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Real name : Matthew Langford Perry
Place of birth : Williamstown
Perry Matthew
Matthew Perry (1969)
Matthew Langford Perry
Matthew Langford Perry is a Canadian-American actor and comedian, best known for his Emmy-nominated role as Chandler Bing on the popular, long-running NBC television sitcom Friends. He also received acclaim for his portrayal of Ron Clark in the television movie The Ron Clark Story, accompanied by another Emmy nomination as well as a Golden Globe nomination. Perry also starred in the short-lived series Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and has appeared in a number of films, including Fools Rush In , The Whole Nine Yards , and 17 Again . In 2010 he expanded his resume to include both video games and voiceover work when he voiced Benny in the role-playing game Fallout: New Vegas.
Most recently, Perry was the co-creator, co-writer, executive producer and star of the short-lived ABC sitcom Mr. Sunshine, which ran from February to March 2011.
Perry was born in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. His mother, Suzanne Jane Louise Morrison (née Langford), is a Canadian journalist and former press secretary to Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, and his father, John Bennett Perry, is an American actor and former model. His parents divorced before his first birthday and his mother subsequently married Keith Morrison, a broadcast journalist. Perry was raised by his mother in Ottawa, Ontario, and was enrolled at Rockcliffe Park Public School and Ashbury College. While growing up he took a keen interest in tennis and became a top-ranked junior player.
Matthew Perry moved from Ottawa to Los Angeles to pursue acting. For high school, he attended The Buckley School in Sherman Oaks. While at Buckley, Perry was featured as George Gibbs in Our Town and appeared as a junior in a production of The Miracle Worker. Patty Duke attended and praised the young Perry's convincing role as Helen's brother Jimmy. He was also featured in The Sound of Music as a junior. In his senior year, director Tim Hillman had planned a production of "The Elephant Man" specifically to feature Perry as John Merrick along with Vanessa Smith, and future Les Misérables star Lisa Capps. He then got his professional break at age 18. On being cast in A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon with River Phoenix, Perry withdrew from Elephant Man and ended his high school acting career. Perry also pursued improv comedy at the LA Connection in Sherman Oaks while still in high school, quickly becoming a featured performer.
After some guest appearances in late 1980s television, it was his intention to enroll at the University of Southern California, but when he was offered the lead role of Chazz Russell in Second Chance he became noticed on the acting scene. Perry originally starred alongside Kiel Martin when the series premiered in 1987, but after 13 episodes the format changed: Second Chance became Boys Will Be Boys, Perry was elevated to top-billing status, and the plots re-focused on the adventures of Chazz and his teenage friends. Despite the shift, the show ran for only one season. When it concluded, Perry stayed in Los Angeles and made guest appearance on the television program Growing Pains in which he portrayed Carol's boyfriend who dies from injuries in the hospital sustained in a drunk driving accident.
In 1991, Perry made a guest appearance on Beverly Hills, 90210 as Roger Azarian. In the midst of his many continuing guest roles on TV, Perry was a regular on the 1990 CBS sitcom Sydney, playing the younger brother of Valerie Bertinelli's title character. Three years later, he landed his second TV starring role on the ABC sitcom Home Free, which only lasted 13 episodes in the spring of 1993. By then, Perry was making his mark, and was instantly cast in a new dramatic pilot titled LAX 2194. The project was slow to take off, so as a backup option, he attempted to secure an audition for the pilot Six of One, later to be known as Friends, by Marta Kauffman and David Crane, both of whom he had worked with on Dream On. However, due to previous commitments to the pilot LAX 2194, he was not initially considered for an audition. When he did eventually get a reading, he landed the part he is best known for, the role of Chandler Bing.
The program was hugely successful and Perry, along with his co-stars, gained wide renown among television viewers. The program also earned him Emmy nominations in 2002 for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series along with Matt LeBlanc, but he lost to Ray Romano. As well as his successful career on Friends, Perry has appeared in films such as Fools Rush In , Almost Heroes, Three to Tango, The Whole Nine Yards and its sequel The Whole Ten Yards, and Serving Sara.
While known primarily for his comic roles, Perry has carved out a career in drama as well, particularly in his portrayal of Associate White House Counsel Joe Quincy in Aaron Sorkin's The West Wing. His three appearances in that series earned him two Emmy nominations for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series in 2003 and 2004. Perry is referred to in the show prior to his guest appearance - Donna Moss seeks him out in the episode "20 Hours in LA." He also appeared as attorney Todd Merrick in two episodes near the end of Ally McBeals five season run, including a 2-hour special intended to revive the legal comedy-drama.
After Friends wrapped up, Perry made his directorial debut in an episode of the 4th season of the American comedy-drama Scrubs (in which he also guest starred as "Murray Marks", an operator of a small airport's traffic control team. Murray is asked to donate a kidney to his father Gregory played by Perry's real father).
He starred in the TNT movie, The Ron Clark Story which premiered August 13, 2006. Perry played small town teacher Ron Clark who relocates to the toughest class in the country. Perry received a Golden Globe nomination as well as an Emmy nomination for his performance.
In 2006-2007, Perry appeared in Aaron Sorkin's drama Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Perry played Matt Albie alongside Bradley Whitford's Danny Tripp, a writer-director duo brought in to help save a failing sketch show. Perry's character was considered to be substantially based on Sorkin's own personal experiences, particularly in television.
In 2006 he began filming Numb, a film based on a man suffering from depersonalization disorder. The film's tentative release date was pushed back several times, but was finally released to DVD on May 13, 2008. He also appeared in David Mamet's Sexual Perversity in Chicago in London. In 2009 he starred in the film 17 Again playing the older Mike O'Donnell.
In 2008, Perry starred in the offbeat film Birds of America as Morrie Tanager, an uptight man who has to deal with his siblings.
Showtime passed on a pilot called The End of Steve, a dark comedy starring, written and produced by Perry and Peter Tolan.
Perry's new comedy pilot ended up in the hands of ABC, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The deal for the untitled comedy is said to include penalties if the pilot doesn't make it to series, almost guaranteeing that the project will get a green light, THR reports. It is based on an original idea by Perry, and will be written by Perry as well as Alex Barnow and Marc Firek, who have both signed as executive producers. Thomas Schlamme is in talks to direct. The new pilot is called Mr. Sunshine. In January 2010, it was announced that ABC has greenlit Mr. Sunshine. It was also revealed that the project is a single-camera sitcom starring Perry as a man who has a minor identity crisis on his 40th birthday. The venture comes from Sony TV and Jamie Tarses' Fanfare Productions. The series was canceled by ABC after nine episodes.
Perry reportedly had relationships with Julia Roberts and Yasmine Bleeth and was dating fashion student Rachel Dunn until 2005. Despite looking for a long-term relationship, in 2009 Perry said he did not know why he was still single.
Perry holds dual Canadian-American citizenship. He is a fan of the Ottawa Senators, the New England Patriots and the Boston Red Sox.
Perry did a 28-day program in 1997 for a Vicodin addiction. Matthew Perry's weight fluctuated drastically over the next few years and once dropped down to . He lost 20 pounds in 2000 due to pancreatitis. Perry again entered rehab in February 2001 to treat an addiction to opioids , amphetamines and alcohol. Perry was in Dallas filming Serving Sara with Elizabeth Hurley when he had such severe stomach pains that he called a local doctor, who advised rehab. Perry flew to Los Angeles and checked into Marina del Rey's Daniel Freeman Hospital. Perry's publicist Lisa Kasteler confirmed his rehab stay.
The Ron Clark Story
The Whole Ten Yards
Serving Sara
Three to Tango
Almost Heroes
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Second Chance / Boys Will Be Boys
Charles in Charge
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Dance 'til Dawn
TV show season
Mr. Sunshine (season 1)
TV show episode
Whole or part of the information contained in this card come from the Wikipedia article "Matthew Perry (acteur)", licensed under CC-BY-SA full list of contributors here.


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Wendy Watson
Wendy M. Watson started her art "career" at the ripe old age of seven with a box of pastels from her grandmother. Art has always been a part of her life. Wendy often included "illustrations" with school reports and projects. Wendy obtained a degree in Theater and Costume Design from the College of St. Benedict in Minnesota. She was active in community theater and served on the founding board of S.T.A.G.E. (Spotlight Theater and Arts Group Etc.). Wendy discovered Decorative Painting in 1986 and has been addicted every since. She participated in Arts & Crafts shows and was a juried artist in Pennsylvania and West Virginia for fourteen years. Teaching became a priority when friends asked her to "show me how to do that". Wendy has been teaching for over twenty years. She currently owns "Wendy's Red Door, Painting Studio and Collectibles" teaching in the studio and several art conferences.
Wendy has been a DecoArt Helping Artist since the program was developed and uses the products exclusively for all original patterns and teaching projects. She has even been known to convert oils, watercolor and other acrylic designs into DecoArt colors. Wendy loves the Americana acrylic paints for their thick consistency, coverage, color selections and ease in prep. The paints have sealer in them, eliminating a step in prep - what is better than that!
Wendy is an active member of the Society of Decorative Painters and has served on the Board of Directors as Board Member at Large and President. She is currently the President of the Board of Trustees for the International Museum of the Society of Decorative Painters (IMSDP).
Check out Wendy's website for upcoming classes, patterns and other products available from "Wendy's Red Door". www.paintingatwendysreddoor.com

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Henderson Cisz
Home| Artists | Henderson Cisz
Henderson Cisz is quite simply the quintessential artist of urban style. Like the cities he paints, his artworks represent a meeting place between the traditional and the contemporary, for while they are classic examples of a long established genre, their interpretation and execution places them firmly in the 21st century. Exhibiting his work all over the world, Henderson enjoys a large following of individual and corporate collectors and has received an impressive range of accolades and awards including the John Solomon Trophy and Artist of the Year in 2007. He has also been the subject of two best selling art books.
Born in Brazil in 1960 Henderson began to paint seriously in his teens. He began to gain something of a reputation locally and by the mid-1980s he decided to leave Brazil and take up painting full time. His first stop was London. Some friends advised him to try the corner of Shaftesbury Avenue painting portraits of passing tourists and such was his success that he started to spend every dry day there.
The work he produced was just too good for the makeshift portrait gallery of Shaftesbury Avenue, so Henderson decided to brave the railings of the Bayswater Road. This turned out to be a defining moment as his paintings began to sell for hundreds of pounds and he rapidly drew a following of serious collectors. 25 years later Henderson is an internationally-acclaimed, award winning artist working from a stunning riverside studio in London, the city that has become his home.
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Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke Heart NPR : NPR Extra Before Midnight is the third film in a trilogy written by Richard Linklater, and starring Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke. The three came in to NPR West to talk with Fresh Air Host Terry Gross about the popular trilogy and showed NPR some love...before leaving.
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Richard Linklater, Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke Heart NPR
June 5, 20136:09 PM ET
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Hear the Interview
'Before Midnight,' Love Darkens And Deepens
Before Midnight is the third movie about Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy), and takes place 23 years after the first one (Before Sunrise) and 15 years after the second (Before Sunset). All three films were written and directed by Richard Linklater. For Before Midnight and Before Sunset, Delpy and Hawke joined Linklater as co-writers. All three came in to NPR West to talk with Fresh Air Host Terry Gross about the popular trilogy. (Heads up: The interview contains mild spoilers, but nothing you don't know if you've seen the trailer.)
During the interview with Gross, Hawke says that while people think of this movie as much darker than the others (they're at a tense moment in their relationship), all three agree that it's an honest look at the good and the bad consequences of choices we make. Linklater, Hawke and Delpy talk about the pressure and satisfaction of shooting a continuous 13-minute shot, and how they want it to make the audience feel as if we've dropped in on their lives already in progress.
Linklater opens up about the woman Before Sunrise is loosely based on, and how she still influences the movies decades later, even though they didn't keep in touch all that often. And of course they (sort of) answer the question: will there be more Before movies?
While they were at NPR, it was fun to see these three interact with each other in person. I was in the studio before the interview started when the engineer was getting microphone levels. Often an engineer or the host will ask a general question to get the guest talking, such as, "What did you have for breakfast today?" But Delpy and Hawke both sang to test their levels.
And on the way out, when I asked if they'd pose for us and handed them each three cards to choose from, they got in a circle, held out the cards, discussed who was wearing what, and which card would go best with which outfit. It was a great little illustration of what three decades of teamwork looks like.
Having figured it all out, and after Hawke said incredulously about my camera "Is that FILM?!" (It's not, but hey NPR, maybe it's time to get me a newer camera?!), all three of them showed a little love for NPR...before leaving.


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Quotes and thoughts from Seth Smith's teleconference Friday
New Orioles outfielder Seth Smith and executive vice president Dan Duquette joined a teleconference with local media Friday to discuss the trade that brought the 34-year-old Smith to Baltimore for 30-year-old pitcher Yovani Gallardo.
Here are some quotes, with my thoughts after each.
Duquette: "The important thing that I want to emphasize today is that we added a good veteran hitter to our lineup to help us in a couple of areas: to help us in the field, to help us in getting on base and setting up the rest of the order, working the pitchers, and also driving in runs … We're gonna continue to build the club. We're looking to add depth. We may sign another outfielder and we may also look at some pitching depth."
My thoughts: The ending of the quote is the key here. Smith helps them, but he's still not an above average outfielder who can leadoff. And there are some players like that still on the market. Also, trading Gallardo may allow Duquette to buy a low-risk starter in February for rotation insurance if one hasn't found a job. And, of course, this doesn't mean that the Mark Trumbo ship has sailed, either.
Smith on being a leadoff hitter: "It seems like I do (leadoff) for a small stretch each season when the team's kind of figuring out what direction they want to go. For me, it's never really been an issue other than just be prepared to play, or be prepared to hit a little sooner than you would otherwise. But after the first at-bat it's business as usual and you approach an at-bat the same way you would regardless of where you're hitting."
My thoughts: He's an emergency option, and probably a better one than sticking Adam Jones or Manny Machado there. But he's not a full-year solution to the leadoff void.
Duquette: "We dealt from an area of surplus – we had six starters – to fill an area of need and that was left-handed hitting, on-base capability and an outfielder. So, we liked the trade from that perspective. We reallocated some of our resources and I think, in the process, we strengthened our team."
My thoughts: The question was about Duquette's thoughts in not having to take from his stout bullpen to add a hitter. And that's a huge key here. Duquette got a hitter without trading a reliever and saved some money. That's got to be considered a win.
Smith on being a platoon player: "It's something that I don't try to control other than work hard to hit right-handers and I work hard to hit left-handers the best I can. And, for me as player, that's kind of what it is. I try to have good at-bats. I try to be the best player I can be in whatever role I am asked."
My thoughts: Buck Showalter is tremendous at putting players in spots where they can succeed. And that's going to happen here. Smith is going to face right-handers almost exclusively, and that should be good for him and the team. Especially that he is willing to do whatever is needed.
Smith on going from Safeco Field to Camden Yards: "You kind of make of it what you want. No one complains about hitting at Camden Yards, I can assure you of that …. There are pros and cons of every ballpark, but, as for hitting at Camden Yards, you can't help but be excited about it."
My thoughts: No one needs to interpret that one. My guess is he was smiling when he said it.
I've been whining and complaining a lot this offseason. Tonight I am smiling!
Steve Cockey
I'd agree, Amazing. I think it's a solid move. Now let's see what else they do. Still need help at DH, leadoff, and vs. LHP.


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The Triumph of the White, Male Ruling Class (I): One Fucking Great Country
Fascinating and entirely predictable fact of the week, month, year, decade and century: no matter who is elected the next president of these wondrous, unique United States of America, "the last, best hope" of all the planets in all the multiverses ever posited in your strangulated imaginations, with respect to every matter of consequence, the next president will be ... a white man! Surprise! This is one fucking great country.
Aw, gee, and shuckity shucks. Am I crapping all over your oh-so-precious, phantasmagorical, transcendental, extra-metafuckinghistorical, orgasmic, hot-cold-tingly, zippity-zappity, sweet, sweet, sweet with double extra gooey, dripping chocolate fudge and yummy, scummy whipped cream MOMENT?!?!?!?!?!?!
You bet your goddamned fat, lazy, dumb ass.
Jesus God, deliver us from The Stupids. Every time the quality of public discussion in this country descends to previously unknown depths of superficiality, triviality, irrelevance, misdirection and outright lying, I think: "At least, it can't possibly get any worse than this." I'm always wrong, every single damned time. The determined lunkheadedness and ignorance of most Americans truly knows no limits. The current orgy of The Ugly Stupids does offer one grimly amusing and fully deserved bonus: most of the major "progressive" writers and bloggers have been fully revealed as the putrid, nauseating crapfest those fourteen of us with open eyes and basically functioning minds have known them to be for some time. I have laughed very, very hard as I watched many of the major progressive bloggers enthusiastically advance the central storyline of this primary season pushed by...yes, that's right: Matt Drudge. The destruction of Hillary (and Bill) Clinton has been one of Drudge's most fervent and frequently announced desires, lo these many years. And progressive writers and bloggers are such wonderfully compliant dumbasses. Many of them joyously leaped to destroy Hillary Clinton, in precisely the ways and utilizing the exact terms that Drudge encouraged them to use.
I hope you have a good appetite for heaping helpings of irony, sprinkled with bloody bits of cranial goo gathered from the progressives' teeny tiny, imperceptible brains. You're going to get a lot of it in the next five months. If Obama is elected, you'll get it for the next four or eight years. I've written extensively about the progressives' intellectual failures; see, for example, the discussion in this essay of the progressives' inability to grasp the historical grounding, political realities, and continuity of U.S. foreign policy, or this article about the more general failures of most liberals and progressives. Most of today's progressives also appear to rejoice in their close to total ignorance of the history of the Progressive movement in this country; see here and here. I've also discussed the blatant mendacity engaged in by leading progressive writers -- for example, their years of protest against "false narratives." As I have explained, they have never been opposed to false narratives because they are false. They are only opposed to false narratives that don't help Democrats. If false narratives help Democrats, or if they help the progressives' hero of the nanosecond, bring 'em on! The recently concluded primary campaign proved my argument many times over. Thank Christ that the progressives aren't constrained by considerations of integrity, honesty, consistency or minimal coherence. If they were, they would all have to retire until such unlikely time as they remembered what they did with their minds (such as they were), and their souls (such as they were, assuming they existed in some distant earlier period).
I've also written numerous times about the progressives' complete and utter failure to act in a manner that might actually make a difference with regard to any issue of genuine significance, and particularly with regard to the matter that remains of the greatest significance right now. I've been writing about it for a couple of years: see here, and here, and here, and here and, most recently, here. What the fuck is wrong with you? See the earlier essays for the answer.
But to see many progressives eagerly following in the footsteps of the dreaded Drudge and the mainstream media, after all the years and the endless posts in which the progressives condemned and ridiculed these same purveyors of "conventional wisdom" and insisted that they, the progressives, offered something new and different and infinitely better...wow, man. That is some impressive shit. (More about that later, probably in subsequent parts of this essay.)
To return to my opening point: let us draw a distinction between the candidates' biological identities and what we might term their functional identities. McCain is a white man; no issue arises there. I am well aware that Hillary Clinton is biologically a woman, as I know that Barack Obama is biracial in hereditary terms. By "functional identity," I refer to the role all these candidates have chosen to play, in cultural and political terms. (Please note that what follows is not intended to mean that Clinton has not been the target of misogyny or that Obama has not been the target of racism. They have both been the targets of viciously irrational beliefs, for it is not a question of either-or on this point. I'll discuss this in detail in future parts of this essay.) Because all three of these politicians have chosen to engage in national politics at the highest level, they have no choice about enthusiastically adopting all the indicia of the ruling class, for indeed they are the ruling class. That is, they have no choice if they want to win. And all three of them assuredly want to win (even if one of them seems to be out of the running for the moment, but much can happen between now and November, and even between now and August).
Reflect for just a moment about what it is they want to win so desperately. Each of these three persons wants to be the most powerful ruler in the world. Given the nature of the weapons that will be at their disposal, they want to be the most powerful ruler in all of history, with the power to fundamentally transform human history and perhaps even to end it in significant part. Even if you believed that you acted righteously, with justice and truth on your side (let us set aside for the moment how one can believe that the power to murder millions of innocent people can ever be thought to be right or just, although I do not believe such considerations should ever be set aside), would you want power of that kind? If you would, I hope never to meet you. For any person who actively seeks the power of life and death over just one other human being, let alone millions of people, is deeply, irrevocably damaged in psychological terms. If we use the term "normal" to designate those goals and motives that can generally be described as supportive of individual life and happiness, no one who wants to be president of the United States is remotely close to normal. When you consider the years of relentless, soul-destroying ambition that are required to approach the office of president, together with the indefensible compromises, the endless lies, and the constant exercise of power over others in less extreme forms, anyone who deeply desires to be president verges on a constant state of insanity.
Yet one of these terrifyingly deranged people will, in fact, be the next president. Many Americans are excited, even thrilled, about the prospect, which tells you a rather important fact about most Americans, actually many important facts. I have numerous reasons for dreaming of a stateless world. There are others, but these are among the most critical of them.
As I have discussed in detail, there are unquestionably policy differences between the two major political parties, but those differences concern only derivative issues. On the points of greatest significance, the ruling class adheres to a consistent, monolithic worldview; the goals on which they all agree are a corporatist-authoritarian state at home, and unending interventions abroad, using military force as and on the scope required. (On the characteristics and dynamics of the ruling class, see "The Elites Who Rule Us," "It's Called the Ruling Class Because It Rules," "Blinded by the Story," "Once More Into the Land of the Blind," and the other essays linked in those articles.)
In general terms, the worldview that allegedly justifies the numerous, repeated acts of invasion, bombing, murder, genocide and torture engaged in by the United States government goes like this:
The West has the answer to successful human life. Since it does, and because certain elements in the rest of the world have now chosen to attack us on our own ground (and never mind that we have invaded and ruled over vast portions of the rest of the world since time immemorial), we must enlighten those benighted portions of the globe in our defense. Our chosen method of enlightenment is brute military force, to be deployed even against countries that did not threaten us. The lack of a genuine threat is no argument against spreading our version of "civilization," for our mission is grounded not only in self-defense: it is also a moral mission. Our success and our "peace" directly correlate to our virtue. Those countries and those civilizations that do not enjoy the same success and peace are without virtue. In the most extreme (and, one could argue, most consistent) version of this tale, non-Western parts of the world are less than human -- and they are subhuman by choice. They are immoral, and sometimes even evil. Since we represent the good and they represent the evil, we are surely entitled to improve them, by invasion and bombing if necessary. If they do not threaten us today, they might at some indeterminate time in the future. And while we might kill many innocent civilians in our campaign of civilization, those who survive will be infinitely better off than they would have been otherwise. Besides, how "innocent" can any of them be -- since they are members of inferior, less than fully human civilizations, and since they are so by choice?
This story may have the virtue of simplicity and the attractiveness of notions that support a faltering sense of righteousness -- but it is also grievously, terribly wrong. It ignores the long sweep of history and complex questions of philosophy, morality and politics. ... It should be noted that, besides being wrong for countless reasons, this story contains the seeds of immense destructiveness. The destruction we have seen in the last few years may only be the prelude to infinitely greater destruction still to come. ...
That final point concerning racism is explored more fully in, "Myths of New Orleans: Poor, Bad Blacks Who Got What They Deserved."
As the above excerpt briefly outlines, the myth of American exceptionalism is an inherently, necessarily racist vision. I indicated in a recent essay that the more accurate and comprehensive phrase would be: the myth of white American exceptionalism. (I leave for another time a discussion of a very complex subject: how the concept of "whiteness" itself is an intentionally inexact, infinitely malleable one, a concept subject to continual revision and reconstruction, but always to the benefit of the ruling class. If you want to read more on this issue, I recommend Matthew Frye Jacobson's book, Whiteness of a Different Color: European Immigrants and the Alchemy of Race.)
In "Racist Nation," I wrote:
We are troubled by a still deeper conflict, between our preferred vision of ourselves and the facts of our history. We see ourselves as citizens of the greatest and most civilized nation in all of history. Our nation is also the most moral country in history, and we as individuals are exemplars of personal virtue. The United States represents Absolute Good, or as close to it as humanity will come. (I've discussed this mythology in a number of essays. See, for example, "The National Myth that Sustains Us -- and Its Inevitable Racism," "A 'Redeemer Nation,' with Some Explaining to Do," and "Myths of New Orleans.")
People who are Good cannot be racists. Obviously, many of us are. What to do.
This sanitized version of our history ignores or unforgivably minimizes the genocide of Native Americans, the slaughter and enslavement of African-Americans, a century following the Civil War of government-enforced segregation, discrimination against Jews, the Irish, Italians, Germans, and Hispanic immigrants today -- yet all of this is set aside so the myth can continue.
It also ignores another manifestation of the racism that inevitably proceeds from our mythologized self-assessment: the racism that has permeated our foreign policy for over a hundred years.
Vicious, murderous racism lay at the core of the war of aggression waged against Mexico in the mid-nineteenth century (see, "The American Myth Continued"), it was repeated in the disgusting and unforgivable war of aggression waged in the Philippines (see, "The Mythology of the 'Good Guy' American"), it would be revealed again in both World Wars, in the Vietnam war, and in almost every war ever waged by the United States government. With the exception of World War II, not one of those wars was genuinely defensive in nature, not in any respect whatsoever. Every one of them was instigated by the ruling class, to open up and/or strengthen markets for those American business interests with extensive connections to government, to establish and consolidate American "influence" (i.e., control), to make American hegemony unassailable, and to "civilize" The Other, who was always characterized -- and hated, despised and targeted for submission or, failing that, destruction -- because he was inferior, less than, not fully human. The United States government sanctifies each American death -- while completely disregarding and lying about the realities of slaughter in war -- and invariably employs American deaths as an additional excuse to continue the slaughter of The Other. At the same time, deaths of The Other are rarely even mentioned.
All of this is now repeated in Iraq. The United States government -- aided by a fully compliant, supportive Congress, which enabled and continues to fund this ongoing act of monstrous barbarity even now -- has unleashed genocide, torture and the destruction of an entire country. Because the American ruling class believes that "the American model of society is destined to dominate the world, by one means or another, since it is held to be the culmination of human development," it cannot possibly be the case that the United States itself is fundamentally wrong. Whatever fault and blame are involved cannot belong to the American government. Any and all important failures must unquestionably be the fault of The Other.
So says Hillary Clinton:
Our troops did the job they were asked to do. They got rid of Saddam Hussein. They conducted the search for weapons of mass destruction. They gave the Iraqi people a chance for elections and to have a government. It is the Iraqis who have failed to take advantage of that opportunity.
So said Barack Obama just last week:
It's not change when [McCain] promises to continue a policy in Iraq that asks everything of our brave men and women in uniform and nothing of Iraqi politicians..."
The condescending superiority of this perspective is unassailable and unchangeable. (In yet another loathsome example of the identical mentality, John Kerry has also said the same thing.)
Listen up, Obama, you cheap, lying fraud: the United States government launched a criminal war of aggression against a nation that never threatened us. It continues a bloody, murdering occupation which does nothing but worsen the agony of the Iraqi people. We have no right to be in Iraq at all. We never did. The actions of the United States government have led to a genocide of world historical proportions.
Genocidal murderers and those who support and enable them -- as you do, Obama, since you vote to fund this continuing crime -- do not get to "ask" one single goddamned fucking thing of their victims. Not. One. Single. Goddamned. Fucking. Thing.
Get it, you pathetic little asshole?
Ah, I must correct myself. Genocidal murderers and those who support and enable them do get to ask one thing: they can beg all the victims for their forgiveness. Otherwise, get out in a matter of months. Not just "combat troops," but every last American -- out. And, no: genocidal murderers and those who support and enable them do not get to decide how to "responsibly" leave the scene of their own crimes. What, exactly, do genocidal murderers and those who support and enable them know about behaving "responsibly"?
It continues to amaze me that matters of this kind must be explained over and over again -- and that the denial of both the American ruling class and most Americans remains impenetrable. That is a measure of the depravity of this nation today. In terms of the conduct of our government and what most Americans are willing to accept, we are a nation without any sense of morality, without the smallest bit of decency or humanity, completely incapable of seeing and acknowledging the horrors we inflict on others. If the United States should attack Iran in the current circumstances -- an attack which no one is doing anything of significance to even try to stop, not the Democrats, not the useless progressive bloggers, no one -- our journey into hell will be complete. The United States will find its place among the most monstrous nations in all of history.
I should mention one further point about Iraq specifically. The American ruling class's patronizing, narcissistic, racist, homicidal impulses force them into denying simple truths that should be obvious to any semi-honest and semi-decent human being. Patrick Cockburn wrote the following some time ago. It remains true today in all essential ways:
One theme has been constant throughout the past three-and-a-half years - the Iraqi government has always been weak. For this, the US and Britain were largely responsible. They wanted an Iraqi government which was strong towards the insurgents but otherwise compliant to what the White House and Downing Street wanted. All Iraqi governments, unelected and elected, have been tainted and de-legitimised by being dependent on the US. This is as true of the government of the Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki today as it was when sovereignty was supposedly handed back to Iraq under the prime minister Iyad Allawi in June 2004. Real authority had remained in the hands of the US. The result was a government whose ministers could not move outside the Green Zone. They showed great enthusiasm for press conferences abroad where they breathed defiance at the insurgents and agreed with everything said by Mr Bush or Tony Blair.
The government can do nothing because it only came into existence after ministries were divided up between the political parties after prolonged negotiations. Each ministry is a bastion of that party, a source of jobs and money. The government can implement no policy because of these deep divisions. The government cannot turn on the militias because they are too strong.
In brief: what Obama and the rest of the ruling class propose to "ask" of Iraqi politicians is that they do exactly as the U.S. government demands with regard to every issue that concerns the American ruling class itself. Iraqi politicians cannot form a genuinely independent, autonomous government -- because the U.S. ruling class has forbidden them to do so. That is not what the ruling class wants, and it was never what they wanted. What they want is an obedient, compliant colony, regardless of the official designation they might use.
This is only one indication, albeit a revealing one, of the numerous ways in which Obama has enthusiastically made himself into a full-fledged member of the American ruling class. It is not even the most significant way in which he has done so; I will address Obama's complete identification with the beliefs, motives, and goals of the ruling class in the next installment. (For a preview, see "Obama's Whitewash," all of the "Choosing Sides" series, and the other essays linked in those pieces.)
And remember: the beliefs, motives, and goals of the American ruling class have remained basically unchanged for well over a century. That means they are the beliefs, motives, and goals of a white ruling class. Obama may be biracial in hereditary terms, but in every significant respect, he is as white as any black man can be -- ideologically, politically, and with regard to every critical policy issue.
As they say, dear reader: only in America. It's one fucking great country.
Very Sorry, But Some Trouble Again
Choosing Sides (III): Let the Victims Speak
Cultivate Your Sense of Wonder, and Live Ecstatica...
Choosing Sides (II): Killing Truth and Hope -- The...
Mr. Potter, You're Fired!
Choosing Sides (I): "Why America May Go to Hell," ...
The Nightmare Made Real: Torture, Murder and Endle...
"I tremble for my country..."
The Little Progressives that Could, Who Can't
Those Clever, Dastardly Iranians! Bamboozling Us ...


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Three Generations of Preservation Object D'art
In 1965, Henri Vaillancourt, of Greenville, New Hampshire, built his first bark canoe by hand; the same way the first people of Canada did. He made only 200. Our family is the proud owner of one of them.
I first became infatuated with Vaillancourt's birch bark canoes when I saw them featured in a craft artisans exhibit at the Smithsonian Renwick Gallery in 1974.
Henri's handmade canoes are built along the same traditions of the birch bark canoes made by the First Nations of Malecite, Abnaki, and Algonquin, as well as those developed by the French voyageurs during the fur trade period—using the same tools: an axe, a crooked-handled knife, and an awl. Henri is arguably the world's foremost expert on the construction of a birch bark canoe.
I placed an order for one of Henri's 14' canoes to give to my father for Christmas. Because Henri could only build approximately 7 canoes in a year, the finished canoe had an unknown ETA. I instead attached the picture from the Smithsonian catalog I had to a wood paddle and presented it to my father. In 1979 my father and I drove up to Henri's house in New Hampshire to collect the finished boat and bring it down to Westchester County, New York.
There's something almost unnatural about using something so beautiful in a utilitarian way, without a single straight line. But I'm quite sure when Henri began making his boats, he didn't foresee them as collectable objects d'art, given their long practical history and the role they played in opening the wilderness to commercial navigation.
In his book, The Survival of the Birch Bark Canoe, Pulitzer Prize winning author John McPhee chronicles the long history and craft of birch bark canoe making, incorporating the story of his 150-mile canoe journey through the Maine woods with Henri and three others—an experience full of memorable successes, challenges, and eccentric companions—namely Henri.
As McPhee writes in the book, "(Henri) proved to be as headstrong in the woods and on the water as he was artful and deliberate in his shop…" They endured a strong headwind that produced high waves, deep troughs, and spray, which Henri "dictated that we ignore this forbidding condition and cross the lake." Soon, they were taking on water and one of the other passengers, after calling Henri a lunatic, said "head to shore!"
Clearly the canoe maker and the canoes were destined for adventures. Making his own wilderness memories, my father loved that canoe. He belonged to the Camp Fire Club of America, the Teddy Roosevelt Association, and the Civilian Marksmanship Program. He used the canoe on outings, canoe races, fishing, and shooting expeditions, paddling, sitting and standing up. He was an outdoorsman for sure. Competitions were a regular part of his outdoorsman life, and my father's claim to fame was the campfire pancakes competition. With a log, a hatchet, a knife, and ingredients, he could start a fire and cook a pancake in 4 minutes and 33 seconds!
After years of ferrying my father through his outdoor passions, the canoe eventually passed back to me where I kept it hanging from the back porch ceiling between outings with my boys. Over the years the tree root lashings holding the edges of the bark fell apart. There was no one but the original builder that I would trust with the restoration. So, after waiting my turn for a couple of years, I took it back to Henri to fix it.
Henri Vaillancourt explains to Ward Bucher the restoration of the birch bark canoe.
This past winter, the canoe was returned again—with the original birch bark good as new—and ready for her next adventure.
On Father's Day, my son Jack, a good friend, and I took my father's restored birch bark canoe to Prettyboy Reservoir in Miller, Maryland, a rural area northwest of Baltimore. We were treated to the sight of a pair of blue herons and the sounds of the Cicada chorus as we paddled idyllically in the summer waters without a building in sight. Then, a bit like that infamous Henri and John McPhee trip, we were required to do some bailing of our own. We unfortunately forgot that the canoe needed some time in the water for the wood decking to swell enough to make it watertight.
Ward Bucher and son Jack take out the restored birch bark canoe for a test drive at Prettyboy Reservoir.
So now, three generations have had the pleasure of paddling in a Henri Vaillancourt canoe, each one with its own stories to pass along, not just about our adventures but about this rescued art form of canoe building.
The canoe serves as a little eye candy at a recent garden party.
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Q: Evenly distribute values over a time period I have got a variable amount of items, and a variable date range that I need to distribute them over. Lets say I have 3 items and I need to distribute them over 6 days. What I would want is to have every second day have an item, and it does not matter if the first day has an item or not. If I had 7 items over 6 days, one of the days would get 2 items, it does not matter which day that is either.
Sadly, it turns out I really suck at maths, so I have no real idea on how to do this in a relatively nice and pretty way, or if it is even possible. I could probably figure it out in a hacky way, but I'm hoping to learn something from it as well :P
The language used is PHP.

A: //If you get the period between items:
$period = $days / $items;
//Then you can iterate through the items:
for ($i = 0; $i < $items; $i++)
{
    //and have a function that will add an item to the day number given as a parameter.
    add_item_to_day_number(floor($i * $period));
}

A: Essentially you're doing division and then distributing the remainder sequentially. So the steps go something like this:

*

*count the number of days

*count the number of items

*if items > days

*

*divide the number of items by the
number of days (items per day) $x

*take the modulus of items/day $m
(this is the remainder)

*cycle through the days placing $x
items on each day, and 1 extra item
on the first $m days

*if days > items

*

*divide the number of days by the
number of items (days per item) $x

*cycle through the days stepping by $x
and placing 1 item on each day (keep
track of how many items are left)

*when you arrive past the last day, if
there are any items left, loop over
the days again starting at day0+1 and
stepping by $x

A: (items in day i) = floor( (i+1) * items / days) - floor( i * items / days), where i is 0-based.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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Category Archives: Reviews
Kanye West and the Diamonds of Doom
Review of Kanye West at the Hammersmith Apollo, 23rd February 2013
Pic by baradar85
Poor old Kanye. An acclaimed music career that shows no sign of slowing down, a blossoming relationship with a little babby on the way, and so very much money that he can afford to slag off corporate sponsorship now – and yet he's still so alone and so cold. At least, that's what we must assume when we see him, a solitary figure in white pacing a vast, bare stage like an aggrieved polar bear while projections of icebergs and blizzards and cold seas play behind him.
It's beautiful, minimal staging. He was surrounded by writhing, body-painted women the last time I saw him, but today there's no-one to get in his way as he lopes around his empty square in what could be either a strait-jacket or a mummy's wrap. Sometimes he covers his face completely, singing from behind a bird mask or, most alarmingly, a sewn-up ski mask completely encrusted in diamonds – the close-ups on the giant screens make him a disturbing, abstract monster. Meanwhile on the backing track Shirley Bassey's diamond fetish gives way to Rihanna's and some sort of circle is closed.
Kanye's own favourite numbers seem to be his robo-despair epics, and he milks Say You Will and Runaway for all they're worth and more. But the dreamlike atmosphere persists even as he makes his way through the big hits, and the design choices are thrilling throughout. When the all-white-everything section has gone as far as it can go – with an outbreak of snowfall over the stalls while Kanye mopes in an icy forest – the Apollo erupts in sudden, dazzling colour for Flashing Lights and All Of The Lights. It's a well-timed middle section that offers some relief before the icebergs return to finish him off and Kanye trudges away towards them. Poor old thing.
Tagged diamonds, kanye, mummies, music, polar bears, rihanna, shirley bassey
The Foxscars 2013
Never mind the Oscars. This year I'm launching my personal alternative to the Academy Awards – the FOXSCARS.
BEST UNSEEN JOURNEY: Doctor Who Magazine's The Watcher recently enthused about the great unseen journeys in Who but Bond and M's desperate drive from Westminster to Scotland in Skyfall takes the biscuit. "It's not very comfortable, is it?" says M, settling into the Aston Martin. "Are you going to complain the whole way?" counters Bond. And then the most extraordinary elision.
Google Maps suggests just over 8 hours for a trip from London to Glencoe. That's a long trip even if you knock off an hour or two for Bond's reckless speeding, and M's a septuagenarian who's just spent hours cooped up in an inquiry. So this grim, relentless flight for their lives must have had at least one comfort break along the way. I picture M rushing into the service station toilets, cashmere coat tails all a-flap, calling out to James who's in the queue at the shop "Get me a Twirl, Bond! Or if they haven't got a Twirl, a Topic!"
BEST IRONIC SURNAME-BASED CASTING: Liz White IS The Woman In Black.
BEST GUYLINER: Lenny Kravitz's gold lids in The Hunger Games. You would, wouldn't you.
BEST MOUTH: If you make a film expecting your audience to spend almost the entire running time staring at your heroine's half-lit face as she stumbles through horrors in the dark, it had better be a good one. And Silent House is a beautiful, beautiful film where extraordinary technical challenges behind the scenes [it is contrived to appear as a single 90-minute shot] are matched by Elizabeth Olsen's brilliant expressive face. I spent ages scouring the disc to get the best screenshot of her mouth opening up in atavistic terror, and realised afterwards I'd landed on the same still as is used on all the promo materials. Well there you go.
BEST LEGO: The telekinetic teenagers in Chronicle hone their skills with some truly awesome Lego action.
BEST BREATHING: Kristen Stewart is already famous for acting out emotion purely through the medium of languid sighs and gasps, so it was a treat that in her first scene in Snow White And The Huntsman she immediately got to blow a candle out.
BEST MONSTER IN AN OTHERWISE TERRIBLE FILM: The spider-thing made out of mannequin parts in Silent Hill: Revelation
BEST IMAGINARY MUSICAL VERSION: There's a moment in the excellent My Brother The Devil when Fady Elsayed says to James Floyd "I'd rather have a brother that's a bomber than a homo!" Every time I've seen it I've been willing him to say "bummer" instead of "homo". Because then it would be the perfect opening lyric to the lead song of the musical version that's in my head.
BEST 3D: I didn't think I liked 3D, but Life of Pi changed my mind, so well done everybody.
BEST OPTIMISM IN A POSTER PULL-QUOTE: Quartet
BEST PUNCTUATION: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2
BEST FINGERS: Not to get all spoilery, but there's a point in Prometheus where Noomi Rapace has just gone through some of the most intense physical and mental trauma that you can imagine. And how do the ship's crew wake her up? Five sharp raps to the face with the back of the fingers. In marigolds. Makes me laugh every time.
BEST GRATUITOUS NUDITY: Nick Sagar suddenly being forced to strip naked in the street in Ill Manors had absolutely no plot justification or character relevance at all. Plan B, we salute you.
BEST INTER-SPECIES NECROPHILIAC FRENCH KISS: Always a hotly-contested category, but this year Cabin in the Woods just edged it.
Tagged cabin in the woods, chronicle, daniel craig, fady elsayed, films, ill manors, james bond, james floyd, judi dench, kristen stewart, lenny kravitz, monsters, my brother the devil, nick sagar, plan b, prometheus, silent hill, silent house, skyfall, the hunger games, twilight
The biggest jigsaw shop in the world – a review
We were in the Lake District recently and happened across this place:
They're very modest on the sign. "Probably the largest selection of jigsaws in the world" they say. Probably! And it does look like an ordinary shop from the outside.
This is the sight that confronts you on the ground floor. Impressive. Still, you've perhaps seen bigger jigsaw displays elsewhere. But then you go upstairs:
This is the view from the top of the stairs, and the point at which things get a bit overwhelming. With jigsaws piled high from floor to ceiling you might struggle to make out that narrow opening on the right there. What's through the rabbit hole?
Here I am at the centre of the cardboard cave. A place where the walls themselves are towers of terrifying puzzles and distance is as meaningless as direction. A person could lose themselves forever here. And what did I find in the furthest corner of the labyrinth? This:
A classy extension of Downton Abbey's brand identity there. So which other cultural forces have taken jigsaw form in this brave new world?
It's Twilight's Edward and Jacob, in Puzzleball form! £6.99 each – a bargain. Finally Bella can have both! Who else is here?
It's Disney's Hannah Montana of course! "Made in 2D, Displayed in 3D" – will Miley Cyrus EVER be able to move on?
Here's a selection of the generic jigsaws. The size and scope of the industry that keeps crazed fans in a constant supply of fresh puzzles had never occurred to me before. What evocative names. Blooming Cart. Proud Peacock. Gotta Love Snow! Yes, you gotta. Is there anything a bit more racy though? Well…
Oh this is the stuff. Really Really (Really) Naughty Dots – Explicit Jigsaw Fun For Adults Only. It's the future our forebears fought for. It even comes with a special pen! Mind you, how many stages of frustration do you want to put yourself through? You'll spend hours doing the jigsaw, and then you have to do the dot-to-dots, and finally you're supposed to get some sort of erotic thrill out of a phallus you've drawn yourself with a wipe-clean pen. I suppose for some people the anticipation's everything. Here's something a bit gentler for a happy finish:
Tagged downton abbey, games, jigsaws, miley cyrus, puzzles, sex, shopping, shops, twilight
My albums of 2012: Games & Puzzles special
Can YOU solve Plan B's logic problem, spot the ball with Frank Ocean or help Usher find his climax? Find out in my Albums of the Year Puzzle Special!
10. Jessie Ware – Devotion
9. Bright Light Bright Light – Make Me Believe In Hope
8. Gossip – A Joyful Noise
Three very thoughtful, quietly euphoric albums to start us off. So let's have a thoughtful and quietly euphoric teaser:
You are queueing for the buffet at a music industry awards ceremony with Rod Thomas, Jessie Ware and Beth Ditto. You know that one of them always tells the truth, one of them always lies, and one can either lie or tell the truth as they choose. Rod says "The salmon en croute is nice! Don't listen to Beth by the way, she always lies." Jessie says "The profiteroles are lovely. And you can trust Rod, he always tells the truth." Beth says "I do lie sometimes but I can tell the truth too if I want to! By the way the mushroom vol-au-vents are delicious."
Which is the only food you can put on your plate with confidence?
7. Usher – Looking 4 Myself
I'm on my own with this one, I think. At least, I haven't seen anyone else raving about it in end-of-year lists. Too much dance-pop for the R&B crowd? Too R&B for the pop crowd? Too cheesy for everyone else? Actually that last one doesn't need a question mark. But I like it a lot. The centrepiece is of course Climax, a cleverly named song as Usher never actually reaches one. But can YOU help him get there?
6. Angel Haze – Reservation
It's not until you put an album on at work and everyone goes rigid with horror that you notice quite how sweary it is. The words in the puzzle are all taken from Angel's lyrics. When fitted correctly into the grid, the shaded squares will reveal a special bonus word! What is it?
5. Frank Ocean – Channel Orange
Can YOU see Frank's balls in this picture? Mark with a cross where you think they are.
4. Plan B – Ill Manors
It's a horrible world depicted in the film Ill Manors, with relentlessly awful things happening to everyone in it. The accompanying album is just as revolting and upsetting, but of course it's all set to brilliant music. Plan B has drafted his plans for the sequel in the form of a logic problem – solve it if you dare!
3. Tyson – Die On The Dancefloor
Here was a 2012 surprise – a concept album about morbidity delivered as a series of falsetto Hi-NRG bangers. Bloody great. So here's a puzzle based on Tyson's twin obsessions of disco and death.
2. Metric – Synthetica
I think Metric's dark, sugary synth-rock is sounding better than ever, and these songs haunted and inspired me all year. Join the fun by solving the riddle to find a word associated with metric measurements.
1. Cassie – The Unreleased Classics Trilogy
Well here's a puzzle. A singer releases a very good first album and goes on to record stacks of even better material for a second album which six years later shows no sign of ever materialising. No don't write in, there isn't an answer to this one. But Cassie's work since 2006 has now been collated and packaged up as a set of three downloads comprising 66 tracks. That's right, my album of the year isn't even a proper album and some of the tracks are years old. But to my tastes, out of this bonanza of material you could get at least two full albums that would wipe the floor with anything else from this year. It's a collection of cold, sexy, sweet and surprising electro that at its best makes me think of Janet Jackson singing her way through Britney's Blackout. But don't take my word for it – it's free!
If you want solutions to the puzzles, they're here. And if you want a soundtrack to working them out, my songs of the year are in a playlist in the previous post. Happy New Year x
Tagged angel haze, beth ditto, bright light bright light, cassie, death, frank ocean, games, gossip, ill manors, jessie ware, metric, music, plan b, puzzles, tyson, usher
Fifty Shades of Cup-a-Soup – the crazy world of knock-off erotic publishing
We've all done it. Stumbling hungover through the supermarket looking for a packet of Cup-a Soup, you grab one from the shelf and it's only when you get home you realise you've ended up with the supermarket's own brand instead. Every successful brand attracts imitators, who'll usually try to match the look and feel of the original packaging as closely as they can. And in books, EL James's Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy is currently the biggest, most successful brand of them all. So I shouldn't have been surprised to see THIS display in WH Smith the other day:
You'll notice that some of the original Fifty Shades books are scattered among the cuckoos, making the display as confusing as possible. So let's find out which of the imitators have come closest to the benchmark. (Yes, I'm judging books purely by their covers. I haven't read Fifty Shades or any of these others, and I'm not here to sneer at them either. I just marvel at the bravado of this sort of opportunistic marketing.)
THE Ninety Days of Genevieve
Background: The gradation from dark at the top to light at the bottom is perfect. Falls into the trap of using a pure grey rather than a bluish one though. 7/10
Font: A bit too austere 4/10
Imagery: None 0/10
Title: Ninety is an impressive step onwards from fifty, "Days" has assonance with "Shades", and Genevieve is a name starting with G. Fair 7/10
Bonus: All the more impressive as a knock-off considering it was originally written in 1996 7/10
Total: 25/50
FIFTY SHADES OF MR DARCY
Background: Again with the over-literal grey 5/10
Font: Nasty mix of caps and italics 3/10
Imagery: The boots and riding crop are textbook 10/10
Title: Copying the whole "Fifty Shades Of" is breathtakingly audacious 8/10
Bonus: It's all completely undercut by putting "A Parody" right on the front cover where even the slowest-brained shopper will see it 0/10
EIGHTY DAYS YELLOW
Background: Much too black, but the imaginary light source is in about the right place 4/10
Font: Nicely rounded but a bit heavy 6/10
Imagery: The choice of abstract, vaguely erotic object – a violin – is nice, but it's tacky to merge it with a human headshot 4/10
Title: "Eighty Days" is a weaker echo of "Ninety Days" (see above) but this has gone the whole hog by finishing with a colour! Yellow is a great choice but may imply piss-sex, which will put off the gentler reader. A point also docked for missing out the "Of" 8/10
Bonus: "Fun, frisky and grown-up" pull-quote 6/10
12 SHADES OF SURRENDER: UNDONE
Background: The blue/grey mix is spot-on. There's perhaps a little too much light if we're nit-picking 9/10
Font: No-one asked for capitals. And where's that yellow subtitle come from? 0/10
Imagery: Stiletto heels meet the "item of clothing with vaguely sexual connotations" criterion nicely 10/10
Title: "12" is a lot less than fifty, and it should be spelt out properly. "Shades" is a daring direct lift but it loses its way with "Surrender: Undone". Show, don't tell! 5/10
Bonus: The "Guaranteed to get you hot under the collar" pull-quote is serviceable but a bit obvious 5/10
TOTAL: 29/50 – with twenty-nine shades of grey we have our winner! Well done Mills & Boon.
Tagged books, graphic design, sex, shops
5 things I learned from The Power of Three
1. The Power of Ninety (miles a second, so it's reckoned)
The Doctor's heartfelt speech to Amy offering perspective on 'one corner of one country in one continent on one planet that's a corner of the galaxy that's a corner of the universe that is forever growing… ' as they sat looking at the stars reminded me very much of Eric Idle's lovely song in Monty Python's The Meaning Of Life.
2. The Power of Pertwee
I really liked this story and the way it balanced a vibe reaching back through various Torchwood scenarios to the feel of the global invasions in Russell T Davies' Doctor Who all the way back to the nostalgic glow of the Pertwee era. Mind you I mean the good Pertwee era of my childhood imagination – the one based on the Target novelisations and what we were told by the guidebooks and magazines, where everything was cosy and action-packed at the same time and it felt like a family – before the videos started coming out and it turned out the Third Doctor was really just a horrible thankless old bully.
3. The Power of other mobile networks are available apart from Three
4. The Power of KIRSty
Implacable cubes make great enemies, from Dungeons & Dragons' Gelatinous Cubes to the Borg, the world of the film Cube and those remorseless advancing blocks in the old PlayStation game Kurushi. There's something about geometric perfection that inspires unease, even when they're not blaring out The Birdie Song. And I wouldn't go so far as to ask Is Doctor Who's The Power of Three a Shot-For-Shot Remake of Hellraiser?, but you know –
There's this girl who can make the cubes work
And the wall in the hospital turns into a dimensional portal
And the cube reconfigures itself on its own
And who the FUCK's this?
– and this is all very welcome to me.
5. The Power of Poultry
Could they be alien eggs? asks Brian. Oh Brian. If only they were.
Tagged amy pond, cenobites, cube, doctor who, dungeons & dragons, films, gaming, gelatinous cubes, hellraiser, jon pertwee, kurushi, matt smith, telly


eCommerce, Big Data and Cloud Services are the top three priorities for CIOs over the coming 12 months.
53% of CIOs believe the implementation of Cloud Services will have a moderate impact on their business and 29% expect a significant impact.
34% of CIOs will see 2-3% of overall revenue reinvested into IT, while 28% will benefit from their company investing 5% or more.
10 September 2013: While Chief Information Officers (CIOs) working in various industries around Australia will spend the bulk of their time on 'business as usual' operational work, the continued emergence of IT innovation areas such as Big Data, eCommerce and Cloud Services will shape the hiring outlook and the skill sets in demand within the technology profession over the coming year.
Based on the findings of the Michael Page Technology 2013-14 CIO Viewpoint report, 38% of surveyed CIOs spend between 20-39% of their time on operational work and 33% dedicate between 40-59% of their time on this work. Transformational tasks take up a smaller percentage of CIOs' workload, with 48% spending between 20-39% of their time on transformational work and 58% spending within the same range of time on aligning the IT strategy with that of the business.
eCommerce is the priority innovation area for the largest percentage of CIOs (31%), followed by 28% citing Big Data and a further 23% choosing Cloud Services. The continued emergence of Cloud Services is having an impact on the IT function, with 53% of CIOs believing Cloud Services will have a moderate impact and 29% expect a significant impact on their business.
"The focus on eCommerce and Big Data highlights that many businesses are focused on connecting with their customers and driving revenue through mobile devices and internet availability," says Ms. Emily Wilson, Director of Michael Page Technology.
In terms of IT spend, 34% of CIOs will see 2-3% of the business's overall revenue reinvested into IT, while 28% will benefit from their company investing 5% or more. Compared to the previous year, the majority of CIOs surveyed (38%) will work with a similar budget over the coming 12 months while 33% expect to have an increased budget and 29% will need to carry out their IT responsibilities working with a reduced budget to the previous year.
"IT headcount for CIOs over the coming 12 months is expected to be stable with the previous year for 45% of survey respondents, and 30% indicate they will increase the size of their teams," says Ms. Wilson.
"We are also seeing the hiring of permanent employees as the preference over fixed term contractors, according to 43% of surveyed CIOs, indicating the commitment to build teams with the relevant skill sets to progress project innovation initiatives," she adds.


text:
Nights are warming faster than days. Here's what that means for the planet.
Climate change can have profound impacts across ecosystems, but rising average temperatures are just one factor among many driving those repercussions. A new study published in late September in Global Change Biology found that nighttime temperatures are increasing at a faster rate compared to daytime temps in most land areas across the Earth. That shift can influence everything from predator-prey dynamics to plant growth.
© Provided by Popular Science
Nighttime ecology is particularly understudied, with most research focused on the daytime activities of organisms.
"Climate change is already messing things up," says Daniel Cox, an ecologist at the University of Exeter and lead author of the study. "But the 24-hour asymmetry is adding an extra dimension of complexity [for species]."
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Previous analyses have found that the rising greenhouse gases in our atmosphere are not having an even effect on temperatures from day to night. But Cox says this is the first study of temperature asymmetries to cover all global lands.
Without understanding these effects, ecologists can't hope to fully grasp how the natural world will respond. Experiments with grasshoppers and spiders, for example, have shown that the time of the day at which heating occurs can tip the ecological balance. In a 2017 study, researchers found increased daytime warming led spiders to seek cover earlier in the day, enabling grasshoppers to munch away at plants without fear, affecting plant growth. Conversely, the spiders hunted the grasshoppers more fiercely when nightime temperatures warmed, possibly reducing the insect's numbers. These kinds of effects can ripple across a larger ecosystem, with potential impacts for plant communities, wildlife, and agriculture.
© Pexels
Nighttime ecology is particularly understudied, with most research focused on the daytime activities of organisms. That's why Cox was interested in understanding temperature asymmetries across the globe. Revealing these differences can be a stepping stone toward seeing how nocturnal activities are faring under climate change.
To find out, Cox and his team mapped 35 years of data on temperature, cloud cover, humidity, and precipitation. For each of the pixels of land area on the global maps, they looked at how the maximum daytime and minimum nighttime temperatures changed over time.
On a global level, nights are heating up more than days. Almost twice as much area has seen a greater temperature increase at night compared to during the day. This change appears to be closely tied to shifts in cloud cover; where cloud cover increased, so did nighttime temperatures. "We think that cloud cover is probably the main driver [of increased nighttime temperatures]," says Cox.
In wetter regions, warming temperatures are causing more water to evaporate, leading to more clouds. Clouds cool during the day by blocking the sun, but at night they trap heat close to the ground. In general, wetter regions over time got cloudier and thus warmer at night. Meanwhile, a smaller portion of already-arid land grew drier as temperatures increased the most during the day.
Cox also included leaf area index in the study, which is a measure plant canopy coverage used to estimate the productivity of flora. Overall, temperature jumps in either extreme—extra hot days or nights—harmed leaf area. With greater nighttime warming, plant respiration (using energy from photosynthesis to grow) at night increases, but the cloudier days make it harder to obtain this energy as photosynthesis requires sunlight. "The paper is good, timely, and important," says Brandon Barton, an ecologist at Mississippi State University who wasn't involved in the research. "Very few studies have done a good job at having multiple factors [associated with climate change]." Climate change isn't simply evenly warming things up; temperatures are changing at different rates between seasons or times of day. Wind, rainfall, and snow patterns are also changing.
For Cox, the research will enable him to continue studying how animals are coping with climate change at night. "We know the world is changing through human influences, but we don't really have a grasp of how the nighttime is changing," he says. "It's a big hole in the literature that has just been missed."
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Posted in science Tagged Days, faster, Heres, means, nights, planet, Warming


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Russian Physicists Synthesize New Superheavy Element 117
Author: Alexandra Witze, Science NewsAlexandra Witze, Science News
Physicists have reported synthesizing element number 117, the latest in the quest to create artificial "superheavy" elements in the laboratory. A paper describing the discovery has been accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters.
[partner id="sciencenews" align="right"] A team led by Yuri Oganessian of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, reports smashing together calcium-48 — an isotope with 20 protons and 28 neutrons — with berkelium-249, which has 97 protons and 152 neutrons. The collision spit out neutrons to create two isotopes of an element with 117 protons, one with 176 neutrons and the other with 177.
"These are very, very interesting results," says Witold Nazarewicz, a theorist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. "This was carefully planned, and it would have been very difficult to synthesize this element without the berkelium target."
The new element, which has yet to be named, slips into a place on the periodic table between elements 116 and 118, both of which have already been discovered. Such superheavy elements are usually very radioactive and decay away almost instantly. But many researchers think it is possible that even heavier elements may occupy an "island of stability" in which superheavy atoms stick around for a while.
The new work supports that view. Analyses of the radioactive decay of the new element, Oganessian's team writes in the new paper, "represent an experimental verification for the existence of the predicted 'Island of Stability' for super-heavy elements."
Images: 1) Yuri Oganessian walks from the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, around 1989 with Ron Lougheed (left) and Ken Moody (right) of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, with whom he has collaborated on previous research into superheavy elements./LLNL. 2) Element 117/Wikimedia Commons.
Superheavy Element 114 Finally Re-created
Top Scientific Breakthroughs of 2009
#physics
#ScienceNews.org


What we've been doing! Picture dump!! | Call Me Mummy!!
So I thought it would be easier to start up with posting some of my favourite pictures of summer… enjoy!
Have a lovely week ahead and hopefully I've gotten my grove back!!! Thanks once again for sicking around, much appreciated!!!


Plot: When Lucy's childhood sweetheart plans to tear down the Gilded Age estate and replace it with a golf course, Lucy fights to preserve the historic mansion at all costs. As Lucy and Duncan set out to find a compromise, they learn that embracing the past may be the key to protecting the future.
Stars Amanda Schull, Peter Porte, Vanessa Bell Calloway.
THANK YOU FOR LOOKING! PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU READ DESCRIPTION CAREFULLY!


Portrait of smiling female fitness instructor writing in clipboard while standing in gym.
Fitness class showing thumbs up in gym.
Group of people in a Pilates class at the gym.
Group of sportive people in a gym taking selfie - Happy sporty friends in a weight room while training - Concepts about lifestyle and sport in a fitness club.
Smiling fitness instructor discussing with man standing in gym.
Portrait of female coach with a stop watch and clipboard by pool at leisure center.


Staying ahead of your competition is the ultimate goal in any industry. With revenues estimated at $1.7 trillion dollars worldwide in 2012, companies in the fashion industry will always be faced with stiff competition trying to get a piece of the pie.
Staying ahead of your competition is the ultimate goal in any industry. With revenues estimated at $1.7 trillion dollars worldwide in 2012, companies in the fashion industry will always be faced with stiff competition trying to get a piece of the pie. Don't be alarmed, though - there are several specific tactics we will discuss that will help you not only succeed but actually make the process of retaining loyal customers and acquiring new ones easier and more enjoyable.
In order to break down the process, let me fill you in on a study by BI Intelligence, an eCommerce data company. It found that in 2013, as many as 74% of online shopping carts were abandoned by shoppers, and that abandonment rate is up from 72% in 2012, and 69% in 2011. Before figuring out how to attract new customers, it's critical we understand how to keep existing ones.
Another factor that no retailer can afford to ignore is the exponentially fast growing rate of the mobile commerce sales. In 2015 U.S. mobile commerce sales will total $104.05 billion, up 38.7% from $75.03 billion in 2014, reveals data from the 2016 Mobile 500. Internet Retailer estimates that this mobile opportunity will grow 2.58 times faster than total eCommerce sales and will translate into billions of dollars.
The Harvard Business Review states that acquiring a new customer is anywhere from 5 to 25 times more expensive than maintaining an existing one. That said, your customer retention strategy should find ways to leverage your existing customers to stay with you, through loyalty programs or discounts. When customers have the opportunity to get the products they are familiar with at a more favourable price, the likelihood of them lurking on your competitors' websites will decrease significantly.
Poor customer service is one of the biggest weaknesses a business can have. If returning items is difficult, customers won't be as likely to come around next time they consider making a purchase. According to TrueShip's findings, about 30% of all products ordered are returned, so making this process as easy as possible will help you have your existing customers coming back for more. Having someone around the clock to help with any customer inquiries will be very beneficial to customer loyalty and support.
You should be giving your customers a reason to come back for more, and maintaining a relationship with them so they don't forget about you. You don't want the expression, "out of sight, out of mind" to apply to your brand. As a result, creating an email marketing campaign that informs your clients of weekly new promotions will enable you to stay top-of-mind, and by segmenting your promotions to the right customers, you will increase sales and create a higher ROI.
Successful fashion eCommerce websites require excellent photography in order to even be a part of the competition. People want the item they're delivered to match what they saw online, so stock images will do you no good – hiring a professional fashion photographer will be your best bet. A high quality selection of your inventory will help your brand embody a lifestyle and will create a better appeal for its story.
Instead of following the mainstream product descriptions, be creative and artistic to create a story that will help your customers imagine the benefits of owning your product. An example would be to change, "The perfect pair of heels for prom," to "Be the Cinderella of your prom, by wearing these unforgettable and exquisite heels."
Being easy to find by using search engine optimization (SEO) is a crucial component of your fashion eCommerce strategy. If you're hard to locate, how will you make any sales? Consult with an SEO specialist to make sure the copy on the page is optimized for every product, and so search engines can properly index your product pages.
The key to developing a successful fashion website is to create smart partnerships. Creating relationships with influencers or bloggers in your industry will be very valuable for your eCommerce site. You should reach out to well-known reviewers who will provide a quote speaking to the quality of your product or try posting a guest article on a fashion industry influencer's blog.
Keeping your fashion eCommerce site clean and simple will help browsing customers navigate easily and encourage them to continue shopping. Your user interface should be faultless and the overall user experience should be as simple and enjoyable as possible. With the endless options on the web, an online customer can easily make the decision to switch to a competitor's site because of difficulty in navigating, viewing products, reviewing complicated checkout information, or lagging.
As mentioned earlier, there has been a rapid increase in mobile consumers, so responsive web design should be integrated into your marketing strategy. However, you should first identify what percentage of your sales comes from mobile devices. There is an increasing trend in customers who shop on-the-go, so you should make sure your fashion eCommerce site is easy to read and is able to interact on any device.
Individuals are no longer interested in low quality products, and if you haven't noticed that successful brands, whether cheap or not, still project the image of a sophisticated lifestyle. You should be able to differentiate yourself from the crowd, and focus on a specific niche to demonstrate your expertise in it.
You should always strive to retain your existing and potential customers. You don't want to lose them to a competitor because they have a slightly lower price, so ensure your pricing is right. You can do this by performing thorough research on pricing and offering coupons or future promotion opportunities to motivate customers to engage in purchasing your products and come back for more.
Following these principles will be your best bet to outshine your competition, and attain the sales and results you are capable of. You should not hesitate to seek expertise from a fashion eCommerce expert.


Take a look, here, courtesy of Coinbase: And this gif shows you how simple it is to use the platform, also courtesy of the platform: There are transaction fees to use site for purchase and sale. Coinbase Pro Formerly GDAX If you feel comfortable on Coinbase, and are looking for something a bit more advanced, with more investment options and opportunities, it might be worth switching over from Coinbase to Coinbase Pro.
On the homepage, just click on the option in the upper left corner: Coinbase Pro offers you options. Coinbase Pro expands on these basic capabilities. Coinbase Pro offers options to make market orders, limit orders and stop orders, to buy and sell. Additionally, Coinbase Pro offers far more in depth analysis of price movements in each of these markets, giving users access to an up to the minute order book and record of trade history. Coinbase Pro and Coinbase work together pretty seamlessly, so storage of these assets should be generally work in Coinbase Pro as they work in Coinbase.
If you are interested in trading on the crypto market at-large, or in hedging risk that is inherent in trading crypto, a Bitcoin ETF or Future might be right for you. Investing in cryptocurrencies and Initial Coin Offerings "ICOs" is highly risky and speculative, and this article is not a recommendation by Investopedia or the writer to invest in cryptocurrencies or ICOs. Meaning, do you think the price will continue to rise. A few pointers for buying and holding Bitcoins: My personal recommendation is to use a hardware wallet to store your Bitcoins.
Make sure to buy Bitcoins only from exchanges that have proven their reputation.
This way you average the price over the course of a whole year.


Records show a former Kansas City priest no longer has valid licenses to practice medicine in Kansas and Missouri after being defrocked last year following an investigation into multiple allegations of child sexual abuse.
John Wisner's medical licenses to practice as a psychiatrist remained active for months after the Archdiocese of Kansas City removed him from the clergy over credible allegations that he abused three minors decades ago.
Kansas registration records now list Wisner's license as inactive, while Missouri's professional registration agency says Wisner's license has lapsed because it wasn't renewed.
Kansas State Board of Healing Arts official Kathleen Selzler Lippert declined to say whether Wisner's license had been revoked. The board's website doesn't show disciplinary records involving Wisner.
The Missouri agency's spokeswoman, Lori Croy, says Wisner's license wasn't revoked.


Bea Lovejoy and Catherine Morgan met in the wings of the Festival Hall, at their first professional audition. Catherine then became a member of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, with whom she has been a part of many wonderful performances as section member, guest principal, occasional soloist, and more recently guest leader, with some of the world's most exciting directors and soloists. She studied music at Oxford University and then post-grad performance at the Royal College of Music, who awarded her their Jacqueline Du Pre prize for string playing, in addition to prizes for concerto performance and chamber music. As a young professional, Catherine went on to win a prestigious Park Lane Award, and then the first Manoug Parikian prize for Violin, from the Musician's Benevolent Fund. She also acknowledges with thanks generous support during her early career from the Dartington Foundation, The Countess of Munster Trust, and Martin Musical Prize Fund. Catherine was one of the first leaders of the National Children's Orchestra, and she is proud to retain a link with them as a violin coach.


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text:
@import discord.DiscordBot

@this(discordBot: DiscordBot)
@()(implicit messages: Messages, session: Session, requestHeader: RequestHeader)

        @buildinfo.BuildInfo.displayName v@{buildinfo.BuildInfo.version}
        <button class="navbar-toggler" type="button" data-toggle="collapse" data-target="#navbarText" aria-controls="navbarText" aria-expanded="false" aria-label="Toggle navigation">

        </button>

@messages("global.pageNames.botCommands")

                @if(session.get("userId").isDefined && session.get("username").isDefined) {

                        @session.get("username").get

@messages("global.pageNames.dashboard")

@messages("global.pageNames.twitchAuthentication")

@messages("global.pageNames.discordBotInviteLink")

@messages("global.auth.logout")

                } else {

                        @messages("global.auth.adminLogin")

                }

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


I am IN LOVE with Indian weddings. my very first experience photographing such a celebration was many years back when I visited India, incidentally had my camera with me and enjoyed every color saturated moment of it. with a few more state side experiences photographing these gorgeous cultural occasions later, I'm thrilled to pieces with the imagery from last night's mehandi.stay tuned for even more colors from the turmeric which rose photo photographed this morning.
love, love, love these celebrations. all the best to you both, radha + praseen.


text:
1889 – Birth of Thomas Sydney Sharpe, British World War I flying ace.
1921 – First flight of the Douglas Cloudster (shown), American biplane aircraft; the only product of the Davis-Douglas Co., it is designed to make the first non-stop flight coast-to-coast across the U.S.
1945 – Death of James Herbert Knight, American pilot who made the first overnight transcontinental air mail delivery; he also was an airline pilot and a vice president of United Airlines.
1956 – The Gloster Javelin, a twin-engined, all-weather jet interceptor, begins service with No. 46 Squadron of Royal Air Force.
1957 – Scandinavian Airline Services (SAS) opens the first regularly scheduled service from Europe to the Far East over the North Pole, with departures from Copenhagen, Denmark, and Tokyo, Japan.
1996 – A Mikoyan MiG-29UB fighter of the Cuban Air Force shoots down two Cessna Skymasters of the Cuban exile activist group Brothers to the Rescue off Havana, Cuba, killing four members of the group, including pilot Carlos Costa; a third Skymaster escapes.


If you would like success, http://wp.me/p5ojrp-K you need a sound schooling on the concepts of multi-levels marketing and advertising. The recommendation in this article is designed to assist you to create a multilevel marketing strategy that may efficiently attain your target audience.
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text:
How Streaming Music Redefined an Industry
By Josh Nilaya • Dec 20, 2016
Wordpress / Flickr
The way we listen to music has been changing for years: iPods replaced Walkmans, playlists replaced albums, and streaming services replaced shopping for music altogether. And as our listening habits have changed, so has the business of being a musician.
Top artists fight for shrinking revenues while a flood of indie bands vie for new fans; record labels fight to stay relevant while big name producers perfect the science of creating hits. This hour, we speak with musicians and industry experts about the present and future of music in the digital age.
Matt Farley - Filmmaker, musician and founder of Motern Media
Cortney Harding - Music industry consultant and professor at NYU's Clive Davis Institute; author of How We Listen: Essays and Conversations About Music and Technology
Paris Marx - Writer and advocate for social equality; author of A Music Industry for the 99%: Streaming Services, Artist Exploitation, and the Indie Future of Music
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An Evening With Patti Smith
By Betsy Kaplan • Nov 10, 2016
Brandon Carson / Creative Commons
Patti Smith wasn't seeking fame when she landed in Manhattan in 1969. She was a fan of the greats of the day - like Dylan, Mapplethorpe, Pollock, Ginsberg - who she followed and emulated, hoping to find her own creative space next to those she most admired.
The Greatest Show on Radio Looks at The Greatest Show on Earth!
By Josh Nilaya • Sep 21, 2016
Aaron Mentele / Flickr
The modern circus has been thrilling audiences for over 250 years, but as times have changed, so has the circus. What began as little more than an equestrian performance has come to include clowns, trapeze artists and even lion tamers.
'Rogue One': The Force Will Be With Those Who Love Battle Scenes
By Bob Mondello • Dec 15, 2016
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away — a slightly longer time ago, actually, than usual — there's a little girl named Jyn. She has a dad who was an important cog in the Empire's war machine until he went on the lam. As Rogue One starts, his Imperial overlord (Ben Mendelsohn, sneering up a dust storm) has caught up with him, and it's Jyn who must go on the lam.
By Betsy Kaplan • Dec 1, 2016
Katie Tegtmeyer / Creative Commons
Imagine if you couldn't speak and had no capacity for learning language as we know it. You couldn't choose words to communicate your feelings and desires and needs. You wouldn't know words that help others understand the world in which you live.
This isn't like vacationing in a country that speaks a different language where the words are different but still convey universal concepts. It's so difficult to understand a world without words, that we block the signals sending us non-verbal cues every day. This is completely foreign to most of us. What would you do? How would you communicate? How would you survive?