text:
natific welcomed 19 new dye houses to the Color Accreditation Program during 2017.
The dye houses who joined the CAP program are trained to deliver maximum efficiency throughout the supply chain. They can expect reduced color development costs (up to 70%), reduced lead-time (4-6 weeks), improved color quality, and support of sustainability goals. The typical ROI for a dye house is 3 months to 1 year on color development savings alone.
THE NEW CAP MEMBERS OF 2017
Apex (Zhejiang) Textile Co., Ltd. (China)
Cheng Horng Industrial Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
Ds Vina Co., Ltd. (Vietnam)
Ducksan Ecotex (Korea)
Ducksan Vina Co., Ltd. (Vietnam)
E.C.I. Elastic Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
Kolon Fashion Material (Korea)
Kun-Profit Enterprise Co., Ltd. (Taiwan)
Mex Mode S.A DE C.V. (Mexico)
Milteks Tekstil San. Tic. A.S-Marsan (Turkey)
Onechange Material Co., Ltd. (Korea)
Paxar Packaging (Guangzhou) Ltd. (China)
PT. Selim Textile (Indonesia)
Shahi Exports Pvt Ltd (India)
Shinil Textile Co.Ltd. (Korea)
Sunny Special Dyeing & Finishing Co., Ltd (Taiwan)
Textufil S.A de C.V. (El Salvador)
Thai Taffeta Co., Ltd. (Thailand)
Thainamsiri Intertex Co., Ltd. (Thailand)
From reactive to proactive:
As part of the CAP program and natific’s ColorWarehouse system, dye houses will enjoy the following benefits:
- Gather production quality data and track performance in one transparent system (ColorWarehouse)
- Real-time production monitoring
- Production consistency by dyeing machine
- Monitor production scale-up accuracy to approved lab-dips
- Accuracy of the color standard used
- Production accuracy and precision, color continuity over time
- Approval Form to provide color conformance lot-by-lot
- Overview of all production sites
- Share production results with garment manufacturers and other tier one manufacturers
- Demonstrate process capabilities to key or new customers
The CAP program is acknowledged by all participating brands and retailers, which means that the same accreditation covers all brands.
Email firstname.lastname@example.org and ask our support team for the full list and details of all the benefits.
Warmest regards from Switzerland!


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Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, insists that indictments against Paul Manafort and Richard Gates have “nothing to do with the president’s campaign or campaign activity.” Administration officials dismiss the alleged criminal activity by Mr. Manafort, formerly President Trump’s campaign chairman, as being merely about money-laundering and Ukraine — but not Russia, the focus of the investigation by Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel.
But Mr. Manafort’s work in Ukraine, which began in 2006, has always in a real sense been about Russia — and may also have been about the campaign.
Mr. Manafort didn’t go to Ukraine to advance the interests of democracy, Western Europe or the United States. He was there to help an increasingly corrupt Russia-friendly politician, who became a Kremlin puppet during the time Mr. Manafort worked for him. In the context of the standoff between democracy and autocracy, his legal and potentially illicit activities demonstrate that he ultimately took a side.
From the moment Ukraine declared itself a state, with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the country found itself torn between Western Europe and Russia. Ukrainians living in the western half of Ukraine aspired to membership in the European Union and NATO, while those in the eastern half near the city of Donetsk oriented themselves toward Russia, which exerted maximum influence to keep Ukraine closely aligned.
In 2004, the European Union and NATO experienced a burst of membership expansion to countries bordering Ukraine and Russia, including the formerly Soviet Baltic States, much to the consternation of the Kremlin. That year, the presidential candidate for the pro-Russia Party of Regions was the former Donetsk regional governor, Viktor F. Yanukovych. The battle to lead the nation had become part of the broader competition between the democratic West and Russia.
Mr. Yanukovych appeared to have won the election, but the outcome was marred by voter fraud and the poisoning of his opponent, Viktor Yushchenko, who favored alignment with the West. Ukrainians took to the streets to protest, in what became known as the Orange Revolution. Mr. Yushchenko won in a new election. Sometime after that, pro-Russian forces recruited Mr. Manafort to advise the Party of Regions and Mr. Yanukovych.
In 2010, with Mr. Manafort’s help, Mr. Yanukovych was elected president. His campaign, primarily targeting voters in the east, was based on opposition to NATO and advocacy for Russian-language rights. Mr. Manafort and Mr. Gates received tens of millions of dollars for this work. Vladimir Putin — who had already invaded and occupied part of the Republic of Georgia — made it clear that Moscow was determined to keep Ukraine out of NATO and firmly within Russia’s sphere of influence.
In November 2013, after on-and-off flirtations with the West, Mr. Yanukovych rejected a pending agreement to join the European Union. The Ukrainian people took to the streets again, starting in a Kiev square known as the Maidan. Mr. Yanukovych ordered his special forces to shoot and kill over 100 unarmed demonstrators and subsequently fled the country, despite a political transition settlement brokered by the United States and European Union, with Russian assent.
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2014, annexed Crimea and shortly thereafter instigated a separatist movement in Mr. Yanukovych’s home region, Donetsk. The result was a war between Russia and Ukraine that continues to this day.
Mr. Yanukovych was in exile in Russia, but Mr. Manafort continued to work in Ukraine for the Opposition Bloc, the successor party to the discredited Party of Regions, and indirectly, for Russia’s interests, since this party continued to be pro-Moscow — and anti-EU and anti-NATO. And then in March 2016 Mr. Manafort became Mr. Trump’s campaign chairman. At the July Republican convention, his staff intervened to weaken the party platform concerning Ukraine, striking a clause advocating for lethal defensive military assistance for Ukraine. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump was praising Mr. Putin, advocating for greater cooperation with Russia and speaking skeptically about NATO and its collective defense mission.
Mr. Manafort, according to Mr. Mueller’s indictment, was an agent of the Ukrainian government for about a decade, through 2016, attempting to influence American officials and policy toward Ukraine. He advised the Ukrainian leader most closely aligned to Russia, a man working to keep his country in Russia’s close orbit. We know Mr. Yanukovych was Putin’s man in Kiev — and therefore, indirectly, so was Mr. Manafort.
We do not yet know the extent to which Mr. Manafort was Putin’s man in Washington. Perhaps that, too, will be up to a future jury to decide.
Evelyn N. Farkas, who served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia from 2012 to 2015, is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council.

domain: news


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Greetings techies, it’s that time of the week again! Today’s App Of The Week is Weave. As always, I wouldn’t recommend an app that I didn’t use myself.
A while back I wrote about a cool app called JotterPad, that lets users create and export various types of documents. The company behind JotterPad, 2 App Studio, comes a new app called Weave. Weave is an awesome video recording app that lets you record a bunch of small video clips, and Weave will automatically stitch or “weave” the clips together into a short 45 second video.
Features of Weave
- Stich video snippets into 45 second montage (up to 1.5 min in Weave Pro)
- Trim, reorder and delete video snippets
- Add a soundtrack and video title
- Up to 60 video filters to choose from, including Auto White Balance, warm, cool, neutral, monotone, vintage, film, lab, selective color and light leak
Weave is fun to use, and it’s really cool that it automatically stitches the clips together; the only thing you have to do is select a fun filter and a soundtrack. Of course, users can manually reorder and stitch clips together, as well as import MP4, JPEG, PNG and BMP files. Since the maximum video length is 45 seconds and 90 seconds for Pro users, it’s obviously not meant for serious videos, but rather a fun mashup that you can share to social media. Think of a Weave video as a really long Vine, or a really short YouTube video. Once you’re done making your video, you can directly share it to YouTube, Facebook, Youku, etc. There’s even an option for Chromecast, so you can cast it directly to your TV.
2 App Studio already has cool apps I love, such as the aforementioned JotterPad as well as Journal by Journey, a journal app. Now that Weave is in the making, they can’t call themselves “2 App” Studio anymore!
Right now Weave is a beta app, but Android users can request an invitation to the Weave Video Community on Google+ and follow the instructions there to become a beta tester.
Google+ Community: Weave Video Community

domain: artistic


Prayer and Phophesy Well-covered
Elizabeth Brooke-Carr takes a whimsical look at today's hat-couture, or lack of it, and St Paul's admonition to women of faith - to cover their heads in Church. She salutes brave and enterprising women who have defied centuries of tradition, culture and prejudice to pray and prophesy in the contemporary world
What would St Paul have thought? The stunning collection of head coverings for women shown at a mid-winter, high tea celebration in Dunedin’s Savoyearlier this year would have rendered him speechless, perhaps. The special hat-couture occasion was smaller in scale but equal in colour and pageantry to the recent opening and closing ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics. Graceful young models wound their way around the tables carrying themselves and their sensational headgear with medal-winning aplomb. There were elegant, wide-brimmed creations of red silk and ostrich feathers, jade green shantung, fuchsia pink satin, blue chiffon, gold grosgrain, cream straw, and navy felt. There were stylish toques, turbans, pillboxes, berets and busbys. All created for the well turned-out women of earlier decades when they ‘went out’. And for many, their most regular outings were to church on Sunday.
It is likely that worshippers sitting in any but the front pew of their local church in the early decades of last century would have had great difficulty catching a glimpse of the preacher during the service. And it’s entirely possible that the preacher might not have known who was present until he shook hands with them at the door on their way out – so wide and high and lavishly trimmed were the ladies’ hats.
St Paul claimed that every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonours her head and his moral indictment ensured that every modest, unassuming (and perhaps fearful) woman kept her head down and well covered. Of course this provided huge scope for distraction among fellow worshippers – even when the sermons were lively. Imagine if you will, sitting behind a glorious, gold, grosgrain concoction, its crown swathed in tulle, broad brim bedecked with seductively trembling pink roses while the preacher exhorted you to examine your sins. Or maybe your thoughts strayed to the sapphire blue shantung creation, set at a jaunty angle, shivering with spotted net and peacock feathers that brushed your face every time its wearer moved. There was truly great potential for ruined concentration.
At secular gatherings it was a different story. In some theatres in New Zealand lady patrons were requested to remove their hats when the lights went out. Some town councils went further, passing by-laws to ban the use of long hatpins on public transport, leaving ladies defenceless to retain their large hats, their style and sometimes their decorum in the public arena. A subtle shift from moral indictment to legal restriction had taken place.
St Paul’s was a powerful voice. And fashion a sly tyrant. In the following decades women’s head covering changed shape. Out with large brims and hatpins. In with head hugging, flowerpot styles that ensured a woman’s hair and most of her visage were still well covered. But she was less dangerous. In church, every woman who prayed or prophesied could still do so without fear of dishonour. Preachers had a better view. Members of a congregation were able to avoid being overshadowed or stabbed or becoming tangled in or distracted by the feathers and frippery of fellow worshippers.
Over time hats gradually became smaller and smaller until demand for them ceased almost entirely. It wasn’t long before hats were kept for special occasions such as weddings, funerals and similar social events. Brave and bold women began to appear in church with their faces shining and their crowning glory uncovered. They let down their hair and held up their heads. Women prayed and prophesied as before. Heads and honour stayed intact. And the Church didn’t collapse.
But it was on the hat block. The full brimmed confidence of male leadership was being re-shaped. Hatless women were acceptable – so long as they stayed in the pews. It was a different matter altogether when they tried to move into the pulpit. Discrimination against these hatless, hapless women was often more offensive than any wound their old hatpins might have accidentally inflicted on their subjugators.
Nevertheless, brave and bold women went on to ruffle feathers and claim their place in the pulpit. Ordained as worthy preachers and wise prophets and leaders in the Church, they turned their attention to liturgical details. But the trimmings, the little accessories, the embroidering of an ‘Our Father’ at the beginning of the Church’s most well used prayer, and the firm stitching of masculine images, words and concepts have remained so much harder to unpick and reshape. There are fears that it might ruin the fabric. So, outmoded tradition lurks like rusty pins in its lining, ready to give an unexpected jab – a reminder of women’s real status in the Church. Old forms and redundancy remain tucked into the pleats and swathes of worship, distracting veils of argument and debate surround issues of inclusiveness, obscuring clear vision. Women feel it intensely, because for centuries they have carried the weight of ecclesiastical fashion in all its guises. It’s a miracle that there are women still prepared to grace the Church with prayer and prophesy. Hats off to them, I say.


Here’s something you probably don’t know, but really should – especially if you’re a programmer, and especially especially if you’re using Intel’s compiler. It’s a fact that’s not widely known, but Intel’s compiler deliberately and knowingly cripples performance for non-Intel (AMD/VIA) processors.
Agner Fog details this particularly nasty examples of Intel’s anticompetitive practices quite well. Intel’s compiler can produce different versions of pieces of code, with each version being optimised for a specific processor and/or instruction set (SSE2, SSE3, etc.). The system detects which CPU it’s running on and chooses the optimal code path accordingly; the CPU dispatcher, as it’s called.
“However, the Intel CPU dispatcher does not only check which instruction set is supported by the CPU, it also checks the vendor ID string,” Fog details, “If the vendor string says ‘GenuineIntel’ then it uses the optimal code path. If the CPU is not from Intel then, in most cases, it will run the slowest possible version of the code, even if the CPU is fully compatible with a better version.”
It turns out that while this is known behaviour, few users of the Intel compiler actually seem to know about it. Intel does not advertise the compiler as being Intel-specific, so the company has no excuse for deliberately crippling performance on non-Intel machines.
“Many software developers think that the compiler is compatible with AMD processors, and in fact it is, but unbeknownst to the programmer it puts in a biased CPU dispatcher that chooses an inferior code path whenever it is running on a non-Intel processor,” Fog writes, “If programmers knew this fact they would probably use another compiler. Who wants to sell a piece of software that doesn’t work well on AMD processors?”
In fact, Fog points out that even benchmarking programs are affected by this, up to a point where benchmark results can differ greatly depending on how a processor identifies itself. Ars found out that by changing the CPUID of a VIA Nano processor to AuthenticAMD you could increase performance in PCMark 2005’s memory subsystem test by 10% – changing it to GenuineIntel yields a 47.4% performance improvement! There’s more on that here [print version – the regular one won’t load for me].
In other words, this is a very serious problem. Luckily, though, it appears that the recent antitrust settlement between AMD and Intel will solve this problem for at least AMD users, as the agreement specifically states that Intel must fix its compiler, meaning they’ll have to fix their CPU dispatcher.
The Federal Trade Commission is investigating Intel too, and it is also seeking a resolution of the compiler issue, but the FTC takes it all a step further than the Intel-AMD settlement. Since the latter only covers AMD, VIA could still be in trouble. Consequently, the FTC asks that Intel do a lot more than what’s described in the AMD settlement:
Requiring that, with respect to those Intel customers that purchased from Intel a software compiler that had or has the design or effect of impairing the actual or apparent performance of microprocessors not manufactured by Intel (“Defective Compiler”), as described in the Complaint:
- Intel provide them, at no additional charge, a substitute compiler that is not a Defective Compiler;
- Intel compensate them for the cost of recompiling the software they had compiled on the Defective Compiler and of substituting, and distributing to their own customers, the recompiled software for software compiled on a Defective Compiler; and
- Intel give public notice and warning, in a manner likely to be communicated to persons that have purchased software compiled on Defective Compilers purchased from Intel, of the possible need to replace that software.
Fog also offers up a number of workarounds, such as using GNU GCC, whose optimisations are similar to that of Intel’s compiler, “but the Gnu function library (glibc) is inferior”. You can also patch Intel’s CPU dispatcher – Fog even provides a patch to do so in “Optimizing software in C++: An optimization guide for Windows, Linux and Mac platforms“.
This is a particularly nasty kind of anticompetitive practice, as it really requires deep knowledge of matters in order to find it out. God knows how many benchmarks have been skewed in favour of Intel simply because people unknowingly used Intel’s compiler in good faith. Intel’s compiler is seen as the cream of the crop and delivers superior performance, but apparently only if you stick to GenuineIntel.


Standard duty metal shelving unit. 5 adjustable shelves are rated to support 200 lb. of evenly distributed weight per shelf. Adjustable feet for leveling. No tools required for assembly. Dimensions: 13.8" D. x 35.9" W. x 72" H.
|Capacity wt.||1000lbs, 200lbs per shelf|
|item weight||12.65 pounds|


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The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) added its second batch of 10 legislative candidates to its platform, it said yesterday, while Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), who is the party’s chairman, said the TPP’s goal is to prevent any single party winning more than half the legislative seats in the presidential and legislative elections on Jan. 11.
The candidates, all under the age of 45, identify with “pushing the pan-blue and pan-green camps to the side to allow for the people to be in the center,” the party said.
Ko at a campaign event in Kaohsiung said that ever since he left his former job as head of traumatology at National Taiwan University Hospital to enter politics in 2014, many voters have told him that they support him because he could achieve what others could not in breaking the pan-green, pan-blue divide.
Photo: Wang Chun-chung, Taipei Times
By nominating TPP legislators, he said he wants to prove that they can gradually realize what others thought was impossible.
The TPP wants to change Taiwan’s political culture, he said, adding that its participation in the legislative election is a social movement toward achieving that goal.
Ko said the party would also nominate 34 people for legislator-at-large seats, and their goal is for no party to win more than half of the legislative seats, so that minor parties could play a significant role in leading Taiwan to break away from the long-term battles between the pan-blue and the pan-green camps.
The 10 legislative candidates announced by the TPP include: Yen Yao-hsing (顏耀星), a former National Assembly representative, who would run in Tainan’s first constituency; former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Kaohsiung delegate Ao Po-sheng (敖博勝), who would run in Kaohsiung’s eighth constituency; Chang Yue-jiang (張渝江), deputy chairman of Taichung Civil Engineers Association, who would run in Taichung’s fourth constituency; and Lee Min-wei (李旻蔚), daughter of Democratic Progressive Party New Taipei City Councilor Lee Hsu-tien (李余典), who would run in New Taipei City’s third constituency.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday said that a surge in respiratory illnesses in China has been caused by at least seven types of pathogens, and small children, elderly people and immunocompromised people should temporarily avoid unnecessary visits to China. The recent outbreak of respiratory illnesses in China is mainly in the north and among children, CDC Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said on Monday. Data released by the Chinese National Health Commission on Sunday showed that among children aged one to four, the main pathogens were influenza viruses and rhinoviruses, while among children aged five to 14, the main pathogens
A New Taipei City hotpot restaurant could be fined after a rat dropped from the ceiling and landed on a customer’s plate last week, the New Taipei City Department of Health said yesterday after conducting an inspection. A woman recently posted on the “I am a Banciao resident” (我是板橋人) social media group saying that she had been eating with a friend at Chien Tu Shabu Shabu Hotpot Restaurant’s Shuangshi B branch in Banciao District (板橋). “While still eating, a big rat suddenly dropped down from the ceiling, landing on a plate next to a hotpot,” she said. “Later on, a member of
A new poll of Taiwanese voters found the top opposition candidate for president jumping past the ruling party’s hopeful into the lead position ahead of January’s election — the latest twist in a drama-filled race. Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) had an approval rating of 31.9 percent versus 29.2 percent for the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) presidential candidate Vice President William Lai (賴清德), the poll released yesterday by the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation showed. The Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜), ranked third with 23.6 percent, according to the survey conducted
Actress Hu Ling (胡伶) on Saturday became the first Chinese movie star to walk the red carpet of the Golden Horse Awards since 2019, when China boycotted Taiwan’s biggest awards show over political tensions. Beijing banned its entertainers from joining the awards, dubbed the Chinese-language Oscars, after documentary director Fu Yu (傅榆) voiced support for Taiwan’s formal independence in an acceptance speech in 2018. There were no films from China in the 2019 nomination list and several Hong Kong movies dropped out that year, while several big commercial productions were conspicuously absent at both the 2020 and 2021 awards. However, Hu, nominated for


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“Do we have to go to bed” is music to your ears when your kid needs to work on their weak foot or ball control in tight spaces. Countless nights our kids have gotten me in big trouble doing “just one more round” of soccer skills that lead to another round and another… Seriously how can you say no when they’re begging to keep training?
Whether soccer training is rained out or the kids are wanting to climb up the leaderboard the DribbleUp smart soccer ball has been a welcome addition to our soccer household.
You can read more about the many reasons we’re super excited about the ball in our DribbleUp reviews.
This package includes:
- 1 DribbleUp Smart Ball (Size 4 or Size 5)
- 1 Phone Stand (Android or iPhone)
- 1 Soccer Star Biography (You Choose From):
- Cristiano Ronaldo – The Rise of a Winner
- Neymar – The Wizard
The footwork is one of the core features of the soccer app, really helping players improve their technical skills. However, in addition to the foot skills players can also work on their juggling – either in the Juggle Challenge or Freestyle mode. Here’s an example of the ball tracking in the juggling app inside of the DribbleUp skills capture.
How Do You Use Dribble Up?
For questions on downloading the smart ball app, setting up your account, and how to use the smart ball there’s a Dribble Up User’s Guide . For tips on getting the most out of your training with the ball and some info on the coaches dashboard we also put together some Smart Ball Tips for you.
If you have more questions about the ball you can ask us in the live online chat, email us, or call our Smart Ball Hotline – 816-398-8846

domain: hobby


The Communications and Marketing Department at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center (UTHSC) is among the winners of the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals’ 2011 MarCom Awards.
The Communications and Marketing Department at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center (UTHSC) is among the winners of the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals’ 2011 MarCom Awards. The department received a Platinum MarCom Award for the UTHSC Centennial Campaign in the Marketing/Promotion Campaign/Materials category and a Gold MarCom Award for the Plough Donation Announcement in the Media Response category.
The MarCom Awards is an international creative competition that recognizes outstanding achievement by marketing and communications professionals. The competition is one of the largest of its kind in the world with entries submitted from corporate marketing and communications professionals, advertising agencies, PR firms, design shops, production companies and freelancers. The competition is administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals. There were more than 6,000 entries in upwards of 200 categories from throughout the United States, Canada and several other countries in the 2011 MarCom Awards competition. Work produced after January 2010 through September 2011 was eligible for the MarCom Awards this year.
“These prestigious awards are well-deserved recognition for our Communications and Marketing Department,” said Ken Brown, JD, MPA, PhD, UTHSC executive vice chancellor and chief operations officer, to whom the department reports. “The creativity, energy and collaborative spirit exhibited by these professionals clearly shine through in their work and in their focus on quality customer service.”
“We are pleased to congratulate our Communications and Marketing team on a job very well done,” stated UTHSC Chancellor Steve J. Schwab, MD. “It is especially gratifying that all their hard work on the UTHSC Centennial Campaign earned a Platinum MarCom Award, the top award given in this international competition.”
Submitted in the form of a booklet, the Centennial Campaign entry provided clear insight to the planning performed and materials assembled by the Communications and Marketing team to effectively promote UTHSC’s 100th anniversary celebration. Everything from fliers and brochures to centennial-focused activities such as book signings, featuring Drs. Alvin Crawford, Steve Schwab and Pat Wall, as well as the centennial gala were highlighted.
In March 2010, The Plough Foundation awarded a grant of $4.5 million to the UTHSC College of Pharmacy. It was used to establish the Plough Center for Sterile Drug Delivery Systems, a more than 5,800-square-foot facility on the sixth floor of the new, $70 million UT College of Pharmacy Building. Once this information was distributed, it was covered by a multitude of media outlets across the nation and internationally. The media interest made the donation announcement one of UTHSC’s most-covered events to date.


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Why I will miss Susan Douglas Rubes
The actress defined the Toronto theatre scene in the ’60s and ’70s, founding the Young People's Theatre, which still stands today.
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When Susan Douglas Rubes died on Jan. 23 at the age of 87, there was no sense of a light suddenly going out, because she had successfully passed her torch on years ago.
Rubes was one of those wonderful women who helped to define the Toronto performing arts scene in the 1960s and ’70s. Her eyes could twinkle brightly, like she was one of The Golden Girls, but make no mistake, this diminutive lady had a will of iron and could mow down anyone who got in her way.
Luckily, she exercised her power for good, creating Prologue to the Performing Arts, serving as head of CBC Radio Drama and working as president of the Family Channel.
But her greatest achievement was as the founder of Young People’s Theatre, which she began in 1966. “We started small,” she recalled, “touring schools and dodging spitballs,” but by 1978, she opened the theatre on Front St. E. that still proudly stands today, continuing her legacy of offering the best theatre possible to young audiences.
The actors who appeared there over the years have included Brent Carver, Cynthia Dale, Megan Follows, Kate Reid, Eric Peterson, Gordon Pinsent, R.H. Thomson, Martin Short and Sheila McCarthy. “I never asked if it was good enough,” Rubes once said. “I just wanted it to be good.” She got her wish and we’re all grateful that she did.
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18. The expert from OICA presented GRSG-101-21 clarifying the requirements on rear underrun protection devices. The expert from the United Kingdom introduced GRSG-101-26 amending the transitional provisions of draft Supplement 1 to the 02 series of amendments to Regulation No. 58, adopted at the previous session of GRSG. Following the discussion, GRSG agreed on the proposal as reproduced in GRSG-101-21-Rev.1 and requested the secretariat to submit it to WP.29 and AC.1 for consideration at their November 2011 session, as a Corrigendum to ECE/TRANS/WP.29/2011/107. [Note by the secretariat: see informal document WP.29-155-04.]
19. The expert from Germany recalled the purpose of documents GRSG-100-25 and ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRSG/2011/19 proposing to introduce, into Regulation No. 58, more stringent requirements for rear underrun protection devices. The expert from Japan introduced informal documents GRSG-101-10-Rev.1, GRSG-101-27 and GRSG-101-28 amending ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRSG/2011/19. GRSG welcomed the proposals and noted a number of comments. Following the discussion, the expert from Germany volunteered to organize an ad hoc expert meeting to further discuss the open issues. He invited all GRSG experts to attend that meeting, scheduled to be held on 23 January 2012. GRSG agreed to resume consideration on this subject at its next session in April 2012 on the basis of a revised proposal to be submitted by Germany, taking into account the outcome of the discussion of the ad hoc meeting.
20. GRSG considered proposals to align the transitional provisions of the 02 series of amendments to the Regulation with the general guidelines adopted in TRANS/WP.29/1044 (ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRSG/2011/33 and ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRSG/2011/34). GRSG adopted ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRSG/2011/34, as amended below, and requested the secretariat to submit it to WP.29 and AC.1 for consideration at their March 2012 session, as draft Supplement 2 to the 02 series of amendments to Regulation No. 58:
Paragraph 31.5., amend to read:


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Combine flour, sugar, apple pie spice, baking soda, and salt in a bowl.
Whisk together buttermilk, cream cheese, maple syrup, egg, and vanilla. Fold buttermilk mixture into dry ingredients just until moistened. Let batter rest 10 minutes.
Heat a griddle or non-stick skillet over medium-low heat. Brush with oil. Pour about 1/3 cup batter onto the griddle.
Cook until bubbles form , 2-3 minutes, flip and cook until golden.
Creamy Icing: Whisk cream cheese, sweetened condensed milk, buttermilk and vanilla over medium heat until warmed.
Spiced Maple Syrup: Heat maple syrup, sweetened condensed milk, butter and apple pie spice until butter melts, about 5 minutes.
View line-by-line Nutrition Insights™: Discover which ingredients contribute the calories/sodium/etc.
|Serving Size: 1 Serving (173g)|
|Recipe Makes: 10 Servings|
|Calories from Fat: 132 (29%)|
|Amt Per Serving||% DV|
|Total Fat 14.6g||19 %|
|Saturated Fat 8.6g||43 %|
|Monounsaturated Fat 2.8g|
|Polyunsanturated Fat 0.6g|
|Cholesterol 67.9mg||21 %|
|Sodium 300.9mg||10 %|
|Potassium 252mg||7 %|
|Total Carbohydrate 71.2g||21 %|
|Dietary Fiber 1.1g||4 %|
|Sugars, other 70.2g|
|Protein 9.1g||13 %|
Powered by: USDA Nutrition Database
Disclaimer: Nutrition facts are derived from linked ingredients (shown at left in colored bullets) and may or may not be complete. Always consult a licensed nutritionist or doctor if you have a nutrition-related medical condition.
Calories per serving: 453
Get detailed nutrition information, including item-by-item nutrition insights, so you can see where the calories, carbs, fat, sodium and more come from.

domain: food


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Tom Shackelford kept apologizing to the crowd.
A lot of the details were fuzzy. Dates had faded into each other. The 93-year-old World War II and Korean War veteran had tucked away many of his memories for safe keeping.
But, he remembered vividly what it felt like to be part of the team tasked by President John F. Kennedy to place a man on the moon.
“Some of the greatest people I ever worked with were in the space business,” Shackelford said. “We were a tight knit group in the early days. That’s how we got the job done.”
Shackelford spoke Tuesday at Westminster Village in Spanish Fort where residents celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo mission to the moon. While he spoke, residents were treated to moon pies, astronaut ice cream and glasses of bright orange Tang. The crowd also launched rockets in the courtyard as part of the U.S. Space and Rocket Center’s Global Rocket Launch.
Shackelford was a radioman aboard an aircraft carrier in World War II and served on submarines in Korea. When his military tenure ended, he went to Huntsville to work for Chrysler, one of the companies that provided contractors to the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville. After the U.S.S.R. launched the satellite Sputnik into space, the military labs were absorbed by NASA and Shackelford was at the forefront of America’s race to the moon.
“After Shepard made his flight downstream we jumped into space pretty quick there,” Shackelford said, referencing Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard’s suborbital flight in 1961. “That was something else.”
Shackelford worked with Shepard and many of the other astronauts of the early Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions. When Apollo 11 launched on July 16, loaded with three astronauts headed for the moon, Shackelford was sitting on the roof of the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.
The smoke that filled the launch pad in Florida once the rocket’s engines ignited made tracking difficult for scientists on site. Shackelford and his co-workers were able to track part of the launch better from Alabama.
Shackelford also worked side by side with Wernher von Braun, a German-American aerospace engineer who was a pioneer in rocket technology.
“He joined us in the ranks when Shepard was getting ready to go,” Shackelford said. “I saw him in a ditch laying cable with the rest of us. It was a blessing to work with him.”

domain: history


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All rights reserved. The whole area was intentionally Boshian with snakes, he says, so the original population's return was impossible. He remembers the sounds of gunshots and chaos on the streets and his father being taken to a prison camp. He remembers being driven to a port in Croatia and, at night, boarding a ship to Italy. Sometimes the noise of a plane or a boyy will bring back these memories.
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Bksnian legend claims they cover the bodies of Greek soldiers who died of the plague during the Ottoman wars. Before that, rain water and hand wells were the village's water source.
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Local industries had collapsed, leaving unemployment high and social tensions strained. Trash floated on the Neretva river. But each summer, members of his generation return from across Europe to reconnect with their ancestral homeland.
The imam of the Bosnian boy prepares for Friday prayer.
During the war, Serb and Croat forces massacred Muslim Bosnians—known as Bosniaks—in an ethnic cleansing campaign. Zulfo, a village elder, is the guardian of endless anecdotes about the people of the village.
He knows Northern Coffs Harbour chinese christian church heart the family trees of those who have lived on this land for centuries.
Coming home is a fraught process for refugees. Even decades after the war has ended, soccer clubs, shops, and neighborhoods are segregated by ethnicity in towns across Bosnia and Herzegovina.
A peace agreement was struck inand by the late s the international community began pressuring refugees to return to Bosnia. During the war, when men and boys were being deported to concentration camps, many used Bosnian boy woods as a hideout. Some of them remained hidden for months before finding an escape route. But getting back is just the first step. Then begins the process of reclaiming their land, rebuilding their houses, and mending relationships.
Military escorts followed United Nations-chartered buses filled with returnees, and legal assistance was offered to returnees. The ground had been laced with mines and Australia super sexe had been booby Bosnian boy. Only a few children are left in the village. The remaining original inhabitants of the village have known the horrors of war and a lifetime of sacrifices.
Please view the main text area of the page by skipping the main menu.
The page may not Bossnian displayed properly if the Bosnian boy is deactivated on your browser. The birth came at the height of a fierce ethnic conflict after the Bosnian boy of Yugoslavia a year earlier. The woman soon vanished, leaving the boy. The infant, Alen Muhic, now 25, was adopted by a male worker at the hospital where he was born, only to be dumped by his biological mother.
The woman who gave birth to Bosnain was Bosnian. During the conflict, she was abducted from her apartment Escort services Australia Serbian soldiers. She was then beaten and her clothes were torn apart as a gun was held to her head. She realized that she was Kalgoorlie swing at a detention center in a town controlled by the Serbs.
In a prisoner-of-war swap, she was taken to the Gorazde hospital on the eve of the baby's birth. The Bosnian War fought among Bosnians, Croatians and Serbians from through killed somepeople.
Each group committed ethnic cleansing in a bid Bodnian annihilate their enemies, and detained women from other groups.
An estimated 25, women were sexually assaulted.
Srebrenica massacre Warrnambool
He spent sleepless nights in anguish, tormented by the thought, "I was not born from love; I Boshian born from hate. He eventually met with both of. ❶I am a product of Australia embassy Mount Isa I was raised, not anything else," said Lejla.
In most cases, they then entered the village or hamlet, expelled or killed the population, who offered no bo resistance, and destroyed their homes.
Those who arrived later could see Bosnian boy what was happening.
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Retrieved 19 April He then pretended to be dead and managed to escape the following morning. Archived from the original on 25 September It did not happen just before my eyes, for I saw that Bosnian boy, but also before the eyes of us all. Dorset stefan savic. Retrieved 24 July And then I think I should have just lied," Lejla said, explaining her mindset before her Bonian with that woman.
He entered Bosnia house he was told to visit, and a woman was sitting on a sofa, crying. And when it was my turn, Bosjian jumped out with what I believe were four other people. But there were even men just men who were still alive, who were Bksnian wounded and as soon as I would step on him, I would hear him cry, moan, Bosnian boy I was trying to move as fast as I could.|Two-and-a-half-year-old Sandro was killed by the blast, which took Bosnian boy lives of 71 young Adult book stores Australia and Bosniaj more than others after a shell was fired from Bosnian Serb Army positions outside the north-eastern Bosnian city in Gay helpline Bathurst by of May 25, So we ran to my car over shredded bodies.
Edina Ahmetasevic was a young woman who also lost her life that day at Kapija; Bosnin father Arif was on the frontline when it happened. I thought, God forbid, Bpsnian used to go out frequently. Adnan Piric was a year-old handball Bosnian boy he Bosnnian come to the city centre Cheap housing Maitland Australia day after a practice session when Bosnian boy shell hit Kapija square.
His friend Asim Hadziselimovic was severely injured, but survived the massacre, although Shemale Mildura backpage had to undergo more bly two years Bosnian boy medical treatment.
Also in The Mainichi
I shall never forget the feeling. I went there to look for my Asim. I was thinking he was maybe helping others, maybe carrying the wounded. But while I was searching for him, I saw a lot of blood, many wounded people, many dead people Bosnian boy with sheets.
Four days after the Tuzla massacre, a funeral for the victims was organised. Because of the constant Bosnixn of the city at the time, the funeral took place at 4am on May Only one Bosnian boy has been convicted of the Tuzla massacre — but he has not yet Asian spas in Maryborough his sentence.
He was sentenced to 25 years in prison. In Junethe state court convicted him again but reduced his sentence to 20 years.]A soldier who spotted a boy with a terrible deformity while on patrol in Bosnia has spent ten years fundraising to finally deliver his promise of.
Lifetime True Story of a Bosnian Boy Soldier by Spiro: Dobrijevic published by Austin Macauley Publishers. Non-Fiction.
GORAZDE, Bosnia and Herzegovina -- A woman gave birth to a boy in Gorazde in southeastern Bosnia and Herzegovina on Feb. 20,


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The only news. Of late has been the good timing of insiders selling 4.5 million shares and no ci
Or responding purchases. Markets do not like seeing insiders so aggressively sell---for whatever reasons they have---especially at little spec plays.
tim, why do you keep on harping on insider sells and how this spooks the market. i highly doubt the market is selling b/c they are spooked. insider sells all the time (spec play or not) and it doesn't always result in consistent downward pressure on the stock. have it ever occurred to you the downward price pressure is the result of something else. e.g. mm driving up vol? perception of this investment being dead money? hedge funds shaking out weak hands?
as for insiders, we all have our own reasons for investing and they are no different. the only thing we can conclude from the sales is that they felt the need to reduce their position (in this case take HUGE profits) and that there are no pending material news.
you seem to have been in this sector for a long time. it should be of no surprise to you then that there is no sure thing no matter how strongly you might feel about the science and data. So, why would the market be spooked by some smart insider taking some profit when history has shown how fleeting paper gains can disappear in these sort of "spec play".
if you're long, the only thing that matter is the science and data. not the stock price, not the dilution, not what bloggers say, not what options management is getting, not b/c insiders are selling/buying.
i've been around this space for a long time. as long as the science and data pans out, you'll eventually make a WHOLE LOT of money if you've bought cheap and hold strong.

domain: finance


The Israel Defence Forces have announced that about 100 jets struck about 150 underground Hamas targets in Gaza Friday night.
“The forces are still on the ground and are continuing the war,” said an IDF spokesperson, R Adm Daniel Hagari.
According to The Guardian, The Hostages and Missing Families Forum called for an urgent meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, the defense minister, Yoav Gallant, and members of the war cabinet due to the intensification of the fighting.
“This night was the worst of all nights. Anxiety, frustration, and especially enormous anger that no one from the war cabinet bothered to meet with the families of the abductees to explain to them one thing – whether the ground operation endangers the safety of the 229 abductees in Gaza,” the group said in a statement.
On X, formerly Twitter, the IDF released footage of multiple tanks crossing a sandy area of Gaza, firing off into structured areas in the distance.
Per The Jerusalem Post, IDF Spokesman Daniel Hagari shared a video highlighting how Hamas uses the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City as a command and control center. The video revealed a network of passageways and chambers under the hospital and other civilian buildings.
“Hamas also has an entrance to its terror tunnels from inside hospital wards. From different places inside the hospital, you can enter underground tunnels,” Hagari said.
“Right now, terrorists move freely in Al-Shifa hospital,” he continued. “Hundreds [of terrorists] fled to the hospital to hide after the massacre on October 7.”
“Hamas wages war from hospitals,” he warned, adding that this “not only endangers the lives of Israelis but exploits innocent Gazan civilians as human shields.”
He also shared a recorded conversation between two anonymous individuals, during which Speaker B asked: “Where are the main headquarters of Al-Qasam Brigades?” In response, speaker A says, “Under the compound Al-Shifa. Yes, the leadership headquarters are under the Al-Shifa compound. Bathrooms, rooms, headquarters.”
On Saturday, Hagari shared another recording in which there were two interrogations of terrorists captured on October 7, the same day the group launched its attack on Israel. In the video, one of the Hamas terrorists explains that there are tunnels and operation rooms under hospitals, including the Al-Shifa Hospital.
“Al-Shifa Hospital is huge, and so we can hide there,” the terrorist says, adding that the group will take cover in schools, hospitals, and other locations amid Israeli strikes.
When asked whether the group exploits places that provide medical care, such as hospitals and clinics, the terrorists answered in the affirmative. He added that the locations also serve as secure locations for the transportation of location, weapons and other goods for its members.
The Hamas attack on Israel on Oct 7 resulted in the death of 1,400 civilians and wounding hundreds. According to BBC News, over 1,500 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed due to retaliatory Israeli airstrikes as of Saturday.
Photo Courtesy: ©Getty Images/Dan Kitwood / Staff
Milton Quintanilla is a freelance writer and content creator. He is a contributing writer for Christian Headlines and the host of the For Your Soul Podcast, a podcast devoted to sound doctrine and biblical truth. He holds a Masters of Divinity from Alliance Theological Seminary.
The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of Salem Web Network and Salem Media Group.


A significant public health concern has emerged as the Schistosoma parasite, known to cause Schistosomiasis, commonly referred to as bilharzia, is likely to surge in the Asuogyaman District in the Eastern region in the aftermath of the Akosombo Dam Spillage. The disease is endemic in communities living along the Volta Lake in the district.
The Ghana Health Service and the Volta River Authority have over the years periodically administered praziquantel, a prescription medication for the treatment of the disease among the populace. Schistosomiasis is a disease caused by parasitic flatworms that can enter the skin when individuals come into contact with contaminated bodies of water.
The disease is notably associated with bladder cancer, and while there is no vaccine for it, there is a drug available for treatment. Transmission occurs when larval forms of the parasite, released by freshwater snails, penetrate the skin during contact with infested water. Further transmission can occur when people suffering from schistosomiasis contaminate freshwater sources with faeces or urine containing parasite eggs, which then hatch in the water.
The prevalence situation in the Asuogyaman district has raised significant concerns as the spillage of the Akosombo Hydroelectric Dam has caused severe floods in numerous communities downstream of the Volta River, potentially exacerbating the spread of the disease due to the increased pollution.
Member of Parliament for Asuogyaman, Thomas Ampem Nyarko, over the weekend while distributing relief items including rice, cooking oil, and bottled water with the support of the national chairman of NDC Johnson Asiedu Nketia, advised residents in flood-affected communities to refrain from drinking raw water from the river or swimming in it to protect themselves from infestation with the Schistosoma parasite and other waterborne infections.
Thomas Ampem Nyarko emphasized the importance of heeding this advice, citing the prior discovery of the Schistosoma parasite in the lake by the District Health Directorate.
“The District Health Directorate announced before the spillage of the Akosombo dam that they found Schistosoma parasite in the lake, so you don’t have to bath in the lake or drink raw water from it. The District Director of Health has told me she’s gone around communities along the lake to speak to the people to boil the water they fetch from the lake very well and allow to cool down and filter before using”.
He stressed the need to boil water fetched from the lake thoroughly and allow it to cool down and filter it before use stating that the river has been seriously polluted due to the flooding, as it carried rubbish and human excreta, making the water unhealthy for consumption. He assured residents of his commitment to quickly mechanize a borehole in the Kokonte Kpedzi Community to provide safe drinking water.
It’s important to note that according to estimates from the World Health Organization, a significant number of people required preventive treatment for schistosomiasis in 2021, with a focus on periodic, large-scale population treatment with praziquantel. This, along with improvements in potable water, sanitation, and snail control, is crucial in reducing transmission.
Schistosomiasis transmission has been reported in 78 countries, including Ghana. Preventive treatment, repeated over several years, plays a vital role in reducing and preventing morbidity associated with the disease. This situation highlights the urgent need for public health measures to address the presence of the Schistosoma parasite in the Volta River and to ensure the safety and well-being of the affected communities.
Source: Ghana/Starrfm.com.gh/Kojo Ansah


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2/17/23: Victory Over, and Beyond, the Haters #poetry
Thinking about haters in a very detached way. Watched the Lumet Iceman Cometh yesterday. Got new insight into the Anti-Semitic high school bully in Fabelmans. Hickey reveals he hated his wife because she loved him so much and it filled him with guilt and shame. That may be where Kushner got the inspiration for the Prom movie sequence.
I don’t identify with the bully, but it gives me some insight into how I set myself up to be hated. I approached my oppressors with a naive love and they hated me for loving them.
This is very interesting to me.
Then I thought of another reason. The hated person shames the haters. It may be obvious but I never thought of it before. My blog, for example, makes the haters look bad. It exposes their lies about me, and it exposes their false claims about themselves.
This appeals to a dark competitive part of my personality … which is part of the reason the haters bothered me so much. They claimed to be winners, but I won. They wanted to stop me, but they couldn’t and they are diminished.
Should I care about beating them? I think it’s important. The two step is winning and then freely being. It’s the revolution followed by new life and they constantly repeat themselves on a loop. With practice the wounded pain dulls, but still is necessary. I used to hope this concern would end, but for me at least, I don’t think it ever will. I come to look forward to the piercing stab of their assaults. They ignite writing.
I think this struggle is universal, a part of the human condition. The haters are phantoms peddling fear instead of conscious life and death. They always arrive at moments of fear … in the void … the empty space … life and death occur in the unknown, and the haters are know it all. The haters are the part of us that want us to avoid our destinies.
I wondered if I have been in a rut —- always a lack of confidence … why keep thinking about this, but O’Neill cured me. This is part of what writers do. It’s funny that creative gold lies beneath the hatred of others.
This I believe was also what was underneath the line edited because I cared too much. A wonderful edit perfect for the piece. And the source of the pieces below , and this preface.
I’ve worked my way to detachment without denial.
Copyright 2023 Richard Thomas
2/9/23: Notes on Process and “Women Talking” (2022) #poetry
Usually I just know when to hit the publish button. I know when I’m thinking about a piece. I know when to type. I know when to revise and edit. I know when to hit send.
Yesterday was an aberration. I knew I had something good, but something was off. I reached out to my friend the genius. He deftly suggested a change of one sentence, and one word choice in another. He made his evaluation in a matter of seconds, and I was good to go.
I am very impressed with his process and pleased with my own, so in this entry I am including excerpts from letters that I sent to him, and the piece that I wrote and he gracefully assisted in the tiny, but crucial step before I crossed the finish line.
… got a specific taste yesterday of how amazing you are in those sessions. Knew it already but man! Like watching Justin Fields! The precision of your observations and emotional intelligence of your way of relating … Fun Knowing you!
Your insights yesterday were invaluable to me. I’ve noticed two things about my craft as a result that I can take going forward. The redundancy that you pointed out with such nuance shows (once again) your high level of understanding. You didn’t say it was “wrong”. You knew it might be a choice. Then you said that your preference would be not to use it here. That is precisely responsive to my process. My hot and fast writing style — after longer quiet gestation — often yields redundancies. I edit some as clumsy, and I keep some for rhythm and musicality. And sometimes I just miss them. Your tone on that line had perfect pitch.
More significantly, changing the line that sounded bitter was, as I mentioned yesterday, the perfect adjustment. A paragraph or two later I say that my work can’t be stolen … the word choice that made me sound wounded above. I changed in the writing of the piece. This leads to another insight into my craft. I transform in the act of writing. Sometimes it serves the piece to show the transformation. Sometimes on rewrite the change should be introduced from the beginning.
On the question of being a writer “now” I think we both said true things. In one sense, I didn’t become a writer until 2014 and I made writing the major and conscious activity of my life. And there always was something missing, a persistent frustration until I actively wrote.
On the other hand, I’d have nothing to write if I wasn’t ostensibly lost. I was ‘writing’ all the time … inwardly interacting with the experiences of my life. I didn’t develop as you kindly say a ‘unique’ point of view. I was born with one. So I was writing in my head constantly. I was always committed to my authenticity for good or ill, and I think on its most basic level that is what writing is.
Everything has worked out. I believe when I wandered I did more to develop as a writer than if I was sitting at a keyboard. The inner experience of life is the main thing. I had so many thoughts that I never wrote down. I threw good writing away, as you have lamented. But nothing is lost. I am confident that I will say to the world every word my person has to contribute before I die. I have this reservoir of thoughts and feelings that rise up on cue. I look at a subject for my writing, a movie for example, and I reclaim years of my life. My life truly feels like one moment. Feelings and insights that I had as a small child or any other point of my life feel immediate and present because they are.
Writing, and gestating for writing , take me outside of time … and of course, time marches on. That paradox makes two different response to the question “when did Rick start writing?” The answers are 2014, and — the moment his parents conceived him.
Barry Diller, the powerful businessman, declared Hollywood and the Oscars dead. Of course he would, in the year with more great movies that I can remember, and more availability of new and real art at movie theaters and streaming services. It’s kind of like social security. Every time I enjoy something, some conservative asshole comes along and wants to take it away from me.
He’s wrong of course. The film industry is changing and adapting to new cultures and technologies. People will never stop wanting stories. — for all sorts of reasons from art to entertainment. Agents of negation always want to stop the joy … they want to reduce human beings to workers and consumers, but as Jeff Goldblum said IN A MOVIE … “Life finds a way.”
Oh … and social security isn’t going anywhere either — as a matter of fact it will be extended eventually. AI will eliminate work as we know it, and what is really essential … art … will become the purpose of everyone. I see a future where people get checks from the government and spend their days watching movies —- like me! Hah!
I saw “Women Talking” yesterday — another great art film in this stellar year. A title card calls the movie an act of female imagination. That it is … and my response to the film is very simple — let it speak for itself. Years ago I read a bit of Gloria Steinem. I found her prophetic feminism to be very helpful to me as a human being. This movie is in Steinem’s tradition. Normally I use a movie to add my perspective, but the main message that I get from this film is LISTEN. I feel bigger for having seen “Women Talking” and I have nothing to add … what she said!
As Columbo said, one more thing … on my process … my segments are pieces of a hidden narrative that I doubt is apparent to the reader. There is a creative logic that links one entry to another. My writing is a road picture. Me and my soul take off on an odyssey through the inner reaches of outer space.
Copyright 2023 Richard Thomas
And here is yesterday’s segment on my never ending story …
2/8/23: Thoughts on Plagiarism and Publication #poetry
A guy I knew has an ‘improv’ book out “Beyond Yes, And … ” or something like that. I wrote some pieces on the blog rejecting the concept “Yes, And” long before this book was ‘published’. Those pieces were widely read among improvisers. I don’t know if he was inspired by what I wrote, and neglected to attribute, or just independently arrived at the same point of view. I don’t care what his motivations are, or how he came upon the idea. I don’t self-identify as an improviser any more. I appreciate my experience as an improviser but I’ve put away childish things, and work in a more mature form.
The “Beyond Yes, And” title provoked some useful thoughts in me, clarifying my attitudes a bit on two practical considerations: plagiarism and what I think of as real publication.
I don’t think I can be plagiarized. I have had many things I’ve written ‘stolen” , but not really. The best anyone has ever done has been to steal a phrase as a marketing trope. My writing is too personal, and anybody who is merely taken by the shiny object of my phrase making isn’t smart enough to understand what I am saying.
This whole Yes, and business is stupid and always has been. It was a simplistic cash cow thing to rip people off in ‘workshops’ that were more Tony Robbins than Paul Sills. A party game is going to make you popular, successful in love and work and … a movie star! Please. This guy with the book is just saying I have a better way to make your rich, famous and sexually fulfilled. That’s like nothing I’ve written.
I rewrote this because my first draft sounded bitter. I’m truly not bitter. I don’t know whether to be embarrassed or proud at how far I have come. I am so over improvisation. It’s been that way for quite a while now. There is so much more. I was either selling myself short by improvising or retracing my past development to understand it better.
But, man is it dumb. And I may be being unfair to the guy who wrote this book. If I suspect him of guilt by association, I’m sorry. It’s just that the improv scene is such a brush fire of the vanities. Plenty of ego but no serious person cares. Rude, petty and stupid. Not even funny. Not real community (the aspect I loved with Paul Sills.) Just inane cliques.
Which leads to my consideration of ‘real’ publishing. If publishing is self-promotion or branding, I don’t think its real. Years ago I co-wrote a joke book for the Cigar Association of America. I don’t consider it a published work! I also don’t consider these books (and classes) by these improv gurus as real. I know — back to old Rick whipping boys … Second City and iO. If Second City and iO (and their alums that branch off and go it alone … the fruits of the poisonous trees) … if Second City and iO are arts organizations then Trump University was an institution of higher learning.
Viola Spolin and Keith Johnstone really wrote and really published about improvisation because they were real artists and intellectuals. The commercial stuff is worthless.
I wrote a book that I used as a text when I taught at UIC. Part of it was ostensibly about improv. It wasn’t. It was my writing. I don’t even think about that book anymore … but I do value some passages more generally as writing. I was done with improvisation, I just didn’t know it.
Improvisation is an early chapter in the book of my life.
I was interviewed back maybe 5 years ago for this book Improv Nation by Sam Wasson. It was reviewed in The New York Times and went to the remainder bin. It’s a shallow stupid book that calls improvisation an ‘art’ without knowing what art is. I don’t consider that book really published. I have a tiny audience on The Rick Blog, but I have more reach than Sam Wasson. People actually read me and will in the future. No one cares about what Wasson wrote already. I’m not being mean, but come on. This guy argues that Del Close was a greater artist than Mike Nichols. No one with half a brain would accept that proposition. Angels in America versus The Harold. This is actually another example of the improv scam. It lies to people and tells them that they have artistic achievement because they had fun playing a party game.
I know a guy from my former life who self published and paid to be nominated for some phony award that sounded suspiciously like the National Book Award but wasn’t. Hah! Clearly not real.
I self produced a one man show in Dec 2017. I use the word ‘produce’ quite loosely. I invited people I knew and shot a poorly made video that documented my writing as spoken word. It wasn’t a real production. It was like throwing a party. It was good for the process of my writing, but it wasn’t a real dissemination of my work.
I don’t want to be “published” as a vanity project. I want to be published by someone as deep and true and smart and sincere in their publishing as I am in my writing.
That’s what is real. I want to respect my publishers, producers, editors and readers. Until I find them, I publish right here. I respect myself and my readers.
And if this guy wrote a worthy book and my ideas triggered him, great. I don’t think he is up to it, but what do I know. I didn’t know that I was as good as I am either.
Here’s what I wrote about Yes, and — first.
Copyright 2023 Richard Thomas
1/10/19: The Trouble with “Yes, and”
I was recently asked, “Why do you think “yes and” is bullshit?”
Here’s my answer :
I personally believe that my understanding of the Spolin concept of “acceptance” is the best way.
I make no claims to be a teacher of Spolin improvisational practice. I teach my own approach. I do this with what I believe is the encouragement of Viola Spolin, who I never met. She wrote that the rules of improvisation should not become rigid. She is surely one of the most skilled, effective and inspired teachers of any subject that ever lived. She was not looking for disciples. She wanted to develop free people, and for those so endowed and inclined, artists.
Spolin said that there should be constant revolution in improvisation. A core value of improvisation is transformation, and that transformation extends to the art itself. I did know and work with Spolin’s son, Paul Sills. He saw a one man show that I did at the West Bank Cafe in New York in the mid-1980s. He called the show the greatest piece of theater that he had seen in twenty-five years, and compared me to Lenny Bruce. I lacked confidence at the time, I was in my early thirties. I didn’t understand my power as an artist. After Paul showered me with praise, the significance of which I didn’t fully understand until many years later, I answered with a quavering apology. “I’m not good at object work (the Spolin way of introducing tangible objects through something that resembles mime to the uninitiated).” Paul got pissed off, and growled “who gives a shit?”
I learned that those improvisational concepts, which have far too often been commodified as rules, are only a means to an end.
I had achieved those ends in the show that Paul Sills saw, which was one of the peak experiences of my life, but I didn’t know it. I had a nervous breakdown one year after I gave that performance.
It took me fifteen years to complete the personal development that I needed to make art. I had to learn to take care of myself and make a living. My art was not going to make me a livelihood, at least not then.
I had to learn to not listen to other people.
An artist needs armor to protect himself from ignorance, arrogance and envy.
I had to grow as a person before I could even begin to do the the work of making art, and developing my potential as an artist.
Ironically, I returned to active creative work when I became a lawyer. I graduated from law school in 1981. I didn’t sit for the bar for twenty-five years.
After wandering the streets of New York as needy and lost soul in my mid-thirties, I worked in soulless telephone sales jobs for several years.
I rose in that awful profession and got a good paying job. I was fired from that job in my mid-forties.
Flat on my ass, I found my sole financial asset to be the human capital of my law degree. I took the bar in 2006 and I passed. It was really an accomplishment to pass the bar on the first try twenty-five years after my law school graduation. It was a lot of work and showed me that I had many resources of intelligence and character to apply to my life and work.
In all of my years in the wilderness, I always self-identified as an improvisor and an artist even when I was seemingly in exile. Those years also made me a writer. A writer has to be lost for a time. A writer needs to struggle in his life before he puts his life into words, to joust with inner and outer experiences, to be innocent, and therefore open, to suffer a thousand wounds, before finally realizing that his life in all of its particularity reflects the universal pain and joy of all men and women.
A lot happens when nothing is happening.
I practiced law for about six years. My bar admission eventually found its real utility. It was the credential that qualified me to be a college professor.
While I was gone, I had missed all of the “yes, and” business. I got a job at the University of Illinois at Chicago Business College teaching “Professional Presence” Improvisational acting instruction was the basis of teaching skills for business students to build self-confidence and communication and leadership skills. Other faculty at UIC, who also taught at the Second City Training Center. mentioned “yes, and.”
I was open to the idea. As a writer and teacher, I’ve never thought that I know everything. I grew to understand that the only thing that I could know is what I know.
Experience is the teacher.
So here is my experience with “yes, and.”
I read Kelly Leonard’ and Tom Yorton’ s (of Second City Works — an offshoot of Second City that teaches business people improvisational concepts to aid their personal and professional competencies and effectiveness much as I did at UIC) book Yes,and. I liked it. I thought it was a realization of David Shepherd’s (a founder with Paul Sills of the Compass Players, the forerunner of Second City) dream of using the teaching of improvisation as a means of positive impact on the lives of ordinary people who had no ambitions related to performing or any other arts. I even wrote a positive review of the book on my blog.
I applied the “yes, and” concept in my UIC classes. I wasn’t happy with the results. I also wasn’t sure if the problem was with “yes, and” or if I wasn’t teaching it properly.
Aretha Sills, Viola Spolin’s granddaughter, and the keeper of Viola’s flame, told me that “yes, and” was not a Spolin concept. She said that the idea originated with Josephine Forsberg.
One of the greatest living improvisation teachers, a friend and a person for whom I hold great respect (you’ll see why I don’t use his name here) told me that Jo Forsberg’s nephew, Martin de Maat, the founder of the Second City Training Center, stole the idea from Jo and commodified it.
To state the obvious, “yes, and” is a hugely successful commercial concept. “Yes, and” has taken over the world. Speak to almost any person who has ever taken an improvisation class in the last twenty years, and “yes, and” will be among the first words to come out of their mouths. I have talked to lawyers who discuss it …
University of Chicago intellectuals …
sales people …
and of course, actors.
“Yes, and” has become a synonym for improvisation in much of the public mind. The masses think that is all there is to it.
It, of course, isn’t.
I stopped using “yes, and” in my UIC classes. My way was getting much better outcomes. I improvised with some old friends that I had worked with at Second City when we young. I did that my own way too. I was very pleased with my work. I was an excellent improvisor again., even better than I used to be. I applied my own way of improvising to my writing, and noted steady improvement in the writing over time.
I like my writing.
My rejection of “yes, and” was the final step in my conscious claiming of my own artistic power.
I don’t even practice the same general creative form as the people who swear by “yes, and”.
I think “yes, and” practice is a bastardization of improvisation. I don’t think it’s improvisation at all.
An improvisation, like any art form, should reflect life.
It is important to accept reality, but we don’t have to like it.
For example, if MLK followed “Yes, and” he would have agreed with racism. He accepted racism’s reality but he didn’t agree and add to it.
In practice, “yes, and” leads to linear scenes — at least in my experience.
“Yes, and” scenes resemble the corporate meetings they seek to enliven. With “yes, and” business has informed improvisation, not the other way around … to the detriment of improvisation.
With “yes, and” everyone gets equal weight at all times. We are all equal in our humanity, but art is an elite experience.
I use a concept where I say the person with the highest consciousness has responsibility for the scene as long as they maintain that consciousness. The job of improvisers is to find the reality in the moment. They explore and heighten the reality and create a new moment. It is harder than just agreeing and implementing whatever the other player lays on you.
“Yes, and” is easy and gives its players a feeling of accomplishment. It doesn’t challenge them to the difficult process of pursuing excellence.
True interactions are more complex than just agreeing to what you are handed.
Give and take, mirroring, status tension (Spolin and Spolinesque concepts)—- all of these are reduced if just focused on “yes, and”. Viola Spolin’s great book Improvisation for the Theater is filled with exercises that I see, when considered in total, as a complex diagram of a human moment. Spolin looks at the split second of spontaneity from many perspectives — the hands, the voice, the heart, the soul … The book is a masterpiece.
Even Spolin’s genius cannot find every aspect of “the moment”, the passing speck of time that contains eternity — because those aspects are infinite.
Good thing too, that leaves something else for the rest of us to work on.
I think “yes, and” got traction because beginners can get a feeling of accomplishment quickly when directed to do it.
Jo Forsberg famously taught children. “Yes, and” might be a nice warm up exercise for children.
“Yes, and” is a sound bite compared to Spolin’s symphony.
Another weakness of “yes, and”is that it is too plot driven. Improvisation isn’t about plot, it’s about who, what and where transformation. If you explore and heighten what is there it naturally transforms into something else. You don’t have to invent an “and”.
“Yes, and” doesn’t lead to real content in scenes. It is usually just one thing after another.
And finally if you agree with anything and add to it, as a rule, you can potentially further evil or crazy or otherwise lousy things. I believe we have to bring our unique voices to the stage — and decisions in life are based on yes and no.
A loud mediocre voice can ruin a “Yes, and” scene, and often does. We have to accept our differences and work with them.
“Yes, and” leads to conformity, and never transcends the collective sense of reality. Art must expand consciousness, not be limited to its current boundaries.
“Yes, and” does not serve improvisational theater, business, writing, or human development.
“Yes, and” is a powerful engine of commerce, and irrelevant to art.
Art is about intensely experiencing life, allowing it to transform you, and communicating what you learned to other people.
Art is hard, and complex in its detailed beauty. It can’t be reduced to a formula.
Copyright 2019 Richard Thomas
2/10/23: Notes on Incomplete Improv, Work vs. Jobs, and How I Learned to Write #poetry
Improv is just a rough draft. It is just part of the creative process, not a full fledged art on its own. Good improvisers easily access their spontaneous freedom, but any creative person does that, right? We’ve talked about this before, the dialogue between spontaneity and logic and structure. Both are required. Some start with reason, some start with impulse, but all who create reconcile the two.
I feel like my process has gotten to the point where I use both simultaneously. I credit improv and law as where I learned the two functions, but I think I would have gotten here no matter what I did.
I always felt pulled down by all but a few improv partners. I just wanted my own voice. I never cared about any other aspect of it. I was often aggravated and bored by their lame initiations, or tired of elevating the proceedings, and then getting a kick in the ass afterwards for my trouble.
I always started jobs with great energy and commitment. They all taught me something. But I always outgrew them. Writing is the only thing big enough for me.
Beyond exhausting the creative possibilities of a job, there were two other factors that ended them.
I always thought I was going to work on the side of the angels, but each job revealed itself to be corrupt. I never did the immoral thing requested. It’s not in me.
My first law job wanted me to work as a lowly associate in support of a representation of the insurance company of a for profit blood bank that gave people AIDS tainted blood. They were trying to screw widows and orphans out of their wrongful death insurance money. I couldn’t do it. That was that.
The Gang Crime Prevention Center wanted me to lobby the state legislature for a law that heavily fined the parents of truant high school students. I told my boss that I couldn’t do it. It was a war against poor people . He demanded that I to do so. I answered that was “like ordering a Catholic doctor to perform an abortion”. I was predictably fired.
At the Attorney Disciplinary Commission the director wanted me to punish a schizophrenic attorney who acted out in a court room. I told him that the woman.was sick. He was in charge of the disposition of the cases. I wouldn’t budge. I quit soon thereafter.
I have integrity. I never did something that someone ordered me to do that would interfere with my ability to sleep at night.
There were other compromises that I resisted in every field I was ever part of. In higher ed they pushed students on a conveyer belt and didn’t really teach. If I did what they wanted it would have been like working at the DMV. Just certifying ignorant people to prepare them for immoral jobs.
Marketing of course is a joke. As soon as I saw that I was manipulating people to do what I artfully suggested, and obstructing them from exercising their self-evident rights to self determination, I was out. It was a creepy job, encouraging uncritical thinking and weakness in people. I couldn’t do it.
In entertainment I always got push back for being smart — and decent — and always felt held back, like in improv.
The second element in my job odyssey was the refusal to accept the insults and disrespect that I found in every workplace, without exception. I wouldn’t put up with it, and that ended jobs.
For years I thought that these conflicts were my problem, but now I see them as systemic.
I thought if I found the right field and the right people, I’d finally be home.
But now I think the immorality and lack of civility and respect is universal.
I read an essay by Vaclav Havel about post-totalitarian society. The Czechs were in this condition as the Soviets were losing power and starting to recede. As I read, I thought he could just as well be talking about America. He was talking about my experience.
We made great progressive strides in America but the ghosts of exploitation and inequality dog us everywhere.
I learned that you can’t find what I was looking for in society. It has to be within you.
My critics think I was frustrated and couldn’t stick with jobs. The opposite was true. I held on too long. I dreamed an impossible dream.
But the ultimate result was perfect. I often get to these points where I think I should have regrets, and I always on reflection feel grateful and proud.
My jobs journey taught me about life —- forced me to experience what is going on. One writer worked as a waitress to write about wage slavery. But she had a book deal waiting. I worked wage slave jobs, ate in soup kitchens, lived the life of an attorney and professor and even brushed with stardom. I didn’t know I was writing a book, and I didn’t have a book deal. I think it’s much better this way.
My journey developed my craft as a writer. It was better to learn writing through improvisation and the law (and in many other ways) than in a writing program or in apprenticeship in a professional writing situation, as useful as those things could potentially be.
Critics mistakenly saw me as a lost soul, or an unambitious child just playing around, or a bum, or a leech, or a fool … critics from my many walks of life. What they have in common is a tolerance for meanness in and around them, and a capacity to endure personal humiliation, that I don’t share.
My jobs weren’t distractions. They were necessary. If I didn’t have my hard road, I think my writing would be trivial. I have seen people I knew decades ago in recent years. They are, for the most part, sadly the same. They have the same values and same level of understanding about life that they had when we were young. Doing what you are told for years stunts your growth. Your soul and reason calcify into stagnation. They did well. or are disappointed that they didn’t do well, at activities not worth doing. They don’t have a clue as to what is worth doing. If someone they granted power tells them that they are a success or a failure, they dimly and meekly accept it.
I wouldn’t change a thing. I have cared too much what people think, but I’ve never let their barbs stop me. Their ignorance serves me. They wound me, and the pain forces me to pursue deeper understanding. I viscerally know they are wrong, and then I discover the words to describe why. Writing is thinking only better. (David McCullough).
One criticism of me was that I reinvent wheels. Not true. I make new wheels. I was born the authority of my own life. I’m lucky. I get physically ill doing anything that is against my own deep impulse. This has caused me a lot of good trouble. The people who have shouted orders at me about how to do it, aren’t going to be lowered into my grave with me. I’ll do it my way.
Even on the jobs I decided what I’d do. I always did what I agreed to do. When they broke their word and changed the job description the split was set in motion.
I’m a writer because I’m a person with a story to tell.
A person’s jobs is not their work. I have been very committed and dedicated to my work since high school.
I am blessed. I feel compassion for my critics and I love my past, present and future life. I don’t know why nature chose me for this charmed life, but I know it wants me to continue to struggle to sustain what’s important … not for only myself …
But for all creation.
Copyright 2023 Richard Thomas
2/16/23: Pipe Dreams #poetry
Groups are a sucker bet. They never pay off. There is no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Success is a scam. There is no solace in the applause of others. If you can’t please yourself, you can’t be pleased.
A pipe dream is a desire for an impossible ideal, that is invariably defeated by a bitter reality.
No group is going to accept you. You can contort yourself for their acceptance, but then, you aren’t you, are you?
If you have integrity, you walk alone.
O’Neill won a Nobel Prize, and knew it was bullshit. Then he started really writing.
Why did they bother me so? They don’t bother me any more. My focus shifts from them to me.
I don’t like them, I don’t respect them and I hold all that they do in low regard. So why did they bother me?
Hope is a fickle thing. It makes you feel great while you have it, and brings you to your knees when it leaves you.
Why did I have the illusion that I would find friendship and understanding in places where they didn’t exist?
I’m no different than you. In a way, I’m better. If you feel content with how things are, a success or just happy to be a part of things, you are a fool.
Don’t feel bad. I was a fool. We are all fools. We weren’t born fools, but we were infected immediately.
It’s not an accident that The Iceman Cometh takes place in a bar. It’s a world populated with drunks, and its hard to put down the bottle and walk out of the dark dirty room into the sunny day.
I’d leave one group and think I’d find a better group. There aren’t any better groups.
O’Neill’s greatest writing was written with no ambition for the plays to be produced. His wife got that job done after he died.
You can’t be happy, truly alive, or great until you swear off groups.
Stanislavski, the great philosopher of acting, that most vulnerable and exposed of arts, said “Be alone in the public.” Even good actors have to ignore the audience.
I would be pleased and they attacked, and they made me feel bad. Was it as simple as that I wanted them to be happy for me? Did I love them or need them?
I think I loved them. What they thought mattered. They disappointed me. But they were stuck in their own pipe dreams and it made them mean and stupid. I was never those things. I’m too proud. I won’t lower myself.
Maybe I still love them, and it wounds me because I can’t do anything for them … because no one can do anything for anybody. All you can do is be yourself.
Whatever I was doing provoked their hatred. They despised me for not observing the rules of their servitude, which they referred to as “reality”.
Letter to a Pure Artist:
Google suggested I read an article and I thought of you.
Al Pacino’s favorite movies:
Looking for Richard —- his busman’s holiday, your life
The Local Stigmatic —- his yearning … your plays and films
Serpico —- your ambition to do art in congruence with where the larger audience is
You are Pacino’s dream.
If he cooled to you, what else could he do. You are everything he wants to be. If he became that, Al Pacino Inc. would fall apart. It would take Christ himself to transform in that way.
He knows the difference between you and Scent of a Woman … and knows he’s trapped and can only pursue his inner being on the side.
When he praised your intelligence, he was admiring, among other things, your self knowledge and your choices in life.
There is no greater fate than to be born a pure artist.
The photo that accompanies the article is Pacino posing as weariness, a cunning and conscious portrait of his soul.
I thought of old Picasso posing … shirtless and barrel chested on a beach with a radiant face and joyful eyes.
My accusers would tell me I wasn’t working. Hah! It bothered them that I was having so much fun.
There is no greater fate than to be born a pure artist.
I’m thinking of Steve Wynn and his multi- million dollar art collection (if it hasn’t been seized by some authority … )
The businessman works, connives, bullies, fights, steals to build his empire.
And then he buys art.
The artist just sits in his studio and makes it.
There is no greater fate than to be born a pure artist.
Picasso’s eyes were fierce and joyful.
I realize that I was mimicking Mamet’s “I pity the writer who’s not from Chicago.”
End of Letter
Picasso’s pipe dream came true? Then why was his art so great and his person so mean? What made him put out cigarettes on Dora Maar’s arm? It wasn’t what gave him fierce and joyful eyes.
Is art my pipe dream? A pipe dream that I can transcend pipe dreams.
Years ago when I was just past being a boy — JUST LIVE! — he or she shouted.
What’s the difference between pipe dreams and meaning? Life has no meaning. We have to create it. We can’t make it up. We can’t search for it. If we live, we discover it, or rather … them. We careen from illusion to illusion. I tell myself that each illusion hold a lesson, and each is a step toward the promised land. Back — to the promised land.
Young Robert Redford is in the cast. He is so much better than old Robert Redford. Was he contaminated by pipe dreams?
The writing is what it is. The world is what it is. The reaction between the two is what it is.
Hickey says he knows the truth and he’s at peace. O’Neill knows that’s not the case. Does anyone know either?
I once lived on the praise of people I no longer respect. The great rush of happiness of the past has evaporated. I cared so much and it didn’t matter.
Maybe the worst fate for a person burdened with a pipe dream is the encouragement that it came true, or could come true.
The Empty Space
Pipe dreams arise in misguided response to the Unbearable Lightness of Being.
I was so happy yesterday morning. Just happy to be alive and to be a writer. And darkness rushed into the void on cue. The old hurts that were processed long ago. But now the focus changed … not the idiots and assholes … but me … why am I troubled when there is nothing to be troubled about … then I realize it’s not about the past … it’s a prophecy … my current pipe dream is exposed … a new group that I long for, like a sap after his fifth divorce who never learned a thing … and I realize it’s the same shit in a new bottle … I look at photos on Instagram of these people … and I’ve known them for years …
and I still want to go be with them … but this time I’ll be like Stanislavski … and I’ll be content with that illusion for awhile … but I know the real place for me is where O’Neill went when he settled home.
The greatest moments of my life happened alone in my room.
The Hindu philosopher negated everything until all that remained is what is …
Do not go gentle into that good night …
rest in peace my ass …
Jung says don’t make suicide literal
Keen says a break down is a chance to see what’s up
Break after break after break …
illusion after illusion after illusion …
merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily … life is but a dream
We are the stuff that dreams are made of …
Becker says don’t deny death
Arendt says evil is banal
Banal, evil dreams … idiots and assholes …
Herzog suffered the burden of dreams
I dream of the company of the enlightened and the kind …
They don’t exist in groups
They happen one by one
Groups exist for those afraid of life and death
Pipe dreams are attempted escapes from life and death …
O’Neill was sick and dying and wrote his greatest plays …
Living and dying at the same time
Life is lived in the unknown
Death occurs in the unknown …
Pipe dreams are born in fevers of fear
Michael Corleone yelled THEY PULL ME BACK IN! …
the apron strings of other cowards
Who knows where my writing goes and what new things life, and the world will reveal to me?
I wish this writing could relieve me from … what?
Joyce said, “History is a nightmare from which I’m trying to awake!”
Do wounds ever heal or do they just reveal ever deeper truths but never THE truth …
THE truth is beyond us …
I don’t worry about what is the point …
I’m not afraid of life and I’m not afraid of death … (who said they were afraid of dying, but not death? That’s me.)
except when I am …
in moments … and maybe those moments are part of what is too …
I’d like to get rid of them … I’m not sure it’s possible …
Pipe dreams are a living death …
Pipe dreams are violent, murderous things …
the source of all conflict …
How we justify our rotten -ness
The banality of evil …
I thankfully never had the perverted nerve of acting out my pipe dreams on the world …
I acted them out in the theater of my mind …
I just gave the world my sweet authenticity …
and they came after me with pitchforks and torches …
which didn’t do me any harm …
because all they wanted was for me to go away …
and when I did, they did too …
but they gave me images for my pipe dream imagination …
which never gave me anything but pain …
sometimes it deceitfully made me feel excited
and then cunningly made me howl and bleed …
Pipe dreams taunted my free will
and I always chose life and death …
Malamud said “Talent is not enough.”
Florian Zeller said “Love is not enough.”
They were both right … talent and love without the knowledge of life and death …
are pipe dreams …
My latest pipe dream group is reduced to reality …
the people will disappoint … but the money and activity would be alright …
I spent my life rebelling against necessity, and now I find great solace in it …
It’s a relief to just think about the things that you need, and be who you are …
You aren’t anti-social or in exile for the world … but you put the world in its place …
the world is the place you get what you need …
and your room is the place where you know who you are.
Note: Hickey is similar to the Anti-Semetic bully in The Fablemans who is humiliated by the love of the person that they torment. The guilt. Which breeds hatred. I can’t relate. But maybe I can understand my pipe dreams better.
I hurt because I loved the idiots and assholes. Like a fool.
And they tried to kill me in a murder/suicide.
I saved my body and repaired my mind as best I could. Always returning for more triage when needed, finding and treating newly discovered elements of my condition.
I’m better off, but I’ll never be without them.
We are all scarred.
And that’s the way it is.
Copyright 2023 Richard Thomas

domain: literature


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Gossip Girl is coming back, and there is still a question of who we’ll see again. Showbiz Cheat Sheet has a theory that Eleanor Waldorf (Margaret Colin) could be one of the secret cameos in the new series for several reasons.
‘Gossip Girl’ will include cameos with actors from the original series
The original stars aren’t returning for the continuation of Gossip Girl. But there will be some familiar faces, according to executive producer Joshua Safran.
“If Blair showed up for two scenes, you’d say, ‘I want more Blair,’” the producer told the Daily Beast. “The decision was: Let’s get season 1 under our belt, and should we get season 2, we’ll have the chance to bring in cameos that are more than glorified cameos but actually give them storylines. Hopefully we’ll get there and will reach out to the cast if that time comes and see if they’ll want to come.”
The producer then teased, “There are some cameos in season 1 from people on the original show, but not the series regulars.” That leaves the question of which cameos will make it into season 1?
Could Eleanor Waldorf be the secret cameo in the new series?
Eleanor Waldorf is Blair’s (Leighton Meester) mother, who has a very successful fashion line. Blair often wanted Eleanor’s approval, but that pressure led to a lot of problems in their relationship. The original series ended with the mother and daughter working together through Waldorf Designs.
The trailer for the new Gossip Girl doesn’t show any recognizable characters. But there are some hints that Eleanor could possibly pop up.
Julien Calloway (Jordan Alexander) is seen walking down a runway in the trailer. The clothes range from gowns to bodysuits. It reflects more current fashion than what Waldorf Designs looked like in the original show. But maybe Waldorf Designs has managed to keep up with the times.
This would be a great choice given Eleanor was an important character from the original series, but not too big of a character to outshine the new ones. It would also give a chance for fans to find out what Blair is up to without showing her.
Of course, it’s possible the clothes will be an opportunity for another kind of cameo. The original show had a few celebrity cameos from the fashion industry.
The runway ‘Gossip Girl’ scene could lead to a different kind of cameo
Rachel Zoe, Tyra Banks, Alexa Chung, Karlie Kloss, Tim Gunn, Vera Wang, and Tory Burch had cameos in the original show. It certainly made the show’s fashion moments feel more realistic.
It’s possible this scene will just give way to more cameos from real people in the fashion industry. But it would definitely be a little more exciting to see Eleanor calling the shots once again.


We present a novel time-domain experimental approach to the study of the dynamics of surface electromagnetic wave propagation in a two-dimensional photonic crystal. A surface plasmon polariton is launched by ultrafast laser pulses and propagates into a photonic crystal, the dynamics of which are measured by an interferometric cross-correlation method. Plasmon photonic stopgaps are characterized by a single measurement. The dispersion around the stopgaps is determined with a series of angle-resolved measurements.
© 2002 Optical Society of America
Yish-Hann Liau, Shunji Egusa, and Norbert F. Scherer, "Ultrafast interferometric measurements of plasmonic transport in photonic crystals," Opt. Lett. 27, 857-859 (2002)


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Never worked in a BPO before? Check out Gautam Sonti's version of what it can be like. Hyderabad Film Club is presenting its monthly short film s on 26th August, 6:30 PM. On offer this month, is "July Boys: New Global Players", by Gautam Sonti. The screening is at Prasad's Preview Labs, Beside LV Prasad Eye Hospital.
July Boys: New Global Players, is a film by Gautam Sonti in collaboration with Carol Upadhya. This is the third of a three film series called Bangalore’s Software Industry, the other two being The ‘M’ Way & Fun @ Sun.
The Indian software outsourcing industry has emerged as a key node of the global economy. The series of ethnographic films coding culture explores the cultures of outsourced work, and the moulding of a new workforce to cater to this global high-tech industry.
July Boys focuses on a small ‘startup’ company in Bangalore that designs and produces software products for cellular service providers in Europe and the U.S. Turning the tables on the usual outsourcing story, July Systems has leveraged US-based venture capital and Indian technical expertise to break into the latest high-tech markets.
Gautam Sonti is a Bangalore based documentary filmmaker, who's done a four year course in electrical engineering. He makes non-fiction films and amongst other things, he is interested in visual ethnographies of institutions of science and technology. Of late, he has been focusing on collaborative ways of film making. His previous trilogy "Little Republics" on grassroots of democracy received wide acclaim. He would present the film, and reply to queries by the audience about the film.
Please contact Bh S S Prakash Reddy, Secretary of Hyderabad Film Club at 93910 20243 or Sumanaspati Reddy at 98852-69369 for further details.