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A LIFE WITH ENTRANCES AND EXITS BY ANTHONY BACON
Anthony Bacon was the pen name of a British Royal Air Force pilot and indomitable lover of boys. His brief memoir, A Life with Entrances and Exits, is published here for the first time in three chapters, of which the following is the first.
Chapter One. Early Years
Conceived around Christmas 1936, I arrived in this world towards the end of 1937. My earliest memories of life involved a large house that had a coaching-arch that opened onto a busy street in a Midland English city. My father was then a prosperous doctor and though my first memories of life must have coincided with World War 2, life for us was still good. We had servants and I would wait in the archway for my father to come home from visiting his patients. He would grin at me and blip the throttle of his Frazer-Nash BMW as he passed through the confined archway. I would shriek with delight and run after him as he parked the car in the stables, there to be hugged very briefly, before being handed over to Nanny.
Which was a lot of parents did in those days. Nanny was a tall, dark, thin, very severe woman whom truly I feared. I was convinced that she was a witch.
Perhaps she was.
The great city of Birmingham was very close by and during the bombing of those heavily industrial areas, we would huddle down in my father's wine-cellar, while Father himself drove out to help the victims of the German raids. I can remember being terrified by both the claustrophobic huddling; the ominous crumps as bombs that fell nearby, and by the fact that my much-loved father was out there, in danger.
A Birmingham street after a 2nd World War bombing raid
The intense fear of confining-spaces has stayed with me all my life. I was not alone in this. A great many of we war-time kids suffered the same terrifying claustrophobia after the war.
Even now, I can remember my mother as a cool and rather remote person who found it difficult to display affection. I was the third child, with an elder brother and sister. I can't be exact, but I think that it must have been about the end of 1942 when my father and mother broke up. I still find it amazing that my father chose to keep my brother to himself; while my sister and I went off to live in the countryside with my mother. It was a terribly unhappy time. Thereafter, I rarely saw my father or my brother, and my mother moved restlessly from pillar to post with my sister and I. Money was a problem, but despite that, I was sent away to board at a preparatory school when I was seven. I was there until I was ten. I was taken away because my mother's personal money had run out.
I sadly and fearfully began life in a series of village primary schools. Oh yes, and one vile place in the back-streets of Rugby. I am doing my best to forget that Dickensian little dump!
Life in 1947 Britain — and for years thereafter — was hard for everyone. A lot of families had broken up and I had another problem. I was the 'kid with toffee-apple accent'. Something deep in my nature made it impossible for me to change. It took my sister five minutes to parrot the new local dialect whenever we moved; but simply I couldn't. It is no surprise therefore, that this little snob often arrived home from school with a black eye. But oddly, I think that my stubbornness and general toughness had its origin in my three years at that 'posh' prep school. Born with a silver spoon in your mouth? Freezing rooms and harsh discipline, perfectly foul food — in wartime — bullying by senior boys and purple bruises on one's bottom from being beaten for the most trivial acts. These things will harden any child?
I soon got used to having to exhibit the purple stripes on my bottom to the rest of my dorm. We would often compare welts: "Look, Hails has a darker purple!" someone would say.
The newer fashion in boys' underwear, 1940s
Most boys in the 1940s wore rather unattractive, baggy-woolly underpants. A few, though, had begun to appear in briefer, much neater designs in fine white cotton. The 1940s answer to Y-fronts, in fact. One such was a fellow denizen of the Fourth's Dorm at my prep school called Kesteven. Though we were only ten, I had started to become interested in the sheer beauty of this boy — nicknamed Pretty Peter — and it left me mysteriously unsettled. How can I remember details like this from so very long ago? Honestly, I don't know.
Up to that age I'd already had a few boy and the odd girl explorations. Just fun?
But looking back to that summer-term evening, I remember a sudden clearing-of-the-mists about sex generally and about prep school sex in particular. We had been sent to bed after prep and tepid cocoa — as usual — and of course it was still light. All of us were changing into PJs and I became aware that Pretty Peter was standing thoughtfully by his bed, simply gazing down at his neat little white pants:
"D'you know, Parkinson is right" he mused "…these pants really are designed to be pulled down".
I came apart laughing and everyone who was close enough to hear Kesteven did the same. I realize now that — as was I was shrieking with mirth and as I literally held my sides and was gasping — I sort of 'watched and listened' to all of those vague jig-saw pieces falling into place. Those mysteries of life that had merely been felt before? All of those half-realized impressions; half-heard conversations and those half-believed 'facts of life'.
Everything coalesced into a certainty that Parkinson and Kesteven truly were 'doing it'! And I realized what 'doing it' actually meant…
Parkinson was a very tall Sixth Former. At least, he seemed enormously tall to me.
I had recently gazed at his lordly self while he was changing after games. My popping eyes had nearly popped right out. He had a small puff of dark hair on his tummy! My God — I looked away quickly!
The odd thing was that even then I knew that if Parkinson had made a move towards little me — I'd have run a mile.
So what did I want? I knew suddenly that I wanted brave, adventurous boys like Pretty Peter. He wasn't even slightly effeminate, for a start. He had a quick-wit and intelligence that deeply, I admired. He was in fact the protype of my first real love, Bevil, although of course, I didn't know that then.
Sometime later, I covertly asked Kesteven what it was like. He flushed and rolled his eyes, giggled and said that "It hurt at first, but then it was OK" and then he wouldn't say anymore, but I saw that his vaguely thoughtful face was calm and happy. Clearly, 'it' was OK?
Which left me even more unsettled, but now in a different way… My own first boy-on-smaller-boy event followed soon after. No more mysteries for me! It wasn't an all-the-way thing like Kesteven's. I was too shy and not assertive enough back then, but it was hugely exciting…
One factor about that private school had already had a deep effect upon me. We Squeakers — the youngest boys — clung together for warmth like terrified rabbits and the relationships that I had, back then, will be remembered until the day I die. It was John le Carré who wrote — words to the effect: "…bereft of the love of our families, we little boys clung together like sticky monkeys".
Intense and often entirely platonic, these huddles were sometimes also intensely warm and physical and were almost always conducted after Lights Out. Bed-hopping was done by all the boys that I knew well. In practical terms it was easier to keep warm on freezing nights with two in a bed? Boyhood curiosity being what it always has been, some of these nocturnal meetings involved sexual explorations… 'Pulling the twig' was a favourite game. Sometimes vague and sometimes strong feelings of love and a growing knowledge of what went where was crystallized. In my case, a sort of step forward happened one night with a boy called Mayfield. We called him Maybug, of course, and he was an insanely brave and mischievous boy who always seemed to be showing the rest of us his newly acquired purple bum-stripes.
Predictably, he had also learned more from the senior boys. Much more than I had!
One night he suddenly turned to me and pulled the cord of my pyjama pants, kissed me and moved in close to rut against my bare tummy. Astonished, I responded and two small pistons jousted until an amazing peak of feeling came and went and we slowed and then stopped moving. In my case, puffing and confused. In those days, I couldn't even spell the word orgasm, but I was thereafter left in no doubt about what that weird climax felt like. Neither of us ever spoke about it during the day, and sadly, I had to come to terms with sharing Maybug with several other boys. Mostly, bed-hopping seniors.
Although I was skinny, I had a pudding face. Maybug, though not the prettiest boy in the Fourth Form, was almost always sought out when senior boys made their nocturnal visits. These seniors, I should point out, were huge, hulking twelve and thirteen-year-olds — and according to Maybug — one didn't say no to a Sixth Former!
Honestly though, I don't think Maybug ever wanted to say no!
Reading J R Ackersley's account of his schooldays at Rossall. I was amazed at the restraint of a senior boy he described as lying on the floor begging to be let into his bed. At my prep school, the quite commonly seen, roving-senior boy — roving after Lights Out, that is — would simply pull aside his loved-one's bed-clothes and climb in.
Begging to be 'let in'? It was the God-given right of any hulking 12 or 13-year-old Sixth Former back in my prep days, simply to have a pretty Third, or Fourth Former.
Were those little people raped? I think some of them were probably quite firmly treated, but one never heard any sounds of pain, or, subsequent blubbing…
And the thing was that no-one ever made disparaging remarks to that younger boy. The feeling was that he couldn't help being pretty?
Me, I did receive the passing attentions of a senior who wore heavy glasses. I most certainly wasn't pretty enough to be chosen by the Captain of Cricket! I think Gig-Lamps mostly wanted warmth and comfort, rather than full-on sex…. Though he did rather ineffectually try…
He was a very clever kid and you'd expect him to have known that he needed at least some lip-salve to get into my tight and nervous little bum…
Perhaps he really didn't want to? ...
Are you perhaps finding it difficult to believe that, particularly, those senior prep-boys were so active and so highly-focused? Or, so freely seminal? I have to tell you that even though we were always cold and underfed in those mid-40s days, the seniors — though they would have smaller and thinner at 12 or 13 then than they would be now — were most of them able properly to come.
Above all, they were fascinated by the acts of sex available to them.
OK, not all of them were wired that way, but remember that preps were very much harsher places back then. Mercy for a small person was soon overcome by a pair of silky-smooth legs and a neat little bottom? "We've been through the mill" they would say "…now it's our turn".
Whispers told us that a couple of masters were similarly fond of the older boys, but that seemed impossibly remote from myself and somehow it did not even relate to kind old Mr Pendarvis. This kind old man would gently fumble our bottoms when we were called up to his desk to have our work corrected. Not long after I left, I heard of his death and many years after that, I had a chance to visit the local churchyard and found his head-stone. Having no family of his own, the school had simply inscribed the stark words: "William John Pendarvis — Beloved Man…" and, of course the dates of his birth and his death. I stood in that peaceful place and wept for the one truly humane adult at that school.
Even the matron was as severe as my nanny had been. We called her the Wicked Witch of the Woods and though we suffered boils and impetigo because of our foul war-time diet, we Squeakers would do almost anything to avoid going to see her.
Go to her with a sniffle and you would get half an aspirin and a huge, hard thermometer thrust up your bottom…
One master, we all hated. He had come back from the war with a badly lamed leg and he always had this stout ash walking-stick with him. He would lash out at our legs as we passed him in corridors, for no good reason. We called him Frax. We clever little toads, you see, knew that Fraxinus was the generic name for ash-trees. He taught Maths, which I believe is one of the reasons I have always hated the subject.
So, after prep school, there was a series of state-run primary schools. Moving restlessly around the southern counties meant that my subsequent education lacked continuity and to be truthful, some of those schools didn't really deserve the name. So, it was a huge surprise to me and my family when I passed the so-called 11-plus exam and found myself at a co-ed grammar school.
This first year of my secondary education is remembered as a truly awful, uniformly grey kind of boredom. Except for the man who taught English. He was quite mad and a totally brilliant, inspirational teacher. He probably instantly forgot this still skinny Pudding Face soon after he'd met him, but I for one will never forget his manic energy in banging open the classroom door and shouting the kind of excerpts from Shakespeare that he knew would inspire even the dullest 12-year-olds — of either sex. Before the siege of Harfleur, the young Henry the Fifth exhorts to his dwindling, sickening army:
Henry V before Harfleur by James McConnell
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;
We loved his madness and even the girls would preen for his attention, even though they feared him. In an age when schoolmasters were often violent, he was loud and unpredictable, but always gentle. Inspiring us all; he lit a fire in me that has never left me. To this day, I have read and loved William Shakespeare's plays and poetic works. His was the only class in which I scored top marks. I knew him simply as Mr Wilson. His real name was John Anthony Burgess Wilson and years later, in a totally deranged period of only three weeks, he was to write the dystopian novel A Clockwork Orange.
At the end of that first year, I completely amazed myself and everyone else, by winning a scholarship to an ancient boarding grammar school in the same county. This left me very nervous, but my mother very happy. She had quickly worked it out that it would cost her less to keep me at this new school than it would to keep me at home. She could do this especially well if I worked on farms throughout my school holidays to provide money to give to my housemaster for my term-time pocket-money!
At this new school, I quickly discovered that if you confined yourself to playing a lot of sport and modestly lowered your eyes when senior boys were about, you could do quite well.
What strange places British boarding schools were! The man responsible for Music, French & Drama at B———, was a wispy little passive homosexual whose love-objects were big, sweaty Sixth Formers for whom he provided the weight-training equipment! And whom he admiringly watched while they grunted and their muscles bulged...
In fact, he was a really nice guy and he opened my ears to classical music when I was thirteen — an art-form that has been important to me ever since. He, too, happily worked within the constraints of Shakespeare's all male stage tradition, choosing the prettiest, youngest-looking boys to play the girls in the full knowledge that those same boys had lovers among the older boys who played the men in our play extracts.
It must have been close to the time of my 'epiphany' that I saw a beautiful boy dressed up as Juliet in the stage-lights and my heart nearly stopped, right there! My certainty about my feelings for boys-as-boys, though, must have been merely days away from that event, I think…
I went through a chubby period and then I suddenly shot skywards. At fourteen I was as skinny as a rake and over six feet tall. Natural enemies fell away, and only a few days after my fourteenth birthday, an earth-shattering event took place. To that day — apart from the episodes with Maybug — I had enjoyed quite a number of explorations with boys, and several girls, but sitting in the changing-room one day after a vigorous game of inter-house rugby, I was drying myself lazily and feeling endorphin-happy and very relaxed. I remember being sure that I had been the last in the showers and I was surprised when a smaller, younger person came flying in naked — as was I — and grabbed his towel off his numbered peg to dry himself.
I suddenly knew, in that instant, that I had never seen anything so perfectly beautiful in my life before. Though I was just fourteen, Bevil was only a couple of weeks younger than me. Yet, in the way these things happen, I had the physique of a young man, while this boy I knew as Bev was still a smooth, neat, perfectly hairless boy. Eyes popping, I covered my rapidly erecting lap and gazed at the slender creature and found my eyes filling with tears. Ridiculously, I felt the beginning-pressure of an orgasm close by at the same time!
By this time, I was very familiar with the commonplace double-desk and the hole-in-the-pocket-friend — doing what we at grammar school called 'the cross-hands-boogie' (after the Winnie Atwell piano piece).
Usually in Maths, in my case… Oh, the joy of squirting all over his hand and getting his warm load all over mine! It was like a sort of affirmation of friendship.
I suppose, in hindsight, I could say that my explorations in sexuality had been pretty normal for that day and age, though later I remember positively thinking that boys were more fun, less complicated than girls. Easier to know? Thinking about it, years later, it seemed that a slow sort of fugal build-up had begun after I was twelve and had seen me preferring boys, and then there was this sudden Epiphany — as I later thought of it — which was the end of that long fugue. My intense feelings for boys are still the same, nearly seventy years later.
I was, in that instant, both passionately and tenderly in love. We had struck up a friendship before this and I had envied Bevil his quick intelligence. As well, I admired his physical courage. Though small and skinny, he had distinguished himself as our house scrum-half. He would often come off the field injured, but grinning cheekily and making light of his cuts and bruises…
Another Maybug? Yes!
In a dark corridor, a couple of days later, I started one of those tussles that are part of school life. Play-wrestling that involved rib-tickling and noisy, fierce-seeming sounds, ritualized moves of a kind of formalized combat — but above all — expressing covert affection. I bathed in his small-neatness, his giggling, puffing warmth and his healthy boy-smell:
"Bully!" he giggled breathlessly:
"Worm!" I replied, gently cuffing his ears and suddenly — in that dusty corridor alone with Bev — I was kissing him. Properly. He was shocked into utter stillness for a moment — then he was kissing me back…
So, back to the changing-room. Why had I cried as I realized what I was feeling for this beautiful younger boy? Simply, as I felt that glorious surge of sheer love — an intense happiness mingled with troubling fears for the future. I knew that, while at that school, I could be happy and love any boy I pleased. Outside in the wide world I would be sent to prison for what I felt and what I did with boys. Even, as some of the kill-joys would now have it, I could be sent to prison just for my thoughts!
My beloved Bevil was still beautiful at the age of 15. He was a wonderful actor and he could still sing supremely well, both in the soprano and the alto ranges.
One day, blushing slightly, he asked me:
"Anthony, am I freak?" and I replied:
"Yes, Bev, you are!" I said "…the most beautiful freak in the world and I will always love you!" he blushed and he giggled and we hugged — even though our physical relationship had ended the year before — after which he had taken up with a muscle-bound Sixth Former…
"Anthony, you should see his…" he giggled, his huge eyes as round as florins!
Was he a true homosexual? Constitutionally, I mean? I have no idea, but oh God, I wish I still had a photograph of him!
Imagine a boy with silky blond hair and sky-blue eyes, and you have my first great love! Oh yes and provide a sweetly gentle nature and a heartful of love and laughter; and you have my lovely sexy Saxon boy! But the thing about Bevil was that he was insanely brave. He climbed into the school Ist XV at the same time as I did and he was a brilliant scrum-half…
Now let me tell you a tale-of-a-tail involving my long, bony and very foolish fourteen-year-old self. It was during the summer holidays following my sexual epiphany at my boarding grammar school.
I still liked girls in a vague sort of way, but I liked them more as people. On the other hand, younger boys made my wheels really spin…
by Pierre Joubert
Not that far off my fifteenth birthday, you wouldn't have known it to look at me. That I was nearly fifteen, that is. I had a baby-face that continued to exasperate me until I was in my early twenties and it was comically attached to my immensely elongated frame. Well even I had to giggle at that.
I was desperately missing Bevil, my small blond foil — as beautiful as I was plain, as compact as I was rangy — and my lover since the September before. Though the affair was smoothing down into a good friendship, by then.
I think Bev had simply started to grown up!
While I… Well, there was me in the village and there was Tim, outside the shop. I thought he must be thirteen at least, but getting into casual conversation (I was quite good at chatting up boys) he said that he was twelve and he was proud to have passed the Eleven-Plus and would be starting at the local grammar school in September.
I showed genuine enthusiasm, because I really was pleased and he was beguilingly beautiful… And, as I said, as slender as a wand… Did I say that? Well he was and I very much wanted to be his friend and I told him how I had started at his new school until I got a scholarship to my present school — blah, blah, blah…
And yes, I got off on the admiration in his huge eyes and we walked and talked and I told him of my ancient boarding school and its totally weird traditions, blah, blah, blah, and he laughed a lot and eventually I walked home with what we then called 'the bone'.
The bone didn't last long once I had reached the bathroom…
I met Tim a couple more times and I think that this very bright boy quickly sensed that the reason this much older boy was so friendly had basically to do sex and he shyly accepted the fact. In fact, I became certain of this in our obligatory friendly tussles in the long-grass— he fending-off my gentle forays with smiling good-nature — and me laughingly repeating the gentle tweaks a few minutes later.
But was he repelled? No. Was he, on the other hand, receptive? Well, he continually wore a pair of footer-shorts that must have been bought for him more than two years before and they hid very little…
But then, we all did, back then. It was the style and I loved it. I also realized that I loved Tim. His quiet, gentle ways; his impish sense of humour, and yes, I even liked the way he would turn sulky to let me know he'd had enough of the touchy-feely stuff!
When I asked him if he would come camping with me, he rolled his lovely eyes and giggled. We both knew it was a straightforward proposition and I hooted with laughter at his reaction. After a lot of pink thought, he said that he'd ask his parents. My heart sank and then I was I was surprised and delighted when he said that his people had given their permission!
I jumped about like an idiot and Tim told me that there was one condition. The tent had to be pitched in their back-garden and we had to invite his ten-year-old brother and his eight-year-old sister. I gave him my best death's-head smile and I consoled myself that even sleeping next to this lovely leggy-boy would be heaven…
In fact, the event was a lot of fun. Tim's parent's provided sausage-rolls and sweet cocoa and an ancient oil-lamp that I was given strict charge of, and the evening went off very well with the younger kids rolled up on one air-bed, cocooned in blankets and amicably, though rather restlessly asleep. I had a sort of agility-mat and my zip-up sleeping-bag and Tim also — between myself and the younger kids — had a thin mattress and two blankets.
Did I deliberately arrange it, or was it an accident? I can't remember, but I ended up on my left side and Tim also rolled onto his left side. After I had turned off the rather horrid old lamp, I could therefore gently reach in under his blankets and presto — we were 'lying-like-spoons' — as we always described that position at my school…
Obviously, this facilitates whispered conversations and if the boy behind should let his right-hand wander and the boy in front is not unwilling…
And Tim, for the first time, did not bat my hand away from his now rigid Wand of Youth… Elgar's music was never more sweet than my being able to play with his lovely hot toy, but when I went gently to pull down those footer-shorts, he firmly shook his head and there was just enough light to see him nod towards his siblings.
by Nicholas Wilde
Deeply disappointed, I resorted to stroking the real object of my desires — his small, neat, padded-seat. The thin calico of his shorts and the not much thicker cotton of his pants seemed to radiate the boy himself, his life and his vitality, his gentle-sweetness and after a while, I again started on the waistband of his shorts. Again, he shook his head and my whisper was more like a despairing bleat:
"Please, Tim!"
He was completely still and I knew — without being able properly to see — that he was in a furious sulk:
"Oh, alright, then!" he hissed and, trembling like a drunk, I bared his sweet little sit-upon, got a glob of lip-salve onto Oscar and tremulously closed with the warm crevice — there, there — very, very gently — eased into the dark blood-heat of the most beautiful boy in Little Writhing, Oxfordshire…
My orgasm was all too soon and unearthly and I'm sure that my heart stopped for a while…
But have you ever tried to make love silently?
He felt pain, as he must have known that he would, but though — on the one hand he didn't want to do it — on the other he did?
Yes, I know that's nonsense! But then Tim was conflicted.
Later, he admitted that he'd been called Pretty Boy in Primary School and he'd hated it.
Then along comes me and I wanted to treat him like a girl! I laughed and made everything worse by saying that girls didn't make me want to fuck the socks off them he then sulked dramatically and said that that made him feel much better!
So, I got angry too and shouted that he must be stupid if he couldn't see that I loved him!
So, he got up with that lovely sulky face and said that he truly was stupid to let me 'do him up the bum' and he walked away.
Though in tears, those childish words: 'do me up the bum' drove me nearly mad as I fully realized the enormity of the act of penetrative-sex with such a very young person. Of actually entering what many people would regard as a boy's most private place?
What, in fact, at my school, we had for hundreds of years called Sovereign Territory. Not surprisingly, perhaps, the tradition had survived since the sixteenth-century, largely because even the smallest 12-year-old could deny the most powerful senior into his own Sovereign Territory. So that, when a truly pretty small boy did say yes…
In my years at that school, only one senior boy ever became forceful with a junior and he — the senior, that is — was beaten up so badly that he had to leave.
I hung about near Tim's house for what seemed like days and finally, he came out, all quiet and pale. I apologized profusely and sincerely, and he just nodded slowly and then he surprised me by grinning. Did I want to go for a walk down by the river?
Oh, the joy of sucking that sweet boy to his first, proper, wet-orgasm! And then being allowed into up into that sweet heaven again… But again, with that touch, that tinge of sulky unwillingness, with pretty frowns and mush wincing — but also now with some lovely little anal twitches and tightening-ups — as much more freely I now rogered his dear little bum…
And so, the summer went quickly, dreamily by, but by the Christmas holidays, he had a girlfriend and couldn't understand why I wouldn't go on double-dates with him and his girl's best friend!
So, it was my turn to sulk…
I have here a photo of a boy model called Logan, who is very dear to my heart because he looks so much like a boy called Peter whom once I knew. It seems like about a hundred years ago, now, but he had the same lovely colouring, skin-tones and proportions as Logan. He was also a terrific tease and we had an impromptu swim in a brook and he knew very well what I wanted and after we more or less dried on my shirt, we then played chase.
The price of his being caught was that I would 'do' him! Of course, I caught him and he shivered as he giggled and I realized that he was both very excited, but terrified, too…
"You shouldn't tease!" I grinned and held him under me, knowing that I could have simply carried on with it, but I let him relax and he managed to look quite ashamed, then I simply laughed and kissed him on the lips…
Which shocked the socks off him and after that — well, let's just say that it all went swimmingly!
But then, I was only about sixteen myself…
I have seen it written somewhere that a true boy-lover will never force a younger person to do anything that he doesn't want to do. This was never an issue for me. Long after Bev and I had drifted apart, there were many other boys. At that school, a senior boy drifting past the scruffy room we called Junior Common, might stop and ask:
"Kipps, would you like to go for a walk to the Water Meadows?"
Young Kippingly might giggle and wrinkle his pretty nose:
"No thanks, Bacon" and Bacon unabashed, would simply smile and ask:
It was amazing how often one of the other juniors would giggle and blush and join Bacon for a walk, down the road, over the medieval bridge and across into the rich green meadows that flooded with water in winter… Hawthorn hedges were everywhere and if you knew where to look, a secret cave could be burrowed under the spreading, thorny lower branches.
Sometimes yes, it is true that a quick call at the Tuck Shop for a Mars Bar was a condition imposed by the junior boy! Both boys, after all, had grown up in a world of give-and-take. Yet, in any case, one of the strictest rules at that school was that no junior was ever forced to do anything. In my first year there, a senior boy was beaten up so badly by his form-mates that he had to leave the school. He had lost control and forcibly fucked a Second Form boy.
The ironical thing was that little Waitley — the younger boy in quo — actually loved sex with older boys, but on that day — for his own reasons — he'd said no...
It was at that school that I first looked up the word 'pederast' and I identified my own feelings for younger boys as a certainty, at that time. I grew older, bigger and yet taller; but the boys I loved stayed the same age and appearance. Back then, eleven to thirteen were the magical numbers.
"Meet you at the New Door" the older boy would say. The New Door was so called because during a riot in the 16th century, the boys had burnt the Old Door off its hinges. The joke was that the New Door was five-inches thick — an oaken affair that was further reinforced by wrought-iron nails and huge criss-cross straps of iron. Most importantly, though, it was where assignations between boys had started for more than four centuries past.
In my second year a new headmaster arrived and he ended the ancient practice of the senior boys electing the prefects. These despots had literally run the school, as had been the case in many other British boarding schools. By ancient tradition, our god-like prefects were called Ushers. Unofficially, they had the power to cane junior boys. With real canes and on the bare bottoms.
I vowed back then that if I ever met a man called Stentiford out in the real world, I would kill him. This six-foot monster had shredded my bare bottom with a whippy Malacca cane one day when I was thirteen. Why? Because I had forgotten to secure all four buttons of my blazer!
And I am still amazed at how this incredible cruelty to a thirteen-year-old contrasted so madly with the gentleness of our frequent and gentle sexual affairs.
And oh, we were not all 'doing it'! Some of our number had strong platonic affairs, while others yet seemed completely unaffected. After the new headmaster arrived, the savagery of the bullying was rapidly crushed. At fifteen, I was appointed a Sub-Usher, but because I could never keep a straight face when I was suppose to be marshalling a herd of rowdy, impish juniors, I became known as the Gentle Giant. Even the truly small new boys — in our case, twelve-year-olds — would mock me mercilessly.
I didn't mind a bit!
A year and a bit later brought a need for a Big Decision. I had taken advantage of the school's code of trust and had played a lot of games, getting into the 1st XV when I was only fourteen and being chosen to represent the County Schools team, receiving a very grand velvet, tasselled cap. But I had done minimal schoolwork and I was suddenly in a panic. GCE 'O' levels were coming up and I was sure that I would fail. In the event, I scraped just enough passes to apply for pilot-training and a short-service commission in the Royal Air Force.
I was incredibly sad to be leaving school, but since my own early childhood I'd had a secret, hugely strong desire to follow my great hero-uncle into the Royal Air Force. What truly pulled me away from Burbridge was the growing conviction that school life was a false-paradise. I wanted desperately to become a pilot, like my uncle before me. I knew that the Royal Air Force College would probably have told me to go away and grow up — so I did my own thing — and to my amazement, I was accepted. I was almost too tall to be a pilot, but I was super-fit and as keen as could be.
In my off-duty hours and during my leaves, I found myself following up my tender passion for boys. Though now, much more carefully. At school, no-one had though pederasty strange, unusual, or bad. Those seniors who said they didn't do it, often secretly did? Out in the real world, I found out a basic truth about British society that I had simply taken for granted in my own extreme youth. It could be summarized simple as: children lived in one hermetically sealed sphere and their parents lived in another. It was traditional that adults had adult-centric interests and pursuits. My mother was very unusual in that she had actually given me some very good advice about not getting girls pregnant — and then proceeded to ignore the fact that I never had any girl-friends. For years thereafter!
So, either she didn't know, or she chose to ignore the fact that I went for day-long walks while on leave, and came home tired and happy, often with leaves in my hair and my clothes in a mess. I was, at the same time, reflectively sad that she had so little interest in the real me and the things that I loved; yet I was at the same time relieved that she didn't ask! The truth was that throughout most of the 1950s and 1960s, I was gently chasing the boys I met on my long country walks. Young people living, as I have said above, in a separate cultural envelope, a boy back then would have cut out his tongue out rather than mention sex to his parents. Or, a sexual event. Meeting a smiling gentle man in the woods and fields often led to pleasantly tickly games and sometimes, genuine love affairs? Sometimes repeated, but often as ships that pass in the night.
Gentleness was my watch-word, and — as I had discovered at school — where there are so many willing boys, the concept of taking from a boy was completely alien to me, and in reality, redundant? To put it crudely: why even think about using a boy when there were so many kids around who would happily, willingly drop their pants for you? Even if only to be sucked off?
So my fears about the cessation of boy-love action out in the real world were happily unfounded. All one had to be careful about was accepting the occasional disappointment. I became a master at detecting the slightest unease in my young friends and would back off at the first sign. It was often the case that that same boy would happily take part in some sweet game at a later time — knowing that he had disappointed his older friend on an earlier occasion. He would therefore sometimes happily give 'of himself' when he felt more relaxed?
It was a simple truth that, in an age when a child might be well looked after in the material sense at home, being well dressed and never hungry; that same child might often feel neglected by his parents. An example of this was presented to me when I was invited, aged seventeen with my mother, to a house party. Mother immediately gravitated to where the drinks were. The place where Pink Gin was sloshed and where adult jokes were enjoyed? Where, in their opinion, real conversation and mild flirtation could happen? Though feeling grown up myself, I crept away and found the very attractive boy of the house. His elder sisters and several other similar-aged girls were noisily closeted in one of the bedrooms.
I found out that he — this sweetly pretty boy — was just thirteen, though he could have passed for a small twelve. He was easy in my company as we sat on the stairs. After a while, I asked him if he would show me his bedroom. He flushed slightly and apologetically told me: "It's a bit of a mess…" and I laughed and said "The messier the better! You should see my room!".
Though perceptibly nervous, this bright boy obviously knew that I was one of those older people who actually liked kids. He almost certainly also guessed that a large part of my interest was sexual. But he led me up the stairs to the top floor. A creaky final staircase brought us to a delightfully boy-scented eyrie under the eaves. We sat on his narrow bed and talked and after a while, I found an excuse to tickle his ribs and made him breathless, giggly as he weakly struggled in one of those eternal play-fights, together with lots of puffing and fierce growling. Of course, I easily wrapped him up in a knot ad then my gentle hand went lower and found that his young peg was at least half-excited, whereupon he gazed resolutely into the window-light and let me rub him and suck him to a trembling, incredibly sweet emission; before lowering his shorts and pants and moving in behind him to 'lie like spoons' with him and — with the aid of a dab of lip-salve — push up inside his lovely firm, slender body.
Silently, bravely, he endured the initial pain, then relaxed and held himself firm to receive my increasingly longer, deeper strokes. Like boys that I had known before him, he found that hollowing his back allowed me deeper access and — as I came through my incredible climax — I found that his young prong, which had softened off as he allowed me to enter, was as stiff as a coat-peg again. Of course I sucked him again and he had two climaxes to my one.
It was quid pro quo, of course. I had given him his pleasure — his first orgasm being violently eruptive and quite possibly his best yet — so it was only fair that I should be allowed to go up inside him? Another factor was the deep curiosity of a boy to know what it was like? One boy of that time had said that though it still 'hurt a bit' — that is to say, after the initial pain of first-penetration had subsided — but that he still "…sort of liked the feeling" even though it "…still hurt a bit"!
The idea of give and take was always strong in boys in their real lives. "If you do your homework now, I'll let you stay up to watch that Purple Monkey show…" says Mum. Simple bribery, really? It works, even with hardly a word being spoken. One of my sweetest out-of-school experiences happened when at home, aged about sixteen. A near-neighbour had a sweet-faced son who looked as if he was too shy to even think about sex. I had spent a great deal of time building an Air-fix Spitfire, finishing the camouflage paint and roundels to perfection. So I took it to show young Tim. He was entranced and 'flew' the model around his room, then landed it very carefully on the smooth white turn-down of his upper bed-sheet, just below his pillow. To my delight, he lay on his tummy and blew through the propellor to make it spin. I lay on my tummy beside the shy boy, thinking how beautiful he was, but fully prepared for a rejection of even my gentle stroking his silky back through his summer shirt as we talked of Merlin engines and the twin-cannons that the later-model Spitfires had. He silently tolerated my very light explorations along his back and up from his knees to the hem of his light-weight football shorts, gently over the small, firm, twin mounds outside his clothes, carefully defining the warm, silky boy within the light clothes. Then, down to his knees again and this time up under his loose-legged shorts on his right side, finding his Y-fronts blessedly loose as well and finally, very gently capturing one lovely velvet-skinned buttock.
All he said was: "Can I have it?". My heart rose far enough to fly out of my chest: "Of course!" I smiled and this sweet, innocent-looking boy, carefully lifted the model up onto the broad window-sill above his head, then astonished by showing his previous experience by pulling his pillow down to his waist level so that his little bum was raised, then left the rest to me!
"Slowly" was all he said as I peeled down his shorts and pants, lubed-up with the lip-salve I always carried and with my head spinning, got onto and into that lovely boy as carefully as I could. Apart from an orgasm that nearly blew my meagre brains out; I learned that you should never judge a person by his appearance! If I'd had a hundred pounds to place on a hazard, I would never have guessed that such a shy, quiet boy would giggle softly and enjoy squeezing up rhythmically to bring me off as quickly as he did. After which, I rather groggily went home and started on a model Avro Lancaster!
Did those giggling play-fights and careful approaches always end with success? Far from it! Obviously, some boys liked sex in all of its forms and degrees, and some had become adepts before they had met me. Others yet loved the tickling and the sucking but they would not go further. More than anything else, though, I simply loved being with them. Sometimes just talking and hugging and sometimes kissing. Living in the boy-fragrant world of their belongings, their neat clothes, their treasures, and their boyish lives. It seemed axiomatic to me that a man who was truly interested in what a boy thought and felt about the world was more than half-way there. Used to the benign neglect of his parents — and anyway, who cares what those old farts thought — it was easy for even a shy boy to give of himself to a quiet, gentle character who quite transparently loved him.
Just as he was?
One of my preoccupations at that time and still, now, was trying to work out what a particular kid was thinking. I still believe that my interest in their thoughts and feelings was rare, but I have always felt that those concerns were a positive factor in both my caution and in my success with them.
Continue to Chapter Two


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text:
OverviewReleasesNewsVideosConcerts
Elisabeth Leonskaja's first release under her new Warner Classics contract to be Mozart's Complete Piano Sonatas
5 November 2021 - Renewing and cementing a relationship that dates back to the 1980s, Warner Classics has signed an exclusive contract with the distinguished pianist Elisabeth Leonskaja.
Born in the Georgian capital Tbilisi and trained at the Moscow Conservatory, Elisabeth Leonskaja has been based in Vienna since 1978 and enjoys special renown as an interpreter of the Classical and Romantic Austro-German repertoire.
Her first recording under the new contract is Mozart's Complete Piano Sonatas, a 6CD box to be released in February 2022. It will join her existing Warner Classics catalogue, which includes music by Brahms, Chopin, Dvořák, Liszt, Schubert, Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky, and an album, recorded in 1995 with her mentor Sviatoslav Richter, of Grieg's arrangements for two pianos of selected Mozart sonatas. Her discography, which ranges from solo works to concertos (notably with Kurt Masur as conductor), also bears witness to her close collaboration in chamber music with the Alban Berg Quartett, Borodin Quartet and Artemis Quartet.
The French magazine Diapason has written that: "Elisabeth Leonskaja's journey leads from one peak to another. By constantly excelling herself, driven by her own personal demands, by her passion and her intelligence, she has earned a place among the greatest, not just of today, but of the past …" Winner of Germany's prestigious Opus Klassik Award in 2020, she is admired as an interpreter who respects the truth of the music. As Leonskaja herself has said: "When I play, I am not presenting myself on the stage, but the music I am playing. It is the music that matters."
The integrity of her approach, and her seemingly innate understanding of the music she plays, stands her in good stead as an interpreter of Mozart's 18 piano sonatas – 'essential' works of the Viennese keyboard repertoire. Mozart composed them in various locations around Europe between the mid-1770s, when he was in his late teens, and 1789, two years before his death. Any pianist who interprets them needs to be an exponent of the proverbial art that conceals art. Famously, the great Viennese-trained pianist Artur Schnabel (1882-1951) felt that: "The sonatas of Mozart are unique; they are too easy for children, and too difficult for artists." As so often with Mozart, the surface of the sonatas appears comparatively simple, but beneath it lies a highly sophisticated structure and considerable expressive substance. In the words of Edwin Fischer, another major pianist of the first half of the 20th century: "One should experience [Mozart's] music with imagination and feeling … Mozart is not sweetness or artistry, Mozart is the touchstone of the heart."
Commenting on Elisabeth Leonskaja's renewed presence on the Warner Classics label, Bertrand Castellani, VP A&R Warner Classics & Erato, says:
"It is a joy and an honour for Warner Classics to welcome back the legendary Elisabeth Leonskaja, who has made so many revered recordings for the label in the past. Not only is she one of the greatest pianists of our time, but she is also a link to the Russian school that has played such an important role in the history of the piano. With her recording of Mozart's complete piano sonatas, she has reached a new discographic landmark. Her Warner Classics catalogue will also now be enriched by the recent recordings that she made for the label eaSonus, notably an outstanding complete cycle of the complete Schubert piano sonatas."
Schubert: The Complete Piano Sonatas, Wanderer Fantasy
ListenDiscover
Mozart: Complete Piano Sonatas
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 2 & Piano Sonata No. 1
Kurt Masur
Liszt: Piano Sonata, Dante Sonata & Petrarca Sonette
Mozart, Grieg: Piano Sonatas
Schubert: Piano Works
Wigmore Hall
Auditorio Nacional
MUPA
Concertgebouw
Hélène Grimaud
Bertrand Chamayou

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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What is Intermodal transport?
The intermodal transport is a form of transportation of containers, loading ramps, road semi-trailer and other unit loads, such as swap bodies, over long distances using rail or water transport. It means the different transport modes can be used over the entire length of the transport route.
The rail transport will be used for a relative short period of transportation before and after the main transport route, i.e., for transportation of load units from the source to rail or water transport node and after that from rail or water transport node to target destination. Over the main and longest route section will be used rail or water transport.
The intermodal terminal is located at the place of loading or unloading and provides appropriate interface between road rail and waterways.
You can find further information about this topic at the Studiengesellschaft für den Kombinierten Verkehr e.V. (SGKV - German Promotion Centre for Intermodal Transport)


I heard many good things about Vintage Brewing Company before we arrived. We tried the sampler of 10 beers including a Kolsch, Amber, Dunkelweiss, IPA, Ginger Amber Double Witbier, Belgian Witbier, ESB, Dusseldorf Altbier, Oatmeal Stout, and a Wee Heavy Scotch Ale. The sampler was $15. They have guest beers, wines, and spirits also. The beers were all good but nothing stood out as great. Service was slow as the bartender was busy flirting with the college girls at the bar. The place has bar, dining, and lounge areas. We sat in the lounge area. There are TVs scattered about, all running different sporting events. The brewery is a stand-alone building in a strip mall. Everything is non-smoking with free WI-FI and plenty of parking in the strip mall lot. A mix of music from the 50s to the 80s was playing on the overhead system and a band was setting up for later in the evening. We didn't have any food as we were between lunch and dinner. Overall I was a bit disappointed and will try the other microbreweries in town on our next visit.
I heard about Vintage Brewing while I was at a different stop on my Madison leg of beercation. I decided to squeeze it in while I was in town. I am glad that I did.
Vintage is located in a standalone building next to a strip mall. There is plenty of parking.
The interior is large and new looking. It is tastefully decorated with lots of wood. There are a fair number of TVs but they are not overly obtrusive. I sat at the bar in the center of the place. It is a large rectangular bar with seating all around. There is a big fish tank in the center. The bar stools were comfortable and there was a chair rail for my feet. They also had purse hooks for the ladies.
I had limited time to enjoy Vintage so I ordered the sampler. I asked for one of everything they had on tap. That turned out to be 17 beers! I ended up staying a little longer than I had originally planned.
The selection of styles was very impressive and overall the beer was good. There were a few lighter beers as there always is at these places. They weren't bad, but just not my style. The oatmeal stout was very tasty and so was the APA. Of course I liked the barrel aged beer too. There was an Islay style beer that I found very interesting due to the unique peat flavor. I am not a big fan of Islay scotch, but the beer was worth a try. I am not sure I could drink a whole pint of it though.
I was planning on eating at my next stop of the day, so I didn't order much in the way of food. The fried cheese curds gave me something to munch on while working my way through the many beers.
Since I was at Vintage on a weekday afternoon, the place emptied out after the lunch rush. It felt luxurious to have the whole place to myself. We chatted with the bartender and the hostess who were friendly. Our water glasses were filled repeatedly as we savored our collection of samples over a couple of hours.
Overall, I liked Vintage so much that I bought the t-shirt. I liked the wide variety of beers and the atmosphere was nice. I would definitely come back to this place if I was in the area again.


These kinds of dogs require lots of exercise in order to burn up that excess energy and bring them back to a calm, submissive state. They also require calm, assertive Pack Leaders who will build up their self-confidence by providing protection and direction.
When a dog's needs are not fulfilled, the dog experiences frustration — particularly if what's missing is exercise. An otherwise happy-go-lucky, high energy dog stuck alone in a small apartment for twelve hours a day can become so frustrated that aggression may result. The problem is made worse if the humans don't also give that dog discipline by providing rules, boundaries and limitations.
If you can't be home to walk your dog at least every four hours, then you need to take the dog on a long walk before you leave and after you return home. In the meantime, make sure that there are plenty of things to mentally stimulate your dog while you're gone, like toys with treats hidden in them, acceptable things to chew on, and so forth.
A dog knows how to be a dog and how to relate to other dogs. It's only when human behavior short circuits that process that a dog becomes antisocial. This is particularly common with smaller dogs, because humans have the irresistible need to pick them up at the first sign of danger.
You never see someone pick up their Rottweiler because another dog on the walk is barking at it. And yet, for breeds like Chihuahuas and Yorkies, this is the first thing that people do, and it completely confuses the dog.
Even without picking the dog up, we can make it antisocial through our reactions. If we become tense or nervous and tighten up on the leash when we see another dog, then we're teaching our dogs to see other dogs as a threat.
Dog on dog aggression is not natural. It's a learned behavior and we teach it. In order for our dogs to unlearn it and become socialized, we have to become aware of what we're doing to make our dogs antisocial and we have to learn what to do to let our dogs be dogs.
Sometimes, a dog that has never shown any signs of aggression will suddenly lash out and snap at a family member unexpectedly. If none of the above cases apply, then this may be your dog's way of letting you know that it's in pain and the snarl or nip is a spontaneous reaction similar to someone yelling "Ouch!" when they stub their toe on the coffee table.
If your dog suddenly lashes out at a familiar human when being touched, then your first step should be to visit the vet and find out if there are any physical causes for the reaction. If this is the case, your dog will be grateful to you for helping stop the pain.
A lot of people assume that a dog is either naturally aggressive or not, but this isn't really the case. Aggression is not a cause, but a symptom. If your dog is aggressive, then it's telling you that something else is lacking. By paying attention to the behavior, we can understand what our dog is telling us and then figure out the cure to the problem.
You have written so well about the human behaviour. Kindly upload more solutions of This issue.
Yes these kinds of dogs needs lot of experiences. This is very unique information for me.
Lack of socialization of a big issue in behaviour. If we don't care about this, this make create more issue.
This blog is very appealing. some of the post are informative and some are motivating. I cannot wait to read more. keep sharing those information with us.


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Ground floor: 2 car park, maid room, and bathroom, warehouse, kitchen, toilet, beautiful hall, through to the private garden.
First floor: 2 master room with wardrobes, balcony with a wonderful view.
Ownership of all nationalities and no residency required.


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Israeli Jewelry Company Makes $1.5 Million Gold, Diamond-Encrusted Coronavirus Mask
The 18-karat white gold mask will be decorated with 3,600 white and black diamonds and fitted with top-rated N99 filters. (Photo: AP)
Yvel, an Israeli luxury jewelry company, is working on what it says will be the world's most expensive coronavirus mask, a gold, diamond-encrusted face covering with a price tag of $1.5 million, AP news agency reported on Sunday.
Isaac Levy, the owner of the company and designer, said the 18-karat white gold mask will be decorated with 3,600 white and black diamonds and fitted with top-rated N99 filters at the request of the buyer.
Levy added that the buyer, an anonymous Chinese businessman living in the United States, had two other demands: that it be completed by the end of the year, and that it would be the priciest in the world. That last condition, he said, "was the easiest to fulfil."
Levy said that while he would not wear it himself, he was thankful for the opportunity.
"I am happy that this mask gave us enough work for our employees to be able to provide their jobs in very challenging times like these times right now," he said.
The mask weighs 270 grams, which is nearly 100 times that of a typical surgical mask.
Iran to Build Port Along Makran Coast
World Bank Expects Global Economy to Grow 4% in 2021


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Cracks opening in relationship between Latrell Mitchell and Roosters
NRL 2019
By Danny Weidler
May 4, 2019 — 10.00pm
Before he retired, Greg Inglis had a simple piece of advice for Latrell Mitchell: "Be your own man."
It was said in the heart of Roosters territory at Bondi Icebergs and it was said before the pair were going to clash in round one. It was said when Inglis was still a player and Mitchell was being called the next Greg Inglis.
Our item last week where we revealed the Roosters feared Souths were preparing to make a big play for the star centre has gained significant traction and momentum. Some have dismissed it, but those who are aware of the issues Mitchell is dealing with know that there is plenty going on behind the scenes. Right now there is a crack in the relationship between Mitchell and the Roosters.
Pressure mounts: There is plenty going on behind the scenes at the Roosters with Latrell Mitchell. Credit:AAP
You can be sure the Roosters will treat Mitchell with all the love and respect that he deserves – as the best and most exciting young player in the game.
The club knows there are external forces telling Mitchell that to reach his true potential as a player and to make the money that he deserves, he needs to be playing fullback. That won't happen at the Roosters. Not while James Tedesco is at the club.
And Tedesco said during the week in an interview with Channel Nine news that he wants to play out the rest of his career at the Bondi club. That may explain why Mitchell is showing interest in a permanent move to five-eighth when Luke Keary moves in to play half after Cooper Cronk calls it quits.
Beyond positional considerations, there are family pressures weighing on Mitchell: a constant theme is that family members have a genuine fondness for South Sydney.
There is also a feeling from the Mitchell family that not enough was done by the Roosters for Latrell's brother Shaq, a young forward with loads of potential. His issues were weight and injury.
The Roosters will say – and provide evidence – that they did everything possible to help Shaq make it in the big time. The last we heard, he injured himself in a local NFL tryout when he was thinking of giving American football a crack. The Roosters have monitored his life and they provided help with a job he was trying to get.
Latrell is also in the middle of a split from his long-time agent, Steve Deacon, the former Easts centre. This issue was discussed by Roosters officials during the week. The Roosters fear Mitchell will link up with agent Matt Rose – a close friend of Mitchell, who also does fight promotion.
Mitchell was at the weigh-in when Paul Gallen fought John Hopoate. He just hung out in a corner of the room and politely declined interview requests. The theory is that if Rose takes charge of his career, Mitchell will end up at Souths. The Rabbitohs are privately hoping that is what happens.
Coup signing: Souths are still hoping to lure Mitchell to Redfern. Credit:AAP
But that's not to say Rose has a great relationship with Souths officials, although his biggest star, Cody Walker, is at the club.
Wayde Rushton, who manages Kalyn Ponga, is another being mentioned as a potential agent.
The Mitchell case certainly is a fascinating one. It's a tribute to his ability that he is still managing to star on the field.
A different approach to religious freedom
Before Israel Folau decided to put religion above all else, Will Hopoate made a great sacrifice, quitting rugby league to undertake a Mormon mission.
He then sacrificed hundreds of thousands of dollars by refusing to play on Sundays.
A portion of his career was played under the leadership of Raelene Castle – who was the Bulldogs boss at the time but is now the head of Rugby Australia. Castle was the Bulldogs boss from July 2013 to August 2017. Hopoate clearly felt comfortable expressing his religious views under her leadership.
Castle had numerous discussions with Folau about his use of social media and his religious views, but it obviously didn't get through to him. Otherwise he would not be fighting for his $4 million deal.
Hopoate is not a controversial character and does not want to get involved in the Folau issue, but he was prepared to discuss his experiences with Castle and the Bulldogs.
"One thing that I've been proud of here at Canterbury is that they have allowed me to live my faith," he said. "There is no pressure ... I've been allowed to live my life without any instruction.
Respectful: Will Hopoate doesn't force his Christian views on others. Credit:AAP
"The Izzy thing is a hot topic and a difficult one to say too much about. I'd rather not put myself out there and say something dumb. I know Izzy, but we are not close."
Hopoate's Instagram is full of his faith. On February 3 he wrote: "I'm Christian ... this doesn't make me better than anyone, but it helps me be better." On March 3 he wrote: "If church was for perfect people, the chapel would be empty."
It's a regular theme on his page. He is strong in faith, but he doesn't force his views on others. After having the club's blessing for some time not to play on Sundays, there was a rethink.
"In a perfect world, I would like to have Sundays off," he said. "But Canterbury is my employer and I have a commitment to them and I have to do what they ask of me. To play footy, I think I will continue that mode. If I was granted a wish then I wouldn't [play Sundays], but I'm not kicking stones.
"What has happened has happened and I am moving on from there. I want to keep playing football for as long as I can.
"When I finish I want to be involved in youth work. I have been going around to high schools sharing my journey to the NRL. I know how much my youth leaders shaped my life and what an influence they had on me and I'd like to have that effect on people. I like to talk about resilience and positivity and how to apply that to your life."
White or wrong?
In the long run, Anthony Seibold will probably taste success – with his roster and resources he has to – but it's looking tougher and tougher for the club's chief executive, Paul White, to survive.
Wayne Bennett's continued success at the Rabbitohs should mean White is under huge pressure. White was the one who speared a legend of the game when he pushed Bennett out the door last year.
It gets even more interesting because not only does Seibold have a five-year deal, but he has an option for a sixth season in his favour. It's hard to believe.
Seibold has not been big on seeing out his contracts. He left Manly early and then swung into the top job at South Sydney after Michael Maguire was shown the door. "Madge" Maguire has not talked to him since the day he was replaced.
Seibold has the best set-up in the NRL and he needs to deliver ina hurry.
Teddy for Wehbe
The fallout continues from the split between Isaac Moses and the "football whisperer" Joe Wehbe.
We told you last week that James Tedesco is now firmly in Wehbe's camp and wants nothing to do with Moses. He is now going public with his support for Wehbe. Asked if he was in Wehbe's corner he said: "Yeah, definitely. He has been a big part in my career and I owe a lot to him."
Other players who now have strained relationships with Moses include Israel Folau, Parramatta's Tim Mannah and Nathan Brown, and rising star Joseph Suaalii – a young rugby player who has signed with South Sydney until 2021.
Folau has largely gone alone in his preparation for his battle with Rugby Australia.
Moses has been busy trying to shore up other clients as he knows his empire is under threat. It is understood Moses has been ringing family members of the clients who are looking to jump ship.
The whole situation is messy and it's threatening to get messier. Moses has friends in the highest of places: one of his best mates is NRL boss Todd Greenberg.
Their families are firm friends.
Ponga's plan
If the Knights want to start talking to Kalyn Ponga about an extension to his contract, they may have to cool their heels for a couple of months at least. The view is that he wants to talk after Origin.
Ponga is in the second year of a four-year contract.
There have been no approaches from rugby union, nor in an early discussion did the Knights indicate they want to do a long-term deal.
Api on the move
Manly may be prepared to let Api Koroisau go. He has given the club great service but it would appear the Eagles have found a No.9 in Manase Fainu.
It's one to keep an eye on.
Danny Weidler
Danny Weidler is a sport columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald.


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text:
Neil Abercrombie on Families & Children
Democratic Governor; previously Representative (HI-1)
Voted YES on four weeks of paid parental leave for federal employees.
Congressional Summary:Allows federal employees to substitute any available paid leave for any leave without pay available for either the: (1) birth of a child; or (2) placement of a child with the employee for either adoption or foster care. Makes available for any of the 12 weeks of leave an employee is entitled to for such purposes: (1) four administrative weeks of paid parental leave in connection with the birth or placement involved; and (2) any accumulated annual or sick leave.
Proponent's argument to vote Yes:
Rep. STEVE LYNCH (D, MA-9): This bill takes an important step toward improving the Federal Government's ability to recruit and retain a highly qualified workforce by providing paid parental leave to Federal and Congressional employees for the birth, adoption or placement of a child for foster care, which is a benefit that is extended to many in the private sector in other industrialized countries.
Opponent's argument to vote No:Rep. DARRELL ISSA (R, CA-49): This bill sends the wrong message at the wrong time to working American taxpayers and families that are struggling in difficult times. Our economy is in crisis, and deficits are already soaring. This bill does not have one provision to say if you make $170,000 a year, why do we have to give you this benefit, because you have to choose between feeding your children and being with your children? Certainly not. There are no protections against, in fact, those who do not need this special benefit getting it. There are no safeguards at all. As a matter of fact, this bill envisions the $1 billion over 5 years, swelling to $4 billion over 10 years or more because, in fact, they believe it should be 8 weeks of special leave. Federal employees enjoy one of the highest levels of job security, without a doubt, anywhere in the United States. I would venture to say many of them the highest. More importantly, in good times and bad, they keep their jobs. Reference: Federal Employees Paid Parental Leave Act; Bill H.R.626 ; vote number 2009-H310 on Jun 4, 2009
Voted YES on establishing nationwide AMBER alert system for missing kids.
Vote to adopt the conference report on the bill that would assign a national coordinator for AMBER alerts. AMBER alerts is an alert system for missing children, make available additional protections for children and set stricter punishments for sex offenders. Two-time child sex offenders would be subjected to mandatory life sentence. The measure would make it a crime to pander visual illustrations of children as child pornography. It would increase maximum sentences for a number of specified crimes against children. It would also make it a crime to take a trip to foreign countries and engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor. It also would enlarge law enforcement's wiretap and electronic surveillance abilities in investigations of child pornography. Reference: Child Abduction Prevention Act; Bill S 151 ; vote number 2003-127 on Apr 10, 2003
Voted NO on reducing Marriage Tax by $399B over 10 years.
Vote to pass a bill that would reduce taxes for married people by $399.2 billion over 10 years by doubling the couples' deduction and the child tax credit. Among other provisions, the bill would allow married couples filing jointly to claim a standard deduction equal to the deduction they would receive filing singly. Reference: Bill sponsored by Weller, R-IL; Bill HR 6 ; vote number 2001-75 on Mar 29, 2001
Rated 7% by the Christian Coalition: an anti-Family-Value voting record.
Abercrombie scores 7% by the Christian Coalition on family issues
The Christian Coalition was founded in 1989 by Dr. Pat Robertson to give Christians a voice in government. We represent millions of people of faith and enable them to have a strong, unified voice in the conversation we call democracy.
Our Five-Fold Mission:
Represent the pro-family point of view before local councils, school boards, state legislatures, and Congress
Speak out in the public arena and in the media
Train leaders for effective social and political action
Inform pro-family voters about timely issues and legislation
Protest anti-Christian bigotry and defend the rights of people of faith.
Our ratings are based on the votes the organization considered most important; the numbers reflect the percentage of time the representative voted the organization's preferred position. Source: CC website 03n-CC on Dec 31, 2003
Permanent crime database for volunteers with kids.
Abercrombie co-sponsored creating permanent crime database for volunteers with kids
A bill to amend the National Child Protection Act of 1993 to establish a permanent background check system. Congress finds the following:
In 2006, a total of 16,500,000 adults volunteered their service to education or youth programs.
An estimated 6.6% of individuals in the United States will serve time in prison for a crime during their lifetime. The Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System of the FBI maintains fingerprints and criminal histories on more than 47,000,000 individuals, many of whom have been arrested or convicted multiple times.
Of individuals released from prison, an estimated 67.5% were rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within 3 years.
Given the large number of individuals with criminal records and the vulnerability of the population they work with, human service organizations that work with children need an effective and reliable means of obtaining a complete criminal history in order to determine the suitability of a potential volunteer or employee.
The large majority of Americans (88%) favor granting youth-serving organizations access to conviction records for screening volunteers and 59% favored allowing youth-serving organizations to consider arrest records when screening volunteers.
Even when accessible, the cost of a criminal background check can be prohibitively expensive, between $21 and $99 for each volunteer or employee.
The Child Safety Pilot Program demonstrates that timely and affordable background checks are possible, as background checks under that program are completed within 3 to 5 business days at a cost of $18.
Source: Child Protection Improvements Act (S.2756/H.R.5606) 08-S2756 on Jul 28, 2008
Call for a White House Conference on Children and Youth.
Abercrombie co-sponsored calling for a White House Conference on Children and Youth
The White House Conference on Children and Youth in 2010 Act - Directs the President to call a White House Conference on Children and Youth in 2010 to: (1) encourage improvements in each state and local child welfare system; and (2) develop recommendations for actions to implement express policy regarding federal, state, and local programs. The Congress finds the following:
In 2005 there were over 3,000,000 reports of child abuse and neglect, and only 60% of the children from the substantiated reports received follow-up services and 20% were placed in foster care as a result of an investigation.
Almost 500,000 children and youth were in foster care at the end of 2004 and nearly 800,000 spent at least some time in foster care throughout the year.
There is an over-representation of certain populations, including Native Americans and African-Americans, in the child welfare system.
The State courts make key decisions in the lives of children involved in the child welfare system, including decisions of whether children have been victims of child abuse, whether parental rights should be terminated, and whether children should be reunified with their families, adopted, or placed in other settings.
Source: Conference on Children and Youth in 2010 Act (S2771/HR5461) 08-S2771 on Mar 13, 2008
Sex Ed including both abstinence and contraception.
Abercrombie signed H.R.1551&S.611
Authorizes grants to states for sex education programs, including education on abstinence and contraception, to prevent teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Expresses the sense of Congress that states are encouraged, although not required, to provide matching funds to receive such grants.
Requires the Secretary to provide for a national evaluation of a representative sample of such programs for effectiveness in delaying the initiation of sexual intercourse and other high-risk behaviors, preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease, and increasing contraceptive knowledge and behavior. Requires states receiving such grants to provide for an individual evaluation of the state's program by an external, independent entity. Source: Responsible Education About Life Act 09-HR1551 on Mar 17, 2009
Teach teens about both abstinence & contraception.
Abercrombie signed Responsible Education About Life Act
To provide for the reduction of adolescent pregnancy, HIV rates, and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), Congress finds as follows:
Leading public health organizations stress the need for sexuality education that includes messages about abstinence and contraception.
A 2005 statement [to Congress] urged that 'Sexuality education should be non-judgmental & support parent-child communication & should not impose religious or ideological viewpoints upon students.'
[A Congressionally-sponsored] 2006 position paper that 'Efforts to promote abstinence should include information about concepts of healthy sexuality, sexual orientation & tolerance, personal responsibility, risks of HIV, access to reproductive health care, and benefits & risks of condoms & other contraceptive methods.'
8 in 10 Americans believe that sex education should promote abstinence and provide information about the effectiveness & benefits of contraception.
There is strong evidence that more comprehensive sex education can effectively help young people delay sexual initiation, even as it increases contraceptive use among sexually active youth.
There is no evidence that federally funded abstinence-only-until-marriage programs are effective in stopping or delaying teen sex.
Most young people have sex for the first time at about age 17, but do not marry until their late 20s. Hence young adults are at risk of unwanted pregnancy & STDs for nearly a decade.
[Congress requires that] Sex Education Programs should:
provide information about the health benefits and side effects of all contraceptive and barrier methods used as a means to prevent pregnancy; and to reduce the risk of contracting STDs, including HIV/AIDS;
encourage family communication between parent and child about sexuality;
teach young people how alcohol and drug use can affect responsible decisionmaking; and
do not teach or promote religion.
Source: S.611&HR1551 2009-S611 on Mar 17, 2009
Click here for definitions & background information on Families & Children.
Click here for a summary of all issue stances of Neil Abercrombie.
Click here for a Wikipedia profile of Neil Abercrombie.
Click here for a Ballotpedia profile of Neil Abercrombie.
Click here for VoteMatch responses by Neil Abercrombie.
Click here for AmericansElect quiz answers by Neil Abercrombie.
Click here for issue positions of other HI politicians.
Other governors on Families & Children: Neil Abercrombie on other issues:
HI Gubernatorial:
David Ige
Duke Aiona
HI Senatorial:
Colleen Hanabusa
Daniel Inouye
Mazie Hirono
Gubernatorial Debates 2017:
NJ: Guadagno(R) vs.Phil Murphy(D, won 2017 primary) vs.Ray Lesniak(D, lost 2017 primary) vs.Mayor Steve Fulop(declined Dem. primary, Sept. 2016) vs.Lesniak(D) vs.Wisniewski(D) vs.Ciattarelli(R) vs.Rullo(R)
VA: Gillespie(R) vs.Perriello(D) vs.Wittman(R) vs.Wagner(R) vs.Northam(D)
AK: Walker(i) vs.(no opponent yet)
AL: Kay Ivey(R) vs.Countryman(D) vs.David Carrington (R) vs.Tommy Battle (R)
AR: Hutchinson(R) vs.(no opponent yet)
AZ: Ducey(R) vs.David Garcia (D)
CA: Newsom(D) vs.Chiang(D) vs.Villaraigosa(D) vs.Delaine Eastin (D) vs.David Hadley (R) vs.John Cox (R) vs.Zoltan Istvan (I)
CO: Ed Perlmutter (D) vs.Johnston(D) vs.Mitchell(R) vs.Cary Kennedy (D) vs.George Brauchler (R) vs.Doug Robinson (R)
CT: Malloy(D) vs.Drew(D) vs.Srinivasan(R) vs.David Walker (R)
FL: Gillum(D) vs.Graham(D) vs.Mike Huckabee (R) vs.Adam Putnam (R)
GA: Kemp(R) vs.Casey Cagle (R) vs.Hunter Hill (R) vs.Stacey Abrams (R)
HI: Ige(D) vs.(no opponent yet)
IA: Kim_Reynolds(R) vs.Leopold(D) vs.Andy McGuire (D) vs.Nate Boulton (D)
ID: Little(R) vs.Fulcher(R)
IL: Rauner(R) vs.Kennedy(D) vs.Pawar(D) vs.Daniel Biss (D) vs.J.B. Pritzker (D)
KS: Brewer(D) vs.Wink Hartman (R)
MA: Baker(R) vs.Gonzalez(D) vs.Setti Warren (D) vs.Bob Massie (R)
MD: Hogan(R) vs.Alec Ross (D) vs.Richard Madaleno (D)
ME: (no candidate yet)
MI: Whitmer(R) vs.El-Sayed(D) vs.Tim Walz (D)
MN: Coleman(D) vs.Murphy(D) vs.Otto(D) vs.Tina Liebling (DFL) vs.Tim Walz (DFL) vs.Matt Dean (R)
NE: Ricketts(R) vs.(no opponent yet)
NH: Sununu(R) vs.Steve Marchand (D, Portsmouth Mayor)
NM: Grisham(D) vs.(no opponent yet)
NV: Jared Fisher (R) vs.(no opponent yet)
NY: Cuomo(R) vs.(no opponent yet)
OH: DeWine(R) vs.Schiavoni(D) vs.Sutton(D) vs.Taylor(R) vs.Jim Renacci (R) vs.Jon Husted (R) vs.Connie Pillich (D)
OK: Gary Richardson (R) vs.Connie Johnson (D)
OR: Brown(D) vs.Scott Inman (D)
PA: Wolf(D) vs.Wagner(R)
RI: Raimondo(D) vs.(no opponent yet)
SC: McMaster(R) vs.McGill(R) vs.Pope(R)
SD: Noem(R) vs.Jackley(R)
TN: Green(R) vs.Dean(D)
TX: Abbott(R) vs.(no opponent yet)
VT: Scott(R) vs.(no opponent yet)
WI: Walker(R) vs.Harlow(D)
WY: (no candidate yet) Newly-elected governors (first seated in Jan. 2017):
DE-D: Carney
IN-R: Holcomb
MO-R: Greitens
NH-R: Sununu
NC-D: Cooper
ND-R: Burgum
VT-R: Scott
WV-D: Justice
Retiring 2017-18:
AL-R: Robert Bentley(R)
(term-limited 2018)
CA-D: Jerry Brown
CO-D: John Hickenlooper
FL-R: Rick Scott
GA-R: Nathan Deal
IA-R: Terry Branstad
(appointed ambassador, 2017)
ID-R: Butch Otter
(retiring 2018)
KS-R: Sam Brownback
ME-R: Paul LePage
MI-R: Rick Snyder
MN-D: Mark Dayton
NM-R: Susana Martinez
OH-R: John Kasich
OK-R: Mary Fallin
SC-R: Nikki Haley
SD-R: Dennis Daugaard
TN-R: Bill Haslam
WY-R: Matt Mead
(term-limited 2018) Abortion
Page last updated: Jul 22, 2017


The Business Ledger is the premier business newspaper for Chicago's suburbs which is mainly targeted at business owners and top management. A special section of its October issue is devoted to the Entrepreneurial Excellence Awards, recipients of which were honored on September 24 at the Danada House in Wheaton. Boris Kontsevoi, President of Intetics, was among 19 entrepreneurs who had managed to demonstrate business savvy insights and contributions to industry and community. As we have mentioned earlier, Mr. Kontsevoi was awarded in the Growth category for the strong long-term potential and the impressive growth that his company demonstrated over the five-year period from 2003 to 2008.
Intetics' success story demonstrates how leadership, energy and quality development strategies can turn an IT startup into a massively profitable business.


text:
Getting Officers To "Step Up and Step In"
Dear PERF members,
As I've reported before, PERF's ICAT training (Integrating Communications, Assessment, and Tactics) was recently evaluated by researchers from the University of Cincinnati led by Dr. Robin Engel. Using a randomized control study design, Robin and her team looked at the impact of ICAT among officers in the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department.
Their findings were remarkable. ICAT was associated with a 28% reduction in use-of-force incidents, a 26% decline in citizen injuries, and a 36% drop in officer injuries. Their research is the first known study to demonstrate significant changes in officer behavior as a direct result of de-escalation training.
As encouraging as those results were, the study identified two areas where more attention is needed: (1) the role of sergeants in managing critical incidents, and (2) officers' understanding and use of the Critical Decision-Making Model. The CDM is at the heart of ICAT's approach to de-escalation, but the Louisville study found that there was a need to further explain to officers how the CDM works and provide them with examples.
In many ways, these two issues are related. ICAT and the CDM are all about getting officers to think more critically, in real time and often during tense circumstances. But in order to become critical thinkers, officers need the support of their sergeants, including the freedom to independently assess situations and make tough decisions on their own. This is especially important when sergeants aren't at the scene to help guide their officers, or when the officers' decisions go against some of the cultural norms of policing, such as never second-guessing a fellow officer in public.
Sergeants also need to know that a big part of their role is to help coach officers in this new model of thinking and decision-making.
This past week, a group of experienced ICAT trainers came together in Decatur, IL at the Macon County Law Enforcement Training Center to analyze these issues and develop some practical guidance to strengthen this new approach. We want to make critical decision-making a dynamic and useful tool for officers, not just an abstract idea.
Our goal was straightforward, but complex: How do we get officers to think differently and act differently in situations that are beginning to escalate, often because of the actions of fellow officers? How do we get cops to step up and step in – to turn around tense encounters before they become so chaotic that force may be needed?
I'm not talking about getting officers to intervene in situations like the arrests of Rodney King or George Floyd. Those were obvious cases of excessive force, and the other officers on the scene clearly had a duty to intervene and stop the force once they witnessed it.
I'm talking about something different, about going upstream in the decision-making process, before situations escalate and officers even contemplate using force. I'm talking about cases when other officers' tactics are counterproductive or just plain wrong, but no one wants to say anything.
Or when there are a number of officers but no supervisor on the scene, and no one steps up to lead.
Or situations when backing up and coming up with a Plan B is a far better option than pressing forward and trying to win at any cost, but no one is willing to suggest that alternative.
We want our cops to think and act differently in these types of situations. But all too often, it seems the culture of policing gets in the way.
The police culture says you back each other up. And that's a good thing, and critically important when officers are in trouble. But the culture also says that you never question, contradict, or embarrass a fellow officer in front of others. And that can lead to bad outcomes, especially if other officers are engaging in tactics that you know will make an already challenging situation even worse.
Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about. In 2019, PERF developed a protocol on dealing with suicide-by-cop situations. In reviewing videos of actual encounters, we saw how officers haven't always recognized the dynamic that is unfolding. So an officer may be pointing a firearm and barking commands at someone who is suicidal and holding a knife. As police psychologist Dr. John Nicoletti told us, pointing a weapon at a potentially suicidal person will increase his or her anxiety and only exacerbate the situation.
Another officer on scene may recognize that this approach is making the suicidal person more anxious. How do we get that officer to direct his fellow officer to back away and lower their firearm? That is the type of situation where we need officers to "step up and step in."
Of course, this type of intervention can be especially difficult when the other officer has more experience or is of a higher rank. There are times in policing when you need to question authority – respectfully – but the culture says otherwise.
I have talked about this before in the context of analyzing use-of-force and other incidents after the fact – Monday morning quarterbacking. But here, I'm talking about officers having the confidence to step forward in real time, as events are unfolding. And about having the skills to stop poor tactics and redirect situations well before they spiral out of control.
It's not just the culture of policing that sometimes gets in the way of good decision-making. It can also be the structure of police agencies themselves.
From their earliest days, police departments in the United States have followed a rigid, hierarchical rank structure akin to the military. In many situations, that model serves an important purpose. When you have an active shooter or other major crime in progress, you need someone in charge, making decisions and giving orders. And you need people who will carry out those orders, without question, in order to neutralize an immediate threat.
But there are other times when a more collaborative, less bureaucratic approach is needed – where officers are given the opportunity to think critically and the freedom to make decisions that may go against the traditional way of doing things.
This is especially important, I think, for the new generations of people entering the policing profession. These individuals often want to know not just what they're supposed to do, but also why they are doing it.
At a time when we're trying to develop independent critical-thinkers and problem-solvers, I fear that our traditional approaches to police hierarchy, culture, and decision-making sometimes get in the way of good, effective and ethical policing. Our work in Decatur this past week is intended to help overcome some of these hurdles.
PERF will be adding a new module to ICAT that will make the concept of "Step Up and Step In" something that officers can understand and use.
The new module will underscore the key role that first-line supervisors must play in developing their people and working together to defuse critical incidents. As we embark on a national rollout of ICAT later this year, I am confident that this addition to the curriculum will help agencies build on the success that departments such as Louisville Metro have already achieved.
Weekend Clips are below. Have a good weekend.


I might gift someone, I might gift myself, or I might just save my money.
Edit: Tell me what you want.
no save it. but if u wanna spam for me again ill gift you or a friend.
jacco, thanks for the offer, but I dont have enough time to spam anymore.