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THE DAYS OF THE TRIFFIDS
Photo by Richard Worsley
A Retrospective with Graham Lee and Rob McComb
by Wilson Neate
In the mid-'80's, like several of their compatriots, the Triffids uprooted and transplanted themselves from Australia to the Northern hemisphere in search of a more receptive climate. Three full-length albums for Sydney's Hot label (with UK distribution by Rough Trade) earned them critical success and a loyal fan base across Europe. Avoiding the Big-in-Japan syndrome, the Triffids' singular blend of country, folk, blues, psychedelia and rock proved especially popular in Scandinavia and the Low Countries. Their distinctive sonic identity -- captured most memorably on 1986's Born Sandy Devotional -- was due in large part to their songwriter and frontman, the late David McComb. While McComb's songs were frequently grounded in the landscape of Western Australia, they were also universal in their reach. Greatness beckoned when the group signed to Island, but two albums later, as the '90's rolled around, they moved on to other projects (without officially splitting). With the Domino and Liberation labels embarking on a long-overdue reissue of the group's albums, now seems like an opportune moment to remember the Triffids and David McComb with help from former band members Graham Lee and Rob McComb.
Early Years: From Perth to Sydney via the Treeless Plain
The roots of the Triffids are best unearthed by David McComb himself. Writing in his diary as a teenager, he traced the band's emergence in Perth, geographically one of the world's most isolated cities: "On the night of November 27, 1976, a tape was made by Alsy MacDonald, playing a single toy drum, and Dave McComb playing acoustic guitar. The multimedia group 'Dalsy' had come into being. Dalsy went on to make several remarkable tapes (mainly of original material): The Loft Tapes, Rock 'n' Roll Accountancy, Live at Ding Dongs, Bored Kids, Domestic Cosmos, People Are Strange Dalsy Are Stranger, Steve's and the seminal punk work, Pale Horse Have a Fit.… Dalsy did paintings, sculptures and poetry, and wrote a book named Lunch. They were tinny and quirky, obsessive and manic, versatile and productive. They were also immensely unpopular.... The members of Dalsy grew to hate their audience. They still do, and this hate is an integral part of their music. Dalsy split up towards the end of 1977…. They launched into 1978 as Blok Musik, with their famous Blok Musik tape.… In April they played at the Leederville Town Hall Punk Fest, alongside Perth's punk rock contingent but, as usual, no one danced. After that they went home and metamorphosised into Logic. Within a day they changed their minds, and metamorphosised into the Triffids."
Despite his hometown's remote location, Rob McComb remembers the late '70's as an exciting time. Punk might have exploded thousands of miles away, but its impact was definitely felt in Western Australia, inspiring numerous Perth bands: "There was a real scene around the Victims and Cheap Nasties/Scientists. My girlfriend at the time was in a band called the Teeny Weenys. It was a great 'do-it-yourself' attitude that went down well in Perth." And although the Triffids would ultimately feel the need to move away in order to pursue their career, McComb maintains that the city did have positive aspects for a band starting out: "We had a big house that we could rehearse in, we could arrange our own gigs at the local bars and the isolation encouraged a cavalier approach."
Like many of their peers, the Triffids were initially motivated by British punk's DIY message, but they had little time for its sloganeering, cartoonish variants; for actual sonic inspiration they looked to the more oblique and arty New York incarnation of punk (Television, Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Richard Hell), as well as to proto-punks like the Velvet Underground and the Stooges. Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen were also important influences. Between 1978 and 1981, with a shifting cast of characters, the Triffids released six cassettes. Rob McComb joined his younger brother's band as violinist and second guitarist in 1979, in time for their fourth tape and fresh from duties with the auspiciously named Tiger Mountain Band (while they borrowed their name from Eno -- and, by extension, the Maoist opera from which he'd borrowed it -- their music wasn't the art-rock that one might expect, as McComb recalls: "We did Ry Cooder and Bob Dylan covers as well as original reggae stuff"). McComb's violin added a new dimension to the Triffids' early sound, although he modestly underplays his role: "I came to the band as the only one with some classical training, and in true punk attitude Dave was keen to use the violin for melody. I was never a very competent player, but it contributed something."
The band eventually debuted on vinyl with the 1981 single "Stand Up/Farmers Never Visit Nightclubs" and, in January of the following year, they made the three-day trek, crossing the Nullarbor Plain, to try their luck in Sydney. Other releases followed: the EP Reverie (1982), the single "Spanish Blue/Twisted Brain" (1982) and, with Only Ones producer Robert Ash, the Bad Timing and Other Stories EP (1983). By late 1983, the line-up had coalesced around Alsy MacDonald (drums), David McComb (vocals, guitar), Rob McComb (violin, guitar), Jill Birt (keyboards) and Martyn Casey (bass), and Hot released the group's self-produced debut album, Treeless Plain.
The band would obviously continue to develop, but the fundamental ingredients that define the Triffids' sound are certainly in place on Treeless Plain and the 1984 mini-album Raining Pleasure: echoes of the artier side of punk fleshed out with country, folk and blues and infused with a series of musical and lyrical tensions (light vs. dark; pastoral and melodic vs. intense and explosive; romanticism vs. cynicism; optimism vs. pessimism). Throughout these records, David McComb makes his presence felt, vocally and lyrically: his commanding voice dominates the swaggering cover of Dylan's "I Am a Lonesome Hobo," as well as driving numbers like "Hell of a Summer" and "Property Is Condemned," while "Hanging Shed" is a paradigmatic example of the sort of dark, elliptical narrative at which he would excel throughout the band's career. With Birt's Hammond organ and Rob McComb's violin often prominent, the Triffids had a markedly retro feel, at a time when many bands were striving to sound as new as possible. As David McComb shrewdly said in a 1984 interview with Rock Australia Magazine (RAM), "the more you try to sound modern, the quicker you start to sound dated," something that makes perfect sense when you compare the Triffids with many of their early-'80's pop peers. Indeed, although the Western flavor on numbers like "Place in the Sun" and the hypnotic "Red Pony" might have seemed anachronistic, it anticipated the interest in country music that indie bands would later start to show.
The Year of the Triffids
In 1984, the Triffids made their first trip to Britain, where they gigged with fellow Australians the Go-Betweens and the Moodists, opened for Echo & the Bunnymen and recorded the first of three sessions for BBC Radio 1's John Peel Show. They began 1985 on the cover of the NME (which posed the question, "1985: The Year of the Triffids?") and, back in Australia again, augmented their line-up. David McComb had been interested in expanding the group's sound with pedal steel guitar and, despite having little experience with the instrument, Graham Lee was tapped for the job. Lee had played guitar on Lawson Square Infirmary, a Triffids side project that was recorded just prior to the band's first trip to England: "I taught primary school, traveled and ended up in Sydney, where I met the Triffids and first sat behind a pedal steel (in that order actually)," Lee recalls. "I met Dave [McComb] through James Patterson, who played in a band in Sydney called JFK and the Cuban Crisis. My initial impressions of Dave were: slightly eccentric, driven, something of a perfectionist, very intelligent."
With Lee on board (rechristened "Evil" Graham Lee -- McComb was of the opinion that all pedal steel players should have a decent nickname), the Triffids returned to London, their base for most of the next five peripatetic years. Rob McComb felt no ambivalence about leaving Australia in search of success: "For me it was a great adventure," he says, although adding, "I used to hope we'd record our first album in Jamaica!" Lee was also enthusiastic but, in hindsight, believes that the move wasn't without its negative repercussions: "It was all a big adventure. It wasn't so much a case of having to leave but wanting to leave. Afterwards, the realities of being away became more apparent, of course, and it was the difficulty of maintaining stable personal relationships that contributed to the end of the band. If it were set in today's framework, maybe things might be a bit different. Such lengthy periods away might not be necessary."
Lee remembers the band being somewhat isolated in London, both socially and musically: "We were a little cocooned in our own little world. We didn't go out much and it wasn't British bands we were listening to." However, they did mix with some of the other Australian artists who had also headed to the UK. "There was camaraderie to a point," according to Lee. "We had barbecues together, went to each other's gigs, drank each other's drinks riders, some of us even played tennis together." Rob McComb confirms this: "I used to play tennis with Robert [Forster] and Lindy [Morrison, both of the Go-Betweens] and Steve Miller [of the Moodists]. The Go-Betweens were great to give us a couple of support gigs when we first got there, and the Moodists became good friends." At the same time, Lee thinks there was "competition also to a point and on several levels." He explains: "I know there was a jousting among songwriters, some envy expressed in subsequent books about the perceived wealth of the Triffids due to our major label deal (not true on a personal level -- we never got paid more than a living allowance, everything went into the band). The Triffids were convivial hosts and this may have given an impression of having more than we really did."
Indeed, Lee recalls the band's lifestyle as being far from glamorous: "London living for us was a necessity. We rented houses, lived together on our meager wages and looked forward to going on tour, when we could eat really well and get looked after by the promoter." On one occasion, on the eve of a gig at London's Town and Country Club, Australia's richest man, the late media mogul Kerry Packer, called and offered to fly them to France: "He tried to get us all to come and party in Paris because our manager, Sally [Collins], was sharing a house (Sam Neill's house actually) with Kate Fitzpatrick, the Australian actress and cricket companion of Kerry. He called the house just as we were about to leave for the gig and said he had a Lear jet waiting at the airport and a floor booked at the Ritz and we should get our bony arses over the channel. But we had a gig to do."
The fact that the Triffids enjoyed a better standard of living on the road might explain their prowess as a live act, but it was David McComb himself who made the difference. He was undoubtedly one of the period's more compelling frontmen and anyone lucky enough to have seen the Triffids will remember his intensity and charisma, which brought something unique to the band's shows. Although Lee attributes his friend's on-stage effectiveness to "a high level of personal involvement in the songs, a pride in his performance, a physical presence and a booming voice," he's also quick to underscore that McComb was an attentive student and fan of rock and that "a wide knowledge of the great frontmen (Iggy Pop, John Lydon, Elvis, etc.) made Dave a formidable front person." Most important, though, was McComb's commitment: "He really hated to do a bad show," Lee asserts. "Even in his later years when he was quite frail, he'd always be able to rise from his seat and become that rock god -- even if it was a fleeting glimpse."
Spring 1985 saw the release of the Field of Glass EP, containing three tracks originally recorded (pre-Lee) for the Triffids' first Peel session. Alternately menacing and explosive, the title track's nine-minute "Frankie Teardrop"-style psychodrama was a bold departure, which found the band experimenting with a whole new range of dynamics. While it showed some kinship with Echo & the Bunnymen, there really was little else from the period that sounded like it. The song occupies a special place in the Triffids' canon. For Lee, it embodies the band's greatest strengths: "'Field of Glass' has an epic quality, a surging simple chord sequence, an intensity bordering on the violent and malevolent. Dave said, in some song notes I read, definitely a comedy. Wild boy in love with rich girl who's still at school gets driven a bit crazy by unrequited love. It was a scary, exhilarating ride. It does sound timeless, due to being so far away from the traditional sound of a song at the time. I think it all comes down to power -- the power of the chord sequence, the power of the rhythm section, the brute force of the climax of the breakdown. The power to change lives, as more than one person has since told me."
Born Sandy Devotional
"Field of Glass" notwithstanding, the band made its masterpiece with 1986's Born Sandy Devotional. Around the time of the album's release, David McComb commented that the Triffids had been more democratic on past records, but he felt those records hadn't been especially strong; so, for Born Sandy Devotional, he played a more dominant part, deliberately trying to push the group. "It seemed a natural progression," according to Rob McComb. "As Dave became more confident, we followed. Maybe we didn't push ourselves hard enough." Lee also attests to McComb's prominent role: "Dave was trying to push the boundaries of his own musical envelope and this meant pushing the band. He would never settle for a cliché, a riff drawn from somewhere else -- he wanted it to be all new and amazing."
One of the especially striking aspects of Born Sandy Devotional was the new dimension brought by Lee's pedal steel. In the mid-'80's, it was something of a novelty to encounter a rock band with a pedal steel player (and a violinist) and, in their own way, the Triffids were alt-country avant la lettre. However, Lee recalls that he was the only band member actually listening to country music at the time and he points to Gram Parsons' Grievous Angel (particularly the song "$1000 Wedding") as a key influence. And Lee suffered for his art, faithfully replicating country's "Sunday Morning Coming Down" feel by recording his pedal steel parts for the album with a hangover of biblical proportions: "It was a crushing, falling-to-your-knees kind of hangover, but it made me concentrate on the essence of the song. And trying to stay alive."
The "essence" of the Triffids' songs raises a question about music and its relation to place: although the band was based primarily in London, Born Sandy Devotional felt intimately linked with Australia. Just as the Nullarbor Plain provided the title for Treeless Plain, Born Sandy Devotional's spectacular aerial cover photograph of Mandurah Township offers a very specific geographical context. As for the record itself, McComb's lyrics often suggest local imagery and many of the tracks have an atmospheric openness and expansiveness that some critics have identified as essentially Australian. In 1990, McComb commented to Juke magazine that much of the record "seemed to naturally evoke a particular landscape, namely the stretch of highway in between Caiguna and Norseman where the Triffids' Hi-Ace [van] monotonously came to grief with kangaroos."
While these songs were undeniably imbued with some sense of cultural specificity, McComb's skill as a writer gives them a broader resonance and that transcendence can be heard most memorably on the anthemic "Wide Open Road." It was voted one of the "Ultimate Australian Songs" in a 2001 Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) poll, but as Lee notes, "This song has a specific meaning, a specific narrative and at the same time a universal story. It could be set, if you think about it, anywhere." Lee prefers to see the songs not as quintessentially Australian but as "quintessentially Dave McComb." He explains: "The sound was built up to satisfy his vision for his songs. Atmosphere, mystery, the extraordinary, complete lack of cliché, originality. Along the way, a sound was heard that could be construed to be quintessentially Australian. I don't think Dave tried to forge an Australian sound at all. I'm not trying to portray him as a puppeteer here -- all band members brought something special to the mix, but Dave had, more than most (in any band), a sound in his head that he tried his best to replicate on two-inch tape. A very different sound but very like Brian Wilson in his drive and vision (though Brian Wilson couldn't write great lyrics)."
By way of a compromise, then, "quintessentially Dave McComb" might be best understood as an ability to create a lyrical and musical link between Western Australia's stark, isolated terrain and universal human feelings of desolation and loneliness. Paradoxically, part of this comes from McComb's more autobiographical approach on Born Sandy Devotional: although many of the songs are deeply personal, autobiography is distilled into often oblique tales of dislocation, psychological turmoil and loss that have a wider existential reach. Moreover, McComb intensifies that connection with listeners by eschewing tidy, closed narratives in favor of evocative, unresolved fragments and vignettes, which enlist the imagination and involve the listener more actively. Elevating the seemingly personal and local to a general human level was entirely in keeping with McComb's desire for what he called a more "wide-screen" feel on this album, something that's complemented by expansive arrangements, often adorned with strings, haunting organ, vibraphone and atmospheric pedal steel. There are many highlights here: the fragmented, cinematic "Lonely Stretch" is cut from the same dark, brooding cloth as "Field of Glass"; "Chicken Killer" comes straight from the pages of an imagined Carson McCullers or Flannery O'Connor novel; and "Tarrilup Bridge" -- which owes something to "Ode to Billie Joe" -- juxtaposes Jill Birt's childlike vocals with spookily echoing vibes and strings. Things coalesce to near-perfection on "Life of Crime," "Stolen Property" and "The Seabirds," the latter remaining one of Lee's favorite Triffids songs: "'The Seabirds' is a narrative that has razor-sharp imagery, a wonderful textural sound and some of Dave's very best lines. Are you drinking to get maudlin or drinking to get numb? go down as among the best I've heard from any writer. These didn't come until not long before the song was recorded. The song is just perfect in every way."
For the album, the band was joined by producer Gil Norton (who had previously worked with China Crisis, Martin Stephenson and Echo & the Bunnymen, among others). Lee believes Norton played an important role: "Gil kept our minds on the job and helped Dave get those sounds out of his head and down on tape. We weren't working in the greatest of studios with a big budget, but we wanted a big-budget sounding album. Not an easy task. Well done Gil."
Following Born Sandy Devotional's attempt at a big-budget sound, the band took a radically different approach for the next album, which was made in April 1986 on a trip back to Australia. A world away from London and its relative comforts, the Triffids ensconced themselves for five days in a remote sheep-shearing shed (370 miles southeast of Perth), recording on an eight-track machine. In the Pines was a proto-unplugged, back-to-basics album -- so back-to-basics, in fact, that "broom," "floorboards" and "water tank" are listed among the instruments. The total cost, itemized in the sleeve-notes, was $1,190. Some indication of the band's priorities might lie in the detail that $340 was spent on booze, $310 on food and $300 on equipment.
Given the simplicity of much of the material on In the Pines, as well as the occasionally playful, communal feel (Lee fronts the "Evil Choir" on a cover of Bill Anderson's sing-along "Once a Day"), it's tempting to interpret the album as a homecoming, a conscious effort on the part of the band to reconnect with its roots. Rob McComb disagrees: "It wasn't really returning to our roots, as the band did not come from a woolshed, or the country, but more an adventure to get a rattley country sound to the recording." Lee is also quick to demythologize the record: "It was just an interesting idea, and one that was possible to do with minimal funds. There were plenty of songs lying around. We had some time off. It wasn't Big Pink or anything." David McComb himself never quite understood why fans loved it so much and Lee concurs: "I can understand why people like it, but it's not really my favorite either. I don't dislike it but would rather listen to more fully formed statements."
Despite its brevity and its stripped-down aesthetic, In the Pines boasts diverse material that stands alongside the band's more developed work. This is especially true of some of the album's darker numbers like "Suntrapper," "Kathy Knows" and the title track, a disquieting love song that had an unusual provenance. Lee had once told David McComb about "Black Girl/In the Pines," done by Leadbelly among others, describing it as the scariest song in the world. McComb's interest was piqued and he wanted to hear the record. Eventually, he got so tired of waiting for Lee to lend it to him that he just went ahead and wrote his own version. According to Lee, this was precisely what he had intended to happen.
Ironically, one of the album's most magical moments -- the haunting "Born Sandy Devotional" -- is more a sketch than a complete song, lasting a minute-and-a-half. A more fully realized rendition was recorded subsequently but went unreleased. Although it seemed to be doomed to purgatory, Lee reports that it is at last forthcoming: "That song had been around since before I joined the band," he says. "It was a song Dave felt very close to and he worked on it over a period of years before finally giving up on it. It may be that his personal situation shifted enough for him to let it go. It has a full song structure and will appear in complete form as part of the reissue program."
Calenture
By 1987, the Triffids had signed to Island and set about recording Calenture in April of that year. The sessions began with American producer Craig Leon. On the face of it, this was an apt choice since he had worked on records by several of the late-'70's New York punk bands who had initially inspired the teenage David McComb, but things didn't go to plan and the sessions were aborted. Rob McComb describes them as a "waste of time" and various versions of the story point to a fraught situation, some actually reporting that Leon wanted to fire the rhythm section of Casey and MacDonald. Lee sheds a little more light: "In the tried and true way of all major labels at the time, they really wanted to sign Dave but got a troublesome band instead. It was probably Island's insistence that Alsy and Marty weren't up to it that caused the Craig Leon sessions to be the unmitigated disaster that they were. Now I could be wrong here, maybe Craig wanted them out, maybe both. We were pretty much forced to let a couple of session guys stand in -- no names because it wasn't their fault -- and we could tell straight away that this was applying a straightener to the normally unruly quiff that was the band. It was also sucking the essence of the band out. Anyway, it's a sorry little interlude that I should draw the curtain on. The sessions were scrapped and we were allowed to be the Triffids again." With Leon out of the picture, Island even brought in Lenny Kaye with a view to getting him involved. Kaye was impressed by the Triffids and their material and told them that they didn't need his help. Calenture got back on track with Gil Norton in the producer's chair once again.
There's a degree of continuity between Born Sandy Devotional and Calenture. With a considerably larger budget, the band traded in the pared-down aesthetic of In the Pines and returned to the sound they had been developing on its predecessor. However, if Born Sandy Devotional was a "wide-screen" album, then Calenture was 3-D: many of the arrangements are bigger and bolder, lush and textured, featuring a broader use of strings, and everything from horns to uillean pipes. On tracks like the sweeping "Bury Me Deep in Love" (which McComb once told Smash Hits was "our Lionel Richie-type epic") and the euphoric "Holy Water," an unbridled pop sensibility emerges -- a development that sounds like an organic progression. Elsewhere, the band retains its rock edge on the dramatic, explosive "Kelly's Blues," another elliptical narrative of psychic turmoil that disabused listeners of any notion that McComb had perhaps mellowed. A sense of alienation, betrayal, insanity and solitude still permeates his writing, although Calenture seems less explicitly imbued with Western Australian imagery than the previous records. McComb told RAM in 1988 that the album was characterized by "an absence of a sense of place," a shift towards rootlessness. It moved away from earlier work, which was, at some level, more rooted -- reflecting the band's nomadic lifestyle, gigging relentlessly around Europe and shuttling between the Northern and Southern hemispheres.
Nevertheless, one of the album's standouts derives from McComb's ambivalent relationship with Perth: "Hometown Farewell Kiss" (a version of which appeared on In the Pines as "One Soul Less on Your Fiery List") is a beautiful doo-wop-nuanced number in which a disgruntled arsonist lover torches the town. Indeed, the album has its usual odd cast of characters and the most interesting appears on the sea-shanty-style "Jerdacuttup Man" -- a classic example of McComb's talent for dark and darkly humorous, ambiguous narratives -- sung in the persona of a bog man on display at the British Museum. For Lee, the highpoint is "Save What You Can," another song he considers among McComb's finest: "'Save What You Can' is a heartbreaking ballad made even more heartbreaking by the knowledge of subsequent events."
In the same 1988 RAM interview, David McComb described Calenture as an "over-the-top record" and even called it the Triffids' Heaven's Gate. But if in McComb's mind the album was something of a folly, that just shows how high his standards were.
For their second album on Island, 1989's The Black Swan, the Triffids were joined by Stephen Street. Although Street was, by then, a high-profile producer, having enjoyed success with the Smiths' Strangeways, Here We Come and Morrissey's Viva Hate, Rob McComb remembers that his brother knew exactly what he wanted and that Street deferred to him: "[Stephen Street] got a clean sound and respected Dave's direction. Once you work with Dave, you see that he knows what he wants. Lenny Kaye said as much to us."
The Black Swan was an audacious move for the band. In comparison with Calenture, the arrangements were often less elaborate and the symphonic sweep that enveloped many of the tracks on the previous album was gone, replaced by a far more direct and immediate sound. The group didn't just explore a different musical direction, but, rather, they struck out in a variety of different directions from one track to the next. McComb and his cohorts ventured into all sorts of new musical territory, drawing on elements of jazz, opera, rap and funk, as well as expanding their instrumental palette with bouzouki, güiro and accordion. Also conspicuous here is the more explicitly state-of-the-art feel and the incorporation of some moderately experimental approaches. Calenture had employed aspects of the newer technology of the '80's, but The Black Swan made more obvious use of synths and programming.
To a certain degree, The Black Swan was McComb's response to what he perceived as the growing homogenization of rock (had he lived longer, he might have been even more dismayed). He believed strongly in the cross-pollination of musics and the potential for one tradition or style to revitalize another. Coupled with this, he was skeptical about the concept of authenticity as it applied to establishing whether an artist was bona fide: McComb felt that his origins and lived experience, as an Australian from Perth, shouldn't preclude his tapping into other traditions and genres with which he seemingly had no direct connection. This attitude manifested itself in striking ways. In the late-'80's McComb had become increasingly interested in rap and hip-hop (particularly artists like King Sun-D Moet, Roxanne Shanté, Ice T, Schoolly D and LL Cool J) and he was convinced that these new forms had a great potential for kick-starting and reinvigorating rock music. There are a couple of modest experiments in that regard on The Black Swan: "Falling over You" comprises floating synth textures and electronic beats and, on the choruses, McComb raps, albeit in a mellow, understated fashion; evoking the Wolfgang Press on "The Spinning Top Song," he fills a rock template with subtly funky hip-hop rhythms, horn samples and guitar loops. At the more idiosyncratic end of the spectrum, "The Clown Prince" blends the operatic backing vocals of Mexican singer Rita Menéndez, tango rhythms and a Rive Gauche cabaret ambience, while "Butterflies into Worms" lays down a similarly smoky, string-bass-driven jazz groove. In contrast, Jill Birt's vocals and some electro-pop gloss on "Good Fortune Rose" and "Goodbye Little Boy" give the band its most mainstream, chart-friendly sound yet.
The sheer diversity of the material took fans and critics somewhat by surprise and the response wasn't entirely favorable. There was a perceived lack of coherence, a feeling that the band was trying too hard and had lost its identity amid all the divergent ideas and sounds (who knows how much worse the reaction might have been had The Black Swan been released as a double album, as was the original plan. Or perhaps the extra tracks might have established the sense of coherence that some felt was missing).
Listening to The Black Swan seventeen years later, it's clear that this wasn't the Triffids' strongest album. Nevertheless, it's hard to imagine why it was such a difficult proposition for some. At the center of it all, David McComb's character and charisma are still unmistakable and, if anything, his songwriting has moved to a new level of maturity and inventiveness. There's plenty of evidence of this: the beautiful Van Morrison-esque country-tinged ballad "New Year's Greetings," the eerie "Blackeyed Susan" or "One Mechanic Town," with its rollicking Spaghetti Western feel. It's no exaggeration to say that some of these songs rank among the band's finest. As Rob McComb comments, "It would be nice if the reissues were heard with fresh ears."
The Legacy of David McComb
As a songwriter, David McComb is sometimes compared to fellow Australian Nick Cave. Their work shares a Southern Gothic aesthetic, a fondness for roots Americana and a tendency towards melodrama, but there are fundamental differences that highlight McComb's strengths. Cave's world is more fantastical and extreme, and occasionally cartoonish. His narrative songs, for instance, commonly grow to epic proportions, with little concern for subtlety or nuance, and there's usually a surfeit of words that spell everything out in graphic detail. On "O'Malley's Bar," for instance, Cave's protagonist, in the midst of a murder-binge, sings about splitting someone's head in two "with an ashtray as big as a fucking really big brick"; McComb's work certainly dealt with death, but he never beat listeners over the head with it. Whereas some of his songs definitely painted eerie, unsettling pictures, he emphasized moods and atmospheres or presented fragmentary perceptions so as to evoke events and to involve the listener's imagination. Consequently, in comparison with Cave's, McComb's narratives were frequently open-ended or incomplete, but they were no less disquieting or compelling. Graham Lee underscores another difference, pointing to the variation in McComb's writing: "I have a feeling Nick's songs don't have quite the autobiographical element that Dave's do. And I think Dave's are much more varied stylistically and more sophisticated both lyrically and harmonically. While I love Nick Cave's music, it hasn't really changed much over the years, to my ears. He has a great band, but they pump out a sound that hasn't had a major reworking for some time. Changes in emphasis maybe but nothing really drastic. Nothing wrong with that mind you, but I doubt that Dave would be sounding much like The Black Swan, had he maintained his health and was still writing and performing today."
While the Triffids were as distinctive musically as they were lyrically, McComb placed great importance on lyrics and perhaps had higher aspirations for his words. Talking to RAM after the release of The Black Swan, he worried that if he attempted to publish the poetry he had also written, he might be seen as just another rock musician with poetic pretensions, commenting, "I feel inadequate that I'm not involved in some more serious art form." Lee concurs that writing was absolutely central to McComb's being but thinks music would have remained his main focus: "Dave had to write to live. He was a serious artist in this way. His every waking moment was consumed with writing. He wrote wonderful criticism; I haven't read too much of his poetry, but I'm sure it would stand up. I think he felt more at home with music and would have probably kept doing that, maybe combining it with other forms of writing." Rob McComb agrees: "Sure, he could have been anything: great writer, academic, critic, poet. But he really loved pop music too."
After the Triffids went on permanent hiatus in 1989, Lee and David McComb continued working together in the Blackeyed Susans and the Red Ponies, and Lee played on McComb's 1994 debut solo album, Love of Will. McComb also busied himself with a new project named costar. Lee remembers the final years of Dave's life: "I spent a lot of time with Dave, not enough obviously but can't worry about that now. He wanted to release the costar stuff, but he really needed to get himself back on an even keel physically and mentally before anything great would happen musically, although he was writing constantly and certainly hadn't lost his strength in that area. The New Year's Eve that brought in 1999 was the last time I stood on stage with him -- at The Standard Hotel in Fitzroy, Melbourne. He was very ill and it was almost too much to bear."
David McComb died on February 2nd, 1999, at the age of 36, three years after undergoing a heart transplant.
Now that Domino and Liberation have their reissue programs underway, Graham Lee also has plans for an album of Triffids songs covered by other artists and there's even talk of a reunion of sorts: "It's possible," Lee admits, "even probable, but it won't be anything long-lasting, or long. And, surprise, surprise, we won't be finding a new singer via a reality TV show."
(For more information, visit www.thetriffids.com)


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Husband Stabbed to Death by his Wife in Northern Thailand
Police said he was stabbed three times — once in the left side of the rib cage, once in the chest and once in the abdomen. His body was sent to Phrae Hospital for a postmortem examination.
A man was stabbed to death by his wife following a quarrel in the northern province of Phrae on Sunday morning.
Police and a doctor from Phrae Hospital rushed to a home in tambon Muang Mo at about 2.30am.
They found Pasin Areewong, 42, lying dead behind the house. A long knife was found near him on a marble chair.
Kanchakorn Wongsuwan, 47, his wife, told police that she stabbed her husband with the knife.
Ms Kanchakorn's told police her husband had been drinking with a number of friends. After the friends left, she and her husband git into a quarrel. Saying her husband wouldn't allow her into the house to sleep.
During the heated argument, her husband produced a knife, prompting her to snatch it from him. She then stabbed him before running away, she said
While running away, she heard him call for help. On returning, however, she found he was already dead.
She said her husband frequently battered upbeat her after getting drunk.
Ms Kanchakorn was detained for questioning and further legal action.
News Source: Thairath
Related Topics:domestic abusenorthern thailandstabbed to death
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


It is a part of State Mission Mode Project (SMMP) under NeGP.The Project aims to apply Information Technology and Government processes re-engineering on high volume Government services to improve them and electronically deliver them through the internet at home/Browsing Centers/Common Service Centers(CSCs). As per the G.O.(Ms) No.22,IT(e-Gov.II) Department, dated 06.12.2013 Government has decided to roll out the e-district projects. Also it was instructed to form District e-Governance Society in each District. More than 200 common service centers doing service to public. District eGovernance Society is formed on 27.12.2012.
Online Patta Transfer was rolled out in Thiruvarur District on August 2015.


text:
Sigrid Ehemann - Pussy Magazine #1, #2, #3, Self published, 2018, Düsseldorf
Softcover, text & design by Sigrid Ehemann, edition of 50 copies.
Pussy Magazine #1, #2, #3, my latest bookwork, is about the social invisibility of the female of a certain age, and it comes in the shape of the first three issues of a spoof fashion magazine, a work-in-progress on style tips for the invisible woman aged 40+ or, heaven forbid, even older than that. Each issue is centred around a different aspect of the topic. #1 - Cool & Bitchy@Workplace - is about women working in male-dominated power structures. With #2 - Pussy's Portfolio: So Many Shapes of Pink - the idea was to give all the hopefuls out there hands-on inspiration in order to help them further their own modelling careers and brands. It is designed with very little text and in a more rose-tinted and girlish way than the other two, which are representing the publisher's black-and-colour house style. #3 - Pussy Goes to Hollywood - is about work in the movie industry; in other words, in Weinstein country.
I started this project way before the #metoo discussion started but it is obviously fed by similar concerns. So this bookwork is about a serious issue that could be treated in a very serious way but this is not how I prefer to work. Being as non-didactic, light-handed and downright silly as possible, my approach is playful verging on the absurd. I want to explore an area where politics, beauty and comedy freely interact. Pussy Magazine is also another example of my deep interest in and fascination with the effects that image and text can have on each other when they are played properly.
Pussy Magazine is also a tribute to the female super ager, to the female unperturbed by the male gaze and, last but not least, to my very own, very talented and completely undaunted supermodel.
http://www.sigridehemann.com
Sigrid Ehemann - Pussy Magazine #1, #2, #3 (Spine)
Sigrid Ehemann - Pussy Magazine #1, #2, #3 (Back)
Sigrid Ehemann - Pussy Magazine #1, #2, #3 (Front)
Sample page 1 for book " ", josefchladek.com
Sample page 10 for book " ", josefchladek.com
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Welcome to the City of New Carrollton.
New Carrollton may be best known as a transportation hub, but the City offers so much more to the D.C. Metropolitan region. From a residential suburb of the 1950s serving as a bedroom community for D.C. commuters, our residents are now within minutes of the Internal Revenue Service regional center, the State of Maryland's Department of Housing and Community Development Headquarters, the currently under-construction regional offices of Kaiser Permanente and related mixed-use development, and one of the East Coast's busiest transportation hubs. In addition to AMTRAK, MARC, and Metro, the completion of the Purple Line by 2022 will provide an east-west route between New Carrollton and Bethesda. With stops at the University of Maryland campus and other community centers, the Purple Line promises to open even greater opportunities for New Carrollton's growth. Our transportation hub puts us at the top of the list of Prince George's County Transit Oriented Development locations.
We are also a residential community with a rich history. At the core of our community are residents, many of whom have lived here for half a century or more, who have embraced an emerging diverse community that welcomes newcomers and visitors. The City relies heavily on our citizens to create community. We take pride in our newly-renovated library (to open in the later part of 2018), churches, swim club, community gardens, award-winning flower gardens, Friends of the Library, Friends of the Police Foundation, Alpine Dancers, local theater group, and other volunteer-run civic organizations highlighting New Carrollton residents' community involvement.
Thank you for your interest. We hope you are able to include a visit to our community in your future plans. If you do not find what you are looking for on the website, click the "Contact Us" link to get in touch our staff.


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The Sharp Teeth Of FTW Opera's 'Dog Days'
by Jerome Weeks 28 Apr 2015 9:29 PM
Fort Worth Opera Festival is presenting one of the harsher, darker, more daring chamber operas ever staged in North Texas. Dog Days is set after both war and disaster have ravaged America. KERA's Jerome Weeks reports one of the only appealing humans left onstage is a man who's decided, in this wretched world, it's better to be a dog.
Dog Days is a survivalist's nightmare.
Something has gone horribly wrong in the outside world, and a bitter, dysfunctional family is holed up in an isolated house. Dad (James Bobick) has a hunting rifle but can find no animals left to kill for food. The family members — father, mother, two brothers, a younger sister — are all resentful and sullen, but then, they're barely fending off starvation. Their only food comes from the rare ration crate dropped by a passing Army helicopter.
In an unusual act of kindness, the young daughter, Lisa (Lauren Worsham), befriends a shabby, long-haired man who scrounges for scraps in their garbage. He's not simply homeless. He's dressed like — and acts like — a dog. Lisa warns him away. She sings, almost shouts, "Dad'll be back soon / His hunting never lasts long / He gets frustrated, discouraged. / Get out of here! You're asking for it!"
So whose idea was it that this cheery scenario would make a fabulous night at the opera?
Composer David T. Little and librettist Royce Vavrek both laugh. "Well," says Little, "I first encountered the story in a film version by a film maker named Ellie Lee." The 2001 film short was adapted from the story, "Flying Leap," by Judy Budnitz.
Composer David T. Little and librettist Royce Vavrek. Photo: Jerome Weeks
"But I didn't necessarily know that it'd make a good opera at the time," Little continues. "I just thought it was really interesting and really moving. So it just sort of stuck with me as a work of art that I really liked."
Little and Vavrek workshopped a scene from the opera as an experiment — their first collaboration. They've now created eight works together — including next season's JFK for Fort Worth Opera — so, as Vavrek notes, it would seem to have been a successful experiment. Peak Performances, a cultural series at Montclair State University in New Jersey, commissioned them for the complete version of Dog Days.
That 2012 production — directed by Robert Woodruff of the Yale School of Drama and hundreds of productions for places like Lincoln Center, American Repertory Theatre, the Spoleto Festival and the San Francisco Opera — got raves, including a 'top 10 operas of the year' listing from The New York Times. It's that production — cast, music ensemble and creative team — that's come to the Scott Theatre (and will soon head for LA.) Darren Woods, general director of the Fort Worth Opera, saw it in New Jersey and promptly approached producer Beth Morrison about bringing it here.
Even Woods admits Dog Days can be rough going for audience members. There are obscenities, bloodshed and a nude dead body. And those aren't even the worst things in this dog-eat-dog world. But Woods says, when he first saw Dog Days, he knew it was unlike any other opera: "It's one of those rare things when you said, 'I am so incredibly happy that I came to see this.'
"But I did need to go to a bar right after that."
Dog Days doesn't really sound like most other operas, either. Little draws from many styles (he and Vavrek had just seen David Allan Coe at Billy Bob's). But he has a background as an avant-garde rock drummer. The chamber ensemble that plays in Dog Days is essentially Little's own band, Newspeak, fleshed out here with more strings and percussion. One critic dubbed the band's sound "punk classical" — and if you can imagine a jabbing, jarring minimalism with odd shifts into lyrical arias, heavy on the percussion and long, piercing sustains, then you're in the general vicinity.
"You know, I grew up really interested in heavy metal," Little says. "I'm still really interested in drone metal. And as a dramatic composer, you're really serving the drama. So the characters you're working with will really direct the sound world."
Lauren Worsham singing the 'Mirror' aria as Lisa. Photo: courtesy of Fort Worth Opera
The sound world in Dog Days is not all bleak. There are moments of beautiful music and dark humor. When Lisa looks in a mirror, she finds there's a twisted upside to starving to death: She's as thin as the fashion models she's admired. "Hello there, beautiful!" she trills — in a remarkable aria that has her holding an illuminated mirror while her giant, rapt face is projected above.
But the strangest thing in Dog Days remains the dog-man himself — nicknamed 'Prince' by Lisa. He may be an opera character but he never speaks, never sings. Yet in a show about humanity reduced to its lowest limits, he looms large. John Kelly plays the dog-man and must give him a character entirely through movement. Kelly is a celebrated New York performance artist who's created award-winning solo works (The Escape Artist), collaborated with composers like Laurie Anderson and David del Tredici and even managed to work on 'side projects,' as he calls them, including James Joyce's The Dead on Broadway and Dog Days.
Performing Dog Days is exhausting, Kelly reports. "We've talked about this backstage. The singers are already singing their asses off, and when I appear, it's like a sprint, these concentrated movements. I have five or six sprints. But beyond that," he adds — given the entire atmosphere of reduced and brutalized humanity — "there's this exhaustion on a primal level."
In fact, it's as if Prince has decided, everything has sunk too low. He's simply renounced being human. Yet in doing that, he seems even more human, certainly more decent, than the quarreling, petty family members or the earth-destroying military outside.
"Well, for sure," says Kelly. "But I try to be literal up to a point and then I have to let it go. For him, I decided this reality of functioning as a dog-man is a survival mechanism. He's low to the ground, he can blend in, he's covered in fur and fabric.
"He's a survivor."
But that's the central question Dog Days asks: Is survival enough – to remain a human being?
Pay-what-you-can performance of Dog Days Wednesday night at the Scott Theatre. Fort Worth Opera's Dog Days runs through May 2.
Storms interfered with the opening night – DMN report.
Star-Telegram review
Front Row review
TheaterJones review
Dallas Morning News review
Darren Woods
David T. LIttle
Fort Worth Opera
Radio, Television & Film: KXT
Robert Woodruff
Royce Vavrek
About Jerome Weeks
Jerome Weeks is the Senior Arts Reporter/Producer for KERA. Previously at The Dallas Morning News, he was the book columnist for 10 years and the drama critic for 10 years before that. His writing has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle, Salon, Los Angeles Times, Newsday, American Theatre and Men's Vogue magazines. View more about Jerome Weeks.
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KXT 91.7 Presents Bastards of Soul
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KXT 91.7 Presents Bastards of Soul on Saturday, February 27, 2021 at Rid...
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Join KXT for two eclectic evenings featuring two sets by The Polyphonic Spre...
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KXT 91.7 Presents David Crosby
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Two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and co-founder of the Byrds and Crosby,...
KXT 91.7 Presents Brian Fallon
Brian Fallon returns to North America in support of his new solo album LOCAL...


L-r General Overseer, Olive Mountain of Prayer and Praise Ministry Ijegun, Prophet Collins Timothy, his wife Pastor (Mrs.) Rosemary Timothy, Women president Mrs. Jecinta Ortutu, Mrs. Maria Abumere, and pastor Prince will Inyang , during the National Women Convention theme' they that sow in tears shall reap in Joy ' Olive Mountain of prayer and Praise ministry Ijegun in Lagos on 26/8/2018.PHOTOS CHiNYERE IKEANYI.
Coordinator of women and wife of the General Overseer Olive Mountain of Prayer and Praise Ministry Ijegun Pastor (Mrs) Rosemary Timothy (3rd right) with her are L-r Mrs Frank Oyamendan, Mrs. Caroline Umennakwe, Sister Joy Chukwuemeka, Mrs. Maria Abumere, Mrs. Ifeoma Sylvia duribe ,and Women president Mrs. Jecinta Ortutu.
Coordinator of women and wife of the General Overseer Olive Mountain of Prayer and Praise Ministry Ijegun Pastor (Mrs) Rosemary Timothy(m)in a group Photograph of virtues women of the Church , during the National Women Convention theme' they that sow in tears shall reap in Joy 'Olive Mountain of prayer and Praise ministry Ijegun in Lagos on 26/8/2018. PHOTOS CHiNYERE IKEANYI.


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A school is a place where people go to learn about topics such as reading, writing and mathematics. In a school, one or more teachers help students to learn.
Today, most countries have laws about school education. Children go to school for a certain number of years. Learning may take place in the classroom, in outside environments or on visits to other places. Colleges and universities are places to learn for students over 17 or 18. Vocational schools teach skills people need for jobs.
Some people attend school longer than others. This is because some jobs require more training than others. For young children, one teacher is able to teach all subjects. Teachers for older students are often specialized and they only teach a few subjects. Common subjects taught include science, arts such as music, humanities, like geography and history, and languages.
Children with mental issues which are difficult to handle are not required to go to regular schools. These children are given other ways to get schooling. There also are special schools which teach things which regular schools do not.
Graduate schools are for students who have graduated from college.
Education for all is quite modern. In England, for example, most people could not read or write, even in the 18th century. We know this because when they got married, those who could not write put an 'X' on the certificate, and someone else wrote their name. Mass education for reading and writing began in the 19th century.
Originally, in most countries, boys were taught differently and separately from girls. Some schools are for boys and some schools are for girls; they only accept boys, or girls, but not both. Long ago, most schools were run by religious denominations. That is because clerics were once almost the only people who were literate. Since there are only men in a monastery, this was often also true for the school, which only accepted boys. Going to a school also meant learning about religion. Some places still do not have schools for girls.
In many parts of the world, schools also help children learn things about life.
In school, pupils develop their personality.
Schools teach pupils about religion and ethics.
Schools help people recognise socially accepted norms and behaviour.
Pedagogy is the science of teaching children. There are different approaches to teaching. Similarly, certain schools use different approaches. There is quite a lot of disagreement about what and how students should be taught. Many countries solve this by allowing different types of school, so parents and children have some choice.
Mental Calculations. In the school of S.Rachinsky by Nikolay Bogdanov-Belsky. Russia, 1895.
Loyola School, Chennai, India — run by the Catholic Diocese of Madras. Christian missionaries played a pivotal role in establishing modern schools in India.
School Facts for Kids. Kiddle Encyclopedia.


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Western Kentucky and BYU stunners highlight monster sports Tuesday
February 16, 2020 March 14, 2012 by dmack
Western Kentucky and BYU overcome double-digit deficit to tip off the Big Dance. Syracuse's Fab Melo ruled ineligible for the NCAA tournament. Vincent Jackson, Pierre Garcon, and Courtland Finnegan signings highlight NFL free agency. Bucks trade Bogut for Monta Ellis as NBA trade deadline looms. Sid the Kid returns on Thursday.
The Madness is upon us and if Day One is indication, it's going to be a wild wild ride. The fireworks started early in the day and off the court when Syracuse Orangemen big man Fab Melo was ruled ineligible by the school. Melo was the Big East Defensive Player of the Year and the seven-footer was an eraser down low in the paint. Melo avgd 7.8 ppg and 5.8 rpg and his loss severely hurts No.1 seed Syrcause's National Championship hopes. Melo missed several games with eligibility issues in January. The Orange were undefeated with him in the lineup until their Big East tournament loss to Cincinnati.
A pair of big comebacks highlighted Tuesday's opening two first-round play-in games in Dayton. Western Kentucky is the only team in this year's Big Dance with a losing record and the Hilltoppers found themselves down 16 in the second half of their game with Mississippi Valley State. The Delta Devils couldn't seal the deal as WKY came storming back to win 58-58 on a TJ Price three-pointer with just 16 seconds left. Western became the first team since the 1988 Danny and the Miracles Kansas Jayhawk team to win while commiting 28 turnovers. The Hilltoppers face Lentucky Thursday in Lexington.
Iona came out with both guns blazing in building a whopping 25-point first half lead and led 55-40 at the half. The Gaels went cold in the second half going 9:00 minutes without a score and knocking down just 17 second-half points in a 78-72 loss in the biggest collapse in NCAA tournament history. Noah Hartstock had 23 points including several long threes that triggered the the comeback. Brandon Davies had 18 points and 15 rebounds for the Coogs who move on to face Marquette.
In the NIT, UMass won a 101-96 double-OT shootout at Mississippi State. Seton Hall edged fiesty Stoney Brook 63-61. Iowa downed Dayton 74-65, Tennessee handled Savanah State by fourteen. Northwestern survived Akron 76-74 while Middle Tennessee State throttled a disintersted Marshall outfit 86-78. Oregon, Washington, and Stanford were all double-digit winners on the NIT late show.
In the CBI, Princeton and Washington State were upset winners downing Evansville and San Francisco respectively. TCU took care of business in a ten-point win over Wisconsin-Milwaukee. In the CIT, five of six home teams held serve with only Robert Morris breaking through at Indiana State. Old Dominion, Mercer, Georgia State, Toledo, and Weber State all defended their home courts. Quinnipiac at Penn and Delaware at Butler are the feature matchups on tonight's CBI card. Cal Fullerton at Loyola Marymount highlights tonight's CIT action.
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Dwight Howard may have played his final home game as a member of the Orlando Magic and he made it count. D12 scored 24 points and pulled down 25 rebounds in Orlando's overtime victory over Miami. The Lakers and Denver also won in extra time. Oklahoma City lost its second straight home game collapsing late to Houston. Toronto, Indiana, Dallas, and Golden State also won. With the trade deadline at 3:00 PM EST on Thursday, the Bucks sent Andrew Bogut to Golden State for Monta Ellis in a five-player deal.
Wager Web will match the first $1000 dollars of your next deposit
NFL free agency began at 4:00 PM EST on Tuesday and first day action was fast and furious. Among the major signings were WR Vincent Jackson going to Tampa Bay on a five-year $55 million dollar deal. The Redskins inked WR Pierre Garcon to a similar five-year $42.5 million dollar deal. Ex-Titan CB Courtland Finningan and the Rams have agreed to a $50 million dollar deal. Reggie Wayne has re-upped with the Colts and the Saints were able to keep Marques Colston.The Dolphins sent wideout Brandon Marshall to the Bears for two third-round picks after the former UCF problem child alledgedly was involved in an altercation at a club. Marshall will be reunited with Jay Cutler with whom he had his best years when both were in Denver.
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The hottest ticket in New York this week is the Thursday showdown between the Penguins and Rangers at Madison Square Garden. The Rangers lead the Pens by six points in the Atlantic Division and in the battle for the top two seeds in the Eastern Conference. Pittsburgh has won nine straight and will have the servies of Sidney Crosby who has missed the last three months with concussion like symptoms.
Live In Game wagering is available tonight at Bookmaker
In tonight's first-round NCAA play-in games at Dayton, Lamar is a three-point favorite over Vermont in the 6:40 PM EST tip. The winner will face North Carolina on Friday. Cal is -3 over South Florida in the nightcap, the winner to face Temple Friday in Nashville. Feature games in the NIT on Wednesday are Minnesota at LaSalle, Central Florida at Drexel, and Nevada at Oral Roberts. The Explorers are giving three to the Golden Gophers, the Dragons give seven to the Knights, and the Wolf Pack catches 5 1/2 from the Golden Eagles in Tulsa. Northern Iowa at St Joes and Valpo at Miami Florida will also draw strong interest.
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Monday Recap, Tuesday Big Dance Preview
Sportsbetting3's Free Plays: Thursday, March 15, 2012


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(-) 11 United States
(-) 11 U.S. Civil Rights Movement (1950s-1960s)
(-) 11 Local Community or Neighborhood-level Campaign
11 Change 2 Defense
(-) 11 Democracy
Sarasotan Students' school boycott stops neighborhood schools from closing, Florida, United States, 1969
3 May, 1969 to 9 May, 1969
Erica Janko 29/03/2015
Before Booker Grammar School, Sarasota's first Black public school, was established in 1925, Black students received their education at home or in churches. The establishment of three other schools for Black students -- Amaryllis Park for first through third graders, Booker Junior High, for seventh and eighth graders, and Booker High School, for ninth through twelfth graders -- followed. These schools, located centrally within Sarasota's African-American community, Newtown, became deeply rooted institutions within the community.
Chicano Students Walk Out for Racial Equality in Kingsville, Texas 1969
2.5 out of 10 points
Beatriz Grace Baker 08/02/2015
During the Civil Rights Movement, Mexican-Americans struggled for equal
rights all across the Southwest in America. In Texas, campaigns for
racial equality were led primarily by organizations like La Raza (the
Resistance), MAYO (Mexican-American Youth Organization), PASSO
(Political Association of Spanish-Speaking Organizations), and the Brown
Berets. These organizations struggled for equal rights and privileges
for Mexican-Americans in all facets of society.
Oklahoma City African Americans sit-in for integration, 1958-64
19 August, 1958 to 4 July, 1964
Carmen Smith-Estrada, 12/09/2011
In 1955, just one year after the Supreme Court issued its pivotal Brown v. Board of Education ruling, the country was again shaken by the Montgomery Bus Boycotts (see "African Americans boycott buses for integration in Montgomery, Alabama, U.S., 1955-1956"). The campaign, which targeted the city's practice of segregation on public transportation, brought leaders such as Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., into the national spotlight.
Community members campaign for integration of Girard College in Philadelphia, PA, USA, 1965-68
January, 1965 to September, 1968
Carl E. Sigmond, 16/6/2011
Stephen Girard (1750 – 1831), the well known Philadelphia merchant and banker, bequeathed a large sum of money to be used in the founding of Girard College, a boarding school for orphaned youth between the ages of six and ten. The school was established in 1848 on forty acres of farmland north of Philadelphia. Stephen Girard stipulated in his will that the school would only be open to "fatherless" white boys.
Chicago activists challenge segregation (Chicago Freedom Movement), USA, 1965-1967
September, 1965 to May, 1967
Pauline Blount, 02/10/2011
In 1962, in response to growing recognition of de facto segregation of public schools and housing availability, the Coordinating Council of Community Organizations (CCCO) was founded in Chicago. This council included the Chicago Urban League, the Chicago NAACP, and the Woodlawn Organization. CCCO elected Albert (Al) Raby, a local teacher, to organize and convene the group. In 1965, Mr. Raby invited Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to tour Chicago and witness the spatial segregation of this northern city.
Baton Rouge students sit-in for U.S. civil rights (Southern University 16), 1960
March 28, 1960 to April, 1960
Arielle Bernhardt, 28/01/2010
Throughout most of the U.S. civil rights campaigns of the 1950s, Baton Rouge, Louisiana remained quiet. The city of "broad avenues and tree-lined streets" (Sinclair 1998) remained fully segregated despite movements towards desegregation in neighboring states. However, at the beginning of 1960, when university students staged sit-ins at lunch counters across the south, students at Baton Rouge's Southern University took notice. Southern University, a black university on the edge of the city, became home to the main civil rights campaign in Baton Rouge.
Cambridge, Maryland, activists campaign for desegregation, USA, 1962-1963
January, 1962 to July, 1963
Rebecca Contreras, 30/01/2011
Cambridge, a small city in Eastern Shore Maryland, was racially divided in 1960 between African Americans and European Americans. Unemployment rates for African Americans were quadruple those of white people and segregation was pervasive in public and private spaces alike.
Atlanta students sit-in for U.S. civil rights, 1960-1961
March, 1960 to March, 1961
Hannah Jones, 31/01/2010
In the early 1960's, student-led sit-ins were a prominent scene in the United States Civil Rights Movement. The success of a sit-in in Greensboro, North Carolina (see "Greensboro, NC, students sit-in for U.S. Civil Rights, 1960") began a wave of action in college campuses throughout the South. One of the many areas inspired by the Greensboro sit-ins was Atlanta, Georgia.
Jackson, Tennessee students campaign for U.S. civil rights, 1960-1961
13 October, 1960 to 1961
Alexa Ross, 12/09/2010
In the United States of America, the 1950s saw the emergence of key individuals in the building of the civil rights movement. The struggle for African Americans against their country's institutionalized racism was highlighted by moments like Rosa Parks' refusal to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. A preacher by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke of nonviolence in his people's fight for equality. But at the turn of the decade, the civil rights movement trended a different way.
African Americans sit-in against segregation at Royal Ice Cream Parlor in Durham, N.C., 1957
23 June, 1957 to 15 July, 1958
Elena Ruyter 01/10/2011
In the 1950's, Durham North Carolina was like most cities in the South: hot and segregated. At the time, the civil rights movement was already polarizing the nation, with the Montgomery bus boycotts in 1955 bringing to prominence such names as Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks (see "African Americans boycott buses for integration in Montgomery, Alabama, U.S., 1955-1956"). In Mississippi, the brutal murder of Emmett Till that same year became an archetype of the horrendous nature of southern racism at its most cruel. Amidst the violence and racial tension, Martin Luther King Jr.
Black citizens boycott white merchants for U.S. voting rights, Tuskegee, Alabama, 1957-1961
25 June, 1957 to February, 1961
Thomas Fortuna 11/09/2011
In 1957, in an effort to frustrate increasing black voter registration and the threat of losing a white voter majority, Alabama state senator Sam Engelhardt sponsored Act 140, which proposed to transform the Tuskegee City boundaries from a square into a twenty-eight sided shape resembling a "seahorse" that included every single one of the 600 white voters and excluded all but 5 of the 400 black voters.


More than 20 years ago, my husband Paul suffered a devastating stroke. Paul was 36, I was 31. My good friend and supporter was in need. Suddenly, in addition to my full-time job and daily responsibilities, I found myself overwhelmed by taking care of my husband's responsibilities, personal needs and health. I worried a lot and the care giving took its toll. I stopped taking care of myself. I got too little sleep, drank too much coffee and ate too much comfort food. I became dis-organised, tired and unmotivated. I gained weight and my overall self-esteem plummeted. I needed help. My goals were to find a new job and to get my physical and emotional health back on track. Working with several professional coaches, I went about doing just that.
Knowing that a new job, at a higher level of management, would increase my self-worth and lighten my mood, I hired a career coach. Career coaches specialise in helping people gain clarity, direction and self-confidence while facing the challenges of career and life transitions. I needed direction and that is just what I got. My coach listened to me, then gave me assignments, deadlines, constructive feedback and support. As a result of her coaching and my newfound determination my career took off again.
Frustrated by my ever-increasing weight and cholesterol, I went to my doctor. He asked, "do you want a lecture or a nutritionist?" I chose the nutritionist. My nutritionist helped me understand portion size and the effect of different foods on my health, stamina and mood. She coached me on eating healthy in all circumstances eating at home, eating out and eating while traveling for business or working late. Every time I reached for a cookie, I saw her face and I didn't want to report that I hadn't stuck to my goals for the week. That was my secret to losing more than 35 pounds.
Working with these coaches has changed my life. They helped me make caring for myself a priority. Now I feel good about myself, about my husband and about my life. Instead of being "the caregiver" and "the survivor," we have returned to being two individuals who simply value each other.
Take breaks throughout the day, close your eyes and visualize something pleasant for a moment.
Add healthy foods and reduce sugar intake.
Participate in a hobby or recreational activity.
Write down your feelings in a journal or talk to a trusted friend.
"A Head of Stroke" is dedicated to those affected by Stroke re-contributing to their community.
We aim to provide impartial educational information on Stroke prevention, awareness, the effects, rehabilitation, re-connection, tips and tricks that can benefit those most affected by Stroke. This is a New Zealand website. Its content is intended for New Zealand resident use.
This website does not provide medical advice. Information provided on this site is not designed or intended to constitute medical advice or to be used for diagnosis. Due to unique individual needs and medical history, please consult your own personal physician who will be able to determine the appropriateness of the information for your specific situation and they will assist you in making any decisions regarding treatment and/or medication.


Cecilia de Rafael Penelope Tights are a vintage fashion piece featuring a mock stocking and suspender belt style. These 20 denier sheer tights are decorated with a mock stocking featuring polka dots with floral stripes and floral mock lace top. The brief area is designed to resemble a polka dot suspender belt, edged in white scalloped lace that really lifts the style for a realistic garter and stockings effect. Stunning luxury style for vintage lovers.


text:
The Silver Pen
The story never ends.
What the Silver Pen is all about
Sarcasm Has Nothing To Do With Being Weak
by wake9779.In Uncategorized.Leave a Comment on Sarcasm Has Nothing To Do With Being Weak
You can call it being a smart-alek, being a smartass, or anything you want to call it, but sarcasm is usually a witty, snappy comeback to something that's been said that sounds particularly dim. It's not always necessary but there are times when it feels absolutely justified, especially in moments when someone decides to flaunt their knowledge and gets something so horribly wrong that allowing them lord it over others seems like a major fallacy.
Of course there is a time and place for sarcasm and a method by which it's best received. Those that use sarcasm to be particularly nasty aren't always in the right and those that use it to simply attack others for no good reason are more likely to be seen as jerks and bullies than witty and intelligent individuals. One doesn't need to be a scholar to practice sarcasm, as a biting wit doesn't take a degree or special learning courses to develop. From the lowest street urchin to the most brilliant mind in the world, sarcasm is something that's learned just by being around society.
But it has nothing to do with a weak mind.
Some say sarcasm is practiced by those that have no understanding of society's 'darker side'.
In short people tend to think that those who practice their wit and biting humor don't have a clue what it means to be on the wrong side of life and have never known a single hardship. To be honest this makes no sense. Where do these people think that wit comes from? Some of the wittiest people are those that have known the greatest amount of hardship in their lives and have had to find a way to defend against it so that the depression doesn't eat them alive. Does the name Robin Williams ring a bell? The man dealt with the 'darker side' of society all the time since he was battling depression for years. One doesn't have to be traipsing through the gutter for years and years to see the darker side of society, one only has to listen to the comments of those that think they have a firm finger on the pulse of that society but don't seem to get that sarcasm is a defense tool, not a failing of those that make good use of it.
It's easy to call people weak-minded when one doesn't look in the mirror too hard.
Some people do take it too far.
Sarcasm on its own is no more harmful than the usual litany of jokes one might hear from a stand-up comedian, but it all depends on the sense of humor that is held by the listener. Some people can take a joke, others can't. Some people use sarcasm to make people laugh and make light of a situation. Others use it to attack. A biting wit is just that, it bites at the ego of the person it's being used against and can cause a great deal of distress depending on how the person doing the attacking goes about it. The idea of sarcasm isn't always to attack, nor is it always to defend. It's to ease the tension in a given situation and make it possible for people to laugh away the stress of the current moment.
Using sarcasm as a weapon is something that needs to be taken on an as-needed basis, but should ordinarily never be practiced.
The intelligence of sarcasm is hard to miss unless your sense of humor is too dim.
Some people take things way too literally and aren't able to think around corners so to speak. They take offense at the slightest thing and tend to think that people that are sarcastic are insulting them when it's far more likely that said people are trying to bring the situation to a head or calm it down with a bit of levity. Sarcasm is not inherently good- or bad-natured, it is simply a means to deescalate a situation and allow people to laugh away the tension. It is also a sign of intelligence as well as a mild sense of empathy since those that use it tend to want to calm those around them down and loosen them up. And the intelligence portion of sarcasm is the quick-thinking it takes when it comes to what a person feels needs to be said in a way that is not insulting or harmful to anyone.
Of course some moments are simply too good to pass up on, and some people, like those mentioned above, need to be taken down a peg or two every now and then. The trick is to be just insulting enough to remind them that they're not as wise as they think they are, while not destroying them entirely.
It's difficult at times, but possible.
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Racial Transition
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text:
Enoplolabus sandacanus es una especie de coleóptero de la familia Attelabidae.

Distribución geográfica
Habita en Malasia y en Indonesia.

Referencias

Enoplolabus
Coleópteros de Indonesia
Coleópteros de Malasia

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Phomopsis dioscoreae är en svampart som beskrevs av Sacc. 1913. Phomopsis dioscoreae ingår i släktet Phomopsis och familjen Diaporthaceae.   Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Sporsäcksvampar
dioscoreae


text:
Surprised by the New England feel of Stony Brook, we lingered over museums and parks, soaking in history on our overnight visit to Long Island's North Shore.
You are here: Home / Travel / Stony Brook, New York
February 13, 2019 // by Sandra Friend
I needed inspiration, and I found it in the unlikeliest of places: the post office parking lot. As I was standing there, John gently fended off a political candidate by letting him know we weren't from around here. As their conversation broke off and John entered the post office to ship a few books, the show started. The enormous iron eagle above the post office doors came to life, flapping not quite in unison with the chiming of the clock above.
Yes, the eagle on the Stony Brook post office flaps its wings on the hour. Usually.
It would have been a surprise had I not read that Stony Brook Village had an automaton. This particular journey had introduced us to what an array of mechanical wonders that word encompassed, so I steered our course to this little hamlet firmly fixed in the New England I grew up in. The other reason we'd made our way to Stony Brook was the intriguing concept of a "bicycle bed and breakfast." While the weather hasn't been cooperating, we'd hoped to get some bike rides in. We figured staying with cyclists might help us learn how and where.
Stony Brook, Long Island, has deep roots, back to Colonial times and the shaping of early America. A ring of spies in the village fed intelligence to George Washington during the Revolutionary War. Dating to 1751, the Stony Brook Grist Mill is the most complete Colonial mill of its kind on Long Island. Our lodging, the Stony Brookside Bed & Bike Inn, sat across the brook from it.
Finding the weather far too brisk for biking, we'd already treated ourselves to a parade of Americana along Long Island's north shore, with stops along Cold Spring Harbor at Teddy Roosevelt's Sagamore Hill, and at the surprising Whaling Museum. Now it was time to relax.
Bike on Inn
Checking in, we met Elyse Buckman and her husband Marty. Operating a B&B was a dream of theirs; finding this particular property to create Stony Brookside Bed & Bike Inn was a perfect fit for both them and the village. "We're just a block off the 25A bike route," she said, referring to the primary east-west route for cyclists to tour Long Island, which is also the route of the Washington Spy Trail. She explained how many of their visitors came across the ferry from Connecticut at Port Jefferson, and a light bulb went on in my head. It is possible to visit Long Island without driving through New York City!
Elyse and John in the B&B foyer
Elyse and Marty are avid cyclists who continue to tour around the world in their off-season. We were among their last guests for 2018. It turned out we had mutual friends in Florida, and John had done some of the rides they enjoyed. We were delighted to have the Pond Room, which looked over the mill pond and Avalon Preserve, which I was eager to explore.
I loved the artsy touches throughout the inn
Appreciating being able to kick back before dinner, we made use of the common areas downstairs. The dining room featured some creative bike-themed art, including a chandelier made of bike chains. The living room had plenty of comfy chairs and an extensive library to borrow from.
Now that's a chandelier!
Elyse spotted us and asked if we'd like some recommendations for dinner. She mentioned that our timing couldn't be better, as the Jazz Loft would be open tonight. Neither of us had been to a live jazz session in years, so we decided to check it out.
Stony Brook is walkable, so we bundled up against the cold and went into Stony Brook Village to look for some simple fare, a feat we accomplished at Sweet Mama's. As it happened, there was live music at the bar, so we lingered a little before striking out for the Jazz Loft.
When we walked in, the musicians were already into their first set, upstairs in the jazz club. The first floor is a museum devoted to jazz greats. We slipped up the stairs and settled in for the show, delighted by the talents of Rich Iacona's "Bad Little Big Band." The ensemble of a dozen or so played both old standards and original compositions, interspersed with Rich's humorous patter.
The Jazz Loft stage between sets
Between sets and after the show, we toured the museum. Jazz historian Tom Manuel founded the Jazz Loft in 2016 to preserve Long Island's jazz history and to train young musicians in the art. The museum has acquired some significant artifacts and collections, from a library of jazz books to the archives of Arthur Prysock to chandeliers from Harlem's Irving Plaza Ballroom. Nooks and crannies were artfully filled with photos, art, and artifacts, including an entire reconstructed mid-century modern living room from jazz great Milt Hinton.
Checking out the museum exhibits in the Jazz Loft
Mists of Avalon
I awoke in a fog. Being the early riser, I decided to let John sleep in while I went rambling through Avalon before breakfast. It's on the far side of the mill pond, which I couldn't see across for the mist. Passing the mill, I found an open gate and two young men doing gardening at the crack of dawn.
Avalon is both a park and preserve, and as I discovered, quite vertical. Well-manicured gardens were interspersed throughout the woodlands, which were resplendent in fall color. I followed signs towards the labyrinth, only to find it being renovated. But that didn't stop the deer from browsing there, and they certainly weren't afraid of me.
Deer browsing around the stone labyrinth
The Preserve portion of Avalon started after a road crossing. I hiked among giant glacial boulders, bringing back youthful memories of playing in the woods of New Jersey. But time was ticking away and I'd be late for breakfast if I didn't turn around, so after completing a short loop I made my way back down the forested slopes to the Stony Brook Mill Pond.
A peaceful perch inside Avalon Park and Preserve
The mists had lifted, and the rising sun made the autumn-cloaked trees glow. I could see how locals could spend hours reading or writing in these natural nooks above the pond.
I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It took three or four double-takes before I finally walked up to the trees and stared up into their canopies.
"How the hell did they do this?"
I'm still puzzling over how the artists pulled this off
I'd never heard of yarn-bombing, but a quick online search for "crocheted trees" confirmed that's what it was called, part of an art installation on the grounds of the Long Island Museum – and like the mechanical eagle, another oddity to be factored into the pages of my nascent novel.
For quirky, the Long Island Museum can't be beat. Elyse told us it was a must-see, especially for John's love of vintage vehicles. Centered on what was the heart of a lumber mill in 1874, the museum grew out of a spillover of collections from the Suffolk Museum, with Ward Melville a major benefactor. The old Suffolk Museum is now The Jazz Loft.
The Long Island Museum campus feels like a homestead
Melville's name crops up all over Stony Brook, as he and his wife Dorothy founded a conservancy in 1939 to protect both historic structures and environmentally sensitive lands. Sensitive to how Long Island was changing with the addition of parkways, bridges, and residents, they wanted to help Stony Brook amplify its colonial character. What you see today – including what's considered the first planned shopping center in America – is largely due to their efforts.
Heir to and owner of a major shoe company, Ward had a thing for antique carriages, and Dorothy approved. It was the carriage collection that became the tipping point to build a new museum. The three story carriage museum is the centerpiece of this campus of museums, with two stories of it hidden underground. But inside, what a parade of conveyances! Eight thematic galleries showcase the grandest of horse-drawn carriages from around the world, covering everything from utility to royalty. It takes a couple hours just to see it all.
Along with an original blacksmith shop and a historic cemetery, two other museums and an art center make up the sprawling campus, which looks like a homestead on the edge of town. Inside the art museum, an intriguing display of Colonial silversmithing was in progress.
Artifacts at the Long Island Museum capture daily life on this spot in 1794
The history museum was where we'd first entered, finding rotating exhibits on the 1964-65 New York World's Fair (which I attended!) and Robert Moses, the father of parkway architecture, as well as a permanent display of carved decoys traditionally used along Long Island's bays.
Stony Brook surprised us. We didn't expect to find so much in such a compact place. Thanks to the intriguing carrot of a bicycle-friendly B&B, we discovered a charming slice of New York that we'll have to return to: with so much else to see and do on a overnight stay, we never did fit those bike rides in!
Filed Under: Travel Tagged With: Architecture, Biking, Dining, Family Travel, Hiking, Historic Sites, Lodging, Museums, Music, New York, Vintage Vehicles
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Hi, lovely article!! ?
I had a question, other than the bike B&B, is there any other place to get good view of the water mill?
Thanks you in advance!
You can walk right up along the edge of the mill, but the view from the B&B is nicer.


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What Graphic Design degree programs were earned in Indiana?


text:
O Rio Bălana é um rio da Romênia afluente do rio Fulga, localizado no distrito de Prahova.

Rios da Roménia


text:
How About Some Composers Who Are Women Cantors?
Deborah Katchko Gray
When I founded the Women Cantors' Network in 1982, there were very few women who composed cantorial music. In fact, music often had to be adjusted for the voice of a woman cantor, sometimes even rewritten. But today, there are dozens of incredible women cantors who are composing for the synagogue. In the era of #MeToo, it is more important than ever that congregations #HearOurVoice and create spiritually safe places that respect women and use our work.
If you or your congregation is looking for more songs composed by women to sing, here is a list of amazing cantors whose work I regularly use in my own congregation. While it was difficult to narrow this down to seven (and my choices of course were purely subjective), I chose based off of melodies that really stick to your kishkes and bring the text to life. I also focused on cantors who have been composing for years; whose music is sung regularly in Reform, Renewal, Conservative, and Reconstructionist Congregations. But even as you read this, young composers are writing and their compositions will become the new "traditional" music in the future. There are dozens more composers whose work is worthy of attention, but hopefully this list can get you started.
Cantor Benjie Ellen Schiller. As a professor of Cantorial Arts at Hebrew Union College (HUC) NYC, Benjie has inspired a new generation of cantors and exposed them to her passion for meaningful Jewish music. Choirs all over the world sing her "Halleluhu Psalm 150" and her new "Oseh Shalom" has been performed with orchestra and world class singers. Personally, I sing "May You Live to See Your World Fulfilled" at every B'nai Mitzvah and "Zeh Dodi" at every wedding. Benjie is also publishing a songbook in the near future—it belongs in every cantor's library! Her CD, A World Fulfilled, is magnificent.
Cantor Natasha Hirschhorn. Natasha is the Music Director of Congregation Anshe Chesed in New York City and is part of the faculty both of HUC and the Jewish Theological Seminary. Her music is haunting and unusual. My congregation's choir sings her rendition of "Oseh Shalom" during the High Holidays, and I believe that her "Yesh Adonai Bamakom Hazeh" ("G-d was in this place and I did not know") has the power to cause a spiritual awakening every time it is sung.
Cantor Robbi Sherwin. Robbi is a force of nature—a unique mandolin playing cantor/rabbi who plays with the popular band, Sababa, and has been a leader in the Women Cantors' Network. She and Marci Vitikus (also a member of the Women Cantors' Network) co-wrote "Atah Kadosh," which my congregation uses to complete the chanting aloud of the Amidah each week. Her "Maariv Aravim" and "Love Adonai Your G-d" are also both notable.
Cantor Rachelle Nelson. Rachelle is a composer of Jewish music from South Florida. She has created several songbooks and CDs and also runs In the Spirit Music Foundation, which encourages writing new inspirational Jewish liturgical music. She graduated in 1984 from HUC's School of Sacred Music (now the Debbie Friedman School of Sacred Music). Her "Modim Anachnu Lach" is a Hebrew-English prayer of giving thanks that I use at my interfaith Thanksgiving services.
Beth Styles. Beth is a producer/composer/musician/vocalist and a popular Artist in Residence at synagogues. As a composer, her music is fresh and unusual, a mix of Jewish gospel flavored with deeply spiritual and lush melodies that stick to your kishkes. I met Beth in the 1980s when she produced my first CD, Jewish Soul. (She also produced for Diana Ross.) Years later, she is a frequent musical guest in my synagogue creating a "Shabbat Experience" that moves and inspires. I could list a dozen of her songs, but "Grateful," "Light These Lights," "Mi Sheberach," "Shehecheyanu," "Hashkivenu," "Adonai S'fatai," and "Shabbat Shalom" have now become "traditional" songs in my synagogue.
Cantor Lisa Levine. Lisa is a worship artist, songwriter, recording artist, and yoga prayer facilitator, who has been writing music for over 30 years. She created "Yoga Shalom," combining Yoga and Jewish prayerful movement and worship. Her songbooks and CDs are numerous and well received, though I love her "Mi Sheberach" and "V'shamru" in particular. These tunes are essential parts of my Shabbat services, bringing an easy singing and soulful quality to song and worship.
Ellen Allard. Ellen is arguably the best known children's composer and teacher around today. Her captivating energy and catchy tunes are classics in the preschool communities. "Holy Holiness" is one of those rare songs that can be perfect for three year olds, teenagers leading a service and/or any intergenerational group praying. The piece's simple repetition of beautiful lyrics, like the phrase, "All around everywhere, holy holiness," is transformative. "I feel like an angel," said one young boy after singing this work. That's what I hope to create in a service—a sense of holy transcendence, a feeling that is uplifting and peaceful. "Holy Holiness" does that every time!
Want more music written by women? The Women Cantors' Network is soon publishing a new songbook that will shed light on many known and unknown composers.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of Lilith Magazine.
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