Program.
Dr. Jonathan Dorfan, President-elect of the OIST Graduate University, first welcomed the students and introduced Dr. Arima, referring to him as an eminent physicist, world-renowned academician, a published master of Haiku, former president of the University of Tokyo, and one of the founding fathers of OIST.
In a lecture entitled "For the Future of Science and Technology in Japan," Dr. Arima encouraged the young students to be confident, saying that what appears to be a large decline in the level of academic achievements by Japanese schoolchildren over the past few decades is in fact an inaccurate interpretation of the survey results. Citing statistics from several international surveys, Dr. Arima pointed out that the number of countries surveyed has increased. He stressed that the decline relative to the increased pool of other countries is only modest and that the actual performance level of Japanese students has in fact improved. He did point out, however, that the flexible thinking ability of Japanese schoolchildren is lower in comparison to their peers in other nations, underlining the importance of self-learning and problem-solving.
In closing, Dr. Arima talked about energy issues, saying that Japan ranks the highest among the Group of Eight (G8) nations in reliance on oil imports. Citing Germany as a model nation, he called for a study into renewable energy resources, such as wind, solar and hydro powers.
In a Q&A session, Ms. Sayaka Hateruma, a junior student, asked how one can improve data analysis skills. Dr. Arima stressed the need for finding second sources and comparing them to the original data. Ms. Sonomoto, also a junior student, asked Dr. Arima how he had studied at school age. Showing a short slide presentation with photos of items that used to fascinate him, Dr. Arima said he enjoyed reading Japanese ancient history books and physics books, as well as making motors and portable radios, explaining that finding tasks and tackling them broadened his knowledge and flexible thinking ability. Responding to a question by Mr. Ryoki Shinjo, a sophomore, about what teens should do before reaching 20, Dr. Arima emphasized the importance of English proficiency and basic studies of a field of one's interest.
After a group photo shoot, the students were then taken on a tour of the OIST facilities by Dr. Masahisa Yamada, Scientific Senior Manager of the OIST Common Resources Group. Seeing research equipment up close and personal, the students, who are all aspiring to pursue scientific careers, were impressed by the research environment at OIST and the magnificent view of the ocean.
Dr. Yamada and several OIST staff joined the group for lunch. Dr. Yamada talked passionately about his recollection of research days and stated that the kind of education and research about to be realized at OIST, which has freedom and no barriers between people working in difference fields, is a truly new opportunity in Japan. The students listened attentively to his talk.
Looking back at their day at OIST, all students said they had a wonderful time, and were deeply inspired by the precious advice given by Dr. Arima and Dr. Yamada. Mr. Ryuki Ameku, a sophomore, said his motivation for achievement in research has increased tremendously.
Students other than those mentioned above are: Ms. Konomi Morita (senior student), Mr. Kenta Yoshida (senior student), and Ms. Miki Touyama (junior student).
For press inquiries, please contact media@oist.jp.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Watch Now: Footage Of Eric Stoltz As Marty McFly In 'Back To The Future'
By The Movie God | @ | Tuesday, October 12th, 2010 at 12:16 pm
For those of you who aren't aware — yes, before Michael J. Fox became the iconic Marty McFly in Back to the Future, the role belonged to Pulp Fiction and Caprica star Eric Stoltz.
Fox was wanted for the role all along, but with previous commitments to Family Ties, he simply was unable to take the job. Because of this, Stoltz was cast and even took part in five weeks of shooting. Ultimately, director Robert Zemeckis realized that while Stoltz was doing a great job, he wasn't delivering the subtle humor that was so crucial for the Marty character, and the decision was made to go back and re-shoot all of the scenes with a new actor. Thankfully for us, they were able to work out a way to score Michael J. Fox after all.
Many geeks have known all of this stuff for years now, and we've even seen plenty of images of Stoltz as Marty, but we've never actually seen him in action…until now! For the 25th anniversary celebration and the release of the Back To The Future Trilogy Blu-ray Edition, a small clip from one of the special features talks a little about this monumental decision in cinematic history, while giving us a peek at footage of the actor in character.
Be sure to hit 88 and jump over to the other side to check out Eric Stoltz as Marty McFly now!
[Source: THR]
Topics: Movies, News, Videos
Tags: Back to the Future, Blu-ray, Eric Stoltz, Michael J. Fox, Robert Zemeckis
Iron Man + Steampunk = Awesome
Andy Richter Set To Re-Join Conan O'Brien On TBS Show 'Conan'
• Robert Zemeckis In Talks To Direct Disney's Live-Action 'Pinocchio'
• Blu-ray Review: Silent Hill (Collector's Edition)
• 4K Ultra HD Review: Pet Sematary (2019)
• Book Review: William Shakespeare's Get Thee Back To The Future!
• 'The Witches': Octavia Spencer Among Latest To Join Roald Dahl Adaptation


Bethesda Reassures That Skyrim DLC Will Have "A Lot Of Meat On Them"
Bethesda's games have always included huge open worlds that reward players for exploration. The game's director Todd Howard was on hand at the Spike Video Game Awards this past Saturday and he shared the company's vision for Skyrim's eventual downloadable content.
We don't have a timetable. They won't be quick, and they'll have a lot of meat on them.
Whatever form the DLC takes it will surely have a lot of content. There is certainly a precedent for that as 2009's Fallout 3 received several different downloadable episodes and 2006's The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion received The Shivering Isles which extended that game's playtime by dozens of hours.
Are you ready for Skyrim's DLC or are you still exploring the snowy mountains and troll filled caves? I've put about a 12 hours into the game and have barely touched the main plot. It is going to be a long time before I am ready for downloadable content.


Torsion and also extension springs are our technician's specialties. Changing the springs on a garage door can be a very hazardous job, and needs to be carried out by a garage door spring repair Westchester IL specialist. 7-10 years is the usual life span of many torsion springs when usually used during new garage door installations. If you use your garage door several times a day, then the springs will certainly reach their 10,000 cycle life expectancy within the 7-10 year time frame.
Torsion: While the extension spring utilizes the power to expand and acquire to help in relocating the garage door, torsion springs utilize the power of torque to do the exact same. The sluggish twist as well as un-twist activity of a torsion spring enables the garage door to move up and down smoothly. The scale of the spring and also the length will certainly depend upon the weight of your garage door.
Extension springs are cheaper yet a little bit more unsteady and dangerous. Torsion springs tolerate much heavier weights and last much longer than extension springs. Your best choice is a torsion spring setup for your garage door. While they might cost more, you will certainly conserve extra in time. A correctly set up torsion spring could last over a years depending upon your pattern of use. When done right, it will be a long period of time prior to you are dealing with anymore off track garage doors or broken garage door springs.


text:
Q: TortoiseGit not showing icon overlays I have been using TortoiseGit for almost a full year now. It has been working very well for me until yesterday, when I encountered a problem. I was deleting a folder when Windows Explorer sort of crashed on me (it hung on "discovering items") for over an hour, then I restarted the system.
Since that time (and I am not sure if the incident described has anything to do with it), TortoiseGit has stopped showing icon overlays in explorer. The behaviour is, however, not like any of the others who posted questions here, because:

In the open file dialogue of all programs, the icons still exist (!).

Here is a list of things I tried:

*

*I changed TortoiseGit settings to show different icons.

*Reinstall TortoiseGit (uninstall, restart, install, restart).

*I deleted all icon overlays starting with "Tortoise" in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer
\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers, then uninstalled TortoiseGit, restarted the computer and reinstalled TortoiseGit.

Edit:
I tried to create a new user on my computer, and the new user has icon overlays working just fine. I am now even more confused.
Nothing helped so far. Any ideas?

A: I had installed TortoiseSVN (1.9.5) and msysgit (2.11.0) first on my Windows 10 64-bit machine. TortoiseSVN icons displayed fine.
When I installed TortoiseGit (2.3.0.0) after these two the icons wouldn't display.
I checked HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers and all looked fine. The tortoise icons were in the top 10.
What I used to fix was raised in TortoiseGit issue #692 on GitLab:

*

*Open regedit.exe

*

*Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer

*Add a new string value "Max Cached Icons" with value "2000"

  closed/restarted explorer and icons display!

A: Windows 10 Solution Steps;

*

*Open regedit

Path :

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers

*Remove/delete all SkyDrive/OneDrive keys. You may need to take ownership of the keys one by one and give your user full control if you receive an error while trying to delete the keys.

*Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc and restart "Windows Explorer" (Optionally restart computer)

*All git/svn overlay icons are now visible !

A: Before going nuts, just try rebooting!  It worked for me ;)

A: I had this same problem today after uninstalling TortoiseSVN. I rebooted and still no luck so I just went into Control Panel, Uninstall a Program and on the TortoiseGit item I picked 'Repair' and everything is back to normal. I suspect that all of the Tortoise line of apps have some shared registry keys or something.

A: I also had my TortoiseGIT shell icons quit displaying suddenly, I don't remember exactly what led up to it but I found this and tried the registry stuff changing 1TortioiseNormal to "1TortioiseNormal" and so on. That is probably a good thing to do no matter what but icon overlays were still not working.
I am too busy for the blanket answer of "restart the computer" what that says to me is "some service process needs to be restarted but you'd never be able to find it so just restart." Nah.
I also use TortoiseSVN and those icon overlays were still working for me. I looked in my processes tab of task manager and saw I had something called TSVNCache.exe running. No sign of anything similar for git, so on a whim I went over to the applications tab and hit "New Task", entered TGITCache.exe and sure enough that process fired up. From there go back to processes, kill explorer.exe, then go back to applications -> New Task again and fire up explorer.exe.
This has worked for me twice now when my TortoiseGIT icon overlays have quit, so, maybe it will work for someone else.

A: Just add one Space(or more if needed) to first Name of Tortoise options to this regedit addersses:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers

for example:
"1TortoiseNormal"

Should change to:
" 1TortoiseNormal"

after a system reboot icons shows currectly.

A: What worked for me was to uninstall Google Drive from my computer. Not sure why yet.

A: I Agree with Chi Chan and I would like to add this as an complementary answer.
It's Dropbox Explorer icons. Here is a registry script to remove them. Save it somewhere, because they will come back!
Note, that the values change from time to time, too. Currently they have 3 spaces before the "DropboxExtXX", before they had only one.
Remove Dropbox Explorer Icons.reg
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt01]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt02]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt03]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt04]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt05]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt06]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt07]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt08]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt09]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\   DropboxExt10]

A: I had the same problem and I got it to work by following instructions from a forum.  What I did was this (copied):

I find solution :)
Wrapping with "" all tortoise keys under  HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers

on 1TortoiseNormal and etc...
I understood the problem, seeing as Dropbox and it worked regedit there was the sign ("") to Dropbox but not tortoise.
So I added the signs, close explorer.exe and hop it was good :)

So what I did was rename the key 1TortoiseNormal to "1TortoiseNormal" etc. I have no idea why wrapping it inside a double quote makes it work again. Note that a restart of Windows Explorer is required for the changes to take effect.
The original forum is gone, but a good summary is supplied in the comments.

A: Windows will only allow up to 11 icon overlay identifiers, arranged in alphanumeric order - if there are more than 11, these icons will not be displayed.
You can run the following command in a DOS prompt:
regedit /e c:\icons.txt HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers
Then open the file C:\icons.txt. Skip the first two lines, and if 1TortoiseNormal and the other *Tortoise* values are not in the top 11 values, their icon overlays will not be shown. The solution provided by @Chi Chan is just a simple way to make 1TortoiseNormal rank higher when ordered among all the overlays, you can also rename the values by adding space(s) before 1TortoiseNormal, i.e.,
"    1TortoiseNormal"
to make them rank higher.
update:  for Windows 8, the limit of icon overlays is 15.

A: The problem with the leading spaces is that every time you reboot, Dropbox adds another space to its registries, and will be always one step ahead of you.
So I've scheduled a python script found on this post (by Christoph Zwerschke) to execute every time the computer boots. You also have to restart the Explorer after that.
The .bat will look like:
python iconOverlayFixer.py
taskkill /f /im explorer.exe
start explorer.exe

And the python script:
#/usr/bin/python3

import os
import winreg as reg

# names of all overlay icons that shall be boosted:

boost = """
    Tortoise1Normal
    Tortoise2Modified
    Tortoise3Conflict
    Tortoise4Locked
    Tortoise5ReadOnly
    Tortoise6Deleted
    Tortoise7Added
    Tortoise8Ignored
    Tortoise9Unversioned
"""

boost = set(boost.split())

with reg.OpenKey(reg.HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE,
        r'SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion'
        r'\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers') as base:

    names = set()
    renames = []
    i = 0
    while True:
        try:
            name = reg.EnumKey(base, i)
        except OSError:
            break
        core = name.strip()
        if core in names:
            print('Delete', repr(core))
            reg.DeleteKey(base, name)
        else:
            names.add(core)
            if core in boost:
                core = ' ' + core
            if core != name:
                renames.append((name, core))
        i += 1

    if renames:
        for old_name, new_name in renames:
            print('Rename', repr(old_name), 'to', repr(new_name))
            value = reg.QueryValue(base, old_name)
            reg.CreateKey(base, new_name)
            reg.SetValue(base, new_name, reg.REG_SZ, value)
            reg.DeleteKey(base, old_name)
    else:
        print('Nothing to rename')

A: What is worked for me for Windows 10 is

*

*uninstalling TortoiseGit

*cleaning folders and register

*installing it once again

*rebooting the computer

*making random commit even not seeing the red icon

A: I noticed that overlay was managed by TortoiseSVN shell extention. This can be verified using nirsoft ShellEx View. The overlay icons disappears when I disable TortoiseSVN extensions. They apparead back when I re-enable TortoiseSVN (the blue lines in screenshot below)

In ShellEx View, select Options > Filter By Extension Type. Select System in dialog and clic OK. Then you should the TortoiseGit and TortoiseSVN extensions. Make sure all TortoiseSVN entries are enabled.
I hope the may be useful to anyone else.

A: Open regedit.
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\
You will see some thing like this:

The order is important, and in above example the Dropbox is above Tortoise, which is the cause of this issue.
To fix this I've add one more space charter to Tortoise. You can do what ever you like to move it to the top. So change    Tortoise1Normal to     Tortoise1Normal.( I suspired when I see that the    Tortoise1Normal has many spaces. The guys at tortoises thought that these many spaces make them top in registry !! While dropbox guys beat them as    DropBox has high order than    Tortoise1Normal. )
The registry will be some thing like this: ( You need to close and reopen regiedit or press F5 to see new sorting)

Finally End Task the explorer and re run it.

A: Go To "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers"
Prefix all the Tortoise*** folders with 5 White Spaces(Spacebars) - You may find Tortoise1*** to Tortoise9*** folders
Close the registry window and restart your PC.
It worked for me, i hope it works for others too.

A: *

*Exported registry file, opened in text editor and deleted leading spaces. Added exclamation (!) to front of Tortoise. Saved as Preferred-Shell-Icon-Overlay-Settings.reg

*Wrote batch file to delete key and subkeys then restore from *.reg file.

*Can run at any time, place in startup folder or write as powershell and place in task scheduler to run upon startup.

batch file:
REG DELETE HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers /F
TIMEOUT 1 > NUL
REG IMPORT "H:\GIT\Preferred-Shell-Icon-Overlay-Settings.reg"

reg file:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\!Tortoise8Ignored]
@="{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxx}"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\GoogleDriveSynced]
@="{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxx}"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers\DropboxExt01]
@="{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxx}"

A: In my case following worked -
Go to TortoiseGit -> Settings -> Icon Overlays -> CHECK THE OPTION - Drives A and B
and then overlay icons appears without restarting PC
Note: I also uninstalled one drive but I don't think that has any contribution to the solution, you can try that also.

A: For me (using Windows 10), after I install tortoise git, restarting windows explorer in TaskManager solved the issue.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Manuscript Critique
Query Critique
Summer Thrillers Giveaway! Jeffery Deaver, Lisa Scottoline, Gillian McAllister & Bev Thomas!
July 5, 2019 Mindy McGinnis
I've got literal stacks of books around the house right now, so I thought it was time to give a few away. Here's a collection of brand new, super fan thrillers for your summer beach reads! Check out the descriptions and enter to win below!
The Good Sister by Gillian McAllister: An electrifying novel about the unyielding bond between two sisters, which is severely tested when one of them is accused of the worst imaginable crime.
Martha and Becky Blackwater are more than sisters--they're each other's lifelines. When Martha finds herself struggling to balance early motherhood and her growing business, Becky steps in to babysit her niece, Layla, without a second thought, bringing the two women closer than ever. But when Layla is found dead one morning, at only eight weeks old, Becky is charged with the unthinkable: the murder of her sister's child.
Nine months later, Becky is on trial and maintains her innocence--and so does Martha. Unable to shake the feeling that her sister couldn't possibly be guilty, Martha sets out to uncover exactly what happened that night, and how things could have gone so wrong. As the trial progresses, fault lines between the sisters begin to show--revealing cracks deep in their relationship and threatening the family each has worked so hard to build. With incredible empathy and resounding emotional heft, The Good Sister is a powerhouse of a novel that will lead readers to question everything they know about motherhood, family, and the price of forgiveness.
A Good Enough Mother by Bev Thomas: A riveting page-turner that lets us inside the secret world of therapist and patient, where boundaries get crossed, and events spiral out of control. . .
Ruth Hartland is a psychotherapist with years of experience. But professional skill is no guard against private grief. The mother of grown twins, she is haunted by the fact that her beautiful, difficult, fragile son Tom, a boy who never "fit in," disappeared a year and a half earlier. She cannot give up hope of finding him, but feels she is living a kind of half-life, waiting for him to return.
Enter a new patient, Dan--unstable and traumatized--who looks exactly like her missing son. She is determined to help him, but soon, her own complicated feelings, about how she has failed her own boy, cloud her professional judgement. And before long, the unthinkable becomes a shattering reality....
An utterly compelling drama with a timebomb at its core, A Good Enough Mother is a brilliant, beautiful story of mothering, and how to let go of the ones we love when we must.
The Never Game by Jeffery Deaver: From the bestselling and award-winning master of suspense, the first novel in a thrilling new series, introducing Colter Shaw.
"You have been abandoned."
A young woman has gone missing in Silicon Valley and her father has hired Colter Shaw to find her. The son of a survivalist family, Shaw is an expert tracker. Now he makes a living as a "reward seeker," traveling the country to help police solve crimes and private citizens locate missing persons. But what seems a simple investigation quickly thrusts him into the dark heart of America's tech hub and the cutthroat billion-dollar video-gaming industry.
"Escape if you can."
When another victim is kidnapped, the clues point to one video game with a troubled past--The Whispering Man. In that game, the player has to survive after being abandoned in an inhospitable setting with five random objects. Is a madman bringing the game to life?
"Or die with dignity."
Shaw finds himself caught in a cat-and-mouse game, risking his own life to save the victims even as he pursues the kidnapper across both Silicon Valley and the dark 'net. Encountering eccentric game designers, trigger-happy gamers and ruthless tech titans, he soon learns that he isn't the only one on the hunt: someone is on his trail and closing fast.
Someone Knows by Lisa Scottoline: From the New York Times-bestselling author comes a pulse-pounding domestic thriller about a group of friends who have been bound for twenty years by a single secret—and will now be undone by it. Someone Knows is an emotional exploration of friendship and family, as well as a psychological exploration of guilt and memory.
Twenty years ago, in an upscale suburb of Philadelphia, four teenagers spent a summer as closest friends: drinking, sharing secrets, testing boundaries. When a new boy looked to join them, they decided to pull a prank on him, convincing him to play Russian roulette as an initiation into their group. They secretly planned to leave the gun unloaded—but what happened next would change each of them forever.
Now three of the four reunite for the first time since that horrible summer. The guilt—and the lingering question about who loaded the gun—drove them apart. But after one of the group apparently commits suicide with a gun, their old secrets come roaring back. One of them is going to figure out if the new suicide is what it seems, and if it connects to the events of that long-ago summer. Someone knows exactly what happened—but who? And how far will they go to keep their secrets buried?
In Book Talk Tags book
The Submission Process.... Worse Than Querying? Laura Heffernan Says Yes.
If there's one thing that many aspiring writers have few clues about, it's the submission process. There are good reasons for that; authors aren't exactly encouraged to talk in detail about our own submission experiences, and - just like agent hunting - everyone's story is different. I managed to cobble together a few non-specific questions that some debut authors have agreed to answer (bless them). And so I bring you the submission interview series - Submission Hell - It's True. Yes, it's the SHIT.
Today's guest for the SHIT (Submission Hell, It's True) is Laura Heffernan, the author of the Reality Star series (available now) and the upcoming Gamer Girls series (2019). The best place to find her is usually on Twitter, where she spends far too much time tweeting about writing, Canadian chocolate, board games and reality TV. She lives in the northeast with her husband and two furry little beasts.
How much did you know about the submission process before you were out on subs yourself?
Almost nothing. I knew that everyone said it sucks a lot, and I didn't quite believe it could be worse than querying. (Spoiler alert: it's worse than querying.)
Did anything about the process surprise you?
The main thing that surprised me about the process is how bad I felt. Like, it was very exciting in the beginning, because of course I assumed that everyone would love my book and read it right away and we'd go to auction within a couple of weeks. (Spoiler alert: that didn't happen.) But as things dragged on and we didn't get replies, it got demoralizing if I let myself think about it too much. Especially when I saw other people announce offers, and especially the ones who went out on sub after me.
Did you research the editors you knew had your ms? Do you recommend doing that?
Not at first. I knew enough about myself to realize that I didn't want to know the names of the editors who had my book, because I'd spend all my time on Twitter. I trusted my agent to tell me what was going on.
With later books, as we got to the point where editors stopped replying as much, I liked to know who had my book. I don't recommend this. I looked up one editor on Twitter and saw her make a comment about reading a book with a horse in it (she also edits historical romance, so it's not like horses are super uncommon) and because I had a horse in the book that was out, I became obsessed with the idea that she was reading my book at that very moment. (Spoiler alert: She wasn't. Or, I don't think she was. She never responded to my sub, and that was about 3 years ago.)
What was the average amount of time it took to hear back from editors?
Forever? It all feels like forever. We were getting about one response a month. Most editors took about 1-6 months to reply. Later, some editors stopped replying at all. When we got the offer, it was after about 4 months.
What do you think is the best way for an author out on submission to deal with the anxiety?
Find something else to do. Everyone says "write another book." Well, I write fast and my book was on sub for 18 months. Meaning, by the time I got an offer, I had 4 or 5 other books written. Every time someone told me to write another book, I wanted to scream.
What actually helped me is that we happened to be buying a house around the same time, but applying for mortgages, packing and moving is also not a long-term solution. The most important thing really is to have friends you can vent about the process with. Privately.
If you had any rejections, how did you deal with that emotionally? How did this kind of rejection compare to query rejections?
The first rejection we got was SO NICE that it really dulled the sting. The editor had nothing but positive things to say about me and my work. Even though she didn't buy the book, I took the time to thank her at RWA a couple of years later, because it really stuck with me. That's very different from all of the form "I didn't connect with the voice" query rejections you get.
If you got feedback on a rejection, how did you process it? How do you compare processing an editor's feedback as compared to a beta reader's?
I never got any useful feedback. I had editors say things like "We don't think we could launch it big enough." I still don't know what that means. In some ways, that's really frustrating because you don't know what changes to make. At least beta readers give you some direction.
When you got your YES! how did that feel? How did you find out – email, telephone, smoke signal?
By the time we got the yes, AMERICA'S NEXT REALITY STAR had been on sub for approximately 18 months, with two different agents. (My first agent changed positions after we went out.) My agent had nudged the remaining editors reading with no response, and we were actually preparing to go out on sub with a completely different book. I got the news while out for a walk sans phone (a very important daily ritual for me, especially during sub.) So when I saw that I had a Facebook message and email from her, I didn't really think it was unusual. But as soon as I sat down to read everything, I started crying and messaged her back right away. Since I'd completely given up on that book, it felt AMAZING to know that we finally had an offer.
Did you have to wait a period of time before sharing your big news, because of details being ironed out? Was that difficult?
We had to wait 3-4 months. In some ways, it was really tough. At the same time, I'd been on submission for 18 months at that point, so most people didn't even ask how it went (Ouch, right? I know). I wound up telling a lot of my friends privately because I was just too excited.
In SHIT Tags submission, agent, writing advice
Betty Bites Back Cover Reveal Plus ARC & Swag Pack Giveaway!
June 28, 2019 Mindy McGinnis
Yes! It's another cover reveal from yours truly. This time I'm working in tandem with my fellow authors Kate Karyus Quinn and Demitria Lunetta to share with you the cover of Betty Bites Back: Stories to Scare the Patriarchy. The three of us edited this anthology, and we're very excited to share the cover with you today!
Contributing authors:
Shannon Green
Elaine Griffin
Lindsey Klingele
Kamerhe Lane
Jenna Lehne
Demitria Lunetta
Emilee Martell
Tracie Martin
Cori McCarthy
Kyrie McCauley
Azzurra Nox
Kate Karyus Quinn
Melody Simpson
Amanda Sun
FEMINIST FICTION TO FRIGHTEN THE PATRIARCHY!
Behind every successful man is a strong woman... but in these stories, she might be about to plant a knife in his spine. The characters in this anthology are fed up - tired of being held back, held down, held accountable - by the misogyny of the system. They're ready to resist by biting back in their own individual ways, be it through magic, murder, technology, teeth, pitfalls and even... potlucks. Join sixteen writers as they explore feminism in fantasy, science-fiction, fractured fairy-tales, historical settings, and the all-too-familiar chauvinist contemporary world.
Betty Bites Back Releases September 16th!
$0.99 Pre-Order!
Enter below for a chance win an advance copy, plus a Betty Bites Back tote bag and swag from some of our awesome authors!
In Mindy's Books Tags short stories, cover art
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Nice concert from the first night in Rotterdam 1979 during the European Jazz Tour. It has tape hiss and some slight dropouts here and there. The sound quality is C+, but it changes to only C from the middle of Keep Yourself Alive till the end of the concert. The concert is complete, so that makes it nice to have. No copy errors. Most likely from mp3, so this one is not for trade. If you have a lossless and clean version of this date, then please get in touch.


He he. Yes. Chicken Festival. Going by what I saw in the press release, this seems to be like a variety of flavours of fried chicken. This festival is on till Jan 15th, so if end up going, I will update, but this is what I have as of now!
Great Marrybrown Chicken Festival' from the 15th of November till the 15th of January, 2015.
044-46218777 or logging on to order.marrybrownindia.com.
dinner coupons for MGM Beach Resort – Sea Crest and gifts from Megamart.


By default Fedora 28 has a firewall which blocks traffic reaching port 9200. This stops you being able to access Elasticsearch on this port from an external machine.
One of the ways to get around this is to forward port 9200 to another port that is accessible. However I wanted to use port 9200 for Elasticsearch so I had to change the firewall to make it accessible externally.
This adds an exception for the Elasticsearch service and unblocks port 9200 on a permanent basis.


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Initial D: Arcade Stage Ver. 2 (Initial D Ver. 2 en los Estados Unidos) es un videojuego de carreras arcade de 2002 basado en la serie Initial D desarrollado por Sega Rosso y publicado por Sega. Es el segundo juego de la serie Initial D: Arcade Stage.

Jugabilidad
Los jugadores compiten contra diferentes oponentes a través de varios pasos de montaña que aparecen en el manga. Los vehículos que aparecen en el juego son en su mayoría autos japoneses, como el Nissan Skyline GT-R, el Mazda RX-7, el Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, el Honda Civic y el Toyota AE86. Con el sistema de tarjeta magnética opcional, los jugadores pueden guardar un automóvil personalizado y su progreso para futuras sesiones; de lo contrario, se elimina su progreso en el juego. Los jugadores pueden seguir creciendo con sus cartas en otro gabinete Initial D de la misma versión. Sin embargo, la tarjeta debe renovarse cada 50 jugadas. La versión 2.0 agrega dos nuevos cursos como Akagi, el campo local de los hermanos Takahashi/Akagi Red Suns, e Irohazaka, el campo local de los Emperor.

Referencias

Enlaces externos

 Initial D: Arcade Stage Ver. 2 en Fandom

Videojuegos de 2002
Videojuegos de carreras
Videojuegos de carreras callejeras
Videojuegos de Initial D
Videojuegos de Kodansha
Videojuegos de Sega
Videojuegos basados en anime y manga
Videojuegos desarrollados en Japón
Videojuegos ambientados en Japón
Videojuegos de un solo jugador y de multijugador
Videojuegos arcade
Videojuegos arcade de Sega

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Tag: Carmel Wroth
Is The Worst Over? Models Predict A Steady Decline In COVID Cases Through March
September 24, 2021 September 24, 2021 Mary Pat Campbell
Link:https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/09/22/1039272244/is-the-worst-over-modelers-predict-a-steady-decline-in-covid-cases-through-march?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_term=nprnews&utm_campaign=npr&utm_medium=social
The most likely scenario, says Lessler, is that children do get vaccinated and no super-spreading variant emerges. In that case, the combo model forecasts that new infections would slowly, but fairly continuously, drop from about 140,000 today now to about 9,000 a day by March.
Deaths from COVID-19 would fall from about 1,500 a day now to fewer than 100 a day by March 2022.
That's around the level U.S. cases and deaths were in late March 2020 when the pandemic just started to flare up in the U.S. and better than things looked early this summer when many thought the pandemic was waning.
And this scenario projects that there will be no winter surge, though Lessler cautions that there is uncertainty in the models and a "moderate" surge is still theoretically possible.
There's wide range of uncertainty in the models, he notes, and it's plausible, though very unlikely, that cases could continue to rise to as many as 232,000 per day before starting to decline.
Author(s): Rob Stein, Carmel Wroth
Publication Site: NPR


NavTools GPS Download - Small utility to display and log GPS data.
Small utility to display and log GPS data.
NavTools GPS is a small and easy to use application to connect your PC or laptop to an existing GPS (NMEA 0183 serial connection) installation. Position data will automatically be displayed and logged on your screen, and voyage data can be exchanged with the NavTools Route voyage planning application. Required course, speed, and engine settings will automatically be calculated and position and noon reports can easily be created by the user.
Requirements NMEA0183 serial connection prefered but not required.
NavTools GPS is a small and easy to use application to connect your PC or laptop to an existing GPS (NMEA 0183 serial connection) installation. Position cata will automatically be displayed and logged on your screen, and voyage data can be exchanged and shared with the NavTools Route voyage planning application, where after required course, speed, and most economical engine settings will automatically be calculated and displayed. Position reports and noon reports can be created from NavTools GPS and many usefull navigational utilities are included in this release.
Actual Transparent Window - Add transparency effect to any window.
CwGet morse decoder - Program to decode CW via a sound card.
Actual Window Rollup - Roll up/unroll windows to title bars!
WinSettings - Protects your online privacy and security.


text:
A Majestical Photo: 'Hunt for the Wilderpeople' Star Julian Dennison Joins 'Deadpool 2'
Posted on Wednesday, June 28th, 2017 by Hoai-Tran Bui
Julian Dennison didn't choose the superhero life, the superhero life chose him.
Or rather, that's how I like to think negotiations went down when the breakout star from Hunt for the Wilderpeople was announced to join the cast of Deadpool 2 — via a very fitting Instagram photo from Ryan Reynolds depicting the diminutive Dennison being given a piggy back ride by Deadpool.
Dennison first captured our hearts and our funny bones with his role as Ricky Baker in Taika Waititi's hilarious and touching ode to the New Zealand brush in Hunt for the Wilderpeople — one of the best movies of 2016.
Now, it looks like both he and Waititi have been plucked up by the superhero industry, with Waititi helming Thor: Ragnarok — which has fans newly anticipating the film thanks to the trailer's irreverent humor — and now Dennison announced to join the cast of Deadpool 2. (Now, it's only a matter of time until Sam Neill gets cast as a supervillain.)
Reynolds posted an Instagram photo of himself in costume as Deadpool, carrying Dennison on his back (echoing a scene from Hunt for the Wilderpeople) as Dennison gives his trademark bewildered face and points to an unseen something in the distance.
Giving Julian Dennison a warm ????????L welcome as we stare off into our beautiful future together. #RickyBakerPool #NZ
A post shared by Ryan Reynolds (@vancityreynolds) on Jun 27, 2017 at 11:17pm PDT
"Giving Julian Dennison a warm [Deadpool] welcome as we stare off into our beautiful future together," Reynolds wrote, using the skull and poop emojis in place of the movie title Deadpool — in keeping with the first movie's off-the-wall viral marketing.
Dennison is a great fit for the Deadpool series, whose fourth-wall breaking humor and lightning quick, snarky dialogue matches the tone that Dennison and Waititi struck in Hunt for the Wilderpeople. I know that we encourage actors to stretch their chops from role to role, but I would be perfectly happy if Dennison just reprised his role of the blunt Ricky Baker in Deadpool 2, wandering into the movie's gory scenes and reacting with only a raised eyebrow and slight bemusement, boasting how he's all about the "skux life."
If Dennison is playing the main kid sidekick to Deadpool, as Brianna Hildebrand did as Negasonic Teenage Warhead in the first Deadpool, his presence would already be a huge 180 from Hildebrand's brooding, silent teenager who played a wonderful straight man to Reynold's wacky Wade Wilson. Whether Dennison is playing a mutant or not is yet to be seen, but I would like to see him be a normal human kid who gets pulled into Deadpool's mess of a life — who approaches existence with the same kind of devil-may-care zeal that Wade does.
Deadpool 2 started filming yesterday. Deadpool 2 will be directed by David Leitch (John Wick) with a screenplay by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. Reynolds, Morena Baccarin and Hildebrand are returning to the cast, while Josh Brolin is joining as Cable. The movie is set to hit theaters in 2018.
Superhero Bits: 'Hellboy' One-Shot Comic Coming, Vanessa Kirby Addresses Catwoman Rumors & More
Superhero Bits: 'Justice League' Deleted Scene, 'Supergirl' Gets a Haircut, Superman Smashes the Klan & More
Dwayne Johnson's 'Red Notice' Moves From Universal to Netflix as Ryan Reynolds Joins Cast
Superhero Bits: Spider-Man PS4 Gets 'Far From Home' Suits, 'Batman: Hush' Heads to Comic-Con & More
20th Century Fox, Comic Book/Superhero, Marvel Studios, Sci-Fi, Deadpool, Deadpool 2, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Julian Dennison, Ryan-Reynolds


This page is for volunteers for the Proverbs 22:9 Project at Victory Christian Center. Please locate the area for which you want to volunteer and sign up for any available slots that you can attend. If there is an opening, then we still need someone to volunteer for those times. You should receive a reminder email or text message prior to your arrival time, but PLEASE keep track of your own times. If there are no volunteer positions available, then we do not need volunteers at that time. Once you are signed up, you should receive a confirmation email, and also you should receive a reminder email or text message prior to your arrival time. You should also receive a notification if there are any changes made to your scheduled time. Thank you for your love for Jesus, and for your support for this Project.


When an elderly, scruffy mole catcher presented a farmer's wife with a notebook filled with stories of his younger life as a poacher, she could perhaps have been forgiven if she hadn't foreseen them becoming one of East Anglia's best loved tales of country life. But when local writer Lilias Rider-Haggard read these engaging memoirs of the self-proclaimed King of the Norfolk Poachers', she encouraged him to write more. His story became 'I Walked by Night', published in 1935.
Seventy years later, Charlotte Paton was struck by the similarity between the poacher's description of a lodge in which he had lived, and her own house. As a keen genealogist Charlotte could not resist this tantalising coincidence and set out to discover if she did indeed share a home with one of Norfolk's best-loved rogues. The first step was to find out his name: Frederick Rolfe.
This was to be the unexpected start of a seven year project researching this secretive man. Charlotte has presented her surprising finding in her own book, The King of the Norfolk Poachers.
Rolfe's reputation is surrounded by as much hearsay as truth; Charlotte's research reveals a man surviving through poaching in rural communities in Norfolk - around which he moved to keep ahead of the law - and Bungay, Suffolk in the early twentieth century. He left behind him a trail of broken laws, broken hearts and a complex family tree which took years to unravel.
Charlotte is as tenacious as her subject and has left no stone unturned in her hunt for the truth. She consulted court archives, birth, marriage and death registers, and tracked down the people who still remember Fred as well as the surviving members of his family. This has allowed her book to become an enlightening background to the lives of the rural poor and the ways of a poacher around Fred's lifetime.
This has truly been a labour of love. It is the biography of a difficult and unreliable man who came to an unexpected and tragic end. You will want to dislike him, but instead you may suddenly find yourself willing him to win.
To purchase, please visit Old Pond Publishing Ltd or any good book shop.
The King of the Norfolk Poachers, by Charlotte Paton, has been shortlisted in the Biography and Memoir category of the 2010 EDP-Jarrold East Anglian Book Awards, sponsored by The Writers' Centre, Norwich and Community University Engagement East.


text:
Senna är en dokumentärfilm som handlar om den omkomne racerföraren Ayrton Sennas liv. Filmen skildrar mestadels Ayrton Sennas Formel 1 karriär från dess början 1984 fram till hans död 1994.

Referenser

Webbkällor

Brittiska biografifilmer
Brittiska dokumentärfilmer
Brittiska sportfilmer
Franska biografifilmer
Franska dokumentärfilmer
Franska sportfilmer
Brittiska filmer 2010
Engelskspråkiga filmer
Franskspråkiga filmer
Japanskspråkiga filmer
Portugisiskspråkiga filmer
Franska filmer 2010


text:
Hans Jørn Fogh Olsen (* 14. November 1943 ) er en dansk astronom og asteroideforsker.

Mellem 1984 og 1987 opdagede han sammen med sine kolleger Karl Augustesen og Poul Jensen i alt fire asteroider ved Brorfelde-observatoriet nær Holbæk.

Asteroiden (5323) Fogh blev opkaldt efter ham.

Referencer

Astronomer fra Danmark


the islands up north will be spared. May God have mercy on us all.
LIVE ON THE SOUTH OF THE ISLAND.
It's 8.45 pm and it is dry in Port of Spain.
cause it has not moved at all for quite a while. It is still warm, 82 F.
there was a competition for least prepared, we'd win by a million miles.
At the same time, God be with all of you up north. So long for now.
Well we here have been officially advised that the Storm Watch has been lifted in Trinidad and Tobago as Jose' is taking a more north westerly track that will put it just south of Barbados. However the local Met office has predicted a lot of heavy rains/thunder storms associated with the feeder bands from the storm.
Its now 7.30pm on Tuesday 18th October and its very overcast and still. There was no panic buying today as most Trinidadians I guess are now taking our extreme good fortune, with respect to not having a hit from a storm for many years, somewhat for granted.
the Chain have a lucky escape like we have.
we have no rain here, perhaps this is the lull before the storm? Who knows?
I expect a good downpour within minutes.
so far away we did not hear the thunder.
and Tobago, Grenada and its dependencies.
and the wind is calm.
in case". More to follow.
- Oh no you don't.
I know it's been a while since my last post. Thing is, our troubles here have been so minor compared to everyone else's. My sympathy to those of you who suffered losses from Floyd and Irene.
Earlier this year I felt that if we got past the first part of the season we would have been spared the threat of any real activity down this way. Well, it shows how much I know. We have a potential monster breathing in our face here wanting to be recognised as Jose and we're half way through October. So far most of our activity has been pretty normal rainwise.
However last week we did have an occurrence of hail in the St. Augustine area. Also in Woodbrook one eyewitness described a swirling wind starting under the inspection shed of the motor licensing department and growing as it moved out unto Wrightson Road. It eventually became a tornado powerful enough to take the roofs off two houses in the vicinity and pile all the galvanize on top of the nearby power plant building forty feet high.
Since my last post when we had a couple of really heavy shower spells, everything seems to have changed. Emily Floyd and Gert followed in quick succession and the general pattern has been so much more volatile regionally, so much so looking at online satellite pictures I had to wonder what happened to the prevailing winds, usually the North East Trades.
At the moment we are experiencing southwesterly breezes strong enough to slam heavy panel doors ( windows are open ) which is unusual for this time of night here. I also noticed low clouds moving in a north to south direction rather quickly since earlier this evening before I heard about TD14.
Well for the time being the only thing to do is pray and wait. Tomorrow will bring a more definite picture of what we're dealing with and what's to be done. Trinidad is not an "experienced" hurricane island and this does not give us a lot of time to plan and do very much. Even the Emergency Management people are going to be behind on this one. Personally I'll look the thing in the "eye" and tell it "Oh no you don't, you're not welcome here. This is God's own country."
- Update 16th Aug 1999.
speak, or maybe entered another phase.
rapidly between yesterday and today.
get into storage. I hope they get all they need.
posts will follow. Hi to fellow correspondents across the Caribbean..
Bye for now, God bless you all.
since returned home, usually south of here, over Georgetown Guyana :-).
"washed" at home on that side of the house, an irregular occurance.
plus "agegroup" were biting again after a bit of a lull.
hope your water situation improves soon.
(again) and this time above the surface. Just food for thought.
Comedy Festival billed for tonight has been postponed.
helping with the heat some. That's all for now, God bless you all.
Well I found this site and did this too late last year.
is, we will have to watch out this year.
problem in dryer years. This year was not as dry.
here. Compliments on the good work Gert.


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Malta techno festival Drumcode cancelled after company entrusted with event logistics goes bust
The highly anticipated techno festival, Drumcode, has been cancelled after the British logistics company chosen to organise the venue failed to meet customer and venue safety standards amid reports it has gone bust
by Maya Dimitrijevic
Photo: (Drumcode, Facebook)
Drumcode festival, a techno event that was meant to take place in Malta on 15 September has been cancelled, organisers have announced.
The highly anticipated techno festival which last took place in Amsterdam in 2019, has been cancelled after UK-based company Pollen, entrusted with the organisation of the event, failed to live up to its commitments. Organisers said Pollen did not meet customer and venue safety standards, did not provide suitable staffing and failed in the financial management of the event.
The line-up saw a number of leading figures in the music scene including Adam Beyer, Alan Fitzpatrick, Ben Klock, Joris Voorn and Richie Hawtin among others.
Tickets to this event were marketed as a four-day curated techno experience, with the 'standard' ticketing price beginning at €259 and 'luxury' tickets selling for €569.
The festival's Facebook event page had 1,800 people marking themselves as 'going' and 4,800 saying they were interested.
However, producer Adam Beyer who is also founder of Drumcode Records, said in a statement shared on social media that "these serious failings, compounded by the absence and lack of communication of key Pollen staff and the well-publicised difficulties that the company is currently experiencing, left the delivery of the event compromised to the extent that we could not continue our involvement in good faith."
In their statement, the Drumcode Festival team said that they have not received any payments from UK company Pollen, and have urged their followers to immediately contact the company to organise refund for the event and accommodation.
Pollen is a UK destination events platform company founded in 2014 by brothers Callum and Liam Negus-Fancey. According to international reports, the company is headed for bankruptcy after it failed to find a buyer. It has also failed to pay staff.
The cancellation of this event was met with outrage on social media by party goers who were planning to attend the Malta festival.
Some have blamed the Drumcode organisers for choosing to work with the "failing company", and also for announcing the cancellation just one month prior to the event taking place.
A number of those planning to attend had warned on the event comment section, before the cancellation was announced, against Pollen being involved, pointing out their dire financial situation.
Pollen has yet to comment on the allegations put forward by the festival organisers.
Maya Dimitrijevic is a social media journalist at MaltaToday
More from Maya Dimitrijevic


Everyone has been there before. The first day of a new job. You have an idea constructed in your mind of how things will be, but once you get started, all of that goes out the window. It was no different for me when I began my ESL teaching position abroad in South Korea. In fact, it was even more so given that I was moving so far from home to a country that I knew relatively little about, didn't speak the language, and was still on the fence about the cuisine.
I remember my director picking me up from the airport and driving me through the streets of the town that was soon to be my home for the next year. So many lights and interesting buildings the likes of which I had not been accustomed to back in the United States. "Rest well" were the words he told me as it would be the very next day that I was to start my new job as the head ESL instructor. After a long and strenuous flight across the Pacific Ocean, slept is exactly what I did. The next morning, not as well rested as I would have liked to have been, I steeled my self for the challenging day ahead. I remember the turbulent mixture of excitement and anxiety as I made the first of what would become my daily walks to work. Knowing that I would be teaching English to Korean children was all I knew about the job. I had no idea what to expect in terms of their behavior, curriculum, nor the details of how I was to conduct each and every type of lesson. Believe me when I say that despite my prior ESL training, I felt incredibly overwhelmed.
But when I walked into the school for the very first time and instantly became the target of so many young children's curiosity, my concerns became significantly relieved. Question after question, in English, about things like where I was from, how old I was, if I liked Kim-Chi or not, why my hair was yellow, etc. Throughout the day, I was taken by the hand to class after class by a new child to be shown off as some kind of show-and-tell figurine to their classmates. I was instantly in the thick of things with these little ones. There were so many questions concerning the particulars of my life in the States, I had to answer to things that I hadn't given much thought to in some time.
While to some this may sound overbearing, I personally feel that there was no greater way to 'take the plunge', so to speak. The level of energy and interest displayed by the children truly helped me to feel more welcomed than overwhelmed for as the day progressed, I slowly felt that anxiety vanishing and in it's place, a feeling of belonging that would continue to flourish over the following year. Indeed, my first day couldn't have gone over any better with my new young students along with my wonderful co-workers who helped me to feel just as welcome among them.
That was the beginning of what was to become a wonderful experience for me working abroad. The level of culture I experienced coupled with the knowledge that I was making a difference in these young children's English education was an incredible feeling I experienced on a daily basis and will cherish for the rest of my life.
Certification Courses, esl-blog, Meet our staff! ESL classroom, ESL students, meet our teachers, teach english abroad, TEFL. permalink.


text:
'Before facts known'
This is a cautionary tale about the dark side of social media. This is a classic case of what can happen when the jackals on Twitter pounce too quickly.
In the wee hours of yesterday morning, The Los Angeles Times reported that the heretofore obscure John Bryson, the U. S. Secretary of Commerce, had been involved in two traffic mishaps on Saturday. According to the cops, he rear-ended a car in San Gabriel, paused long enough to speak with the men in the rear-ended car, then drove off – after hitting the car again. Within minutes, Bryson allegedly collided with another car. Soon thereafter, he was found unconscious behind the wheel of his own car. He was then transported to a local hospital.That's the sum total of what was known when the sun rose in the east yesterday. Yet within minutes, the Twitter sewage began to flow. Twitching fingers cannot remain idle, lest someone else be first with the snark. So a theme quickly developed: Bryson's driving was a stain on President Obama (of course!).Here's a small sampling. Jim Gerharty of the conservative National Review gleefully tweeted: "The U. S. Department of Commerce is FAST AND FURIOUS." Some guy in Philadelphia tweeted: "Every second Commerce Secy John Brysonn remains employed, I'll think less of Prez Obama." One of Karl Rove's Republican groups, American Crossroads, tweeted: "John Bryson cited for reckless endangerment of the economy & failure to yield to common sense, but he's #DoingFine."How predictable that Karl Rove's shop would be banging the keyboard over this incident. Another tweet, supposedly channeling the voice of Obama: "Wait, John Bryson is my Commerce Secy? Who knew, sure he's #DoingFine." And then, just in case those tweets didn't sufficiently titillate, the Rove team doubled-down: "How does CommerceSec have 3 car crashes in 5 minutes and alcohol NOT be involved??"Did Rove's outfit have any evidence that Bryson had been drunk? Of course not. But the beauty of social media is that no evidence is necessary. There's no need to know anything. Typing trumps thinking. The urge to spew is stronger than the weighing of facts.We all know that the concept of gatekeepers is so last century. But the gatekeepers – known as editors – performed a valuable role back when newspapers were strong. At their best, they ensured that stories didn't surface publicly until the reporting was complete. There's a great scene in the movie All The President's Men, when Woodward and Bernstein show one of their early Watergate stories to editor Ben Bradlee – and Bradlee shoots them down. "You haven't got it," growls the editor, as he kills the story. "Get some harder information next time." I hoot whenever I watch that. Today, the partial info would be sliced and diced within minutes on the phone in your pocket.It's great that social media gives everyone the chance to weigh in on politics; at its best, it's a democratizing tool. But at its worst, and all too frequently, it aids and abets the headlong rush to judgment. The Bryson case is exhibit A – because, by mid-morning in the east, some fresh reporting surfaced in the mainstream media. It turned out that Bryson had apparently crashed those cars because he had suffered a seizure. (He's now on medical leave.)Oops! The Rove shop, in particular, had rushed to judgment so egregiously that, after hearing the news about the seizure, it felt compelled to issue an apology, of sorts. First, it expunged the aforementioned tweets. Then it tweeted anew: "Earlier Bryson tweet…attempted levity (before facts known) and failed miserably. We took it down and regret the tweet.""Before facts known." That says it all. That's the dark side of social media.Granted, it's amazing, and thus somewhat heartening, that any group affiliated with Karl Rove would issue an apology – but still, I have to ask: Even if Bryson had been drunk, where is the "levity" in that?Anyway. After the tweeters blessedly fell silent on Bryson, after all the smoke had cleared, the veteran commentator Jeff Greenfield posted this remark at 12:30 p.m.: "Most underused line in Twitter-era Journalism: 'We really don't know what happened yet.'"That was the smartest tweet of all.——-
Today's post was featured this afternoon on Fishbowl LA. Thanks, gang.
Follow me on Twitter, @dickpolman1
Brought to you by National Interest
Dick Polman's column appears weekly on WHYY.org/News. He also contributes to The Atlantic online and is a writer-in-residence at the University of Pennsylvania.