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Tag: Homer Simpson
We're Laughing With not At You
Published on July 19, 2017 by D. G. Hart3 Comments
I imagine that was Peter Sagal's defense for this bit of Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me (an episode I heard while driving in New England):
SAGAL: Tom, this week, listeners also wrote in, saying we were way too mean to Mitch McConnell. What was the specific insult our listeners were upset by? Was it A, Mitch McConnell looks like a thumb with glasses…
SAGAL: …B, Mitch McConnell looks like a Mr. Potato Head if the potato had been mashed…
SAGAL: …Or C, as a young man, Mitch McConnell didn't beat polio. It was that polio left his body because it couldn't stand being there any more?
TOM BODETT: Oh.
ROBERTS: Oh.
BODETT: Oh, you know, I think he did have polio as a child. Is it that one?
SAGAL: No, it was actually a trick question…
BODETT: Oh, thank, God.
SAGAL: …Because it wasn't any of those.
BURBANK: I feel like we wouldn't be on the radio this week…
BODETT: I was going to say, you know?
BURBANK: …If it was any of those.
SAGAL: We said Mitch McConnell looks like a chinless owl.
BODETT: Oh, that's right.
SAGAL: To our credit, we also didn't say…
SAGAL: No, we didn't say these, so people had no reason to complain. We didn't say Mitch McConnell looks like a jack-o'-lantern that was left out on the porch till March.
SAGAL: We certainly didn't say that Mitch McConnell looks like someone dropped a bunch of facial features into a bowl of butterscotch pudding.
SAGAL: We absolutely did not say…
BODETT: And thank God.
SAGAL: …That – you know when somebody pulls out their belly skin to show you how much weight they lost? – that looks like Mitch McConnell's face.
SAGAL: And we certainly never stooped to saying that Mitch McConnell's face was bleeding badly from a face-lift.
SAGAL: We would never do that.
BODETT: That, that…
SAGAL: Too low even for us.
I am sure Senator McConnell chuckled right along with NPR's quiz show host, panelists, and audience.
And to keep it fair and balanced, here is how Sagal yucked it up with Nancy Pelosi when she was Speaker of the House:
SAGAL: Let's clarify something right off the bat. How are we to address you? What is the protocol? Speaker Pelosi, in honor of your former position? Leader Pelosi, in honor of your current one?
PELOSI: Because we're all such good friends here, just say Nancy.
SAGAL: Just say Nancy. Nancy.
SAGAL: It sounds good, though, Nancy. So we're delighted to have you with us. We found out, and it should be obvious, given your success in politics, that you grew up in a very political family. You were raised in the business.
PELOSI: Right.
SAGAL: Your father was the mayor of Baltimore.
PELOSI: Yes, he was.
SAGAL: Right. So what was it like growing up in a political household?
PELOSI: Well, it was like campaigning, forever campaigns, all the time. There was never a time when we weren't walking precincts or receiving volunteers at the door to pick up their brochures, their buttons, their bumper stickers, their placards that would be called lawn signs these days. And I learned how to count votes.
SAGAL: Did you really? So, like, other kids were counting blocks, you were like going "one vote, two votes."
SAGAL: When you were a baby, were you kissing babies?
SAGAL: We were reading about your father's career and your involvement with him, and we read that one of the jobs that you had working with your father was that you kept his favor file. Is that correct?
PELOSI: No, I didn't keep it but I worked on it. That is, to say…
SAGAL: What is it exactly?
PELOSI: What it is, is that if somebody – for example, if someone came to the door and said they needed help in some way, if they needed help finding a job or something like that. The idea was, of the favor file was that when that person was on his or her feet then they would extend a helping hand to somebody else. In other words, they passed it on.
SAGAL: Really?
PELOSI: So where would you go to look for help for somebody else is someone that you had helped already.
SAGAL: Right. Or if you needed to have someone killed…
PELOSI: Again, it was a very…
SAGAL: …call upon this person.
PELOSI: Do I detect an ethnic slur there?
SAGAL: No, no.
SAGAL: I wasn't at all thinking about that scene from "The Godfather." I really wasn't.
CHARLIE PIERCE: Leader Pelosi, we have no idea who this guy is doing the interview.
SAGAL: So, eventually you got married, you moved with your husband to San Francisco and you got involved with politics there. You ran for office yourself. You know, when you went into politics, you did it with a splash.
Of course, you rose through the ranks of the Democratic Party in the House, and you became the Speaker of the House. You're our first Speaker of the House we've ever had on the show. We have a lot of questions about that. Primarily, what is it like to sit behind the president during the State of the Union address?
SAGAL: Is it hard to maintain a straight face?
PELOSI: Well, I'm glad you're getting down to the truly important here…
SAGAL: Yes.
PELOSI: …Speaker of the House.
SAGAL: No, really, I mean it must – because you know, like the nation is looking at the president and you are looming there over his shoulder. You could wreak havoc with the address if you wanted to, by making faces. Do you have to think about, like…
PELOSI: Well, one could.
PELOSI: Well, here's the thing…
SAGAL: Yeah.
PELOSI: …the Speaker of the House has awesome power. And so when the joint session is called and the president of the United States is welcomed in a joint session, House and Senate, it is the Speaker of the House who introduces the president. Not that that's the power part, but it's a manifestation…
SAGAL: That is power. You could keep him waiting. You could be standing, and he could be waiting outside. And you could be like, "So guys, what's up?"
SAGAL: See the game last night?
PELOSI: Well, no, but, you know, but you would want to be respectful now wouldn't you? I mean, under other circumstances you would want to be respectful…
SAGAL: I want to ask a little bit about the job. Do you ever talk to the current Speaker, John Boehner? Does he ever call you up and go "I don't know how I'm going to get this done; these guys are being so obstreperous. What do I do, Nancy?" Does that ever happen?
PELOSI: No.
SAGAL: Really, you don't…
SAGAL: He doesn't invite you over, back to your old office just for a get together, have a good cry, you and him and talk about problems.
SAGAL: No, really, I mean…
PELOSI: Girls don't cry.
SAGAL: No. Well done.
FAITH SALIE: Nancy, I can't believe I just called you that. Thank you.
PELOSI: Thank you, Faith. I'll call you Faith; you call me Nancy.
SALIE: That's a deal. I earnestly want to ask you about an issue that's dear to my heart and I understand it's dear to yours, which is chocolate.
PELOSI: Oh, yes.
SAGAL: We've read this too that this is your great vice, if you will, you're big into chocolate.
PELOSI: I don't consider it a vice. I consider it…
SALIE: A blessing from God.
SAGAL: You consider it…
PELOSI: Very dark chocolate, very dark chocolate.
SAGAL: Very dark. So tell us what you can. Tell us what you're willing to admit of your chocolate consumption.
BURBANK: Let's get down to brass tacks. How many pounds of chocolate have you eaten today?
BURBANK: I'll take that as 20.
You tell me, which is funnier? Peter Sagal laughing his way through the week's news or Man Getting Hit by Football?
Categories Being Human, Gullibility•Tags Homer Simpson, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, National Public Radio, Peter Sagal
It's Funny Because It's True
Published on December 27, 2016 by D. G. Hart4 Comments
That was Homer Simpson's reaction to the video, "Football to the Groin" (as I recall). Good humor has a strong does of reality, that was the lesson implied in Homer's quip. And Babylon Bee's top ten books for 2016 also suggest that Old Life criticisms of the Protestant world have a strong resemblance to reality. These indicate that OL and BB share not a w-w but a wariness about evangelical hype and cliches:
1.) Whatever Tim Keller wrote, probably: Honestly, we didn't read any Tim Keller books this year. But we're sure that whatever he wrote was pretty good. So the number 1 book of the year is whatever he wrote. Pick your favorite and put it in this slot. Congratulations, Tim!
3.) The Purpose Driven Ferret — Rick Warren: While fans of the Purpose Driven series have hundreds of variants to choose from, Rick Warren may have outdone himself with this special edition of The Purpose Driven Life, written exclusively for the close cousin of the polecat. Your ferret will love learning how to fulfill its God-given purpose as Warren masterfully uses over 250 different translations of the Bible to drive home his point.
6.) Worldview: The Worldview: Worldview Edition — Al Mohler: Al Mohler is right in his wheelhouse when writing about worldviews, and his latest work, Worldview: The Worldview: Worldview Edition is an excellent guide to worldviews and the worldviews that view them in the world.
7.) Hyphenating To The Glory Of God — John Piper: Piper focuses with white-hot, laser-like intensity on, as he puts it, "the all-other-punctuation-mark-surpassing splendor" of the hyphen. Soul-stirring and paradigm-shattering, you should not miss this all-too-important, not-exactly-like-his-usual-books-but-still-vintage-John-Piper work.
9.) ? — Rob Bell: "I was thinking about what I wanted my new book to convey," Bell said thoughtfully in a short YouTube video designed to promote the May release of New York Times bestseller ?. "And it suddenly hit me—I really have no idea. I mean, about anything." This masterful work features thousands of question marks arranged on each page in no discernible order, as well as several chapters written in Sanskrit.
The lesson: the way to avoid ridicule is stop doing ridiculous stuff.
Categories W-w, Wilderness Wanderings•Tags Babylon Bee, Homer Simpson, John Piper, Rick Warren, Rob Bell, Tim Keller
Blame Trump on Sunday School
Stay with me.
It looks like evangelicals who go to church don't support Donald Trump:
Across all the states, the March 15 elections showed that, on average, a super-majority of 60 percent of evangelicals voted for someone other than Trump. Furthermore, there continues to be strong evidence that the more religious a voter is, the less likely they are to support Donald Trump. For example, in Missouri exit polls, which tracked church attendance, Trump performed much worse than Ted Cruz. Of those who attend religious services "more than once a week," Cruz garnered 56 percent of the vote, outpacing Trump by a full 26 percentage points. Among those who attend religious services once a week, Cruz earned 50 percent of the vote, which was a full 17 points above Trump.
In contrast, with those who only attend services "a few" times a year, Trump won 48 percent of the vote to Cruz's 29 percent. If Missouri's numbers are indicative of voters in other states, then Trump does much worse among those who actually take their faith seriously enough to attend religious services consistently.
So, who is responsible for nurturing evangelicals who don't go to church (and vote for Trump)? Sunday school is.
Church leaders sensed that Boomer parents wanted the one hour break from their kids—that they wanted to focus on their own spiritual life for an hour away from the distraction of their children. And, again, we assumed, reasonably so, that worship targeted to adult boomers would not be all that engaging for kids. So dynamic Sunday school programs were created to engage the kids at their level in their language while their parents were in worship. In fact, some churches didn't (and don't) allow kids into big people worship at all.
The result: Many of these innovated congregations had a positive, significant impact on the lives of disenfranchised Boomers and their kids. Many saw their congregations and their children's ministries grow exponentially. The evangelism imperative to reconnect with Boomers seemed to work.
But there was (and is) one huge unintended consequence: We have raised the largest unchurched generation in the history of our country.
Admittedly, there are many reasons why each generation in our culture is increasingly distanced from the church. Some have to do with societal shifts that have nothing to do with the church. Some have to do with the inability of the church to articulate the Gospel in compelling ways.
But perhaps one of the reasons has to do with the Sunday School shift…as we shifted kids out of the main worship experience, en-culturated them in their own program, and robbed them of any touch points with the rest of the body of Christ. Another way of saying it: by segregating our kids out of worship, we never assimilated them into the life of the congregation. They had no touch points. They had no experience. They had no connection with the main worship service—its liturgy, its music, its space, its environment, and its adults. It was a foreign place to them. And so…once they finished with the kids/or youth program, they left the church.
In other words, parents who forced their kids to sit through boring church services and eat broccoli at Sunday dinner reared people who vote — wait for it — for Ted Cruz.
Categories Evangelicalism, Piety without Exuberance•Tags 2016 Presidential election, baby boomers, Donald Trump, Homer Simpson, megachurch, Sunday school
Baking Bread the Manly Way
Published on October 23, 2011 by D. G. Hart14 Comments
The Harts have been doing their fair share to help the economy. Having gone from apartment living to a house, we have added a number of time-saving devices lately, such as a 12-cup coffee maker, a vacuum cleaner, and most recently, a break maker. For some reason the economy still struggles.
I made our first loaf this weekend, the cinnamon swirl number from the booklet that came with Cuisinart's machine. The bread was good but butter, like bacon, makes everything better. As Homer would say, bacon sauteed in butter — mmmmmmmmmmm.
But I was disappointed that I had to purchase the ingredients, measure and put them into the machine, and even roll out the dough at one point to add the cinnamon and sugar and then roll up the dough. I expected the machine to do everything since it was supposed to save time.
I know the Baylys would disapprove of a godly man making bread. But I hope the use of the machine shows that I am not a sissy all the time.
Categories Book of Nature•Tags Cuisinart, David Bayly, Homer Simpson, Tim Bayly
Is Creation for Evangelicals and Neo-Reformed what Donuts Are for Homer Simpson?
I am noticing a trend, trend-spotters that historians are, and it does not appear to be promising.
Over at Christianity Today, Scott Sabin, author of Tending to Eden, connects the dots among – hold on to your baseball cap – evangelism, "compassionate justice ministry," and earth care.
On a global scale, restoration is a monumental task. We are unlikely to achieve it this side of Christ's return, any more than we are likely to bring about world peace by turning the other cheek. However, kingdom thinking can serve to guide our planning and our individual choices. At Plant with Purpose, we have seen restoration happen. Rivers and streams that had withered have begun to flow again due to upstream solutions. They have become powerful illustrations of God's ability to redeem and restore, both for us and for the farmers with whom we are striving to share Christ's love. . . .
Much of the world is either directly suffering as a result of environmental degradation or reacting in numb despair to gloomy predictions. Both groups desperately need the hope of Jesus Christ. It is the hope they long for, a hope that speaks directly to the redemption of all creation and reminds them that God loves the cosmos.
The gospel is for everyone—from dirt farmers to environmental activists. It is good news that God cares about all that he has created.
Pete Enns picks up on those same connections between creation and redemption in a piece for Biologos.
Psalm 136:1-9 is similar. The psalmist praises Yahweh for creating the cosmos using language reminiscent of Genesis 1. But in v. 10, without missing a beat, this "creation psalm," brings up the exodus. Then in v. 13 we read that Yahweh "divided the Red Sea asunder." Again, this calls to mind Genesis 1:6-8, where, in creating the world, God divided the water above from the water below (see also Psalm 74:12-17 where God "split open the sea"). "Dividing" the sea is a theme the Old Testament shares with other ancient creation texts, as can be seen in the link above.
Creation and exodus are intertwined. The creator was active again in delivering Israel from Egypt. . . .
What we see in the Old Testament is raised to a higher level in the New. God's redemptive act in Christ is so thoroughly transformative that creation language is needed to describe it.
John's Gospel famously begins "In the beginning was the Word…." The echo of Genesis 1:1 is intentional and unmistakable. Jesus' entire redemptive ministry means there is now a new beginning, a starting over—a new creation. This Jesus, who is the Word, who was with God at the very beginning, through whom all things were made, is now walking among us as redeemer (John 1:1-5). Those who believe in him are no longer born of earthly parents but "born of God" (vv. 12-13). They start over. The language of "born again" later in John (3:3) points in the same direction. . . .
Redemption is not simply for people; Jesus' redemptive program is cosmic, as we can see in Romans 8:19-21. Creation itself awaits its chance to start over, its "liberation from bondage." Cosmic re-creation finds its final expression in Revelation 22:1-5. In the beautifully symbolic language that characterizes the entire book, we read that the cosmos has become the new Garden, complete with not one but two trees of life, where there is no longer any curse.
The Bible ends where it begins, at creation. The goal of redemption all along has been to get us back to the Garden, back to the original plan of the created order. To be redeemed means to take part in the creative work of God. The hints are there in the Old Testament, and the final reality of it is ultimately accomplished through the resurrection of the Son of God.
To round out the redeeming creation line-up, David Koyzis yields the especially helpful service not only of connecting creation and redemption but also neo-Calvinism and Roman Catholicism.
Perhaps readers of Evangel also read On the Square, but if not, permit me to direct your attention to a wonderful article by Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver, which, but for a few sentences here and there, could easily have been written by an evangelical Christian of the Reformed persuasion: Fire On The Earth: God's New Creation and the Meaning of Our Lives. I am struck by his redemptive-historical reading of scripture, which many of us may tend to think is the exclusive preserve of the Reformed tradition. Archbishop Chaput is to be commended for disabusing us of this misconception. Here's an excerpt:
A simple way of understanding God's Word is to see that the beginning, middle and end of Scripture correspond to man's creation, fall, and redemption. Creation opens Scripture, followed by the sin of Adam and the infidelity of Israel. This drama takes up the bulk of the biblical story until we reach a climax in the birth of Jesus and the redemption he brings. Thus, creation, fall, and redemption make up the three key acts of Scripture's story, and they embody God's plan for each of us.
To be sure, the God who creates is the deity who redeems. But to miss the difference between creation and redemption, and to rush to identify them with a Homeric blessing – "mmmmmmmm redeemed creationnnnnn" – is to miss the import of this little thing we call sin. The creation was and is good. It did not fall. It does not need to be redeemed. Only fallen creatures need redemption. In which case, to miss the ways that creation and redemption differ is to repeat the same collapsing of categories that Protestant progressives effected one hundred years ago when they threw out the distinctions between natural and supernatural, divine and human, sacred and secular, to brew an ideology that would save the world.
For that reason, two-kingdom and spirituality of the church advocates are eager to either warn evangelicals and progressive Reformed types about the danger of their view, not only because confusing the creational and redemptive functions of Christ blurs a category that has been crucial to the Reformed tradition. It is also because such confusion inevitably mistakes improvements in standard of living for the fruit of the Spirit.
Categories Neo-Protestantism, Piety with Excitement•Tags creation, David Koyzis, evangelicalism, Homer Simpson, Peter Enns, redemption, Scott Sabin, spirituality of the church


There are five network-related cloud deployment mistakes that you might not be aware of, but that can negate the cloud benefits you're hoping to achieve. In this post, we provide an overview of each mistake and a guide for avoiding them all.
Music streaming service Pandora recently announced its migration to Google Cloud Platform (GCP). For the NetOps and SecOps teams behind the migration, we know cloud visibility is now more important than ever. That's why we caught up with Pandora's James Kelty to tell us how the company plans to maintain visibility across its infrastructure, including GCP, with help from Kentik.
At recent AWS re:Invent, we heard many attendees talking about the push for cloud-native to foster innovation and speed up development. In this post, we take a deeper dive on what it means to be cloud-native, as well as the challenges and how to overcome them.
What Are VPC Flow Logs and How Can They Improve Your Cloud?
Cloud providers take away the huge overhead of building, maintaining, and upgrading physical infrastructure. However, many system operators, including NetOps, SREs, and SecOps teams, are facing a huge visibility challenge. Here we talk about how VPC flow logs can help.
To some, moving to the cloud is like a trick. But to others, it's a real treat. So in the spirit of Halloween, here's a blog post to break down two of the spookiest (or at least the most common) cloud myths we've heard of late.
NetFlow vs sFlow: Which is better? In many cases, the choice is not up to the user because most networking gear supports only one or the other. In this post we look at the difference between the two and how network operators can support all of the flow protocols that their networks generate.
With increased business reliance on internet connectivity, the network world has and will continue to get increasingly complex. In this post, we dig into the key findings from our new "State of Network Management in 2018" report. We also discuss why we're just in the early stages of how our industry will need to transform.
Managing quality of service and service-level agreement (SLAs) is becoming more complex for service providers. In this post, we look at how and why enterprise cloud services and application usage is driving service providers to rethink service assurance metrics. We also discuss why network-based analytics is critical to satisfying service assurance needs.
NetFlow offers a great way to preserve highly useful traffic analysis and troubleshooting details without needing to perform full packet capture. In this post, we look at how NetFlow monitoring solutions quickly evolved as commercialized product offerings and discuss how cloud and big data improve NetFlow analysis.
Digital transformation is not for the faint of heart. In this post, ACG Analyst Stephen Collins discusses why it's critical for ITOps, NetOPs, SecOPs and DevOps teams to make sure they have the right stuff and are properly equipped for the network visibility challenges they face.
Silos in enterprise IT organizations can inhibit cross-functional synergies, leading to inefficiencies, higher costs and unacceptable delays for detecting and repairing problems. In this post, ACG analyst Stephen Collins examines how IT managers can start planning for now as the first step in moving from silos to synergy.
To ensure network operation teams can take action on insights from capacity planning tools, there are several guidelines to follow. In this post, we look at the requirements needed for an effective capacity planning solution that ensures optimal network performance and visibility.
5G is marching towards commercialization. In this post, we look at the benefits and discuss why network monitoring for performance and security considerations are even more crucial to the operation of hybrid enterprise networks that incorporate 5G network segments.
At that ONUG Spring 2018 event, ACG analyst Stephen Collins moderated a panel discussion on re-tooling IT operations with machine learning and AI. The panelists provided a view "from the trenches." In this post, Collins shares insights into how panelists' organizations are applying ML and AI today, each in different operational domains, but with a common theme of overcoming the challenge of managing operations at scale.
Predictive analytics has improved over the past few years, benefiting from advances in AI and related fields. In this post, we look at how predictive analytics can be used to help network operations. We also dig into the limitations and how the accuracy of the predictions depends heavily on the quality the data collected.
While we're still in the opening phase of the hybrid multi-cloud chess game, ACG analyst Stephen Collins takes a look at what's ahead. In this post, he digs into what enterprises embracing the cloud can expect in the complex endgame posing many new technical challenges for IT managers.
While data networks are pervasive in every modern digital organization, there are few other industries that rely on them more than the Financial Services Industry. In this blog post, we dig into the challenges and highlight the opportunities for network visibility in FinServ.
Fixing a persistent Internet underlay problem might be as simple as using a higher bandwidth connection or as complex as choosing the right peering and transit networks for specific applications and destination cloud services. In this blog, ACG analyst Stephen Collins advices that to make the best-informed decision about how to proceed, IT managers need to be equipped with tools that enable them to fully diagnose the nature of Internet underlay connectivity problems.
Traditional monitoring tools for managing application performance in private networks are not well-suited to ensuring the performance, reliability and security of SaaS applications. In this post, ACG analyst Stephen Collins makes the case for why enterprise IT managers need to employ a new generation of network visibility and big data analytics tools designed for the vast scale of the Internet.
College, university and K-12 networking and IT teams who manage and monitor campus networks are faced with big challenges today. In this post, we take a deeper look at the challenges and provide requirements for a cost-effective network monitoring solution.
Sankey Diagrams were first invented by Captain Matthew Sankey in 1898. Since then they have been adopted in a number of industries such as energy and manufacturing. In this post, we will take a look at how they can be used to represent the relationships within network data.
Kentik Detect now incorporates IP reputation data from Spamhaus, enabling users to identify infected or compromised hosts. In this post we look at the types of threat feed information we use from Spamhaus, and then dive into how to use that information to reveal problem hosts on an ad hoc basis, to generate scheduled reports about infections, and to set up alerting when your network is found to have carried compromised traffic.
While defining digital transformation strategies is a valuable exercise for C-level executives, CIOs and IT managers also need to adopt a pragmatic and more tactical approach to "going digital." That starts with acquiring tools and building the new skills needed to ensure business success and profitability in the face of digital disruption. In this post, ACG Principal Analyst Stephen Collins looks at how to manage it all.
A new EMA report on network analytics is full of interesting takeaways, from reasons for deployment to use cases after analytics are up and running. In this post, we look specifically at the findings around adoption to see why and how organizations are leveraging network analytics.
CDNs have been around for years, but they've gained new importance with the rise of video streaming services like Netflix and Hulu. As traffic from those sites soars, CDNs introduce new challenges for network operations teams at both service providers and enterprises. Kentik Detect's new CDN Attribution makes identifying and tracking CDN traffic a whole lot easier. In this blog, we provide examples of how companies can implement this functionality.
As IoT adoption continues, enterprises are finding a massive increase in the number of devices and the data volumes generated by these devices on their networks. Here's how enterprises can use network monitoring tools for enhanced visibility into complex networks.
What's Ahead for Networking in 2018?
From telcos, to financial services, to tech companies, we asked 30 of our peers one question: What are your 2018 networking predictions? Yes, it's a broad question. But respondents (hailing from network, data center, and security operations teams) surfaced five main predictions for the year ahead.
What brands of network devices are Kentik customers using? Where does their international traffic come from and go to? What's the current norm for packet sizes and internet traffic protocols? Drawing on Kentik Detect's ability to see and analyze network traffic, this post shares some intriguing factoids, and it sheds light on some of the insights about your own network traffic that await you as a Kentik customer.
Advances in open source software packages for big data have made Do-It-Yourself (DIY) approaches to Network Flow Analyzers attractive. However, careful analysis of all the pros and cons needs to be completed before jumping in. In this post, we look at the hidden pitfalls and costs of the DIY approach.
Media reports tell us that Cyber Monday marked a single-day record for revenue from online shopping. We can assume that those sales correlated with a general spike in network utilization, but from a management and planning perspective we might want to go deeper, exploring the when and where of traffic patterns to specific sites. In this post we use Kentik Detect to see what can be learned from a deeper dive into holiday traffic.
As last week's misconfigured BGP routes from backbone provider Level 3 caused Internet outages across the nation, the monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities of Kentik Detect enabled us to identify the most-affected providers and assess the performance impact on our own customers. In this post we show how we did it and how our new ability to alert on performance metrics will make it even easier for Kentik customers to respond rapidly to similar incidents in the future.
Managing network capacity can be a tough job for Network Operations teams at Service Providers and Enterprise IT. Most legacy tools can't show traffic traversing the network and trend that data over time. In this post, we'll look at how Kentik Detect changes all that with new Dashboards, Analytics, and Alerts that enable fast, easy planning for capacity changes and upgrades.
At Kentik, we built Kentik Detect, our production SaaS platform, on a microservices architecture. We also use Kentik Detect for monitoring our own infrastructure. Drawing on a variety of real-life incidents as examples, this post looks at how the alerts we get — and the details that we're able to see when we drill down deep into the data — enable us to rapidly troubleshoot and resolve network-related issues.
In today's world of heterogeneous environments and distributed systems, APIs drive synergistic innovation, creating a whole that's more powerful than the parts. Even in networking, where the CLI rules, APIs are now indispensable. At Kentik, APIs have been integral to our platform from the outset. In this post we look at how partners and customers are expanding the capabilities of their systems by combining Kentik with external tools.
With much of the country looking skyward during the solar eclipse, you might wonder how much of an effect there was on network traffic. Was there a drastic drop as millions of watchers were briefly uncoupled from their screens? Or was that offset by a massive jump in live streaming and photo uploads? In this post we report on what we found using forensic analytics in Kentik Detect to slice traffic based on how and where usage patterns changed during the event.
Major cyber-security incidents keep on coming, the latest being the theft from HBO of 1.5 terabytes of private data. We often frame Kentik Detect's advanced anomaly detection and alerting system in terms of defense against DDoS attacks, but large-scale transfer of data from private servers to unfamiliar destinations also creates anomalous traffic. In this post we look at several ways to configure our alerting system to see breaches like the attack on HBO.
How Many Routes Do You Really Need?
With BGP and NetFlow correlated into a unified datastore, Kentik Detect's advanced analytics provide valuable insights for both engineering and sales. In this post we look into a fairly recent addition to Kentik Detect, Route Traffic Analytics. Especially useful for capacity planners and peering coordinators, RTA makes it easy to see how many unique routes are represented in a given percent of your traffic, which indicates the route capacity needed in your edge routers.
Among Kentik Detect's unique features is the fact that it's a high-performance network visibility solution that's available as a SaaS. Naturally, data security in the cloud can be an initial concern for many customers, but most end up opting for SaaS deployment. In this post we look at some of the top factors to consider in making that decision, and why most customers conclude that there's no risk to taking advantage of Kentik Detect as a SaaS.
As one of 2017's hottest networking technologies, SD-WAN is generating a lot of buzz, including at last week's Cisco Live. But as enterprises rely on SD-WAN to enable Internet-connected services — thereby bypassing Carrier MPLS charges — they face unfamiliar challenges related to the security and availability of remote sites. In this post we take a look at these new threats and how Kentik Detect helps protect against and respond to attacks.
Obsolete architectures for NetFlow analytics may seem merely quaint and old-fashioned, but the harm they can do to your network is no fairy tale. Without real-time, at-scale access to unsummarized traffic data, you can't fully protect your network from hazards like attacks, performance issues, and excess transit costs. In this post we compare three database approaches to assess the impact of system architecture on network visibility.
NetFlow data has a lot to tell you about the traffic across your network, but it may require significant resources to collect. That's why many network managers choose to collect flow data on a sampled subset of total traffic. In this post we look at some testing we did here at Kentik to determine if sampling prevents us from seeing low-volume traffic flows in the context of high overall traffic volume.
Telecom and mobile operators are clear on both the need and the opportunity to apply big data for advanced operational analytics. But when it comes to being data driven, many telecoms are still a work in progress. In this post we look at the state of this transformation, and how cloud-aware big data solutions enable telecoms to escape the constraints of legacy appliance-based network analytics.
In higher education, embracing the cloud enhances your ability to achieve successful outcomes for students, researchers, and the organization as a whole. But just as in business, this digital transformation can succeed only if it's anchored by modern network visibility. In this post we look at the network as more than mere plumbing, identifying how big data network intelligence helps realize high-priority educational goals.
Stuck with piles of siloed tools, today's network teams struggle to piece together both the big picture and the actionable insights buried in inconsistent UIs and fragmented datasets. The result is subpar performance for both networks and network teams. In this post we look at the true cost of legacy tools, and how Kentik Detect frees you from this obsolete paradigm with a unified, scalable, real-time solution built on the power of big data.
Large or small, all ISPs share the imperative to stay competitive and profitable. To do that in today's environment, they need traffic visibility they can't get from legacy network tools. Taking their lead from the world's most-successful web-scale enterprises, ISPs have much to gain from big data network and business intelligence, so in this post we look at ISP use cases and how Kentik Detect's SaaS model puts key capabilities within easy reach.
SDN holds lots of promise, but it's practical applications have so far been limited to discrete use cases like customer provisioning or service scaling. The long-term goal is true dynamic control, but that requires comprehensive traffic intelligence in real time at full scale. As our customers are discovering, Kentik Detect's traffic visibility, anomaly detection, and extensive APIs make it an ideal source for actionable traffic data that can drive network automation.
NPM appliances and difficult-to-scale enterprise software deployments were appropriate technology for their day. But 15 years later, we're well into the era of the cloud, and legacy NPM approaches are far from the best available option. In this post we look at why it's high time to sunset the horse-and-buggy NPM systems of yesteryear and instead take advantage of SaaS network traffic intelligence powered by big data.
It's very costly to operate a large-scale Internet edge, making lower-end edge routers a subject of keen interest for service providers and Web enterprises alike. Such routers are comparatively short on FIB capacity, but depending on the routes needed to serve your customers that might not be an issue. How can you find out for sure? In this post, Alex Henthorn-Iwane, VP Product Marketing, explains how a new feature in Kentik Detect can show you the answer.
Not long ago network flow data was a secondary source of data for IT departments trying to better understand their network status, traffic, and utilization. Today it's become a leading focus of analysis, yielding valuable insights in areas including network security, network optimization, and business processes. In this post, senior analyst Shamus McGillicudy of EMA looks at the value and versatility of flow for network analytics.
After presenting at the recent CIOArena conference in Atlanta, Kentik VP of Strategic Alliances Jim Frey came away with a number of insights about the adoption of digital business operations in the enterprise. In his first in a series of related posts, Jim looks at audience survey responses indicating how reliant enterprises — even those that aren't digital natives or located in tech industry hotspots — have become on the Internet for core elements of their business.
Kentik is pleased to announce our membership in the Internet2® consortium, which operates a nationwide research and education (R&E) network and establishes best practices for R&E networking. Because Internet2 is a major source of innovation, our participation will enable us to grow our connection to the higher education networking community, to learn from member perspectives, and to support the advancement of applications and services for R&E networks.
As the architecture of digital business applications transitions toward the cloud, network teams are increasingly involved in assuring application performance across distributed infrastructure. Filling this new role effectively requires a deeper toolset than provided by APM alone, with both internal and external network-level visibility. In this post from EMA's Shamus McGillicudy, we look at how modern NPM solutions empower network managers to tackle these new challenges.
As IT technologies evolve toward greater reliance on the cloud, longstanding networking practitioners are adapting to a new environment. The changes are easier to implement in greenfield companies than in more established brownfield enterprises. In this third post of a three-part series, analyst Jim Metzler talks with Kentik's Alex Henthorn-Iwane about how network management is impacted by the differences between the two situations.
Cisco's late-January acquisition of AppDynamics confirms what was already evident from Kentik's experience in 2016, which is that effective visibility is now recognized industry-wide as a critical requirement for success. AppDynamics provides APM, the full value of which can't be realized without the modern NPM offered by Kentik Detect. In this post we look at how Kentik uniquely complements APM to provide a comprehensive visibility solution.
With end-of-life coming this summer for Peakflow 7.5, many Arbor Networks customers face another round of costly upgrades to older, soon-to-be-unsupported appliance hardware. In this post we look at how Arbor users pay coming and going to continue with appliance-based DDoS detection, and we consider whether that makes sense given the availability of a big data SaaS like Kentik Detect.
As cloud computing continues to gain ground, there's a natural tension in IT between cloud advocates and those who prefer the status quo of in-house networking. In part two of his three-part series on this "culture war," analyst Jim Metzler clarifies what is — and is not — involved in the transition to the cloud, and how the adoption of cloud computing impacts the way that network organizations should think about the management tools they use.
Kentik is honored to be the sole network monitoring provider named by Forrester Research as a "Breakout Vendor" in a December 2016 report on the Virtual Network Infrastructure (VNI) space. The report asserts that I&O leaders can dramatically improve customer experience by choosing cloud networking solutions, and cites Kentik Detect as one of four groundbreaking products that are poised to supercede typical networking incumbents.
Kentik's recent recognition as an IDC Innovator for Cloud-Based Network Monitoring was based not only on our orientation as a cloud-based SaaS but also on the deep capabilities of Kentik Detect. In this post we look at how our purpose-built distributed architecture enables us to keep up with raw network traffic data while providing a unified network intelligence solution, including traffic analysis, performance monitoring, Internet peering, and DDoS protection.
Every so often a fundamental shift in technology sets off a culture war in the world of IT. Two decades ago, with the advent of a commercial Internet, it was a struggle between the Bellheads and the Netheads. Today, Netheads have become the establishment and cloud computing advocates are pushing to upend the status quo. In this first post of a 3-part series, analyst Jim Metzler looks at how this dynamic is playing out in IT organizations.
How does Kentik NPM help you track down network performance issues? In this post by Jim Meehan, Director of Solutions Engineering, we look at how we recently used our own NPM solution to determine if a spike in retransmits was due to network issues or a software update we'd made on our application servers. You'll see how we ruled out the software update, and were then able to narrow the source of the issue to a specific route using BGP AS Path.
There's a horrible tragedy taking place every day wherever legacy visibility systems are deployed: the needless slaughter of innocent NetFlow data records. NetFlow is cruelly disposed of, and the details it can reveal are blithely ignored in favor of shallow summaries. Kentik VP of Marketing Alex Henthorn-Iwane reports on this pressing issue and explains what each of us can do to help Save the NetFlow.
In this post, based on a webinar presented by Jim Frey, VP Strategic Alliances at Kentik, we look at how changes in network traffic flows — the shift to the Cloud, distributed applications, and digital business in general — has upended the traditional approach to network performance monitoring, and how NPM is evolving to handle these new realities.
Kentik recently launched Kentik NPM, a network performance monitoring solution for today's digital business. Integrated into Kentik Detect, Kentik NPM addresses the visibility gaps left by legacy appliances, using lightweight software agents to gather performance metrics from real traffic. This podcast with Kentik CEO Avi Freedman explores Kentik NPM as a game-changer for performance monitoring.
As Gartner Research Director Sanjit Ganguli pointed out last May, network performance monitoring appliances that were designed for the era of WAN-connected data centers leave significant blind spots when monitoring modern applications that are distributed across the cloud. In this post Jim Frey, VP Strategic Alliances, explores Ganguli's analysis and explains how Kentik NPM closes the gaps.
The recorded music market used to be dependent on physical objects to distribute recordings to buyers. Now it's as if our headphone cords stretch all the way from our smartphones to the datacenter. That makes network performance and availability mission-critical for music services — and anyone else who serve ads, processes transactions, or delivers content. Which explains why some of the world's top music services use Kentik Detect for network traffic analysis.
PacketPushers: Flight from the Public Cloud?
Kentik CEO Avi Freedman joins Ethan Banks and Chris Wahl of the PacketPushers Datanauts podcast to discuss hot topics in networking today. The conversation covers the trend toward in-house infrastructure among enterprises that generate revenue from their IP traffic, the pluses and minuses of OpenStack deployments for digital enterprises, and the impact of DevOps practices on network operations.
Cisco's recently announced Tetration Analytics platform is designed to provide large and medium data centers with pervasive real-time visibility into all aspects of traffic and activity. Analyst Jim Metzler says that the new platform validates the need for a Big Data approach to network analytics as network traffic grows. But will operations teams embrace a hardware-centric platform, or will they be looking for a solution that's highly scalable, supports multiple vendors, doesn't involve large up-front costs, and is easy to configure and use?
Cisco's announcement of Tetration Analytics means that IT and network leaders can no longer ignore the need for Big Data intelligence. In this post, Kentik CEO Avi Freedman explains how that's good for Kentik, which has been pushing hard for this particular industry transition. Cisco's appliance-based approach is distinct from the SaaS option that most customers choose for Kentik Detect, but Tetration's focus on Big Data analytics provides important validation that Kentik is on the right track.
CIOs focus on operational issues like network and application performance, uptime, and workflows, while CISOs stress about malware, access control, and data exfiltration. The intersection of these concerns is the network, so it seems evident that CIOs and CISOs should work together instead of clashing over budgets and tools. In this post, network security analyst David Monahan makes the case for finding a solution that can keep both departments continuously and comprehensively well-informed about infrastructure, systems, and applications.
Today's MSPs frequently find themselves without the insights needed to answer customer questions about network performance and security. To maintain customer confidence, MSPs need answers that they can only get by pairing infrastructure visibility with traffic analysis. In this post, guest contributor Alex Hoff of Auvik Networks explains how a solution combining those capabilities enables MSPs to win based on customer service.
Intelligent use of network management data can enable virtually any company to transform itself into a successful digital business. In our third post in this series, we look at areas where traditional network data management approaches are falling short, and we consider how a Big Data platform that provides real-time answers to ad-hoc queries can empower IT organizations and drive continuous improvement in both business and IT operations.
Traffic can get from anywhere to anywhere on the Internet, but that doesn't mean all networks are directly connected. Instead, each network operator chooses the networks with which to connect. Both business and technical considerations are involved, and the ability to identify prime candidates for peering or transit offers significant competitive advantages. In this post we look at the benefits of intelligent interconnects and how networks can find the best peers to connect with.
Looking ahead to tomorrow's economy, today's savvy companies are transitioning into the world of digital business. In this post — the second of a three-part series — guest contributor Jim Metzler examines the key role that Big Data can play in that transformation. By revolutionizing how operations teams collect, store, access, and analyze network data, a Big Data approach to network management enables the agility that companies will need to adapt and thrive.
The team at Kentik recently tweeted: "#Moneyball your network with deeper, real-time insights from #BigData NetFlow, SNMP & BGP in an easy to use #SaaS." There are a lot of concepts packed into that statement, so we thought it would be worth unpacking for a closer look.
For many of the organizations we've all worked with or known, SNMP gets dumped into RRDTool, and NetFlow is captured into MySQL. This arrangement is simple, well-documented, and works for initial requirements. But simply put, it's not cost-effective to store flow data at any scale in a traditional relational database.
Taken together, three additional attributes of Kentik Detect — self-service, API-enabled, and multi-tenant — further enhance the fundamental advantages of Kentik's cloud-based big data approach to network visibility.


Strong indications suggest that Saleh al-Somali, a senior Al-Qaeda operations planner, has died in a U.S. drone strike in northwest Pakistan earlier this week. U.S official claimed al-Somali was part of Al Qaeda's "core leadership cadre" and was responsible for plotting attacks in the international arena including the United States and Europe.
It seems that Saleh Al Somali was probably another alias for Abu Hafez (or Abu Hafiz), considered to be the chief of Al-Qaeda's external special operations unit which has been traditionally responsible for Al Qaeda's attacks in the international arena. Among recent plots which were exposed by western intelligence agencies is the Bryant Neal Vinas case in Belgium where it became evident that Abu Hafez (or Abu Hafiz) was the head of the special operations unit. These reports suggest Abu Hafez personally supervised preparations of Al-Qaeda's global attacks from their earliest stages of recruitment, as well as the arrival of recruits to Afghanistan or Pakistan for preliminary trainings.
The US official added that al-Somali has also maintained connections with other terrorist groups operating in Pakistan and Somalia (Shabab Al Mujahiddin. We believe that this cooperation was operationally evidenced in the David Coleman Headley plot in Denmark (Pakistani- Harakat Ul Jihad al Islami-Huji) and perhaps even in the late 2008 multiple attacks in Mumbai (Lashkar-e-toyba).
Hamza Rabi'a - KSM successor- eliminated in 2005.
Abu Ubeida Al Masri - Rabi'a successor. Died of natural causes in 2007.
Saleh al-Somali - eliminated in 2009.
Although the elimination of al-Somali constitutes a severe blow for Al Qaeda's terrorist efforts in the global arena in the long haul, it will have a lesser affect in the short run on plots that are already "rolling" in different locations around the globe.
In addition, one should bear in mind that in similar situations in the past Al Qaeda has demonstrated impressive adaptating capabilities for changing circumstances and was always able to come up with suitable replacements for the eliminated leaders of its external operations unit.


Law of Attraction at its finest!
The Happiest Man in the World is the incredible story of the life of Dr. Hank Seitz. Enjoy as he vividly takes you on the wild ride of partying hard with the UniBoys to taking down the Korean Mafia with the CIA. He even healed himself of a broken neck, and if Hank can overcome these challenges in life, so can you!
Dr. Hank also shares his secrets for taking top-level corporations and increasing profits by 20 to 30% in one year! His developed his proven Top Performers training when he was a General Manager for Procter and Gamble and their patents were running out.
Dr. Hank has been called "The Spiritual Teacher" and likened to Santa Clause, carrying priceless gifts for others to enjoy as she helps people make their dreams come true!
Dr. Hank Seitz is an International Speaker, Best-Selling Author, and Business Coach. He is a productivity and hiring expert whose time-proven process increases productivity on average by 30% and retention by 50%. Using this success formula creates more clients, cash, and time. He is a Philanthropist and Humanitarian who casts unconditional love and compassion into the world.
Dr. Hank was a General Manager with Procter & Gamble for 15 years, managing a billion-dollar business in the Southeast United States. He developed Top Producers whose results were astounding, as sales grew by 21% and costs dropped by 34% in less than a year while helping the individual team members to personally tap into their genius.
For the past 20 years, he has used his time-proven process with hundreds of corporations and helped thousands of Sales Professionals to become their greatest possibility.


text:
Raisin' the Signal Flag
~ Rogues, Rebels & Rakes
#ReleaseDay ~ A Sprig of Mistletoe
Posted by Katherine Bone in Beginnings, Setting Sail
#Holiday Romance, Christmas romance, Holidays, Katherine Bone, romance, sprig of mistletoe, victorian, Victorian Christmas, Victorian romance
This year I've experienced a lot of ups and downs, but one of the things I am most proud of is writing my first Victorian Christmas book, A Sprig of Mistletoe. And today is the book's birthday. Huzzah!!!
This book has everything I love in it: Christmas; orphans; inspiration from A Christmas Carol and The Man Who Invented Christmas; Charles Dickens; a heroine who wants to change the world, a Scrooge-like hero; and the Victorian Industrial Age. As part of the Miracle Express Series, it also includes steam engines. Trains were a huge part of my childhood. My grandfather longed to be a train conductor, but his mother advised him against the profession, preferring him to study music. 'Grandy' honored his mother's wishes, received his doctorate in music, and taught organ and piano at East Texas State University. During his free time, however, he studied trains and their engines, planning adventures and vacations around them. I suspect in his lifetime he rode every steam train still in existence.
And so, me hearties, A Sprig of Mistletoe comes from the heart, and I hope readers will read this story and come away with the spirit of Christmas.
She's unconventional . . .
Lady Catherine "Kitty" Egerton leads a quiet life in Hertfordshire riding horses, reading extensively to improve her mind, and entertaining one disappointing suitor after another. She desires to marry, but the men her father introduces her to detest a headstrong woman. Kitty wants to help the poor, and Christmas provides ample opportunities when women cannot join organizations that fund these efforts. When she's invited to London to visit Field Lane Ragged School, it's the opportunity she's been waiting for. But she's only allowed to go if she agrees to spy on her brother and his elusive friend—a key investor in the formation of a new Poor Law Union, a man who's refused to visit their home in Christmases past. Kitty agrees because she has an ulterior motive: her dearest friend is in love with her brother, and the railway journey to London allows her time to play matchmaker.
He is not who he says he is . . .
Bartholomew "Bart" Fernsby inherited his wealth from a kind man who liberated him from the workhouse in Holborn. Sent to upper-crust schools, he received every consideration: lodging, food, clean clothes, except what he desired most—his mother's love. But to whom much is given, more is required. Haunted by his parents' deaths and a scandalous past, he's determined to change other children's fates by beating back the crushing blow of poverty taking London by storm. Putting his money to good use, he becomes one of the founding members of a Poor Law Union, which seeks to educate the poorest districts in the city, and enlists an old friend's help to raise funds for Field Lane Ragged School. Another friend, Charles Dickens, has written A Christmas Carol, hoping the book will draw sympathy for the city's poor and downtrodden. Bart purchases multiple copies for the Ragged Schools, but there's only one problem—he hates Christmas.
Can Kitty's love and a sprig of mistletoe mend Bart's broken heart?
BUY AMAZON / BUY B&N / BUY iBOOKS / BUY KOBO
Happy Birthday, A Sprig of Mistletoe!!!
Sharin' is carin':
2019 Easter Egg Hunt Hop!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Holidays, Treasure
Alanna Lucas, Amalie Howard, Amy Jarecki, Annabelle Anders, authors, Ava Stone, Collette Cameron, Deb Marlowe, Diana Lloyd, E. Elizabeth Watson, Easter, Easter Egg Hunt Hop, Eliza Knight, Elizabeth Essex, Elizabeth Keysian, gift cards, giveaway, Heather McCollum, Jane Charles, Jennifer Trethewey, Jerrica Knight-Catania, Julie Johnstone, Kris Kennedy, Lori Ann Bailey, Maddison Michaels, Madeline Martin, Meara Platt, Nadine Mallard, Nicole Locke, Samantha Grace, Tammy L. Bailey, Tina Gabrielle, Victoria Vane
Join up to 30 Historical Romance Authors for a chance to win a $150 Gift Card.
Love historical romance? Love prizes? Thirty historical romance authors including Heather McCollum, Alanna Lucas, Tara Kingston, Elizabeth Keysian, Madeline Martin, E Elizabeth Watson, Lori Ann Lori Ann Bailey, Collette Cameron, Eliza Knight, and Jennifer Trethewey have joined together for an Easter Egg Hunt hop. Visit each of the authors' sites to "collect" the decorated eggs. Collect all 30 eggs for a chance to win $150 gift card! For entry details, and to download your Easter Egg Match form, hop over to the FB event page.
Or find the Easter Egg Hunt Hop form here. If you already have your form, collect my egg at my website, and visit the other authors in the hop. These Easter eggs don't even have calories. The hop runs through Saturday, April 20. And most of all, have fun! 😉
Here's the full author link list for your convenience:
Annabelle Anders: https://www.facebook.com/HappyWritingGirl/
Lori Ann Bailey: http://loriannbailey.com/books/highlander-series/
Tammy L. Bailey: https://www.tammylbailey.com/
Katherine Bone: http://www.katherinebone.com/
Collette Cameron http://facebook.com/collettecameronauthor
Jane Charles:https://www.janecharlesauthor.com/
Elizabeth Essex: https://www.facebook.com/elizabeth.essex.37/
Tina Gabrielle: https://www.facebook.com/TinaGabrielle
Samantha Grace: https://www.samanthagraceauthor.com/
Amalie Howard: http://www.amaliehoward.com
Amy Jarecki: https://www.facebook.com/amyjarecki/
Julie Johnstone: http://juliejohnstoneauthor.com/special-offer
Kris Kennedy: https://www.kriskennedy.net/excerpts-eggs/
Elizabeth Keysian: https://elizabethkeysian.com/
Eliza Knight: http://www.eknightauthor.com/
Jerrica Knight-Catania: http://www.jerricasplace.com/shakespeares-daughters.html
Diana Lloyd: https://diana-lloyd.com/
Nicole Locke: https://www.nicolelocke.com/
Alanna Lucas: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAlannaLucas/
Deb Marlowe: http://www.debmarlowe.com/deb-marlowes-regency-kitchen.html
Madeline Martin: http://www.madelinemartin.com/blog/
Heather McCollum: https://www.heathermccollum.com/
Maddison Michaels: https://www.facebook.com/MaddisonMichaelsAuthor/
Nadine Millard: https://partners.bookbub.com/authors/82544/edi
Meara Platt: https://facebook.com/AuthorMearaPlatt/
Ava Stone: https://www.avastoneauthor.com/family-trees
Jennifer Trethewey: https://www.facebook.com/jennifertretheweyromance/
Victoria Vane: https://www.victoriavane.com/blog
E. Elizabeth Watson: https://www.facebook.com/Author.E.Elizabeth.Watson/
So let the hunt begin! Pillage and plunder your weaselly guts out, me hearties!
Do you enjoy book bundles? Get Kiss Me, My Love Box Set!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Beginnings, Effects, Setting Sail
99cents, Amanda Mariel, Aubrey Wynne, book bundle, Box Set, Bree Wolf, Dawn Brower, eBooks, Entertaining, Historical authors, Historical romance, Keriann McKenna, Kiss Me My Love, Kiss Me My Love Box Set, page-turning, reading, romance, romance novels, romantic, Tammy Andresen
Seven books. One must have box set. #99cents for a limited time! What's not to love?
Experience tantalizing kisses and oh so satisfying romances with Regency rakes, earls, and spies along with Medieval knights, Edwardian ladies, Tudor witches, and Scottish lairds in this must read seven book collection.
Included in Kiss Me, My Love:
Rules to be Broken by Bree Wolf ~
A scandalous lady. A virtuous gentleman. And rules that need to be broken.
After a minor faux-pas, DIANA LAWSON finds herself forced into a marriage of convenience to save her reputation. However, London society still talks, and no matter how hard Diana tries, the whispers never cease.
After her well-respected husband dies in the arms of his mistress, Diana decides to live by her own rules alone.
ARTHUR ABBOTT, EARL OF STANHOPE, is a stickler for propriety and has never met a rule he did not feel compelled to uphold. However, when he saves a young widow from a most inappropriate situation, he is drawn into a world quite unlike his own. Convinced that he is only lending a hand out of duty, Arthur agrees to a daring compromise.
For Diana to uphold society's rules, Arthur has to break them.
Can scandalous and virtuous ever walk hand in hand?
Surrendering to My Spy by Dawn Brower ~
A rogue, a marquess and a spy… Each an integral part of Dominic Rossington's life and he does them all rather well. Love throws him off balance and he'll do everything in his power to protect the one who holds his heart, Lady Rosanna. Danger lurks on the horizon and he'll have to put it all on the line to save her.
Rolf's Quest by Aubrey Wynne ~
A wizard, a curse, a fated love…
When Rolf finally discovers the woman who can end the curse that has plagued his family for centuries, she is already betrothed. Time is running out for the royal wizard of King Henry II. If he cannot find true love without the use of sorcery, the magic will die for future generations.
Melissa is intrigued by the mystical, handsome man that haunts her by night and tempts her by day. His bizarre tale of Merlin, enchantments, and finding genuine love has her questioning his sanity and her heart.
My Wicked Earl by Tammy Andresen ~
Rex is a rake and a rogue who has sworn off marriage. He is the last man Daffodil should give her attention. So why do her eyes drift to him at every opportunity?
One Enchanting Kiss by Amanda Mariel ~
Handsome-as-sin Thomas Astley is more than a little intrigued by the vibrant, saucy woman who saved his life. He knows she is more than she seems, and vows to discover all of Moire's secrets. A move that unbeknownst to him threatens her future and all she holds dear…including her heart.
My Lady Rogue by Katherine Bone ~
Everything Lord Simon Danbury and Gillian, Baroness Chauncey, have done for Nelson's Tea has led to this moment…
As war continues off England's shores, from the sea to the continent, and victory is won at great cost, a devastating betrayal threatens the members of Nelson's Tea, Admiral Horatio Nelson's mercenaries. None of them have ever questioned Lord Danbury's authority–until now. Death's darkening veil is descending over London, and as a new hierarchy within the group begins to rise, a hostile mole prepares to strike.
Surrounded by the greatest spies in England, longing to share their lasting love, can Simon unify the clandestine group without losing the baroness? Or will she be the price they have to pay for peace?
On Loving a Woman by Keriann McKenna ~
Do No Harm. Professor Ian MacDermot is pleased when a beautiful young woman is turned over to him for individual instruction. His task–to teach her to be a dutiful wife.
The fiercely independent-thinking Sarah MacDonald is having none of it. Haunted by a dark experience from her past, she vowed never to marry and become a 'sex slave' to any man, but Ian MacDermot is not just any man.
Lose yourself in these great books!
You don't want to miss this romantic and entertaining box set priced #99cents for a limited time!
#ReleaseDay for TJ London's, The Traitor!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Blackguards, Setting Sail
American Revolution, book launch, Book lovers, book release, French and Indian Wars, historical, historical fiction, New Release, Redcoats and Rebels Saga, Revolutionary War, The Tory, The Traitor, TJ London
Ahoy, me hearties! I'm back, and I'm raisin' the signal flag in honor of historical fiction Author TJ London and her new book, The Traitor! Happy release day, Lady TJ!!!
Spy. Liar. Scoundrel. Redcoat.
Provocateur and spy for His Majesty, Captain John Carlisle returns to Fort Niagara with the secrets he stole in the arms of the beautiful Oneida innkeeper, Dellis McKesson. Determined to complete his mission and clear his name, he'll see justice done—and damn the consequences. Now, he finds himself drawn into political intrigue as the British prepare to launch a three-pronged attack that will bring the Rebels and the Mohawk River Valley to its knees.
A dangerous revelation finds Dellis as whispers of intrigue insinuate her beloved is not all that he seems. Unwilling to wait for her lover's return, she sets out in search of the truth as the Onieda begin negotiations with the Rebels, breaking the neutrality agreement with the crown. A bold move that will stoke a fire between the brother tribes and lead to a bloody inter-confederacy war—one Dellis predicted, and one John incited.
While war between the colonies and the King smolders, the punishing winter of 1777 allows the perfect opportunity for old enemies to settle scores, lying in wait, ready to exploit John's one weakness—his heart. John is not an innocent man. The truth he's long tried to hide from can no longer be ignored, the ghosts of the past seeking justice, and karma wanting payment for sins so dark they cannot be forgiven.
Buy Amazon
In case you missed it, The Tory is TJ London's first book in the Redcoats and Rebels Saga. (I ask you, aren't these covers FABulous?) 🙂
His King or His Conscience…which will he choose?
It is the winter of 1776, and Captain John Carlisle, one of His Majesty's not-so-finest, has gone back to the scene of the crime to right a wrong so dark it left a permanent stain on what was once an illustrious career and left a man broken, defeated, in search of justice…
In an effort to win back his commission, he must discover the true nature of the relationship between the Six Nations of the Iroquois and the Colonial Army. Undercover as a war profiteer, John travels to the treacherous Mohawk River Valley and infiltrates local society, making friends with those he's come to betray.
But a chance meeting with a beautiful half Oneida innkeeper, whose tragic history is integrally linked to his own, will provide him with the intelligence he needs to complete his mission—and devastate her people.
Now, as the flames of war threaten to consume the Mohawk Valley, John has the chance to not only serve King and country, but to clear his name. When the truth he uncovers ties his own secrets to those in the highest positions of the British military and threatens the very life of the woman he's come to love, he will be forced to make a choice…
Buy Amazon – $1.99!
T.J. London is a rebel, liberal, lover, fighter, diehard punk, and pharmacist-turned-author who loves history. As an author her goal is to fill in the gaps, writing stories about missing history, those little places that are so interesting yet sadly forgotten. Her favorite time periods to write in are first and foremost the American Revolutionary War, the French Revolution, the French and Indian War, the Russian Revolution and the Victorian Era. Her passions are traveling, writing, reading, barre, and sharing a glass of wine with her friends, while she collects experiences in this drama called life. She is a native of Metropolitan Detroit (but secretly dreams of being a Londoner) and resides there with her husband Fred and her beloved cat and writing partner Mickey.
I'm thrilled that I got to meet Lady TJ in Riverside, CA, at the Historical Romance Retreat (HRR), Sept 12-16.
Lady Tj is spunky and fun, and oh so smart! (And that red coat with the bric-a-brac! LOVE!)
Here we are with Lady Kathryn le Veque and two unruly pirates. (What can I say? When the pirate's away… Sorry, Lady Kathryn, we're just followin' our natural inclination to pillage and pilfer!) 😉
Lady TJ has been very busy researching her saga, with a focus on the six nations of the Iroquois. How ironic it is that I've chosen to spotlight the Napoleonic Wars and smuggling across the pond twenty-five years later where Britain experienced better success. (Pirate!)
(Hamming it up together. I'm dressed as Britain's beloved and immortal Vice-Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson. Lady TJ is sporting that impressive coat!)
One of the first books I read as a child was The Winter at Valley Forge from Landmark Books. The imagery was so vivid, I actually felt like I was freezing along with Washington's doomed men. (Even now, I can feel the bitter cold on my fingertips.) The Winter at Valley Forge influenced my passion for history at an early age. And I can't wait to step once more into the revolution with Lady TJ's Redcoats and Rebels Saga!
Congrats, Lady TJ! Wishing you fare winds and magnificent success!!!
I'm Blogging at Romancing Yesteryear: Beginnings and Rebirths!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Grog & Gruel
Author, Beginnings, books, Crocus, Endings, Fall, Happy endings, historical author, Katherine Bone, Life, Middles, Nelson's Tea, Rebirth, Romancing Yesteryear, Seasons, snowdrops, Spring, starting over, summer, Winter
Posted on February 22, 2018 posted by barbarabettis1
Photo by Sharon Talson
Every day is a new day –
a day for new beginnings, new dreams, new action –
a day for challenge, adventure, and discovery.
TODAY, what is your goal?
What action are you taking to further your goals and dreams?
– Jonathan Lockwood Huie
I'm looking forward to 2018 because 2017 was a major struggle. I started battling personal issues; chief among them reintroduced neck problems. My doctor, who is awesome by the way, believes in preventative medicine. A let's do everything we can to take care of this problem, saving surgery as a last option, type of physician. I've had two neck surgeries to replace discs in my C 5-7. So when I started experiencing pain in my neck again last March, I kind of suspected the direction my health was going to take in 2017. Unfortunately, I was right.
Check out the rest of my personal story at Romancing Yesteryear.
Cover Reveal for Only a Seduction Will Do by Jenna Jaxon!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Beginnings, Blackguards
announcement, cover reveal, forced marriage, georgian, Georgian England, Historical authors, Historical romance, Jenna Jaxon, lords and ladies, married to a stranger, nobility, Only A Scandal Will Do, peerage, romance, seduction
Sailing in to share Author Jenna Jaxon's cover reveal for her next release, Only A Seduction Will Do! Sound the cannons and raise the signal flag, me hearties.
Only A Seduction Will Do is the next book in Lady Jenna's House of Pleasure Series. Set in Georgian England the book follows Jack Fitzwilliam, the Earl of Manning, and Miss Alethea Forsythe. (Readers met Jack in book one, Only Scandal Will Do, his sister Katarina Fitzwilliam's story.) Those familiar with Alethea from the other books in the series will now get the chance to meet her and share her story.
Ready for the cover?
Drum roll, please . . . In a vulnerable moment, Alethea Forsythe allows herself to be seduced by a married peer. Now she is with child—and without recourse. Her reputation will soon be in tatters and she will be forced to wed a stranger—unless she takes matters into her own hands.
When Jack Fitzwilliam, the Earl of Manning, is summoned from the House of Pleasure on a matter of importance, he hardly expects to receive a marriage proposal. He's long been aware of Alethea's infatuation with him, but at twenty-three, taking on an expectant bride is not in his plans. Yet the desperation in the lady's lovely eyes overrides his misgivings.
Alethea would not have believed it possible for a man to be too chivalrous. But though her new husband is perfectly amicable in public, he insists they maintain separate quarters. Desperate to possess his heart and prove herself a wife in every way, she boldly reaches out to Jack. And as their unexpected connection between silken sheets is tested by jealousy and misfortune, Jack must decide where honor ends…and true passion begins . . .
AMAZON / B & N / iTunes
~ Excerpt ~
"Lord Manning, I must apologize for this cryptic summons, but I importuned my cousin to send to you upon a matter of utmost importance." Miss Forsythe twisted her fingers together brutally, until Jack felt tied in knots.
"Utmost importance to your cousin, Miss Forsythe?"
"To me, Lord Manning. Although it will likely touch on both my cousin and her husband as well." The woman avoided his eyes by moving swiftly toward Braeton. She grasped his arm and leaned toward him, her lips at his ear.
Braeton kept his voice low, though his face acted as an open book. At her first words, he scowled like a vengeful god.
Jack waited for the thunderbolt.
Shaking his head vigorously, the earl drew his brows down almost to his nose. "You will not—"
"My lord, you promised me earlier." Miss Forsythe's face had drawn into determined lines. Her voice lowered, power in her indomitable tone. "Do not renege on this, I beg of you."
Dark brows still lowered, Braeton threw up his hands, paused to collect himself, then turned to Jack. "Miss Forsythe wishes a word with you, Lord Manning." He shot an angry glance at the lady. "Alone."
All Jack's instincts for self-preservation leaped into high alert. Something ill was afoot and he doubted it would be to his liking one whit when it finally came out.
Miss Forsythe stood, demure for possibly the first time in her life, her gaze lowered, her hands clasped primly in front of her. The picture of an obedient woman. And as false as a Newgate penny, he'd be bound.
"I am certain anything Miss Forsythe has to say to me could be spoken in your presence, Braeton." He shot a look of desperation at the earl. Had the girl conceived some sort of trap to spring on him, compromise him into marrying her? Jack stiffened, then for the first time since he had arrived, he relaxed. Even though unannounced, he was already betrothed. Miss Carlton had now saved him, it seemed. Quid pro quo.
"I believe my cousin wishes to ask a boon of you, Manning." Braeton's mouth twisted as though he'd bitten into a lemon. "I am aware of the nature of the request and agree she would want privacy to ask it. I won't be far if you should need me." Braeton bowed curtly and left.
More confused than ever, Jack turned his attention back to Miss Forsythe, who swayed slightly from side to side, fidgeting with a lace handkerchief she'd produced from somewhere. Did she expect their conversation to lead to tears?
"Won't you please have seat, Lord Manning?" Miss Forsythe indicated the chair nearest the fire. She seated herself opposite him. Perched seemed a better word, on the edge of the brown leather chair. "I do thank you so much for attending me at such an inconvenient time."
"No inconvenience in the least, Miss Forsythe," Jack said waving a hand of dismissal. He settled back into the chair. "How may I be of service to you?"
She gripped her lace-edged handkerchief in one hand, the other clenched on the chair's arm. Raising her chin, her deep blue eyes boring into his, she swallowed hard. "Would you marry me, Lord Manning?"
Jenna Jaxon is a multi-published author of historical romance in all time periods because, she says, "passion is timeless." She has been reading and writing historical romance since she was a teenager. A romantic herself, Jenna has always loved a dark side to the genre, a twist, suspense, a surprise. She tries to incorporate all of these elements into her own stories. She's a theatre director when she's not writing and lives in Gloucester, Virginia with her family, including two very vocal cats.
Jenna is a PAN member of Romance Writers of America as well as an active member of Chesapeake Romance Writers, her local chapter of RWA. She has three series currently available: The House of Pleasure, set in Georgian England, Handful of Hearts, set in Regency England, and Time Enough to Love, set in medieval England and France. This March Kensington Publishing will release the first book The Widows' Club series, To Woo A Wicked Widow in both print and ebook.
She currently writes to support her chocolate habit.
Jenna's Ports of Call:
BLOG / TWITTER / FACEBOOK
Interested in Lady Jenna's Pinterest board for Only Seduction Will Do, click here.
***Treasure Alert*** Lady Jenna has graciously offered to offer one lucky commenter a copy of the previous book, Only A Mistress Will Do! All you have to do is tell her you'd enjoy receiving the book. Huzzah!!! 😉
Thank you for letting me share your cover release, Lady Jenna! Best wishes for the greatest success!!!
Happening Now from 4-9 EST! Pilfer and Pillage Your Weasley Guts Out FB Bash!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Setting Sail, Treasure
Aurora Publicity, Author Takeover, books, celebrate, CK Brooke, Elizabeth Rose, Facebook party, Flash Giveaways, fun, giveaway, Guest authors, Historical romance, Kathryn le Veque, My Lord Rogue Relaunch, Party, Party like a pirate, Pilfer and Pillage Your Weasley Guts Out Bash, pirate romance, pirates, prizes, Shana Galen
Ahoy, me hearties! I've been down for the count for a few months but I'm back. And I'm celebrating with a pirate bash! Stop by for flash giveaways, author takeovers with prizes, videos, and tons of pirate fun, eh?
Join me tonight at the Pilfer and Pillage Your Weasley Guts Out FB event! https://www.facebook.com/events/223172414892569/ Flash giveaways and prizes awarded every hour (must be present to win!)
Here's a peak at a small scale of the treasure that will be awarded! Flash giveaways will be going on all night and a grand prize winner announced in the last hour. (Must be online to win!) I'll be featured in a live video!
Join us, won't ye, at the Pilfer and Pillage Your Weasley Guts Out Bash, happening now!
#NewRelease Daring a Rogue to Love is Available Now!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Setting Sail
99cents, Amanda Mariel, Anthology, books, Box Set, Christina McKnight, Christy Carlyle, Daring a Rogue to Love, Dawn Brower, historical, Historical romance, Maggi Andersen, rogues, romance, scoundrels
Today's a day for celebration! The Daring a Rogue to Love box set including books by USA Today Bestselling authors Amanda Mariel, Christina McKnight, and Christy Carlyle, and bestselling authors Maggi Andersen and Dawn Brower, along with yours truly, released today. Huzzah!
What's better than six books for the low price of $.99? Hind sight. When I finished my Nelson's Tea Series in 2016, there were things I wanted to change in the books: characterization, plot opportunities not taken, chances to enhance continuity and strengthen storylines. So when the rights for the books became available to me in April of this year, I took a leap of faith and hopped on the chance to revisit the series and rework the books for a 2018 relaunch. (Ideas for more books in the series are percolating.)
Well, at last, readers will get the chance to revisit Gillian's and Simon's reunion in My Lord Rogue, A Nelson's Tea novella. The first book in my Nelson's Tea Series is included in Daring a Rogue to Love, and its grittier than ever. I can't wait for readers to fall in love with Gillian's strength and determination, and Simon's honor bound duty again.
~ Included in Daring a Rogue to Love ~
NEVER TEMPT A ROGUE by CHRISTY CARLYLE An infamous rogue meets his match in a feisty chaperone who has all but given up on love.
Felicity Beckett's uncle has tasked her with one goal for Lord and Lady Forsythe's country house party. Keep her innocent cousin away from the notorious rake, Lord Lindsay. Unfortunately, no one warned Felicity how irresistible a rogue can be.
STOLEN BY MY KNAVE by DAWN BROWER As a child, Lady Elizabeth Kendall glimpsed fantastical images in a mirror of a handsome man. Imagine her surprise when years later she meets a duke who bears a striking resemblance to her imaginary suitor.
MY LORD ROGUE by KATHERINE BONE A masterful spy in disguise reunites with a noble rogue from her past. Espionage, secrecy, and thwarted assassination attempts. The only thing more dangerous is being in love…
CAPTIVATED BY THE CAPTAIN by AMANDA MARIEL What happens when an American shipping company heiress crosses paths with a dominering pirate? Can two people whose life paths are at odds find common ground?
SHUNNED NO MORE by CHRISTINA MCKNIGHT Lady Viola Oberbrook longed for a quiet life in the country, far from London and the society who'd shunned her during her first season. She never expected to come face-to-face with Lord Haversham, the only man who had every right to despise her.
THE EARL AND THE HIGHWAYMAN'S DAUGHTER by MAGGI ANSERSEN Eugenia Hawthorne, daughter of a deceitful highwayman, saves the life of the Earl of Trentham after he's deposited at her door suffering from a bullet wound. Outsmarting her father, the earl becomes her guardian and takes Eugenia to live as his ward in his beautiful country estate, Lilac Court. But what does he really want from her?
Buy Amazon / Buy Nook / Buy iBooks / Buy Kobo
~ Excerpt of My Lord Rogue~
Again, Simon was met by a defiant mix of stubbornness and sorrow. Then mind-boggling silence. Disgruntled but spurred to action, Simon slapped his hat on his head and began to shove on his gloves. A gentleman wouldn't have removed his gloves at all, he berated himself. But I am no gentleman. Gentlemen didn't fixate on married women. And married gentlemen didn't betray infirm wives, no matter the arrangement.
Oh, his sins were many—too many to count. Damn his eyes! On entering Bedford's box, a small part of him had held out hope that Gillian still loved him. But he'd chosen his path, and in doing so, he'd lost Gillian forever. Lies and misery separated them now. Hers. His. Bloody hell, they'd never been fated to be together, and nothing he could do or say would change that.
Gillian, Baroness Chauncey had become resourceful, cunning, and ruthless in her dealings with him. He deserved every cutting remark, every heated look. But that would not stop him from discovering the reason for her presence in Town. He'd get to the bottom of it, with or without her help.
Regret rose like a deafening buffer between them as applause ignited the crowd below and in the boxes around them. Lighting in the theater had dimmed. The play had begun. And Nelson was late, as usual, which meant Simon needed to return to his duties.
"Promise me you will not leave until our conversation is finished," he said as he made his way to the curtained exit.
"I cannot." She slanted a look at him. "I will not."
His brows shot up in surprise. "As you wish, but I will be back."
Holcroft's Deaf and Dumb began like the metaphor it was—neither character understanding the other, neither ready to accept their true feelings, neither willing to make more sacrifices than had already been made. Gillian stood before him, proud and undaunted with her chin raised and eyes set with unflinching determination.
Simon bowed, barely catching her polite curtsey. "Baroness," he said stiffly before sweeping the curtain to the side.
She made no sound.
Perhaps it is for the best, eh? his conscience prodded.
Duty linked him to Vice-Admiral Nelson, to a cause greater than flesh. The mission they embarked on together—he and Nelson—organizing a group of mercenaries that would answer to the vice-admiral and act to stop Napoleon's threat of invasion, depended on total discretion and his complete concentration. As quickly as his instincts had been triggered to follow Gillian, Simon forced her to the back of his mind, turning off his emotions as he exited the box. His heart was not equipped for the gut-wrenching truth that Gillian wanted nothing to do with him. So be it. A man could not turn back the tide.
Lovers separated by fate are reunited to serve England. Oh, this gives me chills galore and I'm so jazzed this is the beginning of reintroducing my Nelson's Tea Series in Daring a Rogue to Love. (Duke by Day, Rogue by Night, The Rogue's Prize, My Lady Rogue, and The Rogue's Surrender will follow in 2018.)
***Treasure Alert*** One lucky commenter will win an ecopy of Daring a Rogue to Love. Leave a comment for a chance to win. The winner will be announced on November 30th!
Wishin' ye fare winds!
Martinmas: Celebrating the Oncoming Winter by Barbara Bettis!
Posted by Katherine Bone in Effects
by Barbara Bettis
We don't always think of the medieval period as being a time of parties. But people then actually celebrated a variety of special days, many named for saints. Often the saint day observances coincided with earlier (pagan) celebrations.
On Nov. 11, St. Martin's Day or Martinmas was, indeed, a major holiday. The Martinmas feast, celebrated the end of autumn and the 'natural' beginning of winter.
By November the autumn harvest and land preparation for winter crops was completed. Time to get ready for the challenging days of winter. Hogs that had been turned out into the woods in October to fatten on acorns were brought in and slaughtered, and the meat preserved. Cattle were butchered, as well, keeping only those few used to begin production in the spring. (Food was scarce enough; extra for animals wasn't available.)
Read the rest of this FAScinating historical celebration Barbara Bettis's post at Romancing Yesteryear via Martinmas: Celebrating the Oncoming Winter
My Trip to Krakow and Leonardo da Vinci's Lady With an Ermine via Embracing Romance!
Adam Jerzy, Cecelia Gallerani, Czartoryski Museum, Duke of Milan, Embracing Romance, Krakow, Leonardo da Vinci, Lodovico Sforza, museum, painting, Poland, Travel
My Trip to Krakow and Leonardo da Vinci's Lady With an Ermine!
by Katherine Bone | posted in: 19th century, history, Katherine Bone, Uncategorized | 1
Ahoy! It's Katherine and I'm here to tell you a bit about the wonderful trip to Krakow, Poland, my husband and I recently took a few weeks ago. Huzzah!
In all of my military travels, until this trip, I had never been to Poland before. And sadly, I was so caught up in deadlines that I didn't even have time to research Krakow before we left. (I usually do a lot of that before I take a trip somewhere I've never been.) So when I say I was thoroughly impressed by what I found in Krakow, I'm not exaggerating. 😉
Read the rest of my post here.
Previous Adventures
#ReleaseDay ~ A Sprig of Mistletoe November 19, 2019
2019 Easter Egg Hunt Hop! April 17, 2019
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Blade Runner is a joke in retrospect!
Oh I agree. In fact I drove along Broadway about a week ago. I actually have walked all over LA, as I am part of a group that explores neighborhood.
I am not in any way suggesting that all of LA is beautiful. I know plenty of it is rundown. But I still stand by, that its not on the level of midwest and northeast cities. Keep in mind I'm not saying that this is a good or bad thing. In midwest or northeast cities there seems to be a very clear distinction between good and bad neighborhoods. In LA you have more areas that are mixed and in between.
I guess what I was referring to was the fact that is was dark and rainy a lot of the time, with skyscrapers everywhere. When I think of New York I think of it more at night, and maybe raining.
Thank you for responding, and I'm glad you walk around!
I do not believe crime is on the decline. In fact, it's on the rise on the Westside, and people I talk to from other areas are seeing it rise as well, particularly in the valley. I believe the real crime stats are being hidden, just like Tony Villar's tattoos.
Furthermore, the infrastructure is not improving -- just looke at the roads, sidewalks, etc. and tell me this city isn't becoming more Third World by the day.
Just to keep things in perspective here's an actual developing country. Remind me again which area in LA looks like that.
Also, are you in that group who only believes bad news from the government? and is suspicious of anything positive. Its the same LAPD who said crime was bad.
There's no area in LA I've seen that looks like that. Remind me again where I said that there was?
I never said it has worsened. I simply said it's still there. And very visible in sections. Personally, and I've said this before, I love the feeling of Broadway as it is, but it seems to me that many deny the obvious- the years of decay that's plainly visible throughout Broadway and much of downtown.
A lot of people talk about how it's changing. Yes, I'm sure it is. But Broadway specifically still holds with it much of the feeling of Blade Runner. Beyond that, over by the toy district and Chinatown, it continues.
The one thing that actually makes it more like the world of Blade Runner now is the rising population, but aside from that the urban decay is tempered by areas of gentrification and "revitalization".
And no one can deny Skid Row's influence on downtown. If you walk around it, it's right in your face, whether you choose to ignore it or not.
The whole theme of this thread is the trend and general direction of Los Angeles, specifically downtown, as it relates to the likelihood of its descent in to a nightmare predicted in an overrated movie.
Believe me, I'm aware of skid row, please do not lecture me. In fact, folks are ignoring it LESS now. The same gentrification that is often dismissed as ephemeral is also causing a heightened awareness of homelessness and mental health services, as a more broad segment of our city witnesses those realities on a daily basis.
Beyond that, even framing these problems as city-specific is improper. Those people were not born or raised on those streets. It's regional and national shame, and dismissing it as the City of LA's problem alone is wrong. I know you did not imply that it was, but awareness is essential. And awareness is greater now.
I apologize. I didn't mean to sound like I was lecturing you. What I should have written is "...Whether one chooses to ignore it not."
That being said, if awareness is being raised, that's of course a good thing.
All in all, Blade Runner is not a precise prediction of anything, and I don't think it ever intended to be. You call it overrated, I call it a visceral experience on the screen.
You said it was predicting a descent into a nightmare. As a whole the city and downtown LA is not at all going in that direction. But at the same time, I think that many individual cases of people on the streets downtown embody a nightmare far worse than Blade Runner, or any science fiction film could portray.
Great movie, but they probably should have set it in the year 2119 instead.
Walmart and Target are moving into downtown LA. I think that pretty much says it all about how Blade Runner missed the boat completely.
Not really - it's just another sign of the coming apocalypse.


Not far from where I grew up, there lived a family named Simmons—a father, mother, and son. The boy, Buddy, was some three years behind me in school for a while, then five, then seven. He lost ground in the educational process as time rolled on.
Buddy did not talk until he was almost four, and then he just made little bulldozer and airplane propeller sounds, which wasn't exactly talk, but was closer to it than what he'd done before, which was mostly wailing.
Publication information: Book title: Travels with George in Search of Ben Hur and Other Meanderings. Contributors: Paul Ruffin - Author. Publisher: University of South Carolina Press. Place of publication: Columbia, SC. Publication year: 2011. Page number: 48.


text:
Q: Is there any name for this family of functions? Let $\Phi$ be the class of all fonctions  $\phi$ (let's say from $\mathbb{R}^+$ to $\mathbb{R}^+$) such that:
For each sequence $\{t_n\}\subset \mathbb{R}^+$ that converges, the sequence $\{\phi(t_n)\}$ converges also.

*

*Is there any specific name for this class of functions?

*It will be interesting to see some interesting examples/counterexamples.

A: There is a tiny gap between the stated condition and the standard definition of a continuous function, but that gap can be filled as follows: if $\{ t_n\}$ converges to $a$, consider the sequence $\{s_n\}$ with terms $t_1, a, t_2, a, t_3, a, \ldots $. Then $\{ s_n\}$ converges (to $a$) and the convergence of $\{ f(s_n) \}$ implies that $\{f(t_n)\}$ converges to $f(a)$.

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