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Issue 40: Fall 2015
Ideas of Light and Dark: An Interview with Josh Weil
by Brandon Dudley & Josh Weil
Josh Weil's first novel, The Great Glass Sea, is a complex vision of an alternate Russia, one in which darkness has been banished by light-reflecting satellites, where the seasons never change under the massive greenhouses that encase the countryside, and where art, leisure and nature have fallen victim to the trappings of progress.
The novel, which was a New York Times Editor's Choice, shortlisted for the Center for Fiction's Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize, and winner of the Grub Street National Book Prize, is the story of Dima and Yarik, twin brothers with an uncommonly close bond. As children, they cling to each other as they learn to navigate the harsh world around them. As adults, though, the pressures and responsibilities of life begin to pull them apart—Yarik becomes the face of the new economic regime and Dima the face of the opposition.
The emotional heart of the novel is the brothers' effort to maintain their bond as they adjust to their new places in the world; they must learn how to continue to love each other even as they change. Weil's skillful and imaginative rendering of the brothers' struggle is as clear and reflective as the mirrors that light the countryside—in them we can see ourselves grasping, trying to hold tight the ones we love as we grow and change. Like Dima and Yarik, we too must continually adapt, continually re-orient ourselves as we make our way into these brave new worlds.
The Great Glass Sea gives the reader a path to follow, though, a perpetual light to beat back the darkness of the world. In Dima and Yarik, the novel reminds us that the best we can do, all we've ever truly had the power to do, is love unconditionally.
BRANDON DUDLEY. At one point in the novel, Dima, one of the two brothers, asks "Why thesewords? Why this story?" I'm curious about what your answer would be to those questions. What was it that compelled you to write this story?
JOSH WEIL. I think this is the best opening interview question I've ever been asked because it's exactly what a writer should ask him or herself at the start, before embarking on a novel because a novel will eat up all that writer's creative energy—hell, all her energy, period—for years. This one certainly did consume all of mine. But I wrote it for the only reason that anyone should write a novel, I think: I had to. I couldn't get away from it. I tried. Five or six years ago, when I wrote the first few paragraphs (fairly close to what's there now) I realized what I was getting into—a fable-inspired novel set in an alternate Russia and told solely through the perspective of Russian characters—and got scared. I set it aside, tried to write two other novels, failed. And wound up, in a moment of desperation, having spent half a year struggling with other stories, coming back to the one that hadn't ever quite left my mind, the one I couldn't shake. Why was it buried so deep in me? Well, some of it is my relationship to Russia, my history with that place, and some of it the way the characters, over all that time, had begun to take life in the far reaches of my imagination, almost despite myself—but, at heart, it was the brothers. I'm extremely close with my brother, and grew up with him the most important person in my world, and for a while we were that for each other. Then life changed, as it will, and we had to figure out how to change with it. It was so important to me not to lose the bond I have with my brother, to find a way to adapt—and it was to him, too. So a story about brothers who are facing the same issue, but intensified by pressures far beyond anything my brother and I faced, was tapping into a concern at my core.
DUDLEY. The idea of Russia launching light-reflecting space mirrors appeared in your short story "Mirza," published in Narrative back in 2007. That story is very different than The Great Glass Sea, but what was it about the space mirror idea that drew you back and made you want to make it the centerpiece of a novel?
WEIL. You're absolutely right: that was the first place that I wrote about the space mirrors. But I found myself returning to the idea—first in another short story, The First Bad Thing (published a couple years later in American Short Fiction), then in a wider-ranging way in a number of stories and novellas all of which deal, broadly, with the idea of light and dark and the attempt to diminish one with the other. It was simply such fertile territory, both for metaphor and for mise-en-scene, for description and interesting ways to crack the worlds of my characters and force dramatic tension upon them. So I wound up working on a story collection (which is nearly, finally, done) and The Great Glass Sea was, originally, going to be a story in that collection. Then, as I got deeper into it, I thought it would be a novella. Of course, it wound up a novel, and not a short one. And there's a third book now, also tied to this same theme, that's a novella collection. So I guess the space mirrors sparked a larger interest in illumination and darkness that has wound up becoming what will eventually be a sort of trilogy.
DUDLEY. I once heard the Irish writer Mike McCormack speak about recurring themes in a writer's work, which he described as a gravity in the writer's pen that repeatedly leads them in certain directions. What gravity do you think is in your pen; what themes do you feel you keep coming back to in your work?
WEIL. That's a wonderful way to put it—the gravity in a writer's pen. As different as my two books seem on the surface, I do think there's a lot that links them, and it's exactly that gravity. I seem to be drawn to write about characters who don't fit into the worlds in which they find themselves living. I keep coming back to the loss of loved ones, the struggle to either keep that loss at bay or salve the wound that it can cause.
DUDLEY. You said in another interview that this book was inspired in part by your love for your brother, and the book is dedicated to him. At many points in the novel, the story of the two brothers has the feel of a fable, a form which typically has a lesson to teach the reader. Does the novel have any special lessons for your brother? Is there anything you're hoping the readers, especially readers with brothers, will come away from the story having learned?
WEIL. Well, inspired by and dedicated to is so very different from being about. The book is redolent of fables, but it's not quite a fable. The book springs from my love for my brother, but it's not about him. I never thought of it, and still don't, as something from which he might learn anything. I hope that he might read passages and recognize some of the emotions in them. I trust that he will read others and recognize them as stepping far away from our actual relationship. More than anything, I hope that he gets swept up in the story, in the characters, the book itself, a world of its own. That's what I wish for anyone, whether they have a sibling or not. But I do think that a reader who has a sibling—or really anyone who has a loving relationship that has had to grow over time—might bring a particular emotional rawness to parts of the story. And it's that that I'd hope to touch. A lesson? If there's one in there, at least one meant for siblings, it's probably simply a defense of the special nature of a sibling relationship, a reminder that it can be as strong, in its way—and, perhaps, as rewarding and as worthy of attention—as any other kind of love. As far as a larger lesson meant for a more general reader (the kind of thing that might be present in a fable), the closest I can think of is a call to pay attention to the pressures of contemporary capitalism, to some of the ways that it skews our focus in life. Again, not a simple lesson (because it's not a fable) but a muddy mucking around in an idea that I hope will cause the reader to think harder and longer about it after the book is closed.
DUDLEY. There are many dualities in the novel, but two that stood out to me were art vs. science, and quality of life vs. social progress. In the novel there was a great deal of friction between the separate sides, and I wondered if maybe you could comment on what you hoped to illustrate with those conflicts.
WEIL. It's more how those conflicts speak to me, what they created, dramatically, for the story. Personally, I find that much of where modern life pushes us—the constant intrusion of work in the form of email and the internet, the ceaseless plugging-in, the fetishization of productivity, the ever expanding world of gadgets and gizmos that become, with each year, newly 'necessary'—directs my life in a way that is less fulfilling and peaceful than when I pare down to a more simple way of living. The happiest I've ever been is writing day after day alone in a cabin eating rice and beans or cans of soup, unplugged from most of the world, talking by phone to the few people I truly love, living a fairly hermetic life far removed from the usual bustle. So that concern speaks to me. But what makes it central to the story—what makes it part of the story, instead of just a thematic overlay (which I wouldn't want to dominate a novel)—is that the pressures that come with modern life are the very things that split the brothers apart. If one of them (Dima) doesn't push against those pressures, there's no story. So it's less illustrating something than using a concern I have to create the underpinnings of the dramatic tension in the novel.
DUDLEY. The novel is set in Russia, where you spent time as a teenager. What took you to Russia back then, and how do you feel that influenced your writing this novel all these years later?
WEIL. I studied Russian language and culture, intensively, from age twelve to eighteen, all throughout middle school and high school. And when I was fourteen I went to the Soviet Union (the last year before it crumbled) as an exchange student, living with a host family in small city in the country's far north. That's an age when you're just figuring out who you are, when you're growing into who you will be, and the experience was hugely important to me. The world I saw there was so different from the one back home and, when I got home, it didn't leave me; it lodged inside me. By the time I wrote the novel, so much time had gone by that my memories were nearly fables themselves. And it was from that place—a place of memory and imagination—that the story came.
DUDLEY. You traveled to Russia again while writing the novel. How had Russia changed in the time since you'd last been there?
WEIL. Oh, tremendously. It was more changed than any place I've ever been to before or since. Where there once were tea-rooms there were Starbucks-style coffee shops in Moscow. A city that had once seemed so gray and serious and head-down-dogged now seemed, in many ways, gilded, and bright, and almost bubbly, frivolous and light as champagne, and almost drunk on itself. Where once there were no advertisements at all, now there were banners and billboards everywhere. In St. Petersburg, even the canals seemed less beautiful to me—maybe in part because of my own romanticization of the first time I'd seen them in my youth, but also because the painted plaster of the walls lining them was outshone now by gaudy bright banners advertising all sorts of goods and sales. The visual world, in other words, was very different. And the pressures on peoples lives were very different: people spoke to me of having more, and being able to choose more, but also of having less of a safety net, of feeling like they had to constantly scramble just to make ends meet, of no longer having time for family and friends, that kind of thing. But some things were very much the same—the Russianness of the people, of course, things like the dramatic and dark sensibility, the small ways of doing things that make a culture a culture (the way people make tea, or treat each other when lining up at a ticket window). I think in many ways the Russians still hadn't shaken ways of relating to the world that were deeply ingrained by 70 years of the communist state. And, although some of those things made traveling and talking with stranger difficult (there is, I found, an unwillingness to help a stranger that, I think, comes from the need to keep your nose out of other people's business in Soviet times), I found most of that deeply reassuring—that the place was still a very different world from the one I knew back home in America.
DUDLEY. What sort of research was involved in writing about the scientific elements of the novel? Did you feel like you had to be absolutely faithful to the science behind the space mirrors and the glass sea, or did you feel like you were able to tweak the science in service of the story?
WEIL. Oh, the science was always in service of the story. Everything is in service of the story. And the story springs from the characters' wounds and needs. Which is why I never thought of the novel as science fiction—and still am surprised when other people (mistaken, I think) do. Still, like any research (the same as that which I did into tractor repair or the raising of beef cattle for my first book) it's important to get it right enough that the believability of the world isn't broken for the reader. Right enough that even a reader smarter about this stuff than I am won't be taken out of the spell of the book by some slip-up that I make. That's the most important concern. And then, of course, there's the way that research can open up new ideas for the story, reveal new channels—which is fun (though dangerous, since it can lead a writer astray). I got to those places, and to that level of accuracy with the science, through some reading—I was lucky enough to be teaching at different universities and so had access to their libraries—but mostly through asking questions of people who really know their fields. It's amazing how generous people are with their expertise, and their time. There's a pretty hefty list of botanists and biologists and physicists and whatnot in the acknowledgements.
DUDLEY. At one point in the novel, you write "And no matter how good you make a lie, if it's not how the world works people won't believe it." When I read that line it reminded me of Karen Russell's essay "Engineering Impossible Architectures," where she writes: "No matter how foreign or strange your imaginary world may initially appear, if your characters move through it in ways that feel "realistic"—if your characters' speech and behavior and moods and terrors ring true to what we know about their personalities and basic human nature—then your readers are far more likely to accept the place on its own terms."
The world you created was very complex, very fantastic, but very believable at the same time. I wondered, now that you've written a novel centered around building an "impossible architecture," if you had any advice for other writers trying to pull off that feat?
WEIL. I think Karen Russell's advice is spot on and the most important to keep in mind when writing worlds far from your own. I might add this: push beyond your first impulse. When having to imagine whole cloth we tend to step back into generalities or the expected when, really, it's an opportunity for us to create specifics that are even less expected. So look hard at first impulses in description or the action a character takes, or anything, really and see if there's a hint of a place more surprising, a way in that's even more specific to this strange world. I'd also say be fearless: if you ground what you make up in the kind of thing that Russell is talking about then, most of the time, you'll get away with it. So don't be afraid to push into territory that feels unsafe. And finally: specifics, specifics, specifics. If your reader can truly see, taste, feel, the world you're writing, he or she will believe in it.
DUDLEY. Not only did you write the novel, but you actually drew the images on the endpapers and the banners at the beginning of each chapter. They're all very cleverly drawn, and one fun experience reading the book was seeing how the images echoed the events of each chapter. What was the process like for you creating those images? Was there a lot of trial and error and revision or did the images come to you easily?
WEIL. Mostly it was a joy to be able to bring another side of myself to the novel and to be able to experience the creation of the book in another way— a way that, I hope, adds another dimension of pleasure and interest to the reader's experience. But it was also a lot of work. I didn't want to do the drawings until we had a final edit (because I needed to know what elements in each chapter would make their way into the illustrations) so I was working on a pretty tight deadline once I started the artwork. That meant I pretty much did nothing but draw, ten hours a day, for about six weeks. It was an intense time. And I was trying to incorporate some of another artist's style into my work—Ivan Bilibin's, whose illustrations, for me, are inseparable from Russian fables—so that meant referring to his work, as well. I'd sketch the drawings first (often this took the longest time—coming up with rough ideas and seeing what would work), then do a detailed drawing, then ink it in. Because I'm not a professional (and so didn't know some of the tricks of the trade) this was the tensest part, because any slip-up with the ink would mean I had start all over again.
DUDLEY. Though this is your first published novel, you have written others that were not published. What did you learn from those experiences that helped you with this novel?
WEIL. There were some lessons—make sure the concerns of the story are complex and deep enough that the require a novel (and couldn't be addressed in a shorter form); don't be afraid of dramatic scenes, of action driving story; get the sentences as tight as possible, then tighten again, and again, and again; make the big, painful revisions, even when going back in makes you want to puke from exhaustion—but, honestly, I just matured as a writer and a person. I read more stuff. I got to a point where what I had to say warranted the space (I hope) and was matched by an ability with craft that made the saying of it worth reading (again, I hope). It's that confluence that's hard to find, to wait for, to push for: in my earlier writing I think that I was writing well enough, craft-wise, to write a good book. But I wasn't, well, wise enough to match that ability with maturity. Or I was making mistakes that were too big to fix in later drafts. I still make them, of course. I made mistakes with this book. And always will, I'm sure. But you hope to get to a point where the mistakes don't swamp what's working, and where what's working is closer and closer to the heart of what matters.
DUDLEY. What's the best piece of writing advice you've received, or, alternately, what's the best advice you feel you can give writers just starting out?
WEIL. Write what you have to write, what you can't get away from writing, what you feel so strongly about that you want to grapple with it even though it scares you. If what you're writing doesn't scare you a little—because it comes close to you, or pushes you, or touches a particularly fragile place…etc.—then you probably shouldn't be writing it.
BRANDON DUDLEY is a second-year fiction candidate in the Sierra Nevada College MFA program. He is a former journalist and currently teaches high school English in Maine, where he lives with his wife and two sons.
Author Index: Brandon DudleyAuthor Index: Josh Weil


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San Antonio attraction from the 1968 World's Fair. Tower of the Americas The fair's theme structure is the 750-foot-tall (228 m) Tower of the Americas, which remains today as the Alamo City's tallest skyscraper. The top of the tower houses a revolving restaurant, lounge, and outdoor observation deck, and it was designed by architect O'Neil Ford.


Once a year Sendai bursts into a riot of color as the city streets are decorated with sweeping streamers mounted on tall bamboo poles. Look closely for glimpses of the seven traditional ornaments tucked in among the streamers. Diverse events held here and there add to the festive mood of the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri.
Colorful Tanabata streamers fill a crowded shopping street.
Every year over the three days of August 6 to 8, more than 2 million people converge upon Sendai, known in Japanese as Mori no miyako, the "City of Trees," to enjoy the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri. Sendai is the capital of Miyagi Prefecture and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. During the festival the city center and surrounding commercial districts are festooned with decorations.
Colorful streamers made of washi paper hang from bamboo poles set up along major streets and shopping areas.
The annual Tanabata festival celebrates the once-yearly meeting of Orihime (Vega), the weaver star and patron of silk farming, and Hikoboshi (Altair), the cowherd star and agricultural messenger. Based on ancient Chinese folklore, the festival traces its origins in Japan to a ceremony known as kikōden in which supplicants prayed for improved handcraft skills. The ceremony was focused on Orihime's weaving skills and appears to have been introduced from China in the Nara period (710–794).
The festival is celebrated throughout the country today, but the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri, believed to have first been promoted by Date Masamune (1567–1636), the first lord of the Sendai domain, is the most famous.
The Sendai tanabata decorations take many forms, but are invariably flamboyant.
In most areas of Japan, tanabata is marked with bamboo branches decorated with strips of paper called tanzaku on which people write their wishes and hopes. At the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri, however, the tanzaku are just one of seven essential ornaments.
The seven ornaments, in addition to the tanzaku, are kinchaku purses for wealth and prosperity, kuzukago waste baskets containing paper cuttings for cleanliness and frugality, toami fish nets for an abundant catch, orizuru folded cranes for household safety and long life, fukinagashi threads for improved weaving skills, and kamigoromo paper kimonos that promise to improve sewing skills and ward off sickness and disaster.
The bamboo poles are topped by a large round ball called a kusudama. The flowing washi paper streamers are nearly 5 meters long and rustle in the wind with a cooling sound said to bring relief from the summer heat.
Sponsoring organizations compete to create the most creative and impressive decorations.
The Sendai Tanabata Matsuri decorations are crafted several months before the event by groups of shop owners, businesses, and schools. The decorations are judged on the first day of the festival with gold, silver, and bronze placards awarded to the top three. The placards are proudly displayed on the winning decorations. It is a grand sight to see the colorful and unique tanabata decorations lining the city streets and shopping areas.
The whole city turns out for the fun.
Numerous events are held throughout the city during the three days of the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri. Stalls in the city's central Kōtōdai Park sell all manner of food, including the Sendai specialties of beef tongue and oysters, to be savored while enjoying dramatic taiko drum performances, marching bands, and elegant bon odori dancing. A variety of fun activities for children are also available, such as the crafting of miniature tanabata decorations.
Tel.: 022-265-8185 (Sendai Tanabata Festival Support Association office, Sendai Chamber of Commerce and Industry).
Dates: August 6 to 8. Decorations are up 10:00 am to 10:00 pm (9:00 pm on August 8). Omatsuri Hiroba (Festival Plaza) open 10:00 am to 9:00 pm (all times are tentative).
Website: http://www.sendaitanabata.com/en (also available in Korean and simplified and traditional Chinese).
English, Korean, and simplified and traditional Chinese guidance available at temporary tourist information booth.
Zuihōden is a mausoleum complex centered on the mausoleum of Date Masamune, the first lord of the Sendai domain. The original structure, built in 1637 in accordance with Masamune's last will and testament, was famous for its gorgeous architectural features in the style of the Momoyama period (1573–1615). In 1945, the building burned to the ground in World War II. The current structure was built in 1979, undergoing extensive renovations in 2001 to more closely replicate its original elegance and bright colors. A nearby museum houses materials documenting archeological surveys of the complex and a rich display of burial objects.
Access: Take a Loople Sendai bus from the West Exit of JR Sendai Station (Bus Pool No. 15-3) and get off at the Zuihoden-mae bus stop (15 min).
Open year-round: 9:00 am to 4:30 pm (4:00 pm in December–January). Hours are extended during the Sendai Tanabata Matsuri.
Entrance fee: ¥550 (¥400 for high school students and ¥200 for junior high and elementary school students).
Website: http://www.zuihoden.com/en/ (also available in Korean and simplified and traditional Chinese).
Smartphone app guidance available in English, Korean, and simplified and traditional Chinese.


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Have representations of romance from 'Madame Bovary' to 'Four Weddings and a Funeral' ruined the real thing?
Crucially, over the centuries, the most important factor to have shaped how we love is art. It is through novels, poems, songs and, latterly, films that we have acquired our ideas about what aspects of our feelings we should value and where our emotional emphases should fall.
This is unfortunate. It's not that the art has been bad; indeed a lot of it has reached the highest aesthetic pitch. It's simply that representations of love in culture have frequently been profoundly misleading at the psychological level. That we are quite so bad at loving — and the statistics on relationship breakdowns suggest we really are — is a problem that can at least in part be laid at the door of culture. The primary impediment to having better relationships may be the quality of our art.
To call for "better" art doesn't mean art that is more moving or colourful or impassioned. The art that deals with love is already all those things and more. What it is lacking are crucial elements of wisdom, realism and maturity. Our love stories excite us to expect things of love that are neither very possible nor very practical. The narrative arts of the romantic tradition — everything from the poetry of Keats to films such as Before Sunrise (1995) and Lost in Translation (2003) — have unwittingly constructed a devilish template of expectations of what relationships are supposed to be like, in the light of which our own love lives often look grievously unsatisfying. We may break up with our partners or feel romantically cursed because we have been systematically exposed to the wrong sorts of love stories.
In western literary culture, the book that has most generously and deeply explored the issue of how love stories affect our relationships is Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary (1856). Early on in the novel, we learn that Emma Bovary spent her childhood in a convent immersed in heady Romantic fiction. As a result, she's expecting that her husband will be a transcendent being, someone who understands her soul perfectly, a constantly thrilling intellectual and sexual presence.
When she eventually does get married to the kind, thoughtful but in the end human (and therefore often humdrum) Charles, she is set up for a fall. She is quickly bored by the routines of married life. She has no interest in domestic chores, she hates having to prepare dinner, organise the linen cupboard and have quiet nights in with her spouse. Her dissatisfaction gets even worse when her first child arrives on the scene. She is convinced that her life has gone profoundly wrong for one central reason: because it's so different from what the novels she knows told her it would be.
In a clumsy search to bring her reality in line with art, she embarks on a series of misguided affairs with louche figures, spends too much money, neglects her child and eventually commits suicide — bankrupt and in disgrace. Flaubert lays the blame squarely at the door of literature: a certain kind of Romantic novel is responsible for Emma Bovary's death. He is writing the novel that she should have read in order to tolerate the reality of marriage — though sadly, she is the only one not to be able to benefit from Flaubert's wry, realistic wisdom.
We are all, at points, as deluded as Emma Bovary, for our art is full of omissions. For example, in so many romantic tales, the whole business of work is rarely viewed as relevant to the enduring of a relationship. Yet of course, in reality, part of the rationale of any relationship is to enable two people to function as a stable joint economic unit for the education of the next generation. This is in no way banal. There are opportunities for genuine heroism here. Especially around laundry. We don't hear much about this in art.
One of the central manuals of Romanticism — the book that more than any other taught people how to love in a new way — was The Sorrows of Young Werther, written by the German poet and philosopher Goethe in 1774, when he was in his mid-twenties. The book was an instant bestseller in Germany, England and France; Napoleon read it seven times. The novel tells the story of a student, Werther, and his doomed love for a young (betrothed) woman, Charlotte. The tone is intense and ardent. Yet, crucially, as his love for Charlotte grows, Werther is not distracted by the demands of an occupation. Romantic love is a leisured experience.
Romanticism and capitalism are the two dominant ideas of our time, guiding the way we think and feel about the two things that usually matter most in our lives: relationships and work. But combining romanticism and capitalism, as we are actually expected to do, can be arduous in the extreme. It's an unhappy historical clash. We live under two very powerful but oddly incompatible systems — and art doesn't help us here. The impressive philosophy of romantic love in art — with its emphasis on intimacy and openness and spending lengthy, carefree days together (often in nature, sometimes next to cliffs or waterfalls) — sits very badly with the requirements of working routines that fill our heads with complex demands, keep us away from home for long stretches and render us insecure about our positions in a competitive environment.
In Richard Linklater's irresistible film, Before Sunrise, two young lovers meet on a train, fall in love and spend hours talking about their feelings while walking the streets of Vienna at night. Like so many romantic works of art, the film suggests that love involves very close communication about pretty much everything. But the level of openness this assumes is wholly at odds with the realities of day-to-day life.
After a tricky day (or week), one's mind is likely to be numb with worries and duties. We may not feel like doing much besides sitting in silence, staring at the kitchen appliances, or running through a series of dramas and crises at work. Such preoccupation is not pleasant to witness, and it risks expressing itself in a range of not very endearing symptoms: grunting, brooding silence and a short-fused temper. The most innocuous-sounding question about how the day might have gone can elicit a growl — then, if it is repeated, an explosion. None of this we'll be prepared for if we stick to the romantic script.
When romantic writers have explored the troubles of relationships in their works, they have tended to draw attention to important, but notably limited, issues. The great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin depicted the challenges faced by rational, self-possessed people in revealing their true desires in Eugene Onegin (1825-32). Jane Austen was acutely attentive to how differences in social status could pose obstacles to a couple's chances of contentment. In Italy, the most widely read novel of the 19th century — The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni — discussed how political corruption could overwhelm love. All these great writers were — in different ways — deeply interested in what might make it hard for a relationship to go well.
And yet there has tended to be something major missing from their list. There has never been very much interest in any of the challenges that fall within the realm of what we can call the "domestic", a term that captures all the practicalities of living together and extends across a range of small but crucial issues, including whom one should visit on the weekend, what time to go to bed, and whether or not towels should be hung up in the bathroom.
From the romantic point of view, these things cannot be serious or important. Relationships are made or broken over grand, dramatic matters: fidelity and betrayal, the courage to face society on one's own terms, the tragedy of being ground down by political opposition. The day-to-day minutiae of the domestic sphere seem entirely unimpressive and humiliatingly insignificant by comparison.
The good-enough ordinary love stories that do exist are therefore all the more remarkable. Karl Ove Knausgaard's cataloguing of his daily life comes to mind, or, to pick a mid-20th century example, Evan Connell's Mrs Bridge, which looked at the everyday unhappiness of married life. In cinema, we have the films of Eric Rohmer in France or those of Joanna Hogg in the UK, as well as American indie movies such as Richard Linklater's Before Midnight (2013), which catches up with the lovers from Before Sunrise in discontented middle age, and acts as a brilliant corrective to his earlier romanticism. These haven't fundamentally changed our views of love, but they offer a welcome counterpoint to our more starry-eyed predilections.
Until our art changes more completely, we won't go into relationships ready to perceive domestic issues as important potential flashpoints to look out for and pay attention to. We won't acknowledge how much it may end up mattering whether we can maturely resolve issues around the eating of toast in bed or the conundrum of whether it is stylish, or a touch pretentious, to give a cocktail party.
Films like When Harry Met Sally . . . (1989) and Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) are typical in centring the action entirely on the run-up to the start of a relationship. But for most of us, our life's problem isn't finding a partner (that's just one very important and at points thrilling phase), it is tolerating the candidate one eventually finds, and being tolerated by them, over time. A wiser culture than ours would recognise that the start of a relationship is not the high point that romantic art assumes; it is merely the first step of a far longer, more ambivalent and yet quietly audacious journey on which we should direct our intelligence and scrutiny.
There's another thing missing from a lot of art about love: children. In films such as Amélie (2001), children are incidental, sweet symbols of mutual love, or naughty in an endearing way. They rarely cry, take up little time, and are generally wise, exhibiting an unschooled intelligence. But in life, we come to see that relationships are often fundamentally oriented towards the having and raising of children — and, at the same time, that children tend to place the couple under unbearable strain. They may kill the passion that made them possible. Life moves from the sublime to the quotidian. There are toys in the living room, pieces of chicken under the table, years of rebellion and no time to talk. Everyone is always tired. This, too — unlike what Shelley or Baudelaire tell us — is love.
Our culture is full of skilful depictions of love. But at the same time, many of these tales are very unhelpful. We learn to judge ourselves by the hopes and expectations fostered by a misleading artistic medium. By its standards, our own relationships are almost all damaged and unsatisfactory. No wonder separation or divorce so often appear to be inevitable. They shouldn't be. We merely need to tell ourselves more accurate stories about the progress of relationships, stories that normalise troubles and show us an intelligent, helpful path through them.


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Rail and Canal offers comfort food favorites
Jolene Cleaver
ROME — For Rome's Rail and Canal restaurant and bar, new beginnings are paying off.
Opening the restaurant in Rome is a second career for owner Michael D'Amore who will be 72 at the end of November, he said over a recent cup of Saturday morning coffee.
D'Amore grew up in Rome, however, life took him to Long Island where he retired after 40 years from working as a collision mechanic.
But, "my kids are here. My grandkids are here," he said of his return to the Copper City.
After coming home, he tried the retirement thing — relaxing and taking on small projects — but that just didn't suit him, he said.
"When you are used to working 12 hour days ..." he trailed off.
So, when an opportunity came up to renovate the empty building next to Rome's train station — that had a history of being an eating establishment stretching back 85 years — he jumped on it.
"It's been completely gutted," D'Amore said, standing at a bar he made himself. "So, here we are ... everything in here I did myself. I spent 15 months doing this. This is rewarding."
While reconfiguring the space D'Amore said he added creature comforts such as USB ports so patrons can charge their phones and hooks for handbags at the bar.
While crafting the menu he said he focused on well-priced comfort favorites he knows people in this neck of the woods will eat. Skimming the menu, diners will see riggies, wings, homemade greens, gnocchi and haddock among the offerings.
D'Amore also said the Martin Street business community has been very welcoming and supportive of one another, and he said he tries to source as many items as he can in the Rome area.
"We need to pool our resources. ... Buy in Rome. We need to keep the growth here," he said.
Since opening in June, he said business has been good and he is getting repeat customers, "So, I feel like I am doing something right," he said lightheartedly.
"It's long days, but I'm up to it."

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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LRC Team
For inquiries please email
Debra Winter, Administrative Director
debra.winter@friendsofthelrc.org
Friends of the LRC
712 H St NE Unit #944
A 501(c)(3) Nonprofit Organization
Using the Law as an Instrument of Justice Throughout South Africa
The Friends of the Legal Resources Centre of South Africa assists the Legal Resources Centre financially, contributes to its work through joint initiatives, and helps publicize its accomplishments in the United States and globally. LRC attorneys provide legal services without charge to the poor, vulnerable, and marginalized throughout South Africa. With offices in Cape Town, Durban, Grahamstown, and Johannesburg, the LRC uses a range of legal strategies, including impact litigation, law reform, participation in partnerships and development processes, education, and networking within South Africa, throughout the African continent, and at the international level.
The LRC was established in 1979 with the financial support of three American foundations – the Carnegie Corporation, the Ford Foundation, and the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. When four distinguished Americans – Lloyd Cutler, Erwin Griswold, Louis Loss, and Bernard Segal – learned that Arthur Chaskalson, Geoff Budlender, and Felicia Kentridge intended, during the height of apartheid, to establish what would become the LRC, they decided to establish a U.S. charitable organization, now known as the Friends of the Legal Resources Centre of South Africa, hopeful that the FoLRC might offer some level of protection to LRC lawyers and staff during those dangerous days.
© 2021 FoLRC - All Rights Reserved.


Made a cold and misty night on My way home from work.
I added a bit more mist in Color Efex Pro and converted it to black and white in Silver Efex Pro.
Benches by Bo47 is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.


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Fulton, MO 94° View Live Radar Fri H 99° L 77° Sat H 98° L 74° Sun H 85° L 64° Weather Sponsored By:
National Churchill Museum event schedule
May 3rd, 2019 in Local News
Welcome to the 50th anniversary party for the National Churchill Museum, created in 1969 to commemorate the 1946 visit of Sir Winston Churchill, invited by President Harry S. Truman.
Most events will be at or near the National Churchill Museum, at the corner of Westminster Avenue and West Seventh Street in Fulton. The museum and most of the events this weekend are free.
11 a.m., 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. —Museum tours
Meet at the Front Desk of America's National Churchill Museum
1 p.m. — 50th anniversary Commemorative Tour
The 1 p.m. tour will be led by author, artist and videographer Steve Stinson, one of the original tour guides for the Museum during the 1960s.
3 p.m. — Lecture: Preserving the Past: Christopher Wren's Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury, at the church
Sir Christopher Wren's 52 London parish churches constitute one of the greatest architectural achievements of the Baroque era. Preservation Historian Esley Hamilton will discuss how war and commerce have taken a toll on this heritage. This talk will explore the nature of Wren's church designs and approaches to preserve them.
4:30 p.m. — Opening Concert: A Recital on the Noel Mander Organ, Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury
Churchill Fellow and native St. Louisan Frederick Hohman transforms the pipe organ from a "Sunday morning" instrument into a virtual symphony orchestra. Hohman will play the Church's Mander organ, built and installed by the well-known British organ builder Noel Mander, whose most famous organ is at St. Paul's Cathedral in London. His Aldermanbury organ is considered by many the finest baroque organ in America.
6 p.m. — Reception with Churchill Family Members and a Preview of New Exhibits, at the Plaza Outside America's National Churchill Museum
Painting as a Pastime: From Winston to the White House; An Imaginative Concept: Christopher Wren's St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury Journey to Fulton; The Special Relationship Project
Together with members of the Churchill family, guests will have a preview of three exciting exhibits. Inspired by Churchill, Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy and George W. Bush became enthusiastic amateur painters. For the first time, their paintings will be publicly displayed along with works by Churchill. Another exhibit celebrates the relocation of Christopher Wren's 17th century Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury from London to Fulton in the 1960s. A third features more than 4,000 paintings by K-12 students from Missouri who explore the idea of "special relationship," a term coined by Winston Churchill in his Fulton speech.
7 p.m. — Dinner and Program with Members of the Churchill Family, The Historic Gymnasium
A dinner and spirited program with Clementine and Winston Churchill's granddaughters the Honourable Edwina Sandys, M.B.E., and the Honourable Emma Soames; great-grandsons Jack Churchill and Duncan Sandys; former Monsanto CEO and legendary Churchillian Richard Mahoney; British historian and Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts; author and trail blazer Tina Santi Flaherty; Clark Durant, the highly regarded Detroit education innovator and political leader; and, the irrepressible author and fan favorite Lord Alan Watson.
10 a.m., 2:30 p.m. and 4 p.m. — Walking in Churchill and Truman's Footsteps Tour.
Meet Outside the Front Entrance of America's National Churchill Museum
Walk in the footsteps of Winston Churchill and President Harry Truman when they visited the campus of Westminster on March 5, 1946. Tour the Historic Gymnasium, where the "Iron Curtain" Speech was given, and the College President's house where Churchill enjoyed a nap, a meal, and drink. Guests include St. Louisan Baxter Watson, who, as a student in 1946, led Churchill and Truman into the Historic Gymnasium.
9 a.m. Meet the Authors and Book Signing, Inside America's National Churchill Museum
A chance to meet noted authors Andrew Roberts, whose Churchill biography "Walking with Destiny" is a New York Times bestseller; Lord Alan Watson, whose "Two Speeches to Save the World" chronicles the impact of Churchill's Fulton and Zurich speeches; Jim Wilson, author of the historical fiction "Churchill and Roosevelt: The Big Sleepover at the White House"; Tina Santi Flaherty, whose "What's Jackie Taught Us," highlights the heroic battles of Jackie Kennedy and Churchill; and, Edwina Sandys, whose career and life is captured in art. Her book "Winston Churchill: Painting as a Pastime" remains the Museum's best-selling book.
10 a.m. — Continuing the Special Relationship: Sculptural Life Casting of Special Guests,
Inside America's National Churchill Museum
Sculptor and Churchill Fellow Don Wiegand will make life casts of two surprise guests — one American, the other British — to symbolize the ongoing "special relationship" between the United States and Great Britain.
11 a.m. Meet the Artist and Experience Breakthrough, In front of the Breakthrough sculpture (Berlin Wall)
Internationally acclaimed artist and Churchill granddaughter Edwina Sandys will discuss her sculpture, Breakthrough, comprised of eight sections of the Berlin Wall, with a dramatic introduction and special guests.
12:30 p.m. — Enid and R. Crosby Kemper Lecture and Luncheon, The Historic Gymnasium
Churchill Fellow Andrew Roberts will inform and entertain with "Churchill and Humor," from his published and widely acclaimed Churchill biography "Walking with Destiny." Fellow Roberts will emphasize Churchill's sense of humor, which he used to good effect in every facet of his life.
2:30 p.m. — 50th anniversary parade
Starts across from America's National Churchill Museum
Enjoy a fun time with members of the Churchill and Truman families and other VIPs at the 50th anniversary parade, which will include U.S. military bands, high school bands, the St. Andrews Society Pipes and Drum Corps, the Air Attaché British Embassy, and other VIPs. There will be historic military vehicles, and more as we retrace the route Winston Churchill and President Truman took when they arrived March 5, 1946, in Fulton. There also is a special salute to the Eagle Squadrons of WWII and one of their own, 1st Lt. John Lutz, of Fulton. Parade-goers will enjoy a flyover of a WWII B-25, which also will be available at Fulton Airport for 30-minute rides (cost $350). Proceeds benefit the Commemorative Air Force and National Churchill Museum.
Parade route: Starts at the corner of Westminster Avenue and West Seventh Street, south on Westminster Avenue, east on Fifth Street, north on Court Street, west on Seventh Street, and ends after passing the museum. A reviewing stand will be at Westminster Avenue and West Seventh Street, in front of the Churchill Institute. There will be four food vendors nearby.
6 p.m. — Churchill Gala with David Rubenstein (business attire), at The Historic Gymnasium
Join members of the Churchill Family and Co-Founder and Co-Executive Chairman of The Carlyle Group David Rubenstein for a gala dinner in Westminster College's Historic Gymnasium, the site of Winston Churchill's historic "Sinews of Peace" (or the "Iron Curtain" speech).
10 a.m. 11:15 a.m. — Special 50th anniversary service, The Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury
Join us for a special commemorative service in honor of the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury's 50th anniversary with Rev. Jonathan Brewster, Residentiary Canon of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, the Rev. Kelly Carlson, of Ladue, Lord Alan Watson of Richmond, and others. Nine new Churchill Fellows also will be installed. Coffee, tea and pastries will be served after the ceremonies.
Fultonsun


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'Best scheme I've seen' - Stoke City praised for 'ingenious' season ticket plan by national fan body
Stoke City are offering 11-game ticket to get around much-reduced capacity
Malcolm Clarke, chairman of the Football Supporters Association, says Stoke City's season ticket plan is 'ingenious and fair'.
Get the City transfer latest, team news, match updates and analysis delivered straight to your inbox
Stoke City's innovative plan to get supporters back in the bet365 Stadium this season is considered the best scheme any club has come up with so far.
Malcolm Clarke, the Stoke-supporting but steadfastly objective chairman of the Football Supporters Association (FSA), has been keeping a close eye on how all clubs are trying to deal with an unprecedented situation and gradually allow spectators to return.
The FSA, as well as Stoke's own fans' council, was involved in long discussions with Stoke to come up with an idea that was announced yesterday to try to deal fairly with a capacity reduced from 30,000 to between 6,000 and 9,000.
Stoke are splitting the home fixture list in two – with supporters able to choose from a red list or white list at half the price of a normal season ticket – while season ticket holders from 2019/20 will have their seat reserved for 2021/22 when hopefully normality has returned.
Stoke City confirm innovative season ticket plan to get fans back to bet365 Stadium
'You can plan your lives' - Stoke City season ticket plan, why and how the club chose this model and what will happen when rules change
Season ticket holders will also be able to live stream the 11 other home matches – and mid-week away matches – with a £50 package. Match tickets may be available depending on capacity and take up and season ticket holders from the alternative list would get first dibs.
Clarke said: "I am very pleased that Stoke City exchanged ideas and information with the FSA when devising its ticketing plans for the return of fans to the stadium.
"The health of supporters, club staff and the people they live with and care for must, of course, always be the top priority. The allocation scheme adopted by Stoke City is ingenious and fair.
"While prioritising the loyalty of season card holders, it treats them all equally without recourse to the vagaries of ballots for each game, which would be an administrative nightmare and would leave uncertainty for all fans on which games they can go to. It is better than any other scheme I've so far seen.
Stoke City 2020/21 11-game season card plan
Stoke City are introducing half-price 11-game season cards split into a red and a white category with the games in each category clearly defined and adult prices starting from £165.
2020/21 early bird purchasers and anyone who held a 2019/20 season card, will have a priority window to purchase an 11-game season card.
You can select up to six seats (from a maximum of two households) in your group ('bubble') from a seating plan specifically designed to meet social distance guidelines.
You choose whether you come to the 11 games listed as 'red' or the 11 listed as 'white'. Your season card will then reserve you the same seat of your choice for every time you attend the stadium.
As the games in each of the red and the white category are clearly defined you will know exactly which games you have tickets for, will not have to print tickets at home on a match-by-match basis and will not face the potential disappointment of missing out in ticket ballots.
In partnership with the EFL and Sky, Stoke are also to make available a streaming pass for the 11 home games not covered by the 11-game season cards – as well as mid-week away league matches – for just £50.
11-game season cards can be purchased using a six-month payment plan.
"The price of the new cards and the streaming option is very good value for money, as we have come to associate with Stoke City.
"We appreciate the hard work put in by club staff in devising this scheme and preparing the new arrangements at the ground to keep us all safe, and of course we share with them the hope that it won't be too long before things can return to normal."
Tony Scholes
Stoke City confirm exit of £3m defender as transfer dominoes topple
Stoke City FCSunderland have moved late to beat competition from Sheffield Wednesday to sign Danny Batth


Pennsylvania's House and Senate each passed a series of bills Tuesday designed to strengthen protections for crime victims when cases proceed through the legal system.
While both sets of legislation sailed through their respective chambers with strong bipartisan support, there was a bit of debate in the House as Democratic Rep. Greg Vitali noted that two of the bills were opposed by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Vitali arose to speak briefly against House Bill 503, which would extend Pennsylvania's Tender Years Hearsay Exception to also apply to those with intellectual disabilities or autism. Hearsay, or testimony in court to the statements of another person, is generally inadmissible in criminal courts, but an exception currently exists for children younger than age 12.
The sponsor of HB503, Rep. Garth Everett, R-Muncy, said that the bill would give a voice to individuals who are often marginalized when crimes are committed against them.
But Vitali argued that the legislation would deny defendants an opportunity to clear their name by seeing their accuser face-to-face as provided in the U.S. Constitution.
"I have concerns with any provision which weakens the safeguards put in our criminal justice system to ensure that an innocent person is not convicted," Vitali said.
The bills nonetheless received wide support, with HB503 passing on a vote of 186-11 and HB505 by a 193-4 margin.
Virtually identical bills that were voted upon in the Senate on Tuesday each passed unanimously. Sen. Dan Laughlin, R-Erie, in a statement after his equivalent of HB503 passed, pointed to the difficulty that intellectually disabled individuals may have in communicating their thoughts in a stressful situation.
The Senate equivalent of Kauffman's bill was sponsored by Sen. Lisa Baker, R-Dallas.
Dave Lemery is the Pennsylvania & Ohio News Editor for Watchdog.org. He welcomes your comments. Contact Dave at [email protected].


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Is JAKKS Pacific, Inc. (JAKK) a Good Buy?
Before we spend many hours researching a company, we'd like to analyze what hedge funds and billionaire investors think of the stock first. We would like to do so because the elite investors' consensus returns have been exceptional. The top 30 S&P 500 stocks among hedge funds at the end of September 2014 yielded an average return of 9.5% during the last 12 months ending in October 30. Sixty three percent of these 30 stocks outperformed the market. Although the elite funds occasionally have their duds, such as Micron and Anadarko Petroleum, which fell 50% and 26%, respectively during the same time period, the hedge fund picks seem to work on average. In the following paragraphs, we find out what the billionaire investors and hedge funds think of JAKKS Pacific, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAKK).
Is JAKKS Pacific, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAKK) worth your attention right now? Hedge funds are buying. The number of long hedge fund positions moved up by 2 in recent months. The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren't the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds' perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That's why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as Calamos Asset Management, Inc (NASDAQ:CLMS), Medley Management Inc (NYSE:MDLY), and Pernix Therapeutics Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:PTX) to gather more data points.
Keeping this in mind, let's review the fresh action surrounding JAKKS Pacific, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAKK).
At the end of the third quarter, a total of 16 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 14% from one quarter earlier. With the smart money's positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists an "upper tier" of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
When looking at the institutional investors followed by Insider Monkey, Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, holds the biggest position in JAKKS Pacific, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAKK). Renaissance Technologies has a $17.5 million position in the stock, comprising less than 0.1% of its 13F portfolio. On Renaissance Technologies's heels is Yale M. Fergang and Robert W. Medway of Royal Capital, with a $3.5 million position; the fund has 9.3% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining peers that hold long positions contain Ken Grossman and Glen Schneider's SG Capital Management, John Overdeck and David Siegel's Two Sigma Advisors and Peter Muller's PDT Partners.


Due to its extremely high melting point, tungsten mill products (sheet, rod, wire, pins) are fabricated from powder and not through melting and casting.
The tungsten powder is pressed into parts, sintered (consolidated) and worked (rolled, forged, swaged, or wire drawn) to the desired form.
This technology, called Powder Metallurgy, was adopted from ceramics and used at first for mass production of tungsten filaments at the dawn of the 20th century.
Tungsten mill products are either tungsten metal products, such as lighting filaments, electrodes, electrical and electronic contacts, wires, sheet, rods, etc or tungsten alloys.
Such materials are used as components for the electronic industries, in transport (aviation, automobile, and trains), the chemical and glass melting industries, in medical technology, for power engineering and even in sport and leisure activities.


Construction has been ongoing around my work place for quite a while now and a couple of days ago one of the labourers was trying to point my attention to something. From his gesticulation I could see that what he was trying to communicate was important, but I didn't quickly get it because He was not speaking my language.
Language is a very powerful and important thing, especially in relationship and marriage.
Genesis 11:6 (KJV)And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
Genesis 11:6 (AMP) And the LORD said, "Behold, they are one [unified] people, and they all have the same language. This is only the beginning of what they will do [in rebellion against Me], and now no evil thing they imagine they can do will be impossible for them.
Scriptures say the people were one and had the same language and so they were practically unstoppable. If God did not come down to scatter their language, they would definitely have achieved whatever they wanted.The language you speak will affect the unity and oneness between you and bae/bae-to-be.
When bae or boo does not understand your language, there will be confusion.
There's a language that you will speak to bae/boo that he/she will resonate with. By language here, I don't mean English, Yoruba, Spanish e.t.c. I'm talking about his/her love language.
Understanding Love language is non-negotiable for a successful and lasting relationship that will lead to marriage.
Your bae's love language is not something that you can assume. It's something you have to find out deliberately.
This involves speaking words of affirmation, encouragement and expressing words of appreciation and kindness. Words have great influential power, in other for bae to feel love, you have to be deliberate about your choice of words.
You can't afford to be careless with your words. Singles who have grown up in environments where negative words are common will probably have greater difficulty speaking this language. So it will involve unlearning the negative and learning to listen to affirming words of others.
Gifts are powerful in the sense that they say, "I was thinking about you. I wanted you to have this". Love is spelt G-I-F-T-S for them. Until you buy something regularly, you are just wasting time!
It can be any shape, size, colour or price, but it should be consistent. Gifts don't really need to be expensive, but it should be something they care about. You can find out what they care about by listening to them so you have clues of gifts you can get that would be appropriate.
He only feels loved when you give a helping hand. That is the language he/she understands and you have to speak that language before feeling loved. For example, as a student, if you help her out with tutorials, and her love language is acts of service, she would love that more than some box of chocolates.
When a person's love language is quality time, that individual will value you spending "quality" time with him/her. You can't have quality time with someone when you're checking notifications on your phone every moment. Whoever has this love language will not feel loved unless you give him/her your undivided attention.
You might have the money to buy everything, but it wouldn't make the individual with this love language feel as loved as when you spend quality time with them.
The last one is physical touch. Singles in courtship have to exercise some caution here and you should not insist on him or her speaking this language until you are married.
If you're in a relationship and it seems bae does not understand and is not speaking your love language, help him out by showing how. He might have grown up in an environment where he does not know how to express or speak your language. This is a good reason you have to know your own love language.
I will speak the right language. My relationship is/will be blessed.
Out of the five love languages, physical touch seems to me to be the most dramatic.
My question is how do singles escape the temptation that comes with a partner whose love language is physical touch. Since he or she won't feel loved until the this language is spoken .
IS IT POSSIBLE TO HAVE MORE THAN ONE LOVE LANGUAGE?


Logo kicks off its "Sleigh the Holidays" programming event tonight at 9 p.m. with the premiere of "Not Today Bianca," a new special featuring unstoppable "RuPaul's Drag Race" winner Bianca Del Rio. See what happens when Bianca heads to Hollywood to win over Tinsel town. Guest stars include RuPaul, Kristen Johnston, Tori Spelling, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Ross Mathews and Charo. Check local listings for more information.
Spread a little holiday cheer tonight. The Pride Center is organizing caroling at neighborhood senior living facilities from 6:30 to 9 p.m. Meet at the Pride Center, 2040 N. Dixie Highway in Wilton Manors, first to "tune up." Enthusiasm, not talent, required. "Elf wear" and Christmas attire are encouraged, along with wrapped presents for the center's annual toy drive. More information at PrideCenterFlorida.org.
The Miami Gay Men's Chorus, under the direction of artistic director Anthony Cabrera, presents its always entertaining holiday concert, "Pop! Goes the Season!" on Friday, Dec. 16 at Miami Beach Community Church, tonight at Miami Shores Community Church and Sunday, Dec. 18 at Coral Gables Congregational Church. All concerts begin at 8 p.m. For tickets and more information, go to Facebook.com/MiamiGayChorus.
More than 100 exhibitors will fill Richardson Park in Wilton Manors on Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. for the first annual Holiday Craft Festival. Don't miss this opportunity to pick up a special Christmas or Hanukkah gift from the wide array of folk art, pet accessories, pottery, jewelry, paintings, handmade clothing, scented soaps and more. The festival is free. For more information, go to ArtFestival.com.
The FIU Jewish Museum of Florida, 301 Washington Ave. in Miami Beach, holds the opening night reception at 6 p.m. of "Stitching History from the Holocaust" along with a look at "Hot Couture: Florida Jews on the Fashion Scene 1800s – Today." Sponsored by Perry Ellis International and the Robert Arthur Segall Foundation, the exhibits provide a new perspective on Jewish history. More information at JMOF.FIU.edu.
We were so caught up in the holiday madness we forgot to reserve tickets early for "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story." Well, tonight's a great night for less-than-fanatics to catch the Episode IV prequel about the band of rebels who steal the top secret plans to the Empire's ultimate weapon, the Death Star. If the reviews aren't so good, who cares? It's "Star Wars." Felicity Jones stars. Check local listings for theaters and show times.


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Anthem Of The Peaceful Army by Greta ...
Anthem Of The Peaceful Army by Greta Van Fleet (Vinyl/LP - 2018)
Vinyl LP pressing. 2018 release from the critically acclaimed rockers. Modern rock n' roll band Greta Van Fleet to release highly anticipated album, Anthem Of The Peaceful Army. The album includes current single "When The Curtain Falls". Greta Van Fleet recently set a record as the first band in 15 years to hit #1 airplay at Active Rock radio with two consecutive singles. Greta Van Fleet formed in 2012 in Frankenmuth, Michigan. The band was signed to Lava Records in March 2017 and a month later, they released their debut studio EP, Black Smoke Rising. A second EP From the Fires, containing the four songs from Black Smoke Rising and four new songs, was released on November 10, 2017. The band's heavy rock sound is heavily influenced by the work of Led Zeppelin although they are mostly influenced by traditional artists from blues, soul, funk and folk music.
1 Age of Man
2 The Cold Wind
3 When the Curtain Falls
4 Watching Love
5 Lover, Leaver (Taker, Believer)
1 You're the One
2 The New Day
3 Mountain of the Sun
4 Brave New World
5 Anthem


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The Q Radio Breakfast Show with Ryan & Jordan
Waiting For Tonight
Admissions suspended at Co Tyrone nursing home after inspection
Friday, July 19th, 2019 6:35pm
By David Hunter
By Michael McHugh
Admissions have been suspended at a Co Tyrone nursing home after inspectors found some patients treated in a derogatory fashion and a "significant" number of areas of disrepair.
Health watchdog the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA) issued seven failure to comply notices to Valley Nursing Home in Clogher.
It said one wardrobe was insecurely attached to a bedroom wall and in places electrical wiring was partially exposed.
Staff described in "derogatory" terms some residents who required help eating and drinking as "feeders".
An official document from the RQIA said: "RQIA was concerned that this provision was inadequate and was not provided to residents in a dignified and timely manner."
Inspectors also observed inadequate management of distressed behaviour.
The report said: "Supervision of patients was poor, inconsistent and inadequate in some parts of the home."
One patient informed the inspector that being assisted from bed each day in a timely manner was "hit or miss".
Staff were observed assisting the patient from bed in the middle of the afternoon and another patient's clothing was in a poor state of repair.
Inspectors also discovered hygiene problems. Clinical waste in some areas was not effectively managed.
Handwashing was not effectively embedded into practice.
The inspectors gave the home until later this month to fulfil a series of actions designed to comply with regulations.
DUP leader Arlene Foster said: "Today's news will be worrying for families who have family members residing in Valley Nursing Home.
"The well-being and safety of patients is paramount.
"The failings found by RQIA must be rectified to ensure this is the case."
A statement from the MPS Care Group said: "Valley Nursing Home is working closely with RQIA and local trusts to ensure any matters that needs improvement are dealt with in a timely and swift manner.
"The Southern and Western Trusts are communicating on a frequent basis with the home and the provisions of care have not been compromised."
Belfast development given the go-ahead
By Michael McHugh, PA and Q Radio News


text:
Q: figure in single column where the text is in double column (in the same page) I am using IEEE conference style in latex where the page limit is only 1. I have only one figure that spans two columns, and the text is written in two-column as usual. I used figure*, but that is moving my figure on the next page. Also the package 'cuted' and 'widetext' showing some error and not performing properly in my case. Any suggestions, please?

A: Welcome to the community!
As I am quite new to TeX.se myself, I am not entirely sure my suggestion will solve your problem.
You could try the sttools package collection, especially the stfloats-package might be worth a look. The options this solution will give you are still very limited. Your best bet would be placing the image at the bottom of the page (the bp flag after the figure*-environment).
Edit
Apparently, the placement of the figure in your source document is important. Placing it higher prevents it from being pushed to the next page.
Here is a Minimal Working Example (MWE):
\documentclass[conference]{IEEEtran}

\usepackage[demo]{graphicx}
\usepackage{stfloats}
\usepackage{kantlipsum}

\begin{document}

\begin{figure*}[bp]
\centering
\includegraphics[width=\textwidth,height=8em]{example-image}
\caption{Some caption for your image.}
\end{figure*}

\section{First Section}

\kant[1-2]

\section{Second Section}

\kant[3-4]

\end{document}

Here's what it looks like:

I hope this helps.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Source: Cisco Systems
Cisco Delivers First Router Manufactured in Brazil
Local manufacturing will allow Cisco and its partners to better serve the needs of the Brazilian market by optimizing the availability of products in the country and lowering the prices for customers
São Paulo, Brazil, September 26, 2012 - Cisco announced today the delivery of the first router product manufactured in Brazil, expanding its local manufacturing operations in the country. Cisco is now manufacturing a best-selling integrated service router in Brazil. This router features highly secure data, mobility, and application services and is designed for enterprise clients, midsize companies, and branch offices.
This local manufacturing expansion, through one of Cisco manufacturing partners with facilities in Sao Paulo state, enables Cisco to serve the needs of the Brazilian market better by optimizing the availability and competitiveness of these products. Cisco expects to announce additional products that will be manufactured in Brazil.
The manufacturing of these products is in compliance with PPB (Processo Produtivo Básico) and is expected to add approximately 100 new jobs within Brazil to the 100 already created in support of manufacturing Cisco products.
The expansion of local manufacturing is one part of Cisco´s plan to invest over R$ 1 billion in the next four years in Brazil, as announced on April 2012. The investment also includes the investment in Brazil-focused ICT venture capital funds, the opening of a Center of Innovation in Rio de Janeiro, intellectual property agreements with local companies, and social responsibility programs.
Cisco started local manufacturing in Brazil in early 2011, with the production of set-top boxes. Since beginning production, that facility has expanded twice.
Supporting Quotes:
John L Kern, SVP, Supply Chain Operations
"Brazil is a key global priority and growth opportunity for Cisco. With the expansion of Cisco manufacturing in Brazil, Cisco is demonstrating our commitment to investing in and supporting the economy of Brazil."
Rodrigo Abreu, VP Cisco Brazil
"The expansion of our local manufacturing reinforces our long-term commitment to foster innovation, transformation and socio-economic development, expanding Cisco's presence in the country and implementing advanced technologies and creating new jobs."
Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO, news, filings) is the worldwide leader in networking that transforms how people connect, communicate and collaborate. Information about Cisco can be found at http://www.cisco.com. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com. Cisco equipment in emerging markets is supplied by Cisco Systems International BV, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cisco Systems, Inc.
Cisco and the Cisco logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cisco and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries. A listing of Cisco's trademarks can be found at www.cisco.com/go/trademarks. Third-party trademarks mentioned are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company.
Felipe LamusCisco Systems, Inc.+1 919 259-8619flamus@cisco.com
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