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"History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived," said American author Maya Angelou. One of the worst phases in human history that we truly wish undone is the Holocaust. Perpetrated by the Germans against the Jews during the Second World War, the Holocaust was Hitler's 'final solution' to exterminate the 'inferior' Jews.
Many films have been made about the Holocaust. The latest one, Operation Finale, chronicles a covert mission undertaken by the Mossad. Israel's national intelligence agency sets out to bring Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann to justice. Eichmann played a key role in the genocide.
"I will leap into my grave laughing because the feeling that I have five million human beings on my conscience is for me a source of extraordinary satisfaction". Such was the sentiment of the Nazi tyrant. Are you as eager as I am to see him get his due? Well, come to the theatres in September to see Lady Justice win… at last!


text:
using System;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

namespace LibGit2Sharp.Core
{
    internal struct git_oid
    {
        public const int Size = 20;
        public unsafe fixed byte Id[20];
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// Represents a unique id in git which is the sha1 hash of this id's content.
    /// </summary>
    internal struct GitOid
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Number of bytes in the Id.
        /// </summary>
        public const int Size = 20;

        /// <summary>
        /// The raw binary 20 byte Id.
        /// </summary>
        [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.ByValArray, SizeConst = Size)]
        public byte[] Id;

        public static implicit operator ObjectId(GitOid oid)
        {
            return new ObjectId(oid);
        }

        public static implicit operator ObjectId(GitOid? oid)
        {
            return oid == null ? null : new ObjectId(oid.Value);
        }

        internal static unsafe GitOid BuildFromPtr(IntPtr ptr)
        {
            return BuildFromPtr((git_oid*)ptr.ToPointer());
        }

        internal static unsafe GitOid BuildFromPtr(git_oid* id)
        {
            return id == null? Empty : new GitOid(id->Id);
        }

        internal unsafe GitOid(byte* rawId)
        {
            var id = new byte[Size];

            fixed(byte* p = id)
            {
                for (int i = 0; i < Size; i++)
                {
                    p[i] = rawId[i];
                }
            }

            Id = id;
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Static convenience property to return an id (all zeros).
        /// </summary>
        public static GitOid Empty
        {
            get { return new GitOid(); }
        }
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Ellen Bradstreet of Lisbon Community Federal Credit Union helps students with decisions about home furnishings.
This award-winning, half-day event targets high school juniors and seniors and is similar to the game of "LIFE," where participating students are given a career and monthly income and then have to visit booths associated with various expenses that the average adult is faced with each month. Costs, such as transportation, housing, clothing, food, student loans, insurance and several other everyday expenses, are filled in on a monthly budget form by each student. At the end of the event, the goal is for students to have monthly budget that does not exceed monthly income.
The 2014/15 school year was the busiest ever with more than 30 fairs taking place during the school year. A total of 6,411 students participated in one of the Maine Credit Union League's fairs.
Below is a list of most of the fairs that are scheduled for the 2016 school year. Several smaller fairs are also taking place that are not included on this list and they are continually updated at http://www.mainecul.org/community-involvement/financial-education-and-resources/financial-fitness-fairs/.
It costs nothing for a school to host a fair, and is TIME WELL SPENT!
For more information about participating and/or attending one of the Money Management Experience events, scheduling a fair or having a school participate in one, please email Jon Paradise at the Maine Credit Union League or call him at (207) 773-5671, ext. 273.


text:
A stock tie, or stock, is a style of neck wear. Originally a form of neck-cloth that was often stiffened and usually close-fitting, formerly worn by men generally, but post-nineteenth century only in use in military uniforms. Another type of stock is worn by certain clergy and consists of black silk or other fabric, that falls over the chest and is secured by a band around the neck. Equestrians wear a stock tie around the neck when dressed formally for a hunt or certain competitive events. Most equestrian competition rules require it to be white. It is mandated attire for use in dressage and the dressage phase of eventing. Use of the stock tie also is seen in show jumping and fox hunting. The stock tie continues to be in fashion for equestrians.

History
The stock tie was worn by gentlemen as everyday apparel in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It became more of a formal tie in the later nineteenth century. These old stock ties often were black or white. They were made of gauze, fine cotton, or silk. Sometimes the stock tie was starched or otherwise reinforced to be stiff around the neck; with the chin forced up, it was presumed that the wearer would look more important and formal.

Traditionally, the stock tie is used in the hunt field as a safety measure: in case of injury, the tie may be used as a temporary bandage for a horse's leg or a sling for a rider's arm. It also is useful in keeping rain or wind out of the rider's collar. Stock ties often are worn by riders along with a shadbelly.

Some stock ties buckled or hooked up the back, and sometimes had bows or ruffles attached to the front.

Today it is worn with a pin (usually plain and gold, although more elaborate pins also are seen). The pin is stuck through the knot or just below the knot and derives its name from the tie, being called a "stock pin".

See also
 Cravat (early)
 Cravat (modern)
 Stock (military), a leather collar worn by soldiers during the 18th century

References

Rider apparel
19th-century fashion
Neckties
18th-century fashion
Victorian fashion

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Blog – St. George's Lodge No. 41 A.F. & A.M.
First off, I would like to welcome our newly initiated Brethren to St. George's.
I had the pleasure as many of you did to attend the Grand Master's official visit in Revelstoke. M.W.B. Barry Burch had a great presentation on the health of our district as well as the overall health of the lodges in the entire jurisdiction. All of which was great information. I had the pleasure of meeting many brethren from all over district 9 and would encourage anyone who did not have the opportunity to attend to consider attending next year and to seriously consider getting out to visit, it really is a big part of what makes Freemasonry wonderful. As the Most worshipful Grand Master did with all of the brethren at this meeting.
I would like to ask all the brethren of St. George's to ask themselves one question as you enter the lodge room or as you are coming out to attend a meeting, "What can I do to make my lodge better?" Any and all contributions how ever large or small help to make St. George's a better lodge. Ideas are always welcome so I would like to encourage you to approach any of the principal officers at any time with any ideas you feel might help make our lodge better.
We are all working together to continue to make St. George's grow and to create an atmosphere in which all brethren feel they have something to contribute.
Brethren, it is a great honour to be writing this very first of many editions of the Master's corner. I was rendered somewhat speechless on the evening of the installation and did not have much of a speech to give. Now after a few days of reflection I have a few more things to say. I am humbled by the experience of the installation. I was told the view from the east is much different, but it does not become immediately apparent until you are there, and the perambulations begin. Being entrusted with the running of the lodge for this next year means a great deal and I am looking forward to working with all of the officers to ensure that we all have a great year. I am personally looking forward to our Regular meeting in April as we will not only be installing the members that were absent from the installation, but we will be introducing the 24 Inch Gauge of Fellowship. This is a new initiative that I hope will encourage fraternity outside of the lodge room and well after the festive board has ended.


text:
Aaron Rodgers Looking Forward To First Matchup With Ben Roethlisberger Since Super Bowl XLV
By Josh Carney
It sounds strange, but the last time Green Bay Packers star quarterback and future first-ballot Hall of Famer Aaron Rodgers and Pittsburgh Steelers face-of-the-franchise and fellow future first-ballot Hall of Fame quarterback Ben Roethlisberger happened to be in Super Bowl XLV inside AT&T Stadium in Dallas.
Unfortunately, all Steelers fans know exactly what happened in that game.
For a regular season matchup though, you have to go all the way back to the 2009 thriller at Heinz Field, which the Steelers won at the buzzer on a throw from Roethlisberger to Mike Wallace, completing the comeback win.
The Steelers and Packers have matched up since then in the regular season, most notably in 2013 and 2017, but Rodgers missed both games with a broken collarbone. Now, he'll start inside Lambeau Field in likely the final matchup between himself and Roethlisberger ever, as one quarterback looks painfully close to the end, while the other continues to thrive in the wide-open NFL.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday in Green Bay, Rodgers addressed the matchup with Roethlisberger, stating it is "strange" that the two haven't matched up more throughout their careers.
"It is strange how that happened, '13 and '17 obviously breaking my collarbone and [missing] both of those games," Rodgers said Wednesday, according to ESPN's Rob Demovsky. "I remember the '09 game very well. We were pretty explosive on offense, hit Greg down the middle for I think it was an 85-yard touchdown, then hit J.J. on a post late in that game to put us ahead, and then Big Ben took them down to beat us there right at the end. That was a good football game."
Rodgers' feeling about the matchup and it being strange they haven't matched up more is spot on, per usual from the cerebral signal caller. Sunday's matchup will end the longest span between meetings of Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks. Previously, Doug Williams vs. Joe Montana (eight years and 26 days was the longest span between meetings of Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks, according to ESPN Stats & Information.The Rodgers-Roethlisberger span will end at 10 years and 239 days.
"Of course the whole cliché everybody says, 'The quarterbacks are against each other,' and then we will say, 'No, we play against the defense,'" Roethlisberger said to reporters Wednesday via Steelers.com. "But it's still an honor to share a stadium with one of the greatest and a guy that I admire, and a lot of people admire, that has done it at such a high level for a long time. It's pretty cool to watch his mastery of the game. I just hope this week our defense can hold up and may have something to say about it."
While Sunday's matchup inside Lambeau Field is unlikely to be a replica of the 2009 shootout at Heinz Field in which Rodgers and Roethlisberger combined to throw for 886 pass yards and seven total touchdowns. But it will be great to see the two old gunslingers attempting to battle it out on the hallowed grounds of Lambeau Field Sunday at 4:25 p.m.
Related Items:Aaron Rodgers, Ben Roethlisberger, Green Bay Packers, Heinz Field, Lambeau Field, Pittsburgh Steelers, Trending

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Very unique 160 acre Northeast Michigan reacreational property. Your very own Lake with the best waterfowl hunting in Northern Michigan. Trails and deer hunting locations scattered throughout with beautiful views of the Lake. 24 x 24 Log cabin with loft and all the comforts of home. You will not find another one like this.


text:
Ken Salazar wants more drilling, but industry won't oblige?
Alan Prendergast
Alan Prendergast | May 17, 2012 | 2:59pm
See, it's like this. Far from being the obstructionist tree-hugger his critics accuse him of being, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar really, really wants to drill, baby, drill, for oil and gas on federal lands and offshore. He wants to drill the hell out of the place. But the energy companies are apparently full of slackers and greedheads who can't handle the leases they already have, most of which sit idle and undeveloped.
That's the inference one could draw, anyway, from a new report issued this week by Salazar's agency that contradicts the longstanding claim by Republicans that the Obama administration is standing in the way of domestic oil and gas exploration. According to the DOI's numbers, more than half of all federal acreage leased for oil and gas and more than two-thirds of offshore leases -- in excess of 56 million acres -- aren't being used by the companies who hold the leases.
"These lands and waters belong to the American people, and they expect those energy supplies to be developed in a timely and responsible manner and with a fair return to taxpayers," Salazar declared in a statement bruiting the report. "We will continue to encourage companies to diligently bring production online quickly and safely."
Analysts for the Wilderness Society and other environmental interests have complained for years that the cheap rate at which the government offers energy leases provides opportunities for speculation by companies, which can swap and sub-lease in a shadowy aftermarket with no particular urgency to develop the tracts involved. The DOI has sought to discourage speculation by increasing the cost of a minimum lease bid, particularly for offshore drilling; one study showed that deepwater leases attracting bids of less than $100 per acre result in virtually no active exploration.
Not surprisingly, energy industry critics have labeled the report "election year politics" and contend that government red tape and burdensome regulations are primarily responsible for the idle leases.
But while Salazar and the Obama administration may seem like unlikely boosters of the oil and gas industry, the report suggests otherwise. Last year, American natural gas production set new records while oil production was at its highest level in almost a decade. The refinery sector was a net exporter for the first time in sixty years. And, thanks largely to more efficient vehicles, the United States cut net oil imports by 10 percent, about a million barrels a day.
That's a lot of crude -- even with most of the leases on public lands not producing a single drop.
More from our Calhoun: Wake-Up Call archive: "Ken Salazar gets lots of gas for rising gas prices."
Alan Prendergast has been writing for Westword for over thirty years. He teaches journalism at Colorado College; his stories about the justice system, historic crimes, high-security prisons and death by misadventure have won numerous awards and appeared in a wide range of magazines and anthologies.
Twitter: @alanprend


Why does the Bitcoin use the litte-endian notation? It is less common than big-endian notation, thus when programming low-level applications working with Bitcoin protocol, one quite often has to create custom operations for handling the endianness switching. Is there some specific reason why this notation was chosen?
Most likely it is a small design error, but there is big argument about it at bitcointalk.org:What would you change about the Bitcoin protocol?.
Modern computers almost always use little-endian internally, so this choice improves speed. If Bitcoin used network byte order, then order conversions would be necessary for every message sent or received.
Hashes are defined by the standards as being big-endian, and crypto libraries deal with them in that form, so hashes are transmitted in big-endian. Bitcoin displays hashes in little-endian because Bitcoin sometimes considers hashes to be little-endian integers instead of strings.
Bitcoin transaction and block hashes are considered little-endian when treating them as integers. On the network they are just 32-byte sequences in the order they are generated by the hash function.
In both transaction and block hashes bytes are reversed when displayed by Bitcoin software and websites in hexadecimal form. This makes blocks show up in big-endian form, which is the way we humans write numbers down.
I would suppose that the idea of reversing bytes comes from the fact that block hashes in Bitcoin are treated as numbers for the purposes of difficulty calculations, meaning the hash must be below certain threshold in order to pass. It is natural for a human to expect such a number to be displayed on screen with leading zeroes. However this is not a very solid reason, since block hashes could have been interpreted as big-endian when converting to integer, while paying a tiny performance penalty.
As for transaction hashes, I have no good explanation as to why they are also reversed. Perhaps it is just for consistency.
Modern CPUs also typically have byte-swapping load and store instructions, or at least a byte swap register instruction, so that effective programmers (and optimizing compilers) may eliminate, or nearly eliminate, the overhead of endianness compensation.
This "small design error" may be a simple case of "premature optimization".
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged protocol bitcoin-core standard theory or ask your own question.


PhD-educated employees and the development of generic skills.
While considerable research on skills and training exists, less is known about employee perceptions of their skill development. This issue is particularly salient among the most highly educated members of the labour market, given the duration of their training. This study draws on survey data of almost four thousand PhD graduates in Australia. We explore perceived skill development and the importance of these skills among PhD graduates, and the factors that influence these perceptions. The findings reveal a number of factors that explain skill development and skill importance including age, gender, and career destination (for example higher education or industry). Perceived skill importance also depends on discipline area, organisation size, occupation, and sector. We conclude that the most highly educated members of the labour market do not always consider that they obtain the requisite skills during their PhD training; greater attention is needed to ensure that skills are better matched to career decisions and to the demands of high-level professions.
The notion of skill has attracted the attention of policymakers, employers, and scholars alike. At a country level, various governments have been interested in strengthening skills policy and meeting skills shortages to ensure national competitiveness, while also providing more employment opportunities (Shah and Burke 2005; Warhurst et al. 2004; Wilton 2011). In this context, the concept of employability and ensuring that people are job-ready has emerged in wider debates to assist with national goals and to satisfy employer demands to obtain people whose skills match their requirements (Clarke and Patrickson 2008). Moreover, it appears that the contemporary requirements associated with employment involve an ever-increasing demand for skilled workers (Kelly and Lewis 2010).
While a number of commentators have highlighted the complex and multifaceted concept of skill, including the different schools of thought that seek to categorise and understand the notion of skill (Esposto 2008), much of the previous research embraces skills utilisation or employer and government perspectives on skills and skill development. There is far less attention devoted to how employees regard their skills, in terms of skills acquisition and skills transfer. It is acknowledged that employee skill acquisition and transfer are not simple mechanisms, but they can be influenced by various factors including work arrangements.
Nonetheless, it has been argued that skill development contributes to an individual's human capital, which is one way of highlighting differences among those in the labour force (Becker 1964). One of the most important ways to acquire human capital formally is through education and, in particular, through the university system.
Much of the literature investigating skill development in universities has focused on embedding generic skills in the curriculum to enhance graduate employability (Dacre Pool and Sewell 2007). Given the large number of people concerned, the majority of studies have examined the employment outcomes of graduates with bachelor degrees (for example Manathunga and Lant 2006). In contrast, relatively little is known about the most highly educated employees in the labour market--those with doctoral (PhD) degrees (Jackson and Michelson 2015). Although possessing a PhD degree does not guarantee job attainment, those trained to this level would expect to have mastered a range of relevant and highly desired skills (Usher 2002).
Drawing on human capital theory (Becker 1964; Flamholtz and Lacey 1981), the purpose of this article is to: (i) assess perceived generic-skill development or acquisition among PhD graduates from Australian higher education institutions; (ii) measure the perceived importance of skills transfer to PhD graduates' post-degree employment; and (iii) identify the influence of certain work characteristics, individual work experience, and discipline on the perceived importance and actual development of generic skills among PhD graduates. The article therefore focuses on PhD graduates' perceptions of their preparedness for employment in a range of industry sectors and roles. It does not explore industry or employer perspectives of PhD graduate capabilities, or the purpose and value of the PhD degree in different sectors of the economy. The research objectives are examined using national survey data (n = 3829) gathered in the 2012 Australian Graduate Survey (AGS) of recent PhD graduates from Australian higher education institutions.
The notion of human capital refers to the accumulation of various competencies, knowledge, skills, and social and personal attributes, for example, that permit an individual to generate economic value. Commonly associated with the work of Becker (1964), human capital theory idealises the labour market insofar as individual differences in terms of access and rewards are linked, among other factors, to higher levels of education and skill. Having high levels of education and skill are believed to increase an individual's opportunities, including their mobility and employability through their working career (van der Heijden 2002). While the theory assumes the existence of employer demand for the new skills acquired, there has been some critique. For example human capital theory tends to ignore other factors exogenous to employees that might potentially influence their remuneration and career options, or it has argued that labour and individual employees are treated as commodities (Bowles and Gintis 1975; Thompson and Newsome 2004). While mindful of these criticisms, in the case of the former this is admittedly beyond the scope of the article, since our focus is on employee perspectives about their skill; for the latter, it is based on a theoretical perspective that places emphasis on different aspects of employment and the labour market. We therefore utilise human capital theory on the understanding that it serves as a very helpful but imperfect framework with which to explain different outcomes in the labour market (Preston 1997).
One important feature of human capital theory is its distinction between specific and general or generic skills. The former might be those skills that are unique to a single industry or employer, while the latter type of skill has broad relevance to many industries and employers (Kelly et al. 2011). Firm-specific skills tend to be provided by the organisation, yet reliance on them can increase the risk for individuals if the organisation shuts down or if the industry declines. Thus, from the perspective of individual employees, the transferability of skills remains an important consideration in human capital theory. It has been argued, and empirically demonstrated, that the categorisation of specific and general skills is too rigid, and that individuals can elect to invest in a range of educational and training and development opportunities that permit them to move between specialist and generalist roles during their careers (Kelly et al. 2011).
Given that the formal education system is an important means of building human capital (Becker 1964), the attainment of qualifications at the highest level is believed to improve the holders' benefits from the labour market. In many countries, the highest non-medical qualification is the doctorate (PhD), and the main providers of these degrees are universities. However, which skills should be delivered through a PhD degree programme has been the subject of debate (Craswell 2007). For example the development of generic enterprise' skills can occur through PhD study but others--such as the management of finances and people--generally do not (Lean 2012). Therefore, it is important to examine generic-skill development, and the importance of these generic skills among PhD graduates, as this is important for individuals, and also for organisations and the wider economy (Flamholtz and Lacey 1981).
While the development of generic or general skills is but one component of the overall human capital of an individual, it is consistent with the theory of human capital that some differences in the value of a PhD education and skills may emerge, and that these could be influenced by, for example, a career destination (higher education, industry), employment characteristics, discipline background, and individuals' work experience. The sub-sections below and the subsequent hypotheses reflect the potential role played by such factors.
Studies of the benefits of skills and training have largely assumed a relationship between the training and various performance outcomes such as learning, behavioural change, and performance improvement (Santos and Stuart 2003). Heyes and Stuart (1996) examined the impact of training on employee attitudes such as commitment and motivation, while Noe (1986) similarly explored employee attributes and attitudes in terms of accounting for the effectiveness of training. There has been a tendency in the literature to examine perceptions of training effectiveness, rather than individuals' perceptions of skill development. Understanding how such skills are developed in the first place is important, as are the views of those acquiring the skills.


text:
A Zanjero's Life
Controlling the waters of California, one irrigation gate at a time.
By Marcela Davison Avilés
Tod Seelie
Before his commute to work every morning, Sergio Lopez packs the essentials:
Cell phone, check. Calculator, check. Laptop, check. Long-iron irrigation-gate bar, check.
Lopez is a zanjero, or irrigation-ditch minder, in the Imperial Valley, an agricultural expanse that lies between the Salton Sea and the Mexican border. The Spanish word for "ditch" is zanja. Since the days of old Alta California, zanjeros have directed irrigation water where it's needed, released exactly the right amount for crops to grow, and stopped the flow when the earth has had enough. California leads the nation in farm cash receipts—the Imperial Valley alone produced more than $2 billion in crops in 2019. Every farm in the valley needs water delivered by the Imperial Irrigation District. Lopez is their deliveryman.
When people think of the state and water, the so-called Kings of California often come up, like William Mulholland, a onetime zanjero who worked his way up to become the first supervisor of the Los Angeles Water Department and the builder of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. But who really controls the irrigation canals that carry water from the state's reservoirs and aqueducts to the people and farms that are its end users? Zanjeros, the legendary water channelers of California.
This article appears in the Winter 2022 issue of Alta Journal.
With his salt-and-pepper hair and trimmed goatee, Lopez has the bearing of a college professor. And given the wisdom he's earned by coaxing water out of rivers and over to thirsty fields, his patient and learned demeanor is itself an essential resource, especially during a drought. When he shares his story, you hear heritage, humility, and pride—a quiet confidence refined by decades of hard work on the canals. "My parents are from Sinaloa," he says. "When they immigrated from Mexicali to the U.S., I was nine years old. My dad was a feed-truck driver. So [when] I was a little kid, I started working cattle. I used to work for a farmer in the valley. I've worked in agriculture all my life."
In this valley, water is nature's oxymoron: it exists because it shouldn't. It's piped in from the Colorado River, and the district employs 143 zanjeros to manage its path. In an average year in California, approximately 9.6 million acres are irrigated with roughly 34 million acre-feet of water. It's an amount that would cover 31 million football fields with 1 foot of water. On the Imperial Valley's football field, Lopez is quarterback, pass receiver, and sometimes coach, all at once.
Since the 1800s, zanjeros have guided the river's edge, metaphorically and literally, first for the old Californio haciendas and later for the cities that replaced them. In Los Angeles's early days, the zanjero was paid more than the mayor. For generations, zanjeros have navigated the back roads along canals, first on horseback and now in rigs with computers. More than the state's land barons, more than the subjects of Hollywood mythologizing, zanjeros have wielded the power of necessity. Without the zanjero, there would be no California oranges or grapes. No California "backyard orchard." There would be no California as we know it at all.
Water in an irrigation canal in the Imperial Valley waits to be released into a field.
Life from Divergence
In Southern California, irrigation via diverted water from the Colorado River runs through a complex system of reservoirs, aqueducts, and canals. California farms supply about 16 percent of total U.S. agricultural exports. The roughly nine million acres of irrigated farmland in the state represent approximately 80 percent of all water used for businesses and homes in California. Stakes are high. In the Coachella Valley, just north of the Imperial Valley, agricultural production is worth some $7,000 per acre, says former Coachella Valley Water District zanjero supervisor Ty Mull. "If it wasn't for the zanjero who is making $25 an hour to deliver water," Mull says, "the loss would be over a million dollars a crop." He calls the work of zanjeros "the lifeblood of our agricultural industry."
According to Robert Schettler, the public information officer for the Imperial Irrigation District, experienced zanjeros on average earn $85,000 annually, including benefits. But the value of their role to the state's cultural heritage is incalculable. Zanjero folklore abides in ballads, novels, art exhibitions, documentaries; the word zanjero even shows up in the names of housing subdivisions.
If the legend seems romantic, the work—especially during a drought—is not, but it is essential. Lopez's district "has the largest allocation of the Colorado River," Schettler notes. "Our entitlement is more than some states'. People are asking, 'What are you doing to conserve water?' We conserved over seven million acre-feet since 2003. We have to do our part. Part of that is to help these guys make their orders without wasting water."
The irrigation district is the nation's largest, moving water via four canals. The 80-mile All-American Canal channels water from Imperial Dam into three arteries: the East Highline, the Central Main, and the Westside Main. These canals flow south to north. Off the branch arteries are smaller lateral canals that run east to west.
Lopez's job is at this intersection of canals, tradition, and technology. Every morning, he receives irrigation orders from valley farms. As he made his rounds one day this summer, he irrigated several types of crops (fruits, vegetables, forage products like alfalfa hay and straw). Using software that manages irrigation data (such as scheduling and water-release routing) and a calculator, he computes allotments of requested acre-feet before setting out for these distribution canals. Out in the field, he uses a map and manipulates canal gates with experienced facility, wise to the ways of running water.
"Our water system is gravity flow," Schettler explains. "It comes from the Imperial Dam, and water's constantly running, 24-7. Sergio's job is to get water where it needs to go without giving short or giving too much. It's a delicate balancing act. When Sergio gets his orders, it's crazy—we have 500,000 acres of land here in the valley that we need to irrigate." The district, he says, has three shifts of zanjeros working 24 hours a day.
Lopez's map depicts a confluence of canals called Ash 15/30, located between Highway 80 and McCabe Road. He consults his daily manifest and releases water by lifting canal gates with his iron gate bar until the flow reaches the requested allotment for a field. Then his job transitions from calculation to sensibility. The release is measured not only by the level of water in a canal but also by its speed of flow through a series of gates. Water levels can fluctuate dramatically in the course of a day and cause outflow to canal gates to also fluctuate. Too much water can be released; water can be lost downstream. Gates must be adjusted to fulfill orders and compensate for nature's impact and flow fluctuation within a canal. Automation can't beat nature. "Somebody has to ride the canal," Lopez says. On a rainy, windy day, nature delivers tumbleweeds, trash, and worse. "If somebody doesn't clean it up, it'll run over."
Sergio Lopez adjusts the height of an irrigation gate to control the amount of water released. The Imperial Valley employs 143 zanjeros to manage the flow of water that is piped in from the Colorado River.
Chasing the Water
In addition to using a calculator and a computer, Lopez measures water levels with a yardstick. Applying 20 years of experience, he determines the water speed in a canal and when the flow will hit the next gate. Hopping into his truck, he needs to arrive at the gate before the water does. It's a constant race against time and gravity flow. Too much water running too fast can flood over a gate and ruin a crop just as easily as an errant tumbleweed can block the flow of water through a gate.
His work is about more than chasing water, though—it's also about connecting with people. "The relationship with the farmer is solid," Lopez says. A good zanjero also becomes friends with a farm's irrigator. "If you can't make it somewhere and they see something, they can help you out," he says. "The farmers rely on you. They depend on you. And we depend on them for our work. If they're not farming, I'm not working. We're in constant communication. It couldn't be any other way."
And yet his work is unsung.
"They work in fields and ditch banks in all weather conditions and all seasons," Schettler says. "Unless you're an agricultural water customer, irrigator, a fieldworker, or someone who plays a part in delivering water, it's easy for zanjeros to go unnoticed, but they are a key part in the delivery of water."
The job is also dangerous. The All-American Canal functions as a binational moat separating the United States from Mexico. Migrants, tourists, and even border patrol agents have drowned in its waters. Smaller irrigation ditches are just as risky. Lopez has discovered dead bodies and drug stashes in them.
The old zanjas are now fantastic realms of steel and concrete, sustaining agriculture whose bigness is always at risk. Yet the connection between the Colorado and the zanjero remains the same. Technology hasn't changed the simple beauty of a hand cranking open a gate, or the glint of sun on water as it rushes through. Nor has it altered the earth's response to rejuvenation. And while the days of zanjeros on horseback are gone forever, one thing that remains is the cadence of farmers and water channelers speaking their unique language of cultivation. The sight of a lone man listening intently to the river's end—that'll hold in your eye like dusk. •
Who Owns the Border?
Farming Today: Drought, Depression, and Suicide
Marcela Davison Avilés Marcela Davison Avilés is a prominent American essayist, independent producer, attorney, and Latino cultural dramaturge and adviser.
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text:
Philip Howard Francis Evergood (American, 1901-1973). The Tooters, 1961. Oil on canvas, 62 x 64 in. (157.5 x 162.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Ford Foundation, 62.76. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 62.76.jpg)
Philip Howard Francis Evergood (American, 1901-1973). The Tooters, 1961. Oil on canvas, 62 x 64 in. (157.5 x 162.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Ford Foundation, 62.76. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 62.76_bw.jpg)
The Tooters
Philip Howard Francis Evergood
ARTIST Philip Howard Francis Evergood, American, 1901-1973
DIMENSIONS 62 x 64 in. (157.5 x 162.6 cm) (show scale)
ACCESSION NUMBER 62.76
CREDIT LINE Gift of the Ford Foundation
CAPTION Philip Howard Francis Evergood (American, 1901-1973). The Tooters, 1961. Oil on canvas, 62 x 64 in. (157.5 x 162.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Ford Foundation, 62.76. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 62.76.jpg)
IMAGE overall, 62.76.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph


how to reach bhutan from Delhi ?
Paro International Airport is the only point of entry and exit for all travelers by flight to Bhutan. Only two airlines operate in and out of Paro International Airport, Druk Air, the national airline and Bhutan Airlines. The airlines operate an inbound flight from New Delhi. Visit their website for flight schedule and bookings.
The most preferred point of entry is from Phuntsholing Dzongkhag, a border town in south western Bhutan that links with the Indian plains of West Bengal. The town is located approximately 170 kilometers east of the Indian National Airport Bagdogra. The nearest train station is New Jalpaiguri, Nawapara, Siliguri, West Bengal from where you can take a taxi or bus to the border town of Phuntsholing.
Phuntsholing is 176 kilometers away from the capital city Thimphu, which is about 5 hour drive.


Who's ready for another awesome Hawaiian beer festival? I sure am and tickets for the 2013 Maui Brewers Festival went on sale today.
Hosted by Maui Brewing Company, Paradise Beverages and held at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center this festival will feature over 30 craft breweries, 20 plus ono Maui restaurants and food trucks and live music by Nuff Sedd, Lia Live! and Simply Twisted. Pre-sale tickets are $50 (at the event $60) and include eight 4 oz. samples of beer in a commemorative glass, island-style dishes and parking (from 4 to 7 pm). If you are a true beer geek you'll splurge for the Rare Beer Tasting tickets ($95) that includes early entry at 2:30 pm for Rare Beer Tasting with brewmasters and brewery representatives in the pavilion, a reserved parking space and logo shirt.
The festival is a fundraiser for the MACC with net proceeds benefiting arts and cultural programs for students, seniors and the Maui community. Follow the fest on Twitter @mauibrewfest for more updates and news.
Tags: events, festivals, Maui Brewing Company. Bookmark the permalink.


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text:
Have You Been Thinking About Suicide Today?
The whole world is in pain over the completed suicide of Robin Williams. Robin was very sick and despite reaching out for help countless times, he wasn't able to find the help he needed. I'd like to talk about suicide and some thoughts about it.
Have you ever been dumped by someone and found solace in a torchy break-up song? Breaking up with someone can hurt so much that you think no one else could possibly understand how you feel. But break-up songs understand, they feel your pain, they say exactly what you are thinking and feeling, they don't say the wrong things and they comfort you because they resonate with you.
In Dusty Springfield's song "You Don't Have To Say You Love Me" she desperately sings;
Don't you see that now you've gone
And I'm left here on my own
And that I have to follow you
And beg you to come home
Just be close at hand
You don't have to stay forever
I will understand
Phil Collins sings in "Take A Look At Me Now;"
So take a look at me now, oh there's just an empty space
And there's nothing left here to remind me,
just the memory of your face
Ooh take a look at me now, well there's just an empty space
And you coming back to me is against all odds and that's what I've got to face
I wish I could just make you turn around,
turn around and see me cry
There's so much I need to say to you,
so many reasons why
You're the only one who really knew me at all
Who hasn't felt those feelings over a love lost? If we have, how many of us have found a comfort in those songs and listened to them over and over simply because they explored our feelings?
Henri Nouwen once said, "The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing... not healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares."
When someone is thinking about suicide, chances are they want to talk about it, about their feelings, about their pain. They just don't know how to start the conversation and most certainly, many of us don't know how to, either. It is very easy to say the wrong thing and many people do.
Every fifteen minutes, someone in this country completes suicide. Many have given warning signals and have even reached out for help but all too often the people they reached out to may not have been listening. It's not their fault, they just don't know how to listen or are uncomfortable with the topic.
We should never be afraid to talk about suicide because the person thinking about it isn't and we need to engage them and encourage them to talk. Getting them to talk means listening to them. Re-read the Henri Nouwen quote. That is how you listen, by not talking.
For example, if someone is depressed because they lost their job, here are some things NOT to say: You'll find another one; I lost a job once; You're better off not working for them; I know someone who is hiring; I'm sorry; Get over it; I know exactly how you feel; it's only a job; You'll be able to collect unemployment now; How dare they, you should write them a nasty letter; What did you do wrong?
Instead, with careful listening, like a good torch song, you should steer them into their pain where they can explore that pain. You can achieve this by asking questions. These questions will get them to talk about their pain and like a good torch song, help them to understand their own feelings and heal.
So someone tells us that they lost their job. You can ask, "How have you been dealing with that?" An open ended question such as that will get them to talk further about how they are feeling. Again talking about their issue is for them, not you. They may pause and the silence may be uncomfortable for many of us but resist the urge to fill the uncomfortable silence. Re-read Henri Nouwen's quote. In that silence, they may be thinking and feeling and working through how they are feeling and your discomfort and urge to fill in the silence could destroy all that. Be patient and silent and present.
If they are not responding, here are some other questions you may ask:
What is most difficult about losing your job?
Tell me what happened.
Tell me more about that.
What is it you want from your job?
How do you feel about what happened?
Do you feel comfortable talking to me about this?
Have you told anyone about how you are feeling?
What do you think you can do?
What may stand in your way?
These kinds of questions establish rapport and define the problem. Your job is to guide them or steer them into the pain. If you can't find a question to ask, there are statements you can make which may spur their thoughts and conversation:
Say more about what happened.
It sounds like you are going through a difficult time.
I can see why you feel that way.
Take your time, I'm here to listen and support you.
After exploring feelings, don't be afraid to ask the suicide question. If they are not thinking about suicide, there is no harm done. If they are, chances are they will be willing to talk about it. This is very important because if they are willing to talk about it, it is because they are ambivalent and your talk, honesty and presence can actually save their life.
Go ahead and ask questions like:
Have you been thinking about suicide?
Do you have a plan?
Do you know how you would do it?
Do you have the means to act on your plan?
Do you have a time set for doing this?
If they answer "yes" to any of those questions, help is critical. If you can get them to give you or lock away the means (drugs, gun, knife, rope) that is what is called a protective factor. The point is to get them through the moment. If you can get them to live another day, tomorrow they may feel different.
While answering a local suicide hotline, I discerned that the caller was safe for the night because she locked her gun in a box and put it in the basement. I made her promise to call me tomorrow to let me know how she was doing. She did. She told me the only reason she didn't go back down into the basement to retrieve her gun and kill herself was because she promised to call me back the next day and she wanted to keep that promise. At the very least, I got her through the moment and to live another day. While speaking with her the next day she made a comment to her cat which jumped on her lap. I asked her what would happen to her cat if she were not around anymore and she paused for a moment and said, "I don't know. I could never leave my cat alone." The cat was another protective factor. A very powerful one. She had a reason to live.
Before leaving someone, we need to make sure they will be safe. We can achieve this by exploring their protective factors and distracting activities. Getting someone to prepare a meal, go shopping, take their dog for a walk, cuddle with their cat, take a shower, take a nap, draw, write, watch TV or exercise, we are giving them a plan which can be enough to get them through the day.
"The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing... not healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares."
-Henri Nouwen.
A library recently asked me to present a workshop about being a volunteer answering a suicide hotline. There were almost 50 people in attendance ranging in age, race, economic diversity and motive for being there. I transcribed some of the questions people asked of me.
Why did you decide to answer a suicide hotline? Having been raised in a private rest home for the elderly, which my parents ran out of our 19 room house, caring for and helping people has always been part of who I am, it's in my DNA. I spent 25 years volunteering at the Stratton VA hospital and since I wasn't doing that anymore, I wanted to find another way to reach out to people who were in pain. I also volunteered at a homeless shelter.
How many volunteers were there answering the lines? There were at the most, five us us who were paid during the day and at night there was usually only one volunteer on duty. There were about thirty volunteers in total. We were open from nine in the morning to ten at night. Now that the center has lost their funding, the lines are only open a few hours each day.
What happens if you were on the phone with someone and your shift was over? We all took a pledge that the caller would come first and if we were on the phone with them at the time of closing, we would remain there to finish the call for as long as it took. I was covering for a volunteer one evening and a call came in minutes before ten. It was a long call. After hanging up and writing out my report, it was well after midnight.
What was the longest call you've had? Calls can range from five minutes to two hours. There are many variables. My longest call was about an hour and a half. We also had an internet chat line. One time my supervisor was chatting with a person for two hours when she had to leave. She discreetly passed the chat off to another staff member who chatted with the person online for another two hours when she had to begin a training class for new volunteers. I was about to leave and she asked me to stay and continue the chat. I was there for about two hours when the person finally decided to end the chat because they felt that they were going to be okay. That was a difficult chat to take because I had to read the entire chat log and continue the current conversation at the same time. That sort of thing rarely happens.
What kind of people were the volunteers and what was their motive for doing that kind of work? There were many reasons people answered the phones. Some volunteers knew someone or had a family member complete suicide so they wanted to answer the phones to help others and, to honor the memory of their loved one. One volunteer's son completed suicide so as a pseudonym she took on the feminine version of her son's name in remembrance of him. Others where college students looking to get something impressive on their resumé. They usually didn't stay long. Some were retired people looking to do something to keep busy or give back. Some were people who were unemployed hoping that if they could prove themselves, they may get hired if an opening presented itself. One woman was arrested for drugs and prostitution and was required to perform community service so she chose this. Regardless of motivation, everyone found it rewarding on many levels and most of us cared deeply for the callers. There was only one person I couldn't figure out. He used to surf the internet during calls and grumbled when a call came in. We were both given the task of verifying referrals and in one day I had called over a 100 people and he called about 25. He said it was because he got a lot of calls but I checked his call log, plus, I was first in the queue that day. He kept an iPad discreetly tucked into his employee handbook and had an earphone tucked into his headset. He spent most of his time watching movies online or playing video games. He was the exception. Ironically he got a big promotion.
Did anyone who called in actually take their life? There is no way to know that. I don't know. We do know about some of the people whom we have saved because they call back.
Why do you say "complete" and not "commit?" I had an English teacher who taught us Latin roots. COM means "with" and MIT means "thread." So for me it means to follow through with something with no indication of outcome, and it also has negative psychiatric connotations such as committing someone. COMPLETE means "with" and "full." It means to fully perform the task rather than follow a thread. It is just my preference.
Have you ever answered the phone and known the caller? Six times. That's why some of us with unique names take on a pseudonym. I also answered the phone three times and saw that the callers lived a few blocks from my house. The first thing I do when a call comes in is to type the number into our program. If the caller has called before, a record of their previous calls will come up. That way I can better help them by reading about their call history. I also reverse search their number in an attempt to get an address in case the call becomes a medical emergency.
Have you ever gotten any prank calls? All the time. Mostly teenagers. I listen carefully to the background sounds of every call because those sounds can reveal a lot about the caller. If I hear a dog or cat for instance, I can use that knowledge later in the call as a "Protective Factor." I also listen for giggling or someone else whispering in the background. Many prank callers aren't prepared to answer questions and you can hear a friend in the background helping with the answers. After a while you get to know when someone is truly depressed, in crisis or prank calling. Their tone and answer content doesn't lie. Despite that, we treat every call as a real call. Once we discern that it is a prank, we politely end the call because a real caller may be trying to get through. As much fun as some of them are, we have to keep the lines open.
What is a protective factor? A reason to live. A person who owns a pet may not kill themselves because they are concerned about what would happen to their pet if they were no longer around to care for them. Other protective factors are family, friends, someone who is with them at the time of the call, the fact that they called, plans for the future or even religious beliefs that forbid suicide. Listening carefully to the caller is important to help identify these factors for and to them. It is also important to weigh these against any existing "Risk Factors" such as previous attempts, the means are there, the intent is strong, any kind of loss the caller is concerned with such as a relationship, job or poor health. Many callers will consider suicide because of seemingly insignificant concerns but,those are usually the "final straw" and not the real problem.
How do you know the identity of the person calling? We have caller ID but we also ask the caller for their first name. If they don't want to give one, we tell them it is okay but I then ask for a fake name. I like to call a person by a name throughout their call. I think it is important to call people by name. If they block their caller ID information, that is okay. I once had a woman use a fake name and before she ended the call, she shared with me her real name. That was very touching to me.
Do you ever call 911 on a person contemplating suicide? It was our office policy not to. Other suicide hotlines may vary. We would call 911 if we had permission or the person lapsed into a non-responsive state. We call those "medical emergency" calls.
Do you ever get depressed after talking to people and hearing about all their problems? I don't. I have the ability to drop and forget everything after each call. I can answer each call fresh and new with every person who reaches out to us. Our supervisors are always available to talk and debrief us if needed. Once my supervisor was listening in on a call, for quality control, and after the call she came over to ask if I wanted to talk about the caller. She was even teary eyed. I have a good genetic self defense mechanism and can let things go. It has always been easy for me to forgive and forget. In "Star Trek: Into Darkness," Spock elegantly waxes about how his choice not to feel does not imply that he is cold. On the contrary, he chooses not to feel because he feels too much. Maybe that is me.
How come you lost your funding? People don't think suicide is important or is as pervasive as it really is. Write your congressman! A suicide center is not a money making business and our office was unable to sustain itself in this economy. You need space, phones, computers, internet, IT personnel, heat, electricity, software, supervisors, people to train volunteers, people to seek and screen volunteers. There is a lot of overhead that most people are not aware of. It is not just a phone line. Although, I do currently answer a hotline for a prison organization and they provide the phone. It is more laid back, the calls are not recorded and no records are kept. I am just there to offer support and listen. Write your law makers asking them to support these services. There is a large portion of our population who are either depressed, struggling, thinking about suicide, or wish they were dead. It's a sin that we are not there to help them while congress can vote themselves raises.
Why would you record a call? Quality assurance and training. Each and every call is totally confidential. No data, information or recording leaves our office. Supervisors listen to the recordings so they can provide feedback to us in an effort to improve our service to the callers. We also write up reports about the call so that other people who answer the phones can read the reports both for learning purposes and in case that person ever calls back. The information from previous calls can help to steer the conversation especially if the caller is quiet and reserved.
If someone calls after ten pm and you're not there, what happens? It gets routed to another suicide hotline office. It is all automated. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 24/7.
Do you ever get a caller who doesn't want to kill themselves but needs to talk? All the time. Most callers have ambivalence (both + strength), that's why they call because they don't want to die. All of our callers are going though some kind of emotional pain and don't know how to make it stop. They do have the strength and courage to call for help. We are there to get them through the moment.
Do you get people who harm themselves in other ways such as cutting? All the time. Especially teenagers. I don't know where they get this idea of cutting. Many people think that the pain of physical cutting will take away their emotional pain. I ask many of these callers that the next time they want to hurt themselves, instead of hitting, cutting or biting, try holding an ice cube in their hand. They will get the pain and not scar or bruise or bleed. It does not solve their problem but ameliorates the symptom of wanting to feel pain without doing permanent damage. We often ask people if they want referrals to support groups, counselors, hospitals or mental health agencies.
Playing with Soul
"Tell me a fact, and I'll learn. Tell me a truth, and I'll believe. But tell me a story, and it will live in my heart forever."
- Steve Sabol, President of NFL Films.
One of the most difficult questions someone once asked me was about what I planned to do in the future to further improve or educate myself musically. I knew the answer existed but I could not then delineate it. A second difficult question was "How do I learn to play with soul?"
About ten years ago a convergence of events and opportunities presented themselves to me. I was musically stuck and I thought I achieved all I could achieve. I was energized for growth but seemed to lack the tools, colleagues and inspiration thereof. I started looking for a new job. I was also working for a cleric who was not a very good human being on so many levels. When we were converting the rectory basement to a youth meeting room the contractor found decaying asbestos hanging from the pipes and he wouldn't take the job. A new contractor was found for the job and he surprisingly didn't find any asbestos. Hmmph. Then when we purchased a building to expand our parking lot, there was asbestos found in the basement and the bid to remove the asbestos and demolish the structure was $80,000. The bid from a second contractor who didn't find any asbestos was only $30,000. Praise Jesus the church didn't incur any additional expense for apocryphal asbestos removal and, in sixty years when our children develop lung cancer, well, there will probably be a cure. Praise Jesus again. So, who is the greater monster; someone who is, for instance on the sex offender registry for urinating in public (that pervert) or a cleric who discernibly hurt no one? To think major industrial companies got away with these activities for decades.
I was at the height of my then musical skill yet at the lowest in inspiration, I continued working and going through the motions but still did not sense growth. I didn't know why. I still did my job to the best of my abilities and even have a letter from the Bishop's office stating that I had the best music program in the whole diocese. Something was still missing. It was then when I gave up my pursuit of music that I began to grow. I had another "cease and desist" about five years later, another about a year after that and I am ascending the precipice of one right now. The less I did in search of soul through discipline and structure, the more I found it. I played the Broadway Tour production of "Les Miserables" and there was an inspirational line sung by the unholy trio of Jean Valjean the convict, Fantine the prostitute and the lying Bishop: "To love another person is to see the face of God."
When you go to college and immerse yourself in books, lectures and study, you come out with knowledge, inspiration, drive, energy and maybe even technique. Much of that is rooted in academia and, it is good.
I then started volunteering answering two suicide hotlines. I would spend hours listening to a caller's struggle with drug abuse, addiction, homelessness, joblessness, arrest, domestic and sexual abuse. Many of my callers were feeling lost, alone, forsaken, abandoned or ostracized. I quickly realized that these were normal, ordinary people all of us would encounter on the streets, in our homes, in our churches, our neighborhoods or in the stores on an everyday basis. When a caller was reticent to allow me to steer them into their pain, I could keep them on the line and safe from harming themselves by talking about music, hiking, religion or travel; Anything we had in common. It was easy for me to let go of all that pain and stress when I hung up. I would also go home and practice the piano, go to a rehearsal, or study the Gospel readings for Sunday. I would sometimes talk about the pain in the world to my music friends, church friends or hiking buddies while on a trail. It was my form of debriefing and, I would play the piano with the life of others on my mind.
While keeping vigil at a homeless shelter for men, I would sometimes talk to the guys late at night and discover that many of them were once professionals, family men and dreamers. Some of these peripatetics were running from a past, a future, a crime or just wandering hoping for a break. Interestingly, many of them were very spiritual. We would talk of hiking, travel, music, religion, carpentry or plumbing. One once sat at the piano and ripped off some ragtime. Another 20 year old sat in a corner with his guitar, composing a tune. I would then go to my church the next morning to prepare for my weekly recital where I would spend the day alone in the church with music - pondering the many wonderful stories I just heard and shared.
I taught GED classes for about two years. Many of the students were in their early 20's and dropped out of school because of drugs, gangs, arrest, to be providers to their baby's momma, or they had unstable family lives and were kicked out of their homes. Most all of them were very smart - such as the drug dealers and gang members and not only in the street sense. Their math skills surpassed mine, especially in the metric system (how drugs are measured). The women who gave birth in their teens had a tenacity, ferociousness, courage and work ethic which could only have been borne out of being thrust into adulthood at an early age, like gold tested in fire. There is an earthy difference between one of those moms as opposed to someone who went to college, started a career, then planned and prepared to have a baby and start a family. A common denominator for all these people was the copiousness of music. It was sinuously networked throughout their life from listening, jamming on a stoop, in a car, in an alley or dancing in the street. They could recite thousands of lyrics because it was how they communicated and communed.
I recently "purchased" through a donation to PBS the complete five disc set of the Ed Sullivan Show and three discs containing footage from the original Woodstock concert. The musicians were young kids, uneducated in music theory, harmony and technique. However, they were musicians with talent and confidence most of us could only dream of achieving in a lifetime. Why is that? Because music was the fabric of their lives. They ate it, drank it and slept it (and smoked it). Music was part of their social landscape. They made music on stoops, in fields, in cars, living rooms, basements, garages, jail cells and to escape their parents. Then one day someone would say "Let's start a band" and the rest is history. Music wasn't their goal in life, it was the inspiration thereof. They didn't have time to study it because they were living it. Their teachers were not professors in a classroom, but practitioners who were doing it. Music then became a tool to educate others about the evils of legislation, war, poverty, persecution, prejudice, dumping of pollutants (like asbestos) . . . every struggle in life which created, BTW, good music. They suffered oppression, suppression and arrest, then they sang about it. A great example would be Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant."
The early African slaves sang in the field to pass time, to keep time, to remember stories from time long ago, to pray for salvation and to surreptitiously speak in code right under the noses of their white masters. Early Jews and Christians sang songs around campfires to remember history, impart lessons and share stories of the wonderful deeds of God such as the parting of the Reed Sea and saving the oppressed, the story of Adam and Eve and original sin, The Christmas Story and the death of the Holy Innocents, Noah and the great flood which eradicated evil from the earth, etcetera.
My most favorite church service of the entire year is the Easter Vigil Mass, starting with the magnificent Exultet extolling the power of God, all sung by firelight. Then there are several more stories accompanied by songs again, all by firelight. Done properly and in its entirety, this service could take up to four hours. Most churches cut it down to one and a half to two. Praise Jesus - but not for four hours. WWJD.
At this stage in my life I don't need to study music as I did in my youth. Despite continuing to do so because there is much I want to do but can't, I found that there are other things which can improve my "soul." The music is already in me and around me, under rocks and in the wood. I need to work at being a conduit between instrument, God and people. A trinity within the thin-spaces. It is not enough to study music, to make music or to share music. Music is an expression of life and that is where its growth lies: in the pain, struggle, joy, excitement and transformation of one another. For, out of what we live and we believe, our lives become the music that we weave.


And, most importantly, able to defy superhero wardrobe conventions and refuse to wear tights because they are SO not flattering. The cape thing, however, is working.
Today's adventure finds our heroine (that would be me) typing away at some nonsense or other, hoping to become a famous writer one day. As I type, I am soothed by the sounds of the washing machine in our charming laundry alcove (aka dingy closet). My superhero super-senses aren't activated this morning, perhaps because I'm not wearing my cape. If they were, I might notice an odd sound to the washer, but I type blithely away until I hit my RDA of 1,000 words, and break for a brownie.
Emerging from the den, I am horrified to see the hallway floor awash in water. The hardwood hallway floor. The beautiful, cherry-stained, hickory hardwood floor that I begged for, and that my husband so painstakingly installed.
I hear whimpering. Fearing he's in trouble, my eyes scan the disaster area for my faithful sidekick, Unbrushed Dog, only to spy him leisurely lapping up some water at the other end of the hall. Apparently, the whimpering is coming from me.
Time to get a grip. Time to get hold of myself. Time to get a towel.
I cry out to the heavens, "Where is a superhero when you need one?!" There's a bang ( I trip), a splash (it's a lot of water), and whoosh – I'm wearing my SuperMA'AM cape. I utter the classic superhero line of reassurance, "Thank God this cape covers the backs of my thighs!" Then, "There's no need to fear – SUperMA'AM is here!
I leap into action – rushing into the bedroom for the horrible afghan that Aunt Mary gave us for Christmas. I'm hoping it holds a lot of water, and that it won't recover from the effort. I spread it out on the hallway floor, sopping and sobbing, alternately.
Gallons of water and a herniated disk later, the floor is somewhat drier and the horrible afghan is drying across our rough-hewn back fence, safely ensuring its demise. I grab a beach towel and commence my trial run for the Household Olympics of "towel-skating floor-drying". Finally, just as my super-knees are about to super-give-out, the floor seems relatively dry. I step back to survey the hallway and the laundry alcove.
Water squishes out from under the wood where it meets the kitchen linoleum. Some boards are already slightly warped, and some have split at the ends. The washing machine can't be used again until an exorcism has been performed.
Bringing in a fan, I prepare to unleash my mightiest superpower ……..
I pretend the fan will dry out the underside of the wood. I squint my eyes tightly, so I can't see the warping. I convince myself that those little splits in the wood are part of the grain, and that I don't really need to do laundry anyway.
I have let loose the Depth Charge of Denial, and it is indeed powerful. So powerful that I find myself relieved that the dryer still works, because I'm going to remove my king-size down comforter from the washer, run it through the dryer, and put it back on the bed. I'm going to forget how I debated large-capacity laundromat washers vs. our washing machine, and then decided that if I could get the washing machine closed by sitting on the lid, then technically, the comforter fit into ours. I'm going to tell my husband that I have no idea why the washing machine would have overflowed like that, and that I'm sorry about the afghan.
Denial of this magnitude could only come from a superhero, and that's what makes me SuperMA'AM.


ett la benn designers Danilo Dürler and Oliver Bischoff used lighting to exceptional effect when they conjured up a daring dining space at Berlin's fashionable Chinese restaurant the Long March Canteen.
ett la benn set the stage for an intimately lively dining experience. They also made sure that the restaurant's critically-acclaimed food remains centre stage.
Flexible Ball & Socket fittings - customized and delivered in just 14 days - were used to define each place setting precisely. Guests now dine in striking yet comfortable light that focuses full attention on each individual meal.


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Two Branstetter, Stranch & Jennings (BS&J) attorneys achieved a big win for union members in an unfair labor practice trial before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
David O'Brien Suetholz and Pamela M. Newport successfully represented the Teamsters Local 89 in a claim against Smyrna Ready Mix (SRM) Concrete LLC. The claim was filed on behalf of employees who were terminated from the company's Winchester, Kentucky facility. The initial charges were filed in November 2019, and the case was tried during the summer of 2020.
Administrative Law Judge Arthur Amchan ruled on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2020, that SRM Concrete violated the National Labor Relations Act by partially shuttering and making the Winchester facility an "on-demand plant" and terminating its drivers "due to employees' known and suspected union sympathies." Further violations included termination of additional employees, denying terminated employees future employment "solely on the basis of their known and suspected union sympathies without credible evidence of punishable misconduct or poor performance," and requiring the drivers to sign a separation agreement in order to receive enhanced benefits.
Judge Amchan ordered SRM Concrete to resume full operation of the Winchester plant, rehire the terminated employees and provide back pay with interest. SRM Concrete was also ordered to provide additional compensation for search-for-work and interim employment expenses, and for any adverse tax consequences resulting from lump-sum back pay awards.
In addition, Region 9 of the NLRB instituted an action in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, seeking an injunction to force SRM Concrete to reopen.
"SRM Concrete's flagrant attempts to stifle their employees' voices for dignity and justice in the workplace were egregious violations of the National Labor Relations Act, and BS&J is proud to have been a part of this victory," said Suetholz.


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Hamish Bowles Remembers the Unparalleled Energy, Wicked Wit, and Insatiable Curiosity of Karl Lagerfeld
by Hamish Bowles
Photographed by Horst P. Horst, Vogue, September 1974
As a very little boy, Lagerfeld was annoying his unforgiving mother so much with his clumsy piano practice that she slammed the piano lid down on his infant fingers and firmly told him, "Enough piano! Now, you draw."
We must be thankful for Frau Lagerfeld's tough love because Karl never stopped drawing from that day forth. As a teenager he sketched his way into a prize at the International Wool Secretariat (where he met his fellow winner, the coltish Yves Saint Laurent) with a chic design for a shoulder-belted barrel coat that landed him a job with the couturier Pierre Balmain, known for his becoming Jolie Madame fashions. Postwar Paris, as Lagerfeld told me, was "dark, not very clean—everything looked different then," but nevertheless it was the beginning of an enduring love affair, even though he briskly claimed that at chez Balmain he learned everything that a designer should not do. Soon after, still a remarkably young man, he was appointed designer at Jean Patou, a dusty house long past its Jazz Age prime where he was bored out of his mind designing two collections a year but learned sophisticated 1920s dressmaking techniques from the elderly fitters and seamstresses in the ateliers that would inform his designs for seven decades. Disillusioned with the world of the haute couture, he left for Rome to study his favorite composer Bellini. However, he realized that he was "a fashion junkie" at heart, and with the uncanny intuition that remained a true friend for the rest of his life, understood that fashion wasn't about making garden party frocks for debutantes and their mothers, but that the future was in the emerging ready-to-wear design houses that would be eager for dynamic young talent. He decided to present himself as a gun for hire, taking his talents from one house to another and picking up a fistful of salaries that grew handsomer and handsomer with every passing year.
Karl Lagerfeld for Chloé, 1975
Photographed by Deborah Turbeville, Vogue, January 1975
He worked for Loewe in Madrid and a slew of Italian labels (at Tiziani in Rome he created the explosive headdress and caftan worn by Elizabeth Taylor to portray the richest woman in the world in the ill-fated 1968 movie, Boom!), but his destiny changed when he met Gaby Aghion of Chloé in 1964. Here he made ready-to-wear clothes as covetable as haute couture, moving voraciously from trend to trend with Pop Art embroideries one minute, dainty clothes inset with panels of lace that seemed to have stepped from the pages of the Gazette du Bon Ton the next, followed by bold-shouldered Memphis-inspired looks, always riding the crest of the fashionable wave. Karl molded Chloé's image so successfully that a decade later he entered into a partnership agreement with Aghion. ("In this business I like two things," he told Vogue, "the work and the money.") For the ruthlessly unsentimental Karl, timeless fashion was a bore, and although he worshipped the past, he had no nostalgia in him; in fact, he was voracious in his quest for novelty and newness.
No sooner had he sent a collection down the runway than he had consigned it to oblivion and was pursuing the next big thing, the next trend, the next It girl. "Things are done for the joy of doing it," he told Vogue in 1995. "Tomorrow, I begin again."
Photo: Kim Weston Arnold / Indigital.tv
In 1965 he met the quintet of formidable Fendi sisters, whose grandparents Adele and Edoardo had founded an under-the-radar luxury fur house in 1925, and he triumphantly reinvented their family brand too. He treated fur to innovative designs and treatments, and not only conceived the linked F logo that would define the Fendi brand but cannily registered the design before he showed it to the enthusiastic sisters, who apparently rewarded him with an apartment in the Eternal City. ("I love Italy and I love Italians," he said.)
By 1979, Vogue described "a personal lifestyle that's as much that of a royal courtier as of a couturier," but Lagerfeld demurred. "I'm working-class," he always insisted.
The work amplified in 1983, when Alain Wertheimer hired Lagerfeld to revamp Chanel and he embarked on an enduring Postmodern transformation there too. ("When I came to Chanel, I said to Mr. Wertheimer, 'Let's make a pact,' like Faust with the devil. But we don't know who is the devil and who is Faust.")
All this work had made him a very rich man, indeed, and for decades Lagerfeld was free to indulge his passions for houses and the things to fill them. "I think it is healthy to decorate, to destroy, to do and redo," he said.
By the turn of the '90s Karl owned seven houses in four countries, furnished with museum-quality antiques, state-of-the-art contemporary commissions, and a quarter of a million books. "I'm a very messy person with all my books, letters, writing" he said. His homes were filled with objects but not with people. "I realized at 14 that I was born to live alone," he said. "I live in a set with the curtains of the stage closed and with no audience." Latterly he lived with his beloved cat, Choupette, surrounded by the tools of his work and food for his febrile mind.
Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, Vogue, September 2018
I was 20 when I went to my first Karl Lagerfeld show. The designer was already a world-class fashion star and had just begun his sly, seductively Postmodern reinvention of the codes of Chanel—a house that had languished in staid propriety in the dozen or so years since its eponymous founder had died.
The couture show was unveiled at the Opera Garnier; there were tightrope walkers, doves, circus magic, and the launch of the fragrance Coco. At least that's what a breathless Suzy Menkes told me afterward as I wept on the steps: The defenders at the gate wouldn't let my 20-year-old self through the door, although I had spent days proffering my credentials as the barely-out-of-my teens Paris and London editor of Australian Harper's Bazaar, and who indeed can blame them? The gorgons finally relented, however, and I was allowed into the salon on the rue Cambon where chic clients saw the same collection in the time-honored fashion of the haute couture houses—quietly so that they could study the clothes up close and place their personal orders. A beige screen crashed to the floor in the middle of the show, but there was a lot more fashion excitement in the clothes themselves that took the codes of La Grande Mademoiselle and subverted them with wicked wit. The Lesage embroideries were crusted on, and I was amazed to discover that the carefully seamed suits were garlanded with "gilded lavatory chain links."
At the Lagerfeld show the following ready-to-wear season I was still enough of a fashion neophyte to ask Karl to autograph his portrait in the run of show program, and I am glad I did. "For Hemish," he wrote, and I cherish it to this day.
Karl's energy was unparalleled. He would retreat to one of his country houses for the weekend and return with 200 costume designs for an opera or ballet. He would wake up from a vivid dream and design a collection based on it that very morning, or conjure one on the most esoteric things that had tickled his fancy. He might, for instance, be inspired by the colors in Jawlensky's oft-repeated reductive face portraits or (as he was for his final Chanel haute couture collection shown this January) by an exhibition of the master purveyors of luxury goods to the 18th-century French courts that he had sleuthed in a little-trafficked museum in the heart of the Marais. And it never ended; almost unique among creative directors for major international brands today, Karl produced almost every sketch, controlled every fitting. "For Chanel alone I do 10 collections, and I do it all myself, all the sketches," he said pointedly, "I'm not the 'art director,' with 25 people working on computer."
I had a sense of Karl's crazy schedule as early as 1989 when he was commissioned by London's Sunday Times Magazine to photograph a series of contemporary dandies, and, to my great delight, the fashion editor Caroline Baker invited me to sit for him as part of the portfolio. The sitting was to take place at Le Mée near Fontainebleau, the exquisite 18th-century house that Karl had decorated with a thoroughly modish mash-up of Gustavian, Martine School, and 1940s furniture. The Times equipe was ferried into the depths of the French countryside. At the time, Karl was in the thrall of the madcap Princesse Diane de Beauvau-Craon, who was the establishment's de facto hostess. (As a rebellious debutante, she had been furious when her mother ordered a couture dress for her coming-out ball from Marc Bohan at Dior, a froth of pale pink Lady Diana organza. The princess shaved her head on the eve of the ball so that at least she could wear it with punk attitude—just the sort of gesture that Karl would have applauded.)
Karl swept in hours later and we sat down to a sumptuous midnight meal that Baker realized weeks after the fact represented the better part of her annual fashion budget. By two in the morning Karl was more or less ready for the séance. My hair was given Marcel waves and my cheeks powdered and lightly rouged so that I looked like Stephen Tennant, the aesthete aristocrat of Britain's Jazz Age, a reference that both Karl and I relished. (One of my hapless friends on the shoot got an Otto Dix makeover with Lynn Yaeger-esque whorls of deep pink cresting his cheekbones, so I considered myself very lucky.) Karl approved the Nehru-collar jacket that the London tailor Richard James had made, of deep sky blue raw silk embroidered with soft pink cabbage roses, and dug out a vast pink silk flower and photographed me apparently breathing in its heady fragrance, lost in transports of ecstasy, the very embodiment of camp. We weren't back in Paris until dawn but I couldn't have been more thrilled.
Helena Christensen, Stephanie Seymour, Karen Mulder, Naomi Campbell, Claudia Schiffer, and Cindy Crawford wear Chanel in Vogue
Photographed by Peter Lindbergh, Vogue, September 1991
The astonishing thing is that the protean Karl kept up this relentless schedule more or less up until the weeks before he died. Night after night after night, for decades on decades, he operated on almost no sleep—often having dreamed vividly of clothes that would materialize in the next collection. The financial rewards of all his hard work went towards more lovely houses and breathtaking wonders to fill them with.
By the time I was invited to visit the astonishing Hôtel de Soyecourt in the heart of the Left Bank in the early '90s it was filled with 18th-century furniture, pictures, and objets d'art of princely quality that lived up to their setting. The house had been built in around 1706 by Lassurance—a little known architect whose praises Karl was delighted to have read in the letters of Liselotte, Madame Palatine, the long-suffering wife of Louis XIV's flamboyantly queer brother, the Duke of Orléans, known as Monsieur. The outspoken Liselotte—like the tragic Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of James I of England, and known as the Winter Queen—was one of history's esoteric fascinators who bewitched Karl: his erudition was a constant astonishment.
Karl had already graduated to the building's magnificent principal block from an only faintly less magnificent set of rooms in an adjoining wing. The drawing room was filled with broad-seated giltwood chairs signed by the great makers, such as Tilliard, Dalanois, and Bauve, and upholstered in sharp yellow silk damask and raspberry pink stamped velvet, a curious scheme nabbed I believe from the painting on a snuffbox belonging to the Comte d'Artois. Karl did not believe in the poetry of patina: Whenever the sun streaked the acres of silk faille shades that ballooned at the tall windows, he swiftly replaced them. But this was no museum. Karl used his beautiful, precious things as they had been used by the aristocrats and crowned heads who had originally commissioned them, and the world's preeminent supermodels and superstars of the moment would loll on the spindly arms of those chairs and scrape their vermeil cutlery on the hand-painted blossoms of the Sèvres porcelain with giddy abandon.
Dinners chez Karl in those pre-diet days were Proustian affairs: He served French food prepared and presented to a Belle Époque level of elaboration, and the women came in bedazzled couture. During one unforgettable soiree, he rolled up the Savonnerie carpet—it had, after all, been commissioned for the Salon de la Paix at Versailles—to reveal the beeswax gleam of the parquet de Hongrie beneath and danced a spirited tango with the very nimble-footed Oscar de la Renta, who I seem to recall had a rose in his mouth. Was this the night that Karl's great friend Princess Caroline of Monaco stood on the stairs, each tread lit with a scented candle, and started reciting Coleridge, perfect to the word?
Upstairs in this marvelous house, Karl subsequently created a sitting room filled with plump 19th-century upholstered furnishings (based on a set that had belonged to Wagner) that he covered in a surprising marmalade-color velvet. Under the window was a bronze by Falconet that had once belonged to Catherine the Great. He gave me a tour and I discovered that his nearby bathroom was a visual palette cleanser with the look of a 1930s moderne sanitorium. It was hung with the most exquisite studies by the Art Deco fashion illustrator Georges Lepape, including one of a wasp-waisted dandy that I had loved since childhood and was astonished to discover there. Karl was gleeful that I recognized it. God, it was so fun sparring with someone who had such encyclopedic style references.
In the grand courtyard-facing gallery upstairs Karl installed a vast table that stretched almost the entire length of the room. He heaped it with books, more and more and more and more to fuel his voracious appetites for literature and visual stimulation, until eventually the table shot right through the 18th-century floor and the ceiling beams and into the entrance hall below.
Then, on a whim, he sold his superb 18th-century treasures—just as he had shaken off his museum-quality Art Deco treasures and his Memphis Group wonders—and commissioned state-of-the-art objects and furnishings from the coolest designers of the day instead. He tired of these, too, and left that amazing house to move to a platinum gray spaceship of an apartment spangled with light that bounced off the Seine. He was just as unsentimental and ruthless with his friends. When his intimate pal Anna Piaggi published a book filled with the wonderful portraits of her in her ever-changing tenues that he had sketched for her through the decades, a distinct froideur set in to their relationship. When Inès de la Fressange, the witty, willowy muse who had helped him define a playfully patrician elegance for Chanel, was elected to represent La Marianne, the symbol of France, he declared her irredeemably bourgeoise and banished her from his inner circle, promoting the giggly, jewelry-designing Victoire de Castellane, the pulpeuse niece of his longtime Chanel right hand, Gilles Dufour, instead, and ushering in a new era of saucy vinyl and plastic that seemed to capture the zeitgeist of the moment. Inès was eventually invited back, but real enemies were not so lucky. Karl famously feuded with Kitty d'Alessio, for instance, the president of Chanel in America, when he first arrived to reinvent the brand. Her tenure did not outlast his displeasure. "The good news is that Kitty d'Alessio has been made director of special projects," he announced gleefully, snapping his fan shut. "The bad news is there are no special projects."
Chanel Spring 2004
Karl always had the eye for the girl of the hour. One moment it was the fabulous cognac-eyed Marpessa, who swung and flirted her way down his runways. The next it was an astonishingly pretty Claudia Schiffer, who in those early days couldn't walk down a runway to save her life (and had to have special low-heeled shoes made for her outfits) but bounced along in her dimpled blonde magnificence brimming with joie de vivre and igniting the photographers into a frenzy of wolf whistles.
The quest for novelty and newness never left him—although for years it must be admitted that he communicated only by fax, his florid hand so much more expressive than a generic email or text's font.
Chanel Fall 2018 Couture
Photo: Yannis Vlamos / Indigital.tv
The last time that I really spent time with Karl he was conducting the fittings for his Fall 2018 haute couture collection behind a desk heaped with papers and trays of costume jewelry. He had recently discovered a verre églomisé silhouette portrait of Gabrielle Chanel painted on mirror by the modish antebellum artist Etienne Drian, whom I happen to worship, and he mischievously placed his own '70s bronze portrait bust by Claude Lalanne beneath—two gutsy profiles, two endlessly fascinating and compelling and controversial characters who changed the way women wanted to look. Karl's hearing was faltering and he kept up a machine gun rat-a-tat-tat of conversation to stall interrupting questions that he might not understand clearly, leaping from fashion to music to literature to technology to politics to industry gossip to a little of his own history (this last only with strident prompting from me), in easy bounds, leavening his chat with the outrageously politically incorrect provocations that he delivered like the Marquise de Merteuil in Dangerous Liaisons.
Photo: Alessandro Lucioni / Gorunway.com
And still he didn't slow down. One minute he was costuming a ballet for the gala opening night of the season at the Opera Garnier and dressing its chic director, Aurélie Dupont, in black chiffon onstage and Chanel's black satin panniers and Toulouse-Lautrec ankle boots off; the next, he came to New York to show his Egyptian-inspired Métiers d'Art collection for Chanel in the Temple of Dendur at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Then it was on to the Spring 2019 haute couture, unveiled in an ersatz Italianate garden constructed under the dome of the Grand Palais, one among so many astonishing environments whipped up in the alchemical centrifuge of Karl's brain. The clothes—inspired by that exhibition of 18th-century fournisseurs—were enchanting enough, with dresses crusted with what looked like hand-painted Meissen porcelain flowers or scattered with blossoms made from feathers, but there was something inexplicably solemn in the atmosphere. And then Karl did not appear to take his customary bow, and suddenly all the air was sucked out of the room.
It seems impossible to imagine that he will not take that bow any more, will not continue to surprise and astonish us with his wicked wit, his insatiable curiosity, and his protean imagination, but perhaps we can take solace by doing what he never did himself—look back, in wonder and in awe, at his unmatched and unmatchable body of work.
In This Story:Karl Lagerfeld, Obituary, Hamish Bowles