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Tag Archives: Eugene Levy
Here Are The Major 72nd Emmy Nominations!
Posted on July 28, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman
Usually, when it's time for the Emmy nominations to be announced, I'll post what I personally would have nominated. I didn't do it this year because, for whatever reason, I didn't watch as much TV last season as I have in the past so I felt like, if I had done a Lisa Has All The Power post for the Emmy nominations, I would have ended up just nominating a bunch of shows that I hadn't actually watched and that would just be wrong.
I will say that I was hoping to see nominations for Bad Education and Unbelievable. Both did receive nominations, though not as much as they should have. Bad Education was nominated for Best TV Movie and Hugh Jackman received a nomination but it deserved so much more. (It's the best film that I've seen so far this year and it bugs the Hell out of me that it was sold to HBO and not Netflix because Bad Education is the type of movie that should get Oscar recognition.) Unbelievable was nominated for Best Limited Series but Kaitlyn Dever and Merritt Weaver deserved nominations as well. I was also disappointed that neither Aaron Paul nor Robert Forster were nominated for El Camino. I'm also upset that my favorite comedy series — Medical Police — was totally snubbed but I'm not really surprised. Medical Police is hilarious but it's not self-important enough for the Emmys. Still, considering that Curb Your Enthusiasm was kind of terrible this year, it's a shame that Medical Police couldn't sneak in there.
(This year still isn't as bad as the year that Twin Peaks: The Return was snubbed in all the major categories.)
Anyway, here are the major nominees. At least The Mandalorian got some recognition. GO BABY YODA!
"Better Call Saul" (AMC)
"The Handmaid's Tale" (Hulu)
"Killing Eve" (BBC America/AMC)
"The Mandalorian" (Disney Plus)
"Succession" (HBO)
"Curb Your Enthusiasm" (HBO)
"Dead to Me" (Netflix)
"The Good Place" (NBC)
"Insecure" (HBO)
"The Kominsky Method" (Netflix)
"The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel" (Amazon Prime Video)
"Schitt's Creek" (Pop TV)
"What We Do in the Shadows" (FX)
"Little Fires Everywhere" (Hulu)
"Mrs. America" (Hulu)
"Unbelievable" (Netflix)
"Unorthodox" (Netflix)
Televison Movie
"American Son" (Netflix)
"Bad Education" (HBO)
"Dolly Parton's Heartstrings: These Old Bones" (Netflix)
"El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie" (Netflix)
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Kimmy vs. The Reverend (Netflix)
Lead Actor in a Drama Series
Jason Bateman ("Ozark")
Sterling K. Brown ("This Is Us")
Steve Carell ("The Morning Show")
Brian Cox ("Succession")
Billy Porter ("Pose")
Jeremy Strong ("Succession")
Lead Actress in a Drama Series
Jennifer Aniston ("The Morning Show")
Olivia Colman ("The Crown")
Jodie Comer ("Killing Eve")
Laura Linney ("Ozark")
Sandra Oh ("Killing Eve")
Zendaya ("Euphoria")
Lead Actor in a Comedy Series
Anthony Anderson ("Black-ish")
Don Cheadle ("Black Monday")
Ted Danson ("The Good Place")
Michael Douglas ("The Kominsky Method")
Eugene Levy ("Schitt's Creek")
Ramy Youssef ("Ramy")
Lead Actress in a Comedy Series
Christina Applegate ("Dead to Me")
Rachel Brosnahan ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel")
Linda Cardellini ("Dead to Me")
Catherine O'Hara ("Schitt's Creek")
Issa Rae ("Insecure")
Tracee Ellis Ross ("Black-ish")
Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie
Jeremy Irons ("Watchmen")
Hugh Jackman ("Bad Education")
Paul Mescal ("Normal People")
Jeremy Pope ("Hollywood")
Mark Ruffalo ("I Know This Much Is True")
Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie
Cate Blanchett ("Mrs. America")
Shira Haas ("Unorthodox")
Regina King ("Watchmen")
Octavia Spencer ("Self Made")
Kerry Washington ("Little Fires Everywhere")
Supporting Actor in a Drama Series
Giancarlo Esposito ("Better Call Saul")
Bradley Whitford ("The Handmaid's Tale")
Billy Crudup ("The Morning Show")
Mark Duplass ("The Morning Show")
Nicholas Braun ("Succession")
Kieran Culkin ("Succession")
Matthew Macfadyen ("Succession")
Jeffrey Wright ("Westworld")
Supporting Actress in a Drama Series
Laura Dern ("Big Little Lies")
Meryl Streep ("Big Little Lies")
Helena Bonham Carter ("The Crown")
Samira Wiley ("The Handmaid's Tale")
Fiona Shaw ("Killing Eve")
Julia Garner ("Ozark")
Sarah Snook ("Succession")
Thandie Newton ("Westworld")
Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series
Andre Braugher ("Brooklyn Nine-Nine")
William Jackson Harper ("The Good Place")
Alan Arkin ("The Kominsky Method")
Sterling K. Brown ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel")
Tony Shalhoub ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel")
Mahershala Ali ("Ramy")
Kenan Thompson ("Saturday Night Live")
Dan Levy ("Schitt's Creek")
Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series
Betty Gilpin ("GLOW")
D'Arcy Carden ("The Good Place")
Yvonne Orji ("Insecure")
Alex Borstein ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel")
Marin Hinkle ("The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel")
Kate McKinnon ("Saturday Night Live")
Cecily Strong ("Saturday Night Live")
Annie Murphy ("Schitt's Creek")
Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or Movie
Dylan McDermott ("Hollywood")
Jim Parsons ("Hollywood")
Tituss Burgess ("Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Kimmy vs. the Reverend")
Yahya Abdul-Mateen II ("Watchmen")
Jovan Adepo ("Watchmen")
Louis Gossett Jr. ("Watchmen")
Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie
Holland Taylor ("Hollywood")
Uzo Aduba ("Mrs. America")
Margo Martindale ("Mrs. America")
Tracey Ullman ("Mrs. America")
Toni Collette ("Unbelievable")
Jean Smart ("Watchmen")
Reality Competition
"The Masked Singer" (FOX)
"Nailed It" (Netflix)
"RuPaul's Drag Race" (VH1)
"Top Chef" (Bravo)
"The Voice" (NBC)
Variety Sketch Series
"A Black Lady Sketch Show" (HBO)
"Drunk History" (Comedy Central)
"Saturday Night Live" (NBC)
Variety Talk Series
"Daily Show with Trevor Noah" (Comedy Central)
"Full Frontal with Samantha Bee" (TBS)
"Jimmy Kimmel Live" (ABC)
"Last Week Tonight with John Oliver" (HBO)
"Late Show with Stephen Colbert" (CBS)
Posted in TV, TV Review, TV Show | Tagged Aaron Paul, Anthony Anderson, award, awards, Bad education, Better Call Saul, Billy Porter, Black Monday, Black-is, Brian Cox, Catherine O'Hara, Christina Applegate, Curb Your Enthusiam, Dead to Me, Don Cheadle, El Camino, Emmy nominations, Emmys, Eugene Levy, Euphoria, Hollywood, Hugh Jackman, I Know This Much Is True, Insecure, Issa Rae, Jason Bateman, Jennifer Aniston, Jeremy Irons, Jeremy Pope, Jeremy Strong, Jodie Comer, Kaitlyn Dever, Killing Eve, Laura Linney, Linda Cardellini, Lisa Marie Bowman, Little Fires Everywhere, Mark Ruffalo, Medical Police, Michael Douglas, Mrs. America, Normal People, Olivia Colman, Ozark, Paul Mescal, Pose, Rachel Brosnahan, Ramy, Ramy Youseff, Robert Forster, Sandra Oh, Schitt's Creek, show, Sterling K. Brown, Steve Carell, Stranger Things, Succession, Ted Danson, television, The Crown, The Good Place, The Handmaid's Tale, The Kominsky Method, The Mandalorian, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, The Morning Show, This is Us, Tracee Ellis Ross, tv, TV Show, Unbelievable, Unorthodox, Watchmen, What We Do in the Shadows, Zendaya | 1 Comment
Club Paradise (1986, directed by Harold Ramis)
Posted on January 29, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland
I think I was nine or ten years old when I first saw Club Paradise on HBO. I remember thinking it was pretty funny.
I recently rewatched Club Paradise and I discovered that ten year old me had terrible taste in movies.
Robin Williams plays Jack Moniker, a Chicago fireman who gets blown out of a building while rescuing a dog. Living off of his disability payments, he retires to the island of St. Nicholas, which is basically Jamaica but with less weed. Jack and reggae musician Ernest Reed (Jimmy Cliff) open up their own Club Med-style resort, Club Paradise. Jack doesn't know much about the resort business but he does know how to put together a good brochure. Almost the entire cast of SCTV shows up at Club Paradise, looking for a tropical vacation. Things quickly go wrong because Jack doesn't know how to run a resort and there's also an evil developer (played by Brian Doyle-Murray) who wants Club Paradise to fail so that he can get the land.
Club Paradise has got a huge and impressive cast, the majority of whom probably signed on because they were looking forward to a paid Caribbean vacation. Peter O'Toole plays the British-appointed governor of St. Nicholas. Twiggy plays Jack's girlfriend. Joanna Cassidy plays a reporter and Adolph Caesar is cast in the role of St. Nicolas's corrupt prime minister. Because the film was directed by Harold Ramis, it is full of Ramis's co-stars from SCTV. Andrea Martin tries to get her husband to enjoy the islands as much as she's enjoying them. Joe Flaherty is the crazed pilot who flies people to the resort. Rick Moranis and Eugene Levy play two nerdy friends who are both named Barry and who are only interested in scoring weed, getting laid, and working on their tan. Rick Moranis and Eugene Levy playing nerds? It's a shock, I know.
There's enough funny people in Club Paradise to ensure that there are a few isolated laughs. Not surprisingly, the movie comes to life whenever Moranis and Levy are onscreen. (If I had to guess, I imagine they were the reason why ten year-old me liked this movie so much.) Needless to say, Jimmy Cliff also provides a killer soundtrack. But Club Paradise ultimately doesn't work because the script is too disjointed and it feels more like an uneven collection of skits than an actual film. It's impossible to tell whether we're supposed to think of Club Paradise as being the worst resort ever or if we're supposed to be worried that the bad guys will shut it down. For a movie like this, you need a strong central presence to hold things together. Unfortunately, Robin Williams's style of comedy is too aggressive for the role of Jack. The role was originally written for Bill Murray and it shows. Most of Jack's lines sound like things you would expect Bill Murray to say in his trademark laid back fashion and it is easy to imagine Murray redeeming some of Club Paradise's weaker scenes simply by attitude alone. Instead, Robin Williams is so frantic that you never buy he could be happy living a laid back life on a Caribbean island. As played by Williams, Jack often comes across as being unreasonably angry at everyone staying at Club Paradise and it's hard to care whether or not he manages to save his resort or not.
Club Paradise was a bomb at the box office. Harry Shearer, who was originally credited with working on the screenplay, hated the movie so much that he requested his name be removed from the credits. (Instead, credit is given to Edward Roboto.) As a result of the film's failure, it would be 7 years before Harold Ramis would get to direct another movie. Fortunately, that movie was Groundhog Day and this time, Ramis was able to get Bill Murray.
Posted in Film, Film Review | Tagged Adolph Caesar, Andrea Martin, Brian Doyle_Murray, Bruce McGill, Club Paradise, Eugene Levy, Harold Ramis, Jimmy Cliff, Joanna Cassidy, Joe Flaherty, Mary Gross, Peter O'Toole, Rick Moranis, Robin Duke, Robin Williams, Simon Jones, Steven Kampmann, Twiggy | 1 Comment
Monster Chiller Horror Theatre: Deadly Companion (1980, directed by George Bloomfield)
Posted on October 11, 2019 by Jedadiah Leland
Deadly Companion starts with John Candy sitting in a mental institution and snorting cocaine while happily talking to his roommate, Michael Taylor (Michael Sarrazin). Michael has been in the institution ever since the night that he walked in on his estranged wife being murdered. Because of the shock, he can't remember anything that he saw that night. When his girlfriend Paula (Susan Clark) comes to pick Michael up, Michael leaves the institution determined to get to the truth about his wife's murder. Once Michael leaves, John Candy disappears from the movie.
Michael suspects that his wife was killed by her lover, Lawrence Miles (Anthony Perkins) but there is more to that night than Michael is remembering. Deadly Companion is a typical low-budget shot-in-Toronto thriller from the early 80s, with familiar Canadian character actors like Michael Ironside, Al Waxman, Kenneth Welsh, and Maury Chaykin all playing small roles. Michael Sarrazin is a dull lead but Anthony Perkins gets to do what he did best at the end of his career and plays a thoroughly sarcastic bastard who gets the only good lines in the film.
What's interesting about Deadly Companion isn't the predictable plot and it's certainly not Michael Sarrazin. Instead, what's strange is that several cast members of SCTV show up in tiny supporting roles, though none of them get as much of a chance to make as big an impression as John Candy. Deadly Companion is a serious thriller that just happens to feature Candy, Joe Flaherty, Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, and Dave Thomas. It's strange to see Michael Sarrazin trying to figure out who killed his wife while Eugene Levy loiters in the background. It leaves you waiting for a punchline that never comes.
The SCTV people are in the film because it was directed by George Bloomfield, who also directed several episodes of SCTV. Since this film was made before SCTV really broke into the American marketplace, it was probably assumed that no one outside of Canada would ever find the presence of John Candy in a dramatic murder mystery distracting. Of course, when Deadly Companion was later released on VHS in the late 80s, Candy and the SCTV crew were all given top billing.
Posted in Film, Film Review, Horror, Horrorthon | Tagged Al Waxman, Anthony Perkins, Catherine O'Hara, Dave Thomas, Deadly Companion, Elizabeth Shephard, Eugene Levy, George Bloomfield, Howard Duff, Joe Flaherty, John Candy, Kate Reid, Kenneth Welsh, Maury Chaykin, Michael Ironside, Michael Sarrazin, SCTV, Susan Clark | 2 Comments
A Movie A Day #224: Armed and Dangerous (1986, directed by Mark L. Lester)
Posted on August 20, 2017 by Jedadiah Leland
John Candy and Eugene Levy make a great team in the underrated comedy, Armed and Dangerous.
John Candy plays Frank Dooley, a member of the LAPD. One of the first scenes of the movie is Frank climbing up a tree to save a little boy's kitten and then getting stuck in the tree himself. When Frank discovers two corrupt detectives stealing televisions, Frank is framed for the theft and kicked off the force.
Eugene Levy plays Norman Kane, a lawyer whose latest client is a Charles Manson-style cult leader who has a swastika carved into his head. After being repeatedly threatened with murder, Norman asks for a sidebar and requests that the judge sentence his client to life in prison. The judge agrees on the condition that Norman, whom he describes as being "the worst attorney to ever appear before me," find a new line of work.
Frank and Norman end up taking a one day training course to act as security guards and are assigned to work together by their tough by sympathetic supervisor (Meg Ryan!). Assigned to guard a pharmaceutical warehouse, Frank and Norman stumble across a robbery. The robbery leads them to corruption inside their own union and, before you can say 80s cop movie, Frank and Norman are ignoring the orders of their supervisors and investigating a crime that nobody wants solved.
Armed and Dangerous was one of the many comedy/cop hybrid films of the 1980s. Like Beverly Hills Cop, it features Jonathan Banks as a bad guy. Like the recruits in Police Academy, all of Frank and Norman's fellow security guards are societal misfits who are distinguished by one or two eccentricities. There is nothing ground-breaking about Armed and Dangerous but Mark Lester did a good job directing the movie and the team of Candy and Levy (who has previously worked together on SCTV) made me laugh more than a few times.
Armed and Dangerous was originally written to be a vehicle for John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd. It's easy to imagine Belushi and Aykroyd in the lead roles but I think the movie actually works better with Candy and Levy, whose comedic style was similar to but far less aggressive than that of Belushi and Aykroyd. One of the reasons that Armed and Dangerous works is because John Candy and Eugene Levy seem like the two last people to ever find themselves in a shootout or a car chase. With Belushi and Aykroyd, it would have been expected. After all, everyone's seen The Blues Brothers.
Posted in Film, Film Review | Tagged Armed and Dangerous, Brion James, David Wohl, Don Stroud, Eugene Levy, Glenn Withrow, James Tolkan, John Candy, Jonathan Banks, Kenneth McMillan, Larry "Fash" Jenkins, Larry Hankin, Mark L. Lester, Meg Ryan, Movie A Day, Robert Burgos, Robert Loggia, Stacy Keach Sr, Steve Railsback, Teagan Clive, Tiny Lister, Tito Puente, Tony Burton | Leave a comment
Film Review: Finding Dory (dir by Andrew Stanton)
Posted on December 30, 2016 by Lisa Marie Bowman
Finding Dory, the latest film from Pixar, tells the story of Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), a regal blue tang (for our readers in Vermont, that's a fish) who suffers from short-term memory loss. You may remember her from Pixar's previous movie about fish, Finding Nemo. In that movie, she helped a clownfish named Marlin (Albert Brooks) find his son, Nemo (voiced, in Finding Dory, by Hayden Rolence). In the sequel, it's Marlin and Nemo who are now helping Dory to find her parents.
Dory has spent years searching for her parents. Of course, it would be easier if she didn't suffer from short-term memory loss. It seems that every time she sets out to track her parents down, she ends up getting distracted and forgets what she was doing. However, while helping to teach a class about migration, Dory has a sudden flashback to her parents (voiced, quite charmingly, by Eugene Levy and Diane Keaton). She sets out once again, determined to find her parents. This time, Marlin and Nemo are accompanying her. As Dory continually frets, she's can't do it alone because she can't remember directions.
Though her memories are fuzzy and her flighty nature leads to some conflict with Marlin (who is just as cautious and overprotective of Nemo as he was in the first film), Dory eventually finds her way to where her parents were last seen. And, in doing so, Dory discovers that she and her parents originally lived at a water park, the California Marine Life Institute.
(One of my favorite parts of the film is that apparently, Sigourney Weaver recorded several greetings and other messages that are played continuously over the Institute's PA system. "Hello, I'm Sigourney Weaver and welcome to the Marine Life Institute." Dory becomes convinced that Sigourney Weaver is some sort of God-like being who is leaving personal messages for her. At one point, Dory exclaims, "A friend of mine, her name's Sigourney, once told me that all it takes is three simple steps: rescue, rehabilitation, and um… one other thing?")
Since this is a Pixar movie, Dory meets the usual collection of oddball and outcast sealife at the Institute, all of whom help her out while overcoming their own insecurities, providing properly snarky commentary, and hopefully bringing a tear or two to the eyes of even the most jaded of viewers. Finding Dory is full of familiar voices, everyone from Idris Elba to Bill Hader to Kate McKinnon. But, for me, the most memorable of all the voices (with the exception of Ellen DeGeneres herself) was Ed O'Neill's. O'Neill brought Hank, the bitter but ultimately good-hearted seven-legged octopus, to poignant life. I imagine that, should there be another sequel, it will be called Finding Hank.
Finding Dory continues the annual tradition of Pixar films making me cry. Finding Dory is an incredibly sweet and truly heartfelt movie but, at the same time, it's also an extremely witty comedy. This is one of those Pixar films where the joy comes not only from looking at the amazing animation but also from listening to truly clever dialogue being delivered by some of the best voice actors around. DeGeneres does such a great job bringing Dory to life that, as the movie ended, my first instinct was to run out and buy a regal blue tang of my very own. But then I read an article on Wikipedia, which explained why I shouldn't do that.
(Basically, blue tangs may look cute but they have big, scary spikes that can cut up your hand. As well, they don't do well in captivity. So, if you're planning on getting a Dory of your very own, you might be better off just rewatching this movie…)
It'll make you laugh. It'll make you cry. Finding Dory is another great film from Pixar.
Posted in Film, Film Review | Tagged Albert Brooks, Alexander Gould, Allison Janney, Andrew Stanton, Angus MacLane, Austin Pendleton, Bennett Dammann, Bill Hader, Bob Peterson, Brad Garrett, Diane Keaton, Dominic West, Ed O'Neill, Ellen DeGeneres, Eugene Levy, Film, Finding Dory, Hayden Rolence, Idris Elba, Jerome Ranft, John Ratzenberger, Kaitlin Olson, Kate McKinnon, Katherine Ringgold, Lisa Marie Bowman, Lucia Geddes, movie, Pixar, review, Sigourney Weaver, Sloane Murray, Stephen Root, Torbin Xan Bullock, Ty Burrell, Vicki Lewis, Willem Dafoe | 18 Comments
Boobs, Music, and Sci-Fi: Heavy Metal (1981, directed by Gerald Potterton)
Posted on December 15, 2015 by Jedadiah Leland
I think I was twelve when I first saw Heavy Metal. It came on HBO one night and I loved it. So did all of my friends. Can you blame us? It had everything that a twelve year-old boy (especially a 12 year-old boy who was more than a little on the nerdy side) could want out of a movie: boobs, loud music, and sci-fi violence. It was a tour of our secret fantasies. The fact that it was animated made it all the better. Animated films were not supposed to feature stuff like this. When my friends and I watched Heavy Metal, we felt like we were getting away with something.
Based on stories from the adults-only Heavy Metal Magazine, Heavy Metal was divided into 8 separate segments:
Soft Landing (directed by Jimmy T. Murakami and John Bruno, written by Dan O'Bannon)
Heavy Metal opens brilliantly with a Corvette being released from a space shuttle and then flying down to Earth, surviving reentry without a scratch. Who, after watching this, has not wanted a Space Corvette of his very own?
Grimaldi (directed by Harold Whitaker)
On Earth, a terrified young girl listens a glowing green meteorite called the Loc-Nar tells her that it is the source of all evil in the universe. This sets up the rest of the film, which is made up of stories that the Loc-Nar tells about its influence. The Loc-Nar is the film's MacGuffin and, seen today, one of Heavy Metal's biggest problems is that it has to find a way to force the Loc-Nar into every story, even if it meant sacrificing any sort of consistency about what the Loc-Nar was capable of doing. Even when I was twelve, I realized that the Loc-Nar was not really that important.
Harry Canyon (directed by Pino Van Lamsweerde, written by Daniel Goldberg)
In this neo-noir tale, futuristic cabby Harry Canyon (voiced by Richard Romanus) is enlisted to help an unnamed girl (voiced by Susan Roman) to find the Loc-Nar. Slow and predictable, Harry Canyon does feature the voice of John Candy as a police sergeant who attempts to charge Harry for police work.
Den (directed by Jack Stokes, written by Richard Corben)
Nerdy teenager David (voiced by John Candy) finds a piece of the Loc-Nar and is transported to the world of Neverwhere, where he is transformed into Den, a muscular, bald warrior. As Den, David gets to live out the fantasies of Heavy Metal's target audience. On his new planet, Den rescues an Earth woman from being sacrificed, overthrows an evil queen and a sorcerer, and gets laid. A lot. Den is the best segment in Heavy Metal, largely because of the endearing contrast between the action onscreen and John Candy's enthusiastic narration.
Captain Sternn (directed by Paul Sebella and Julian Harris, written by Bernie Wrightson)
On a space station orbiting the Earth, Captain Lincoln F. Sternn is on trail for a countless number of offenses. Though guilty, Captain Sternn expects to be acquitted because he has bribed the prosecution's star witness, Hanover Fiste. However, Hanover is holding the Loc-Nar in his hand and it causes him to tell the truth about Captain Sternn and eventually turn into a bloodthirsty giant. Captain Sternn saves the day by tricking Hanover into getting sucked out of an air lock.
Captain Sternn was a reoccurring character in Heavy Metal Magazine and his segment is one of the best. Eugene Levy voices Captain Sternn while Joe Flaherty voices his lawyer and Dean Wormer himself, John Vernon, is the prosecutor. Even National Lampoon co-founder Douglas Kenney provided a voice.
B-17 (directed by Barrie Nelson, written by Dan O'Bannon)
After the Loc-Nar enters Earth's atmosphere, it crashes into a bullet-riddled World War II bomber, causing the dead crewmen within to reanimate as zombies. Scored to Don Felder's Heavy Metal (Takin' a Ride), B-17 is one of the shorter segments and its dark and moody animation holds up extremely well.
So Beautiful and So Dangerous (directed by John Halas, written by Angus McKie)
Nubile Pentagon secretary Gloria is beamed aboard a spaceship that looks like a giant smiley face. While she has sex with the ship's robot captain, the two crew members (voiced by Harold Ramis and Eugene Levy) pour out a long line of cocaine and shout "Nosedive!" before snorting up every flake. So Beautiful and So Dangerous is so juvenile and so ridiculous that it is actually all kinds of awesome.
In the film's final and most famous segment, Taarna, the blond warrior was featured on Heavy Metal's poster, rides a pterodactyl across a volcanic planet, killing barbarians, and finally confronting the Loc-Nar. She sacrifices herself to defeat the Loc-Nar but no worries! We return to Earth where, for some reason, the Loc-Nar explodes and the girl from the beginning of the film is revealed to be Taarna reborn. She even gets to fly away on her pterodactyl. Taarna was really great when I was twelve but today, it is impossible to watch it without flashing back to the Major Boobage episode of South Park.
Much like Taarna, Heavy Metal seems pretty silly when I watch it today. But when I was twelve, it was the greatest thing ever.
Posted in Film, Film Review | Tagged Al Waxman, Alice Playten, Angus McKie, August Schellenberg, Barrie Nelson, Bernie Wrightson, Caroline Semple, Cedric Smith, Charles Joliffe, Dan O'Bannon, Daniel Goldberg, Don Felder, Don Francks, Douglas Kenney, Eugene Levy, George Touliatos, Gerald Potterton, Harold Ramis, Harold Whitaker, Harvey Aitkin, Harvey Atkin, heavy metal, Ivan Reitman, Jack Stokes, Jackie Burroughs, Jimmy T. Murakami, Joe Flaherty, John Bruno, John Candy, John Halas, John Vernon, Joseph Golland, Julian Harris, Len Doncheff, Marilyn Lightstone, Martin Lavut, Mavor Moore, Ned Conlon, Patty Dworkin, Paul Sebella, Percy Rodriguez, Pino Van Lamsweerde, Richard Corben, Roger Bumpass, science fiction, Susan Roman, Thor Bishopric, Vlasta Vrana, Warren Munson, Zal Yanovsky | Leave a comment


Talk about being in the city, yet at the same time isolated enough from the hustle and bustle of inner city lifestyle to enjoy the suburban neighborhood ambiance.
Harbour Esplanade of Docklands is the strip along Victoria Harbour. Located just one street west of Spencer Street (which is the edge of Melbourne CBD), it is strategically located in between the CBD and Vic Urban's future development plans to transform Docklands into the "Darling Harbour" of Melbourne. Great for walking and cycling, it allows people to promenade along the water front to take in the fresh air and admire the lovely scenery. Here, one can see berths for yachts should that be the choice of transportation. In essence it offers the million dollar view but without the million dollar price tag, yet.
The northern end of the strip takes you to New Quay, the earliest establishment in Docklands which provides a variety of restaurants and eateries, highlighting the diversity in cuisines to serve Melbournians. Within the vicinity, the Harbour Town development provides a mix of both retail shopping, residential living, with a food and entertainment precint and topped with Melbourne's iconic Southern Star observation wheel.
Along the Esplanade you can find Central Pier, dubbed 'the most culturally significant waterfront development undertaken in Melbourne'. Events are held all year round creating a vibrant cultural, community and creative hub which caters for this multicultural society.
Right opposite is the Etihad Stadium (formerly Telstra Dome) which can seat a capacity crowd of over 50,000 where sporting events and concerts take place. During the AFL season it becomes a weekly ritual where spectators pour in to cheer their favourite team. A slight inconvenience on event days as can be expected from slow moving traffic navigating around the area in search of parking.
There is a child-care centre which just opened, the local Government had indicated future plans to develop a school for the community. Ten metres from the Bourke Street intersection you'll find Docklands Park. This is a great area for taking the kids on the weekend and having a nice Sunday afternoon BBQ and there is also children's playground to keep the young ones occupied. Although generally quiet during the week, the barbeques are very popular during the summer months so it is advised to get there early on weekends to make sure you don't go hungry.
In summary, an established, well-planned neighbourhood with further development plans showing what Melbourne has to offer.
CommunityMan Don't you find the Docklands rather sterile and soulless?
silvest Depends on the time of day. Harbourtown does have quite a lot of people.
CommunityMan During the week (I worked on Docklands for 2 yeasr) it was a bit desolate, but maybe the weeeknds are more lively?
CHARLIE43 Looking at buying an apartment in Victoria Point Building.. this is my first Melbourne investment and just a little nervous about the Docklands area. Seems people either love it or hate it.
Have had a couple of friends comment that it's always cold.. It's not going ahead like it should have... it's desserted and stark..


Each year we invite a wide variety of organizations to display their offerings for the homeschool community. From co-ops to museums, specialty classes to park district events, support groups to clubs.
We would love to have you join us for this event which will be held Tuesday evening, April 23 at the Elk Grove Village Public Library from 7-9pm.
Vendors: For a nominal $5 fee you will receive a reserved spot and table space at the fair and be part of our contact list which will be distributed to all participants of the event. To register, please click here. You will be contacted within a few days with a confirmation.
We hope that you will join us this year. Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have. We look forward to another successful event!
**please note that curriculum will not be sold at this event. Our curriculum sale will be held in May.
For homeschoolers – check out what's new!!
STEM Exploration Lab this Saturday!
The Museum will be packed with 50 hands-on science experiments. From lasers and lights to magnets and mirrors, this event will be a blast for the entire family!
– OR – purchase a membership (or add a year to your existing membership) and get in for FREE!
We offer 48 different courses this year, including graded high school electives that can count for credit. These include Music Theory, Advanced Art, Photography, Pottery, and Creative Writing.
We offer courses in athletics, life skills, visual arts, music, literature study, creative writing, and science enrichment for all ages.
E-Commerce, Supreme Court Simulation, LEGO Robotics, and Young Investors' Simulation.
Registration opens to the public on April 5th. Please see details at the website.
We have enjoyed talking to tomatoes and smiling with squash for as long as we've had kids. Our two year old has now reached the age of enjoying Larry's silliness and Bob's wisdom as well.
They continue to crank out enjoyable kid-friendly, God-honoring videos as the years go by. This time around VeggieTales has taken some well knows nursery rhymes and combined them with the truths of Scripture with a healthy ensemble of vegetables.
My kids enjoyed this twist that combined the parable of the wise man building his house on the rock with the three little pigs. The story line keeps moving, and even though they know both stories well, it didn't seem overly predictable to them, until they had watched it over and over and over throughout the week. Even then, they asked for it again.
I always like to interact with my kids over their media interaction, and VeggieTales even helps with that. Check out their website for printable coloring pages and some discussion questions. Help these great lessons sink in even further!
Be sure to pick up your own copy maybe for someone special's Easter basket!
For those of you in or near the Fox Valley area, you may or may not have been able to attend the Homeschool Resource Fair this past Monday. Either way, I am making the vendor booklet available online for those that might be interested in many of the resources local to that area.
You can either right click the link and select "Save As" to save this file to your computer or click "link" to open from website.
Hope this is helpful especially to those that were unable to make it on Monday night.
Primrose Farm event — FREE!
Our homeschool group enjoyed a field trip at this farm last year and I appreciated that it was different than other living history farms. It seems the common era for farms around Chicagoland falls somewhere around the 1840s. Primrose settles in around the 1930s and has a whole different feel to it. This would be a great multi-generational event as some in the earlier generation might even remember some of the artifacts and such around the farm and enjoy sharing some of their own personal history.
Saturday, March 23rd AND Sunday, March 24th!
Farm is a 1930s living history farm.
Area homeschoolers are invited to attend a Resource Fair featuring organizations offering services to the Fox Valley home school community.
Come, discover local co-ops, support groups, sports opportunities, private lesson instructors, tutors and more! Representatives from each organization will be on hand to answer questions about their services.
Take home a directory listing each organization and their contact information for future reference, free of charge!


Perhaps it's all the Feminism reading I've been doing lately, but my eyes have now been fully open to the way in which our society treats women. Abhorrently is how we treat women. We blame them, we don't trust them, we undermine them, we speak over them, and worst of all, we hurt them.
Violence against women is a reality and will be a reality for the majority of women in America. 1 in 4 women experience domestic violence in their lifetime, and nearly 3 women are killed every day from intimate partners, and black women are 35% more likely to be at the receiving end of domestic violence than white women. There is A LOT to unpack with regards to domestic violence and violence against women, but with the news this morning from Las Vegas, I'd be remiss if I didn't share (in case you didn't know already) that there is an undeniable link between domestic abusers, or men that are violent against women and men that ultimately commit mass shootings.
So while Congress heartlessly repeats their "thoughts and prayers" line and continues to do nothing to enact real policy that could actually help us see the number of mass shootings and gun deaths decrease, I'll put the spotlight on something we can do: spread love & support victims of domestic violence during Domestic Violence Awareness month.
I found this great DC nonprofit via Twitter: DC Coalition Against Domestic Violence that are out at metro stations this morning trying to spread love and awareness to garner support. If you are feeling like I am, so utterly distraught and helpless (especially without representatives to even call to ask for stronger gun laws), perhaps share your time, talents, or money with this great cause and great organization.
OR if you are in an abusive or dangerous situation, please know you can contact DC's Victim Hotline 24 hours a day: 1-844-4HELPDC (1-844-443-5732). The DC Victim Hotline is available 24/7 by telephone, text, or online chat.
Perhaps if we can tackle the very real & present problem of domestic violence, we can also inadvertently decrease the amount of mass shootings in America. It's worth trying.
In case you are looking for another resource for domestic violence support, please check out The Recovery Village, as well.


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No, this has nothing to do with Cakes, and EVERYTHING to do with HENRY CAVILL aka MAN OF STEEL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh - Em - Gee!!
This guy is TOO FOINE for words! Like, I was watching the movie with Cakes and I couldn't take my eyes off this beautifully handsome specimen! His eyes are just gorgeous! THAT BODY!!!
JEAN-CLAUDE VAN DAMMMMMMMMMMN, I want to marry Henry Cavill!
I dare you not to swoon over these eyes!
Ouuuuuuch! I totally bumped my head when I fainted just now.
I agree with Myne, the acting lacked depth but that bod?!!! Wow! You should have seen the look of disgust on my man's face as I literally covered him with drool at the cinema. My OMG moment was when he kicked down a door in the burning rig and he was naked chest up and was on fire, I mean the sight of the flames licking up his naked torso was.....I totally enjoyed the fight scenes and it was nice to see my fave superhero get a makeover, love the new costume and the departure from the good, geeky Clark Kent into a real hunk of a man. Great Movie, 5 popcorns from me!
@Myne: He's not the greatest actor, but his eyes are sooooooo dreamy!
@TWP: Lol, the movie wasn't that bad. I actually want to see it again.
@Bex: YOU KNOW WARRAMSAYIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Mmm mmm MMM!! He's definitely God's creation!!!
Berry, get a grip of yourself jooo. Lol.
@Millz - Shia (boring), Bale (boring), Ealy (even more boring). Now Avery Jackson - HECKS YEAH!!!!!!!!!


Author, New York Times bestseller, The Big Fat Surprise.
Nina Teicholz is a professor (adjunct) at NYU's Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, the Executive Director of The Nutrition Coalition (a group devoted to evidence-based nutrition policy), an investigative science journalist and author. Her international bestseller, The Big Fat Surprise has upended the conventional wisdom on dietary fat–especially saturated fat–and challenged the very core of our nutrition policy.
The executive editor of "The Lancet" wrote, "this is a disquieting book about scientific incompetence, evangelical ambition, and ruthless silencing of dissent that has shaped our lives for decades…researchers, clinicians, and health policy advisors should read this provocative book." A review in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition said, "This book should be read by every scientist…[and] every nutritional science professional." In the BMJ (British Medical Journal), the journal's former editor wrote, "Teicholz has done a remarkable job in analysing [the] weak science, strong personalities, vested interests, and political expediency" of nutrition science.
The Big Fat Surprise was named a 2014 *Best Book* by The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Mother Jones, Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal.
Teicholz's writing has also been published in The BMJ, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, The Independent, The New Yorker, and The Los Angeles Times among others.
In addition, Teicholz has emerged was a thought leader in the field of evidence-based nutrition policy. Towards this end, she is the executive director of The Nutrition Coalition, a nonprofit, non-partisan group that is free from industry funding. Teicholz has testified before the Canadian Senate and the U.S. Department of Agriculture about the need to reform guidelines so that they are based on sound science.


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text:
Acanthiophilus brunneus är en tvåvingeart som beskrevs av Munro 1934. Acanthiophilus brunneus ingår i släktet Acanthiophilus och familjen borrflugor. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Borrflugor
brunneus

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


More students will be entering the School of Nursing, thanks to a $700,000 grant from Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.
The grant, which continues a three-year pilot program, will help advance the education of nurses to meet national guidelines and address the nursing shortage by providing more highly educated nurses.
One example of this is at San Antonio College, where office space has been reserved for the School of Nursing faculty to regularly advise prospective students on prerequisites needed to enter UT Health Science Center nursing programs.
As a result, 52.3 percent of the students entering the School of Nursing's Bachelor of Science in Nursing program in fall 2014 completed their prerequisites at SAC, Dr. Breslin said.
The grant also provides funds for three scholarships each for the Doctor of Nursing Practice and Doctor of Philosophy degree programs.
The program supports the Institute of Medicine's recommendation that 80 percent of nurses have at least a bachelor's degree by 2020. Only 54 percent of nurses in Texas and 55 percent in Bexar County hold a B.S.N. or a more advanced degree.


What is your allergen policy?
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If you have any questions regarding our policies, please contact us!
We are an allergy-conscious monthly snack subscription service. Each month we will ship a box full of goodies right to your door! We currently offer a dairy-free, nut-free, or gluten-free preference. Our current inventory is free of all three allergens. Our boxes come in two sizes, single or double. Just 3 easy steps! You can cancel anytime.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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Day-to-day management is simplified using the Avaya Aura's easy to use interface. A single interface allows for system setup, configuring agents, assigning skill sets, performance reporting, managing contact flows and more, helping you to manage your agents and giving you the flexibility to quickly adapt to market changes.
Understanding how your customers are being served and which options are available to them is critical to managing the customer experience. Avaya Aura Orchestration Designer is a graphical workflow management tool that gives you a clear view of customer contact flows and lets you respond accordingly.


text:
Improving Children's Life Chances through Better Family Planning
Series: CCF Briefs
Isabel V. Sawhill and Joanna Venator Friday, January 23, 2015
PDF File Download the full paper
Non-marital childbearing is associated with many adverse outcomes for both the mother and the child. Most of these births are unintended. If we could reduce these unintended births it might improve children's prospects by enabling their mothers to get more education, earn more, and wait to have children within marriage. In this brief, we trace the effects of reducing unintended childbearing on children's success later in life by using the Social Genome Model (SGM) to simulate the effect on children's life chances of aligning women's fertility behavior with their intentions.
Though the impacts of improving women's control over their fertility are small for the population as a whole, there are significant and important improvements in the lives of children who would have otherwise been "born too soon." These findings suggest that increasing access to and awareness of high-quality, easy-to-use contraception and improving the educational and labor market prospects of low-income women are important steps in improving children's life chances.
Causes of Unintended Childbearing
Unintended pregnancy is a growing problem in the United States and accounts for the majority of births to single mothers. The term "unintended" is derived from the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) which asks women to characterize retrospectively the intentionality of all of their previous pregnancies at the time they learned they were pregnant. If a woman describes the pregnancy as unintended, she is then asked if the pregnancy was mistimed (that is, came earlier or later than the woman desired) or unwanted (that is, she never wanted the pregnancy to happen). About half of all pregnancies in the US are unintended and around seven-in-ten pregnancies to unmarried women under the age of 30 are unintended. Less educated, poor, and minority women all have particularly high rates of unintended pregnancy (see Figure 1).
By John Hudak
Marijuana Federalism
Edited by Jonathan H. Adler
U.S. Inspectors General
By Charles A. Johnson and Kathryn E. Newcomer
Not all pregnancies are carried to term, of course. Almost half result in miscarriages or are aborted. But among births to single women under the age of 30, 60 percent are unintended (see Figure 2). Less-advantaged women are, in addition to being more likely to have an unintended pregnancy, also more likely to carry an unintended pregnancy to term. As a result, unintended births as well as pregnancies are much more common among less advantaged women.
A key cause of the rising number of unintended pregnancies and births is inconsistent and incorrect use of contraception. Though many types of birth control are widely available, many couples who claim they do not want to have a child do not use birth control regularly or correctly. There are many reasons for this – misinformation and myths about contraception and its side effects, the cost of the most effective forms of birth control, and human error.
Isabel V. Sawhill
Senior Fellow - Economic Studies, Center on Children and Families, Future of the Middle Class Initiative
Twitter isawhill
Joanna Venator
Senior Research Assistant
Of those who do use contraception, many people do not use the most effective methods. Among sexually active women aged 20-24, about 3 percent use intrauterine devices (IUDs), 27 percent use the pill, 7 percent use another hormonal method, and 15 percent rely on condoms. These methods have low failure rates when used perfectly, but, alas, humans are imperfect. Condoms require a couple to remember to use one in the moment, the pill must be taken every day, and prescriptions must be refilled on a regular basis.
Long-acting reversible contraception (LARCs) such as IUDs and implants have particularly low failure rates in large measure because they are more likely to be used consistently than other methods. The CHOICE Project in St. Louis, which provided free contraception and counseling on the efficacy of different methods, found that the risk of contraception failure was twenty times higher among users of the pill, transdermal ring, and hormonal patch than among LARC users. The advantage of a LARC is that it changes the default from getting pregnant unless you work hard to avoid it to not getting pregnant unless you take a deliberate action to do so.
Income Inequality & Social Mobility
Dismantling white privilege starts with undoing racist housing policies
Andre M. Perry and Stuart Yasgur
Four reasons why more public housing isn't the solution to affordability concerns
Jenny Schuetz
How We Rise
The for-profit college system is broken and the Biden administration needs to fix it
Ariel Gelrud Shiro and Richard V. Reeves
Get updates on economics from Brookings

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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text:
BooksTwilight
Accidentally on Purpose (I Fell in Love with You)
By: wellthizizdeprezzing
Bella is naturally accident prone. She just seems to be more accident prone whenever Rosalie's around. Rosalie wonders why. Everyone else already knows why.
Rated: Fiction T - English - Romance/Supernatural - [Bella, Rosalie] Edward - Chapters: 22 - Words: 55,926 - Reviews: 240 - Favs: 541 - Follows: 626 - Updated: 7/1/2020 - Published: 2/3/2020 - Status: Complete - id: 13492491
1. Chapter 12. Chapter 23. Chapter 34. Chapter 45. Chapter 56. Chapter 67. Chapter 78. Chapter 89. Chapter 910. Chapter 1011. Chapter 1112. Chapter 1213. Chapter 1314. Chapter 1415. Chapter 1516. Chapter 1617. Chapter 1718. Chapter 1819. Chapter 1920. Chapter 2021. Chapter 2122. Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty Two
Eventually the trip has to come to an end and Bella's back in Forks after the five day trip sooner than she thought possible. But she's not standing outside of her house. She's standing inside the Cullens. Bella stands in the middle of the Cullens living room, awaiting the decision to start. The one on where they decide if she's going to become a vampire or not.
She's just spent a good chunk of her time here, going over her points. She'd even written it down on paper. They're all really good points, she likes to think, and she's made a compelling argument. Now, she just has to await their decision.
"Thank you Bella. We appreciate your transparency on the matter," Carlisle, the mediator of this whole affair said, hands clasped behind his back. "Now, we also know that Bella was given an ultimatum, either to turn into a vampire by the Volturi or risk being killed. Not the best two options, but we are also willing to run away and hide Bella for her own safety." This last part he directed at Bella who shook her head solemnly.
"I've made my choice. I'm fine with this. Now, you have to make yours."
"Everyone in favor of not turning Bella into a vampire?"
Predictably Rosalie's hand goes up. Bella knew the blonde would vote this way, but it's still a bit disheartening that Rosalie doesn't want Bella as a vampire. Is she really committed to having Bella become old and then dying? Wouldn't she rather have an immortal eternity?
"Everyone in favor of turning Bella into a vampire?"
Esme's, Jasper's, Emmett's and Alice's hands go up. Carlisle isn't voting in this.
"Very well," the blonde doctor hums. "It seems the results are clear. Bella, you will be turned into a vampire."
Bella doesn't know an appropriate way to celebrate this moment so she doesn't. Instead, just standing there awkwardly in the middle of the room as they sit on couches. Rosalie scoffs in disgust at what her family has chosen and then zooms off to go brood while the family plans. Bella tries to not let that hurt her. "What now?" she asks.
"Now, we discuss the process of turning you," Carlisle says. "It's very painful."
"I know that. And I want Rosalie to do it."
Carlisle looks mildly surprised by this. "You do?"
"Yes," Bella nods her head. "She's my mate, it only seems fair."
"Did you ask her about it?" Jasper pipes up. "She doesn't quite seem...all that likely to do it."
"She'll do it. She just won't like it," Bella said.
"Or she might like it too much," Jasper murmurs. "It's only natural for vampires to want to sink their teeth into something living and breathing, and inject it with their venom. It's kinda like the human equivalent of seeing cake in front of you and wanting to try the icing. So, Rosalie's not worried about having to do it, she's worried she might like it too much. She's...never bitten someone before. Or drank their blood. Unlike the rest of us."
Jasper had a point there. Bella hadn't even considered it. "Oh, damn. I feel bad now. I shouldn't have asked."
"You didn't know," Alice soothed.
"Carlisle, will you do the change then?" Bella asked him, brown eyes hopeful.
"Naturally. I will make it as painless as I can."
"I'll ask Rosie if she's coming down to watch," Emmett makes to get up but Esme places a hand on his chest. "No, it might be better if she doesn't. It will hurt her to see Bella in pain."
"She can't stay by my side to help me?" Bella inquires, slightly panicked by this fact.
"No, I think it's best if she doesn't. She might get aggressive with us for 'hurting you' or she might not let the change happen," Esme explained. "Alice and Carlisle will stay with you to make sure you're okay. And once everything is over, we'll allow Rosalie to come in."
"Can I...can I see her one more time before I turn?" Bella asked.
"Of course," Carlisle said, nodding his head. "I'll get the room ready for the turning." He left to do so.
Esme commented to Jasper and Emmett, "you keep Rosalie occupied while the change is occurring. We can't have her storming in here."
Alice gave a nervous Bella, a soft touch on the shoulder. "I can't wait until you're a vampire, Bella. We'll finally be true sisters." Then she flounced off to help Carlisle.
Bella went up the stairs, hoping Rosalie was in her room. "Rosalie?" she called tentatively, and knocked on the door. It was quiet, so Bella assumed Rosalie had left the house. As she swiveled on her heel, the door opened. Rosalie was there, and her eyes were scrunched up, like she had been trying to refrain from crying and failing even if no tears came from her eyes.
"I hope you're happy with the choice." There is no bitterness in the blonde's voice but Bella feels the words cut through her all the same.
"I wanted to see you before the transformation," Bella said, clearing her throat a bit awkwardly. "One last time as a human."
"I won't change you if that's what you came to ask," Rosalie says, arms crossed over her chest.
"I won't ask you to do that. I realize it would be wrong of me to do so," Bella said, shoving her hands into her pockets. "I just wanted...I just wanted one more kiss."
Bela watches as Rosalie's stoic facade crumples and the woman reaches out and grabs Bella's face greedily to hers and kisses hard. It's a needy kiss and Bella gasps into it, her sound getting swallowed up by Rosalie's hungry mouth. It's like she's trying to convey all her worry and love for Bella into the span of one kiss.
When she pulls away she leaves Bella dizzy, lips swollen. Rosalie's hands haven't left Bella's cheeks, still cupping them as a thumb traces her lips. "I...Don't think that just because I don't want you changed doesn't mean I don't love you," Rosalie says softly, a break running through her voice. "If I had a choice I'd want us to both be human and to have spent our life, loving as humans do. Messily, and with no immortality, just us growing older side by side. Even now, I feel the urge to just snatch you up and run away with you so that you won't get turned. But, this is your choice. And I won't- can't- take it from you. Because I wouldn't want my choice to be taken from me."
Bella gives a sad smile. "I'll see you on the other side," Bella says, before they allow themselves to separate.
Carlisle tells her it'll be a three day process. First, he drains her of her blood, but not nearly enough that she'll be drained dry. Just enough so that he can inject her with his venom, and then offer his own blood to her for her to drink. She barely remembers this part at all, delirious with blood loss and all that. All she can hear is the murmur of his voice and Alice's as her vision swims black and she tastes blood on her lips.
Day two and three are pain. No other way to describe it. As she sleeps, her body feels like it is being forged in fire. Liquid flames running through her veins and making her scream in pain. She's sleeping but she feels everything and she can't wake no matter what. She just hopes it will be over soon, her bones creaking and popping as they rearrange inside her, becoming strong as concrete.
They weren't lying about the pain. But all she can do is grit her teeth and let it happen.
Eventually, she opens her eyes and a kaleidoscope of colors greet her. The pain is gone, all but a mere vague memory and she sits up, feeling stronger than ever before. She's not breathing nor can she feel the thrum of her heart. It's disconcerting, but she barely has time to think on it, when Alice barrels into the room.
She has a wide smile on her face. "Bella, you did it! Welcome to being a vampire!"
The rest of the family crowd in and her heads starts spinning from all the new sensations. Everything is so bright and loud. And she can smell things strongly. She clamps a hand over her nose and growls loudly. She surprises the family. Carlisle is at the head of it. "Everyone, out. You're overwhelming Bella. She is newborn. We can't have her agitated."
They listen to him, though sulkily.
"How are you feeling?" he asks when they've left and it's only him and Bella in the room.
"Um...weird?" she says and even her voice is different. It sounds more smooth. Seductive almost. Speaking of seductive, where is Rosalie? The thought of the blonde sends a sharp pang through Bella's chest which must be the mate bond. She wants her. Wants to see her mate. Before she knows it, she's off the bed and on her feet, sniffing to pick up her mate's floral scent.
Carlisle steadies his hands. "Relax, Bella. Rosalie will come to you."
She's been growling out Rosalie's name without even knowing it. She shuts her mouth, a bit mortified.
"Let's get you some blood." Carlisle insists.
But she doesn't want blood, not now. She wants Rosalie. As if drawn to her, as if hearing the pull of their mate bond, Rosalie enters the house. Bella knows this because the door slams open and Rosalie is striding in, not even attempting to be quiet. Bella is vibrating with excitement. Mate! Her mate is here!
Rosalie goes into the room, standing in the doorway, just as they assess one another. Tension hangs in the air. Want. Need to hold one another. Carlisle seems to sense this. He scoots his way around them. "I trust you will be able to handle...Bella. The family and I will be leaving." He says to Rosalie as he dips out.
Bella opens her mouth, flashing her fangs. The animal part in her is starting to take over, but she still has enough control left to allow Rosalie to make the first move. The blonde strides up, pushing back a strand of Bella's hair with the back of her hand. "Hm, you make a decent vampire," Rosalie says once her eyes have finished examining Bella's new form. She's teasing, one side of her mouth quirked up.
"I make more than a decent vampire," Bella growled out, the animal inside her challenged by this. She kissed Rosalie hard, hard enough to make her stumble back. Bella didn't know her own strength yet, but Rosalie didn't seem to mind. She pressed back harder, hissing into Bella's mouth as Bella's hand went up and wrapped around her shoulders. Rosalie began backing her up until Bella's knees hit the bed and together they went down, collapsing on top of each other.
"Of course, the first thing Bella does as a newborn is fuck you," Emmett said, smiling when the family finally could come back to the house. For once, Rosalie looked a bit disheveled in all her decades of flawless existence. She had fading bruises where Bella couldn't control her strength, red marks where Bella's nails had dug in, and her hair was a mess.
Rosalie closed the door softly behind her. Bella was still in the room, getting dressed.
"Oh shut up," Rosalie grumbled. "We did not." She was insistent on the first time being special, still. And wouldn't let even newborn hormones get in the way.
"Uh huh, sure," Emmett popped a brow. "So, can we make the welcome party or not?"
"Bella's fine now. We're both fine."
"I bet the room's not fine," Emmett said and ducked out of the way when an unimpressed Rosalie tried to kick his shin. Laughing, he went down the stairs.
Rosalie went to go fix herself up and ten minutes later the two of them were ready to join the rest of the family downstairs.
"How do you feel?" Rosalie asked Bella who looked so much more confident and poised as a vampire now. It was like all the awkwardness she had had as a human was gone. In her place, only grace. She could be a model now.
"I don't know how to feel. I'm...I'm trying not to think about it."
"It can be a lot," Rosalie said. "But you're doing pretty great for a newborn. You're more controlled than any I've ever seen."
Bella would be blushing if she could. "Even if I did destroy the room?"
"You didn't destroy me," Rosalie pointed out.
Bella laughs. "Why would I want to? You're my mate."
"Not every newborn would be able to control themselves and would get too excited," Rosalie commented.
"Dweebs, hurry up and come on down. Alice is going to explode if she has to wait any longer for you to come down," Emmett called up with his booming voice.
"Shall we?" Rosalie held out her hand. They were both dressed in casual clothing. Jeans, and a plain tee. But as Bella took Rosalie's hand, she couldn't help feel like they were royalty, descending down the stairs. Bella knew she looked good, perfect now. And Rosalie was a stunning figure too. Bela could barely contain her joy and her smile. She had eternity with Rosalie now. Eternity with her new family too.
She'd given up a lot to be here, but she had gained even more.
When she got to the bottom step, she saw the downstairs had been outfitted into a party of sorts. There was a banner with her name on it, balloons strung up, everyone wearing a party hat, with Alice popping the confetti.
"Welcome to the family," Esme said, smiling softly at Bella.
And Bella smiled softly right back.
A/N: I've decided to end the story here. I can't see where else to take it and I don't quite want to remove it from too far from it's original roots. That said I hope you enjoyed the story. I'll be writing more Rosella stories soon.


California inventor Matt McMullen, who makes the world's most realistic life-sized female doll, the RealDoll (with exquisite skin texture and facial and body architecture, and which sells for $5,000 to $10,000, depending on customization), is working with engineers experienced in robotics to add animation–but according to a June New York Times report, faces a built-in problem. As a pioneer Japanese robotics developer observed, robots that become too humanlike tend to disgust rather than satisfy. Hence, the more lifelike McMullen makes his RealDolls, the more likely the customer is to be creeped out rather than turned on–perhaps forcing the virtuoso McMullen to leave enough imperfection to reassure the customer that it's just a doll.
A low-caste minor girl was beaten up by several higher-caste women in the village of Ganeshpura, India, in June (in retaliation for the girl's having disrespected a male relative of the women–by allowing her shadow to partially cover the man). The girl's family managed to get to a police station to file charges, but in some remote villages like Ganeshpura, higher-caste aggressors can intimidate the victims into silence (and in this case, allegedly threatened to kill the girl and members of her family for the shadow-casting).
Yunessan Spa House in Hakone, Japan, recently began offering guests supposedly soothing, skin-conditioning baths–of ramen noodles (elevating to health status what might be Japan's real national dish). The pork broth that fills the tub is genuine, but because of health department regulations, only synthetic noodles can be used, and it is not clear that the artificial ramen achieves the same (allegedly) beautifying collagen levels as actual noodles.
The federal Medicare Fraud Strike Force obtained indictments of 243 people in June in a variety of alleged scams and swindles, and among those arrested was Dr. Noble U. Ezukanma, 56, of Fort Worth, Texas, who once billed the government for working 205 hours in a single day (October 16, 2012). Other indictees were similarly accused of inflating the work they supposedly did for Medicare patients, but Dr. Ezukanma clearly had the most productive day of the bunch.
Canada's naval vessels stationed in Halifax, Nova Scotia, currently lack supply-ship services, according to a May Canadian Press report. One of the two supply vessels has been decommissioned, and the other, 45 years old, is floating limply because of corrosion, and work on a replacement will not begin until 2017. Consequently, according to the report, the navy has been forced to order repair parts for the ship by advertising for them on eBay.
Because the walkway in front of a Publix supermarket in Fort Lauderdale had seen its share of Girl Scout cookie sellers, Patrick Lanier apparently thought the venue a natural for his product. On June 4, he plopped down a live, 5-foot-long shark he had just captured, and which he hectored shoppers to buy, asking $100 (and occasionally tossing buckets of water on it to keep it shimmering). He had less success than the cookie-peddlers, and in short order loaded it back into his truck, took it to an inlet and released it. However, he did avoid the police; it is illegal to sell fish without a commercial license.
The New York Court of Appeals ruled in June that, when a body is taken for official autopsy and organs are removed (including the brain), the deceased's family does not necessarily have a right to receive the body with organs re-inserted. "[N]othing in our common law jurisprudence," the judges wrote, mandates "that the medical examiner do anything more than produce the … body." The family had demanded the entire body back for a "proper" Catholic burial.
Marijuana is purported to make some heavy users paranoid, and the January arrest of alleged Bozeman, Montana, dealers Leland Ayala-Doliente, 21, and Craig Holland, 22, may have been a case in point. Passersby had reported the two men pacing along the side of Golden Beauty Drive in Rexburg, Idaho, and, when approached by a car, would throw their hands up until the vehicle passed. When police finally arrived, one suspect shouted: "We give up. We know we're surrounded. The drugs [20 pounds of marijuana] are [over there]." According to the Idaho Falls Post Register, they were not surrounded, nor had they been followed by undercover officers–as the men claimed.


text:
Cracks within Anglican Communion widens over same-sex relationships
By Jeckonia Otieno | February 27th 2021
The fabric connecting the African Anglican Communion to the West seems to be tearing like the temple curtain at Jesus' death.
This is after the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) wrote a terse letter to the Anglican Church of North America over the issue of same-sex relationships.
The letter signed by Archbishop Henry Ndukuba, the Primate of the Nigerian church comes after a statement by the College of Bishops of Anglican Church in North America (ACNA), which has largely been interpreted as support for the gay.
"The Bishops noted, 'that the struggle with human identity is real and painful for Christians who experience same-sex attraction'," read the letter by the Nigerian church which argues further that ACNA seems bent towards promoting same-sex relationships within the American church.
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Ndukuba averred that the move by ACNA mirrors the route taken by The Episcopal Church (TEC) before it moved to fully embrace same-sex unions, including among ordained clergy.
The standoff now puts the unity of Anglican bishops who coalesce under the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) at stake.
"ACNA was formed by GAFCON, as a safe haven for faithful Christians who reject the apostasy and rebellion in TEC. They should not now find in ACNA the aberrations which drove them from TEC," Ndukuba stated.
He also reminded the American church that the current chair of GAFCON is none other than its primate Archbishop Foley Beach whose "actions or inactions and that of his Province have serious implications for GAFCON leadership."
The letter charged, "Its appeal to subsidiarity is another trick not to submit to clear authority of Scripture on homosexuality, rather, they defer to individual Bishops discretion of discernment on how to relate to homosexuals, and offer them room."
In its statement, the College of Bishops had announced the decision to allow each bishop to deal with the matter at their own discretion within their own dioceses. Church of Nigeria views this as a perilous move to the Christianity based on what it termed truth of the Gospel.
The College of Bishops wrote, "We acknowledge that you have, on some occasions, felt ignored by fellow followers of Jesus to the point of feeling invisible.
Many of you, in the midst of these heartbreaking experiences, are, together with all Christians, fighting the good fight to become more like Jesus. Please hear this: we love you, respect you, and pray that this statement will encourage you."
An invitation to gay Anglicans by a group within ACNA seems to have fueled the fire with fears rising that would end up in gay clergy being allowed in pulpits in parishes.
However, the invitation seemed to have been pulled down from the internet after the outcry.
The Nigerian primate asked the Archbishop of ACNA to officially comment on the matter to avoid any ambiguity.
He reiterated, "A Gay is a Gay, they cannot be rightly described otherwise. In the same vein, we cannot describe people as 'Christian Murderer', Christian Adulterer' and 'Christian terrorist'; neither should we even have 'Gay Christian' or 'Gay Anglican."
This is the first visible difference that is arising between the diocese that broke away from The Episcopal Church in 2009 and the largely conservative African congregation.
Some of the most vocal provinces against same-sex marriages in East Africa include the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK), Church of Uganda, the Anglican Church of Tanzania (ACT) and the Anglican Church of Rwanda.
There are expectations that ACK Archbishop Jackson Ole Sapit will issue a statement condemning the move.
The current standoff comes just four months before the Lambeth Conference which was postponed last year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Dr Sapit said he will not attend the conference unless the invitation extended to gay bishops from North America is withdrawn.
He, however, clarified that bishops within AC are free to attend in their individual capacity.
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When postmodernism tends to realism: Island City (Mini Review)
Though these are films on two very different themes, the film Island City reminded me more than once of Party, Govind Nihalani's brilliant adaptation of Mahesh Elkunchwar's play which explores the role of the writer as artist and activist in a shallow, self-serving society. Both films constantly make the viewer pause to think and reflect on the questions raised by the premise.
Island City is a thought-provoking exploration of urban loneliness, conveyed through three loosely interconnected stories. The corporate employee in an Orwellian setup who is desensitised to obey any instruction unquestioningly, the suppressed housewife who chooses the lead character in a schmaltzy television soap over the tyrannical man of the house, and the blue collar worker who finds love in an unexpected place which proceeds to render her life bleaker than before, come from very different backgrounds, but their lives are equally affected by the impersonal hollowness of life in a city. Though the stories are set in Mumbai, these are universal tales of present times which could have played out in any city in the world. The boundaries between fiction and reality, as well as technology and human emotions, blur and eventually dissolve at the end of each story, leaving the viewers with a paradox: despite the images of absurdism and black humour, the film comes across as more real than surreal, reemphasising that we now live in a post-postmodern world.
AbsurdismDark ComedyFilmsMetafictionPostmodernismSurrealism
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Do you ever stare deeply into your own eyes while looking in the mirror? So deeply that the rest of your vision becomes blurred and all that remains is the intensity of your gaze?
I get goosebumps and my eyes swell with tears every time I do it.
I'm staring at all that exists--looking into my soul, into the soul of the universe through my own eyes, periodically wondering which side of the glass I'm on.
I just had the second most profound meditation of my life (the first being during my third Ayahuasca ceremony in Peru earlier this year). I expressed thanks to all of you: my family, my friends, the shamans I've worked with, my colleagues, the people who I don't necessarily share a strong connection with, all the people of the world who I've yet to meet, all the people who have come before me, and all the people who will come after me. I expressed thanks to the animals, plants and other life forms on our planet. I thanked Mother Earth, Mother Ayahuasca, our universe, the multiverse, the beings of different dimensions, and the different dimensions themselves. I thanked space, time, and existence itself. . .
Video discussing meditation, what it means, and how to get started.
Unintentionally, I started visualizing microorganisms dividing and spreading, then evolving into grass and other plants. Then, I saw buffalo eating the grass and the slaughter of the bison I have in my freezer. I then saw the bison integrating with my body to help me grow via my digestive tract and other organs. I watched as I ate numerous bison (and other animals) throughout my life before dying and decomposing in the earth, and then my cells redistributed like microorganisms dividing and spreading before they evolved into grass, and a bison started eating them. . .