While Bibledit may be used for making any Bibles, there are some distinct advantages to releasing Bibles under a free license.
Others will feel free to publish the open Bible. You don't need to do everything yourself: Others will help spreading the Word of God.
It becomes easy to publish Bibles in a variety of formats by a variety of people: on paper, phones, the Internet.
If you think that the Bible you translated is good and reliable, and you release it under an open license, it will rapidly spread over the Internet.
Compare an open Bible to the Greek minuscules: They were copied freely, and they can now be found all over the place.
Various church people regularly express a desire to have a more accurate Bible than what they have now. The years pass by and the desire becomes stronger. They pray about the matter, discuss it, and decide to start the work on improving the Bible themselves, with the help of a booklet with directions. The booklet is published by the Bible Society.
Over the years some people join the group, and others leave the group. The church now has a translation team consisting of four people who by the grace of God work full time on the revision of the Bible. Each of the four people bring in their own expertise. Two of them focus on the target language. They aim at using accurate, faithful, beautiful and contemporary language. One of them focuses on the original Greek and Hebrew. He ensures that the translated text matches the originals. One of them focuses, more than the others, on the recipients. She aims at acceptance of the language by the future readers. Many proof-readers contribute to the work. The translation team regularly consults with language scholars and church representatives about the Bible translation. The Bible Society answers queries about how to translate difficult passages.
After several years the New Testament becomes ready. The manuscript is submitted to the Bible Society for publishing. The manuscript is formatted and uploaded to the church website. It can now be used by whoever wants to do so before it would be published in paper form.
The translation team starts to translate the Old Testament. The years pass by. The team eagerly awaits news from the Bible Society about publishing the New Testament. Five years later the news arrives that the Bible Society starts the preparations for publishing it. Another year later the team sees the first copies of the New Testament in book form.
During all those years the New Testament has been locked up in the offices of the Bible Society. It was not free to go out to the people in book form, but was kept locked up. It was enslaved.
The team keeps working on the Old Testament during many years. They are enabled to do so by the Lord God. The Old Testament becomes ready. The manuscript of the whole Bible is submitted to the Bible Society for publishing. One member of the translation team suggests to upload the formatted manuscript to the church website, just as was done with the New Testament. The team leader decides to not do this, but let the Bible Society be the first to publish the Bible. The translator feels disappointed, because the Bible, now complete and accurate, is not free to go out to the people. Not in paper form, not in digital form. It is enslaved, again.
Over the years the translator heard stories from others who had similar experiences. It occurs to him that the current way of doing things is not right. It leads to a situation where the Bible is not free to go where it is needed most: To the people. The translator begins to see more clearly that Christians should have freedom to publish Bibles or portions of it any time they wish to do so.
The translator becomes the leader of the translation team. The team leader is acquainted with open licenses. He chooses the GNU Free Documentation License as an appropriate license for the Bible. He is of the view that it is appropriate for the Word of God to be created under an open license to allow it to have free course.
The GNU Free Documentation License allows noncommercial distribution of the Bible by anyone who accepts the license. That is a good thing because this enables anyone to print the Bible and give it to someone else.
The GNU Free Documentation License allows commercial distribution of the Bible by any publisher who accepts the license. This is good, because it maximizes the distribution potential by allowing sales of printed Bibles. It also harnesses the profit motive for distribution. It limits overcharging with competitive pressure on prices.
The GNU Free Documentation License allows to update the Bible, provided the updated version is shared under the same license. This is a good thing because it allows legitimate updates, revisions, adaptations with no hassle to the translators and no delay for getting permission. A disadvantage is that changes can be made by people who might not be qualified or called to make changes, with possibly heretical results.
There is some fear that granting permission to make revisions would make it easier for somebody to make heretical changes to the Bible. But copyright law is not about preventing this. If anyone wants to make those changes, he would still do it. There is no need for this fear, because it is God who protects His own work. He makes clear what is a good translation, and what is not.
If a Bible Society is so protective about a Bible, so as not to grant a license to make revisions, then there is a bigger danger than that of heresy. The bigger danger is that the copyright holder holds on to the Bible, or disappears, or dies, or fails to be a good steward of it. Nobody would be allowed to improve or update the text.
Trust God. He takes care of His Word. He deals with anyone who might abuse it.
The Bible Society says: We own copyright, not in any way to restrict distribution, but to preserve the text. Protecting the text may at times restrict distribution. For example, the Bible must be distributed by us, or under our supervision. We have made a big investment in the Bible. Nobody may improve it without our authority. If anybody gives us details as to where the Bible can be improved, they can improve it, but only when we agree. This Bible is our property. We share it. It is not entirely ours, so there is a shared property. The Free Documentation License is good in an ideal world. But the world is evil, so we need a license where we can protect the integrity of the text.
The proponent of the free Bible says: A free license enables spreading the Word of God more quickly. The Bible Society has made such a reliable and good Bible. Is it not worthy of being spread as far and wide as possible? A restrictive license confines the Word to one publisher, one channel. A free license opens up the Word to being spread by more channels.
If the license is restrictive, it is not the bad people who are afraid of illegally copying the Word of God, making changes, then publish it. But it's the good people who would be worried to violate copyright law when spreading the Word, thinking that God's blessing cannot be on something illegal.
The free license does not aid bad people much, but it assists good people in many ways. A restrictive license does not stop heretics in any way, but it stops good people from spreading the Word.
The restrictive Bible Society says: If you revise our Bible, we'll see you in court.
The free and open Bible Society says: If you revise and spread our Bible, we thank God for opening another channel for distribution.
God wanted property rights to be there for the benefit of humans. But did he also want copyright on Bibles? Show from the Word where this is the case.


Social Media Marketing is based on the principles of Inbound Marketing. The first principle of Inbound Marketing is to be remarkable, in fact to be the most remarkable at what you do in your chosen market niche.
For home Internet businesses that are associated with the same business opportunity this can be a double challenge. For companies that produce and market their own products they can set out from the design stage to be remarkable. Apple would be a good example of this approach, they focus on the 'wow factor' any new product they launch is going to produce.
However if you are in direct sales and you are marketing a product over which you have no design and manufacturing control you have to create a niche market.
Decide why you are in the business of direct selling. This has to be service based as opposed to being focused on you. An example might be, 'To raise the level of financial awareness of average people to enable them to increase their wealth'. So now you have decided you are in the business of, 'finance and wealth management'. If you type "wealth management" into Google you get 5.3M hits. So the good news is there is a huge market. The bad news there is a lot of competition.
So if you decide to change the search to "wealth management uk" the search drops to 5.3K far too small a market on the face of it. You need to establish the volume or number of searches performed to see if you can create a niche market. Anything at or below 10K is a good number because you have a chance to become a, 'big fish in the pond'.
Once you have established a related key phrase using various software applications available your next step is market research. Your aim is to find a phrase or 'niche' where the competition is weak and create remarkable content that fits that phrase.
In the case of home Internet businesses remember YOU are the remarkable content. This is known as personal branding. Now remember you are aiming to project your reputation using social media marketing methods which are in the main free or low cost.
However the fact that Inbound Marketing techniques are low cost is only part of the reason you should focus on them. The main reason is they have 5 times the amount of paid for traffic on Google searches.
Being remarkable simply means you have to 'stand out' this means you need to find out the type of questions people in you niche are asking. Then you produce content; Blogs, Articles, Videos, Email Campaigns, Twitter, Social Bookmarks and Social Networks which answer these questions.


text:
From the network
Scott Tobias
Filed to:Interview
With rapid fading and poorly maintained archives leaving many films, even acknowledged masterpieces, in danger of being lost to history, Robert A. Harris resides at the forefront of a movement to reconstruct and restore American classics for future generations. A former producer whose credits include The Grifters, Harris cut his teeth aiding Kevin Brownlow in reviving Abel Gance's 1927 silent opus Napoleon. He then undertook a massive two-year project to bring an uncut version of Lawrence Of Arabia to the screen in its original 70mm format, a labor of love that was widely hailed as a landmark in film restoration. Shortly thereafter, Harris teamed up with longtime partner James C. Katz, and together, they've consistently turned their painstaking efforts into major moviegoing events, specializing in such gorgeous large-format restorations as Spartacus, My Fair Lady, and Vertigo. Their latest reissue, Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window, took advantage of Technicolor's new dye-transfer process, which allows many luminous color prints to be duplicated without damaging the preserved negative. Harris recently spoke to The Onion A.V. Club about his work.
The Onion: How did you learn your craft?
Robert Harris: When I was a kid, my father was an importer of Zeiss cameras and lenses and Astro lenses, which were German telephotos, so I grew up with cameras and photography—still and motion picture. I had my own darkroom when I was a kid, and I was processing black-and-white film and then color film, so I got to know quite a bit about emulsions. And, at the same time, I loved movies. Of course, we didn't have videotape back then, but we had a 16mm projector. One of [my father's] friends was head of a company called Seven Arts, and they had all the pre-1949 Warner Brothers films, the Monogram films and things of that sort for TV. So my parents would go to Europe for a couple of weeks, and before they went, we would have cartons and cartons and cartons of 16mm films delivered. And I would do my homework every night, then load up the projector and watch old movies. So I really gained an education and a respect for film. Also, in New York, we had something on TV called "Million Dollar Movie," which would enable you to watch stuff like King Kong or Yankee Doodle Dandy eight times a day. I grew up on Universal horror movies. So I just loved films, and I'm a bit of perfectionist, so I like to see things properly. My favorite film was always Lawrence Of Arabia and, although I had seen it in 70mm when it first came out, it had already been shorn of 20 minutes and I didn't know it. So that's how I got into [restoring] Lawrence. I went to people I knew at Columbia and told them I'd like to reconstruct and restore this film. This was after working with Kevin Brownlow on Napoleon.
O: The word "painstaking" is invariably used to describe what you do. Is that an accurate term?
RH: It is extremely accurate. I had hair before I started doing this. It's really, really difficult. You can't do it by the seat of your pants. You only get one opportunity to work with the film elements; they can be screwed up really easily, so you can't take any chances. You've got to do your research. Before you find out where you're going, you have to find out where you've been. So, number one, you have to know what the film looked like originally—or was supposed to look like originally. You've got to go through all the production records to see how the film was made. And only then can you start to try and fix it. And when you do that, you have to look at it on a shot-by-shot and frame-by-frame basis to see what the problems are and where the problems are, and then you begin to fix them. And there's no single answer how to do that. Every restoration is different, which is what makes it interesting.
O: With so many films deteriorating, how do you decide which ones to restore?
RH: [James Katz and I] restore the ones that we like, generally, unless someone wants to come up and offer us ridiculous amounts of money to do it. But it takes so much time, and it is so painstaking… There's blood on these things. There's a lot of sweat, there's a lot of blood, there's a lot of angst, and it's not worth spending your life saving something if you don't care about it. You have to be passionate about it. It's something that you can't just be paid to do, because that doesn't work.
O: Are there any other classics you can think of that are in dire need of attention?
RH: Yeah.
O: Any titles come to mind?
RH: A few. Would you like to hear them?
O: Sure.
RH: How about The Alamo? The Godfather...
O: The Godfather? Really?
RH: The Godfather is a mess. The Godfather is as bad as Rear Window.
O: Does it have to do with the film stocks of that particular period not being as durable?
RH: It's the period and the way they're handled, and The Godfather was butchered by the laboratories. It was handled horribly, like a piece of garbage.
O: They didn't do anything with this recent re-release?
RH: It was horrible. They called it a restoration. They spent half a million dollars. This is one of the things that has come back to haunt us, because once a [restoration] is done, it should be done and you assume that it is done. But The Godfather wasn't restored. North By Northwest has not been restored. Dr. Zhivago has been restored, but more damage was done than help. You have to know what you're doing, and it can't be done by bean counters.
O: Are there not adequate apprenticeships in place for people to learn how to do it correctly?
RH: There are, but the wrong people are being asked to do it. There are some wonderful apprenticeships out there. We hire people when we do a film, generally. There's the Jeffrey Selznick School Of Film Restoration And Preservation at George Eastmanhouse in Rochester. UCLA has one. There's a film-restoration program at East Langley University. So people can learn and it can be done, but what's happening is that the wrong decisions are being made on a corporate level. So when you try to restore a film like Zhivago for $120,000 and you come out with a piece of garbage, that speaks more of Warner Brothers and their inability to run and control their library. And I think it speaks of incompetent management. Same thing with Gone With The Wind. Incompetent management.
O: So this is an industry-wide problem, with studios not being able to preserve and maintain their archives.
RH: It pretty much is. Universal is actually pretty good. MGM—the new MGM, let us get our terms straight—has a new guy in there who's trying very hard, and he's got a real mess on his hands. Disney just shut down their restoration program, so they don't even have one. The company's in financial straits, I guess, because Michael Eisner probably needs to get his salary. So they've literally shut down their restoration-and-preservation department.
O: Could you explain briefly what happened with these Paramount Hitchcock films before they were picked up by Universal?
RH: Yes. The rights for five films—Rope, The Trouble With Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Rear Window, and Vertigo—reverted to Hitchcock in 1967. Hitchcock called someone and said, "I've got hundreds and hundreds of cartons. This is going to cost money, and I can't fit it in the freezer because I'm not going to take the ice cream out. What do I do with it?" And he was misinformed. Hitchcock, whose work I love, was a superb master craftsman when it came to filmmaking and a really lousy archivist. Basically, he got some really bad advice. And that advice was, "Take your camera negatives, your black-and-white separation masters (which protect the negatives), a 16mm and a 35mm soundtrack negative (which is used for making prints), and junk everything else worldwide." What this means is that they junked all of the original audio stems (music, effects, dialogue), they junked the three-stripe mag master (which included music, effects, and dialogue on separate stripes on a single 35mm film), they junked the monaural composite mag master, they junked all the foreign elements, they junked all the advertising elements and trailers, they junked all the effects material, and they junked all the main title backgrounds and main titles, except for the composite dupes. Then they took [what they kept] and stored it in a non-air-conditioned, unheated warehouse in Los Angeles, where it stayed from 1967 to 1983, when Universal got it. Universal's vaults, by the way, are superb: 34š, 25% humidity, right on target. But by the time they got [the films], they were faded. They were gone.
O: What were some of the most daunting challenges posed by the Rear Window restoration?
RH: Picture and sound.
O: So everything.
RH: Everything. There was nothing that was good. There was no surviving original sound material whatsoever, only used 35mm tracks. We found that when they made the optical soundtrack negative in 1954—which was made for the manufacturing of all the prints—it had been run 389 times along with camera negative in '54. So they were both worn out, but the [soundtrack] negative had been made defectively. You've obviously seen a piece of film at some point?
O: I was a projectionist for many years.
RH: So you've seen a lot of film. The Rear Window track negative was a bi-polar variable-density track… you know, two soundtrack impulses. The outboard impulse was fine. The inboard impulse—the one next to the perforations—was out of focus and not properly exposed. So all we had to work with was a single impulse cutting the quality of the sound down in half, plus all the splices, all the dirt, and all the wear built into the optical track. We had to go in and digitize everything, take different pieces of track from different prints and do what we could to piece the track back together. We did find the original music, which was all mono, and that's been preserved. There was no reason to go stereo [for the reissue], because the music itself was recorded mono. That's why we didn't do what we did with Vertigo.
O: With Vertigo, you completely overhauled the foley work, correct?
RH: We had to, yeah. All the foley and the effects were totally redone. We had the same problem with the Vertigo track [as we did with the Rear Window track]. All that survived were used 35mm prints. We had no mag material, except for the music, which we found in the Paramount vaults. These weren't even the cut music takes; these were the original floor recordings that we found in three-track stereo. So, once we found those and they sounded so extraordinary, we discussed it with a number of critics we respect and Herbert Coleman, who was Hitchcock's producer, and Pat Hitchcock [the director's daughter], and a few other people. We said, "What do we do? Do we try and make the mono track, which is dirty and has holes in it, sound as good as we can make it sound? Or do we take the original music, which is stereo and which many people feel is [composer] Bernard Herrman's finest work, and redo the tracks?" And everyone, to an individual, said, "We want to hear it in stereo." The caveat, of course, was that we would have to re-foley and re-effect the entire picture.
O: That must have been a fearful thing to do.
RH: Not really, because we preserved what existed. Actually, on the DVD, we wanted the studio to put what was left of the original mono track optical on one track and run the stereo on the other. But they didn't want to do that, because it wasn't on the laserdisc. Anyway, the music sounded so extraordinary and the recordings were so well done, but there were problems. Put yourself back in 1958. You're putting film on a projector. How old do you think that projector was in 1958? Where do you think it came from? It's probably out of the mid-'30s, with a tube sound system and speakers out of the '30s. So all of the warts that are in that soundtrack would not come through on the speakers, which smooth everything out—lop off the high end, lop off the low end. But if you take that track and you run it on a new system today, you hear everything, including lots of holes where they would just cut in dead film—no room tone, nothing. So when we would add a foghorn, a couple of birds at the bridge, some wind rustling through the tower at the end of the film… Those were to cover holes. We had no room tone. We had to create everything.
O: On Rear Window, what sort of detective work did you have to do in order to put it together properly?
RH: Well, we didn't have a surviving print with the right color. Most of the information that we got relative to color came from Herbie Coleman, who produced the film. He was there with Hitchcock starting with Rear Window and going all the way through for lots of films. We would go through things if we could find them. We found Georgine Darcy's shorts; she played Miss Torso [the ballet dancer]. She brought them into the office one day and they were faded, but if you fold down the cuffs, you have the color. And that's what you go for. Flesh tones you can maneuver a little bit, but what is right? So you try to make it as right as possible. Even when we had footage from the original negative, it was very faded, and we had to bring it back as well as we possibly could and work with the [Technicolor] dye-transfer process.
O: This is one of the first restorations to use that process, right?
RH: We feel this is the first restoration to use it successfully and properly. It was used on Gone With The Wind, but you couldn't focus it, which was a minor problem. [Laughs.]
O: What did you think of the Gone With The Wind restoration?
RH: Let's change the subject.
O: Oh, that good?
RH: I watched two reels and left because I had a headache.
O: Colors were too pronounced?
RH: Colors were wrong, and they couldn't focus, and it was out of registration, and it was contrast-y. Beyond that, it was beautiful. It's a lovely film.
O: What sort of discoveries do you make about a film when you look at it that closely?
RH: Well, how badly it cuts together when they change the lighting and change the camera angles—how things don't match. Remember, this is very early Eastmancolor, and it might have looked better in 1953 and '54, but now it's all faded. Part of the trick is making it all look like it cuts together and making a new cohesive film.
O: What are your thoughts on the prospect of digital projection?
RH: I don't think it's viable at the moment.
O: But is it a system that you approve or disapprove of?
RH: I don't think it's up to me to approve or disapprove. I think the tests people have been seeing don't tell the truth. There's a lot of smoke and mirrors. Because when you look at a picture like the new Star Wars or Toy Story, these are films in which the effects were done at 2K, which is half-resolution, and the audience doesn't know it, so you're looking at effects that are low-resolution. They then take all the production photography for the film, the cut camera negative, and they input that and output it digitally, at a lower resolution. That's how they make a dupe negative. So you're looking at a lower-resolution-than-normal 35mm print versus a lower-resolution-than-normal digital file.
O: Now, a digital image can't approximate the resolution that film can achieve, correct?
RH: It can get close. It depends what you're trying to do, and it's certainly going to get better as time goes on. If you want to see great projection, look into a system called Maxivision48. [MaxiVision48 places a large image on regular 35mm film, then runs it twice as fast, creating a clearer and sharper image. —ed.]
O: I was going to ask you about that. You've seen a demonstration? What's it like?
RH: Superb. Absolutely superb. And projectors can be retrofitted to accommodate the system. The system works beautifully, and it yields an image that's much sharper than what we're seeing today. Basically, put your digital output next to Maxivision and there's a big difference.
O: But it seems to be one of those situations where you've got the industry and a lot of money behind digital projection, but no one to stand behind a perhaps superior system.
RH: Well, look at the cost of digital projection. What are we looking at, $150,000 for a projector? I don't think the mom-and-pop theaters will ever have digital projection, because if they do have it, why do people need to go to the theaters? You can actually have a much more satisfying experience today watching most movies at home. At a theater, you have somebody on your left getting a cell-phone call, you've got somebody behind you translating dialogue to friends in another language… I mean, my movie-going experiences have not been terribly positive in the last couple of years.
O: But it seems like the cost of digital projection would go down, wouldn't it?
RH: I don't know. It depends on the cost of the projectors.
O: Is there a force behind Maxivision that might drive it ahead?
RH: Not yet. Just people who love films and have seen the system and think it's great.
O: What's been so surprising to me about digital projection is that there hasn't been much of an outcry about it. People seem resigned to the idea that this is the future of film projection.
RH: But who are the people? Are these the people who are sitting at home watching Titanic on a pan-and-scan VHS tape? They'd be thrilled to see something on a bigger screen. So it depends on who the people are. Who is the public? Is it an uneducated, unwashed public that's out there watching their pan-and-scans? Or is it the cognoscenti who are watching their DVDs? We're up to, what, four million DVD players now? I think the great unwashed are suddenly realizing that they can have quality for $250. I wasn't around when fire and the wheel came in, but DVD is bang right out of the chute.
O: So with something like digital projection, people would shrug and say, "I'm not seeing anything better here than I could see at home."
RH: I don't think they care. They have to care. I mean, do people know that film is dye-transfer Technicolor rather than Eastmancolor? Do they see that facial highlights are green? When I go to a theater, I'm up in the [projection] booth half the time. If something is out of focus, I'm in the booth. If it's not in frame, I'm in the booth. My wife doesn't want to go to movies with me anymore. I was once at a film and the frameline just sat there and sat there. I went to the usher and said, "Would you please tell the projectionist to frame it?" He said, "What do you mean?" And I said, "See on the screen, you can see the top of the frame after the bottom of the frame that we're looking at." Ten minutes later, the guy came back. I said, "Did you talk to him?" And he said, "Yeah." I said, "Well, [the frameline] is still there." He said, "The projectionist told me that you have to understand that a movie is strip of frames, the frameline separates those frames, and you have to have it." I said, "I know it's there, but you're not supposed to see it." [Laughs.] When I was about 17, I was with a couple of friends at a theater in White Plains, New York. We went to see Hombre, the Paul Newman film. And the guy was running one reel sort of out of focus and the other reel way out of focus and out of frame. I spoke to the usher a couple of times, and I finally said, "Look, can I talk to the projectionist?" So I went up [to the booth] and there was this ancient projectionist, probably 130, 140 years old. There he was, reading Playboy, and the usher said, "This young fellow would like to talk to you." He said, "Oh, what the hell do you want?" I said, "Well, you're running Projector One out of focus and you're running Projector Two out of focus and out of frame." He said, "What the fuck do you know? Here, you fix it if you're such a hotshot." So he took the projector—this is with an audience, mind you—and he throws it way out of focus, he throws it way out of frame so the film is clanking up and down, and then releases the tension, so the film is wobbling all over the place. He says, "Go ahead, hotshot, see what you can do." And he's cursing and there's no portal glass, so you've got 300 to 400 people turning around wondering what the hell is going on. So I get the tension reasonably in, then I focus the thing, get the frame in, reset the tension to perfection, and put it in critical sharpness. Then I hear my friends start applauding, "Yo, way to go, Harris!" And they hear the guy screaming, "Get out of my fucking booth or I'll have you arrested!" Later, of course, he changed over to the other projector and it was out of focus.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
June 28, 2020 Message by Dr. Blake
"Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing." – Audre Lorde
"O my Ancestors, what was it like to be stripped of all supports of life save the beating of the heart and the ebb and flow of fetid air in the lungs? In a strange moment, when you suddenly caught your breath, did some intimation from the future give to your spirits a wink of promise? In the darkness did you hear the silent feet of your children beating a melody of freedom to words which you would never know, in a land in which your bones would be warmed again in the depths of the cold earth in which you will sleep unknown, unrealized and alone? (Howard Thurman) Much has been happening in our world that should call us to attention and help define our moral obligations. The last week or so brought into our presence Juneteenth, the Poor Peoples' Campaign, the opening of Gay Pride Month events, summer solstice, continued protests and calls for something new in our communal journey and relationships. Many years ago, Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick stated: "At the beginning the gospel was primarily a message not about what we ought to be but about what we are. 'Now are we,' – Now are we the sons[daughters] of God." The Good News translation reads: . . . "We are now God's children." What is before us, according to Fosdick, is the idea that "You are." You are a son, daughter of God, and then you ought because you are. The ideal must proceed from the reality of You are, we are. Fosdick explains: "You never can tell what anything ought to do until you know what it is…. Only when you know what anything is can you tell what it should be expected to do." According to the Psalmist, we are made a little lower than the angels and are crowned with glory and honor. It is time for us to assume this heritage.
'Rabbi Abraham Heschel declared us "Holy sparks." To be defined as children of God, holy, cosmic sparks means that we are primarily spiritual beings, and this idea is often lost when we raise the question of where we go from here, what ought we do. This reality of spirituality is incorporated in each breath and embedded in the cells and tissue of our being. We are revelations of the universe's continuous birthing, the energy of the cosmic flaring forth, the All-Pervading Presence, the Great fashioner of existence. We are born in original blessedness not original sin. When we think of ourselves in these terms, we are better able to understand, and pursue the "ought." The ideal must proceed from this grounding in the soul of the Sacred, in the recognition of who we are. Putting words in the mind of Jesus, Thurman describes Jesus' struggle with temptations in the following way: "My interests in creature needs must be genuine and practical, but I must see these needs as things which may stand clearly in the way of the realization of the higher ends of life. Feed the hungry? Yes, and always. But I must know that man is more than his physical body. There is something in him that calls for beauty and comradeship and righteousness." This understanding, Thurman says, is critical for those who seek to answer the question: "What shall I do with my life?" Heschel continues: "God needs us: the fulfillment of the divine intention for the world cannot be accomplished apart from the work of God's children…. God has placed us here in the midst of an unfinished creation and has given us the task of helping to bring it to fulfillment" –" the ought." "That is why we were created. That is the purpose of our lives. That is the content of our prayer. That is why our deeds and our prayers can never be separated…. The meaning of [a man's] life lies in his perfecting the universe. [He] has to distinguish, gather, and redeem the sparks of holiness scattered through the darkness of the world." That is the quest before us today, not merely as individuals, but as a nation, the redemption of the sparks of holiness scattered through the darkness of the world. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference formed in 1957 by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and others to redeem "the soul of America." The presumption was that the nation had a soul. The redemption was to be done through nonviolent resistance, a resistance that projected belief that even the opponents of the moral imperatives were holy sparks. Under the leadership of Dr. King, the organization drew on the power and independence of black churches to support its activities. King wrote that SCLC was founded "because we have no moral choice, before God, but to delve deeper into the struggle—and to do so with greater reliance on non-violence and with greater unity, coordination, sharing and Christian understanding." King often quoted ideals inscribed into the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." And, with clear insight and uncompromised courage he with voice and body declared the fallenness of the nation, what it really was: the most violent nation on the earth filled with injustice and the inevitable chaos caused by the nation's devotion to the giant triplets of racism, militarism, and excessive materialism. Only a revolution of values he announced would be able to bring about a society where justice would "well up like fresh water, and honesty roll in full tide."Heschel like King believed that society could be redeemed: "God has a stake in our moral predicament. I cannot believe that God will be defeated."
What are we as a nation? It appears to me that this question must be addressed before we imagine what we ought to do and can become. Was SCLC deceived? Sixty-three years later, Dr. William Barber presented to the nation, just last week, a Declaration of Fundamental Rights and Poor People's Moral Agenda. He spoke before Congress last year on the same day that Ta-Nehisi Coates spoke about reparations, an interrelated campaign. What are we as a nation doing regarding repairing what has been broken since its inception? Yes, we know that reparations cannot repair the bodies, minds, hearts brutally raped, dissected, and murdered during slavery and ongoing opression. Reparations must not be merely an attempt to mend in the present sins and exploitation of the past. It must be about the future, what ought to be. It is about a future of all of us, all humanity, all genders, all racial/ethnic expression, nationalities, creatures that dwell on this terrestrial ball. It could mean an invitation to forgiveness, a recognition that the "new nation" that Lincoln declared in his Gettysburg address – a nation of the people, by the people and for the people – never became manifested. It could mean that Rabbi Heschel was right when he said: "Not all are guilty; but all are responsible." If reparations incarnated respect for all the cosmos itself into the corporate body of the nation, how liberating and sustaining that would be! In this invitation to forgive, there must be the recognition that the financial compensation itself would include monetary extraction from communities on the edges, extraction that continues to haunt and harass those communities even today. This asking for forgiveness could be an asking for a new relationship, one that does not continue to demean, dominate, destroy. For whatever amount the financial compensation might be, it would not put the descendants of the enslaved on an equal footing with the descendants of the owners of those enslaved bodies. My hope would then be that reparations would be an opening for all the children of the cosmos to begin a new walk together truly as sisters and brothers. We could: "Walk together children and not get weary" during the difficult discussions, decisions, dismantling, deconstruction, revolution of values, and construction of something we have never experienced before but ought to experience now. I would hope that we could disarm the barricades that prevent our claiming common ground and sing of "a great camp meeting in a New Promised Land" – in the new consciousness of freedom that we must claim in the World House as Dr. King envisioned where we would all snuggle together with warmth, kind hearts, affection for all and malice toward none. Reparations to me could signal that perhaps this nation is seeking its soul, to have integrity, to be authentic, to seize the opportunity to be its best self, a best self that needs and comes about only by claiming and respecting the richness of its diversity. It could mean a commitment to live differently, with an economic order not based on profit and division – the capitalistic model; but, one that would incarnate the idea of beloved community, where there "is plenty of good room" for all, where the nation would be a vine and fig tree and everyone could live beneath the vine and fig tree without being crushed, and live in peace and unafraid. The protests are re-defining who we are. The disinherited are claiming their inheritance. They will no longer be silent or afraid. They are surgically revealing who we are. With ears as stethoscopes we hear faint heartbeats being revived and now imagine what a wonderful world we could be.
Think what a love God has for us, in letting us be called 'children of God! That is what we are. We are children of God now, beloved; and it does not yet appear what we shall be. I John 3:1-2


"Ralph Bradshaw White. Friends and Relatives"
Ralph Bradshaw White was the beloved father of Dr. Krista Few, fiancé of Dr. Rosaly Lopes, father-in-law of Darren Few, future step-father of Thomas Gautier, and friend and inspiration to countless members of the oceanographic exploration community. Ralph is also survived by son Randy Pixley and grandchildren Samantha and Nicholas.
Ralph was born in 1941 in San Bernardino, California. Ralph served in the U.S. Marine Corps as a Force Reconnaissance Team Leader, was a member of the US Parachuting Team, and was a highly decorated Reserve Forces Captain, who commanded the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's Photographic Unit.
Ralph enjoyed a distinguished professional career as an award-winning cinematographer, video cameraman and editor, with over 30 years of production experience and hundreds of motion picture and television credits to his name. In 1985, he documented the expedition that found the wreck of the RMS Titanic, and in 1987 and 2000, he co-directed the salvage operation and photography during the recovery of over 5,000 artifacts from Titanic's debris field. He was the submersible cameraman for the 1991 IMAX feature film Titanica, and in 1995-96, he was the expedition leader and second unit cameraman for James Cameron's Academy Award winning feature film Titanic. Ralph made 35 dives to the 12,000 foot deep wreck of the Titanic, and qualified as a copilot on the French Nautile and Russian Mir submersibles. He was operations supervisor of the MedusaROV for James Cameron's 3D IMAX film Ghosts Of The Abyss and Technologies Coordinator for James Cameron's live broadcast from the deck of the ship for the Discovery Channel's Last Mysteries of Titanic. Ralph was also the deep sea imaging and guest wreck expert for the History Channel's Titanic's Last Moments.
Ralph White was a Knight, Order of Saint Lazarus and Knight, Order of Constantine for his filming and conservation accomplishments. His extensive field experience was rewarded by his peers. He was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, Fellow of the Explorers Club and recipient of the Lowell Thomas Award for Life Achievement, Fellow and Chairman of the Board of The Academy of Underwater Arts and Sciences, and former President of the Adventurers Club.
"Ralph's wish was for his ashes to be scattered all over the world by his friends and fellow adventurers. His ashes have already been to all continents, but his friend Reda Anderson has done the ultimate by sending him into space."
[Ralph was] one of the world's greatest adventurers — award winning cinematographer and submersible pilot, knife-fighting instructor, thousands of skydives as a Master Jumper, Member of the Explorer's Club of New York, President of the Adventurers Club of Los Angeles, member of the Bob Ballard discovery team of the Titanic in 1985, who has dived to the Titanic more than anyone else and spent over 400 hours exploring the Titanic, and was Jim Cameron's technical advisor on his movies including Titanic.
Just before Ralph passed away, he and I were scheduled to do a debate between the two of us — just for fun! The question to be debated was whether the goverment should spend more money exploring the ocean or exploring space. As I am the first person to sign a contract to go to space in a commercial (non government) vehicle, I took the space side of the debate and he took the ocean side. But, really, since as Bob Ballard has said, "Less than 1/2 of one percent of the ocean has been explored" we should definitely be spending much more money exploring the ocean.


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Bastard! Season 1 Part 2
Written by Dawfydd Kelly on 31 Oct 2022
Distributor Netflix • Certificate 15 • Price n/a
Picking right from where the first half of the season ended, Part 2 of Bastard! runs on the dual philosophies of "More is More" and "Subtext is for cowards", with results that amplify the excesses of the show in the hope that it can compensate for any weaknesses by sheer bravado. And I gotta say, it kinda works.
It's still a show that is deeply, deeply flawed, with our "hero" Dark Schnieder's default being "smug prick" and his interactions with most of the female characters being well, let's leave it at "less enlightened".
But, when it clicks the show is an absolute riot – listening to the dub there is a wonderful sense of anarchy and spontaneity to the recordings with characters being cut off-mid speech and moments of Epic Grandeur™ being undercut by characters either not giving two figs, being complete goofballs, or some combination thereof. And it's great. I genuinely laughed out loud at some moments which is not something I can say about a lot of comedies, but this managed to do the job in a few spots for me. Admittedly it probably does help that a lot of what this show is skewering with it's so-say Heavy Metal Fantasy trappings is a genre that I'm a fan of to start with, so it's easy to spot the tropes in play and where they are being poked fun at.
At the end of the day, Bastard! remains a show I never expected to see revived, but whoever is over at Netflix with a yen for early 90's manga & anime that keeps commissioning these shows and getting these sorts of results (see also Spriggan) I hope they keep on going as it's been an entertaining ride so far.
An entertaining watch, in spite of itself.
About Dawfydd Kelly
Wargamer. Anime fan. Giant robot enthusiast. Congenietal absorber of science fiction & fantasy. Dawfydd is most definitely too old for this ****, but see's no point in stopping now. If only he could cut down on his use of the words 'dude' and 'groovy' in everyday conversation...


text:
Pearl and Platinum gasp in surprise when they see Dr. Footstep kneeling next to the colossal Pokemon which popped out from Platinum's bagpack, and wonder why he has come to the Spear Pillar. The chubby little man remarks that he has no idea, and recalls walking out from the Sinnoh Police Headquarters right before he ended up where he is now. Yet, he is extremely excited that this happened, because it has given him the chance to obtain such a marvelous footprint.
Pearl sweatdrops that he could have been crushed by the gigantic Pokemon, but also recalls that Dr. Footstep's interpretation of footprints has never been flawed, which implies that this giant being is no doubt a friend. He shares an excited look with Platinum, who agrees with a nod, while Cynthia remains in awe at the Pokemon's surprise appearance, having recognizing it as the legendary Regigigas.
Wasting no time, Regigigas charges forward towards Dialga and Palkia, and grabs each of them by their necks with its gigantic hands. Cynthia, Pearl and Platinum exclaim that the giant has managed to subdue the two deities, and now that the temporal and spatial dragons are held immobile, the void focus seems to have stopped expanding.
Dia cheers at Regigigas's extraordinary strength, but Honchkrow suddenly ambushes him from behind, and knocks him off the colossal Pokemon. The boy crashes hard against the ground, and just as he is struggling to get up, finds Cyrus looming over him.
With tears running down his face, the Team Galactic Boss doesn't understand why they are thwarting him, and wonders if they realize how sacred it is to have a complete spirit, and how noble it is to have a complete world. He doubts that they could comprehend the great achievement he is trying to accomplish, for after all, concepts as perplexed as Time and Space are too complicated for kids like them to grasp. He relents that his questions to Dia have perhaps been pointless and redundant, and gives the boy a look of pity.
However, despite an initial moment of astonishment, Dia gradually puts on a pensive look, and states that he actually understands it, much to Pearl and Platinum's shock. With a cautious tone, Dia mutters that he is might not be able to put sophisticated words to it, but he believes that he understands it.
For as long as he could remember, Dia knows that he is slow, and on the contrary, Pearl is hasty. To complete the same task, Pearl will always be ahead, and he himself will always be late. More than occasionally, the same amount of time will feel long to Pearl, while it feels short to him. But, they are still the same time. To Dia, this is the 'Time' that he felt.
Together with Pearl and the Lady, Dia has set out on a journey. The three of them used to know nothing but things near and around their hometown, but as they travelled far and wide, all the places, people and Pokemon they met for the first time, made him realize just how big the world they are living in is. To Dia, that is the 'Space' that he felt.
Hearing Dia's words, Cyrus's tears stop flowing, and he begins to frown. He mumbles that he has heard enough, and mocks that people with such inferior understanding are hopeless in trying to thwart his scheme. He shakes his head in disgust, and says this shall all be rid of soon, along with the incomplete world.
The Team Galactic Leader's statement sparks anger in Dia, and the boy's hands slowly tremble with rage. He questions why it is up to Cyrus's decision to determine the fate of the world, and states that the 'Time' that he has spent with Pearl and the Lady and the 'Space' that they have travelled together mean more than anything to him. Taking a glance at Cynthia and all the fallen Gymleaders, Dia states that he is not alone, and there are many more people and Pokemon who treasure and cherish this 'Time' and 'Space', which was why they have all come to join this fight. The boy puts on a determined look, and declares that it is not alright for Cyrus to take it all away for his twisted and convenient logic.
Cyrus stares down at Dia with disdain, but suddenly realizes that Dialga and Palkia are no longer fighting. He bolts around in bewilderment, and sees that they have stopped their clash even though they are still under his control and the colossal Pokemon isn't even seizing them anymore. He refuses to believe that these legendary Pokemon who possess immense power have actually paid heed and listened to a boy's words, and even acknowledged such naive thoughts.
Roaring in fury, the man sets a single Red Chain spinning again, and almost immediately, the eyes of Dialga and Palkia turn hollow once more, causing the two to resume lashing out at one another with savageness. Regigigas quickly throws itself forward to stop their fight, but the collision between the two creates such an intense force that the colossal Pokemon gets blasted backwards and down.
Cyrus hollers that Dialga and Palkia must keep on clashing, and shows Dia the other Red Chain which has been broken. He grunts that thanks to Dia and his companions setting free Azelf, Uxie and Mesprit, they were unable to harvest the second set of crystals, giving him no choice but to replicate another with technological means. Yet, such an artificial item is incomplete in its existence, which was why the Gymleaders were able to shatter it, resulting in making his scheme incomplete. Passing blames on the boy, the TG Leader hurls the broken chain towards Dia, and smacks him square on the face, knocking him back.
Pearl and Platinum hurriedly dash forward to help Dia up, but the boy simply grins and holds a hand over his swollen cheek. Pearl calls Dia a fool for what he did, but nevertheless feels proud of his courage. Platinum too, compliments on Dia's words, and says it made her delighted, for she considers the journey they spent together a true blessing as well. With that, the three young trainers share a heartfelt smile, and feel once again connected with each another.
Dia then steals a glance at Dialga and Palkia, and feels dejected that they have not been able to stop the deities from clashing. He sees that Regigigas has also sustained massive damage from the collision between the legendary Pokemon, and wonders what else they could do. Pearl suddenly recalls that Platinum has been deciphering a scripture, and wants to know if she has succeeded in decoding it.
The Lady responds with an affirmative answer, and says she has already fully interpreted it. According to what was written, the two beings are an impeccable pair: 'Time' and 'Space'; the 'Adamant Orb' and the 'Lustrous Orb'; Dialga's strongest attack, 'Roar of Time', which is able to blow off time, and Palkia's strongest attack, 'Spacial Rend', which is able to slice through space; they all complement and balance out one another. Clearly, everything about the two comes in pairs. However, right now, only one single Red Chain remains, and it will not be fully capable of controlling the two beings. There will certainly come a moment when the tug-o-war balance of power breaks, which is the instant that they must catch.
Dia and Pearl nod in understanding, and quickly get all their team members to standby for that split second, that one fleeting moment when they would fire off their strongest attacks to exacerbate the imbalance. Ahead of them, Dialga and Palkia continue to claw at each other, but the spatial deity all of a sudden loses the hollowness in its eyes, and freezes in its motions. The temporal deity quickly grabs the chance to slam its opponent down to the ground, and pounces on it forcefully.
Cyrus roars in anguish at the imbalanced power control, and cries for Palkia to fight back. Platinum hollers that the moment has come, and Dia and Pearl's teams immediately unleash their attacks on Dialga, with Roo, Moo, Chatlord, Raylord, Zellord and Diglord firing distant energy blasts, and Chimlord, Taulord, Beh, Pooh and Lee hurling themselves forward physically.
The powerful array of strikes manages to snap Dialga out from its hollowed state, and the two deities share a nod with each other, both finally freed from the restraints of the Red Chain. Channeling their energy into the dark void in the sky, Dialga and Palkia combine their powers to cease the time and space distortion, and cause pulses of blinding light to radiate in and out of the dimensional portal.
Cyrus feels himself torn between the waves of energy as he gets lifted off his feet. As everything gets swallowed in an intense flash, the man steals a glance at the three young trainers who have come to oppose him. In that instant, he finally sees it, an undeniable fact that he was oblivious to all this time: the calm and thoughtful 'Emotion' of the red-hat boy; the tough and strong 'Willpower' of the blonde boy; and the 'Knowledge' of the girl. Perhaps the three are incomplete on their own, but having formed a team in support of each other, they have managed to achieve a complete spirit, and that was the reason they were able to thwart him.
As the light surrounding the dark purple focus gradually fades out, the portal itself begins to slowly close up. Pearl is glad that the void is finally disappearing, and Dia notices that the effects of the time and space distortion have all been reversed. Lying on the ground ahead of them, Cyrus remains motionless as Cynthia crouches next to him to check on his vitals. The Champion remarks that the man is still alive, but his body and soul have sustained considerable damage. She believes that the evil scheme of Team Galactic has finally been put to an end, and knows that it will only be a matter of time before the rest of the organization gets cracked down.
Cynthia then turns to look up at Dialga and Palkia, and feels glad that the two deities have regained their poise and calmness. She states that after this terrible thing which Cyrus has done to them, it would logically have been an extremely difficult task to befriend them, but apparently, Dia, Pearl and Platinum have done it. Putting on grins of relief, the three young trainers share their moment of victory by bumping their fists against one another, while Cynthia and the two legendary dragons stand to watch from behind, each wearing a smile on their face.
Dia suddenly thinks of something, and grins that it is perhaps time for the Lady to look for her special material. Platinum gets baffled as to what he is talking about, and Dia reminds her of where they currently are. The girl soon bolts in realization that they are now at the summit of Mt. Coronet, and exclaims that she has almost forgotten that it was the destination they originally set out for, where she would obtain the accessory that bears her family crest.
Dia and Pearl offer to help out and ask how the material looks like. Platinum describes its size and shape to them, and before long, the boys discover several pieces that fit the bill. Making a careful selection, Platinum eventually makes her pick, and lets out a sigh of relief as she holds the sparkling item in her hands, shaped like a shining star with a jeweled core in the center.
Pearl cheers that they have finally achieved their goal, but Platinum's smile slowly fades from her face, and she confesses that there is actually one more thing that she hopes to do. She remarks that in their struggle against Team Galactic, there were people who have sacrificed themselves in the fight. These men were sent to another place, even before she managed to meet them, and she feels obliged to find a way to help them.
Dia realizes that the Lady is talking about her original bodyguards, Phool and Ignor, and Platinum states that the two men gave all they could to protect her, just like what Dia and Pearl did. Her guilt has compelled her to find them, and she believes that it is the one thing she could do to repay them for their heroic act. Pearl recalls that Phool and Ignor were sent to an alternate dimension created by a machine of Team Galactic's, and thinks there would be no better option than to ask people from the organization directly. However, he takes a look at Cyrus, who remains unconscious, and relents that the man doesn't seem to be a good candidate right now.
Cynthia suggests taking Cyrus along with the Gymleaders to the hospital, and the three young trainers agree to help. Dia orders Regigigas to carry Roark and Gardenia in its hands, while Pearl puts Crasher Wake on top of Roo. Platinum lifts Maylene and Candice onto the back of Rapidash, and Drifblim hoists Fantina up with its long arms just as Garchomp picks Cyrus up. The group then starts departing from the scene, completely oblivious to a pair of watchful eyes on them.
Nearby, hiding behind the rubbles, the purple-haired old Scientist of Team Galactic spies on the ensemble, and has his gaze fixed on Regigigas. He knows well that it is yet another legendary Pokemon of Sinnoh, and desperately wants to have it for himself. He wonders if he should ambush the group and snatch it away, but on a second thought, decides against it as he still has yet to achieve what he came to the Spear Pillar for.
Staring up into the dark purple void that is gradually closing up, the old man mumbles that he must take a measure of its readings before it disappears. He muses that everybody seems to conveniently think that the portal really paves the path to a new universe, and mocks them for his naïve thought. Little do they know that they have been terribly wrong.
The old Scientist takes out a device with a pair of antennae, and starts picking up signals from the void. However, the low buzzing sound of the machine catches Dia's attention, and from his high-up position on Regigigas, the boy spots the man's hiding place behind the rubbles. He quickly alerts Pearl about it, and the old man immediately bolts to his feet, grunting in frustration that he has been busted. He decides to flee the scene despite not having collected the data he needs, but a voice demands to know what kind of data he is seeking, and a spade suddenly breaks out from the ground in front of him to stop his tracks.
Popping out from the Underground, Byron, Prof. Rowan, Sir Berlitz and the Underground Man reveal themselves, and state that they are extremely interested to know what the purple-haired man is researching on. Dia, Pearl and Platinum gasp in bewilderment at the few men's unexpected appearance, and wonder why they have been staying underground.
Byron sends out his two Bronzongs to lock down the Team Galactic Scientist, and snatches the device away from his hands. The old man cries out in horror that the device must be handled with care, and says its surveillance radio-waves must not be allowed to synchronize with the signals of the dimensional portal. However, it is too late. As the Canalave Gymleader inadvertently faces the machine's antennae towards the closing void in the sky, a low shriek echoes throughout the area, and six black tentacles with blood-red claws all of a sudden materializes out from the dark purple opening.
Before anyone could react, the tentacles shoot down to wrap around Dialga, Palkia, and Cyrus, and forcefully yank the three into the opening. Pearl exclaims that the legendary deities and the Team Galactic Boss have been swallowed by the void, and right before it closes, a creature with metallic facial features and a long serpentine-like tail shows itself to the three young trainers for a split second before disappearing altogether with the portal.
The purple-haired Scientist giggles that he has given them his warnings, and Platinum demands to know whether the creature within the void is a Pokemon. The old man wonders if the young Lady knows of the reverse side of the world, and the girl puts on a look of confusion upon hearing the term. The Scientist suggests her find out what is before asking her question, and introduces himself as Charon. He grins that they might meet again someday, and bids her goodbye as he tosses out a smoke ball to stun the Bronzongs and loosen their grip on him.
Using the cloud of smoke to shield himself, Charon makes his escape, but Lee spots him with its sharp eyes, and strikes out its long tongue towards him. Unfortunately, the man still manages to get away, and Dia sulks that they have lost him. Yet, as Lee retrieves its tongue, the boy finds that the Lickilicky has snatched what appears to be a notebook of Charon, and wonders what it contains.
Meanwhile, on the Spring Path which leads to the Sendoff Spring, Volkner stares at the dark purple void that has formed in front of him and makes a call to his companion, Flint. The Sunyshore Gymleader states that the opening has materialized all of a sudden out of thin air, and says it seems to exude an eerie atmosphere about it.
Flint, sporting a red afro hairdo, laughs and wants to know what Volkner feels after seeing the portal, and is curious as to whether it thrills him. Volkner admits being thrilled, and gets pushed by his friend for the reason why. Pausing to think for a moment, the man puts on a grin and states that it feels as if he is on the trail of facing ridiculously powerful trainers like Flint.
Volkner's answer delights Flint, and the afro-haired man is grateful that something finally sparks interest in the Sunyshore Gymleader again. He proposes to investigate upon this thing right away, and wonders if Volkner is able to meet him. Volkner replies the affirmative, and asks where Flint is. Stealing a glance at the exotic trees around him, Flint senses a rush of excitement over himself, and states that he is currently at the Battle Zone.
And so, things start to move and proceed respectively, taking each of them to their respective places... Two weeks later, on board a luxurious liner, the captain announces their departure from the port, and the giant ship begins sailing out. Standing on the deck, a young woman wearing a lab coat gazes out to the open seas, and feels the gentle breeze stroke her shoulder-length hair, an ornament shaped like shining star with a jeweled core in the center glistening in front of her collar.
Her associate, a middle-aged man in suits, addresses her as professor, and wonders how many years it has been. The young woman grins that it has been too long, and she has honestly lost count of it. The man states that her accessory looks truly marvelous, and queries if it acts like a symbol of identity that allows people in her family who haven't met for a long time to recognize each other. The young woman giggles that it might serve the purpose as well, but more so, it is a ritual, a kind of formality. Passed on as a tradition, everyone in their family personally climbs to the summit of Mt. Coronet to obtain a special mineral, in order to create an accessory that bears the family crest, something that she did herself in her much younger days.
The man is curious as to whether the professor's daughter did the same, and the young woman nods that the girl made the challenge rather early at the mere age of 12, during which she became involved in something much bigger and complicated.
Just then, her Pokegear beeps, and she picks up find no other than her daughter calling. The girl hopes that she is not intruding, and the young woman laughs that a mother always has time for her child. She remarks that she has had some success in her investigation, and the girl replies that she has already received the email. The young woman recalls what she was told about the fate of the two bodyguards, how they were sent into an alternate dimension, and believes that the place she identified is the most likely answer. She informs her daughter that alliance with the International Police Force has already been established, and tells her not to worry and simply go to the agreed meeting place.
At that moment, a sailor walks up to the professor and apologizes for interfering. He hopes that she would do him a favour by signing her name on the passengers' list, and the young woman takes a pause from the call to scribble her full name, Willow Berlitz, on the clipboard handed to her. She then resumes conversation on the Pokegear, and reiterates that it is the Distortion World that her daughter should be looking for, the Distortion World that her daughter, Platinum, should be looking for...
--Fin. The Seventh Chapter--
(Original Japanese Jokes)
There are no jokes or Manzai in this chapter.
416: VS Dialga & Palkia VI


A barcode is a unique code that identifies a product. It includes a particular set of numbers, as well as a unique pattern of stripes — or "bars". This pattern can be recognized by computers and optical readers, like the ones you see at the checkout counters of retail stores. And the list of numbers can be typed into a search engine, such as Barcode Lookup, to find info on that specific product.
Yes! Different countries and regions use different barcode formats. The United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and many other countries use barcodes that are called Universal Product Codes (UPCs). Retailers in Europe and other regions of the world use a barcode format called International Article Number (EAN — because it used to be called European Article Number). Books often use their own special type of barcode format, called the International Standard Book Number (ISBN).
A product's package may not give you all the details you want to know. For example, maybe it doesn't tell you where the product comes from, who makes it, how durable it is, how well it does what it's supposed to do, or how much other stores are charging for it. When you enter a barcode into Barcode Lookup, you're tapping into an international database of information about millions of products sold worldwide — their manufacturers, their descriptions, and even photos and customer reviews. We also show you online stores that carry that exact item, so you can find discounts and special deals easily.
Our barcode and product data comes straight from a worldwide network of more than 1,500 retailers and regular users just like you. On a daily basis, companies and individual website users send us new and updated barcodes with product data.
How can I buy my own barcodes?
The Internet offers many different options to generate and buy your own unique barcodes for use in retail stores and e-commerce shops across the web and around the world. Start with your search engine and type in a term such as "buy your own barcode". You'll see sites that make it easy for you to buy and register a barcode for your product. If you're interested in our recommendation, we suggest you contact GS1.org. And remember that certain types of barcodes are designed for specific kinds of products and situations — so before you buy a barcode, be sure to check up on the rules.
Not at this time. But as outlined in the section just above, it's easy to find online stores that would be happy to sell you one.
Visit our Add a Barcode page to add your product or edit the product information if it already exists.
How do I list my e-commerce site as one of your 'online stores'?
We work with a large list of online retailers. However, we're selective about who we include on that list because our users trust us to provide recommendations on quality, trustworthy online stores. If you're interested in listing your online store in our database, lookup a product and click the "ADD STORE" button in the Online Stores section.
I bought a defective product. Can you help me return or report it?
We're sorry to hear that! Unfortunately, we can't help with any product issues because we're not a manufacturer, a distributor or a retailer. All we do is maintain a database of barcodes and product info for customers to lookup. We suggest you get in touch with the product retailer where you made your purchase and explain the issue.
Not necessarily. Although our database contains info on millions of barcodes and products, that doesn't mean we have every single barcode used anywhere in the world. If your search doesn't return information on a certain barcode, it simply means we don't have it yet.
How much is your Bulk Lookup or API service?
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We follow Google's product taxonomy to classify products in the Barcode Lookup database.
Can a barcode determine where a product was purchased?
Unfortunately, we cannot determine where a product was purchased solely by its barcode. We suggest you locate the original product receipt.


Catering services for the City of London Corporation including but not limited to police, schools, offices, courts and other buildings and locations.
City of London Corporate Catering Services.
Catering services for the City of London Corporation including but not limited to police, schools, offices, courts and other buildings and locations. The successful provider will also be responsible for catering equipment PPM and repairs and the supply of light catering equipment.
Catering services for the City of London Corporation schools including but not limited to staff and pupils dining and hospitality requirements. The successful provider will also be responsible for catering equipment PPM and repairs and the supply of light catering equipment.
Option to extend the contract in increments for up to 2 years.
Option for the successful provider to quote for the provision of catering services at the City of London Freemen's School. The City of London reserves the right and at its discretion to not to award the contract for the City of London Freemen's School.
Option to add or remove buildings/sites or part thereof over the life of the contract that are owned or affiliated or funded (in whole or partly funded) by the City of London Corporation.
The Estimated contract value is between 6 500 000 GBP to 18 000 000 GBP over 7 years.
Catering services for the City of London Corporation including but not limited to staff and student dining and hospitality requirements. The successful provider will also be responsible for catering equipment PPM and repairs and the supply of light catering equipment.
The Estimated contract value is between 3 500 000 GBP to 6 000 000 GBP over 7 years.
Catering services for the City of London Corporation including but not limited to the Lord Mayors and Sheriffs' dining, staff, jury, Barristers and legal representatives dining and high profile hospitality on behalf of the Lord Mayor, the City of London Corporation, Her Majesty's Government, in addition to the many Charity and Livery occasions. The successful provider will also be responsible for catering equipment PPM and repairs and the supply of light catering equipment.
The Estimated contract value is between 1 800 000 GBP to 3 000 000 GBP over 7 years.


text:
Locals tell story of the Red Arrow 70 years after railroad disaster
Sean Sauro
ssauro@altoonamirror.com
Cranes sift through the wreckage of Pennsylvania Railroad train No. 68, known as the Red Arrow, which derailed on Feb. 18, 1947. Two dozen passengers died and another 138 suffered injuries in the crash in the area known as Gum Tree Hollow.
Behind schedule early on a foggy morning, Pennsylvania Railroad train No. 68 — the Red Arrow — sped east on a slope of the Allegheny Front as it approached the Bennington Curve. Catastrophe followed.
The Red Arrow's speed proved too great about 3:21 a.m. Feb. 18, 1947, when it derailed from the tracks and crashed down an embankment and into an area called Gum Tree Hollow.
"People started screaming, and I braced myself against the window sill," Chester J. Bialecki, a 17-year-old sailor, told the Mirror, recalling his experience from a hospital in the hours after the crash.
Two dozen passengers were killed, and more than 100 were injured. Now, 70 years later, local historians and railroad enthusiasts remember the fatal trip, which ended with crushed train cars and mangled tracks.
"Everyone's lives were impacted by this," said Joe DeFrancesco, Blair County Historical Society's executive director. "Even people today who were children at the time, they remember."
The Red Arrow was a passenger train traveling east from Detroit to New York.
Postal workers, families, performance troupes and military personnel were aboard.
"They were servicemen, returning servicemen from the war," DeFrancesco said. "There were local people from Altoona and Hollidaysburg."
As the train approached the sharp curve, it passed along a section of track with a steep downward grade, he said.
Today, that section of track is often called "the slide," said David Seidel, a local railroad enthusiast.
Seidel was only 9 years old at the time of the crash, but he still remembers hearing the news.
"I understood it was a big deal at the time," he said.
An after-crash report said the Red Arrow was about an hour and 3 minutes late as it passed Gallitzin.
Experts estimated the train was traveling quickly around the curve between Gallitzin and Altoona, which had a limit of 30 mph.
"They were behind schedule, and it was a common practice to make up time on the straight portions of track," DeFrancesco said.
A week after the crash, M. N. Neff, a fireman who was on a freight train stopped near the crash scene, described the Red Arrow's approach.
"Oh boy! Look at the fellow going," Neff said, according to a 1947 Mirror report, recounting his testimony to investigators of the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Excessive speed blamed
The cause of the derailment, according to an ICC investigation report, was "excessive speed." The Red Arrow, at the time of the accident, was traveling in excess of 65 miles per hour, the report said.
The Interstate Commerce Commission was a federal agency tasked with regulating railroads. It was abolished in the mid-1990s, but its reports are available via a U.S. Department of Transportation database.
The Red Arrow was a 14-car train, and of those cars, the first 11 were fully or partially derailed in the crash, the report said. The passenger train was powered by two K-4 engines — No. 422 and 3771. The first engine overturned to the left and stopped on its left side about 405 feet to the east of the derailment site, according to the ICC.
"The cab was demolished, steam pipes within the cab were broken and the left side of the engine was badly damaged," the report said.
Descriptions of the wreckage did not stop there, as the report goes on to detail damages to the remaining Red Arrow cars.
The train's operators were among those killed in the crash.
"The fireman of the first engine and the engineer and fireman of the second engine were killed," the report said. "The engineer of the first engine and the front brakeman were
injured."
All told, 24 people were killed and 138 were injured, the report said. The section of railroad where the train derailed is known as the Mainline, and it was the site of four parallel tracks.
Three of four tracks damaged
The Red Arrow was traveling on the second track at the time of its derailment. It then traveled across the third and fourth tracks, also damaging them, railroad enthusiast Gary Clare said.
Earlier this week, Clare displayed photographs of the aftermath, which showed widespread damage, including train cars toppled on top of one another.
Among the wreckage was a mail car, Clare said.
"All of the thousands of pieces of mail were scattered over the hillside," he said.
Because of the mountainous location, it could not be accessed by ambulance, Clare said.
Instead, local doctors and nurses piled onto trains that traveled along the single undamaged track to the crash site, DeFrancesco said.
"Altoona Hospital and Mercy Hospital enlisted technicians and nurses to the site, and they paged Altoona doctors to come, as well," he said.
In addition to the local hospitals, injured passengers were taken to impromptu emergency centers, DeFrancesco said.
They were set up in various areas, including the former Penn Alto Hotel and United Service Organization's Canteen, he said.
Many did not make it that far before they died of serious injuries, experts said.
"It was not a very pretty death," DeFrancesco said.
There has been some debate about what circumstances led to the crash, DeFrancesco said, explaining both operator error and equipment malfunctions have been blamed.
Weather also could have been a factor, as the ICC describes the day as "hazy."
"The weather conditions could have affected the judgment of the crew," DeFrancesco said.
Regardless of the cause, it's not hard to imagine how the train achieved such an excessive speed, he said.
"The weight of that train and the momentum could have pushed it to those speeds very quickly," DeFrancesco said.
Within a few days, the tracks were repaired, but debris was still scattered across the nearby hillside, said Seidel, who worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad for a brief time.
Cranes lifted debris
Clare's photos showed rail-bound cranes that were used to lift large pieces of wreckage.
"It wasn't until three or four months after the accident happened that the official word came down absolving any of the crew," Seidel said. "It wasn't human error or anything like that."
The Red Arrow's crash wasn't the last on that stretch of tracks. There was a second accident in the area only 10 days later, Clare said.
About 4 a.m. Feb. 28, 1947, the rear Pullman car — called the Cascade Mirage — uncoupled from a train known as the Sunshine Special near Gallitzin, according to a 1947 Mirror report.
The car sped backward down the tracks, derailed and "smashed into an outcropping of rock" about a quarter mile away from the Bennington Curve.
"Among the first to reach the wreck were unidentified watchmen guarding wreckage of the Red Arrow, which plunged over the Bennington Curve last Tuesday," the Mirror report said. "They estimated the runaway car was traveling about 50 mph when it passed them on the way down."
The Sunshine Special was headed west from New York to Texas, and a man aboard the runaway car later recalled the moments before the accident.
"It was the longest five minutes of my life," Harry Willis of New Jersey told the Mirror at that time.
One person died, and 12 were injured in the second crash.
The successive wrecks impacted the Pennsylvania Railroad greatly, Seidel said.
"These instances tarnished that reputation," he said. "It tarnished the image and reception."
And the crashes, especially the Red Arrow's, have not been forgotten.
"The trauma still lives on today in people who remember it," DeFrancesco said.
Mirror Staff Writer Sean Sauro is at 946-7535.
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