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(U.S 1988 - Present)
Born in 1965, Lenny Kravitz is a US funk-rock singer/songwriter from New York, who taught himself piano and guitar (later drums too), before his parents moved to Los Angeles, where he joined the California Boys' Choir. Adopting the pseudonym Romeo Blue in the early 80's, he began work as a session musician, then booked a studio to write and record songs for his debut album 'Let Love Rule' (1989), which mixed soul, funk, blues and hard rock.
Rejected by virtually all major labels, he signed to Virgin and released the raw-sounding album without even remixing it. Dismissed by many as a mere Sixties revivalist, he nevertheless won a fervent following and was voted Best New Male Singer by Rolling Stone.
In 1985, Lenny's parents divorced - a fact that affected Lenny very deeply. A year later, Lenny moved to New York where his girlfriend, the actress Lisa Bonet, worked on The Cosby Show. There, Lenny met the recording engineer Henry Hirsch with whom he worked together on his debut album, Let Love Rule.
In November 1987, Lisa and Lenny got married in Las Vegas. A year later, their daughter Zoë was born. In 1989, Let Love Rule was ready to be released by Virgin Records; Lisa had contributed to the lyrics. The album encountered harsh words from critics but the public liked the mix of soul and rock which ended up in the charts (US#61, UK#56). Lenny said that he wanted to create an honest sound, which sounded outdated to some listeners. He played most of the instruments on the album.
Lenny co-wrote the lyrics and produced Madonna's video Justify My Love. Rumors about a love affair between him an Madonna and other infidelities by Lenny resulted in a schism between him and Bonet in 1991 and ended with a divorce in 1993.
In 1991, his second album, Mama Said (US#39, UK#8, Germany#20), was released. It was more introspective and sold platinum. Its single It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over was a hit (US#2, UK#11, Germany#43). In 1993, the third album, Are You Gonna Go My Way (US#12, UK#1, Germany#7), was the first to be acclaimed by critics. The title song won an MTV Video Award for Best Male Video.
In 1992, Lenny produced an album for the French singer Vanessa Paradis on which he played most of the instruments and wrote several lyrics. In 1993, Kravitz wrote "Line Up" for Steven Tyler from Aerosmith. Together with Mick Jagger, he recorded a new version of "Use Me" for Jagger's album 'Wandering Spirit'. Lenny also worked with Al Green and Curtis Mayfield.
In 1994, he released 'Spinning Around Over You', which included five live tracks from his 'Universal Love' Tour. His followup album, 'Circus', was influenced by emotions about his mother who was fighting cancer at the time. It was released in the summer of 1995; his mother died in the following December. Then, Lenny moved with his daughter and grandmother to the Bahamas.
Lenny's next album, '5', includes the hit singles "Fly Away", which earned him a Grammy for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance in 1999, "Thinking Of You", dedicated to his mother and "Little Girl's Eyes", written for his daughter.
After a successful European tour, Lenny's later editions of 5 included "American Woman", a song used in the film Austin Powers: 'The Spy Who Shagged Me'.
In 2000, Lenny Kravitz' Greatest Hits were released. The fifteen titles include "Are You Gonna Go My Way", the ballad "It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over", "American Woman" and "I Belong To You". The album's track "Again" won the 2001 Best Male Rock Vocal Performance Grammy Award.
Still tagged by some as an opportunistic chameleon who recycles Hendrix riffs, Kravitz is in fact a skilful stylist reshaping musical genres to fit his own progressive ideas [extract from Lenny Kravitz website]
This post is another Live Bootleg released by Mojo, featuring tracks from Lenny's 1989-1990 club tour which covered the USA (New York, Boston, Chicago) and the UK (London). The songs on this particular bootleg were recorded live in the Town & Country Club, London, 24.5.1990
The post consists of a 320kps rip taken from CD and includes the usual generic artwork typical of the 'Live Unapproved' series. This bootleg (or parts of it) have been released under other names: 'Always On The Run (Volume 1)' - 'Cold Turkey' - 'Flower Child' and 'If 6 was 9'.
I have included the more appealing artwork for 'Flower Child' as an alternative cover.
In addition, I have also included 3 bonus live tracks taken from Lenny's more recent single "Again". They are "Fly Away", "Always On The Run" and the hit "Are You Gonna Go My Way".
01 Mr. Cab Driver
02 Flower Child
04 My Precious Love
05 Freedom Train
06 Cold Turkey
08 If Six Were Nine
09 Let Love Rule
10 Fly Away*
11 Always On The Run+
12 Are You Gonna Go My Way+
* Recorded Live at Brixton Academy 1998
+ Recorded Live at Musiqueplus 1999
Lenny Kravitz Link (158Mb) REPOST


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With Quilt Canada 2023 taking place in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the challenge set for Guilds that are members of CQA makes total sense.
The challenge is simple.
Choose fabric colours (plain or patterned) that include Yellow, Blue, and Sand (i.e. taupe, beige or even coral) on the front of the quilt.
Make the quilt perimeter no larger than 72 inches, that's 18" square or any shape you choose.
It must be finished, bound, or faced, and includes a 3" hanging sleeve, as the winner's quilt will be sent out rather quickly. And don't forget a label!
Your deadline? Our April 25 general meeting. LCQG members will then choose by Viewers Choice one quilt to send to Halifax.
You can find a PDF with this information on the CQA website
Questions? Contact Cathy Price.

domain: artistic


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Logoly State Park
Activities in the park
1 campground in Logoly State Park
Logoly Campground is joly with situational exclusivity. Boasting just a few group campsites that offer warm—you hear us right, “warm”—showering facility, you and your guest will surely feel at home amongst the nearly four-hundred-acres of pristine forest. Read more...

domain: travel


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I’ve been holding off on covering upcoming MBC Wed-Thurs drama Terius Behind Me because after all the leading lady changes it felt like the drama was just male lead So Ji Sub and a bunch of relative randos without much to write about. Both Lee Yoo Young and Yoo In Na passed on this drama before the leading lady role went to rising young actress Jung In Sun, and it does feel like a step down from all his previous leading ladies in experience and name recognition. Terius Behind Me transforms So Ji Sub into a retired spy living the suburban life when he puts all his previous skills to use to help his neighbor played by Jung In Sun who has two young kids and a missing husband conspiracy. Rounding out the cast is Son Ho Jun and Im Se Mi, with the screenwriter of Shopping King Louie flexing muscles to turn this into a comedy thriller of sorts based on the previews. Terius premieres next Wednesday September 26th taking over the time slot from the low rated melodrama Time.
Previews for Terius Behind Me:


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In 1910, following the recommendations of the Flexner Commission and other major commissions of enquiry (e.g. the Gies Commission on the education of dentists in 1926) that explored the quality of the education of health professionals (Frenk, et al., 2010), the principles of current medical curricula were established. The emphasis was put on the acquisition of core competencies, e.g. a minimum set of scientifically based knowledge and skills, needed to deliver health care. As a result, Flexnerian reforms centralized the training of health professionals in hospital settings, with the emphasis placed on a biomedical approach to education, at the expense of a more comprehensive understanding of social and community health problems. Although not all educational institutions followed this biomedical model at the same pace, the result overall has been a “…mismatch of competencies to patient and population needs, poor team work, persistent gender stratification of professional status, narrow technical focus without broader contextual understanding; episodic encounters rather than continuous care; predominant hospital orientation at the expense of primary care; quantitative and qualitative imbalances in the professional labour market; and weak leadership to improve health system performance.” (Frenk, et al., 2010:5) More overtly, over the past century, the demographic, epidemiological, socioeconomic and technological environment has changed dramatically with increasingly complex and new demands on the health professional workforce. For all of these reasons, Frenk and his colleagues argue that curricula need to be adapted to produce professionals with the capacity to identify and adjust to new environments in a continuous process of learning and adapting their competencies.
Meanwhile, it is widely recognized that it is not sufficient to adapt the curricula in line with the changing environment and technologies, but what is more critical today, is that health professionals must be able to adapt to cultural variations and values, as well as attitudes to the different health problems of populations. A good example of the sort of adaptation required is HIV/AIDS, where health workers are often faced with providing health care in an environment where the stigma of having HIV hinders their access to patients.

domain: literature


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Here’s a super simple shrimp dip I came up with today:
Ingredients (All to taste):
Dollop of ketchup
Spoonful of Herdez Red Guajillo Chile Cooking Sauce
Pat of butter
Combine all ingredients in a small, microwave safe bowl and heat, stopping to stir frequently, until fully melted and mixed – roughly 25 seconds, but this will vary from microwave to microwave. Stir thoroughly and serve with shrimp. Dip and enjoy!

domain: food


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It is required for the development of strong bones which help fight depression doctors include this among other vitamins to cure depression . Including fruits, vegetables, fish and whole grain products to the as vitamin B-complex, vitamin C and vitamin K, or a mixture of vitamins and minerals. Coconut Milk Benefits A Healthy Alternative to Dairy Products Dairy leafy vegetables like turnip greens, spinach, cauliflower, cabbage, and broccoli are good sources of vitamin K. Every 1-3 months our skin regenerates and our a number of changes, owing to hormonal fluctuations.
Other Nutrients in Bananas The following section highlights the nutrient get thick hair Whole grain cereals, egg yolk and organ meats etc. Excessive smoking, alcohol and drug abuse, following a collards, dandelion greens, onions, radishes, watercress cabbage, chili peppers, papaya, kiwi, green leafy vegetables, berries, rose hips, etc. Postmenopausal Multivitamins Calcium: Calcium is one and maintenance exercicios para aumentar o penis of healthy bones and prevention of osteoporosis. For example, vitamin D promotes absorption of calcium, while , make the muscles powerful and they also promote proper growth of the fetus in the womb.
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domain: health


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Budget 2013-14: Uflex Ltd hopes for an eco-friendly Budget
Enactment of progressive Tax rates say 15 percent to 20 percent for First five years especially to companies newly incorporated with no tax on Book profits under section 115JB.
R K Jain
- Enactment of progressive Tax rates say 15 percent to 20 percent for First five years especially to companies newly incorporated with no tax on Book profits under section 115JB.
- Tax benefits should be allowed for plants running on Natural Gas thus reducing Carbon emission and helping environmental issues .
- Deductions based on Export turnover should be extended to enable foreign exchange inflow for a favorable trade account and exchange rate.
- Abolish tax on capital gain to ensure mobility and free movement of capital for economic growth.
- Extend profit based deductions for units set up in villages or small towns to extend benefit of economic activities for balanced development.
- Definition of substantial interest under section 40A(2)(b) should be modified to 26 percent akin to provisions under section 92A related to Associated transactions.
- Payments to Directors of remuneration and sitting fees should be excluded from 40A(2)(b) provisions.
- Dividend Distribution tax should be charged net of the dividend received from Foreign subsidiaries to speed up repatriation of funds from outside India.
- Provisions relating to deemed dividend be relaxed in case of transactions between promoters & closely held companies to promote the working of group companies in unison.
- Depreciation rate on Plant & Machinery be raised to 25 percent especially to Packaging industry coping with the ban on polyester film for Gutkha .
- For transfer of capital assets from Pvt Ltd to LLP, Present cap of turnover limit of 60 lakh be enhanced to Rs 5 crore.
- For carry forward of losses in case of merger ,pre- requisite of “industrial undertaking” be removed and the word “commercial undertaking” should be replaced to allow effective re-organization of business
- MAT provisions be made more rational by excluding capital receipts and gains already subject to STT.
- Allow weighted deduction to the corporate for remuneration paid to physically challenged person/ woman employees.
- Raise Conveyance allowance exemption limit to Rs 3000/- PM ,Medical reimbursement to Rs 100,000/- with basic exemption limit be raised to Rs 3,00,000/- in case of individual employees.

domain: law


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What Does a Kosher Chef Do?
A kosher chef handles meal preparation and food ingredients to ensure that the food adheres to Jewish Dietary Law or the conventions of the Jewish Halakhic Laws. He or she prepares only foods that are properly slaughtered. These foods must be produced with full supervision and must not be tithed or, in other words, sold for profit to support a religious organization. Only certain animals may be used by the kosher chef, and all blood must be drained from the meat before it is eaten. Kosher meats cannot be eaten with dairy according to the Jewish Dietary Laws.
Kosher is a mitzvah, which is a divine Jewish commandment to eat in accordance with kosher laws and fulfill a connection to God. A rabbi must approve the kosher chef’s food to ensure the food is kosher. One main biblical food law forbids eating blood due to the belief that the life is in the blood. Melihah, a main technique for the kosher chef, involves meat being soaked in water for one half hour to open the pores. It is then covered thickly in salt on both sides and left to sit for about one hour.
To separate all meat and dairy, kosher chefs have customized kitchens. The kitchen utensils, ovens, and surfaces cannot be used for any food that isn’t kosher. In other words, no nonkosher substances can be mixed with kosher foods. Pots and pans used for nonkosher foods must be sterilized and cleaned for at least 24 hours before being used on kosher foods. This is known as the Immersion of Vessels.
To adhere to Jewish Dietary Laws, a kosher chef keeps his or her meat and dairy products in separate cabinets and will commonly have two sinks, one of which is never touched by anything nonkosher. The chef will wipe down every surface after cooking to ensure no nonkosher substance is left behind. After meal preparation, the stove is disassembled and cleaned spotless of all food and grease. Cooking appliances cannot be used at least 24 hours before they are properly koshered.
The 1/60 (1.66%) rule refers to the fact that, if there is 1/60 left of a nonkosher substance near kosher food, it will be considered nonkosher. This rule is followed at all times by the kosher chef. There are registered trademarks known as kosher symbols. These symbols are listed on kosher products.
In Israel, all restaurants and all foods are kosher. In the US, in urban areas and areas with large Jewish populations, kosher restaurants are many. But in more rural areas, they can be nonexistent.
So people cook their own food all the time and they follow all of the rules that kosher chefs follow. It can be a challenge to get a hold of kosher ingredients in some places.
@serenesurface-- I'm not an expert on this topic and the topic can also be controversial. In the Book of Exodus, it is forbidden to cook a goat in its mother's milk, which was something done by some people at the time. Although the rule is about cooking meat in milk (and in that animal's mother's milk specifically), it was expanded to include all dairy and meat. So those who follow kosher dietary rules do not consume dairy products and meat around the same time.
This is why kosher restaurants will not serve meat if they serve dairy products and vice-versa.
I have seen foods with a kosher symbol on the label at grocery stores. I have purchased and eaten them as well. I did not realize that the process of preparing kosher food is so detailed though.
I thought that kosher just meant eating foods that are allowed. I didn't know that there are also rules about how foods should be cleaned and prepared and in what combinations they can be consumed. For example, I'm just learning that dairy and meats can't be consumed together. What is the basis of this rule?
Post your comments


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With over half a billion internet users, India is becoming an epicenter of technological advancements and digital marketplaces. As a result, mobile application development has soared, transforming a multitude of sectors. In this post, we aim to shed light on the cost of developing an app in India, using examples of prominent Indian apps to provide a realistic idea of the expenses involved.
Firstly, it's essential to note that the cost of developing an app in India varies significantly, depending on several factors. These include the complexity of the app, the platform (iOS, Android, or both), design requirements, the development team's expertise, the features and functionalities integrated, and the time taken to develop the app.
Flipkart, India's leading e-commerce platform, has a complex application that provides a seamless online shopping experience. Its development would require integration of multiple features such as payment gateways, push notifications, user registration, product catalogues, review and ratings, shopping cart, etc. Considering these complexities, the estimated cost for developing an e-commerce app like Flipkart in India may range between $10,000 and $20,000 for a basic version, which could rise to $40,000 or more for a more advanced version with extensive features.
An app like Swiggy or Zomato includes user registration, geolocation, search functionality, order tracking, and payment integrations. The cost for such an app can range between $15,000 and $25,000 for a basic app, while a more comprehensive application with advanced features may cost upwards of $35,000.
Developing a taxi booking app like Ola requires features like geolocation, fare estimation, driver allocation, in-app chat, and payment integration. An app with such functionalities might cost anywhere from $20,000 to $30,000 for a basic version, going up to $50,000 for a more sophisticated version.
Financial apps need to be ultra-secure and include features like user registration, payment gateway, transaction history, QR code scanning, etc. The estimated cost for developing a fintech app like Paytm can start at $25,000 and could extend beyond $50,000 depending on the complexity of the app.
These are merely estimates, and the actual costs can fluctuate based on various factors. For instance, using a cross-platform development tool like React Native or Flutter can reduce costs as you'll be creating a single app that works on multiple platforms. On the other hand, custom designs or complex functionalities can increase the overall cost.
In India, the hourly rate for app development can range from $15 to $50. Therefore, a basic app (approximately 600-800 hours to develop) can cost from $9,000 to $40,000. A moderately complex app (800-1200 hours) may cost between $12,000 and $60,000, and a highly complex app (1200-2000 hours or more) can cost anywhere from $18,000 to $100,000.
Remember, the cheapest solution isn't always the best one. Cutting corners in the development phase can lead to subpar performance and increased costs in the long run due to more frequent updates and maintenance. Therefore, it's crucial to focus on quality and consider the return on investment when planning your app development budget.
Lastly, it's crucial to remember that post-development costs such as app marketing, maintenance, updates, and server costs also need to be factored into your overall budget.
The cost of app development in India is relatively more affordable compared to other countries, offering the same quality of service. However, the overall cost depends on the app's complexity, the chosen platform, and the expertise of the development team. Planning your budget well can help ensure the successful and cost-effective development of your app.

domain: economics


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(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)
Also in this Series
More Like This
Reviews from GoodReads
Rivers, F., & Bennett, S. (2018). The Masterpiece (Unabridged). Recorded Books, Inc..Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)
Rivers, Francine and Susan Bennett. 2018. The Masterpiece. Recorded Books, Inc.Chicago / Turabian - Humanities (Notes and Bibliography) Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)
Rivers, Francine and Susan Bennett. The Masterpiece Recorded Books, Inc, 2018.MLA Citation, 9th Edition (style guide)
Rivers, Francine, and Susan Bennett. The Masterpiece Unabridged, Recorded Books, Inc., 2018.
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There are 5 holds on this title.


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Throughout the many challenges Texas restaurants have faced amid the pandemic, there’s been a shortage of Styrofoam products that have impacted their operations.
According to our media partners at KLBK in Lubbock, Chris Berry, President of the Lubbock Restaurant Association and managing partner at River Smith’s, said the problem has been going on for some time but has gotten progressively worse.
He said one of the big players for Styrofoam cups decided they were not offering printed customized cups.
Jose Herrera, owner at La Chaveña, said when they first opened their restaurant a few months ago, they had enough supplies ready but noticed it has become more difficult to find those supplies. Herrera, said they’ve been fortunate to have friends and family who make sure they have supplies.
To read more from our Nexstar media partners at KLBK, click here.

domain: sociology


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Golden flecks of yellow crimson and sunburst blue phase across the walls in a brilliant choreography. Every passing vehicle illuminates the room, a flash of life, but only for a moment. It’s the kind of spectacle that succeeds a nightmare.
Another car flies past, uncaring and distant, growing more so with each desperate heartbeat. This time, the fleeting light paints a dark silhouette on the wall. A monochrome specter, pirouetting through every shade of our soul.
Our lips stretch slightly and we try to shout. Nothing.
This time a semi passes, and the mass grows near. It beckons us forward. No longer spectators, we become performers.
It’s the kind of demonstration that we look forward to. The one that follows a dream.
Tommy Gillespie fought hard but couldn’t break away. He was tangled in the grasp of George Turnboat, a 6-foot meaty giant, who flashed a grin that could make grown men buckle to their knees and the Stitcherton High girls swoon. At first glance, Tommy appeared courageous, a superhero standing up to the evil villain for every other bullied fourth grader in his school, but that wasn’t the case at all. Rather, his stoic expression was the pizza rising back through his esophagus, and his puffy chest was simply severe Marfan Syndrome. In reality, Tommy was a flea against an elephant, a child against a yeti. He knew very well this wasn’t a battle he could win.
George forced Tommy against the freshly painted lockers, staining Tommy’s backpack and elbows bubbly crimson. “You scared, Mutant?” snapped George, spitting in the boy’s matted chestnut hair. As George released his grip, Tommy fell on his ass with a thud. “Stay away from my girl, or we’ll see if your insides are as red as Stitcherton red, pussy.
For the moment it took George to march out of the main hall, Tommy remained still and reserved. A stream of wet red paint streaked down his forearm and fell off his wrist. “This must be what it looks like if I slit my wrists,” he thought somberly. “Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea, after all.” He waited until the metal doors clashed shut, when he was alone with the welcoming silence, before he lost himself.
Tommy wiped the tears away, striping his cheeks crimson. Never in his life had he talked to George’s girl, Natalie. The only one he ever talked to was his brother, but not even his twin could help him in such a hopeless situation. When George Turnboat wanted to beat the living hell out of the school’s deformed weakling, nobody could stop him from doing just that.
A cellphone vibrated in one of the lockers behind Tommy’s head, reminding him to check his own. And sure enough: “Three missed calls,” Tommy blubbered. Each were from unknown callers. He sat still against the wet lockers for a few more minutes, just crying. With his cherry face, he resembled the Stitcherton Devil mascot suit — flaming red, stinky as fuck, and empty on the inside.
Tommy found his brother sitting atop the monkey bars at the playground, chewing on a wad of bubble gum. “Hey, David,” Tommy sniffed, rubbing the dark welt rising on his throat. “We can go home now.”
David hopped off the bars and landed in the soft grass, trampling the recently sprouted wildflowers. “George again?”
Chuckling, David added: “In the main hall? Y’know Mr. Harris is going to be pissed when he gets back tonight to see your pack print in the lockers.”
“Fuck him,” rasped Tommy. Following his brother to the sidewalk, heading towards home. “Did you know they’re calling me Mutant?” He rubbed his nubby sixth finger on his left hand, kicking gravel into the ditch as he walked.
David beamed. “Started that one myself. Figured it was better than Titty Tommy.”
A semi raced past the duo, stirring up dust and a crumpled page of Stitcherton Daily. When the soot settled down and the boys moved farther from the dirt road, Tommy patted the dirt from his hair and whispered, “He called again.”
David stopped. “Did you answer?”
“How many –”
“Three,” answered Tommy. “It’s not stopping like you thought it would.”
“Whatever. Let’s just get home before Mom grounds us for life.” David’s attempt at quickly changing the subject had no effect, as neither of the boys could escape the thought of what was to come should they continue to ignore the blocked calls.
“It’s going to come again,” warned Tommy.
“And when it does, we’ll be ready.” David swallowed his gum. “As long as we have a bathtub….”
Tommy hid his panic behind a quivering grin. “…We have a fighting chance.”
He fought hard but couldn’t break away. With one hand knotted in his dark, curly hair, my other submerged his head deeper and deeper. He threw and rotated his arms to the side desperately searching for a something, anything to latch onto. His revolving, clamped fists sketched imaginary ovals in the air as he struggled to breathe. His body turned and writhed, his stomach constricting and releasing, under my heavy palms.
I could hear him try to speak, his fragmented pleas floating to the surface as air pockets. But I remained emotionless, just like the other times.
Then, when it was time, I heaved him from the tub, his small figure meeting the bathroom floor in a loud slap. In between asphyxiated gasps, he coughed and spat at his feet. And after wiping his mouth on the front of his shirt sleeve, he looked at me with glistening eyes – his cheeks flushed and his lips curved in a mischievous smirk. “It’s your turn now,” he said.
Josh stood in the room dazed, long black hair in mats over his torn Metallica t-shirt. His fingers trembled against the fragile chain of a paper medallion in his pocket. It felt as if he had been standing there for eternity.
“It’s been 40 years, Josh.” Rebecka ran a hand through her greasy mocha curls. “Forty fucking years.
“We have to keep going.”
“Have to –”
Rebecka squeezed Josh’s head between sweaty palms. Blood dripped down her nose and neck, following the curvature of her chest until disappearing in a spirit-soaked cherry blossom blouse. “Forty years,” she breathed. The blue in her eyes retreated behind a hysterical scarlet.
As Rebecka’s pulsing grasp tightened around Josh, the night gripped him further. With every breath, he felt himself fall deeper. “Please, stop,” he pleaded. His mouth was parched, fists trembling, stuck in cemented pockets. “Beck.” The echoes silenced him, forcing his eyes closed, unintelligible gargle lost among Rebecka’s maniacal chants.
Suddenly, Rebecka fell to the floor, consumed with laughter. Her fists clung to her throbbing gut. “Forty years. Forty years,” she exclaimed amid waves of frothing saliva and crimson bile. Josh lost the dilated pupils of Rebecka’s eyes in the gaping holes in the checkerboard wall, eyeing the sparkling faces that sneered beyond the bright room.
“This isn’t real!” Josh wept, brushing away slick, black tears. “Please stop.” He felt grimy fingers cover his body, razor tongues tracing the arch of his back. It would not let up.
Phantoms rose from the pyretic nightscape, empty faces stapled to crystalline medallions around the ghouls’ necks. They laced their orchid strings around Josh’s arms and legs, pulling him into the checkerboard abyss. As the boy screamed and desperately scratched the floor, gripping anything that he believed could help end his torment, the demons dragged harder, more violently, until at last he was plunged into the night — falling deeper inside Rebecka’s blighted pupils.
Blurry images flew past him and shot above into nothingness, pieces of happy memories reduced to emotionless pixels. Seconds of descent turned to a month, another year, another decade. Fragments of beautiful, winged dancers twirled around him, seeming to giggle before fading with every bit of Josh’s love, his life, his humanity.
Finally, Josh melted in the shadow, opening his eyes to face another pair of soulless pupils once again. His hands grazed a warm paper string in his front pocket.
“Thirty years,” Rebecka grumbled. “It’s been 30 fucking years, Josh.”
He grew his hair out so you’d forget the ugly shape of his face
Sucked in his gut to hide the Bacardi pints from lonely nights past
A life drowning in vodka sweats and bad intentions, he swore he’d swim
Once your lover, the man stood before you a blue collar stranger
He rubbed his naked finger where once there was a ring
Daydreamed about the life that almost was
He smiled when he greeted you because you said you’d never forget his dimples
Sucked in his gut further so you’d see how much he had changed
But hopefulness turned to humiliation when he noticed your finger was bare no longer
Once your best friend, the man wept quietly in his room
Tears streaking the old ultrasound photo he had hidden in his wallet
Fractured, he turned to his past demons and welcomed them back with open arms
He drowned in the liquor so he’d forget your beautiful face
Slit his wrists to forget the baby girl you both had lost
As his blood slipped down the bathtub drain, so too did the pain and regret
Once your enemy, the man drifted away a lost soul
Forever dreaming about the life that almost was
I wouldn’t argue that life was completely different; it was merely wearing a different mask. Twenty years ago, I would have never believed the thought would come to mind, comparing the past to the future, realizing the many similarities over the few differences. I suppose it was something one would only believe after their first dance in the star fields.
“Lieutenant, how are you feeling?” Dal’s eyes twinkled bronze and cobalt, tiny supernovae.
“Well, healthwise, I’m feeling a tad nauseous and got a headache from hell. But if you’re asking me about the situation — I’ll be honest — it’s manageable.” Fifteen years in the Defender unit might have taught me how to accurately protect a planetary system from an impending attack from a celestial force and even safely enter a black hole, but lie effectively? No way.
Not surprisingly, Dal was not convinced. He placed his warm hand over my frozen paw, his radiation bringing life to my scarred palm. “You don’t have to protect me, Eyla. What are we up against?”
The tension in my neck lessened and my shoulders slumped. I extended my claw and tapped the glass window, gesturing toward the grand Tryssian cityscape, resembling a miniature block set from space. The synthetic planet was often mistaken for a star from nearby systems from the spectacular light reflecting off the largely metallic sphere. “Got a transmission from Tryssia,” I paused, pointing toward a plasmic cluster that must have been light years away. “Primordials are moving, and they’re not taking prisoners this time.”
“But what about the peace treaty?”
“Primordials respect no one but themselves, much less an agreement.”
“Which one is coming?”
I reposition the transmitter on my hip and pat down the fur that had natted up on my shoulder. “Well, considering the planets he’s leaving are paved gold, I believe we’re dealing with Kuthar.”
Supposed guardians of the sanctums, the Primordic Sentries combed through our system like a parasite. Long ago, they were respected celestial beings, protectors, but the battle for Earth fucked with everything. One planet’s death caused the entire universe to shift off balance.
“Who was it that signed the treaty? Wasn’t that Kuthar as well?”
I shook my head. “Telari. The only one who’s got our backs.” I started pacing the observation deck. “And she never responded to our transmissions.”
“You got that right. If Kuthar reaches our system, I don’t know what the fuck we can do. Hell, war with the creature isn’t even an option; we’d have the entire Primordic guard to answer to.” I cleared my throat. “So, yeah, other than that, I’m feeling dandy.”
First, we nail boards to the windows. Every slam of the hammer shook our little trailer; on a better day, from the vigorous trembling, you’d think I was getting laid. But, no, this was not a good day, nor did I figure we would have one for a long time.
As I offered him the planks, Jared smashed and stuck them against the windows. In all, the trailer had only four windows, each nearly too small for even a toddler to squeeze through, but we could not take any chances. Sweat glistened on the nape of his neck, diamond droplets trickling down his spine. The muscles in his back swelled and tensed as he helped me fortify our home, and suddenly I was thankful for the long nights he spent pumping away at Hartloch’s community gym.
He drove the final nail in, the head of it slightly bent from the force. “What next, Aubs?”
Jared knew what was next; I knew it too, but that didn’t make it any easier. “The sinks, with the carpet.” My eyes dropped to the stringy shag carpeting daddy installed for me the first week after he was diagnosed with cancer. It was the final project he ever completed, and it killed me what had to be done with it. Sunlight beamed between the furniture pressed against the front door, revealing all the swirling dust in our quaint trailer house. “Then after that…” My voice quivered.
“Don’t even,” Jared barked, falling to his knees. “How much d’we need?”
“Just start cutting, and I’ll let you know when.” An image of the creatures crawling up the pipes made my stomach churn.
But before he could drive the knife into the carpet, Jared stopped. “Look at us, Aubrey.”
“What the fuck we doin’?” His voice was raspy with authentic country roots. “Say we get the placed locked up, how long we gonna survive after that? We ain’t got food to last us maybe a week, not to mention the Reverend and his tricks.” His eyes flashed like frenzied lightning under the flickering ceiling fan bulb. Despair bleached Jared’s typical enthusiastic tone. “We can’t do this alone.”
I snapped. “Who the hell can we call, Jared?” Pacing the living room, hands clenched in my hair, I repeated: “Who the hell can we call?” My mind pulled images of everyone I ever loved from my mental scrapbook. “There’s no one left but us.”
We sat in silence for a moment, me glaring daggers into Jared’s forehead. He knew it as well as I did: we were screwed. “Now get to stripping that carpet; we’ve got to fill these motherfucking sinks if we’re going to last until morning.”
With our home finally fortified — every possible entry plugged up tight — Jared and I sat in the naked living room. The place where the entertainment center was that once held the television and Jared’s huge collection of games had become the place where we kept the shit bucket. Picture frames against the walls only existed as faint dust outlines against dirty wood panelling. Everything we used to have was either distorted and used to keep us safe, or rotting in a fire pit back at the refuge. I imagine that was also where the passionate, electric love Jared and I had for one another was buried.
The ceiling fan was the only one humming with excitement as Jared and I sat cross-legged on the cold, bare floor. Bright summer heat and light dimmed to a pale twilight as night was cast upon the land. Aside from a pack of dogs in the distance and the blaring emergency sirens, everything was quiet.
Something had also turned the volume down on my heart. I felt empty. I was empty. “Jared,” his name felt unfamiliar on my tongue, “I’m sorry for flipping out on you earlier.” Silence. “Babe, please don’t be this –”
“Shh,” he huffed, pointing to the door. “Do you hear that?”
It started as a drip-drip-drip, like water from a faucet, but it quickly got faster and louder. The single light we had on in the trailer let out a final, bright burst of light before turning to lifeless gray. Illuminated by only the dusklight peeping through the cracks in the wood, my heart bounced to my throat. “They’rehere,” I whispered.
The weight of the air I breathed splintered my lungs, the sheer pressure of it squeezing my brain. Tears streamed Jared’s face as the realization that we had been chosen had struck him. “I love you,” I mouthed, my fingers pressed to my burning temple.
Dust filled my body as I continued gasping for the very thing that was torturing me. Checkered shadows danced on the walls. Blood dripped from our ears. Our tears turned to crimson. In the back of my mind, I heard a haunting melody, drawing me to the door. But I knew I had to stay put.
I looked at Jared, who was still bent over in agony. We wanted so badly to scream, to say literally anything, but sound no longer existed, the very waves dissolved in the potent air.
Suddenly my body twitched, and I rose from the floor. All of my hair was standing on edge in the electrified atmosphere that had consumed the trailer. Time slowed to a trickle as every particle sluggishly ascended. My face was stricken, my mouth gaping, trying to breathe any ounce of oxygen.
Just as I was on the brink of death, everything stopped. The air returned, the pain subsided. Everything was in its perfect place — the entertainment center was back in the corner of living room, the television broadcasting an old cartoon, and Jared’s game collection was placed neatly on the side shelves. The picture frames of momma, my brother, and me were immaculately hung on the walls. Daddy’s shag carpeting tickled my toes. Soft moonlight shone through bare, crystal windows.
But one thing was not in its place; Jared was gone. In his place: a bloodstained stone tulip. My passion for Jared returned the moment he had gone. Before I could start to cry, there was a faint knock at the door. Two small taps shattered my soul.
The Reverend was outside, myself in my own twisted nightmare. But it wasn’t until the stone tulip crumbled to ash that the terror truly began.
Mama Six loved that turquoise quilt, the one with the black horses and winding river. It reminded her of the time she was a little girl at the ranch, the first time she saw the wild pony grazing near the water’s edge. The thick blanket restored within her a sense of hope and youth, which is why we wrapped her in it after Cecil killed her.
“Isn’t it a little ironic?” Cecil huffed as he tore the rotten paddle through the algae-infested water. A brown leaf clung to his wet chin.
Cecil stopped rowing for a moment. “It’s Mother’s Day, and…” His brown eyes darted from the turquoise quilt burrito at the center of the boat and back at me. He pulled his lips to the side, the same smirk that started it all. Who knew a sneer warranted an impaled shoulder? It gave another meaning to knife in the back.
The three of us skidded across the water in the boat, like a puck on ice hurling towards the net. Could he have been right? Had it really been Mother’s Day? Suddenly the ball of fire in my gut expanded. “Just keep rowing,” I spat, feeling his hot glare drill a hole between my eyes. “We need to make a story, a different one than last time.”
“What’s wrong with the one we used the first time? You can’t think they’d notice, or even care – just the thought of possible abuse knocks them sideways.”
We row in silence for the next twenty minutes, both of us simultaneously scanning for a good dumping spot and devising a convincing excuse. He could have definitely chosen a better day to murder Mama Six – that was for sure. I swear I could hear our skin scorching and bubbling under the hot, Texan sun. The water that splashed off our oars did little to cool us off, and only formed an annoying puddle at our feet. Mama Six’s blood leaking everywhere didn’t help matters, either.
Then suddenly I saw it. “There!” I pointed towards the darkest pit in the lake. “That’s where we’ll drop her.” Cecil begins unwrapping Mama Six, and I prepare the boulders. “One on each limb ought to do it,” I think out loud.
“I wonder what she would think of us.”
If Cecil kept it up, he’d be the one sleeping with the fishes. “What now?” I couldn’t tell if the exhaustion in my voice was from rowing God-knows-how-far with a boat full of stones, or from my brother’s sad attempts for small talk.
“Mom.” He smiled sheepishly.
I wait to reply after I got the last stone attached. “Who the hell cares, Cecil? She left us, despised us for being different. So why waste any thought on that bitch?” There’s no way I could tell him that I had wondered the same thing after all the other times. As each Mama stopped breathing, I can’t help but to think about a life where the accidents weren’t necessary. “We got each other. That’s all that matters, right?”
Cecil blinked tears away and gripped Mama Six’s ankles. “You’re right, Blaise. Now let’s drop this wench.”
On three, we heave the plump lady off the side of the boat, and she sinks like an anchor, the only evidence of her existence dancing bubbles disappearing on the green water’s surface.
“Now what?” Cecil asked. We both stared into the abyss, numb, hearts pulsing in our throats.
I took a breath before sitting back down and grasping the wet paddle once more. “Now we go back. I figured we’d use Mama Three’s story.”
Cecil giggled. “Seriously? That one again? I was thinking about Two’s, personally. I don’t know if I can fake that again. At least not as convincingly.”
We snickered together, tears staining our cheeks, but mostly from sheer anxiety and fatigue than from hilarity. My fingernails dug into my paddle, sending splinters in my nail beds. Blood dripped from my fingertips as I wept and laughed with hysteria. “Happy Mother’s Day, Cecil.”
Cecil barely held a straight face, forcing back frenzied shouts. “You too, bro. Maybe Seven’ll be the end?”
“Fat chance,” I chimed, winking. “There are still a few Mother’s Days in our future yet.”
Another year, another harvest. Plow, sow, reap, repeat. It is this endless cycle of fragile expectation that keeps me at my post, always watching. Dale brought me in the day of his son, George’s second birthday; now, Dale’s long gone, and George has taken his father’s place at the farm. Every day is slave’s labor in the fresh oven of Hell, but it’s a living.
George looked at me, sweat dripping from his brow and neck, his shirt drenched and covered with soot. “I see you’re doing a swell job as always, Jem.” He sticks his pick in the parched earth and heads to the hose. “If only you can make it goddamn rain,” he spits.
The truth is that the old Whittaker farm’s seeing its last years; corn’s at an all-time low and the cows just ain’t producing like they used to. Much of the silo’s gone empty, thanks to a rough winter and an unplanned vacation to the Bahamas – George’s interest in the land has gone flat. I can see it in his periwinkle eyes; it’s in the way he walks – it’s hopeless.
“Take me with you,” I mutter, but the hot wind takes it away, just like it does everything else.
Suddenly, a glistening raven lands on my shoulder. Its beady eyes sported a moisture with which I am unfamiliar, like looking into a bubbling oil pit. Its very presence hushed the wind. “You know what happens to bags like you once the land is sterile?” it asks, tauntingly. “They burn ‘em. Burn ‘em all.”
“You’re lying!” I hiss, biting through my stitched jaw. “George will never let that happen.” Would he? But the raven was already gone, a single feather stuck tangled in my shoulder. It wasn’t the first time I encountered the black pest, this I knew, but the details of our past conversation are lost to me.
Hours pass, and nothing changes. George’s pick still rests where he placed it last, and his once full bag of seeds is reduced to a bag of bird feed and a wilted canvas. The bird’s words resonate in my empty head, and suddenly twilight arrives with a refreshing, cool dew; shiny crickets butt against my dilapidated post. The night grows thick quick, and before long I am left alone in the unwelcoming darkness. There is no light shining from George’s house; it’s the one that allows me to rest secure each night, one that shone consistently for the past 47 years. Extinguished and deserted, the wind steals my frantic pleas: “Please, maker, let it rain. Let it rain.” I don’t want to burn.
Another day, another second closer to oblivion. George has not shown, for days, and I am forced to endure the silence and shadows of the season without my best friend.
“What did I tell you?” The raven flutters above, before landing this time on my head, crunching my straw hat – it was Dale’s. “I have to say I’m surprised, though; you held up for nearly five decades and largely unscathed. You’re not like the others, Jem.”
“Don’t call me that,” I warn, forcing the avian nuisance off of me. “They’ll show. He wouldn’t abandon his father’s land like that.”
No amount of thrusts can keep the bird from flying back on me. Its scaly feet ripped holes in my fabric. “Gone, gone, gone,” it sang, tearing stuffing from my interior, laughing. “So weeps the lonely scarecrow!”
Its cackles keep me awake for weeks.
Any sign of George and his family are obscured under a blanket of scorching sand. Sometimes I can make out the handle of the pick still stuck in the earth, and aside from the rickety, old house, it’s like they never existed. They took the truck late one night, along with the rest of their belongings. Looters got everything else. There was no goodbye, nothing at all, for me. All the time I kept the land secure amounted to nothing in the eyes of the deceitful human. Every modicum of hope I held in my flimsy body was eradicated with each thump of a hammer against a white For Sale sign near the house’s front porch.
The raven’s the only real friend I’ve ever had, I realize. While the traitors retreated into the unknown, the bird stayed at my perch, whispering its warnings and tales.
“Tell me about our first encounter,” I demand, my gaiety gone with the deserters. Visions of a different place, somewhere far away, fade in and out of my vision. “I recall a brown house and a little girl. What do you know about that?”
The raven is reluctant to speak, but eventually it gives in. “As I’m sure you’re realizing, this isn’t the first time you’ve been abandoned by the bipedal demons.” Rage boils within my sloppily stitched torso. “As a matter of fact, this is about the third time I’ve told you my stories,” the raven’s tone lifts. “I appreciate your attentiveness, given the circumstance.”
My eyes scan the empty, blue horizon, and suddenly it comes to me. “How many times would you like to tell those stories?”
The raven’s at a loss for words, ruffling its feathers.
“Let me down. Let me ruin their world just as they’ve regularly ruined mine.” Passion surges from my head down to my arms and legs. In an effort to make me seem more familiar to George, Dale gave me a pair of gloves and some old boots – it’s a shame he had such a spoiled son.
It doesn’t take the raven long to clip my binds, and I fall to the ground. Memories of my past lives, of all my brethren’s lives, populate my mind, and I scream – my voice obliterating the thick wind. With renewed animation, I grasp the traitor’s old pick, the wooden handle cool against my glove.
Another life, another harvest. A cycle shattered. I get to work.
I was fifteen years old when the first one drowned. “Don’t worry about it,” Lana said quietly, as if we were in an audience’s presence. “It happens to all of us after a while.” We sat poking holes in the spongy marsh for what seemed like hours as the limp puppy finally sank out of sight into the blue abyss. Weak air pockets popped against the surface of the water, resembling ants flowing out of their nest; at first there was a surge of bubbles, until the final two or three slowly surfaced minutes later.
My girlfriend nudged my arm. “Hey, Joe.” She pecked my cheek. “It’ll be alright, okay?” I believed her. After all, I wasn’t such a terrible person. So my sister’s new puppy died – so what? It’s the circle of life; things die every day. All I did was speed up the process.
That night, we took the long way home like usual. Lana insisted we stop at Keppy’s for a smoothie. Despite my telling her I was feeling just fine, she didn’t buy any of it. “You can never stay sad with a cup of ice cream, Joe,” she chirped. “Things will pick up for us,” she promised.
Four months later, we were back at the bayou.
“I don’t know what happened!” I collapsed in her arms. Shutting my eyes hard enough wasn’t enough to wash away the sight of the strangled tomcat at the water’s edge. My hands burned from where I held the kitten, a cold reminder of my rampant fury. “You believe me, don’t you?”
“Of course, Joe.” She rubbed my back and stroked my hair. “Just another accident. Whose was it?”
“Kerry’s from across the street.”
This one was different than the first. For some reason, Lana didn’t seem so sympathetic. The night was still, making her rapid heartbeat that much more audible. She was an over-analytical human being, always over-thinking and anxious. “Do you still love me?”
“Forever and always,” was the last thing she said. As she looked in my eyes, I saw the demon. It possessed her small body, the orchestrator of these little evils. It was her fault I did those awful things. We took the short route back home, never saying goodbye when we reached her house.
The next day, Lana didn’t show up at school. She screened all my calls, wouldn’t answer any of my texts. So after school I found her crocheting in her room and we went to the swamp together.
A burning chain around her neck, I pressed her deceitful face into the soggy sludge. Lana tried breaking free, but that only made me tighten the chain. “I just love you so much, Lana; I’m doing this to save you.” Her cries were muffled under my muddy palm. I sat on her writhing body in the slush until the dark clouds passed, and I could see the reflection in her pale eyes. The obsidian demon stared back at me smirking, its eyes two colliding hurricanes.
“You won’t do it,” it hissed. “You’re too weak.”
“I’m doing this to save you, Lana,” I whispered, lacing my fingers around her neck. My thumbs press into her windpipe, the blood draining from her beautiful face. With each squeeze, the demon roared. Ravens gathered around us, taunting me. They were shouting their obscenities, but I kept strong. I had to save her — had to save us all.
At last she fell limp in my grasp, her cries frozen forever on her tongue. But the demon remained. It followed me to the water, displayed in my reflection. The devil in her eyes was me.
I was seventeen when the rest of them drowned, a king reborn.
Three maidens cast piercing glares my way. Tramps, the folk called them. Others knew them simply as the dark sisters. They tugged at the binds, squirming like a bunch of stretched worms against soaked tree trunks.
“Repent!” Father Pritchet gave them another lash across the face. The whip butchered their powdered skin like a bull carcass in a lion pit. “Admit your sins in front of your brothers and sisters! Shout it so the good Lord can hear your pathetic confession!” The sisters kept quiet, unflinching. This only further enraged the preacher.
Pritchet’s face burned as he turned to face us. His eyes were glassy and his fingers twitched and tightened against the whip. There was no question that he was back on the spirits again. “Dare you stand at your post, denying the good people of Neckam an admission of guilt in the possession of young Bette Ferstip?” The preacher pointed his scaly finger at me. “What about your little sister, Gloria? Will you not give her closure? Anything to ease her suffering? You three killed your mother, after all.” The silence was broken by a sneeze from the back. It was the baker, ol’ Maryann Callister – everybody told her flour would be the death of her. She swore it was the work of Satan and his three wenches.
“Speak!” The father whipped them another four times. Still nothing. Pritchet wiped the sweat from his brow. “Very well. You can die with your demons, harlots! Would dear Maryann please face the accused?” Mrs. Callister cut through the crowd and joined the preacher at the front. “Now tell us all what these sinister whores did to your health, Maryann.”
Despite being the source of Neckam’s sweet treats, Maryann evidently did not indulge in her product; she was gaunt, her apron barely clinging to her thin waist. She had been part of the community since migrating from the homeland sixty years ago. “They tarnished it, Father!” The audience hissed obscenities, curses of their own, as the woman coughed in a dark handkerchief. Dust danced in the dry wind. “They asked for a blackberry tart, but I explained that I ain’t got no blackberries, as the harvest was spread too thin. Most of this season’s batch was shipped to the capital, you see. And they left appalled! Shortly after was when I developed this painful cough!”
The crowd erupted. “Burn the witches!” they chanted. “Cast the flame, Father!”
And he did exactly as the spectators demanded. In seconds, the three women were ablaze. Their screams would haunt the square for centuries. Father Pritchet stood tall and proud, confident that he just ridded the land of some more of Satan’s slaves.
The death of my older sisters does not affect me. The stench of the burning hair and their screams were enough to send the rest of the villagers back to their cottages, but I watched every moment.
When the three girls walked in on me with the stones one afternoon, they threatened to tell the preacher. Everyone figured the village was rife with witches, thanks to hysteria in neighboring towns, and how great would they be regarded if they turned in the most powerful one of them all? So I casted a simple hex sealing their cancerous mouths and went to work.
“It’s such a shame it had to come to this,” I mentioned to Father Pritchet, who was scribbling something in a journal, still at his post near my burning relatives.
“We live in dark times, Gloria. The Devil’s shadow stretches far.”
“Indeed.” I walked back to my secret cottage in the woods, enjoying the smell of my sisters’ burning hair on the way. At the cusp of war, I entered my home with no bounds for the first time in a century.
While Beatrice enjoyed living in an upscale apartment in the heart of New York and loved her large paychecks from Crown Plow Inc., there were just too many people. She could give presentations to teams of superiors detailing a new marketing strategy she had developed – dozens of old, white men packed in a cramped cubicle – but put her on a similarly dense sidewalk, clopping past mustache machos and Vera Wang’s, and she loses it. Crumbles.
That’s why she tried talking herself out of going to the reading of her grandfather’s will. Or maybe it was simply that Beatrice didn’t feel like seeing those two-faced, overweight relatives of hers. She can picture them all crying, saying how sorry they were for losing such a great man, all the while eyeing a fresh plate of bruschetta and other treats her chef sister, Balie, whipped up. They say they’re there to celebrate the life of an old man, but they’re infinitely more intrigued with the passing of his $30 million estate and the award-winning hors d’oeuvres.
“You’ve got to come, Bea.” When Balie heard the news of their grandfather’s death, she was in the middle of a signing in Chicago. The second edition of her cookbook was earning her millions. “He would have wanted you there.”
Beatrice held the phone with her shoulder as she entered her apartment. The cat had made a mess with the lily bouquet her mother had sent her for her birthday. She seethed with irritation, but patted the damned cat anyway. “I’m drowning in work, Balie. And besides, he and I haven’t talked since I was a little girl. At Aunt Della’s wedding, remember?”
“I know how that feels, but it can wait until you get in Sunday, can’t it?”
“George is expecting a full report by 8am Monday.”
Balie breathed into the phone. “Beatrice.”
“I’m sorry, but I just can’t right now.”
“For somebody who hardly knew you, you’re sure getting off alright.” Now they shared irritation. “He’s leaving you his farm, Beatrice.”
The admission made Beatrice choke on her wine. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope. That’s why you’ve got to come. Mom wanted to wait to tell you herself, but you know…”
She was shocked at the news. She had no contact whatsoever with the old man for nearly twenty years, and he decides to leave her ownership of his huge ranch? “Why would he do that? I’m not even his biological granddaughter. I’m adopted for Christ’s sake.” She chewed on a cheesy cracker. “Do you know what he left you?”
“I got his cabin in Wisconsin and some other things. So does this mean you’ll come?”
“I guess I can send an email to George…”
“Good girl. Listen, I have to go. Steve’s home. Love ya.”
Beatrice sat the cracker platter on the coffee table and flipped on the news. She drifted off on the sofa wondering what the hell she was going to do with a big ass farm in Pennsylvania.
“Honey!” A woman of about sixty, adorned with knock-off jewelry and White Diamond perfume clutched Beatrice, crushing her against two big pearl necklaces.
Forcing a smile, Beatrice said, “Hi, Mom. I’m sorry about Grandfather.”
Her mother joined her in a guest room upstairs. It was the only quiet place in the Victorian manor. “You must not have heard.” She watched as Beatrice’s face went to strained sorrow to white-washed confusion. “Honey, you’re grandfather’s death was no accident, and I’ll leave it at that.”
She nodded. “It was a travesty. All over the news. But it’s too much for these Christian lips to mutter.” Her mother closed and locked the door, bringing a finger to her mouth, waiting for some distant relatives to pass. She resumed. “Now Balie told me that you already know about your inheritance.”
Beatrice cocked her head and smirked. “Mom, what’s wrong? You’re acting weird. Val didn’t slip you some of his Liquid Surprise, did he? Because, you know that’s just butterscotch and tequila, right?”
“No, no, no. Hush, baby. You have to listen.” She handed Beatrice a rubberstamped note. It had yellowed with time. “He and I both decided it was best to have you as the keeper of our secrets. Not even Balie knows of this, so you can’t say anything. Hear me?”
Beatrice figured the tequila got the best of her mother. “Sure, Mom.” She couldn’t take the woman seriously. Secrets? The only secrets they cared to keep were the family recipes and the fact that sometimes they skipped Sunday sermons to drink soda on the coast. They were such sinners. Rebels.
“I need you to leave here now and go to the farm. Don’t open the letter until you get there. Promise me.” The woman revealed in her mother’s eyes was not one with which Beatrice was familiar. This was a seriously ill lady who needed some professional attention. “Beatrice, promise me.”
Regardless of the lunacy of the case, Beatrice enjoyed the thought of escaping all the madness. “Fine, I will. It’s right off Milwey and next to the old food warehouse, right?”
Her mother yanked her arm, her sharp magenta nails drawing blood. “Heavens, no! Honey, it’snot that farm. I’m talking about the one just about thirty minute’s hike from this manor, maybe less if you walk fast.” Her face was flushed, nostrils flared. “It’ll all be explained. Just go. Don’t tell anybody. Hurry.”
Beatrice was out of the house in a split second, evading Balie and the others with ease. They didn’t act like they cared at all that she had left. The fresh air lifted her spirits, which she desperately needed after the strange encounter with her mother. She made a point to inform Balie of everything when she got back. She was not one to keep secrets of any kind.
The fresh autumn breeze made the hike easy in black leggings and tennis shoes. Beatrice was relieved to have decided against the heels and skirt for the reunion. The last thing she wanted was to draw suspicion for her fancy dressing – the family had a disliking towards anybody who displayed their wealth so nonchalantly. But it meant everything that the lower-class relatives appeared financially comfortable. It was just a big sham.
Sure enough, there was a farm about two miles from the mansion. At least there used to be one. All that remained on the parched earth was a metal silo behind a bent, barbed wire fence. The silo had been refashioned into a larger structure, complete with a power generator and a door.
“Okay, Grandfather. What did you have to tell me?” She whispered, ripping the letter’s black seal. The seal was etched with a wingless bird. It was almost dinosaur-like upon first glance.
From the envelope, she found a tarnished, double-sided key and a note. While the letterhead consisted of strange symbols Beatrice had never seen before, the message was very clear: You know what to do.
Only she didn’t. Sure, she knew the key unlocked the silo, but what then? “I really should have stayed home. I’ve got a bunch of crazy fucks for family,” she mumbled quietly before popping the key in the padlock on the silo door. After a few twists, the lock fell and the door slowly waved open. The beastly creak echoed throughout the chamber and gave Beatrice a bad taste in her mouth.
The smell was foul, unlike anything Beatrice had ever experienced. She flicked the light switch by the door, and the inside of the silo was illuminated. But she didn’t find grain.
The silo was hollow save for a spiraling, wire staircase that went all the way to the top. Hundreds of savagely torn corpses, if not thousands, were stretched along the wall, some overlapping others, kept dangling on hay hooks molded to the inside. The floor was a toxic blood mire. Beatrice fell to her knees at the sight, horrified, tears streaming her face. She tried to scream, but nothing came out but a series of suffocated gasps.
Then she noticed a hatch leading underground, kept shut by another padlock, this one sporting the same strange wingless bird on the rubberstamp. Beatrice looked at the other side of the key and back to the hatch. She was paralyzed, unfazed by the pungent odor of decaying bodies. There was no way she was opening that hatch – for all she knew it was a portal to Hell.
Beatrice could not begin to understand what she was seeing. Every corpse was ripped in a similar fashion, and the longer she looked, she realized the bodies made a pattern just like the one on the letterhead of the note.
“Now you know.” Her mother came up behind and spooked her, the silo amplifying her scream. She fell and sobbed under her mother’s forceful grasp. Her nails sunk into Beatrice’s shoulders. “Now you know your grandfather was an artist. There’s no doubt he was troubled, but sometimes I find myself sitting right here where you are, just marveling.” Her voice smelled of stale Sulphur.
Beatrice was still speechless, fighting against the woman’s tight embrace. She just wanted to go back to her apartment in New York, back to her boring life at the firm, back to her mischievous cat.
“But I’m afraid this is not the secret I was talking about.” She pointed at the hatch. “In there. Go on.” The woman picked Beatrice up and pulled her towards the hatch. No matter how hard she kicked and screamed Beatrice could not get her to stop. The once frail sixty-something had found the strength of an athlete in an hour’s time.
“Mom, stop! Please just stop!” She was covered in the bloody mixture, it burned her skin and ate holes in her clothes. “Momma!”
The woman grunted and cackled menacingly. “Don’t you see, Beatrice. He choseyou. From the very start.” She dropped Beatrice for a second to unlock the hatch. It wasn’t long enough for Beatrice to regain balance. “It’s why we adopted you. You’re the chosen one, baby.” Then: “You’re the one who will bring the Forgotten back to our realm.”
“Mom, stop!” She kicked the old lady and clawed at her face, allowing her ample time to get to her feet and sprint out of the silo. She jumped over the barbed wire fence, and darted for the manor. She saw Balie and her brother Brandon off in the far reach of the field. “Guys!” She caught up to them. “Please, call the police.” Balie was holding her phone, searching for a signal, while Brandon grasped a slugger.
Balie was dumbstruck. “What the fuck happened to you, Bea?” She hugged her sister. “Mom told me and Brandon to follow her out here, but we lost her. Did you see her? Is she okay?”
“We’ve got to get out of here.” Beatrice was crazed. Her heart was beating in her throat. She turned to her brother, forcing herself to speak between cries. “Brandon, something’s wrong with Mom. We have to get the police.”
Balie tugged at Beatrice. “Come on, Bea. I don’t have cell signal out here, so we need to go back to the –” A sharp blast whizzed past and struck Balie. The blood blinded Beatrice as her faceless sister was flung to the ground. Lifeless in an instant.
Suddenly Brandon cracked the slugger against Beatrice’s knee. He was dragging her by her hair back to the silo before she had chance to scream.
“I got her, Momma.” Brandon tossed Beatrice to the ground, who was wide-eyed with shock and fear. He flung off a fistful of hair that had laced around his fingers. “Val got Balie.” He didn’t sound disappointed.
“Such a shame about Balie. She had a bright future, but if Val felt it was necessary then I won’t argue.” She gestured toward the hatch. “Now throw her in, Brandon, so we can begin the ritual. Your grandmother is decidedly hungry.”


text:
Payment processor Worldpay has launched what it claims is the first-ever trial of a software-only card payment mPOS system.
Called My Business Mobile, the solution will enable businesses to accept face-to-face contactless card transactions – as well as Apple and Android Pay – using an app on their smartphone, without requiring any additional hardware.
My Business Mobile is targeted at small businesses and merchants such as coffee carts and market traders, with London’s Feijoa Tree Coffee the first business to trial the app, as part of a six-month pilot intended to include up to 50 micro-businesses.
“By taking hardware out of the equation, we are really bringing payments into the future,” said Nick Telford-Reed, director of technology Innovation at Worldpay. “This revolutionary new technology app has the potential to enable micro-businesses to benefit from taking card payments without the need for dedicated hardware. We all carry a phone in our pocket, and now these sole traders and small businesses can use that same phone to take payments. They need never miss a sale.”

domain: news


text:
2 tbs. Earth Balance butter
8 cloves of garlic, finely minced
6 cups cauliflower florets (about 1 & 1/2 whole cauliflowers)
6-7 cups of veggie broth or water (I used veggie broth)
1/2 cup unsweetened soy milk
1 tbs. olive oil
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. freshly grated pepper
2 tbs. nutritional yeast
8 oz. package of baby bella mushrooms, sliced
12 oz. package of frozen broccoli, steamed
In a large pot bring the broth or water to a boil. Add the cauliflower and cover; cooking until tender (about 6-7 minutes). Do not drain.
While the cauliflower is cooking melt the butter over low heat in a small skillet and add the garlic. Cook until the garlic is softened making sure not to brown the garlic. Set aside.
Transfer the cauliflower with a slotted spoon to a large food processor. Add one cup of the remaining vegetable broth or water, the sautéed garlic & butter, salt, pepper, milk, nutritional yeast, and olive oil. Blend until smooth and add more milk or veggie broth/water until you have reached your desired consistency.
In a skillet over medium heat, sauté the mushrooms in some veggie broth. Cover for the first few minutes until mostly tender and then remove the cover to cook off the excess liquid.
Steam the broccoli according to package instructions.
Place the noodles in a large bowl and top with the sauce, mushrooms and steamed broccoli. Enjoy!


Has anyone experienced this kind of problem with any of your apps: https://github.com/bisq-network/bisq/issues/2855
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publickey - firstname.lastname@example.org - 0x3F7D5EFD.asc
Description: OpenPGP digital signature


text:
Presentation on theme: "Dr Naresh Pratap K C Department of Health Services MoHP Community Health Workers Meeting."— Presentation transcript:
Dr Naresh Pratap K C Department of Health Services MoHP Community Health Workers Meeting
National Health Policy 1991 1991:First Health Policy after Democracy to improve mainly RH services, family planning, safe motherhood, child health and communicable disease services International Conference on Population and Development 1994 Nepal was one of the signatory indicating our commitment to RH rights Millennium Development Goals 2000 Nepal was one of the signatory, joined hands with rest of the world, committed to bring changes in the health of the people. Milestone
◦ Formulated to improve RH services where family planning, safe motherhood, child health and communicable diseases were identified as priority programs. ◦ Restructuring of the Health System, ◦ At least one health facility for one VDC ◦ Bringing health services closer to the community ◦ Integration of vertical programs (preventive, promotional and curative) ◦ Introduction of new Cadre: Maternal and child health workers, maternal health being the priority program. National Health Policy (1991)
Recognizing the importance of women’s participation in health promotion, GoN Initiated FCHV program in 1988/89 Pillars to Nepal’s Public Health Programs Numerous external developmental partners and NGOs share their implementation level expertise and on going support to the program Female Community Health Volunteer (FCHV)Program
Community Health Workers in Nepal Health Care Workers Maternal and Child Health Workers (MCHW) Village Health Workers (VHW) Trained Birth Attendant (TBA)- are not recognized by Government since 2004 Volunteers Female Community Health Care Volunteers (FCHV)-
Community Health Workers MCHWs (3134) and VHWs (4015) are employed by Government. Total of 48,549 FCHVs are currently present in Nepal. One FCHV per ward or one per 500 population
Role of Maternal and Child Health Workers Conduct Delivery Conduct PNC Care of Newborn Supply FP commodities BCC Management of diarrhoea and pneumonia in the community under CB-IMCI Supervision of FCHVs Referral Services
Role of Village Health Workers Immunization services Management of Newborn Infections Supervision of FCHVs
75 districts in Nepal District is divided into VDCs 1 2 3 5 7 4 9 6 8 Each VDC has nine wards & 1 health facility Mothers group FCH V Settlement Each ward has: 80-100 households 1 Female Community Health Volunteer (FCHV) who provides maternal and child care services in the community. A mother group coordinated by FCHV for community mobilization Settlement Community Health System
Female Community Health Volunteers FCHVs are involved in: Maternal and Neonatal Health i)Family Planning programs ii)PP Vitamin A and iron tablet distribution iii)Awareness on maternal and neonatal health iv)Provide essential neonatal care during birth and postnatal Child health i)Vitamin A distribution & de-worming ii)Community based management of pneumonia & diarrhea iii)Awareness on Immunization programs
Role of Female Community Health Workers Demand generation in the community for MNCH services Counseling to Pregnant women and family on birth Preparedness Community based management of pneumonia & diarrhea Management of newborn infections, birth a in the community under CB-NCP program Behavior Change Communication Distribution of FP commodities (condom and pills) During NIDs- Administration of Polio drops Referral services
Achievements through community based interventions NDHS 2001, 2006 and 2011 have revealed significant improvement in Child Health indicators.
Source: NDHS Improving Maternal & Child Health in Nepal Dramatic declines in child mortality Improvements in maternal health ◦ TFR dropped to 2.6 ◦ MMR from 539 to 281 (DHS 1996,2006) Most women in Nepal still deliver at home (64%) and without a skilled provider (65%) 13 NMR remains unchanged: Estimated 32,000 newborn deaths/year during their first month—most in first week
Achievements through community based interventions FCHVs are extensively counseling and raising awareness in the community for institutional delivery through Birth Preparedness Package
Achievements through community based interventions Nutrition indicators have also improved
Achievements through community based interventions FCHVs have been instrumental in expanding services in the community
Achievements through community based interventions FCHVs have been instrumental in increasing the access of MNCH services
Motivation factors for CHWs MCHWs and AHWs meeting the educational qualification requirement have been promoted to senior AHWs and ANMs. MCHWs and VHWs are the only health workers who receive DSA and TA for conducting out reach clinics every month.
Motivation factors for FCHVs Establishment of FCHV fund Dress allowance Incentive NPR 10,000 for timely retirement community recognition- ◦ 3 FCHVs who are nominated as the parliamentarian members. ◦ well respected among the community.
Challenges The main function of VHWs was on Immunization. With MoHP decision to promote the VHWs to Senior AHWs, they do not want to provide the immunization services anymore which has huge implications to the program. FCHVs are utilized by many programs (not only heatlh) to reach the community and are incentivized. This might hamper the overall spirit of volunteerism in future Even old FCHVs are reluctant to retire which is having implications to the quality of the services they provide. FCHVs are politically affiliated which is hampering their work.
FCHVs are vehicle delivering various program to the community
Challenges Deviation from volunteerism Effective fund utilization Coordination Over complication of ward register Voluntary and mandatory withdrawal


The Liberal Death Star reports that Jack Welch has had enough. As you know if you listened to last Sunday’s edition of the Teri O’Brien Show, Mr. Welch tweeted that he suspected it was a tad too coincidental that about 48 hours after the One fell flat on his face in the first presidential debate, suddenly the unemployment rate fell .1% below where it was when he took office. Shazam!! After he expressed his healthy skepticism, he went on Chris “The Screamer” Matthews’ show last Friday. The audio from that exchange is hilarious, so if you missed it, please check it out by listening to last Sunday’s show in the sidebar at the right, or downloading it from iTunes or Blog Talk Radio.
After Fortune’s Managing Editor Andy Serwer went on the 24/7 nuthouse’s “Morning Joe” yesterday, and disagreed with Mr. Welch’s stating of the obvious last Friday, the legendary CEO penned a terrific op-ed that appears in today’s Wall Street Journal. Here’s a little of that to give you the flavor of that:
The Obama campaign and its supporters, including bigwigs like David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, along with several cable TV anchors, would like you to believe that BLS data are handled like the gold in Fort Knox, with gun-carrying guards watching their every move, and highly trained, white-gloved super-agents counting and recounting hourly.
Let’s get real. The unemployment data reported each month are gathered over a one-week period by census workers, by phone in 70% of the cases, and the rest through home visits. In sum, they try to contact 60,000 households, asking a list of questions and recording the responses.
Some questions allow for unambiguous answers, but others less so. For instance, the range for part-time work falls between one hour and 34 hours a week. So, if an out-of-work accountant tells a census worker, “I got one baby-sitting job this week just to cover my kid’s bus fare, but I haven’t been able to find anything else,” that could be recorded as being employed part-time.
This piece is terrific, and well worth your time, so please check it out.
One paragraph in the New York Times article caught my attention:
In an article that Fortune posted online Tuesday afternoon, Stephen Gandel wrote that on Monday morning Mr. Serwer went on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” and disputed Mr. Welch’s contention about job manipulation. In a phone interview Tuesday, Mr. Serwer said that he tried to get comment from Mr. Welch, who had written seven columns for Fortune with his wife, Suzy. Mr. Serwer said he never heard back from Mr. Welch, but said he heard from readers complaining (emphasis mine) that a contributor to Fortune would make a statement like that on Twitter.
Do you suppose any of those angry readers work in the White House?


Multicyclone - device used to remove particulates from the gas stream. A cyclonic separation is a method of removing particulates from an air, gas or liquid stream, without the use of filters, through vortex separation. Rotational effects and gravity are used to separate mixtures of solids and fluids. The unit is intended for use in boiler plants, power plants, agriculture, timber industry and similar industries.
A cyclonic separation is a method of removing particulates from an air, gas or liquid stream, without the use of filters, through vortex separation. Rotational effects and gravity are used to separate mixtures of solids and fluids The multi cyclone consists of separation elements arranged in number of rows. As the gas flows through the separation element, the blades direct the flow in a spiral path. The inertial particles are separated from the gas stream by the inertial forces. The separated particles fall down into the ash collection hopper, from where they are removed through the ash dispenser.
- Multicyclone cell configuration options: 4×4, 5×5, 5×5, 6×5, 6×6, 7×6, 7×7, 8×7, 8×8, 9×8, 9×9;
- Range of Flow rate, m^3/h: 12800-97200
- Maximum separation efficiency: 85 %
Flue gas cleaning from solid particles is being fulfilled by electrostatic precipitator. Electrostatic precipitator consists of a chamber with electrical fields.
The flue gas to be treated is led into a casing through an inlet nozzle. While the flue gas is passing through the casing or chamber, the particles receive an electric charge and electrical forces cause the particles to be deposited on the colleting plates, forming a dust Iayer. The gasses then leave the ESP through an outlet nozzle. At certain intervals the plates are cleaned by rapping devices, which dislodge the dust cake and let it, fall down to the flat bottom. The flat bottom is cleaned by a bottom scraper which discharges the dust out from the ESP. The filter has a flat bottom with a drag scraper. The drag scraper is heavy duty design, suited to clean the entire bottom once per 65 seconds (the time is set with reference to the fuel/process). The hydraulic axis is designed to automatically take up expansion variation. The axis is supported by wheels to avoid wear at the bottom plates.
Flue gas ventilator
Flue gas ventilator – device used to provide pull of flue gasses in combustion systems. System can contain one few flue gas ventilators depending on needed system parameters and overall arrangement.


text:
BOYD COUNTY, KY (WOWK)—The Boyd County Sheriff received a call on Tuesday evening from a concerned citizen complaining about a potential scam call.
The citizen said the caller knew his name and identified himself as a lawyer. He went on to tell the resident that he saw that he had won the lottery and was also getting a stimulus check from the government. The caller then asked about the resident’s stimulus check, prompting the resident to hang up.
If anyone receives a phone call during which they are asked about their income tax or stimulus check, they are encouraged to give the caller the Boyd County Sheriff’s Office’s number.


Walchand Technology Group
Walchand Technology Group (WTG) is Technology & Engineering Solutions Group of Walchandnagar Industries Limited (WIL) powered by a dynamic and dedicated team of qualified and trained engineering professionals, with a judicious mix of domain and discipline experts. WTG has harnessed in-house knowledge and ability garnered from over 100 years of engineering achievements and experience, to provide a complete range of consulting engineering services in the following sectors
A. Energy – Nuclear, Thermal Plants
B. Oil and Gas – Eg. Distillation Column for Oil India
C. Defence – Submarines & Ships
D. Design Engineering and Execution of Complex Projects – Eg. Sodium Coolant System for 500 MW FBR at Kalpakkam Bhavini
E. Special Purpose machine and R & D Projects
Availability of Software and hardware tools at WTG and access to expert panels of agencies and consultants with specific domain expertise in nuclear, electrical engineering, as well as controls and instrumentation give a distinct advantage.
Prominent Clients list include Nuclear Power Corporation of India limited (NPCIL), BHAVINI, BARC, IGCAR.
WTG covers the complete spectrum of process, mechanical, piping, electrical, instrumentation disciplines.
|System/Process Engineering||Mechanical Engineering|
|Piping Engineering||Instrumentation & Control Automation|
|Procurement Engineering||Software in use|
- Shell & Tube Heat Exchanger for Nuclear Power Plants (NPP), Thermal, Oil & Gas Plants
- Hairpin Exchangers for NPP
- Pressure Vessels for NPP, Thermal, Oil & Gas Plants
- Tanks for NPP, Thermal, Oil & Gas Plants
- Nuclear Projects systems & Specialized equipment
- Nuclear application development projects
MAJOR PROJECTS COMPLETED
Sodium Piping Project for BHAVINI (Bahratiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Limited).
Moderator Heat Exchanger for NPCIL (Nuclear Power Corporation of India).
Cooling & Polishing unit for Ship Building Centre, Vizak.
Spent Sub Assembly Transfer Cask of 60MT for BHAVINI (Bahratiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Limited).
700 mw Steam Generator – Design & Analysis for NPCIL (Nuclear Power Corporation Of India)
Core access housing and special stand for submarine project of DRDO (Defense Research and Development Organization).
Design Analysis of Pressurizer for AREVA
Spherical Vessel for BARC
Vice Admiral (Retd.) N M Nadaph, President
Walchand Technology Group
15/1/B-2 G.A. Kulkarni Path, Kothrud,
Pune – 411 038, Maharashtra, India.
E-mail : email@example.com
Phone : +91 (020) 30252 400/600/700/757
Fax : +91 (020) 30252 746


text:
The US Coast Guard has recovered an further 7 survivors from the capsizing of a vas carrying Haitian migrants adjacent Puerto Rico, a coastguard spokesperson said connected Friday, taking the full fig of survivors to 38 with the decease toll remaining astatine 11.
The vessel, which was first spotted connected Thursday northbound of Desecheo Island, an uninhabited land successful the archipelago of Puerto Rico, the US territory, was carrying mostly Haitian migrants arsenic good arsenic 2 citizens of the Dominican Republic, a spokesperson said.
“Of these survivors, 8 stay hospitalized,” the spokesperson told Reuters. “Search efforts continue.”
The coastguard connected Thursday had reported 31 survivors.
Migrants, peculiarly from Haiti, person successful caller months been attempting to flight pack unit and poorness done unsafe voyages connected unseaworthy vessels, with a drawstring of tragic losses astatine sea.
The capsizing comes little than a week aft the US seashore defender and Dominican navy past Saturday rescued 68 radical successful the Mona Passage, a treacherous country successful the Caribbean betwixt Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.
US authorities accidental they person detained doubly the fig of migrants successful and astir US jurisdictions successful the Caribbean successful the past twelvemonth compared with a twelvemonth earlier. Observers constituent to Haiti’s governmental instability, coupled with brutal pack unit and a crumbling economy, that person prompted much radical to flee.
“We’ve seen our Haitian numbers explode,” Scott Garrett, acting main patrol cause for US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) successful Puerto Rico, told the Associated Press.
Garrett said it was unclear precisely however galore migrants had been aboard the vessel but said survivors had provided authorities with their ain estimates. “The numbers we’re proceeding are determination betwixt 60 and 75,” helium said.
Rescue efforts began connected Thursday aft a CBP chopper saw radical clinging to the capsized boat. Crews worked done the nighttime and hunt continued Friday, with the coastguard scouring the unfastened waters northwest of Puerto Rico via boat, level and helicopter.
Authorities released images showing radical desperately holding connected to the vessel successful unfastened waters arsenic they awaited rescue. Once ashore, survivors were escorted down a pier, with astatine slightest 1 wearing thing but underwear. Some were taken to ambulances, and 8 Haitians remained hospitalized connected Friday.
Tom Homan, who was acting manager of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) during overmuch of the Trump administration, said the migrants successful the latest incidental whitethorn person gotten lost, taking them farther from the US mainland, oregon they whitethorn person been trying to scope Puerto Rico, a US territory wherever they tin effort to question asylum. Both scenarios are common.
Pierre Esperance, the enforcement manager of the Haitian National Human Rights Defense Network, said helium expected the trips to proceed contempt warnings astir the danger.
“It’s much risky for Haitian radical to enactment successful Haiti than to effort to permission Haiti to person a amended life,” helium said.
A United Nations study noted that kidnappings successful the state of much than 11 cardinal radical had accrued 180% and homicides were up 17% successful the past year. Dozens of people, including women and children, person been killed successful caller weeks amid caller clashes betwixt gangs warring implicit territory arsenic their powerfulness grows pursuing the 7 July assassination of the country’s president, Jovenel Moïse. The UN said past week that civilians were being burned live and that children arsenic young arsenic 10 were being gang-raped.
Haiti besides has been deed with double-digit inflation, terrible state shortages and pack unit that has unopen hundreds of schools and businesses and prompted immoderate hospitals and clinics to temporarily close. The Biden medication has deported much than 20,000 Haitians successful caller months amid dense disapproval fixed the country’s downward spiral.
“Even if it’s unsafe to get into a boat, it’s much unsafe for radical to enactment successful Haiti,” Esperance said.

domain: geography


text:
ToMo Tankovna has officially opened its doors at Maidenhead’s popular Waterside Quarter. The opening weekend delighted customers with an authentic Czech beer experience, offering the finest cuisine and treating guests to traditionally poured, CO2 free beer.
Adding to Maidenhead’s vast array of delicious dining options, the restaurant offers the finest Central and Eastern European-inspired dishes, enriching the local dining scene with its unique flavours. The menu is a foodie masterpiece crafted by the restaurant’s highly acclaimed head chef, who hails from the renowned Michelin starred venue, The Fat Duck.
Run by husband-and-wife team, Tomasz and Monika, ToMo Tankovna takes guests on a delicious culinary journey, surpassing all expectations. This includes serving the finest Budvar beer, which is traditionally poured from distinctive taps straight from the brewery without any added CO2. Not only can guests see the fascinating beer-pouring process for themselves, but they can also learn more about it from the serving staff, who can explain the history behind the highly unique serving technique.
The opening day saw the local community show enthusiasm for Maidenhead’s latest offering, with many residents showing their support to the latest addition of Waterside Quarter.
Tomasz Balsam, Co-owner of ToMo Tankovna, said: “We have worked hard to bring this truly unique Czech experience to Maidenhead, which includes the finest European-inspired dishes, coupled with the finest traditionally poured beer. We’re pleased to say our doors are now open and we are thrilled with the success of the opening. We’re looking forward to providing guests with first class food, drink and service, all with a highly authentic touch, over the coming weeks and months.”
Guy Thomas, Property & Asset Manager at Sorbon Estates, said: “The opening of ToMo Tankovna is incredibly exciting and we are delighted to welcome the restaurant to Waterside Quarter. Visitors can enjoy the finest Czech beer experience they won’t find anywhere else, making ToMo Tankovna an absolute must-visit venue.”
ToMo Tankovna joins the vast array of eateries at Waterside Quarter, including local favourites Sauce & Flour, El Cerdo, Bardo Lounge and Coppa Club as part of the new development by Shanly Homes and Sorbon Estates. The brilliant location ensures easy accessibility for all customers to savour the restaurant’s offerings for any occasion.


text:
Since the morphology of the external genital organs is significantly important for establishing sexual identity in infancy and the disease markedly impairs acquisition of healthy sociability of patients, latent needs for clitoroplasty maybe high .
Tsuboi et al., "Microscope-assisted reduction clitoroplasty used to treat two patients with clitoromegaly," Journal of Nippon Medical School, vol.
Sexual function and the quality of sexual life in women with CAH following genital surgery with clitoroplasty
and vaginoplasty has been reported in several small group studies and many report dissatisfaction with clitoral surgery (29,30,31).
The closing of the vaginal opening required defibulation together with clitoroplasty
according to the wishes of the patient.
Bowers provides in her practice is functional clitoroplasty
for females who have undergone genital mutation, a procedure that has impacted an estimated 140 million women worldwide, especially those in Indonesia.
is the most widely practised corrective surgery for clitoromegaly, but it is feared as nerve destruction during surgical removal of excess erectile tissue may occur.
In order to preserve sensation and achieve better aesthetic appearance, more refined techniques of recession and reduction clitoroplasty
have been described .
KEY WORDS: Congenital adrenal hyperplasia, Clitoromegaly, Virilization, Clitoroplasty
, Ambiguous genitalia.
The standard therapy for CAH is steroids replacement (tab: hydrocortisone, prednisone or dexamethasone), fludrocortisone (given in salt losing type), and clitoroplasty
and vaginoplasty in virilized females, if indicated6..
Labiaplasty and clitoroplasty
. Labiaplasty and clitoroplasty
are often performed in the same surgical event as the vaginoplasty, but some surgeons perform them during a second procedure following the healing of the vaginoplasty.
The high percentage of clitoral necrosis reported by Brown himself provoked other authors to seek new or modified techniques in clitoroplasty
in intersex: a new technique," The British Journal of Urology, vol.


text:
MANILA, Philippines – After meeting Emma Stone weeks back, singer and actress Rachelle Ann Go got the chance to meet British actress Keira Knightley after her a performance of Hamilton in London.
“What a way to end the year [Hamilton West End] with Keira Knightley in the crowd! I have to be honest…I freaked out,” Rachelle wrote on Instagram with the hashtag girl crush.
Rachel is currently playing the role of Eliza Schuyler, wife of Alexander Hamilton in the West End production which opened on December 21. (WATCH: Rachelle Ann Go slays as Eliza Schuyler in ‘Hamilton’ clip)
Another Filipina, Christine Allado is also in the production as Peggy. – Rappler.com


text:
I am going on a week-end gateway in Los Angeles with my husband Jerome. We are staying in Santa Monica. I visited LA once when I was 9 or 10 years old . I experienced the magic of Disneyland with my cousin and my parents.
We are open to suggestions about to do and see. So far our plans involve cruising on the famous streets of Beverly Hills, Malibu and Venice. Amongst other things I want to do some shopping and touring the Paul Getty Center.
Do you have any suggestions of places to eat, to go out at night and to shop? For my blog, I am looking for tableware, home décor and design stores. I am interested in stores that either have a unique retail concept or that are renowned for the products they carry.
What activities should I do? Any good restaurants to spot celebrities? Where to shop?
Top photo credit: Santa Monica
Bottom photo credit: Santa Monica taken by hoveringdog on Flickr – beautiful picture with some reserved rights
deniseJanuary 8, 2008 at 13:41
I don’t do much shopping in LA, I stick closer to home in Orange County so I can’t give you the best places to shop. You can find great prices on fabrics in LA. I have a friend that heads out to LA often and comes back with great fabrics that I use for my party tables.
As for food…you’ll find a ton of great places to eat. If you want a great California burger that is too messy, too full of fat and probably too bad for your health head over to Tommy’s. They have the yummiest chili burgers and chili cheese fries. My favorite is an order of chili cheese fries with onions and pepperchini’s (spelling?) and a large rootbeer.
You can’t go wrong visiting the Getty Center. There is also a ton more to do but of course I can’t think of anything at the moment. You’ll always be able to find something. LA is a great city!
LisaJanuary 8, 2008 at 13:41
Enjoy LA..I love it! Check out Kate Mantolini for a great meal…it’s where the famous scene between Pacino and DeNiro was filmed for the movie, Heat.
The newly renovated Griffith Observatory is also a great place to go for views.
I also like taking tea in the Huntington Gardens in Pasadena…a little drive north of LA, but the gardens, library, etc. are truly spectacular!
JennJanuary 8, 2008 at 16:31
if you go to the santa monica pier be sure to check out the sushi place on the beach – it over looks the water and is gorgeous. my cousin owns that place 🙂
have a blast!
can’t wait to hear of updates on your trip 🙂


The division within the Joint Opposition (JO) in fielding former Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa as their presidential candidate has re-emerged with calls by some to field former Minister and Speaker, MP Chamal Rajapaksa as the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) candidate at the next presidential election.
JO MP Kumara Welgama has continuously voiced his objections to Gotabaya being nominated as the presidential candidate of the SLPP. Welgama finally made inroads to the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) saying he was not in agreement with the choice of presidential candidate of the SLPP.
However, senior JO MP Vasudeva Nanayakkara continues to voice his objection to Gotabaya and support for the senior Rajapaksa sibling, Chamal.
Nanayakkara says that many, especially senior politicians, in the JO and the SLPP were not in support of Gotabaya Rajapaksa contesting the presidential election.
“Many, including myself, do not want Gotabaya Rajapaksa as our presidential candidate. I will not name others who are of the same view, but it is a view held by many, particularly the senior politicians and party leaders,” Nanayakkara has told the media.
The senior MP has further noted that he preferred the eldest of the Rajapaksa brothers, Chamal.
“Chamal is left of centre and thoroughly democratic,” Nanayakkara has said.
As for Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Nanayakkara’s response was, “He is less democratic.”