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- 2 Cor. 10:1-13:14
- Acts 20:2-3a
Paul suffered greatly as an apostle for Jesus. He also was blessed immensely as a result of His obedience to Jesus' call. In order for Paul not to become conceited (that is, to think too highly of himself—to be arrogant), he was given a thorn in the flesh to humble him. Consider what Paul said about this:
6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
(2 Cor. 13:6-10 NIV)
There are a number of odd twists to be found in life in Jesus. For example, He said that in order for us to save our life we must lose it. Now, we see that it is when we are weak that we are really strong. How can this be? GOD's grace covers our weaknesses and, when we admit that we can't do it alone (whatever "it" may be), that's when GOD steps in and works through us. We must give up the sense of false control in order to allow GOD to work through us and our life.
Here's another interesting thing about how GOD's grace works: The messenger of Satan (whatever it was) was not intended as a "blessing" to Paul, nor did he view it as such. However, in the end, it truly was a blessing because it forced Paul to trust in GOD to overcome his personal weaknesses. We sometimes go through situations in life that are hard and difficult to explain or understand. We need to remember Paul's situation when we're going through these challenges because GOD can and will work in our lives similarly to how He did with Paul. | English | NL | e21449cb3a14df0b2b182c1db3547a9d7812453371f736e3c2f8b668b1005fa8 |
The History of Surfing
If we were to follow back the history of surfing, we should not be surprised to find its roots deep down Polynesian cultures where the community members were wave riders. The chief of the tribe was actually the best surfer of all, and his board was crafted from the greatest wood. According to the same history of surfing, the Polynesian nobility had the best beaches, the most exquisite boards, and did come to develop the most impressive skills. Nevertheless, the other members of the community were also allowed access on the beaches, and the ability to surf well brought them prestige among the others.
It is not difficult to trace religion and myth marks in this history of surfing, since the ancient communities took activities like surfing spiritually. Such practices go back three thousand years ago without one being able to tell when surfing became a sport. The first records in the history of surfing appeared at the very beginning of the 18th century when Europeans came into contact with the civilizations of Tahiti for the first time. It is in the log of captain James Cook that we find the description of a Tahitian catching the waves in his canoe just to have fun.
The history of surfing extended to Hawaii where the practice was apparently implemented by the Polynesian settlers. The simple surfing form practiced in the old times gradually turned into the Hawaiian surfing variety that remains one of the most popular in the world. As for the surfboard making, there was a whole ritual involved, with a careful selection of the trees and special offerings to the gods as a sign of gratitude for their great mercy. Afterwards, the process of shaping began and in the history of surfing as practiced in Hawaii four distinct types of boards were created.
Presently, the history of surfing serves as a reminder of how old things and customs can remain actual, respected and widely practiced. Surfing has no age requirements, all one needs is a good physical shape and the desire to ride the wave. Furthermore, given its immense popularity and the large extent at which it is practiced, surfing is still writing its history every day, in many parts of the world. We would be very much in the wrong to consider that there is nothing new we can learn about it, since experience has taught many surfers that there is always something challenging to try. | English | NL | cae72e326f5e5cec10278388495ad1bce74552295134bee106cbedbfc09f2257 |
Once upon a time, Mr. And Mrs. Foote learned that they would be having twins, a girl and a boy. The girl, being in a hurry, was born first and they named her Righty. The boy, a few seconds later, arrived, and they named him Lefty. They were adorable identical twins, and the parents were “toe-tally” thrilled with their tiny baby toes. So sweet, so cunning.
However, as they began to walk Mrs. Foote noticed that Righty’s little toes turned out as she began to walk and that Lefty’s little toes turned inward. Fearing that this might hamper their agility, she enrolled them in Miss Toe Knees School of Dance. The children took to dance immediately! Righty found Ballet to be the perfect style for her and the second that Lefty put on those shiny black tap shoes, he was off and away! Continue reading | English | NL | e5682530c3115fb97dd0e7504825fd4898aa175d98a8f8132db67cdb9089774a |
After returning from the construction site to the north, Helkias began acting strange. The lightness of the previous weeks remained. Yet he was more standoffish. Which is to say if you didn’t know the man he would have appeared the same. It was clear that something troubled him. Knowing how close we had been to the anniversary of the young princes I worried what it was he was carrying that we could not see. I made sure to join him on patrol one morning. So it was armed and armored alongside the dreaded Blackraven that I truly saw him and understood even more so than I could have thought the truth of why he was who he was now. And the truth that drove him ever onward.
“I miss bandits. I never thought I’d say it but I miss the durned bandits, girl.”
He was talkative that morning.
“A full breakfast,” he said before we left, “And a cool breeze at our backs. Makes me giddy it does.”
The patrol turned out to be somewhat uneventful, sighting the occasional pack of wolves, lycans or not, they bothered us not.
“They’re free,” I said as we took a break on an overlook of Kenkilit. Below us, the masons and the refugees and those Voranians that chose to live among us were hard at work. Repairs continued. But more importantly, new buildings and outlying walls were rising up. “Soon we’ll be a town proper. Hire a sheriff. Maybe a baker?”
“Aye, I’ve heard tell the elf girl makes cakes or something. Still hain’t seen it though. Ancient elf secrets are hard to pull out of her folk.”
“You okay, old man?”
He chuckled leaning against a tree just over my shoulder. He pulled out a well-burnt roll of leaf and lit it, biting off the end. Smoke billowed out around us.
“I lived the role of a legendary figure for a while there in Corbach. The shadowy billowy hellbent Blackraven. I was something out of a campfire tale,” he took a drag and shook his head. “I never killed like I did in the week after I learned what happened to the young princes.”
“You’re a warrior, Helk. Seem to me that comes with the territory.”
“Not like this, girl. Those dark and bloody days, I was lost in it all. The world focused to a pinpoint around me and nothing else mattered. Not life, love, people, nations. It was my spearpoint and their chest or backs or throats. I lived only for that. And I was wrong.”
He took his pack off and sat at the edge of the cliff, his boots dangling over a 500-foot drop. He seemed overly calm. Though calm draws upon a balance of emotion. Telling this tale he seemed devoid of the stuff.
“I killed Cronin’s men. For days. I don’t know how many my rampage took,” He stopped momentarily, “Eighty-five. Durned memory I killed Eighty-five innocent men before I turned my hatred on the ones who did the deed. Even after I confronted Councilor erm Headsman Prel. Even after I defeated the assassins. There was still a revelation to be had.”
He spat over the edge. I sat next to him. Watching for any hint or what was to come. A change in posture. A twitch of an eyebrow. All the signs my mentor had drilled into me. Signs of weakness, of feeling, of emotional attachment. In Helk’s body language I saw only regret.
“I left the refugees alone. It was dumb. But I was still that broken castoff then. It was before Cronin, Matt and I took to the Realms. Before we left Corbach. In those early days, we were lucky if we had watchmen at night. And I left. I returned to the last village we passed through.”
I knew most of this. I tracked his movements during those early days. Hooded and wearing rags I was just another refugee fleeing the Headsman’s wrath. The tale he told then, I already knew it.
“The Corbachian rains drenched us then. Unprotected in the valley it soaked through cloak, armor, and underclothes. I let it wash me. I hadn’t taken the armor off in days. But I was in search of a drink. So I barrelled through, soaked to the core of myself. I made it to the tavern in good time. It was empty save for the innkeep and a hooded someone. We drank quietly for what it was worth, good company I thought.”
A pack of wolves moved behind us. Stopping to listen.
“I drank well. And when I thought ‘last one ole boy’ I had another three. Drinking like that, with no mirth no celebration. Drinking to forget. That was how I lived then. It was my specialty. And so when the hooded man drew on me I was slow. Too slow. She gave me this,” He gestured to a faded scar on his chin.
“Managed to get out the door, but they were already waiting. Council guard. The best and brightest. Most trained by my own hand. Knew some of them since they were babes at breast. And there, wearing a shiny white, soaking wet cape was Ser Quioren. Up jumped bastard. The girl came out behind me. Five total. All wearing that uniform. The blasted star of the council and their new god. And there it was staring at me from the chest of my best friend.”
“Quioren,” I asked, knowing the answer. They grew up together. Were like brothers. It was prerequisite reading before I took Helk’s contract. My mentor had a few personal tales to add. How the two of them had adventured throughout Corbach in their younger days. Were to marry sisters before tragedy struck Helk’s betrothed. Helk didn’t know I knew all of this. So he continued.
“Aye, my brother. Yrolf. Replaced it with a Ser even before he earned his armor. Turns out if you use a title as your informal name it can stick.”
“Maybe I’ll become a Lady of Whosits.”
“Hah. I’ll support yer claim.”
The levity broke whatever spell he’d been under and he was nearly cheery for a moment. After another puff of leaf, the blank face returned.
“So there I knelt drunk, wet, and stinking from days of travel. My spear was standing outside the door, maybe ten feet away may as well have been in my pops’ homestead for all the good it did there. And he stood over me then. This man who had seen me at my best. One of three people who’d ever really known me. And he laughed.”
I could see him struggle then. The emotion breaking through. I saw it as weakness for a brief moment.
“I think that laugh was the final blow. It broke the man I was. Ended him right there. I looked up into his eyes and I think I knew. I saw in him the capability to do it. In that uniform, I knew he had to have given them something. And still laughing he looked down at me. And kicked me. Right here.” He gestured to his chest.
“I fell to the ground too tired to do a damned thing about it. And he kept laughing. It was a strange thing to be reborn out of another’s callous disregard. But that’s where I changed. Where this shining example of manhood really began.”
He gestured to himself with both hands leaving the rolled leaf in between his teeth.
“I didn’t care if I died there, Quioren would tell me what he did. So I did what I could with what I had and broke his durned nose with my face. I can’t say I felt it, drunk as I was but he did. He screamed and wailed and the others came at me. I wouldn’t recommend it, but there is a grace to fighting while completely smammered on bad village ale, so long as ye don’t care about coming out the other side. So that was my rebirth. Killed three of them before they got a hold of me again. ‘Say it.’ I spat blood and a tooth into Quioren’s face. ‘I did it. You know it. Who else would young Eric have trusted enough to ride out alone with? Should’ve seen him weep and wail as we torched the place. Boy managed to kill two o’ mine before we did him in. But I did it. I ended him. But hell, I hated every minute of it. Of all of this.’ Quioren looked like he was about to fall down, blood trailing in the rain on his face, one eye swollen shut. ‘It didn’t have to be like this brother.’ And I looked up at him then. Right in his eye. And I told him ‘It really didn’t’. The arrows flew then. And some of the refugees came out of the dark. Asher, he led them to me. Quioren escaped into the dark with the woman who cut me. And I passed out. Woke up back in a wagon. Asher watching over me while I sobered up.”
He twisted out the remnant of leaf and put it out on his boot.
“My best friend was the one who did in the young prince. And he did it because of me.”
“You can’t possibly take that on yourself,” I told him, sincere as I knew how.
“I know. Forgive me a bit of melancholy. But today was the day. Quioren and I were going to marry a pair of sisters. They were warriors from the south of Corbach. I wonder what would have come of us if that day had passed as it was meant to.”
He stood and stretched. Groaning.
“Let’s continue on then. Get back to those free folk back there. See if Elowen will give us a damn cake for our wondrous patrolling.”
The pack of wolves continued on their way then. And we gathered our packs and made our way back to the path.
It was only because of my mentor’s training that I didn’t blurt it all out then. Sometimes I wonder if he already knew. It would be a while yet before it was all out in the open. But that day walking back, I hoped against hope that I wouldn’t ever have to scar him again. | English | NL | 6399aec0f964d164ab330907cd63cee41061fb7c4597f78dfd9a95ac20d67de0 |
The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, 10and so the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.” 11But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ” 12So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?” 13The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there. 14Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” 15The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. 16So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jews persecuted him. 17Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working.” 18For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
To paraphrase an old friend, ‘Now that is remarkable. Here is a man who has been laying idle for 38 years and the first thing you Pharisees point out to him is that he is carrying his mat on the Sabbath. The man hasn’t carried a mat on any day for 38 years. He hasn’t carried a mat for 13, 870 days and you are worried about today? Did you praise him on any other 1,976 preceding Sabbath’s that he did not carry his mat?” Here is no miracle, for sure. The only thing that happened was that the law was broken. That is all they saw. They did not see a man set free, they did not see a man healed, they did not see a captive loosed from his prison, they did not see a man cured of a disease that had left him completely impaired and despairing for 38 years—a man who had, for all intents and purposes, simply lost the will to live. Of course he had no one to help him in the water when it was stirred—he didn’t want anyone to; it was easier to do nothing each day.
I quoted from an essay, in my previous meditation, written by Tim Keller. Here’s another helpful paragraph:
Moralism is the view that you are acceptable (to God, the world, others, yourself) through your attainments. (Moralists do not have to be religious, but often are.) When they are, their religion if pretty conservative and filled with rules. Sometimes moralists have views of God as very holy and just. This view will lead either to a) self-hatred (because you can’t live up to the standards), or b) self-inflation (because you think you have lived up to the standards). It is ironic to realize that inferiority and superiority complexes have the very same root. Whether the moralist ends up smug and superior or crushed and guilty just depends on how high the standards are and on a person’s natural advantages (such as family, intelligence, looks, willpower). Moralistic people can be deeply religious–but there is no transforming joy or power.
These are the people who find no joy in the ‘success’ of others because they are far too concerned with the sins of others. They are utterly incapable of being joyful—joy-filled. To these folks, life is a burden they must carry around as they trudge from person to person helping them work out their own salvation—with fear and trembling of a kind the apostle Paul was unaccustomed to. These folks are ‘holier-than-thou’ types. They care not about a person’s walking and leaping and praising God, only about his carrying a mat on the Sabbath. It is a terrible way to live, and sadly, it is a life completely devoid of grace.
They said, ‘It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.’ I take this as their way of saying, ‘It is the Sabbath; we forbid you to carry your mat.’ I take these to be very cold, callous folks. Seriously, who is more concerned about a mat being carried than about a man being healed of a 38 years long trip to nowhere? My Lord! There should have been a party in the temple precincts! They should have killed the fatted calf! They should have invited Jesus to turn the Jordan River into wine so the party would not have to end! But, these sour-pusses stared down their pronounced noses, glared over the top of their gaudy bi-focals, stretched out their long, pointy fingers, and declared with the authority of a prophet, the justification of Scripture, and in the voice of God: “You would be better off still crippled by that pool in Bethesda than to be carrying your mat on the Sabbath.” Isn’t that really what they are saying?
I think those people still exist today.
But the man replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’” Funny, isn’t it, how Jesus’ authority was good enough for this man when it came to getting well but afterwards Jesus is merely scapegoat. I take nothing positive from this man’s actions between verses 11-15. I think he became an ingrate or at least his true colors began to show. He evidently goes back to a life of sin—a life of sin that may have led to the condition that had laid him up for 38 years to begin with. Jesus did not set this man free from his prison so that he could go and pick up where he left off in sin. No he picks him up, sets him free, and demands, I think, a life that reflects that freedom. Instead, he went back to sin. Let’s read Mr. Keller’s essay again:
Relativists are usually irreligious, or else prefer what is called “liberal” religion. On the surface, they are more happy and tolerant than moralist/religious people. Though they may be highly idealistic in some areas (such as politics), they believe that everyone needs to determine what is right and wrong for them. They are not convinced that God is just and must punish sinners. Their beliefs in God will tend to see Him as loving or as an impersonal force. They may talk a great deal about God’s love, but since they do not think of themselves as sinners, God’s love for us costs him nothing. If God accepts us, it is because he is so welcoming, or because we are not so bad. The concept of God’s love in the gospel is far more rich and deep and electrifying. (There is a link in yesterday’s meditation where you can access the entire essay.)
I think those people still exist today also.
The guy is a tattle-tale, and Jesus is the one who is persecuted for it. ‘For this reason the Jews tried all the harder to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.’ There will always be someone who wants to persecute and kill. I don’t know about you, but I find it not one bit surprising that it was the religious folks who wanted to persecute Jesus. It was the religious folks who wanted to kill him. It was the religious folks who had no room for him in their scheme of things. They had it all worked out: the rules, the laws, the manner of obedience. There was no reason for this Jesus guy to come in and mess things up for them. He was only making matters much worse than they had to be.
I think those people still exist today too.
Seriously, there are too many religious folks in the church and too many irreligious folks in the church. Here’s Keller’s point: They are both folks who want control over their own lives and over their salvation. Religious folks want saved by their rules and laws and obedience to them; they tell Jesus what to do. Irreligious folks determine their own paths of right and wrong: They don’t need Jesus telling them what to do. You know what is scary? I have lived both ways. This is what I realized in that short van ride last night: For a very long time I did because I had to if I wanted to be saved. There was no joy in serving. It was all work. All burden. All trying to please God day in an day out because I could not grasp grace.
Then there was a time when I did because I wanted to. I confess, it is a lot easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. So instead of submission (‘Go, and sin no more.’) out of love for what he had done for me that I could not do for myself, I simply did what I wanted, when I wanted, and how I wanted. Again, there was no joy because there was only ever guilt, shame, and the humiliation of having to come back to him again and again asking for that forgiveness I thought so easily obtained. Neither is a way to live properly in grace. This was an abuse of grace.
Up until about 3 years ago I never did because because God did first. In other words, I did not do because of grace. Life was either serve to be saved or sin and seek forgiveness later, but never saved to serve—gladly, freely, without obligation, simply because the love and joy of God had done for me what I could not do for myself, because grace had broken in, because I had been set free. I was a slave to law; I was slave to sin. Never was I a happy servant of the Lord. I realize that both of these folks were ingrates. The religious folk because they didn’t see a healed man; the healed man because he went back to sin. I think these are both ways of doing the same thing: persecuting Jesus, plotting his death, or turning him over the authorities who wish to do so. But never recognizing that one who claims to be equal with God has the right to set me free from slavery on any day of the week and determine the course of my life after I have been set free.
I think these folks still live in the church today. And shall they be set free?
Both parties missed grace—the leaders and the healed man. My hope is that we won’t: Neither you, nor I.
I hope this 19th Day of your 90 with Jesus finds you living in and because of Grace.
Soli Deo Gloria! | English | NL | 910603c96dfacfc80544e528273ffbcfed7d0297cfd17507cdf82d4c5eb33b63 |
I am reluctant to talk about my visions on the whole, I would rather talk of knowledge on a practical level of what I know. Visions are in general unexplained phenomena which take years to be explained. But in the interests of emptying myself which is the shaman’s practice I will tell you about my Saturn return.
The Saturn Return is an astrological phenomenon that occurs at around the age of thirty, coinciding with the time it takes the planet Saturn to make one orbit around the sun. It is believed by astrologers that as Saturn “returns” to the degree in which it occupied at the time of birth a person crosses over a major threshold and into the next stage of life. With the first Saturn Return, a person leaves youth behind and enters adulthood. With the second Return, maturity. And the third and usually final Return, a person enters wise old age.
The first Saturn Return is famous because it represents the first test of character and the structures a person has built their life upon. According to traditions, should these structures be unsound, or if a person is living out of touch with his or her true values, the Saturn Return will be a time of upheaval and limitations as Saturn forces him or her to expel old concepts and worn out patterns of living. It is not uncommon for relationships and jobs to end during this time of life restructuring and re-evaluation.
I was working in a holiday home by the sea in a place not far from where I live now. I had for many years struggled with my self-importance. Self indulgence seemed to engulfed me on a day-to-day basis; I felt pity for myself and the world. And as I worked in this place my problems seemed to manifest themselves. I had been homeless for a time and I was reliant on my employer for a place to stay. I was at my lowest ebb, lower than I had been for a long while. I found it difficult to keep my head above water; maintaining my position in this establishment was near impossible with the difficulties I was experiencing.
Then one day I had a moment of clarity – a sense of giving up and abandoning myself to what might be. I had made a friend in this place, I can’t even remember his name but he was a decent person I liked. I stepped outside of the building onto the patio to gaze at the world for a moment while on a break.
My friend stood next to me. I remember looking down to see I was standing on a grate – I made a pun to myself of the word imaging it spelt GREAT and that “I was standing on the GREAT”. We stood in silence it seemed a sombre moment. But just then he said to me “Just look at that”…
I surveyed the horizon looking out to sea, the man to my right pointing. I could not believe what I saw. Instead of the seeing the sun setting on the horizon, I now saw Saturn with its rings. It was enormous and utterly eclipsed my mind. I had entered into a state of wakeful dreaming. As I stood there gazing at the scene something had shifted within me and I was in a dream-like vision, I could not have even imagined. My friend was calm, as if his eyes had seen this many times before (I doubt he was seeing the same as I was) Just for a moment I stood there between the worlds of waking experience and that which is dreamed. And Saturn returned to me.
It was an omen of prolific proportions. As is the nature of these things I thought I knew but in a sense was totally unaware of its significance. Particularly as only until recently did I discover the term ‘Saturn Return’ and understand its meaning. But now many years on I see the significance. This for me was a moment of portent and promise – a return to not quite to sanity but to a place of well-being and a place where I could be free.
The man left the place I was working – thrown out I was told. As was I a short time after. But there was no regret for me due to what I had seen. I felt uplifted, as if I had passed a test. And the stage was set for me to continue on my path of discovery. | English | NL | d86121f8a6d9d13effa1d90d7ea49e54fe7198fa9bb2df4c2b9abe6436df7a72 |
I have been doing a lot of driving recently. On one of these drives, I was mulling over what to write about this week when a song bubbled to the top of the randomized playlist on my iPod. Before I knew it, I had hit repeat more times than I paid attention to, then realized that my decision had been made. Let me introduce you to three minutes of classic jazz perfection.
Artie Shaw is not one of the first names that will come up in a jazz discussion, even one that goes back into the older stuff. Shaw was among the top tier of bandleaders during the swing era of the 1930s and 40s. His big bands (there were at least five distinct versions over a fifteen year stretch) were among the better quality groups, as you might expect from one who paid more attention to the music than to the business. However, he also fronted an occasional small group that he called his Gramercy Five.
World War II interrupted a lot of successful careers, Shaw’s included. Like many other stars of the time, Shaw enlisted in the military. As expected, Shaw led a band for entertainment of troops in combat. Unlike most, though, Shaw took his band deep into combat areas in the Pacific Islands, in order to bring some R&R to the fighting men who needed it the most.
After Shaw mustered out of the service at age 34, he put together a new big band, and from within that band, chose five men to make up the new Gramercy Five. Drummer Lou Fromm (age 25) and bassist Morris Rayman (30) were both underrated players who really made the music move, but were not obtrusive about it. Guitarist Barney Kessel (21) was just starting a long and brilliant career.
Dodo Marmarosa on piano was just 19 and even then was a brilliant player who could seamlessly navigate both the older swing style and the emerging new style of bebop. Finally, there was Roy Eldridge (33) on trumpet, whose style was intense and a bit raspy. Eldridge was the most famous of the group, other than Shaw. “Little Jazz”, as he was known, had a difficult time as a black man touring with a white band, particularly when the band went on tour in the deep south.
On July 31, 1945, the group assembled at the RCA Victor recording studios and recorded this gem, which they called Scuttlebutt. You can listen to it here, which I urge you to do. The record begins with an intro which sort of introduces all of the players to the listener, and then off they go, with a moderately quick-tempo theme sketched out by Eldridge. This record is almost a perfect bridge between old-style swing and the newer, harder-edged bebop which was just beginning to spread. The result is a recording that will satisfy fans of either genre.
When I listen to an unfamiliar record, I like to listen to it several times, paying particular attention to a different instrument each time through. Even if you don’t do that, listen for the sublime piano work of the teenaged Marmarosa. He fills in with chords, but adds a percussive effect, where he sort of becomes part of the rhythm section too as he backs the other soloists. His balance of rhythmic kick and a light, sparkling right hand is just about perfect.
There are also solos by Shaw and Eldridge, broken up by a short solo of Kessel’s guitar. Shaw finds a way to finish each phrase by taking us in an unexpected direction. I don’t really like the clarinet, but Shaw has a way with it that makes you want more. Eldridge’s solo with his muted trumpet, while brief, lives up to the high standard that you expect from a Roy Eldridge performance. Too many leaders claim the biggest share of the playing time, overshadowing the sidemen. To Shaw’s credit, there is none of that here. In fact, it is arguable that Marmarosa is the star of this performance.
After a final repeat of the opening phrase, the record finishes with two piano chords which linger for nearly five seconds before disappearing into the mist. A good jazz record (and this one is) is like capturing lightning in a bottle. Skilled musicians will never play an improvisational piece the same way twice, just like the way a group of friends can never exactly repeat a conversation. This session is one for the ages, without a single weak performance from anyone in the group.
I have often joked (OK, half-joked) that the advent of the long play record ruined jazz. The old-timers who were kids in the era of the 78 rpm shellac disc developed an economy and an efficiency in their playing, which resulted in packing a whole lot of stuff into the three minute time limit dictated by the technology of the day. As you listen to this record, try to find a theme that is undeveloped, or something that is missing. This record has everything that should be there, and nothing that shouldn’t. I have heard longer versions of this piece, but I have never heard a better one.
Even the composition of the group was like quicksilver, as each of them soon went their own ways. Fromm the drummer was battling a drug problem even in 1945, and disappeared some time in the late ’40s, never to be heard from again. Rayman the bass player would go on to a career in the furniture business. And pianist Dodo Marmarosa would play less and less as mental instability overtook him. He died in a Veterans hospital in Pittsburgh in 2002, not having played professionally in decades.
But there were also success stories among the players. Roy Eldridge remained a jazz icon until his disability from a stroke in 1970, by which time he had amassed a huge legacy of recordings. Even then, he continued playing publicly until a heart attack in 1980. The most surprising turn was that of guitarist Barney Kessel, whose studio work led to his becoming a member of the now-famous Wrecking Crew, that informal group of top-flight studio musicians who played anonymously on literally hundreds of the biggest hit records of the 1960s.
Perhaps the strangest end was that of Artie Shaw himself. After self-producing some small group tracks in 1954 and failing to find a record company to release them, he put down his clarinet and never picked it up professionally again, despite the fact that he lived an active life until he died at the age of 94 in 2004. Shaw even occasionally fronted a band in his later years, that included a hired clarinet player.
I have gone on for quite a long time over a three minute record, have I not? However, in writing this piece, I have listened to this recording perhaps thirty times or more. I find something magical about taking in a three minute slice of 1945 that remains as relevant as ever. I will not hesitate in calling this one of the greatest jazz records that most people have never heard of. But you have heard of it now, and I hope that you will give it a listen. Or three. Now that I have mentioned it, that is exactly what I’m going to do. | English | NL | 9b0a7dabce64f9291a297ec54e79b97f8604c93998fbc91c7a15701f8c895a05 |
The bitterest irony is that, if we had not been winning the war, I could not have made the mistake that destroyed us.
The volunteer soldiers of the revolution marched across the land, muskets in hand, slowly pushing back the hated monarchists. It was a terrible business, the death of millions and the ruin of the land, but we were winning. As the leaves began to turn, we seized the king’s autumn palace.
There, amid the portraits, statues and tapestries, we found an automaton – the famed chess playing Turk. I knew the machine well, having studied it in detail when I was an engineer rather than a general. I knew its strategic brilliance could outmatch that of any man on our side. I was sick of the slaughter, sick of writing to the parents of the dead, sick of the smells of blood and burning buildings. In that automaton, I saw salvation. Its gifts could bring us a swifter, surer victory.
For a week I barely slept, my whole attention on adapting the machine. I turned my campaign map into a playing board; wrote punch cards instructing the machine in the qualities of different troops; extended the Turk’s arms to manoeuvre pieces around the map.
At last it was ready, its carved face staring blankly across its new game. It began to make moves. Each one was written down and turned into orders for our troops. Couriers galloped from the palace to every regiment on our lines.
The results were electrifying. The analytical genius of the Turk let us drive the royalists back. Entire armies were isolated and forced to surrender. I became complacent, not checking all the orders before they went out.
Then came the first mistake. To cut off the army of the Grand Duke, the Turk sent troops in a flanking manoeuvre through the lands of our neighbours. Foreign powers had been looking for an excuse to join the war, and now they had it. Soldiers poured in to bolster the royalists. For the first time, we were outnumbered.
In that moment I had the flash that I took for genius, arrogant fool that I was. In my mind, all the Turk needed was clearer instructions. If I could explain the politics of our war then it could take that into account. I created fresh punch cards explaining the revolution, our fight against monarchy, which neighbours clung to their own monarchs and must be handled with kid gloves. As I slid them into the machine, its demeanour changed, and in that moment of exultation I thought that I had saved us.
The Turk began to manoeuvre differently. Cautious around the flanks, decisive in the centre. We made great advances towards the capital while staying still on the borders. Diplomats rushed forth to negotiate peace with those neighbours who we could buy off. And on that playing board in the shape of our nation, the pieces of the republic drove a passage into the heart of monarchist lands.
As I have said, I was more engineer than general. I had only a creeping sense of unease before the hammer fell.
Monarchist forces formed up on the flanks of our advance. In a pincer movement led by veteran officers they cut off our main force. Deprived of supplies and of orders, our advance stalled. A month later, surrounded and starving, half the soldiers of the republic surrendered. Officers I had worked alongside through three glorious years, men who had trusted me and my machine with their lives, were hanged by the roadsides, their guts left trailing for the crows.
Never accept failure. This was the lesson my father beat into me as a child. So I returned to the innards of the Turk, desperate to understand what had gone wrong.
Meanwhile, the royalists advanced. Land we had liberated once more fell beneath the boots of the oppressors, free men and women made serfs once more.
The roar of cannons rattled the windows of the palace by the time I found the problem. There in the heart of the machine, the most fundamental rule of chess and yet one I had overlooked – protect the king. The Turk had its own principles, and the moment I had shown it what was at stake, it had turned against me. We had no king, and so it had ruined us to protect the other side.
In my rage, I raised a hammer, ready to smash the Turk’s placid face to pieces. But I had spent so long working on it that my interest had turned into an obsession close to love. Weeping, I lowered the hammer. This was my own fault. The rage was mine to receive.
As battle lines crumbled, we fled. Most went to the mountains, where they fight on now. But I took a different path. I took that hammer, and I took a knife, and I wrought ruin on my own face. When the bandages came off I was unrecognisable, one more scarred veteran of a bitter civil war. And so I was able to return to the capital, to serve in the machine shops as a lowly labourer.
At night, I smuggle parts from the shops to my lair in the sewers. I am building a new machine, using what I learnt from the Turk. This one will show me how to start a revolution we can win. It will lead the survivors out of the hills and the serfs out of their bonds. It will lead us to freedom.
When exhaustion takes over, I slump into a fitful sleep at my machine. In my dreams, I return to the autumn palace. In my dreams, the Turk plays on.
* * *
If you enjoyed this story then please share it with other people. And if you’d like more like it straight to your inbox every Friday, you can sign up to my mailing list. | English | NL | 4fe5f1db0d1c2116a296e2e34cca85976fd9a8628de3f4d61a9c6a933600df50 |
Later in life Churchill reflected on his years in the 4th Hussars. He recalled that the young officers envied the decorations and experiences of their senior colleagues and wondered whether their own chance to win glory would ever come.
The ever pro-active young Winston created his own opportunities by procuring permission to go to Cuba during his five months’ leave from the army. He also contracted I with the Daily Graphic for occasional reports.
He travelled to Cuba via New York. Although his mother warned he would find that city boring, his experience was quite the opposite. In America he first encountered a paper dollar, which he called “the most disreputable coin the world has ever seen.” Nor was he impressed by American newspapers:
(“… the essence of American journalism is vulgarity divested of truth”) but he found “that vulgarity is a sign of strength. A great, crude, strong, young people are the Americans—like a boisterous healthy boy among enervated but well-bred ladies and gentleman.”
When he finally saw Cuba he felt as if he had “sailed with Long John Silver and first gazed on Treasure Island.” On his twenty-first birthday he “…heard shots fired in anger, and heard bullets strike flesh or whistle through the air.” Later he was in more immediate personal danger with bullets passing within a foot of his head.
From Cuba Churchill planned to bring back a quantity of Havana cigars to lay down in the cellar of his mother’s house. In Cuba he also learned the merits of a midday siesta, concluding that “the rest and spell of sleep in the middle of the day refresh the human frame far more than a long night. We were not made by nature to work, or even to play, from eight o’clock in the morning till midnight.”
Back home there was some criticism of Churchill’s escapades. One newspaper suggested that “…sensible people will wonder what motive could possibly impel a British officer to mix himself up in a dispute with the merits of which he had absolutely nothing to do. Mr Churchill was supposed to have gone to the West Indies for a holiday, having obtained leave of absence from his regimental duties at the beginning of October for that purpose. Spending a holiday in fighting other peoples’ battles is rather an extraordinary proceeding even for a Churchill.” | English | NL | c44863eb80f21ed177f08a235d12e70a9763c4b784369c255acf46950bce0044 |
"The element of the wonderful is required in Tragedy. The irrational, on which the wonderful depends for its chief effects, has wider scope in Epic poetry, because there the person acting is not seen." Aristotle, Poetics, Part XXV
Mary Talbot, Mrs. Tom Talbot, that is, was lovely. She had red hair with green lights in it. Her skin was golden with a green cast and her eyes were green with little golden spots. (…) When she was excited, and she was excited a good deal of the time, her face was flushed with gold. Her great-great-great-great-great grandmother had been burned as a witch. John Steinbeck, Cannery Row, p. 142
The element of the wonderful, as Aristotle suggests, is a necessary part of Tragedy. While at this point in Poetics he is speaking of Epic Tragedy, poetry format rather than narrative or stage play, when speaking of story style of one such as Steinbeck, I would not hesitate to apply it and slap "poetry" labels upon it.
The above excerpt is one of several that Steinbeck slips in among the story of Mack and Doc and Cannery Row. It is an encapsulated metaphor as is the book, the party being, I suspect, life itself. In the brief chapter (24) that is the exclusive story of Mary Talbot and her husband Tom, we meet another idealist who believes deep in her heart that attitude is all. Despite the bill collectors, the joblessness with no near prospects, Mary believes that parties can cure Tom’s depression, his realistic view: "Mary came softly in, for the blue-gray color of his gloom had seeped out under the door and through the keyhole. She had a little bouquet of candy tuft in a collar of paper lace. (p. 25)
As a determined realist, my fantasy reserved for escape rather than to cotton-candy wrap the world as it exists, I seek the answer to the optimistic attitude that claims it offers opportunities closed to those with dour expressions, hopeless outlooks. A smile alone will never do it, but it may, by reason of its own false bravado and effect allow another person entry into one’s space and leave a glow within that thus inspires.
Action, though, action I agree (with Aristotle) is the Plot. That Diction, Thought and Character are only the modes. For plot is carried by action, and reaction is a direct response born of character and thought. | English | NL | 0ce63ef7cd0b38e7b7b80143eaf69476867faa9fedc2d28adb5d05c05b194025 |
In the Mishna at the beginning of the perek (61b), we learned that a non-Jew cannot participate in an eiruv unless he actually leases his rights to the courtyard to the Jews who are there. This is in contrast to a Jew who can turn over his rights to the other residents – even on Shabbat, if it had not been taken care of prior to Shabbat. Rabban Gamliel introduces the case of a Tzeduki, who seems to have the status of a non-Jew with regard to this halakha.
The Gemara on our daf distinguishes between a person who is not Shomer (Sabbath observant) privately and one who desecrates Shabbat publicly. The public Shabbat desecrator will be considered a non-Jew with regard to this law, and the residents of the courtyard will have to rent his share of the hatzer (courtyard) in order to create an eiruv for carrying on Shabbat.
The Gemara now relates that a certain person went out with a coral ring into the public domain, and it is prohibited to do so on. When he saw Rabbi Yehuda Nesia approaching, he quickly covered it. Although he was desecrating the, he did not want the Sage to see it. Rabbi Yehuda Nesia said: A person such as this, who is careful not to desecrate in public, may renounce his rights in his courtyard according to the opinion of Rabbi Yehuda.
(To understand why some jewelry cannot be worn on Shabbat, see Massekhet).
There are different girsa’ot – variant readings – in the Gemara as to whether the person in the story did this just one time or if he did this on a regular basis. What is clear, however, is that someone who is embarrassed about being seen by a religious leader desecrating will not be placed in the category of “Mehalel b’farhesya” (public desecrator of the).
On a biographical note, Rabbi Yehudah Nesi’ah was Rabbi Yehuda ha-Nasi’s grandson – the son of Rabban Gamliel. He was a first generation amora, who was contemporary with Rabbi Yohanan and Resh Lakish. He had the responsibility as Nasi for many years, and was the last of the Nesi’im who was a great Torah scholar and also headed the Sanhedrin at the same time. | English | NL | 7f47fc137e19993b0ea0e905a862755b1df4732dc08f715fa5e9bfef8d19629b |
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Joe Gans, byname of Joseph Gaines, (born November 25, 1874, Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.—died August 10, 1910, Baltimore), American professional boxer, known as the Old Master, who was perhaps the greatest fighter in the history of the lightweight division. Because he was black, he was compelled by boxing promoters to permit less-talented white fighters to last the scheduled number of rounds with him and occasionally to defeat him. He was also forced to fight at unnaturally low weights, and, perhaps as a result, he was so weakened that he contracted tuberculosis and died while a young man.
After 11 years of fighting, Gans won the world lightweight title by knocking out Frank Erne in one round at Fort Erie, Ontario, on May 12, 1902. On September 30, 1904, Gans fought a 20-round draw with the great welterweight champion Jersey Joe Walcott, who thereby retained his crown. Gans was already ill when he defended his lightweight championship against Battling Nelson at Goldfield, Nevada, on September 3, 1906. Gans, who gave one of his finest performances, won this match when Nelson deliberately fouled him in the 42nd round. In a return bout with Nelson in San Francisco on July 4, 1908, a weakened Gans was knocked out in 17 rounds.
Gans spent several months in Arizona in an unsuccessful attempt to arrest his disease. When he returned to Baltimore, Maryland, to die, his train was greeted at each station by groups of boxing fans, and his impending death was treated as a national calamity by the press. Gans was inducted into The Ring magazine’s Boxing Hall of Fame in 1954.
Learn More in these related Britannica articles:
boxing: Economic impetusOf African American boxers, Joe Gans won the world lightweight championship in 1902, and Jack Johnson became the first black heavyweight champion in 1908. Before and after Jack Johnson won his title, prejudice against black boxers was great. Gans was frequently forced by promoters to lose to or underperform…
Jersey Joe Walcott
Jersey Joe Walcott, American world heavyweight boxing champion from July 18, 1951, when he knocked out Ezzard Charles in seven rounds in Pittsburgh, Pa., until Sept. 23, 1952, when he was knocked out…
BoxingBoxing, sport, both amateur and professional, involving attack and defense with the fists. Boxers usually wear padded gloves and generally observe the code set forth in the marquess of Queensberry rules. Matched in weight and ability, boxing contestants try to land blows hard and often with their… | English | NL | e096be470d68af5a8a4aabe0116b71ad3a98457b66772c6fe79f4bb6a07e6724 |
How bad does it have to be for a mother to leave? It would have been easy to say that Kay O’Gorman just continued the cycle of her own neglect and abandonment, but she thought that too easy an excuse. It would have been easy to place the blame on her own traumatic childhood, on the early death of her mother, on her domineering but charismatic father. To escape this background, she married early but, like many such marriages, it was not a happy union. She hoped that children would change things, but they did not. Her circumstances grew ever more desperate. Kay fled. She formed a new relationship, but her sense of guilt at having abandoned her children oppressed her to the point that she herself developed problems with alcohol. It took a long time, but finally she sorted out her life. In ‘Where’s Your Mama Gone’? she writes with unflinching truth about her past and the motivations for her actions. It recalls an Ireland of casual cruelty, all-powerful authority figures, sexual ignorance and non-existent choice.
The product has been added to your shopping cart. | English | NL | 87bc246899530176bbbfad0fa2ad62434d1fb2326c52a451c2dd09db6c9ef991 |
are river dwelling Piranha Plants (obviously), which first appeared in New Super Mario Bros. Wii back in 2009. They are commonly found in jungle areas such as the Bramble Jungle, and can also be seen in Snake Block Tower. These enemies are always seen with a spiked ball which they keep suspended above their heads by blowing out air. When Mario gets close they bring the spike ball down to their lips and blow it upwards more slowly than normal, in an attempt to harm him.
Appearance: River Piranha Plants mainly appear to just be the head of an average Piranha Plant. Their heads are large, red and bulbous with whit spots all over them and full white lips. They don't have a stem, however they do have a kind of leafy base underneath them.
How to defeat them: River Piranha Plants can be taken care of rather easily with various methods. They can be killed with a fireball, with a Starman and also with a Koopa shell. It's also possible to hit their spiked ball and rid them of their weapon, rendering them helpless. This can be done with a Starman and with a shell as well.
Trivia: If the player gets rid of their spiked ball and leaves the River Piranha Plant alive, it will begin to panic and sweat, as it has no method of attacking anymore.
Was this guide helpful? | English | NL | 0161cf502e91cc06679b27a33ebbefb67b8ff5ed1ab57b4565e79888a0d19618 |
Thespis was living during the 6th century B.C. in Greece according to Aristotle, he was the first ever person to appear on stage and act as a character in a play. He was said to have introduced the principle ways of acting in chorus.
Whilst Thespis was a singer of dithyrambs which had mythology songs and stories of refrains. They had been accredited with a new style of acting and performing in singing as a individual person and different of characters with masks. The new style of acting was called tragedy this was a popular style and exponent of it. In 534 B.C. the best tragedy was at the city of Dionysia in Athens a which Thespis won the first documented competition.Upon his great victory the invention of the touring of theatrical plays had troupes travel to various different cities, costumes, mask and props made. | English | NL | 266e775ea6d42010ab8e1a2ca3ac698e4df8f9b61574adc7aeda24985492fa2c |
E. Jane Beckwith, M.F.A.
Associate Professor and Associate Chair
- Tuohy Hall, Room 314
M.F.A., Painting and Art History, Pratt Institute, 1970
B.A., Art and English, Seton Hill University, 1967
While my formal education from high school onward always focused on art, I always had other interests that lend relevance to the content of my work. I began teaching while still in graduate school in the 60s, and found that — along with being an artist — teaching was my true vocation. I feel very fortunate to have work I love, both my personal work as an artist and teaching at SJC. My family is important to me. I am close to my four siblings, though we are not geographically near. My son is also an art professor and we do a lot of planning curriculum together as, like me, he teaches photography (City College).
"Never get on the train and wish you'd bought a box."
To explain, this was something my mother recommended. In the early days of train travel when there was no food on the train, passengers could purchase a box meal to take with them. If you didn't have the foresight to provide something to eat, you went without.
But the meaning (she told us) had wide implications for "seizing the day" and having no regrets for something you didn't do. In life, don't "wish you bought a box." I live with that mantra! | English | NL | 89bcb181380ea88a59a67cb4f9e4be1027ce0f6ed8c78e3b82a9d6e0691c12f2 |
David Haines has been a practicing artist for over twenty years. In that time he has exhibited extensively both within Australia and internationally. He was born in London and lives and works in the Blue Mountains, NSW. His work covers a wide range of approaches and techniques including video, sound, sculpture, photography and painting. Since 2004 he has been working with aroma and has been developing an extensive library of aroma molecules. Haines has been represented in the Adelaide Biennale of Australian Art, 2004 Sydney Biennale, 2002 Tarrawarra Biennale 2012 and The Kuandu Biennale 2014.
David Haines is represented by Sarah Cottier Gallery | English | NL | c1543ab3e05bf584ea0784ce9c03cd4eafbdaecc8d4b9ac8a86e6e9db412528a |
By Will Barber – Taylor
Batman and Katana team up with Rex Mason (who has been classified as the “Golem of Old Gotham”) as they combat an increasing army of armoured thugs that have been terrorizing several parts of Old Gotham after they were supplied the high-tech armours that came from Stagg Enterprises. In addition, they also dodge Harvey Dent’s newly-created Special Crimes Unit which is ordered to take down both the armoured criminals and the vigilantes fighting them.
Following on from the previous episode, The Dark Knight of Gotham is in a bad state. As mentioned in the previous episode without Alfred grounding him, Batman seems to be losing control and getting harder on both himself and Katana. This plays out interestingly in this episode as we see Batman once again not only push himself to the limit but also those around him, Katana and Rex.
In the case of Rex this story serves as a way to go from his origin to actually being hero. His reason to be a hero is kind of flimsy. It essentially boils down to the fact that he had powers and he decided to use them for good. While this is possible as a motivation for becoming a superhero it does seem a bit convenient for the plot. The fact Rex seems to have been defending Old Gotham for a while suggests that Batman, without Alfred’s presence, has become a tad sloppy. In a way this episode helps cement why Alfred is so important to Batman in his crusade against crime. Without his direction and sympathy, The Caped Crusader seems to lose his purpose and to an extent loses his humanity. This makes Batman seem more of a grounded figure and shows that even though he is a superhero like Superman he still has weaknesses. This in turn makes us empathise with him because we realise he is simply trying to do his best while juggling his own life problems.
All in all, Monsters is a fine addition to the Beware the Batman canon. It shows us in greater depth the universe in which Batman inhabits as well showing him in an interesting light. As Katana calls Alfred, will Batman’s former butler and father figure be able to bring him to his senses? Tune in soon for the next review. Same Bat – Time, Same Bat Website! | English | NL | 210d122ca04f87024b4e6f091b9d541e9c6f76055e31818bec4e8ab2ba65fb52 |
The IT Crowd was to be a television comedy on NBC in the 2008-2009 television season, based on the British series of the same name and adapted for U.S. audiences. NBC filmed the studio audience portion of a pilot for an American version of The IT Crowd on February 16, 2007. The show was to be remade with an American cast, akin to The Office, although Richard Ayoade would reprises his role as Moss. Jessica St. Clair was to play Jen, the female lead, and Joel McHale was to play Roy. The show was picked up for a midseason debut in 2008 but was later pushed back to air during the 2008-2009 season. On September 13 2007, it was reported that NBC pulled the plug on the show.
|Release Date||Jun 30, 2008 (US)|
Note: CharacTour uses the TMDb API but is not endorsed or certified by TMDb. | English | NL | f6f17268a17ca7cdf64af9000b0b841be7aceafa766ccbcb3da56410ffe16bab |
Terentii Timofeevich is the proprietor of the waystation in the village of Lazarevo, and the husband of Irina Aleksandrovna, its hostess. The main purpose of the waystation is to house Yam messengers and to provide horses to passing messengers if needed. However, the waystation serves as a hostel for other travelers, or even for locals. He is the only known survivor (aside from Yaakov's mother, and possibly Plamen's grandmother Olga) to return to Trofimovka from captivity. Terentii is a man in his 50s, and slightly hunchbacked. He is businesslike, and willing to be flexible and discreet if it is in his interests. He has exchanged a night's stay for Plamen's magical berries on several occasions, rather than charging coin. He has also kept information about guests secret from the local authorities (Hegumen Yaakov) if they had paid him. He has a sense of pride about his connection to the Yam, and his knowledge of the Kochmak tongue. He is also proud of how many children he has. Terentii's current whereabouts are unknown, though he is still presumably running the waystation in Lazarevo. | English | NL | 701b089be06119647459d91c793a50c5b3527457702ffef0e7a5486def418924 |
Very important for us to know the new humanity that God is building in this world breaking down barriers that divide us and hurt us. Only Christ is the answer to this new humanity through the cross.
11 Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” (which is done in the body by human hands)— 12 remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ.14 For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15 by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, 16 and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. 17 He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit. | English | NL | f4f472b0bb532d284d8d22ae43bcdec76ca27b36cb930af5be15b651d0f11028 |
Buildings should come up in the proper form to actually get the best of them. It would be well worth the effort when the real results are seen through it. This could be how it reasons out to be something which needs to be paid a lot of attention. Go here https://resolutionprojects.co.nz/ for more information recladding.
Building renovations Auckland focuses a lot on this as a factor which could move on towards much more than what is expected through it. It should be deep within how the idea is fenced up and what would come out of it.
This can pave way towards many more things to come up in light of it and could cause a lot of variety to come from it. It is one way of ensuring that a lot has been achieved with regard to it and could form what leaves it to be very essential amongst everything else.
Renovation designs Auckland should be able to provide a lot of input with regard to this subject matter which is a major concern above all. It could be rationalized in such a manner which could leave everything else in suspension.
This should be handled quite well as it needs to be all of what goes along with it. Hence, there can be certain conditions which doesn’t seem to agree with it all. This is when you need to find out the many ways of going through it and to make it the most essential part of it. It could end up being much worse than what you expected from it. This would then make it quite possible as it would supply all what is required from that point of view. It might just be a measure of what takes up most of it and how it will become at the end of it all. This can moving towards all ends of it and would be provided just like that, as it needs all of the attention it deserves. There could be many more other ways of doing this when it is adjudged to be some of the best in all forms. It would be then be realized as something of a concern which needs to be addressed as soon as possible. Going along with the given designs would make it much easier to tackle this subject matter as it would really allow it to be much worth it all. This should be enough to prove to be much more beneficial than what is expected out of it and how it goes on to be. | English | NL | 39755c8d5c69bb07100dfca5ef7bc34c154362defe43e8b9dd3d3a888a3913dc |
It was a night like many others in town. The new moon was late in lightening the alleys and paths among houses and fields and my steps were unsteady because of the excessive amount of alcohol that I had drunk that evening.
“Tomorrow is another day” I said to myself, mentioning one of those sentences that settle in the collective subconscious. Sentences that belong to everybody and nobody at the same time, just like sayings.
The day after would certainly be another day too similar to every other day to awaken my interest. Lift the lever, lower the lever, lift the lever, lower the lever. My days were reduced to nothing else than that. Up to the point of feeling like a machine myself. And Liana, oh Liana was so sweet, but too busy with her career to be able to put up with an exhausted man, who makes love like a machine: up with your arms, push with your feet, put the piston inside, down with your arms, release your feet, take the piston out, up with your arms.
Maybe this was the reason why she wanted to be a career woman. She did not want to be like me. And that evening she was out for her umpteenth business dinner with managers and some privileged colleagues. Who knows, she was maybe flirting with the ones working in high positions. Career was everything for her, the cure-all, the solution for all problems.
For me it was alcohol. After work, if Liana was out, a flying visit to the market to buy a special offer drink, a walk into the night among the houses and fields, looking for a localized peace.
That night it was late when I went back home with no memory at all of the route I had walked along. Like many other times. Liana would not arrive before one or two o’clock. Though, that time I caught sight of her: she was sitting in a sports car near a handsome sinister type who wore a two thousand euro suit and looked as he felt gorgeous; the hateful whisp of hair brushed his forehead. A manager, of course. They were saying good bye near our home. It was not really a regular good bye, like with shaking hands or a kiss on the cheek. Unless tightening lips and rolling tongues were a new conventional way of saying good night.
My car was parked three places behind them. I reached it, opened the boot, left there the empty bottle, drew out the monkey wrench. I remember this very clearly. Then, I reached the two bodies skein getting closer and closer, more and more locked. I gazed for a second at my wife’s bare breasts, her turgid nipples ready to receive the man’s tongue. Then, I acted.
The monkey wrench smashed the glass to pieces. The man raised and turned towards me at first looking afraid, then self-important and arrogant. I seized his whisp of hair and dragged his neck along the broken glass. While my wife, frightened, rushed out of the car and ran home, the manager bled to death gargling disgusting screams.
I grabbed my wife by her hair while she was trying in vain to unlock the front door. Her expression was of mere terror, her beautiful breast dashed out of her bra, lit by a street lamp. Then, only a second. Lift the monkey wrench, lower the monkey wrench, lift the monkey wrench, lower the monkey wrench. A simple daily movement.
Today is a day like any other. I don’t drink anymore and I walk for an hour a day in the concrete courtyard avoiding other people’s glances, words and gestures. The rest of the time, I remain in my cell. I read. I sleep. I don’t study, I’m not interested. Each single day is too similar to the other days to awaken my interest. “Tomorrow is another day” I say to myself. A sentence that should be full of hope. But for me it’s only routine. Life sentence, they said, despite the fact that I have no reason to kill someone else. But it’s quite a relief not to be in the factory anymore and life here is not worse, pugged of the same dullness.
Nevertheless, before going to sleep at night in the weak light of the moon that comes through the bars, it’s with bitterness that I repeat to myself: tomorrow is another day. | English | NL | e289d89a968bda0a93f4a07a26932a2a779d28c95652e8a06529a2aed2692fd3 |
WHATS IN A NAME 2-3-19
What’s in a Name?
February 3, 2019
We are identified by our name. We use it on everything from driver’s licenses and legal documents, to name tags such as the one I wear at Evenglow, and items we wish to identify as our property or our work. When someone calls it, we respond. In fact, “there is scientific evidence to prove that hearing one’s own name tremendously impacts on the brain.”*
Yet we did not choose our original names, our parents did. Some of us may have been named to honor an ancestor. Others perhaps after someone famous that our parents admired, or maybe it was just because it was a popular name at the time. But often our names are chosen on the basis of their meaning. My original birthname was Renee, which means ‘reborn’. Then my adoptive parents named me Karen, which means ‘pure’. Isn’t that a beautiful picture of the new birth we have through Christ? When we are reborn through our faith in the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus, we are cleansed of our sin and become pure in God’s sight. My husband’s name, Edward, means ‘rich guardian’. And I do consider myself both richly blessed and well protected by him. Do you know what your name means? There are plenty of online sites that you can use if you do not know the meaning of your name and wish to look it up.
Sometimes we change our name. A woman’s last name changes when she gets married, although nowadays that is not always the case. Celebrities often change their name to something that will give them more popular appeal. I’m sure some of you know that Marilyn Monroe’s real name is Norma Jeane Mortenson, although she often used the last name of Baker, her mother’s married name from her first marriage, before becoming the famous Marilyn Monroe. Elton John even wrote a song about her called “Candle in the Wind – Goodbye Norma Jean”. But do you know Elton John’s real name? It is Reginald Kenneth Dwight.
When God changes a person’s name, it is usually to establish a new identity. In our first Scripture reading (Genesis 17:1-8,15-16) you heard how God changed Abram’s name to Abraham when he was 99 years old. Abram means ‘high father’ and Abraham means ‘father of a multitude’. You also heard how He also changed the name of Abraham’s wife from Sarai, which means ‘my princess’, to Sarah, which means ‘mother of nations’. He did this as part of His covenant to make their descendants his chosen people, of which we are among through our faith in Christ, as Galatians 3:29 tells us, “And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.” Do you remember what Sarah did when she was told she would have a son even though she herself was quite old? She laughed. Laughed at God himself! Therefore God told Abraham to name his son, (the child Sarah conceived and gave birth to in order to fulfill God’s promise) Isaac, which means ‘laughter’!
In our second Scripture reading, we are faced with a seeming conundrum. Jacob (whose name means “supplanter”, because he tried to take the place of his brother by stealing his birthright) wrestled with a ‘man’, who then changed his named to Israel (which means ‘having power with God’). Now remember, it was God who changed Abraham’s and Sarah’s names. So who is this ‘man’? The clue is right within the passages. Jacob understood that he had struggled with God, for he said in Genesis 32:30 "I have seen God face to face, and my life was spared.” Therefore, “many believe the person who fought and wrestled with Jacob was not (a man nor) an angel but the member of the Godhead who became the Son. He was the same one who had appeared to both Abraham (Genesis 12:7, 17:1, 18:1) and Isaac (Genesis 26:1, 24) in the form of a 'man.' He later would be known, after being born through a human, as Jesus Christ.”**
And it was also Jesus who changed the name of the disciple originally named Simon (which means ‘God has heard’) to Peter (which means ‘rock’). And yet after He had changed his name, Jesus still occasionally called Peter ‘Simon’. Why? “Probably because Simon sometimes acted like his old self instead of the rock God called him to be. The same is true for Jacob. God continued to call him ‘Jacob’ to remind him of his past and to remind him to depend on God’s strength.”***
What about us? God knew our human name even before we were born! The prophet Isaiah said, “Before I was born the Lord called me; from my mother’s womb he has spoken my name.” (Isaiah 49:1). Not only that, but someday God will give us a new name, too! Revelation 2:17 says that God will give to the one who is victorious a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it. And did you know that Jesus also has a name that only He knows? In Revelation 19, in an event that takes place at a time that is yet future, John mentions three names for Jesus: ‘Faithful and True’, ‘Word of God’, and ‘King of kings and Lord of lords’, but also says “He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself.” Philippians 2:9-11 says of our Lord Jesus, “God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Jesus’ name is above all other names! There is still so much about Jesus that we won’t be able to comprehend until we are united with Him in the heavenly kingdom. His glory and might is unfathomable by our limited human minds.
Indeed, all three persons of God have many names in the Bible. If I tried to list them all here in this sermon, you would no doubt start pointing to your watches! But suffice it to say, that God is so great, in such an infinite number of ways, that even the vast amount of descriptive names given him in the Bible do not do him justice.
Best of all, the Bible says that unlike the Jews in the Old Testament who were not allowed into the Holy of Holies in the temple, and not even allowed to speak the name of God, “Because of Christ and our faith in him, we can now come boldly and confidently into God's presence.” (Ephesians 3:12). Many people get excited over being in the presence of human celebrity, but don’t realize the immense privilege that is ours through Christ. We can come boldly and confidently into God’s presence. We can cry out “Abba, Father” to our heavenly Father as a child would cry out to their daddy. And we can cry out to the one who has the name above all names, Jesus. Amen.
"Names of God" (Laurell Hubick)
"Just Say Jesus" (7eventh Time Down) | English | NL | e6e999e4903e8fd37ac5b00714f674451e1752f5af2ed26047d8c6361cf8afeb |
To My Mother, On Her Birthday
First, let's be honest - I cried straight through this layout. It is difficult, and I am sure that is no surprise, to be so far from my mother while she fights this illness, and it is even more difficult, as I am sure once again it is no surprise, to be far from her as she celebrates another year of life. Birthdays seem different when life feels more fragile than before.
This layout contains a letter I wrote to her, but wanted to send with a bit more flourish than simply pen and ink on paper. Beyond the words, there's so little to the design, just a few large alphas and an almost full page image. For a woman who doesn't like a lot of fuss, but who still loves beautiful, simple things, I knew that the page needed no more and no less than this.
The one touch I knew it needed was a few stitches, this time only to affix the vellum journaling to the photo, but a nod to my mother's love of making, a generation of women who use their hands to sew, knit, cut, glue, tape, and build their way to a life full of handmade beauty.
If you were here, I’d give you snapdragons just like these, and we’d have a tea party like when I was little, and I’d listen to all your grand plans because you always have grand plans. If you were here, I’d remind you that you look nowhere near your age in numbers, and that even though treatment has robbed you of so much, it has yet to capture your spirit, and I doubt it ever will – you’re much too feisty for that, a power no illness can match. If you were here, I would tell you in person about how wonderful and scary these last few weeks have been as I open myself up to new adventures, and how every time I look down at my hands as I make something new, I see your hands, Grandma Bess’s hands, Michelle’s hands, and I know I am doing what I am supposed to do. We are makers, women who craft and create and curate our lives with the scraps we wrestle from the world around us. If you were here I would give you this stack of clothes I’ve been meaning to send, and you would tell me once more that your closet is made up of all my old clothes, and I would look at you, so much skinnier than I am used to, still, and I would be glad that some part of your comfort would come from something that once comforted me. If you were here, we’d eat chocolate cake, even after your birthday was over, and we’d laugh about how much we ate after we swore we would eat no more. If you were here, we’d watch ridiculous movies, rationalizing loudly with the character’s poor choices, but we would love them just the same. If you were here, I would tell you that I wish we were closer, but I know we are both where we need to be. If you were here, I would cry and you would cry, I would laugh and you would laugh, and in the middle of all that we would remember that no amount of miles could ever diminish the love of a mother and a daughter, so very different, and so very much the same. If you were here, I would say Happy Birthday with a hug, but instead, with the reality of miles that will continue to span the space between us, all I have to offer you is a collection of these words, a bouquet of lines meant only to say I love you, and I am made better each day because of what you, as my mother, taught me with your actions and your words. Happy Birthday to the only woman who can balance the mouth of a sailor with the heart of saint, and who still makes the very best apple pie of all time.
Happy 55th, mom! | English | NL | a52d7b6a53dca12f5c63c915d9b7e216c82583b6770e0dafeb0b4c08f35b784a |
West Fitzroy Apartments
The West Fitzroy Apartments are located in central Christchurch. The site contains two separate buildings, a 100 vehicle five storey car park building and a seven storey, 70 unit apartment building.
The car park and main building structure were completed in February 1998. Fit out of the apartments followed the main building structure and was completed in May 1998.
Both buildings were designed and constructed using the tilt slab concrete building method. West Fitzroy was unique at its time as the tilt slab method had not yet been used to construct seven storey buildings.
Patented innovative features and time and budget benefits make this a unique project | English | NL | 42c9a06b64c65f6aec79e522b2666ae0ac5a90f1b3651555f2b212a1eda20fd5 |
Sher Shah’s Work
Sher Shah was one of the most distinguished rulers of north India who had done a number of developmental works (along with well-planned administrative works). His works can be studied under the following heads:
Sher Shah re-established law and order across the length and breadth of his empire.
Sher Shah placed considerable emphasis on justice, as he used to say, “Justice is the most excellent of religious rites, and it is approved alike by the king of infidels and of the faithful“.
Sher Shah did not spare oppressors whether they were high nobles, men of his own tribe or near relations.
Qazis were appointed at different places for justice, but as before, the village panchayats and zamindars also dealt with civil and criminal cases at the local level.
Sher Shah dealt strictly with robbers and dacoits.
Sher Shah was very strict with zamindars who refused to pay land revenue or disobeyed the orders of the government.
A number of villages comprised a pargana. The pargana was under the charge of the shiqdar, who looked after law and order and general administration, and the munsif or amil looked after the collection of Land revenue.
Above the pargana, there was the shiq or sarkar under the charge of the shiqdar-i-shiqdran and a munsif-i-munsifan.
Accounts were maintained both in the Persian and the local languages (Hindavi).
Sher Shah apparently continued the central machinery of administration, which had been developed during the Sultanate period. Most likely, Sher Shah did not favor leaving too much authority in the hands of ministers.
Sher Shah worked exceptionally hard, devoting himself to the affairs of the state from early morning to late at night. He also toured the country regularly to know the condition of the people.
Sher Shah’s excessive centralization of authority, in his hands, has later become a source of weakness, and its harmful effects became apparent when a masterful sovereign (like him) ceased to sit on the throne.
The produce of land was no longer to be based on the guess work, or by dividing the crops in the fields, or on the threshing floor rather Sher Shah insisted on measurement of the sown land.
Schedule of rates (called ray) was drawn up, laying down the state’s share of the different types of crops. This could then be converted into cash on the basis of the prevailing market rates in different areas. Normally, the share of the state was one-third of the produce.
Sher Shah’s measurement system let peasants to know how much they had to pay to the state only after sowing the crops.
The extent of area sown, the type of crops cultivated, and the amount each peasant had to pay was written down on a paper called patta and each peasant was informed of it.
No one was permitted to charge from the peasants anything extra. The rates which the members of the measuring party were to get for their work were laid down.
In order to guard against famine and other natural calamities, a cess at the rate of two and half seers per bigha was also levied.
Sher Shah was very solicitous for the welfare of the peasantry, as he used to say, “The cultivators are blameless, they submit to those in power, and if I oppress them they will abandon their villages, and the country will be ruined and deserted, and it will be a long time before it again becomes prosperous“.
Sher Shah developed a strong army in order to administer his vast empire. He dispensed with tribal levies under tribal chiefs, and recruited soldiers directly after verifying their character.
The strength of Sher Shah’s personal army was recorded as:
o 150,000 cavalry;
o 25,000 infantry armed with matchlocks or bows;
o 5,000 elephants; and
o A park of artillery.
Sher Shah set up cantonments in different parts of his empire; besides, a strong garrison was posted in each of them.
Sher Shah also developed a new city on the bank of the Yamuna River near Delhi. The sole survivor of this city is the Old Fort (Purana Qila) and the fine mosque within it.
One of the finest nobles, Malik Muhammad Jaisi (who had written Padmavat in Hindi) was the patron of Sher Shah’s reign.
Akbar’s Administrative System
Though Akbar adopted Sher Shah’s administrative system, he did not find it that much beneficial hence he had started his own administrative system.
In 1573, just after returning from Gujarat expedition, Akbar paid personal attention to the land revenue system. Officials called as ‘karoris’ were appointed throughout the north India. Karoris were responsible for the collection of a crore of dams (i.e. Rs. 250,000).
In 1580, Akbar instituted a new system called the dahsala; under this system, the average produce of different crops along with the average prices prevailing over the last ten (dah) years were calculated. However, the state demand was stated in cash. This was done by converting the state share into money on the basis of a schedule of average prices over the past ten years.
Akbar introduced a new land measurement system (known as the zabti system) covering from Lahore to Allahabad, including Malwa and Gujarat.
Under the zabti system, the shown area was measured by means of the bamboos attached with iron rings.
The zabti system, originally, is associated with Raja Todar Mal (one of the nobles of Akbar), therefore, sometimes, it is called as Todar Mal’s bandobast.
Todar Mal was a brilliant revenue officer of his time. He first served on Sher Shah’s court, but later joined Akbar.
Besides zabti system, a number of other systems of assessment were also introduced by Akbar. The most common and, perhaps the oldest one was ‘batai’ or ‘ghalla-bakshi.’
Under batai system, the produce was divided between the peasants and the state in a fixed proportion.
The peasants were allowed to choose between zabti and batai under certain conditions. However, such a choice was given when the crops had been ruined by natural calamity.
Under batai system, the peasants were given the choice of paying in cash or in kind, though the state preferred cash.
In the case of crops such as cotton, indigo, oil-seeds, sugarcane, etc., the state demand was customarily in cash. Therefore, these crops were called as cash-crops.
The third type of system, which was widely used (particularly in Bengal) in Akbar’s time was nasaq.
Most likely (but not confirmed), under the nasaq system, a rough calculation was made on the basis of the past revenue receipts paid by the peasants. This system required no actual measurement, however, the area was ascertained from the records.
The land which remained under cultivation almost every year was called ‘polaj.’
When the land left uncultivated, it was called ‘parati’ (fallow). Cess on Parati land was at the full (polaj) rate when it was cultivated.
The land which had been fallow for two to three years was called ‘chachar,’ and if longer than that, it was known as ‘banjar.’
The land was also classified as good, middling, and bad. Though one-third of the average produce was the state demand, it varied according to the productivity of the land, the method of assessment, etc.
Akbar was deeply interested in the development and extension of cultivation; therefore, he offered taccavi (loans) to the peasants for seeds, equipment, animals, etc. Akbar made policy to recover the loans in easy installments.
Akbar organized and strengthened his army and encouraged the mansabdari system. “Mansab” is an Arabic word, which means ‘rank’ or ‘position.’
Under the mansabdari system, every officer was assigned a rank (mansab). The lowest rank was 10, and the highest was 5,000 for the nobles; however, towards the end of the reign, it was raised to 7,000. Princes of the blood received higher mansabs.
The mansabs (ranks) were categorized as:
The word ‘zat’ means personal. It fixed the personal status of a person, and also his salary.
The ‘sawar’ rank indicated the number of cavalrymen (sawars) a person was required to maintain.
Out of his personal pay, the mansabdar was expected to maintain a corps of elephants, camels, mules, and carts, which were necessary for the transport of the army.
The Mughal mansabdars were paid very handsomely; in fact, their salaries were probably the highest in the world at the time.
A mansabdar, holding the rank of:
o 100 zat, received a monthly salary of Rs. 500/month;
o 1,000 zat received Rs. 4,400/month;
o 5,000 zat received Rs. 30,000/month.
During the Mughal period, there was as such no income tax.
Apart from cavalrymen, bowmen, musketeers (bandukchi), sappers, and miners were also recruited in the contingents.
Akbar followed the system of the Subhah, the pargana, and the sarkar as his major administrative units.
Subhah was the top most administrative unit, which was further sub-divided into Sarkar. Sarkar (equivalent to district) was constituted of certain number of parganas and pargana was the collective administrative unit of a few villages.
The chief officer of subhah was subedar.
The chief officers of the sarkar were the faujdar and the amalguzar.
The faujdar was in-charge of law and order, and the amalguzar was responsible for the assessment and collection of the land revenue.
The territories of the empire were classified into jagir, khalsa and inam. Income from khalsa villages went directly to the royal exchequer.
The Inam lands were those property, which were given to learned and religious men.
The Jagir lands were allotted to the nobles and members of the Royal family including the queens.
The Amalguzar was assigned to exercise a general supervision over all types of lands for the purpose of imperial rules and regulations and the assessment and collection of land revenue uniformly.
Akbar reorganized the central machinery of administration on the basis of the division of power among various departments.
During the Sultanate period, the role of wazir, the chief adviser of the ruler, was very important, but Akbar reduced the responsibilities of wazir by creating separate departments.
Akbar assigned wazir as head of the revenue department. Thus, he was no longer the principal adviser to the ruler, but an expert in revenue affairs (only). However, to emphasize on wazir’s importance, Akbar generally used the title of diwan or diwan-i-ala (in preference to the title wazir).
The diwan was held responsible for all income and expenditure, and held control over khalisa, jagir and inam lands.
The head of the military department was known as the mir bakhshi. It was the mir bakhshi (and not the diwan) who was considered as the head of the nobility.
Recommendations for the appointments to mansabs or for the promotions, etc., were made to the emperor through the mir bakhshi.
The mir bakhshi was also the head of the intelligence and information agencies of the empire. Intelligence officers and news reporters (waqia-navis) were posted in all regions of the empire and their reports were presented to the emperor’s court through the mir bakhshi.
The mir saman was the third important officer of Mughal Empire. He was in-charge of the imperial household, including the supply of all the provisions and articles for the use of the inmates of the harem or the female apartments.
The judicial department was headed by the chief qazi. This post was sometimes clubbed with that of the chief sadr who was responsible for all charitable and religious endowments.
To make himself accessible to the people as well as to the ministers, Akbar judiciously divided his time. The day started with the emperor’s appearance at the jharoka of the palace where large numbers of people used to assemble daily to have a glimpse of the ruler, and to present petitions to him if required so.
In 1580, Akbar classified his empire into twelve subas (provinces) namely:
o Malwa and
Each of these subah consisted of a governor (subadar), a diwan, a bakhshi, a sadr, a qazi, and a waqia-navis.
CGPCS Notes brings Prelims and Mains programs for CGPCS Prelims and CGPCS Mains Exam preparation. Various Programs initiated by CGPCS Notes are as follows:-
- CGPCS Mains Tests and Notes Program
- CGPCS Prelims Exam - Test Series and Notes Program
- CGPCS Prelims and Mains Tests Series and Notes Program
- CGPCS Detailed Complete Prelims Notes | English | NL | 4932dac98d2758225a4b577fddadf6efc2df00ac6039078f06e613a531a3b65e |
Shabbat Bible Study for 8June2019
©2019 Mark Pitrone and Fulfilling Torah Ministries
Year 1 Sabbath 10
Genesis 12:1-13:18 – Joshua 24:3-18 – Psalm 9 – Hebrews 11:1-10
B’reishith 12:1-20 – This Sidrah marks a SEA CHANGE. What went before was a history of mankind in general as the descendants of Adam after his fall and their general descent over 10 generations into greater and greater sin until Elohim had to destroy all air breathing flesh due to the deliberate debasing of the original creation by man’s genetic manipulation; and then the foolish attempt of Nimrod and his ilk to build a sort of siege-works for the purpose of conquering and dethroning Elohim and the rest of the 10 generations until the birth of a man who would agree to trust Y’hovah Elohenu and obey him. The name of the man of that 10th generation from Noach was Avram ben Terakh. Here’s what Chumash says in the prefatory paragraphs of this Sidrah (pp.60-61). In a spiritual sense, Avram was already Avraham – in much the same way that Yeshua was already ‘slain from the foundation of the world’.
And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him (anti-Messiah), whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. (Revelation of John 13:8)
In V.1 Y’hovah told Avram to leave everything he knows behind; his country, his kin and his father’s house – his LIFE; and to follow Y’hovah to a land that would belong to him and his seed in perpetuity. If Avram would do this, Y’hovah would bless him by making him a great nation, a man of righteous renown and a blessing to his seed and to those around him. Avram’s leaving everything he held dear in this life; his brother Nachor and his kin, his father, his very self; behind and trusting Y’hovah to deliver on his promise before he saw any of the fruits of that promise, Y’hovah was able to bless every step Avram took in obedience to him. Lot was Avram’s nephew, the son of Haran who died in Terach’s face in our portion last week. In 14.14, Lot is referred to as Avram’s brother. I think that Avram was raising Lot in Haran’s stead as if he were his kinsman-redeemer. As such, Lot might be seen as Avram’s first or perhaps his favored talmid in the faith of Y’hovah, like Sha’ul was to Gamaliel or Kefa was to Yeshua. It COULD be that the “‘souls’ they had gotten” in Haran were Avram’s talmidim [I think they were] and some of the 318 “‘trained’ servants” Avram took to rescue Lot in 14.14 [that word ‘trained’ is H2593, chaniyk, literally ‘initiated’, from the root H2596 chanak חנך, to habituate, or immerse in activity for a specific act].
Avram took all his stuff, Lot and all his talmidim with him to go to Cana’an, and they all came into Cana’an. It was at this time that Avram became the Ivri, he who crossed over from trusting his ‘self’ to trusting Y’hovah and worked out that faith by crossing out of his past life in Shinar/Kasdim (Chaldea), crossing Euphrates, which was the physical boundary between Cana’an and Kasdim [as it would be in future between David and early Assyria (2Sam.8.1-15) and between Rome and Parthia], and crossed into his inheritance from Y’hovah.
Vv.6-20 – Avram crossed Yarden and came to Shechem (Sichem – KJV), the same place that Ya’acov came to first in the land when he returned with his family from Laban’s home near Haran. I was of the impression that Shechem’s father had named the place after his son, like Ca’in had named Chanok for his son. As it turns out it was called Shechem over 100 years before Ya’acov purchased a piece of ground there (ch.33). Moreh means rain, so when Avram came into the land, the plain was ‘well watered’, which explains why Ya’acov would want to own some land there to graze his sheep. If you’ll remember, when Jake sent Joe to find his brothers, Joe went to Shechem. I assume it was the family’s summer pastureland and perhaps had been for a century by then. Cana’ani were the inhabitants when Avram came into town, and the Hivites (a clan of Cana’ani) were there when Jake came home from Haran.
In v.7 Y’hovah appeared to Avram and gave him the land. Chumash’s note says that Y’hovah is incorporeal and the word ‘appear’ is metaphorical. As you already know, I think that every place in scripture where Y’hovah speaks face to face with a patriarch or other significant actor it is actually a post-resurrection appearance of Y’hovah Yeshua in time. Avram built an altar to Y’hovah in gratitude that he would have a seed to whom to give the land. Isn’t it interesting, if my thinking is correct, that the one who spoke to Avram and to whom Avram made offering was the very seed that was promised and for which promise Avram made the offering.
Now to Avraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Mashiyach. (Galatians 3:16)
If my twisted thinking is correct, the resurrected Y’hovah Yeshua haMashiyach told Avram that he would have a seed and knew it to be so because HE was that very seed.
Avram moved southward and pitched his camp between Bethel and Ai and built a 2nd altar to Y’hovah and called on his name there. Chumash’s translation says that he ‘called out in the Name of Y’hovah’ (on pg.63). From there Avram began a descent into self that nearly cost him everything. Avram was a human being, not much different from you and me. He had foibles and imperfections of character that he had to overcome. He was pretty new at this whole ‘trust explicitly in Y’hovah’ kind of faith and had bouts of doubt and unbelief, even as we do. His descent into Egypt is one of those bouts that Y’hovah had to win for him and which began to build that implicit and explicit trust.
As he went down to Egypt, he asked Sarai to tell people that they were brother and sister, not husband and wife, because he knew the wickedness of Egypt and that, being that she was more beautiful than Wayne’s World’s model of “Babus Majoris”, they might kill him to get to her without delay. What he didn’t count on was that she was SUCH a major babe [I infer that at age 65 she was the most beautiful woman any one of them had ever seen] that they thought, “What a QUEEN she’d make!” and they took her for Paroh’s harem. NOW what is Avram going to do?!
Well Paroh decided to ask the bride price for her from her ‘brother’ and offered all the ducks and pigs and chickens he could find for her (for some reason, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young’s Marrakesh Express came to mind). Avram had to be beside himself with worry about how he was going to tell Paroh that Sarai was his WIFE and that he could not have her. Here was a guy who could actually do what Avram had feared without worry of any legal reprisal! But Y’hovah had other plans.
Y’hovah laid various and sundry plagues on all of Paroh’s house and belongings, including the ducks, pigs and chickens (to carry on the metaphor) and then somehow showed Paroh WHY the plagues were visited on his house [do you think Y’hovah Yeshua appeared to Paroh?] – he’d dared to attempt to purchase Avram’s wife from him as if she was a common slave and not the budding TRUE princess she was. In about 24 years, when Avraham and Sarah try this again with Abimelech, the plagues are made more explicitly known, but I assume they were of the same type and severity. So Paroh forbad anyone to molest Avram and Sarai in any way and sent them off towards home with everything and everyone they’d brought with them AND all the ducks, pigs and chickens (to complete the metaphor) that Paroh had offered for Sarai. Q&C
B’reishith 13 – So Avram began an ‘aliyah’ from Egypt back toward haAretz along with Lot. No matter where on earth you are; even if it’s the pinnacle of Mt. Everest; you always go up toward Yerushalayim, which is the holiest place on earth, regardless the political situation there (Chumash note to v.1, pg.65). Why wasn’t Lot mentioned in “The Egyptian Affair”? I haven’t the slightest, except that he had nothing to do with the narrative. Perhaps Lot had made Sarai’s true identity known to Paroh behind the scenes? What scripture tells us is that Lot came out of Egypt a very well-to-do man, like his uncle Avram; so much so that quarrels arose between Lot’s and Avram’s herdsmen. Avram tried to calm the disputes, but it looks as though Lot’s herdsmen wanted to have Avram’s stuff, too. So in v.9 Avram gives Lot the choice of the land [none of it was scrub land] and the choice was probably really hard to take; the beautiful hills or the beautiful plains and river valley. At this point, there is nothing to indicate the future of these plains and the towns that controlled them (we’ll discuss these towns and their kings next week, Y’hovah willing and the creek don’t rise). I think there MAY be a copyist error in v.10, because Zoar is one of the cities of the plain, the one to which Lot will escape in ch.19, while there was a city in Egypt called Zoan that bordered the eastern frontier of Egypt proper. It was the northern capital of Rameses on the eastern, or Tanitic (Zoan was where Tanis is), branch of the Nile Delta and was undoubtedly very fertile and ‘well watered’. The reference to Lot and the copyists change of a nun to a resh based on the knowledge of the destruction of the cities of the plain is a simple mistake to make and understandable. I am not saying there IS a mistake, only that one of this sort would understandably be an easy one to make.
V.10 begins the outward sign of Lot’s descent to what ended up being condoning and almost approval of the sinful lifestyles in the cities of the plain. Kefa speaks of the vexation of ‘just [tzaddik] Lot’ in 2Pe.2
And delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked: (II Peter 2:7)
Vexation is an uncommon word these days, so let me give you Noah Webster’s 1828 definition [I love W1828, because it uses scripture to illustrate when it can]:
1. The act of irritating; or of troubling, disquieting and harassing;
5. Afflictions, great troubles, severe judgments;
Y’hovah shall send upon thee cursing, vexation, and rebuke, in all that thou settest thine hand unto for to do, until thou be destroyed, and until thou perish quickly; because of the wickedness of thy doings, whereby thou hast forsaken me. (Deuteronomy 28:20)
WOW! Does that not describe what happened to Lot over the 23+ years of his vexation? The first step we see is that he looked at the land. Now, Lot had a large entourage of both livestock and servants, so he could leave the livestock in the servant’s hands and live where he chose to live, whether on his property away from town or in town. Lot took his choice of the plains of Yarden in v.11 and moved eastward [towards Kasdim/Shinar – backsliding]. Chumash has an interesting note on this choice on pg.67. That is an interesting application of the word kedem, the Ancient One. The sages are saying that Lot deliberately chose to leave the protection of Y’hovah and actively moved to the cities of the plain, particularly ‘pitching his tent toward’ Sedom, which was the next step in his vexation. When it says ‘pitched his tent toward’ in v.12, I infer that it means that his tent’s door opened toward Sedom; metaphorically welcoming Sedom into his tent; and it had to be the first thing of the world that he saw every morning. V.13 tells us how wicked were the men of cities of the plain. We’ll have to keep that in mind for next week’s study.
But v.12 also tells us that Avram dwelt in Cana’an, as Y’hovah had commanded him. Y’hovah gave that command again in v.17, but in between, in v.14-16, he reiterated the blessing he’d given Avram in
1 Now Y’hovah had said unto Avram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’ house, unto a land that I will shew thee: 2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: 3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed… 7 And Y’hovah appeared unto Avram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto Y’hovah, who appeared unto him. (B’reishith 12.1-3, 7)
Except NOW, Lot was not with him and there could be no question that Avram’s seed did NOT include Lot, even if Avram WAS his kinsman-redeemer, as we inferred earlier. Lot was NOT Avram’s heir, as the sages think Lot’s servants thought and as they think was possibly the source of the troubles between Avram’s and Lot’s servants in v.7. Chumash has a comment that makes sense to me on the phrase, ‘as the dust of the earth/land’ in v.16 (pp.67-68). Then, Chumash’s last comment in this parsha, on the promise/command of Y’hovah in v.17, is also quite good (pg.68).
In v.18, Avram builds his 3rd altar to Y’hovah in this parsha. It seems to me that Avram wants a good altar wherever he resides on which to offer thanksgiving offerings to Y’hovah. Avram had a character that was thankful for everything he received from Y’hovah, and he acknowledged that everything he had was a gift from Y’hovah. Perhaps the major difference between Avram and Lot was Avram’s acknowledgment of whence all his blessings came. Q&C
Joshua 24:3-18 – Vv.1-2 have Yehoshua telling Yisrael, by Y’hovah’s command, that their fathers dwelt on ‘the other side of the flood’ and then he defined what that meant; to the east of Euphrates in the land of Shinar and the Chaldees. And then he went into a brief history of Avraham’s family, including how he’d ‘led Avraham’ as he fulfilled the commandment of Y’hovah to walk the entire land of Cana’an and received Y’hovah’s promise of a multiplied seed in Yitzhak. Then Yitzhak received the same blessing as Avraham, when he multiplied his ‘spiritual’ seed in Ya’acov, and his physical seed in both Ya’acov and Esav. Then Ya’acov received the same blessing in his multiplied seed through his 12 sons and his one named daughter, Dinah (whose child by Shechem may have been Asenath, Yoseph’s wife). Every succeeding generation of Ya’acov has proven Y’hovah’s blessing of Avraham and his seed until now they ARE almost as the stars of the heavens in number. But the time is coming that we will fully be even more numerous that the grains of dust on the earth, sand of the sea, or the stars of the heavens – in the olam haba, wherein dwelleth righteousness.
Y’hovah gave Esav Mount Seir as a possession and then sent Ya’acov down to Egypt to become a nation. Then he brought them out of Egypt, delivered them through the Red Sea where he destroyed Paroh and his armored cavalry, brought Israel through the Wilderness Adventure and wiped out the Amorites (giants) and the Midianites, would not allow Bilaam to curse Yisrael at Balak, king of Moav’s, instigation, but blessed them through Bilaam’s mouth.
Then he brought Yisrael into Cana’an through the Yarden dry, as he had the Red Sea, and delivered Yericho, all the fighting from Egypt to Yericho without a casualty. Then he delivered the 7 nations of the Cana’ani into Yisrael’s hands and gave them the land and the cities that had been built by the nations that had been driven out before Yisrael and all the produce of that land the previous inhabitants had sown.
And then, in v.14 Y’hovah gets to the payoff. After he’d done all this for Yisrael, he wanted basically ONE thing in return from them; their undivided loyalty and obedience. Y’hovah wants us to forget the gods our fathers had served in Shinar and Egypt and to serve only him. Then Yehoshua leaves off with thus saith Y’hovah and speaks for himself (Mark paraphrase); If you think it evil to serve Y’hovah then YOU choose whom you will serve, but as for me and MY HOUSE, WE will serve Y’hovah!
The people came back with one voice, saying (another Mark paraphrase), “Elohim forbid that we should serve any other Elohim than Y’hovah, for it is Y’hovah who brought us up out the Egyptian house of bondage, performed all those signs before our eyes and gave us this land. We will serve Y’hovah, as well, for HE is our Elohim.”
How about us? Is Y’hovah our Elohim? Do we serve any other gods that are no god? On what do we spend our wealth? On what do we spend our health? Do we study to show ourselves approved of Y’hovah, or do we strive for the approbation of mortal men? Q&C
Psalm 9 – This is a psalm of praise after the death of one of David’s adversaries. I think it may be after the death of Avshalom, because the meaning of the Hebrew words muth labayn is ‘death of the son’, and Avshalom was David’s most favored son – THE son whom David may have been hoping would be Melech Mashiyach. If this were true, David’s piteous wailing over Absalom death would be MUCH more understandable than if he’d just put down an insurrection by one of his less favored sons or an usurper. If all the foregoing were true, this psalm would have been offered after David had recovered his wits about him and understood the vileness of his son, Avshalom.
Vv.1-5 show David’s thanks for Y’hovah’s protection in the troubles he and his kingdom had suffered at the hands of the enemy; how Y’hovah had delivered David once again out the hands of those who would do him dirt because Y’hovah’s judgment is always according to his righteousness and not men’s desires. In vv.6-8, David addresses his enemy directly, telling him that, even though he destroyed whole cities in his rebellion against Y’hovah’s anointed king, Y’hovah would be the one to bring him to naught by his righteous judgment.
In vv.9-10, those who take their refuge in Y’hovah know his name and trust him because they know that he will not forsake any who seek him. Do you see that if you are seeking him, you will trust in his Name and take refuge in it? That Name is Y’hovah, אֶֽהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶֽהְיֶה, Eh’yeh asher eh’yeh, I am THAT I am, which is a profound statement of eternity. In vv.11-12, those who have humbly placed their trust in Y’hovah’s Name have also become partakers in his eternity, because he has chosen to remember them and when he does that he has made them so that they will continue with him. Only when he chooses to forget something does it cease to be – like all your sins (Jer.31.34).
In vv.13-14, David rejoices in Y’hovah’s salvation by lifting him up from the gates of death to the gates of the daughters of Zion;
Roni, Roni, bat Tzion! Rejoice! Rejoice! Daughter of Zion!
Hareu, Yisrael! Shout aloud, Yisrael!
Simchi! Valtzi! Sing! Rejoice!
B’chol lev, With ALL your heart,
Bat Yerushalayim! Daughter of Jerusalem! [Zecharyah 10.7]
Vv.15-17 show what the unfaithful to Y’hovah can expect. The gins that the wicked set against Y’hovah’s people will be their own undoing. They will fall into their own traps at Y’hovah’s direction and instigation; he will actually ‘put hooks in their jaws’ and spring their own traps on them (Ez.38-39 – Gog uMagog). The word Higgaion means ‘to murmur’ with the implication of a low whisper or to speak under the breath. It is used as a musical notation here, according to Strong’s. It is used, according to the Artscroll rabbis, to emphasize the ‘Selah’, stop and think about the statement in v.16 squared [think about what you are thinking about – REALLY chew on it], ‘the wicked is snared by the work of his own hands. May it be so, soon and eternally, for the Bush/Obamanistas.
The oppressed by the wicked; in our day, the poor and afflicted who unwittingly support those wicked who take advantage of the lack of wits and understanding of the oppressed poor, who like what they hear from the wicked rulers; fail to see that the outcomes never equate to the promises made. But Y’hovah always delivers those who place their trust in him and HIS promises. The implication here is that those who fear Y’hovah and not men will see Y’hovah’s deliverance/salvation, but those who trust to men will soon see that even the greatest of nations are nothing more than men who are out for their own ends, while Y’hovah is out for the best and most proper end of those who fear him. Q&C
Hebrews 11:1-10 – Faith is most definitely NOT a mere mental assent to a statement of truth, but the life lived in compliance with that belief. Faith is the actual outworking of that to which a person has mentally assented – the actual evidence in our lives of what noone can see and the thing on which we base our earnest expectations. That thing on which we base our earnest expectations may not have physical substance, but is more substantial spiritually than anything around which we wrap our grimy mitts. Did the elders obtain a good report for those things to which they’d mentally assented, or for the actions they took based upon them? Next week’s Torah parsha will be on Avram’s rescue of Lot from the 4 kings of the east. I’m here to tell you that no matter how strongly Avram believed that Y’hovah could deliver Lot from those wicked kings, his waiting for Y’hovah to deliver him by someone else’s actions would NOT have been a good report for Avram. It was Avram’s actions that produced the good report about Avram, so faith is NOT mere belief; it must be SHOWN to be real.
Vv.3-4 – If anyone ever tells you that his position on the origins of the universe and life are based in science, tell them they are full of hooey! There is no scientific basis for either creationism or evolutionism; both systems are based on belief. There is some fossil evidence that exists, but HOW it got there or ever came to be in the first place is absolutely without evidence of any kind, and true science is based on observation. No human being, save Y’hovah Yeshua, was there to witness the event. At least creationists are honest about the religious and faith-based nature of their position. V.3 tells us outright that Y’hovah created all that exists out of nothing by the power of his Word. Chevel received the good report because his offering was more perfect – not that Ca’in’s was not acceptable, but that it was not what Y’hovah required; contrition. It was ultimately a heart problem that Ca’in had, not the thing he offered. Ca’in brought what HE desired to bring, not what Y’hovah desired he bring.
In v.5, Chanok was changed over the last 3 centuries of his life to the point that he didn’t even have to die, but was just changed to a body that could survive close proximity to Y’hovah. He obtained that good report from none other than the Y’hovah with whom Chanok communed for all those years. 3 different times in that one verse, Y’hovah changed Chanok; twice, he was translated and once he experienced translation. The word is a compound of meta, ‘with’ and tithemi, to set, put or place. In its context Sha’ul says that Y’hovah placed Chanok with himself, changed him so that Chanok could be in the very presence of Y’hovah. When one walks with the Almighty for 300 years one cannot help but to change. Before he was translated from ‘the body of this death’ (Rom.7.29) to a body of life, he was known to all to have pleased Elohim. The only higher testimony I know of in scripture is
1 And after six days Yeshua taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, 2 And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light. 3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moshe and EliYahu talking with him. 4 Then answered Peter, and said unto Yeshua, Master, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moshe, and one for EliYahu. 5 While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him. [Matt.17.1-5]
If we don’t have our faith testifying about us in v.6, we can never please Y’hovah. Your mental assent to truth is a great thing, but it is NOT biblical faith, which works out your mental assent before Y’hovah and men.
Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works. (James 2:18)
Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. (Philippians 2:12)
If you have biblical faith, it will show forth in your godly character, which is, by definition, your actions appertaining to that biblical truth you say you believe.
But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? (James 2:20)
If you have only a ‘said faith’, you have a dead faith. Those who ‘diligently seek’ Y’hovah are those who trust him enough to obey him, to look to do those things that he commands; to have the same testimony as Chanok had.
Noach, in v.7, believed what Y’hovah told him and started acting on it. For 120 years; while he was felling the trees, milling them into keel, ribs, joists, rafters, studs, planking and perhaps dowels; he testified by his eccentricities [building a barge on a plain hundreds of miles from an ocean, along a river down which the barge could not float or make more than a few hundred yards of travel before encountering a bend that it could not navigate – ASSUMING it had a shallow enough draft to actually float in said river] that he believed the judgment of Elohim was coming on the earth. I am sure he got in a word or 2 about what was coming when his neighbors took a breath in between the insulting barbs they fired his way over the eccentricity he displayed. Were he alive today, he wouldn’t be free to build his barge for more than a couple of weeks before they’d put him in a looney bin. And, you may take my word for this; in the very near future YOU will be in danger of the booby-hatch because you believe Y’hovah and throughly distrust the men in power. Just read the news. Nary a week goes by that people who profess faith in Y’hovah and his Word are not excoriated in the mainstream press by television and radio programmers and personalities, educators, lawyers, judges and government officials; in other words, by public opinion shapers.
And then, in vv.8-10, we see our Torah parsha for today summarized and we are brought full circle. V.10 says that Avraham was looking for an inheritance of a city made without hands [as Noach’s ark had been] whose builder and maker is Elohim; he looked for New Yerushalayim, as I hope we all do who are participating today! Avraham did not live in a city, as Lot did, but testified to his belief in the Word of Y’hovah to him that wherever he laid the soles of his feet would one day belong to his seed by living only in Sukkoth, for he was but a sojourner in this world, not a permanent resident. He was looking for the olam haba, the world to come, and testified to that fact by his life. His faith was REAL! Is mine? Or YOURS? Q&C
End of Shabbat Bible Study. | English | NL | 822935635a2fd22813c272fba39f4e38793ddbc2f7468415975e14b8dd0a3c9b |
The Long Awaited Mr Han Chapter 110
"Not bad," Han Zhuoli felt increasingly proud of Lu Man in his heart.
The longer he knew Lu Man, the better he understood her, and the more he admired her.
"If it were a normal person, they would probably take it as everything is in order after they had been hired through the interview. They would feel that this case would definitely not be given to them, and will have nothing to do with them. However, they do not know, that opportunities are always given to those who are prepared," Han Zhuoli did not hide his admiration at all, his eyes shone as he looked at Lu Man.
The girl he liked, was absolutely outstanding.
His blatantly admiring gaze made Lu Man's blush in such a way that no verbal praise would make her face this red.
"Wait for a while," Han Zhuoli made a phone call, asking people to take away the food containers and clean the table.
Then, he sat by Lu Man's side and opened the file between the two of them, "Talk about your train of thought."
Lu Man nodded, "I have thought of two plans, but I'm more inclined towards the first one. If both are accepted, we can let Du Lin choose himself, to see which one he is more willing to accept."
Lu Man began speaking systematically about her plan.
While she was in the hospital, she had already written down the two plans. It was just that she did not think that Han Zhuoli would suddenly take this case as a test for her, and hence she had not brought the documents along with her on her first day of work.
The good thing was that even though she did not know beforehand that this case would be passed to her, but with her principle of seizing every opportunity to learn something, she seriously finished planning the program for Du Lin. She even took the time to enhance it making edits over and over again, thus she had every single detail about the plan was by heart.
Hence she could systematically explain the complete plan to Han Zhouli without needing the written script and also without missing out any part of it.
From what she said, Han Zhuoli himself could tell that Lu Man had privately put in a lot of hard work.
"Not bad, I'm also inclined towards the first plan," Han Zhuoli nodded, then looked at Lu Man, the look of admiration in his eyes became stronger and stronger.
Even without his help, Lu Man probably could have entered probably Han Corporation based on her own ability.
This was the girl he liked!
Later on, Han Zhuoli called Zheng Tianming in, "Make a call to Du Lin."
"Do you mind telling Du Lin the plan later on?" Han Zhuoli asked Lu Man.
"Of course not, there's no problem at all," Lu Man said.
"You don't need to explain as detailed as you did just now, the two plans are of two different directions, you can just let him understand the gist of it," Du Lin probably did not have that much time to come and listen to the plan either, "Let's see which one he wants to choose."
Not long after, Du Lin picked up his phone.
Then, Lu Man briefly explained the plans to Du Lin, and Du Lin also chose the first plan.
"You can go back now and do up the plan in detail, from now on, you can directly contact Du Lin's manager, Gu Qingfang," Han Zhuoli said.
Although Lu Man did not think that she would be assigned a case to do on her own, she was not at all nervous. To her, this was a challenge, and instead, it made her even more excited.
Thus, she had basically forgotten the weird behavior of Han Zhouli and also the words he had spoken, almost seducing her. The excitement of working on Du Lin's case had made her push aside all the thoughts of Han Zhouli acting like a hooligan again this time.
After expressing her gratitude and saying thanks to Han Zhuoli, she returned to the Public Relations Department.
It was only then that Zheng Tianming became anxious and distraught as if going to be sentenced, and entered the office with a heavy heart.
"CEO," Zheng Tianming put on a long face, "I really gave specific instructions to them, but who knew that Ye Xuanxuan would be so silly."
Zheng Tianming had almost called her an idi*t.
It was fine if she wanted to die, but why bring him down with her?
"It must have been that your attitude was not enough to let them properly understand Lu Man's importance," Han Zhuoli said, his face devoid of any expressions.
Zheng Tianming said in his heart that he had already personally gone to welcome her, was that still not enough?
Even for customers, if they are not of a certain level, they would not even be welcomed by him, much less an ordinary worker in the company.
It was just that Ye Xuanxuan was an idi*t and could not be helped!
Zheng Tianming was ready to accept his punishment, "CEO, how do you want to punish me?" | English | NL | e2d5f27d9af812901ef0530b79598f6a250ca4b3f319e51a4abe3cf823e8ed28 |
Previously Published Book
The hatred between two brothers, Huyuk and Krot, leads to a split among the people in Ur;s village. Along with a group of other hunters and gatherers, Huyuk leaves to found their own village. Their quest is to improve their way of life.
They fight battles with ferocious beasts, killing them or driving them away from the land they regard as their domain. Guided by Huyuk and his mate Catal, the people search for others, to learn from them and exchange ideas. In a very short time, their little village grows and prospers.
Krot, however, is envious of his brother's success, and his cruel nature prevails over him, thus bringing to his people murder and misery. | English | NL | 29454215eba7ca986af318f555e51c06933278bc6fb2012bbc55681d71839a89 |
It?s Creepy, but Good Story Material
Sometimes the best inspiration?for writing new stories is other people. I don?t mean asking them for ideas, I mean they are the idea. I watch people as they eat, work, walk down the street, talk with their friends or children, or sit across from each other in the middle of a busy mall saying nothing. I know that sounds creepy, someone sitting there watching everyone like a spy or something, but I?m not just watching. I?m imagining.
Examples of ideas
A young mother struggling with her infant and toddler while she gets a coffee becomes this story:
Molly just discovered that her husband will be staying late at the office . . . again. For the third time in four weeks, her best friend has cancelled their coffee date. She teeters on the edge of depression and longing and then, her nightmare comes true.
A middle-aged man sitting at his laptop in the middle of the library is thinking:
I hope no one sees me here. What if she walks in?
A sample story
I adopted this practice when I was a teenager. I worked a minimum wage job at a retail store in a mall and on my break, I would sit in the middle of the mall and watch people. One day, inspiration hit me and I wrote?the following short story after watching an old couple for a while.
??????????????? They sat there, the two of them opposite one another. Although they were seated in the middle of the mall where several people passed them each minute and where music played continuously through unseen speakers above them, a lonely silence filed the space between the man and his wife of too many lost years.
She would not look at him; she was afraid of what she might see. Instead, she would glance at him every few minutes to see if he was looking at her. She noticed the tired lines that marked the years upon his every feature. The skin on his hands was no longer taut and strong, but loosely hanging on his bones. This was true for the rest of his body as well. She could remember when he had been a younger man, full of dreams and expectations. She remembered how he would lift her up in his arms and hold her so close she thought he would never let go. Those were grand times, she thought, and smiled.
He saw that smile over the edge of his newspaper. He wondered what she was thinking about. Probably those grandchildren of ours or, she?s remembering that it?s Janet?s birthday on Wednesday, he thought. He remembered then the different things that she had done for his birthday over the years. She had thrown a surprise party for his fortieth birthday and later on, they had their own little party upstairs. Oh, those were the days, he thought, and he, too, found himself smiling.
Soon, both of them found themselves smiling?at each other?and, as they rose from their chairs and embraced, both could swear they were young lovers again.
Everyone?s life is a story unfolding. As a writer, I uncover the hidden truths that are under the surface, waiting to be discovered.
You can do it, too.
When I taught a literature class featuring short stories, I gave the teenagers the assignment of going to a public place and writing a story based on what they saw. Don?t just look at people, though.
- What are they feeling?
- What happened to them earlier in the day?
- What are they thinking about?
- Why are they in the caf?, park, museum, etc.?
- Who is with them and what is their relationship?
- What do they secretly think of the people they are with?
- What problems are they dealing with?
In other words, create a whole backstory for that moment. And then, imagine what that person might be doing later in the day, later in the week. Now, you have the beginnings of a short story. Do this in different places and at different times of the day, with different sexes and ethnicity, with different age groups. Pretty soon, you will have a collection of very interesting characters to use in your stories. Even if you never write a story that features any of these people, you will have still gained a greater understanding for your fellow humans. | English | NL | 250d6367fcd99fab96ca9324dffacf60f28de625d712678e2b68cc803b178cb6 |
Today I was researching Hazrat Inayat Khan because I saw a quote of his, which really spoke to me, and realized that aside from knowing he was a Sufi, I knew very little about this mystic. As I searched the internet for PDF files, which I could download to read, I encountered the preface to The Mysticism of Music, Sound and Word. The first two sentences of this book caused me to sit with them, in quiet reflection. Consider these words and share your understanding with me, if you feel so inclined:
It was this second sentence which gave me pause. Do we really need to sacrifice what is dearest to us in order to serve God? As I processed this statement I had the following thoughts:
- I do believe that we must give up all identity with the self in order to open the heart to discover Self, which is a realization the mind cannot grasp. Was he writing about this type of sacrifice?
- Next, I thought: I have seen jazz musicians, completely lost to any sense of self as they allowed something greater than themselves to flow through them, expressing as unique and sometimes exquisite music.
- I have seen other artists and athletes who seemed to lose all sense of self as they entered a “zone,” that place where no thought was involved, and life just seemed to express through them. In fact, I have been there myself.
Sometimes when I write it seems my brain is disengaged, completely, and the words just flow through me. Other times it is obvious that my mind is trying to do the writing. During these times I struggle to compose thoughts that adequately convey what is in my heart.
At first it was hard for me to comprehend what Khan was saying. Surely he was not suggesting that I needed to give up my writing in order to serve God. I have always felt and believed that I was serving the Universe when I wrote what I discovered in my heart while exploring my journey. Then I suddenly understood that this was the point. Writing from the heart instead of from the head was, in essence, giving up that censor, that believer in an “I” which could somehow be separate from God.
Finally, I felt I could comprehend what Inayat Khan meant. Paraphrasing In my own words I think he was suggesting that we must live, move, and express from our hearts and not from our heads. I don’t think he was suggesting that everyone must give up what they hold dear in order to serve Life, but instead we must give up that which identifies its source in our ego-created minds. I came away from my period of reflection with the idea that perhaps he was teaching the same thoughts as was expressed by Jesus in the Parable of the Unrighteous Steward: the idea that we cannot serve two masters.
Inayat Khan found that when he released the self who played music and surrendered to the ONE Self, he became the instrument for the Divine. By releasing all sense of a separate individual who “did” something he became the music himself.
I am going to reprint Khan’s complete preface here. Please read it and share your thoughts with me, either by the comment system on this blog or by my email which is email@example.com
“I gave up my music because I had received from it all that I had to receive. To serve God one must sacrifice what is dearest to one; and so I sacrificed my music. I had composed songs; I sang and played the vina; and practicing this music I arrived at a stage where I touched the Music of the Spheres. Then every soul became for me a musical note, and all life became music. Inspired by it I spoke to the people, and those who were attracted by my words listened to them, instead of listening to my songs. Now, if I do anything, it is to tune souls instead of instruments; to harmonize people instead of notes. If there is anything in my philosophy, it is the law of harmony: that one must put oneself in harmony with oneself and with others. I have found in every word a certain musical value, a melody in every thought, harmony in every feeling; and I have tried to interpret the same thing, with clear and simple words, to those who used to listen to my music. I played the vina until my heart turned into this very instrument; then I offered this instrument to the divine Musician, the only musician existing. Since then I have become His flute; and when He chooses, He plays His music. The people give me credit for this music, which in reality is not due to me but to the Musician who plays on His own instrument.” ~ Hazrat Inayat Khan
I think Khan’s offering is spot-on. I strive to be the Universe’s eyes, feet and hands so that which is in my heart flows through me, directly from the Oneness of Self. I must learn not to be a filter, not to restrict this flow by my incessant thoughts, but to be an open vessel of Love in all of the manners Self chooses to express through me. It is my Truth that this is ultimately the one purpose for living.
I feel very blessed to have found this preface today. I hope his words speak to you and allow you to hear whatever it is you most need at this moment in your life. Life has an amazing way of speaking to us when we are open and willing to let go of that precious self-identity, which is ultimately what we hold dearest. | English | NL | 742e154df0f813d93f594306d0f0174d9e2965e28848a76109a9affd30270b4f |
The chin places me right into one of the most difficult situations of my job as a psychologist. This old Chinese oracle could mirror the knowledge of the subconscious or greater self. It had aided me solve problems, deciding, and had actually even literally saved my life. However the doctorates I gained in psychology and social work operated from very different expert premises.
After years of relying on the chin as a spiritual overview, I had begun integrating the technique right into psychotherapy sessions. It is a valuable tool that equips customers that can learn the technique themselves, if proper and it offered an objective viewpoint that frequently disclosed the covert problems of the unconscious. I was a Jungian-oriented psycho-therapist and also Jung, himself, had actually trusted the chin for decades. He even composed the introduction for the Wilhelm and also banes translation.
This made sense and had worked completely for many years, till one day, in a most difficult case I might see that the chin reviewing the customer gotten throughout a therapy session was the incorrect answer. And also, it was not slightly incorrect, but entirely as well as badly, wrong.
The chin’s judgment straight opposed my professional judgment as a psychologist. This tossed me right into a spiritual dilemma of belief and also a specialist dispute in real-time throughout this session.
The client in question was entrapped by her denial of the damaging nature of her papa’s failures. He was less nurturing than Attila the Hun. Click site onemindtherapy to read more. She had developed an adaptive misconception of his fathering that had actually assisted her endure childhood, but imprisoned her as a grown-up, and also eventually have to be outgrown.
Every effort to review the daddy’s negative background set off a strong protection of her glowing deception. He was not as poor as people say had actually been countering any criticism for decades. It blocked out a truth also excruciating for the child, but necessary for the adult to face. Perhaps, given that she had pertained to rely on the chin, if she were to cast an analysis throughout our session, it might offer an objective view that she may take to heart.
The client was eager to hear this feedback therefore was I– until I saw the solution it was my work to read to her. She had asked: how should I view my daddy. She tossed the coins and generated the hexagram of the family members, that made sense, but it had favorable comments describing and also commending the actions of the head of the family!
Emotionally, this was dead wrong. This view might feed as well as additional set her resistance to the fact. Should I choose psychology over spirituality and also terminate the reading because I really did not like the result. | English | NL | 1022afb6fb119c71f8117ea925b709471cc2846cb576d696cd9f9b0e6fc2054e |
The 'How you doing?' line of Joey in Friends is very famous. English is my third language. I seem it's general conversation dialogue. What's so special about it?
The expression How you doin'? is a modification of the English How are you doing? which is another way of saying "How are you?".
This phrase seems to be used by stereotypical mobsters in popular culture, who usually were of foreign descent and so would pronounce expressions with an accent. For example, Tony Soprano in the third season (the 5th quote in Another Toothpick):
Tony Soprano: How you doin'? I got new shoes. Soles are a little heavy
Joey does the same (probably a reference to his foreign descent) but in his case, the sentence is a pick-up line, a conversation starter for his die hard promiscuity with women.
As others have pointed out, the phrase in itself is very innocuous and mundane, but it's mostly the WAY he says it that adds the flirting overtones. Notice how when he usually says it he narrows his eyes and raises his chin in what he must believe is a seductive look.
I also think it says 2 things about his character:
- He is not smart enough to think up anything more original
- And/or he believes he is so good looking he doesn't have to say anything more to attract women | English | NL | c3d530315d67f92a99d502c2c4919bbb16207911184010b1fe8cdbafa58cafaf |
I stareed this project with one vision in mind, then it took 180. I was going to make this old cathedral into a royalty scene but then I came across a picture in my files of an explosion that changed my direction. After logging on to facebook I saw too many arguments between my fellow Christian about petty things and theological differences that had nothing to do with our salvation in Christ and that’s when I thought of the scripture Matthew 12:25 which states, “And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said to them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand”. My fellow believers let conduct ourselves more Christ like in public and in private. Lets have more unity and love between us and not look like the Church is having a Civil War. Jesus said “If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.-1John 4:20. | English | NL | 77afda893463bb9debcf70da3c95f19825c28a2af6460ab447a87317615c5b57 |
THREE TALES OF UNSURPASSED LOYALTY AND DEVOTION.
“Learn lessons from every living being, everything that you find around you. Learn faithfulness and gratitude from the dog, patience and fortitude from the donkey, perseverance from the spider, far-sightedness from the ant, and monogamy from the owl.” (Sathya Sai Speaks Volume 11, Chapter 20, P.117)
Since the beginning of man’s friendship with dogs, there must have been simply millions of tales of doggy devotion. Anyone who has loved and cared for a dog will know how much love and adoration a dog can have for his human owner. They live for their human companions and many dogs will even die to protect those they love. The following stories, although only the tip of the iceberg, demonstrate the depth of this love.
In Edinburgh in Scotland, there is a statue of a dog called Greyfriars Bobby. The people of Edinburgh made a statue for Bobby after he died because he was so faithful to his master and lived on his master’s grave for fourteen years after his master’s death until he, too, died.
What happened was this: Bobby was a lonely, stray dog and because he had nothing to eat, he had to try and find food every day. Most of the time, people treated him cruelly. One day, an old shepherd befriended him and from that day on, he fed little Bobby. They became best friends and were always together. Finally his master died and Bobby was heartbroken. For the next fourteen years, he stayed by his master’s grave both day and night, in all weathers, whether it was boiling or freezing, only leaving once a day to beg for some food. Nothing and noone could make Bobby leave his master’s graveside. Even the gravediggers who kicked him and threw stones at him when they dug the grave could not make him stay away. Sometimes children came to play with him but after playing for a little while, he always went back to his master’s last resting place. The local people were so moved by his love, loyalty and devotion that they built a small shelter for him next to the grave.
Also, because he touched the hearts of so many people, when he died in 1872, they built a statue for him in Edinburgh with a large drinking fountain for dogs! Beside this, there is now a bar called “Bobby’s Bar”. Today, you can still see Bobby’s collar and dinner bowl in Huntley’s Museum in Edinburgh.
How many human beings would be so very loyal? The following story adapted from 'Peaceful Kingdom: Random Acts of Kindness by Animals' by Stephanie Laland shows how a dog will literally risk its own life to protect the ones it loves.
On August 29th, 79 AD, an enormous volcano erupted in Pompeii. It happened so suddenly that noone had any warning. Most people died in the eruption and their bodies were not found until almost nineteen centuries later. At that time, archeologists discovered about 2000 skeletons. One body told a very moving story. It was the body of a dog which was stretched out protectively over the body of a small child. The faithful dog was trying to protect the child from harm even until its own last breath. The archeologists were even more moved and amazed when they read the inscription on the dog’s collar. The inscription on the collar stated how the dog had saved the child’s father, Severinus, three times, once from drowning, once from thieves and once from a wolf. Finally, its dying gift was to try and save the child it loved.
“...For He makes us aware that the God we adore, the God we love, the God we live by, is in every other being as LOVE. Thus Love expands and encompasses all creation...” (Sathya Sai Baba)
I knew a little dog well once who, because of sad circumstances, had to be given away to another person. Luckily that person and the little dog fell in love with each other at first sight and the little dog had a happy home. In spite of being tiny, she soon became the ruler of the roost, and the roost included some very big dogs indeed… but they knew who was boss… tiny Dolly. Despite being very happy and loved with her new mistress, she still showed the most enormous loyalty to her previous owner. Whenever he came to visit her… when it was time to go, she would leap onto his shoulder as she always had done, as if to say, “Well, come on, let’s go… I’m coming back home with you…” but it could never be. That is not all. For several years, at the end of the afternoon, Dolly would go down to the bottom of the drive and wait and wait and wait... it was the time that her previous owner used to come back home from work. After long and patient waiting, when he did not appear, she would finally give up and go back inside with a loud, sad sigh. No matter how disappointed she must have felt, she kept up her patient vigil for a long time.
“If you develop love for all beings, in the faith that God resides in all, you may be anywhere else, but your prayers would reach Me and My Grace will reach you. While in My previous body, I told Nanasahab that I am in ants, insects and animals, besides all men. When a dog ate all offerings intended for Baba, it was declared to have reached Baba, for he had eaten it in that form. “Nana says he is giving me food, but when I go in the form of a dog, he drives Me off”.
“Follow what I say wherever you are in the world, if you do then I am near you always, I am there always where my Words are followed” (Sathya Sai Baba’s Shivrathri discourse, 1979)
Apart from these three touching stories above, there are many, many others, some known about and many more unknown. It is truly humbling to become aware of the great love and loyalty many dogs feel for their human companions, even when they are treated badly. Hundreds of these loyal and loving creatures worldwide are cruelly treated or simply dumped on the roads each day, by callous and cold-hearted owners, abandoned and left to fend for themselves, inspite of their loyalty and love. Imagine the hurt and distrust created in those souls’ memories for lifetimes to come. Luckily, there are some truly loving human beings who are willing and able to adopt ‘rescue’ dogs with physical and emotional scars and give them the healing love and care they need. While all dogs are not the same, just as people are not, the love that they receive or not from human beings… as well as the correct training… has a profound effect on them and an enormous bearing on their subsequent behaviour.
“Compassion towards all creatures is the greatest virtue, wilful injury to any creature is the worst vice. Have full faith in this; spread love and joy through compassion, and be full of joy and peace yourself”. (Sathya Sai Speaks, Volume 12, chapter 51)
(Article written by Mercini Sherratt for Vedanta Empire's charity incentive)
Vedanta Empire is dedicated to raising money for charity: A portion of profits raised from each commercial and business booking is given away; to feed, aid and protect neglected animals. When a charitable or spiritual event has been booked; Vedanta Empire shall give away all of the profits raised from the booking, towards this very same cause of supporting animals...
Furthermore, to help raise money for feeding and protecting neglected animals: Music can be purchased from Vedanta Empire. - All profits go towards this charitable cause. Please feel free to make contact ([email protected]) for purchasing the music or asking for further information. - A preview of the music can be heard here: | English | NL | ea6a1bcc3f0467b1b3e600d7ea89e846355f1f96b3db4ba588d99dbb5a90b587 |
Today’s team review is from Noelle, she blogs at http://saylingaway.wordpress.com
Noelle has been reading The Dead City by Dylan J Morgan,
This is a review based on an advanced reader copy from the author; the book.
The Dead Lands, which I recently reviewed here, is the prequel to this book by Dylan Morgan – The Dead City. In the first book, a team of highly trained soldiers from Erebus are sent in response to a radio signal from the sister planet Hemera, indicating that the President of Hemera and his family are awaiting rescue after being in stasis since a nuclear war one hundred years prior. They are sent by the avaricious and pig-like Colonel Paden, who features prominently in this second book. Rather than a barren land with no surviving inhabitants, the team finds a baking, dusty, rubble-strewn wasteland populated by murderous thugs and a completely destroyed capital city of Magna, overrun with hordes of horrifying and ghastly mutants. The sole interest of these mutants is killing and eating the organs of their prey.
In The Dead City, another crack team is heading to Hemera and Magna, accompanied by Colonel Paden. He wants to find the treasure in gems said to be hidden within the capitol city, ostensibly for Erebus but in reality for himself. He brings with him physicians to tend to his health and three prostitutes to tend to his other needs. The team is led by Lieutenant Marshall, a much-decorated soldier revered by his men. Among the team members are Ryan and his sister Jayde, who is also a soldier and very close to her brother, and also the loathsome Murdoch, who has hated Ryan since their training and fantasizes in graphic ways about what he will do to and with Jayde, if he ever gets the chance.
This time the soldiers are aware of what awaits them, and the trek to the capitol’s palace is a running of the gauntlet, with the gruesome deaths of both soldiers and mutants. The mutants, who have deadly aim with sharpened metal blades, are held off by a plasma guns (Berserkers), which blow them into bloody bits but which cannot stem their unending tide. Eventually some of the groups into which the team has been split reach the deepest level of the palace, where the President and his family, long since dead, were once housed. Paden then follows in relative safety, at the cost of more men, and the search of the building and sewers for the gems begins.
The Dead City has an inherently interesting story line with characters you can really love or hate. My dislike of Colonel Paden was so great, I prayed for a mutiny. While Ryan is suitably indomitable and brave, the author has also created many minor characters who grabbed me emotionally. As I said about The Dead Lands, this is not a story for the faint of heart. There were times when I was overwhelmed with the repetitive and gruesome slaughter; there’s a limit to the amount of gore I can handle. Luckily, each time when I thought I’d reached that limit, the story and characters kicked back in and I kept reading. The ending was a total surprise and made it more than worth reading the book. I want the sequel!
Two things. I wish there had been more of a transition between the previous book and this one – seeing what happened to the first team when the remnants of it returned to Erebus, for example. I also wondered why the mutants never killed and ate each other.
The relentless gore aside, the author does a great job of describing his world and drawing the reader into it. This book should appeal to everyone who likes strongly written, post-apocalyptic thrillers.
PS, this is a planet I would never want to visit!
Four out of five stars. | English | NL | 1c558834ccb7f40931db792ee1e512aaa943e917d75d5dd6c1300e210b987f18 |
Non-Fiction Book Report The book Ernest Hemingway and his world was written by Anthony Burgess and it was published in 1978 by Charles Scribners Sons. Its main concept is about the life of Ernest Hemingway and how he differed from his fellow writers in being a very strong man of action. There are many settings in the book because Ernest Hemingway was a man who traveled all his life to all of the United States, Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and several other places. The author describes what Hemingway would do in each of these places and what the consequences caused by his actions were. The first setting is in Oak Park Illinois, this is where Ernest Hemingway is born on July 21, 1899. When he grows up, Ernest goes to war in Europe and after that he comes back and moves to Chicago, which is where he marries Hadley Richardson.
After they get married, they move to Canada where Hemingway’s son is born. When he finds himself unhappy, he divorces Hadley and moves to Paris where he meets and marries Pauline Pfeiffer, after a short period of time, he divorces her and marries Mary Welsh in Havana. In 1953 he goes to a safari in Africa and has a serious accident, which leaves him ill for the rest of his days. At his last home in Ketchum, Idaho, on a Sunday morning on July 2, 1961, Ernest Miller Hemingway commits suicide. The author shows all the main conflicts that Hemingway goes through.
I wonder how he knew such personal details about Hemingway’s life knowing that he was always a very private person. It is shown how Ernest is always treated by as a baby by his mom and how he never forgives her for his humiliation. When he was in high school he would sometimes get in trouble for using forbidden words in the school paper. He would do this just to create a ruckus. The author lets us know how Hemingway’s heart is broken when a nurse he falls in love with, rejects him for another man. He also lets us see that Ernest is a very insensitive person when he leaves his wife and son for another woman, and this one for his third, and then finally fourth wife. This shows how unstable Ernest is.
He becomes so unstable that he takes his own life when he can’t handle all his problems. Burgess apparently wants the public to see how Hemingway lived an adventurous life and even though he always looked and acted very manly, he had a very confusing life and this probably explains why he didn’t fear death, especially his own. He also compares how Ernest takes much of his storyline from his novel, A Farewell to Arms, from his personal experiences. The main character of the book experiences many of the same situations Hemingway faced. Some of these similarities are exact while some are less similar, and some events have a completely different outcome. I think that Anthony Burgess does a good job in this biography because he lets the public see all the details of Ernest Hemingway’s success and failures.
I liked reading about Hemingway’s life because it was very interesting and I wouldn’t mind reading one of his famous books like A Farewell to Arms or Death in the Afternoon. | English | NL | f53f9a8c3128458a2ce1dea0156802b8c7aa43fa7ba3720fd56ad34a1a1a6bb6 |
One of the most common forms of human trafficking practiced by colonizers during the early fur trade was the practice of taking “country brides”.
Country marriages were a widespread phenomenon in Canada and the United States frontiers during the fur trade. They were essentially a way for European traders to exploit the Indigenous community by forging “alliances” with local native populations by taking native girls as “country wives”, whereby they cemented a connection with the tribal people for the purpose of trade, while at the same time satisfying their carnal urges while away from the trading centers in places like Montreal, Detroit, and elsewhere.
The country marriage was a way for colonizers to gain a competitive advantage over other competing traders, as their marriage to their native brides helped gain them access to rich fur trapping grounds, allowed them to establish franchises within native communities, and in some cases helped them to exclude other traders from also exploiting an area. At the same time, the native girls and women they took as country brides were easily-exploited sexual partners and “workers” who possessed valuable domestic and outdoors skills that could be exploited for advantage. These marriages were not based on love, but rather were a tool of colonialism used to exploit indigenous women for the benefit of the European frontiersmen.
It was noted by some eyewitnesses that most of these marriages were shams, and in some cases were nothing but ruses used to conveniently handle trade and sex. One recorded observation states that, “In earlier days they [traders] had handled the situation more conveniently by contracting a so-called "country marriage" which in reality, was no marriage at all.” Another noted that while country marriages were the preferred lifestyle, when only sex was desired (rather than a protracted trade issue) that prostitution was common, and in many cases was a flourishing business around the Hudson Bay, which led to a spread of various forms of venereal disease that made its way into the indigenous community, harming the population with diseases introduced by European men traveling about and spreading it from post to post.
There was little consideration for the indigenous women who became country wives, and in the majority of cases, the early country marriages resulted in the abandonment of the women and any offspring that resulted. In one example, a young trader, having gone to the Saskatchewan River region in the early 1800s, took a French Canadian half-breed girl, aged fourteen, as his country wife. He wrote in his memoir that he, in the custom of the country, took the young girl for his wife, lived with her in the country for a time, and then, upon intending to leave the country to return east, placed her and her children under the care of an “honest man” and gave him a certain amount for her support.
One can only think that this “giving” of his wife and children to another man was simply the transfer (i.e. trafficking) of his sexual slave to free himself of a burden.
Bryce, G. (1900). The remarkable history of the Hudson's Bay company: including that of the French traders of north-western Canada and of the North-west, XY, and Astor Fur companies. Toronto: W. Briggs.
Godsell, P.H. (1939). The Vanishing Frontier -- A Saga of Traders, Mounties and Men of the Last North West. Toronto: Ryerson | English | NL | 2f396fbf19af22f03b71f6a72bcb5427a39221000020f6812a4e6b1b7a3b061a |
True Crime Uncensored!
Saturdays at 2pm PT, 5pm ET
Listen LIVE on Outlaw Radio: CLICK HERE
Fred Rosen is a veteran true crime author with over 25 books published world-wide including the classic “Lobster Boy,” Rosen is also the award winning crime historian who wrote “The Historical Atlas of American Crime.” A former columnist for The New York Times, he is an Adjunct Professor of Criminal Justice at Ulster County Community College of SUNY. His frequent media appearances as a crime expert include Dateline NBC, Inside Edition and MSNBC. He’s written for all the major magazines including Cosmopolitan, Penthouse, and The Reader’s Digest.
Grady Franklin Stiles, Jr., was born in Pittsburgh on July 18, 1937, the sixth in a long line of lobster-men (preceded by William Stiles, 1805-1888; Jacob Stiles, 1843-1932; Elisha Stiles, 1880-1935; and finally Grady Stiles, Sr., 1912-1988). Grady could not walk and used a wheelchair in public, but could crawl around on his incredibly powerful arms and could perform nearly any task using his “claws”. He was married twice to Mary Teresa Herzog and once to Barbara Browning and had four children, two of whom, a boy and a girl, also had lobster-hands. When his eldest daughter Donna was engaged to marry a boy of whom Grady disapproved, Grady shot and killed the boy.
However, Grady escaped a prison sentence on the grounds that no prison was equipped to handle his disability. He was given fifteen years probation, and soon after the trial re-married Mary Teresa and continued to physically abuse his family. In 1992 Mary Teresa mentioned to Grady’s son-in-law, a circus employee, that “something” needed to be done about Grady’s abusive behavior. On November 29, 1992, he was shot to death while watching television in the family’s trailer home. The killer was a neighbor, hired by Grady’s son-in-law.
In that case it was Mr. Rosen’s detective work that led to the conviction of the killer! | English | NL | 68533ce049e36a40871ae69fd40a35de160b420b2e8b6df129d8ea85e27bad28 |
Online melanoma test could save your life
GOLD Coast-based author Mandy Johnson always thought she was at low risk of developing melanoma until she took a simple online test developed by Queensland researchers.
She was shocked to discover she was in the highest risk bracket for melanoma - a prophetic finding given she booked in for a skin check based on her results and was diagnosed with one of the potentially deadly skin cancers on her right upper arm.
Fortunately for her, the melanoma was caught early, before it had a chance to spread beyond the skin.
"It was the faintest little black spot," she said. "Seriously, I looked at it and thought: 'There's no way that could be a melanoma. But they sent it off and it came back as a melanoma."
Ms Johnson, the author of two business books and mother of two teenagers, said she had been for her annual skin check just six months before doing the online test.
"Usually they send me the reminder and I go about three months later," she said. "I probably wouldn't have gone back for about nine months if I hadn't done the online test."
If she had waited that long, she faced the risk of the melanoma infiltrating beyond the skin.
"I feel like the luckiest person alive," Ms Johnson said. "I've got a couple of kids. If I hadn't done the test and gone in for a skin check, it could have been a really different outcome."
The QIMR Berghofer test is for people aged 40 and over to predict their risk of developing melanoma in the next few years based on risk factors such as age, gender, ability to tan, hair colour, sunscreen use and number of moles at age 21.
Co-developer David Whiteman, head of QIMR Berghofer's cancer control group, designed the test based on a survey of about 40,000 Queenslanders, known as the QSkin study, including more than 650 people diagnosed with a melanoma.
Professor Whiteman said Ms Johnson was one of a couple of people who had written to QIMR Berghofer saying the test had prompted them to have their skin checked, resulting in a melanoma being discovered and removed.
He said more than 135,000 Australians had completed the test and about 31,000 people internationally since it was launched in March.
"Our next plan is to take this tool and use it in skin cancer clinics to see how it works in that setting," Professor Whiteman said.
He said the online test was about 70 per cent accurate. They hoped to eventually add DNA data collected from the QSkin participants to assess whether genetic information could improve the test's predictive value.
"The main thing is that regardless of whether people are at high or low risk, all Queenslanders should still slip, slap, slop all year round," Professor Whiteman said. "Most people living in Queensland, compared to other people, have a higher risk of melanoma just because they live here.
"The recommendation is to wear sunscreen when you're outside in Queensland during daylight hours."
To access the online prediction test: qimrberghofer.edu.au/melanomariskpredictor | English | NL | 09ab43b1d52a0626f2ae8fd9fb8e2cef97acf0934d3bcd73d39a75c9664f754d |
By the way, Hermann Rorschach, the inventor of the psychological inkblot test named after him actually liked making inkblots as a child. In high school, his nickname was "Klex" (meaning inkblot). His favorite game was Klecksography, a Swiss childhood game where an ink blot was spotted on a paper which was then folded to make a butterfly or a bird (sounds familiar?) (source)
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Success! Your email has been sent! | English | NL | a0f49797f6e81ffef59d938b5e1814746c63b32d6b463b19bf3c0b8f35e4fb0f |
The PrGM Tony Harrison was pleased to appoint and invest David Walmsley an Assistant Provincial Grand Master at the Provincial Grand Lodge meeting held at Blackpool. David will have particular responsibility for the Eccles and South Eastern Groups, succeeding John Hutton who retired from office at the same meeting.
David was born in Preston and on leaving school, gained a cadetship with the Lancashire Constabulary. His first posting was to Eccles and for the next 30 years he served in various roles, latterly specialising in forensic sciences and major crime investigation before taking retirement from the force in 2001. He then worked as a community safety advisor for the local authority in Salford, assisting witnesses in the criminal justice system, until he took final retirement in 2012.
He and his wife, Sandra, were married in 1975 and have two children. Their son Mike is a senior manager in the construction industry as well as following in his father’s footsteps as he is also the chief officer of the Greater Manchester Special Police Constabulary. Their daughter, Claire is a travel consultant and lives with her family in Essex. They have one granddaughter and another grandchild expected shortly.
When time permits, David and Sandra enjoy walking both locally and in the Lake District. They have travelled extensively and particularly enjoy cruising, having visited the Mediterranean, the Far and Middle East, the Caribbean and South America plus other exotic destinations. David admits that he particularly enjoys their trips to Essex, where he receives intense instruction from his granddaughter on the duties of a perfect grandad!
David’s Masonic career has been as equally busy and varied as his professional history. He was initiated into Broad Oak Lodge No 7239 in 1978, serving in several offices within the lodge including a stint as director of ceremonies for eight years. He also served as master on three occasions and as if this wasn’t service enough, he returned to the chair for a fourth time in 2013, some four years after the lodge had amalgamated to become Trafford Park Broad Oak Lodge No 4486. He received his first Provincial appointment as PrGStwd in 1994, rapidly gaining promotion in Provincial rank and he now holds his present grand rank of Past Assistant Grand Director of Ceremonies, which he received in 2015.
In the Royal Arch, he was exalted into Egerton Chapter No 2216 in 1989 and served as the first principal in 1998. He was appointed as Provincial Grand Steward in 2004, promoted in 2008 to PPrGSN and received the grand rank of PGStdB in 2017.
At a local level, David has given exemplary service to the Eccles Group, occupying the group offices of minutes secretary, secretary, vice chairman and chairman across a span of 16 years. He is succeeded as Eccles Group Chairman by Stuart Sutherland Boyd, who was the chain bearer at David’s investiture.
On learning of his appointment, David admitted that he had regarded the honour with ‘a great deal of pride, tempered with a little trepidation’ but was very grateful for the opportunity it afforded him to be of further service to the Province. | English | NL | cf1a34c168f0b3abd33870cbdcf359d16c53300a2aeddceb21ed73533e2d6936 |
enrollment. On the other hand, the loyal men throughout those portions of the State which had suffered from rebel outrages rallied at the first call with an eagerness which showed how deeply they had suffered and how highly they prized the opportunity of ridding themselves once and forever of the great evil under which they had so long lived.
In the city of Saint Louis and other portions of the State not subject to guerrilla outrages the case was different. The President's order for a general draft of militia had not yet been issued but was expected, and this was regarded as a step toward preparation for it. Thousands fled from the State to avoid the enrollment. By the disloyal of all shades it was assumed as part of a general conscription, intended to force them into the ranks to fight against their Southern friends. Many young men, who would otherwise have been glad to remain quietly at home, were induced by these misrepresentations to enter the rebel ranks. Indeed, the question what to do with the disloyal among those subject to military duty was the most difficult one to settle. Their obligation to do the required service was certainly no less, if not far greater, than that of the loyal. It was regarded by the loyal people, and, apparently with justice, a great hardship that rebel sympathizers should be excused from the military duty which was required of those who had been faithful to their allegiance. Whatever may be said of the policy of embodying unfaithful men in a large army, it would manifestly have been ruinous in a scattered force, such as the militia must often be, and where the loyal would often be outnumbered by the traitors.
It was first proposed to exempt them upon payment of a certain fee; but this proved impracticable. A sum which the poor man in the country could pay was ridiculously small when required of the wealthy man in the city. Many reputed loyal men, but more mindful of their comforts than of the salvation of their country,would willingly pay a high fee, which the really loyal poor man could not, and thus throw upon the shoulders of his poor neighbor the burdens, of which the latter was willing to bear his share, but not the whole. Finally it was determined to take the high ground that none but those of approved loyalty should be required or permitted to bear arms in defense of the State. I have had no reason since to doubt the correctness of the principle thus established nor the wisdom of the policy pursued under it.
Another serious question was how to provide the means for arming, subsisting,and clothing this force. A portion of the arms required were supplied from the United States Arsenal, but they were of a kind poorly adapted to the service required of the militia. Subsistence was entirely denied, and clothing was out of the question. The State was entirely without means.
The calamity under which the State was suffering had been brought upon her by the influence of prominent and wealthy persons, thousands of whom were still living in the State, and even in the city of Saint Louis, enjoying the protection of the Government, and many of them growing rich upon their country's calamity. These persons even yet did not hesitate to talk and act treason whenever they could do so with impunity. They even persuaded young men to join the bands of outlaws who were plundering the loyal people and driving them from their homes and furnished them with arms and money. No permanent peace could be expected in the State until these aiders of rebellion should be banished or silenced.
For these reasons, after consultation with the Governor of Missouri, | English | NL | eead0718a188ae42de7368ca3582fbdaf2db0ecd841576e827ef941e519fb1b0 |
Hi. I have got a number of images- old paintings and prints of Japanese origin, these were collected during the late 1940s and 1950s (immediately after World War 2) by my late grandfather who was posted in Japan (Tokyo) on official work. Most of these prints seem to be later copies of famous works by some of Japan's older and well known artists from the 19th c. However, I have this one painting or image that nobody and no site seems to identify.
This depicts a caravan of sorts, or maybe the entourage of some famous or powerful person , passing through a typically Japanese landscape. I can also see a mountain in the background, is that Mt Fuji? There are two persons on horseback and the rest walking. What does this scene depict? Approximately how old is this (it is a framed image) ? And who is the artist?
I would be grateful for any help/ideas. Thanks. | English | NL | ad5fece4b4bf82e99e3a0b4b78e41679f4779405a9561390b5f28ecac71596bb |
I'm back in my old habits of writing entries the day after the readings appeared. So be it...for the time being, that's where I'm at. And yesterday ladies and gentleman...we had a floater...a floating Saint!
Patron of:Aviation, astronauts, mental handicaps, test taking, students
Mystic, born 17 June 1603, in a stable; died at Osimo 18 September.In his eighth year Joseph had an ecstatic vision while at school and this was renewed several times; at the age of seventeen applied to the Capuchins at Martino near Tarento, where he was accepted as a lay-brother in 1620, but his continual ecstasies unfitted him for work and he was dismissed. Joseph did not lose hope. He succeeded in obtaining permission to work in the stable as lay help or oblate at the Franciscan convent. He now gave evidence of great virtues, humility, obedience, and love of penance to such an extent that he was admitted to the clerical state in 1625, and three years later, he was raised to the priesthood. Joseph did not have much human knowledge, yet infused by knowledge and supernatural light he not only surpassed all ordinary men in the learning of the schools but could solve the most intricate questions.
His life was now one long succession of visions and other heavenly favours. Everything that in any way had reference to God or holy things would bring on an ecstatic state: the sound of a bell or of church music, the mention of the name of God or of the Blessed Virgin or of a saint, any event in the life of Christ, the sacred Passion, a holy picture, the thought of the glory in heaven, all would put Joseph into contemplation. Not many things would take him out of contemplation. Frequently he would be raised from his feet and remain suspended in the air. This was disruptive to the community, so at the age of 35, he was ordered to remain in his room, where a private chapel was prepared for him. Evil-minded and envious men even brought him before the Inquisition; he was even sent from one lonely house to another, as each community struggled to deal with him. Joseph Nevertheless retained his resigned and joyous spirit. canonized 16 July 1767 by Clement XIII;
Reflections: What was most striking to me about St Joseph's story was how much he was chastised for his spiritual gifts. On the other hand, if I saw a guy floating around downtown Toronto or Montreal today, I don't think I'd admire him for spiritual holiness. I'd either be jealous of his skills or concerned that he's defiling the laws of gravity. However, if the same person where in a Franciscan habit I'd probably turn the event into an add campaign with a picture of him floating and a text at the bottom saying ' Still think there is no God?!" That would be kind of petty of me, I know! I mean, the whole point of these kinds of Saints is that we can admire from a far these great gifts they had, and maybe not long to have them for ourselves, but at the very least appreciate the depth of their love for God.
Because that's what triggers saints. It's not a desire to do extraordinary things, but a profound love for the mystery of our Faith as St Paul named it in the first reading, and an ability to sit with it and let it work on them. And I know, I know...many people out there HATE The word mystery. I don't care. We have to appropriate that mystery that has allowed so many Saints to have ecstatic visions of the divine. And that mystery is not rocket science.
" God(through Jesus) was made visible in the flesh,
justified in the Spirit,
seen by angels,
proclaimed to the gentiles,
believed in throughout the world,
taken up in glory"
It's not rocket science, but it does challenge us (well parts of it do. That he was proclaimed to the gentiles and believed in all over the world is fact! A fact that wouldn't have been possible without the others parts of this mystery, but still a fact!) . However, when ever I struggle with believing any of these aspects of the Christ story, and I often do struggle, at the end, all I say myself to bring me back to a point of meditation on it is, 'but imagine if it were true. What then. How would you respond?"
And I'm back to that question. It seems I spent most of last week meditating on that along with the readings. It's kind of a theme for my paper as well, so it's an understandable point of return for me! And HOW would I respond? In faith. In gratitude. In love. This is what allows me to hear the message of Wisdom our Lord Communicates to us to this day. It's what opens me to at least, if I can't 'dance with the children' of wisdom (a reference to the obscure Gospel passage...basically, Jesus and John are the Children calling out to other children, and being ignored.) appreciate the dance, and perhaps, yearn to be able to dance, and mourn, and laugh and cry with them.
Reading 1, First Timothy 3:14-16
14 I write this to you in the hope that I may be able to come to you soon;
15 but in case I should be delayed, I want you to know how people ought to behave in God's household -- that is, in the Church of the living God, pillar and support of the truth.
16 Without any doubt, the mystery of our religion is very deep indeed: He was made visible in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed to the gentiles, believed in throughout the world, taken up in glory.
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 111:1-6
1 Alleluia! I give thanks to Yahweh with all my heart, in the meeting-place of honest people, in the assembly.
2 Great are the deeds of Yahweh, to be pondered by all who delight in them.
3 Full of splendour and majesty his work, his saving justice/wise designs stands firm for ever.
4 He gives us a memorial of his great deeds; Yahweh is mercy and tenderness.
5 He gives food to those who fear him, he keeps his covenant ever in mind.
6 His works show his people his power in giving them the birthright of the nations.
Gospel, Luke 7:31-35
31 'What comparison, then, can I find for the people of this generation? What are they like?
32 They are like children shouting to one another while they sit in the market place: We played the pipes for you, and you wouldn't dance; we sang dirges, and you wouldn't cry.
33 'For John the Baptist has come, not eating bread, not drinking wine, and you say, "He is possessed."
34 The Son of man has come, eating and drinking, and you say, "Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners."
35 Yet wisdom is justified by all her children.' | English | NL | 45b2330e58602ec0283cd777c2a16d1adfe098b200bd4fa04ada38cd22e87502 |
No sooner had my knee returned to normality than my back went on me. Thankfully it eases off as the day goes on and by lunch time I'm mobile enough to pick up a rucksack and some rods. That was what I did yesterday afternoon. At last I was on a gobio hunt.
That was the way things continued. Drop the float in, wait a few seconds and there'd be a gudgeon on the hook! Some were among the tiniest gudgeon I've ever seen. None were as large as I used to catch when I was younger. All were too small for pike baits.
I missed one or two bites. Probably because the little buggers couldn't get the hook in their gobs. When I tried a red maggot things hotted up. No longer did I need to wait for a bite to show. As soon as the bait touched bottom the float was on the move. The bottom of the pond must be crawling with gudgeon.
After swinging in a dozen or so of the little fish I put the float rod away and dropped two grains of fake corn over the spot I'd been feeding. I had a liner to the other rod before the corn rod sprang into action. The culprit being one of the pond's skinny chub. Back out with the corn and shortly after a small carp hung itself on the same bait.
Around four o'clock a song thrush began to sing high on a black-budded ash tree. Such an English sight and sound it's no surprise Thomas Hardy found the thrush's song an inspiration for a poem. Listening to it certainly cheered my soul on a gloomily overcast and chilly afternoon.
After banking the carp I put that rod away and reverted to the float for the last half hour before the thought of food tempted me back home. First put in and the float buried. No gudgeon this time but a hand-sized carp. Had the pasties moved in over the feed and pushed my little friends out? The next cast proved they hadn't as another gudgeon was swung to hand.
If it had been warmer I'd have spent more time gudgeon bashing, in an attempt to find one that wasn't minute. Then again, if the water had been warmer I reckon the nuisance carp would have been more active and annoying. It was still an enjoyable afternoon. I'm not sure I'll be repeating the exercise as I think I've got gudgeon out of my system for now. | English | NL | 8f16fcc5b8cce972aa0c137b9727c1145178105ca7f219014dc04cf5a0c9db82 |
AZO Cast Members & Creatives
Leonard Bernstein was born on August 25, 1918, in Lawrence, Massachusetts. His birth name was Louis, the name his grandmother adored, but his family always called him Leonard or Lenny, which he officially renamed himself when he was 16.
His father, Sam Bernstein, was a Russian immigrant who in his native Ukraine was destined to become a rabbi. Once he arrived and settled on New York City’s Lower East Side, the elder Bernstein took up working as a fish cleaner. He eventually got a job sweeping floors in his Uncle Henry’s barbershop and then landed a position stocking wigs for a dealer. He eventually built a rather profitable business distributing beauty products. Leonard grew up understanding that business and success were paramount, and “occupations” in the field of music and art were simply off-limits.
It was at the age of 10 that Leonard first played piano. His Aunt Clara was going through a divorce and needed a place to store her massive upright piano. Lenny loved everything about the instrument, but his father refused to pay for lessons. Determined, the boy raised his own small pot of money to pay for a few sessions. He was a natural from the start, and by the time his bar mitzvah rolled around, his father was impressed enough to buy him a baby grand piano. The young Bernstein found inspiration everywhere and played with a voracity and spontaneity that impressed anyone who listened.
He attended Boston Latin School, where he met his first real teacher and his lifelong mentor, Helen Coates. After graduating, Lenny entered Harvard University, where he studied music theory with Arthur Tillman Merritt and counterpoint with Walter Piston. In 1937, he attended a Boston Symphony concert conducted by Dmitri Mitropoulos. Bernstein’s heart sang when he saw the bald Greek man gesture with his bare hands, exuding a rare kind of enthusiasm for every score. At a reception the next day, Mitropoulos heard Bernstein play a sonata, and he was so moved by the young man’s abilities that he invited him to attend his rehearsals. Leonard spent a week with him. After the experience, Bernstein was determined to make music the center of his life.
To strengthen his technical skills, he spent a year of intensive training at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. He studied conducting with Fritz Reiner, a man who believed in mastering every detail of every piece. Bernstein benefited from the discipline, but he believed in more than the mechanics. In 1940, when he was 22, the Berkshire Music Center at Tanglewood invited Bernstein to join some 300 other talented students and professional musicians for a summer of musical exploration and performance. Leonard was one of only five students accepted in the master class in conducting that was taught by the fame Serge Koussevitzky. The man became a father figure to Lenny, encouraging his belief in the power and importance of music.
Musician, Composer and Conductor
Despite Bernstein’s passion and brilliance, he found himself out of work after the summer at Tanglewood. For a while he took odd jobs transcribing music, but then, out of pure luck, he was offered the position of assistant conductor of the New York Philharmonic. Due to the war draft, very few able musicians remained stateside. The conductor Artur Rodzinski was given the rather unconventional recommendation of an American-born assistant—the asthma-stricken Bernstein. On November 14, 1943, Bernstein was called at 9 am. The symphony’s guest conductor, the very prestigious Bruno Walter, had fallen ill. Rodzinski—able but generous—ordered Bernstein to step up and conduct that afternoon’s concert. Step up he did. The young conductor amazed his crowd and his players. Ecstatic applause implored The New York Times to publish a front-page article about his performance. Overnight, Bernstein became a respected conductor, one who would lead the Philharmonic 11 times by the end of the season.
From 1945 to 1947, he conducted the New York City Center orchestra and appeared as a guest conductor across the United States, Europe, and Israel. Despite his great talents, rumors about his sexuality became rampant. His mentor Mitropoulos advised him to marry, believing that doing so would quash the speculations and secure his career. In 1951, Bernstein married the Chilean actress Felicia Cohn Montealegre. Although friends and colleagues always said Bernstein loved his wife, with whom he had three children, he continued to engage in extramarital liaisons with young men. In that same year, he wrote the musical Trouble in Tahiti (1951), a 45-minute two-character chamber piece about a bored, upper-middle-class couple.
Leonard’s musical life continued to blossom, taking him on several international tours during the 1950s. In 1952, he founded the Creative Arts Festival at Brandeis University. He also found a love for teaching. The television shows "Omnibus" and “Young People's Concerts” allowed him to speak to a whole new audience of music lovers. Always a fan of both classical and pop music, Bernstein wrote his first operetta, Candide in 1956. His second work for the stage was a collaboration with Jerome Robbins, Arthur Laurents and Stephen Sondheim, the beloved musical West Side Story. When it opened, the show garnered unanimous rave reviews, matched only by its movie version released in 1961.
After battling emphysema, he died at the age of 72 in 1990. | English | NL | 837621cf4dc1c2059d34f2aaa17b182ffe5b6274d5b1df568167860b3fcd088b |
Mike is the Head Trader and a member of the Investment Committee. Prior to joining Inverness in 2008, Mike was Vice President and Senior Equity Trader at David J. Green Inc. Mike worked as the Head Trader at Brown Brothers Harriman from 1993 to 2003.
Mike received a BS in Accounting from SUNY Plattsburgh in 1983. He has previously held the Series 7, 55, 63, and 65 designations. | English | NL | 19ff314eb451d71daf11499691ca63ebec7b203748c2231beb25706791ee685c |
Представьте английский текст в виде подстрочника-кальки по цепочке по 2-3 предложения.
NOW this is the next tale, and it tells how the Camel got his big hump.
In the beginning of years, when the world was so new and all, and the Animals were just beginning to work for Man, there was a Camel, and he lived in the middle of a Howling Desert because he did not want to work; and besides, he was a Howler himself. So he ate sticks and thorns and tamarisks and milkweed and prickles, most 'scruciating idle; and when anybody spoke to him he said 'Humph!' Just 'Humph!' and no more.
Presently the Horse came to him on Monday morning, with a saddle on his back and a bit in his mouth, and said, 'Camel, O Camel, come out and trot like the rest of us.'
'Humph!' said the Camel; and the Horse went away and told the Man.
Presently the Dog came to him, with a stick in his mouth, and said, 'Camel, O Camel, come and fetch and carry like the rest of us.'
'Humph!' said the Camel; and the Dog went away and told the Man.
Presently the Ox came to him, with the yoke on his neck and said, 'Camel, O Camel, come and plough like the rest of us.'
'Humph!' said the Camel; and the Ox went away and told the Man.
At the end of the day the Man called the Horse and the Dog and the Ox together, and said, 'Three, O Three, I'm very sorry for you (with the world so new-and-all); but that Humph-thing in the Desert can't work, or he would have been here by now, so I am going to leave him alone, and you must work double-time to make up for it.'
That made the Three very angry (with the world so new-and-all), and they held a palaver, and an indaba, and a punchayet, and a pow-wow on the edge of the Desert; and the Camel came chewing on milkweed most 'scruciating idle, and laughed at them. Then he said 'Humph!' and went away again.
Presently there came along the Djinn in charge of All Deserts, rolling in a cloud of dust (Djinns always travel that way because it is Magic), and he stopped to palaver and pow-pow with the Three.
'Djinn of All Deserts,' said the Horse, 'is it right for any one to be idle, with the world so new-and-all?'
'Certainly not,' said the Djinn.
'Well,' said the Horse, 'there's a thing in the middle of your Howling Desert (and he's a Howler himself) with a long neck and long legs, and he hasn't done a stroke of work since Monday morning. He won't trot.'
'Whew!' said the Djinn, whistling, 'that's my Camel, for all the gold in Arabia! What does he say about it?'
'He says “Humph!”' said the Dog; 'and he won't fetch and carry.'
'Does he say anything else?'
'Only “Humph!”; and he won't plough,' said the Ox.
'Very good,' said the Djinn. 'I'll humph him if you will kindly wait a minute.'
The Djinn rolled himself up in his dust-cloak, and took a bearing across the desert, and found the Camel most 'scruciatingly idle, looking at his own reflection in a pool of water.
'My long and bubbling friend,' said the Djinn, 'what's this I hear of your doing no work, with the world so new-and-all?'
'Humph!' said the Camel.
The Djinn sat down, with his chin in his hand, and began to think a Great Magic, while the Camel looked at his own reflection in the pool of water.
'You've given the Three extra work ever since Monday morning, all on account of your 'scruciating idleness,' said the Djinn; and he went on thinking Magics, with his chin in his hand.
'Humph!' said the Camel.
'I shouldn't say that again if I were you,' said the Djinn; you might say it once too often. Bubbles, I want you to work.'
And the Camel said 'Humph!' again; but no sooner had he said it than he saw his back, that he was so proud of, puffing up and puffing up into a great big lolloping humph.
'Do you see that?' said the Djinn. 'That's your very own humph that you've brought upon your very own self by not working. To-day is Thursday, and you've done no work since Monday, when the work began. Now you are going to work.'
'How can I,' said the Camel, 'with this humph on my back?'
'That's made a-purpose,' said the Djinn, 'all because you missed those three days. You will be able to work now for three days without eating, because you can live on your humph; and don't you ever say I never did anything for you. Come out of the Desert and go to the Three, and behave. Humph yourself!'
And the Camel humphed himself, humph and all, and went away to join the Three. And from that day to this the Camel always wears a humph (we call it 'hump' now, not to hurt his feelings); but he has never yet caught up with the three days that he missed at the beginning of the world, and he has never yet learned how to behave.
by Rudyard Kipling | English | NL | 3e1362c52dfea793080437da98a7a5c810cbc9c5c3b63f556bcc43120e3cbbb8 |
We all have them. Stories. And each of us has to tell them. Regularly. And to anyone who will listen.
Growing up I knew that I was either going to be a lab scientist or a public speaker/entertainer. Combine studying spiders as an "independent study" in third grade with breaking into dance at the Kitchen Kabaret ride at Epcot, and that about sums about the direction I was headed in. Thanks to a number of incredibly powerful teachers in high school, I realized that my desire to explore the sciences and need to work with people could be equally met through my becoming an educator.
After graduating college, I was lucky enough to begin work in a district that valued rigorous education and understood the power of relationships. Within days of entering the field, I understood the importance of this quote :
Frank's comment, made to me early in my first year, has served as a guiding principle of my learning and leading, and, in many ways, has encouraged me to move forward in my career with a spotlight always on the people first.
My time as a middle school science teacher and department chair was a decade that I will always cherish. I've become a better educator, and better person, for all that my students and fellow educators taught me.
When I moved into regional roles, first as a regional science coordinator, and currently as an assistant director of curriculum, I took with me the necessity of remembering that relationships mean everything. I learned that there is a great big world of education outside of our current schools and districts, and in all cases, collaboration is the only real way to bring down walls and make learning and leading meaningful for us all.
Whether working with districts on curriculum projects, or helping to hash out the design of a three-day professional learning series, I relish working with others; I can only get better if I take the time to learn from those around me.
My story is far from over, and I'm looking forward to continuing down pathways of both self-discovery and collaborative inquiry, always making sure that the people, and the relationships are the driving force.
Where My Story Has Taken ME. . .
Click here to see how my story has taken shape so far. | English | NL | 950428ede9536153ffee57aa881a8eea56c02585e60bcb0ae742a436d251ddac |
|REEL FACE:||REAL FACE:|
Born: April 24, 1974
Jersey City, NJ, USA
Antwone Quenton Fisher
Born: August 3, 1959
Birthplace: Cleveland, Ohio, USA
He's a real person but I had to have him do some things that a few other people had helped me do. He also serves the purpose that he served in real life, and he also does things that other people did for me - just like the girl. Since you can't have that many characters, you combine people.
I was kind to them in the movie and the book. I was kind to them. They are worse.
Certainly he was.
We knew each other for some years before that so he didn't suddenly have to pay attention to me. He knew me. But the thing was, it was most important for him to do a good job. No one knows who I am so it doesn't matter whether he copied my mannerisms or not, because no one knows me. For Will Smith to play Muhammad Ali was different because everybody knows Muhammad Ali. If he came in and acted like Will Smith, then people would be disappointed because he's not being Muhammad Ali. It's much harder to do famous people.
Antwone Fisher was born in prison to seventeen-year-old Eva Mae Fisher and twenty-three-year-old Eddie Elkins. His father, Eddie, was shot and killed before Antwone was even born. Antwone was placed in foster care within the first few weeks of his life, and for two years he lived with a loving family. The state eventually put Antwone back in the foster system, claiming that Antwone's attachment to his foster mother could be problematic. He was subsequently placed in the home of Reverend and Mrs. Pickett, where some of his most traumatic childhood experiences unfolded. For fourteen years with the Picketts, Antwone suffered both emotional and physical abuse.
Antwone walked out the door of the Picketts without getting so much as a good-bye. The road ahead for Antwone wasn't easy. Upon graduating high school, he found himself staying at the YMCA where he began life as an emancipated minor. He fell in with a criminal named Butch to avoid the derelicts and sexual predators at the YMCA. He ended up sleeping on park benches and in alleys, and it was at that critical moment in his life that he decided to join the Navy.
Antwone Fisher spent eleven years with the Navy where he learned many lessons and befriended a Navy psychiatrist, Commander Williams (portrayed by Denzel Washington in the film), who helped him realize his potential. Upon leaving the Navy, Antwone took a job as a security guard at Sony Pictures Entertainment. It was then in 1992 that he decided to look for his real family. He eventually found his aunt, Annette Elkins, who lived in Cleveland, and within months he met all of his kin, including his mother, Eva Mae. READ THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
The Antwone Fisher movie trailer for the film directed by Denzel Washington and starring Derek Luke. The movie marked Washington's debut as a director.
WATCHAntwone Fisher Trailer
Antwone Fisher trailer. A sailor (Derek
Luke) prone to violent outbursts is sent
to a naval psychiatrist (Denzel
Washington) for help. Refusing at first to
open up, the young man eventually breaks
down and reveals a horrific childhood
during which he was abused in foster care.
He searches for both his real family and
foster one, to help mend the wounds that
he has been suffering from. | English | NL | 8e533a2bdf4f59e8d4e21894307b45041df536089bcc7509d9660deb7941d2bf |
American Standard VersionIntroduction for Theophilus
1The former treatise I made, O Theophilus, concerning all that Jesus began both to do and to teach, 2until the day in which he was received up, after that he had given commandment through the Holy Spirit unto the apostles whom he had chosen: 3To whom he also showed himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing unto them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God:
Wait for the Holy Spirit
4and, being assembled together with them, he charged them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which,'said he , ye heard from me: 5For John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days hence.
The Ascension of Jesus
6They therefore, when they were come together, asked him, saying, Lord, dost thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? 7And he said unto them, It is not for you to know times or seasons, which the Father hath set within His own authority. 8But ye shall receive power, when the Holy Spirit is come upon you: and ye shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea and Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
9And when he had said these things, as they were looking, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. 10And while they were looking stedfastly into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; 11who also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking into heaven? this Jesus, who was received up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye beheld him going into heaven.
Matthias Replaces Judas
12Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is nigh unto Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey off. 13And when they were come in, they went up into the upper chamber, where they were abiding; both Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James. 14These all with one accord continued stedfastly in prayer, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.
15And in these days Peter stood up in the midst of the brethren, and said (and there was a multitude of persons gathered together, about a hundred and twenty), 16Brethren, it was needful that the Scripture should be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spake before by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who was guide to them that took Jesus. 17For he was numbered among us, and received his portion in this ministry. 18(Now this man obtained a field with the reward of his iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out. 19And it became known to all the dwellers at Jerusalem; insomuch that in their language that field was called Akeldama, that is, The field of blood.)
20For it is written in the book of Psalms, Let his habitation be made desolate, And let no man dwell therein: and, His office let another take.
21Of the men therefore that have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us, 22beginning from the baptism of John, unto the day that he was received up from us, of these must one become a witness with us of his resurrection. 23And they put forward two, Joseph called Barsabbas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. 24And they prayed, and said, Thou, Lord, who knowest the hearts of all men, show of these two the one whom thou hast chosen, 25to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas fell away, that he might go to his own place. 26And they gave lots for them; and the lot fell upon Matthias; and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
Section Headings Courtesy INT Bible
© 2012, Used by Permission | English | NL | 1d0cecd8b7a852b7250df213259541a67cd0250947a8bf10f81a7d2b45c8fa79 |
Political power is a responsibility | The Sunday Guardian | May 22, 2011 | Page 15 Solomon, an Israelite Prophet as well as a King, was the ruler of Palestine and Syria. While engaged in trying to win over the Queen of Sheba in both the political and religious sense, he asked for the throne of the Queen of Sheba to be brought to him. The queen and her throne were hundreds of miles away at that time, but because he had been endowed with special powers, he expected his order to have immediate effect. The Quran refers to how Solomon responded to his order being instantly complied with in the chapter entitled Al-Naml (The Ants) of the Quran. The relevant verse is as follows: "But one of them who had some knowledge of the Book said, 'I will bring it to you in the twinkling of an eye.' When Solomon saw it placed before him, he exclaimed, 'This is by the grace of my Lord, to test whether I am grateful or ungrateful. Whosoever is grateful, it is for the good of his own self; and whosoever is ungrateful, then surely my Lord is self-sufficient and generous." (27:40) This verse illustrates the Quranic concept of political power, i.e. it is not a kind of a worldly blessing; it is a test set by God. Just as everything that one possesses in this world is a test paper, so also is political power a test paper. God Almighty is constantly watching the behaviour of the ruler to ascertain whether he is just or unjust in performing his duties. A king is accountable before God just as the common man is. According to this Quranic concept, political power is a responsibility rather than any kind of blessing. The possession of political power does not mean that the ruler is a superior person, or that the ruler is the master of his subjects, or that the ruler is great and others are not great. | English | NL | 9721a8015b785d49e89a8f975a2218c7222f1dbf91e4b3b06ebe1cbb0354a641 |
Episode(s): 14 - Little Arcadia
Patricia proves that the Nebraska Family is just one weird family. Mother of Gofsef (from Episode 5), Marilyn, Chinpei, Tonchiki, and Kanta, she and her daughter are hired by Morgan to kill Badwick's parents. As an attack, Patricia throws her three sons who act as a human cannonball. When Chinpei is taken out by a bullet from Vash, Patricia retreats.
Episode(s): 25 - Live Through
Arriving into the small town, Petori mentions his family is missing and that there has been mass disappearances in the twelve towns, with no trace. The town Petori has arrived is the only peaceful town left. He notices Vash sitting on a porch, but he can't seem to exactly remember him. However, his friend, Simon, does.
Episode(s): 05 - Hard Puncher
Needing the $$60 Billion for the damaged plant, Professor Nebraska and his son, Gofsef, were released from jail and hired of the chairman of Inepril City as a last resort to get Vash the Stampede. When his son is defeated, Professor Nebraska confronts Vash, but is easily defeated with a dart gun Vash used. | English | NL | a55bdeea2651babcd03f75514cda4584537768a7005e3b7171267eb9723f28de |
You May Be Tested Later On This Material (1985)
I learned quickly that if I wanted to make larger work a good strategy was to develop it in modules. In 1985 I was working toward a piece called Vegetable Love when I was invited to do a performance at the Noyes Cultural Center in Evanston, IL. I therefore put together what I assumed would be the first module of my work-in-progress, and called it You May be Tested Later On This Material. I had no idea at the time that this would eventually become my best-known performance work.
Tested was intended as a critique of structuralism, as an ironic critique of all my worst habits as a teacher, and as a critique of the denial many gay men were feeling at the time, as the AIDS crisis was steadily worsening ("I don't need to be tested!"). When I was in the middle of writing this script, my best friend in Chicago - a funny, brilliant man named Timothy Paul - died at the age of 29. Despite all my attempts to be ironic in this work, the pain I felt about this loss came bleeding through the humor. My little deconstruction often left audience members in tears.
For most people, the real core of this work was when I attempted to explain the idea of kinship, or more specifically, gay kinship. Since kinship was originally used to chart marriages and births, the idea of transposing this to queer culture involved a leap into the unknown. It also becomes quickly obvious that my discussion of the kinship of "Gay Man A" is actually a break-down of my own past relationships. My "analysis" quickly spirals out of control: "But A just really couldn't stand C because of his relationships with B, D, and E!" By the end, instead of an objective analysis, I am covered with colored chalk from head to toe, and left a stammering, sweaty mess. Friends would come up afterwards, look at the smeared chalk wall (or chalk-board in some performances) and shake their heads: "That's how my sex life looks, too!"
In the years that followed, I often performed this work at academic conferences, under fictional titles, waiting to see how long it took audience members to realize that what they were seeing was not an academic analysis of structuralism, but an example of performance art. This work was also the beginning of an attempt on my part to minimize the technology required to present my work; I became fond of saying "a box of colored chalk and a tomato - that's my idea of technology."
Tested became my best-known work not only because I performed it frequently. It was also published in the magazine Whitewalls, and later included in the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art's exhibition Art in Chicago, 1945 - 1995. | English | NL | d9e4d950cdfceb6deb0e91fb4a0ac7b5b15728afce51091f871a62a83e16550f |
The Welch Brothers, Jeremiah Allen Welch and Gabriel Welch, are an artist duo living and working in San Francisco. The Welch Brothers were born in Visalia, CA into an artistic family. Their father was a muralist and sign painter and their mother and oldest sister started a clowning business. As children, sketchbooks, legos and costumes from their family's clowning business supplied an endless amount of entertainment. Their father sold comic books and toys at the local flea market and this would serve as an inspiring force for the years to come. The colorful world of comic books can be seen throughout much of the two brothers work.
When their family moved to the small town of Winslow, Arizona in 1996 they became best friends and partners in crime. This is where they began to pass sketchbooks back and forth and build ideas together.
The Welch Brothers moved back to California in 2002. Graffiti, street art, and hip hop became their main forms of expression until they became immersed in ceramics and fine art. Comics, graffiti and fine art eventually began to melt together into the style you see today.
Their individual styles combine seamlessly to create works unlike anything else that has been seen in the past. From impressionistic animals to abstract worlds that look as though they could be created with computers, The Welch Brothers continue to push the boundaries of traditional art. They have struck out on a grand adventure together with no path to follow, paving a walkway into the unknown. Although the two brothers took time to cultivate their own unique styles, they would often work together throughout the course of their lives. | English | NL | 297e66c8e9a2dae0716933eb90f1868dc3d9350284166ba6ed6ac5d40632ff96 |
This book took me what felt like forever to get through, and then left me in a reading slump. Trying to write a review for it has left me stumped too because I don’t even know how to put in to words what I feel about this book.
The scope of this novel, it has to be said, is impressive. It’s a multi-generational family saga set amongst the political backdrop of China over the best part of the last 80 years. We follow the story of several members of the families and how they interconnect in the past and the present day primarily through a handwritten book called The Book of Records. It is through this book within the book that we bridge between past and present day and characters. As such, this book is able to explore the cultural and political history of China through two families and their interweaving lives.
The writing for the most part, while dense, was lyrical and enjoyable to read. My main issue was that I really struggled keeping track of what on earth was going on. The characters didn’t seem to have any definition, which is especially problematic when you’re ping-ponging between decades of history and completely different characters. It isn’t a book you can just relax in to, I found myself constantly having to focus and remember who was related to who and what other names they went by. It got confusing for me very regularly which really put me off picking it up for a few days.
Stories which have many characters and are set in many different periods of history have to be written in such a way as to not confuse the reader beyond belief. Unfortunately, this book failed at that for me. I think with more defined chapters which outline where in the story the events are taking place would have easily elevated this book to something so much more than it was for me as a reader.
I think I may give Thien’s writing another go in the future, but not too soon because this book actually exhausted me. | English | NL | 394ffd7f80c690398fae52cec9efb5d68bd80eea3dd818fdda700471872d58d0 |
2nd Story Gallery is pleased to present a public reading by Susan Musgrave.
The many volumes of poetry Susan Musgrave has had published since her first ("Songs of the Sea Witch") at age eighteen, have established her as one of Canada's most gifted and compelling poets. She is also the author of two novels and two books for children. Forthcoming in 1989 is a non-fiction book, "Musgrave's Landing."
Musgrave was raised on Vancouver Island, and has lived abroad in various countries, most recently Panama and Columbia. She currently lives near Sidney, British Columbia. | English | NL | b70f8d775a8f3b24898af67bbc1d634d9bdfe6ef21fbf23c21f0f6ba71ec3384 |
PhD (Educ), 2002
In 1975, Dr. Ethel Gardner, a Stó:lō member of the Skwah First Nation, decided she wanted to learn how to speak her people’s traditional language. Searching Vancouver bookstores for a resource on the Halq'eméylem language, Gardner was shocked by what she found: absolutely nothing.
Gardner is an Elder in Residence at SFU, and the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology. Now (mostly) retired, she has held professorships at multiple universities including SFU, Lakehead University and the University of Alberta. She continues to work as a sessional faculty member at the University of the Fraser Valley. She completed a Special Arrangements PhD at SFU in 2002 and an Ed.M. from Harvard University in 1993.
“I was born in Hope, BC, but then we moved to Quebec. We would get taunted by neighborhood kids. They would say you’re Indians and my dad would say 'no you're not, you're half-breeds.' But sometimes at home he would speak Halq'eméylem and he would look so proud when he did. At home we were real Indians but outside we were not. I grew up very confused,” says Gardner.
Returning to BC as an adult, Gardner began focusing her efforts on revitalizing her traditional language so others in her community wouldn't have to experience the same confusion she did. “I wanted to know why there were no resources on our language. I went to university and learned about the history of First Nations in Canada and about residential schools. That made me angry. I wanted to redress what had been done,” she says.
Gardner’s SFU PhD dissertation examined the syntax, history and cultural significance of the Halq'eméylem language. The experience she said not only cemented her passion for the field, but was personally transformative. “Through my PhD, I was able to establish how language tied us together with our identity, land, spirituality. It was an epiphany. I came to understand what it means to be Stó:lō,” she says.
As a faculty member at Simon Fraser University, and later, Lakehead University, Gardner led the design and development of Indigenous teacher education programs across Canada. As well, she was the director of the Indigenous Languages Education initiative with the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Education.
Gardner explains that what she is most proud of are the many Indigenous language teachers she has helped train over the years. “Now they are out there helping grow the language in communities, band schools, adult classrooms, Head Start programs—everywhere—Indigenous peoples across Canada can stay connected with their culture and what it means to be a First Nations person in their context,” she says.
Gardner credits SFU as helping get her started on what has been a career that has touched so many lives. "I was thrilled with what I was able to do at SFU. I was able to determine how I wanted to do things at every step," she says.
- Written by Jackie Amsden and the Office of Graduate Studies & Postdoctoral Fellows.
Published in 2015 | English | NL | e9507f6eccfd737f50fd8aa8304ce539841244059909194c9413a380b2a74da5 |
I walked into a room in our house where the t.v. had been left on and playing on that channel was one of those shows about tattoo artists and I got sucked into watching it pretty fast. Not my usual thing, but it was interesting.
A man came into the tattoo parlor with some pictures and a story behind the tattoo he wanted inked over his heart. It seems when he was very young, he and his dad were flying in a small plane and as a strong wind kicked up, the plane’s tail went up and the nose went down, threatening both of their lives.
His dad’s instinct was to save his son. He used his own body as a shield between the life of his child and the ground they screamed toward below. His dad made the ultimate sacrifice with his very life.
The man had brought in a newspaper clipping with a picture of the plane crash and a picture of his dad holding him when he was a baby. His request was to have a collage of sorts with the picture of the two of them and the date that his dad saved his life permanently memorialized over his heart as a reminder of his dad and the gift of life he had given to him that day.
More than once the man remarked that he was indeed special to have received that kind of gift. Only a precious few have faced death and have been loved enough by someone that they willingly gave their life for their loved one’s. The joy on his face at being loved that much by his father was palpable.
How could the analogy have been made any more plain?
Jesus Christ came to give His own life to act as a shield between our souls and hell. He placed Himself in harm’s way, giving His very life to pay for our sins so that we wouldn’t have to face punishment for them ourselves.
If we’ve put our faith in Jesus Christ, not only have we been given a second chance in this life, but we’ve been given the gift of eternal life.
How incredibly special is that?
Just think of the magnitude of God’s love for you - that He sent His only Son to die for you. And what’s more, God kept loving you until you were brought to the place of repentance and faith in Him and you became His child.
If we daily remember how privileged we are to be loved so much that Jesus Christ willingly gave His very life for us, then we, too, will beam with joy at the very precious gift we’ve been given.
Now I’m not saying we should have that sentiment indelibly inked onto our bodies, but we can have the joyful remembrance that His love will always be written on our hearts.
“No one has greater love than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13 | English | NL | e04fc4ad31a324a8f527f2761b4c28526aa0a6a1ce405c2a029b57c819819239 |
As an Of Counsel member of the firm, Fred focuses primarily in the areas of trust and estate administration, real estate, banking, and corporate governance matters. He serves as a trustee, executor and special administrator of complex trusts and estates, by private and court appointment. Fred has been appointed by state and federal courts as a receiver, special servicer and interim corporate officer.
From 1999 until 2014, Fred was a member of the board of directors of Red Rock Community Bank and its affiliate, Bank of Las Vegas. He served as the bank’s corporate Secretary, Chairman of both the risk management and real estate committees and as a member of the loan and special assets committees.
Fred previously served as Vice President and was a member of the boards of directors of Farmers & Merchants National Bank and its holding company in Texas. He has also served as Chief Operating Officer of a real estate development firm, as a partner and general counsel of private equity funds, and as in-house counsel to family offices and privately held companies. Additionally, Fred has led and served on investigative teams responsible for providing information to the US Securities and Exchange Commission and other state regulatory agencies.
A graduate of Baylor Law School and Brigham Young University, Fred has served on a number of community and charity boards and foundations.
Fred and his wife are the parents of six children. | English | NL | 4583f45d06e2a34de2f1c5ee08e8942bbbd32c0330ec93c40d63effda03d39e7 |
15She Betrayed Her Family
When Ned Stark began to the uncover the truth behind Cersei and Jaime Lannister's incestuous relationship, he realized that his family might be in danger. He prepared a secret escape from King's Landing for his family and servants.
Ned had a ship ready to take them out of the city at a
moment's notice. When Sansa became aware of this plan, she told Cersei, as she wanted to remain in King's Landing and marry Joffrey.
Sansa hoped that Cersei could mend whatever issues she was having with Ned and keep the engagement on. This tipped off Cersei that Ned was planning something, which caused her to accelerate her own plans. Sansa had inadvertently betrayed her own family, which led to the death of her father.
This story was removed in the show, due to the fact that all of the characters had their ages increased by a few years in the adaptation. An older Sansa wouldn't have been gullible enough to betray her family in such a way, so the scene was left out. | English | NL | fe0d07864e3af392e786ab4432e4197e3edba91259dd600c846c8be77e7c2399 |
Build and Skin Color: Susuyu has richly colored bronze skin, with a number of genetic tattoos marring the perfection of her skin along her back. She has a slender, but firmly lithe body, the results of a desire to keep herself looking physically fit, though her figure is almost “girlish” as a result.
Eyes and Facial Features: She has narrow, luminous golden eyes, which stand out clearly against her skin on a well worn face. Her face has the same lithe, narrow quality to it as the rest of her body, though most of the rough edges have faded at this point in her life.
Hair Color and Style: A long, dark auburn head of hair fills out her appearance rather nicely, settling in loose waves down to about her shoulders.
Distinguishing Features: Susuyu has very nearly turned her back into a record of her service, with the Star Army Hinomaru tattooed opposing her serial code on the lower right side of her back, with a listing of her postings lined up her back, originating at her serial number and progressing up, shown by the symbol most closely linked with each assignment. Finally, she has the kanji and the motto of the Second Fleet's emblem, her original posting, and the only one she shared with her twin sister, tattooed across the top of her back, crossing her shoulder blades.
Personality: Susuyu is a blunt, outspoken person. She focuses very heavily on her duty, and what she feels is right, with little regard to how others might perceive it, or respond to it, and tends to come off a bit abrasively as a result. She's very nationalistic at heart, and doesn't understand how some people can forget all that they owe to the nations they're born in. Her mannerisms tend to be a bit overbearing, and she's a realist where it counts, which results in a fairly dominant personality.
Enime Resaneyu (twin sister) Susuyu and her sister were created as a pair by the Star Army of Yamatai.
2nd SF (original) Susuyu and her sister, Resaneyu, were created and assigned to the Star Army Second Fleet of Yamatai in early YE 29, where they began service with the fleet immediately upon completion of their training. Susuyu was purely infantry, while her sister was a Star Army Caretaker, and so they spent a fair bit of time apart. After only a short time in active service, the Second Fleet was almost entirely eliminated in combat with the SMX, though both Susuyu and her sister survived to be part of the reformed fleet later. However, late in YE 30 Susuyu was transferred out of the fleet to a different section of the Yamataian military, and spent the next three years being transferred from unit to unit, always on the front-lines somewhere.
Finally, in early YE 33, Susuyu was transferred to the First Legion, ostensibly to assist with organizing and leading newer soldiers, since she had several years of combat experience at that point. The real reason was actually that she'd made a point of calling out several superiors in various positions on what she perceived as inappropriate or detrimental actions. Regardless of the veracity of her claims, she'd managed to irritate enough people higher up that they wanted her gone, and kicked her to the furthest place they could think of.
Completely unworried by the potential blacklisting of her name for any kind of advancement, Susuyu did her best in her new position, and served well, including during the Battle of Yamatai, where she was wounded for the second time during her now remarkably decorated career. Despite her decorations, her continued stubbornness pertaining to disagreements with officers all but guaranteed her lack of advancement, despite her complete loyalty to the precepts of the Star Army of Yamatai. This made her rather eminently attractive to certain elements of the military, though, when the need for loyal soldiers came up, especially ones who could be counted on to stand up to their leaders when it came to the Empire.
Susuyu has been over the basic Star Army training procedure many times through her career, and that definitely includes the communications procedures, which she knows inside and out at this point. She can use the standard comms systems in nearly any of the standard Yamataian equipment with ease, and is fluent in both Trade (Nepleslian) and Yamataian, though she's also picked up a smattering of words from a couple other languages as well. She's had plenty of experience with reports and forms of all kinds, and has experience with both giving and receiving orders while under duress and, at times, fire.
She is also fully proficient in the usage of the wireless communication system built into her body from birth, and the nuances to it's use.
As the core of Susuyu's chosen occupation, combat is by far her central training precept. She is confident in both the Mindy and Daisy armor systems, and at least familiar with the MCAS, though she's had little practical experience in it. She's proficient in movement and combat in the standard realms of combat, including zero-g and low-gravity environments, both via the weapons she's trained with, and in hand-to-hand combat.
She has extensive experience with the majority of the Army's standard firearms, as well as both the LASR and Plasma Rifle most commonly used with the PA systems. Her hand-to-hand experience includes both straight fists, the use of guns as physical weapons, and a small amount of knife fighting.
Though definitely not her specialty, Susuyu is fully capable of using any of the standard Kessaku OS systems found on most ships. She can find (and store) information relatively easily in any of those systems, but little else.
Susuyu has absolutely no head for numbers, despite being taught all of the way up to trigonometry. She can count things well, but anything much past the basics that can't be handled automatically in her head is beyond her unless she sits down to work it out.
Having lived for a greater portion of the Star Army's history than most nekovalkyrja, Susuyu has made it her goal to know the Star Army, both current and past. She firmly believes in the purpose of the SAoY, and wants to know as much about the organization as possible, the better to understand it.
As part of her efforts to be as capable in her duties as possible, Susuyu keeps a strict regimen of physical fitness, even though it is not strictly necessary, with the natural fitness of the nekovalkyrja. This includes both physical and cardio exercises, with her (private) favorite being swimming. She is a very capable swimmer as a result of her workouts, and much more physically aware of her own limitations and abilities than average.
Having spent time in the Legions, Susuyu made it her business to learn how to operate in a planet-bound situation, without the convenience of a ship or civilization. She is capable of finding her way in rougher terrain, creating and finding shelter, and providing for herself off of the land on a temporary basis. She is familiar with the processes for doing these things in unfriendly environments or enemy territory, but has no actual experience in those variations. | English | NL | e1ea5c8c9bd57fdcb9cd5d7c4d4d5414ea30311b4abae82c4a97342c8140f205 |
CHAMPAIGN – Joseph T. Verdeyen, 83, formerly of Champaign, died at 12:45 a.m. Tuesday (Feb. 16, 2016) at home, surrounded by his family.
Visitation will be from 4 to 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 18, at Morgan Memorial Funeral Home, 1304 Regency Drive, Savoy. A Mass of Christian burial will be at 10 a.m. Friday, Feb. 19, at St. Matthew Catholic Church, 1303 Lincolnshire Drive, Champaign. Burial will immediately follow at St. Mary's Cemetery.
Joe was born Aug. 15, 1932, in Terre Haute, Ind., to George Francis and Josephine Kelly Verdeyen. He was the youngest of 10 children. On June 12, 1954, he married the love of his life, Katie, also of Terre Haute. As Joe wrote in the dedication of his third textbook, "Laser Electronics," "From my perspective, our marriage has a storybook characteristic to it with my love for her increasing daily." Katie survives along with his children, Mary (Dennis), Joe (Anita), Jean and Mike (Tammy). Joe loved being a grandpa to his 16 grandchildren, Mark (Monica), Anne (Andy), Katie (Paul), Jean (Chris), John, Nick, Andy, Joe, Sarah (Graham), Rebecca, Danielle, Kelli, Dan, Will, Erin and Kate, as well as his stepgrandchildren, Antonija and Ante. He was also blessed to be a great-grandpa to Anna, Isabel, Nathan, Noah, Caleb, Ethan and Avery and step-great-grandpa to Gwen, Mia and Stella. He was also a proud uncle to many nieces and nephews.
Joe was defined by his faith, which he lived out in numerous ways, specifically as a member of both the Holy Cross and the St. Matthew's school boards and the Peoria Diocesan Board of Education. Additionally, he was an active member in several other Holy Cross and St. Matthew's ministries. But more than these associations, Joe's faith was demonstrated by the way he lived his daily life: a humble, kind and faithful servant.
In addition to family and faith, Joe's next love was his 38-year career as a professor of computer and electrical engineering at the University of Illinois. During those years, he served as director of the Gaseous Electronics Lab as well as the Microelectronics Center, and was the graduate adviser to countless master's and PhD students in electrical engineering. In this role, he touched innumerable lives with his passion for teaching and research, as well as his integrity, respect and commitment to each student. Joe was a pioneer in the field of laser electronics and is named on several patents.
Joe received his bachelor's degree from Rose Hulman Institute, his master's degree from Rutgers University and his PhD from the University of Illinois. Joe had a great love of country and served in the ROTC. This military background meant many Saturday mornings started with patriotic hymns and an occasional "dime test" on his children's beds to be sure they were well-made.
Joe also enjoyed woodworking, jogging, fishing, golf, U of I sports and a well-poured beer (no head) at Murphy's Pub. He lived a life full of love, faith and family and will be dearly missed. His legacy will carry on, though, by how we treat our neighbor and … how we pour our beer.
In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to St. Matthew's Catholic Church, 1303 Lincolnshire Drive, Champaign, IL 61821; St. Camillus Hospice, 10101 W. Wisconsin Ave, Wauwatosa, WI 53226, or email@example.com, founded by a family member to serve the poor in Honduras. | English | NL | 29cff6d01610aaf7dbecc96056872e62144e648da7ad14c033f21b0a97d4a7a7 |
Why you’re not too busy to lead family worship
Charles Spurgeon proves that you aren’t too busy to make disciples in the home.
Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892) was a Baptist pastor in London for most of the second half of the nineteenth century. His is one of the most recognized names in Christian history, but he’s best-known today as the Prince of Preachers.
An electronic search of the mountain of material produced by Spurgeon reveals that he often referred to family worship, which he also called “family prayer.” “I esteem it so highly,” he said, “that no language of mine can adequately express my sense of its value.”
Some may think that Spurgeon lived in a much simpler era that afforded him more time to practice family worship than Christians would have today. I’ve conducted a great deal of Ph.D. research on Spurgeon’s life and pastoral ministry, and can confirm this isn’t so.
Spurgeon’s autobiography, as well as many first-hand observers, tell us that Spurgeon. . .
(1) pastored the largest evangelical church in the world at that time (with more than six thousand active members),
(3) edited his sermons for weekly publications, and thereby
(4) produced (in the sixty-four volume Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit) the largest collection of works by any single author in English,
(5) wrote an additional one hundred and twenty books (one every four months throughout his entire adult life),
(6) presided over sixty-six different ministries (such as the pastor’s college he founded),
(7) edited a monthly magazine (“The Sword and the Trowel”),
(8) typically read five books each week, many of which he reviewed for his magazine, and
(9) wrote with a dip pen five hundred letters per week.
And I think I’m busy! Five hundred hand-written letters? I couldn’t write five hundred tweets per week! Even if I were just copying verses from the Bible!
God gave Spurgeon an extraordinary capacity for work and productivity. And yet, despite the ceaseless, crushing demands on his schedule, at 6:00 each evening, setting aside a to-do list that few could match today, he gathered his wife, twin boys, and all others present in his home at the time for family worship.
After his death, his wife Susannah wrote this glimpse into their lives together with their twin boys, both of whom became pastors:
After the meal was over, an adjournment was made to the study for family worship, and it was at these seasons that my beloved’s prayers were remarkable for their tender childlikeness, their spiritual pathos, and their intense devotion. He seemed to come as near to God as a little child to a loving father, and we were often moved to tears as he talked thus face to face with his Lord.
A visitor to the Spurgeon home once wrote,
One of the most helpful hours of my visits to Westwood was the hour of family prayer. At six o’clock all the household gathered into the study for worship. Usually Mr. Spurgeon would himself lead the devotions. The portion read was invariably accompanied with exposition. How amazingly helpful those homely and gracious comments were. I remember, especially, his reading of the twenty-fourth of Luke: “Jesus Himself drew near and went with them.” How sweetly he talked upon having Jesus with us wherever we go. Not only to have Him draw near at special seasons, but to go with us whatever labour we undertake. . . . Then, how full of tender pleading, of serene confidence in God, of world-embracing sympathy were his prayers, . . . His public prayers were an inspiration and benediction, but his prayers with the family were to me more wonderful still. . . . Mr. Spurgeon, when bowed before God in family prayer, appeared a grander man even than when holding thousands spellbound by his oratory.
You may know of no one as busy or as burdened as yourself, but can you honestly say you have more responsibilities than Spurgeon?
Despite his innumerable and important responsibilities, Spurgeon made the privileges and delights of family worship a priority. How about you?
C. H. Spurgeon, “Hindrances to Prayer,” Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, vol. 20, (London: Passmore and Alabaster, 1874; reprint, Pasadena, TX: Pilgrim Publications, 1981), 506.
C. H. Spurgeon, C. H. Spurgeon’s Autobiography. Susannah Spurgeon and J. W. Harrald (comps.). (London: Passmore and Alabaster, 1899; reprint, Pasadena, TX: Pilgrim Publications, 1992), 64.
Arnold Dallimore. Spurgeon: A New Biography (Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1985), 178-179.
This post originally appeared on The Center for Biblical Spirituality. | English | NL | 1d6b392b2ff763af61feb00ba577991054fce7ea82e843b601b861a65687ce66 |
The EMH backup module was a 24th century computer memory storage device carried on Starfleet vessels equipped with the Emergency Medical Hologram program. It was capable of storing data too complex or too large for contemporary systems. As such, it was used to store backup versions of the EMH, on a frequent basis, in case it was lost or damaged.
The USS Voyager's backup module was stolen during an attack and recovered centuries later by the Kyrians. This version of The Doctor helped to reshape Kyrian and Vaskan history and served as the Kyrian / Vaskan Surgical Chancellor for many years before finally taking a small vessel and setting course for the Alpha Quadrant in an attempt to trace the path of Voyager. He claimed to have "a longing for home." (VOY: "Living Witness")
The existence of a backup module would seem to contradict "Message in a Bottle", in which Tom Paris and Harry Kim tried and failed to create another version of The Doctor. However, since no date or stardate was given in "Living Witness", the only things that date when the module was stolen is Seven of Nine and the state of Voyager's distance from home being 60,000 light-years, placing the episode sometime after "The Gift" but before "Timeless". This means that the module could have been stolen before the events in "Message in a Bottle", or it could have been created afterward and then stolen. The determinative question never directly answered by any episode of the series is whether Voyager launched with this technology on board. Kim's ability to create the Crell Moset program in "Nothing Human" seems to suggest the backup program was created after "Message in a Bottle" and stolen before "Timeless". Voyager's presence in the Vaskan sector in "Demon" as revealed in "Course: Oblivion" also seems to suggest that the module was stolen around the end of Voyager's fourth season.
In the String Theory trilogy of novels, it was revealed that there were several backup EMHs, most of them based on different versions of The Doctor according to when the information was "saved." In the second novel in the trilogy, Fusion, a Nacene who had infiltrated the crew by altering their memories- creating the illusion that she was Janeway's sister, Phoebe Janeway, who had accompanied Voyager on their original mission to create a portrait of the Badlands and remained with the crew ever since-, was forced to shut down The Doctor and activate the first backup version – essentially the "original" EMH activated in "Caretaker" – as The Doctor knew that she was not who she seemed (Significantly, 'Phoebe' had initially contemplated simply altering his programmed memories, but her analysis of The Doctor showed some undefined quality within him that made him more than a simple computer program, suggesting that The Doctor's development at this point in his existence had advanced to a point where he had acquired some kind of 'soul'). Despite his lack of practical experience, the new EMH was still able to confirm that the crew's memories had been altered, as well as explain why Harry Kim and Naomi Wildman had not been affected by the alteration, as the two were slightly 'out of phase' with the rest of the crew as a result of them being duplicates created during the events of VOY: "Deadlock", before B'Elanna Torres was able to restore the original Doctor. | English | NL | de75cfe7433840935c137f684669fdb2e64054967e4ae98125464a1241284333 |
HR advisor, board secretary and health and safety representative
Courtenay joined Skills Active in 2005. She originally started as an administration assistant and then in October 2007 became the EA to the CE. In October 2008, she also included HR administration into her role, and in November 2009 was appointed HR advisor.
Currently, Courtenay is kept busy with plenty of variety in her roles as she is the HR advisor, board secretary and health and safety representative for Skills Active.
She has more than 20 years' experience in a variety of administration roles within small, medium and large companies and is familiar with employment environments ranging from research and advertising, to power, oil and transport. | English | NL | f1381337459337d064cc87517d29c301fe5d8e5f1ea488015507e4aa1d39e4fa |
Original Online Fiction
It was two in the morning when the phone shook Francis from a deep sleep. “My mother’s dying,” the woman said, sobbing. “She needs Last Rites—now.”
Francis whispered, not wanting to awaken his wife, Eleanor. He asked the caller for her mother’s name and the hospital she was in and promised to be there soon.
“What is it?” Eleanor turned toward him and rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
“Someone’s dying,” he said. “I have to see her. Go back to sleep. You need your rest.” She had a classroom of second graders to teach in the morning.
Francis changed from his pajamas into a wrinkled gray suit and faded black shirt. He put on his white clergy collar. He drove to the hospital in his ten-year-old Taurus, its doors and fenders patchy with brown rust from too many winters of road salt. An early March snow slanted across the car’s headlights. Rolling down the window, he hoped the cold air would slap him into full wakefulness. He gripped the steering wheel and followed a snowplow up Main Street.
By nature he was a quiet, introspective person. At the moment, though, he felt irritated, even resentful, for being roused from his warm bed beside his wife. Francis caught himself; he was a priest, after all, and had been one for fifteen years. And human—a clergy collar did not make him otherwise. He remembered something his college chaplain had told him many years earlier when he was sensing a call to the priesthood of the Episcopal Church. “Unless you’re willing to help someone in need, whatever the hour, then don’t become a priest. Do something else.”
He did. After college and newly married, Francis took a job as a newspaper reporter for his hometown paper, The Courier-Journal. He liked reporting, worked hard, advanced from beat to beat, and eventually ended up writing editorials. Then he and Eleanor got involved in church, and the call resurfaced. A few years later, at the age of 37, he went to seminary in New York City; three years after that, he graduated with his master’s in divinity and was ordained. He served his first parish back in Louisville. Two years later, Good Shepherd Episcopal Church in Binghamton, New York, called him to be its rector. That was ten years ago.
Francis reached the hospital, parked the car, and trudged to the Emergency Room entrance, the only one open at this hour. The snow felt good on his face; it crunched beneath his boots. His breath froze in clouds.
He felt alive.
Francis asked the nurse at the desk for the room number of Mildred Giacometti.
“Are you family?” she asked.
Francis shook his head no, then unbuttoned his topcoat, showing his clerical collar like a police officer flashing his badge.
“Oh sorry, Father. Go right on up. Room 408.”
Francis found the room: bare and dim, except for a yellow glow from a light over the sink. Medical technology surrounded the dying woman, blinking, beeping, pumping artificial life into her. Her skin was tattooed with black and red splotches. He recoiled internally.
The sleeping form of a man slumped in a chair, snoring. A woman sat at the bedside, her gray hair wound into a long braid and her face creviced with worry. “What took you so long?”
“I came as soon as I could,” he explained, trying not to sound annoyed. “The snow is heavy.”
“I wouldn’t know. I haven’t been outside in two days.”
“I’m sorry. This has to be hard for you.”
“It’s hell.” She relaxed slightly. “I’m Carol, her daughter.” She began to sob, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her blouse. “That’s my husband, Jerry, over there—sleeping like nothing’s happening.”
“How’s she doing?” Francis asked.
Of course, Francis chided himself. What a stupid question to ask.
Francis wrapped his white stole around his neck. He touched the patient’s face. Her skin was cool and moist, thin to the point of translucence, revealing a spider web of capillaries.
“Hello, Mildred,” he whispered. “It’s Father Francis from Good Shepherd. I’m going to anoint you and pray for you. Carol is here—and Jerry, too.”
“Oh, Mama,” Carol said, crying as she stroked Mildred’s cheek. She leaned closer to her mother. “I love you.”
“Would you like to lay your hands on her with me?” Francis asked them. Tentatively, they pressed their hands to Mildred’s head and shoulders. Francis opened his prayer book. Touching the woman’s head, he prayed and then made the sign of the cross on her forehead with the holy oil used for healing and Last Rites.
They stood in silence. Mildred’s breathing was labored, long pauses punctuating each breath.
“Would you like me to wait with you?” Francis asked. “Until…”
“No,” Carol said firmly. “You’ve done what Mama needed. She’s in God’s hands now.”
Francis nodded. “God made her. And he’s with her now and always.” He extended his hand to Carol. She hesitated, then took it reluctantly.
“You let her down—after Daddy’s funeral. You don’t remember?”
“No, I’m sorry. What did I do—or not do?”
“At the cemetery, you said you’d visit her, but you never did. You failed her.”
“Carol,” Jerry said, shaking his head. He turned to Francis. “Padre, I’m sorry. She’s upset.”
Francis had a vague memory now of Mildred’s husband who died two years earlier from a heart attack. He probably said he’d check on her; that sounded like him. But as he recalled more clearly now, there had been another death, and he rushed to console that family.
“I’m sorry,” Francis said to Carol. It was the only thing he could say. He had learned that lesson a long time ago in his final year of seminary when he was doing his clinical pastoral education at a hospital in New York. The chaplain had given him invaluable advice: “All that emotion, it’s not about you. It’s about them. You’re in a privileged position, even a sacred one, seeing them at their worst but also at the point of their greatest need.”
Now, ten years later, Francis looked at Carol and Mildred, as white as the sheet she was wrapped in. He drew in a deep breath of calmness. This is about her. Her grief. I’m here for her now. “I’m sorry for not visiting your mother,” he said. “You have every reason to be disappointed. I’d be, too. Thank you for telling me how you’re feeling. Again, I’m sorry. I’ll check back in the morning. Shall I?”
“Yes, please,” Carol said.
He returned home and to bed. As he lay there beside Eleanor, listening to her breathing, he felt troubled for having failed someone who counted on him. He prayed, asking God to have mercy on him. Finally, he fell asleep until the sun came up, glinting on a new layer of snow.
Carol called him at seven that morning, just as he was leaving for the hospital. Mildred had died a few hours earlier. “I feel relieved. She’s no longer suffering,” Carol told him. “She’s in a better place now. Thank you for coming last night. I’m sorry I was angry with you.”
Francis assured her she had nothing to apologize for. He was glad she’d been honest with him about her feelings and hoped they could make a new start.
That afternoon, Francis visited with Carol over tea and carrot cake at her house and planned the funeral. The next day she and Jerry were in church.
A few weeks later, Francis’s mother called him. She said she didn’t want to worry him, which was why she hadn’t said anything earlier. But his father had gone to the doctor, then to a specialist for tests. The results were back. “Lung cancer—stage four.” She began to cry. “I knew it. He had that cough that wouldn’t go away. I kept asking him to see the doctor, but he told me to stop nagging him. Finally, he went. Now he’s dying.”
Francis felt helpless. They were hundreds of miles apart. “I’ll come for a visit, as soon as I can.”
“He’s getting treatment. It won’t cure him—the cancer’s too far along for that. But it might slow it down. Give him some more time. Help his breathing some. Sometimes, I think he’s going to suffocate at any minute.”
Francis promised to check back soon. He hung up the phone and sat in his study. He’d dealt with dying and grieving people all the time, but now death was invading his own family. He started to cry.
Taking a long walk that night, he cried out, “God, I don’t think I can take all this dying anymore. Maybe I’m not meant for this work after all.” He fantasized about being a reporter again. He did not know what to do next. “God, help me,” he prayed aloud.
A few days later his bishop surprised him at church. “How about lunch? I’m buying.”
At the little Greek diner up the street, Francis picked at his Caesar salad.
“How are you doing?” Bishop Alex Sherwood asked him.
Francis looked at his eyes, which were blue and kind, like his own father’s. The bishop felt less like his superior and more like a friend. “One Sunday, I’m going to look out and see just empty pews,” he said. “I’ll have buried the whole congregation.”
“I’ve felt similarly,” Bishop Sherwood said. “And I’ll assure you the whole congregation is not dying.”
Francis took a deep breath. “My father has cancer.”
“I know,” Bishop Sherwood said. “Eleanor called me yesterday. I’m sorry about your father.” The bishop patted Francis’s hand.
“I feel as if I am drowning in a sea of sadness,” Francis said.
“I know you feel these loses deeply,” Bishop Sherwood said. “And that’s because you’re a good pastor. You care for your people. And they know it. You’re a man of the heart. Such people are rare, even among priests—and among bishops, for that matter. Don’t keep these feelings inside. Tell God in prayer. Tell Eleanor—it’ll bring the two of you closer. And tell your lay leaders. Ask others to help you carry this burden. It’s bigger than one person.”
Several months later, Francis and Eleanor had just finished their bedtime reading and had turned off the lights. They held one another. He felt loved and secure. Then the phone rang.
“Fran,” his mother said. “I don’t think your father has long.”
“Jesus,” Francis said, more prayer than oath. When he’d seen his father a couple of weeks ago, he’d been weak, but Francis hadn’t expected him to decline so quickly.
Eleanor reached for Francis, putting her arm around his shoulder as he held the phone.
“Is he up to talking?” Francis asked.
“Hearing your voice will give him a boost.”
“Hi, Pop. I love you,” he said.
Emotions rushed at him: fear, sadness, helplessness, disappointment with God, who had not answered his prayers with a miracle. Tears poured out.
“Love you, too, son,” his father said weakly.
“I’ll be home soon. I’ll get the first flight out tomorrow.”
“It’s okay,” his father said, struggling. “I’m not afraid of death. There are worse things than cancer.”
Francis knew the truth of that statement. He’d found his father’s wartime journals in the attic and read them. A D-Day survivor, his father had seen plenty of death on Omaha Beach.
“See you soon, Pop,” Francis promised, but realized this conversation might be their last in this world.
Francis leaned into Eleanor. She opened her arms and told him that she loved him, that she was there for him, that the two of them would survive this together.
“I’m sorry,” he stammered. “I know I’ve been preoccupied. Sometimes when we’re together, I’m somewhere else. I’m thinking about a sermon or dealing with a death or some crisis. And now that Pop’s dying, I can’t think of anything else. I’m afraid of losing him—or losing you.”
“I’m right here, Fran,” Eleanor said softly. “Just cry it out. Don’t hold it in. Let it out.”
He awoke the next morning in her arms. On the drive to the airport, he contemplated burying someone he loved; the thought terrified him. At the curbside drop-off, Francis held Eleanor tightly, smelling the perfume he had bought her at the Galleries LaFayette in Paris. They had celebrated their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary in the City of Lights.
“You better get to your gate,” she told him. “I love you.”
He arrived in Louisville in the afternoon and drove his rental car to the ranch house in the South End where he had grown up.
“He’s sleeping,” his mother said at the door. He kissed her cheek and held her for a moment. “The hospice nurse just gave him something for the pain to make him more comfortable.”
His father lay in bed, covered by a blue blanket. He gasped for each breath, the pauses between each lengthening. A hint of ammonia hung in the air—the odor of death.
Francis sat down beside the bed and stroked his father’s forehead and cheek, cool and moist. He leaned over and whispered, “It’s me, Pop. I’m home. I love you.” He hoped his father would open his eyes and say, “I love you,” but all he heard was the death rattle of his lungs.
His mother brought him a plate with a ham on rye sandwich. “With extra pickles,” she said. “Just the way you like.”
Francis set the sandwich aside. His mother lingered in the doorway, looking ten years older than she did just a few weeks earlier when he had visited.
“I’ll let you two have some time together,” she said. “I’m going to lie down in the living room. Call me if you need me.”
Francis picked up his father’s Bible and read the 23rd Psalm aloud. Then he lay down beside him, resting his head on his father’s chest. He listened to the heart’s thump and the gurgled breath.
As he followed the rise and fall of his father’s chest, he thought he smelled Old Spice aftershave. The scent unlocked the vault of memory: Francis stands at the bathroom sink beside his father. He studies his father as he wipes the last traces of shaving cream from his face. His father picks up his shaving brush and dollops the foamy cream on Francis’s chin. “You’ll do this with your son one of these days.”
Francis and Eleanor always wanted children but contented themselves with being family for each other. Now he was the son, a grown man, but unwilling to let go of his father. He wanted to keep him here but knew that would only mean more suffering. He prayed and visualized letting his father slip into the sky, pure spirit set free.
His father gasped, and his chest went still. Francis waited for the next breath, but there was only silence. His father’s mouth gaped open, the gurgles quieted now. He leaned over and kissed his father’s stubbled cheek.
“Mother,” Francis called out and went into the hallway, calling her once more, before returning to his father’ bedside.
Eleanor came for the funeral and offered to stay on in Louisville. “I’ll be with you here as long as you want,” she told Francis, squeezing his hand. “I love you and want to support you.”
“I really appreciate your offer, Ellie,” he said. “I’ll be okay. I need to spend some time with Mother. Just the two of us. I hope you understand.” He also knew how difficult it was for her to be away from the classroom. He hugged her. “I appreciate you.”
Francis spent a few more days with his mother, and when the visit came to an end worried about how she would cope. His mother had never been one for sharing her feelings; his father had been the source of emotional warmth in the family. He could see the imprint of his mother on his personality.
“I’ll be all right, son,” she said at the doorway as he left for the airport. “Call me when you land.”
“I’ll be back to check on you,” Francis promised. “Call me if you need me. When you do, I’ll get the first flight out.”
“Don’t worry about me. You’ve got a church to take care of.”
Back home, Francis was quickly swept up in the swift currents of congregational life. When members of his parish asked how he was doing, he thanked them for their kindness, but assured them he was fine.
One morning, Bishop Sherwood phoned. “I’m grieving appropriately,” Francis reported, pleased with how he was handling his feelings, not letting them get in the way of his job. Francis thanked the bishop for the call, ending their conversation quickly before it went any deeper.
Most days, he left the parish office at noon and went home for lunch. The house was empty with Eleanor at school. He ate a bowl of tomato soup, drank a glass or two of burgundy, and fell into bed.
Late one afternoon, Eleanor came home from school and found him asleep. “I’m worried about you,” she said. “You’re more tired than usual. And you’re irritable. It’s been going on for awhile now. Won’t you go see someone—please? I’ll go with you.”
“I’ll be fine,” Francis said. “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine. Good Shepherd is a busy parish. That’s all.”
Eleanor sat on the edge of the bed. “No, something is different. It’s more than being overworked.”
“I don’t mean to be difficult,” Francis said, trying not to sound annoyed. “I appreciate your concern. Tell you what—I’ll think about talking with someone.” He went to his office at church to work on his Sunday sermon.
During the day, he kept busy, and at bedtime, after a melatonin or two, he fell asleep. Night after night, he dreamed that he and his mother stood in a dark, musty room like a cellar, looking into a casket. Inside lay his father’s body; then, another body took his place. I can’t be dead, Francis shouted in the dream. No, it’s not possible. He awoke shouting. “No. No. No….”
Each time he had the dream, Eleanor took him into her arms until he fell asleep. The next morning, he was exhausted.
Finally, he gave in to Eleanor’s pleas and went to see his general practitioner. Dr. Harris listened as Francis explained that his wife had insisted he come in. “She says I’m not myself, that I seem tired and cranky.”
“Is she right? Wives can be pretty perceptive,” Dr. Harris said.
Francis studied his hands, picked at a hangnail. He admitted to having a pain in his stomach for more than a week and diarrhea.
“It could be stress,” Dr. Harris said. “Maybe a flare up of your irritable bowel? You’ve got a tough job, after all. All those people to deal with, their personalities, and their problems.”
“This will probably sound crazy,” Francis said. “But I keep thinking that maybe I’m dying. It’s worrying me and has been ever since—” He paused. “My father died, a month ago. He had lung cancer. I keep thinking about him. Being with him at the end and seeing him in the casket. Missing him—knowing that he’s never coming back.”
After examining him, Dr. Harris assured Francis he was not dying. He was grieving. “I’m no psychiatrist, but it seems you’re repressing your feelings, pushing them down into your gut. And they’re letting you know they’re there. And they don’t intend to say there, silent.”
“You might be right,” Francis admitted.
“People grieve in their own way. And it takes time to come to terms with the loss. I’m sure you’ve told people the same thing. If you want, I can prescribe something to help.”
“I think I’ll be okay,” Francis said. “I feel better, just talking to you.”
His conversation with Dr. Harris soon faded as he turned his attention to other matters. He had a vestry meeting to get ready for on Tuesday night. He dreaded it: some members wanted cuts to the budget because pledge income was down. Francis wanted—needed—more funding, not less for the church to operate.
A storm hit on Wednesday afternoon, downing a tree on the church’s playground and stripping a swath of shingles from the church roof. Now, water leaked into the church and pooled near the altar. He was on the phone for hours, trying to find a roofer to make repairs and someone to remove the tree. He had not even looked at the readings for his Sunday sermon.
Overwhelmed, Francis wanted to cry, but he was out of tears.
On Sunday morning, he wished he could be anywhere other than Good Shepherd. At the 8 o’clock service, he felt as if he were watching himself conduct it, not actually leading the familiar prayers and rituals. When he preached, he droned the words of his homily. Mercifully, it was short.
The 10 o’clock service would be better, Francis hoped. At least it wasn’t Lent or Easter, Advent or Christmas—those times of extra prayers and special music. It was a typical sleepy Sunday, what the Church called “Ordinary Time.” But for him, after his father’s death, it was no ordinary time.
At the second service, Francis lost his focus a few times while leading the prayers. Thoughts of his father distracted him. He saw his father in the casket, then saw himself at the cemetery as the casket was lowered into the ground. His father was gone. He would never see him again. Francis felt a sharp stab of sadness in his chest right where his heart was.
“I’m sorry,” Francis said from the pulpit. “I don’t think I can go on. It’s my father, you see. I think about him; it’s all I can do. It’s as if part of me is missing, and all I have is this big emptiness inside me.”
Francis began to weep, crying for his father and also for all the people he had buried over the years. There had been so much death. Too much for one man, no matter how good he tried to be as a person and a priest. All the grief of those many months and years fell from Francis ‘s eyes and onto hardwood floors of the church.
Something shifted. Lightness rolled away the stone of his sadness, the way dawn drives out the night. It was love, Francis knew: his father’s love for him, and his for his father. He looked up at the congregation, smiling through his tears. “I feel it here.” He put his hand on his heart. “Love never dies.”
Eleanor was the first one out of her pew. She took Francis in her arms and kissed him. Carol and Jerry, who’d been coming to church every Sunday since Carol’s mother’s funeral, followed. One by one, the others in the church left their pews and encircled Francis. It was a day of resurrection, a day of new life.
Kenneth L. Chumbley serves as Rector of Christ Episcopal Church, Springfield, Missouri. | English | NL | 3533778a8aa1bb32fa43ee8cb2c2835538b5012d2a83b2fc6bb05ceca1c8707d |
Putting It Together - Part 5
Dear Lord, thank You for Your Word in the Bible. Help me take to heart the words you have given us. There is always more to learn. Amen.
Read: Judges 16:15-16 (NIV)
“15 Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t confide in me? This is the third time you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.” 16 With such nagging she prodded him day after day until he was sick to death of it.”
Which of us has been the nagging spouse, either actively or passively, to try to get our way? Which of us have had the nagging spouse, either actively or passively, who tried to get their way? In the cases I have seen, nagging has not strengthened the marriage. It sometimes created bitterness, distance, and resentment between the two spouses.
That’s what’s happening between Samson and Delilah – who aren’t even married – in the verses above. Delilah is nagging Samson to reveal what makes him so strong so that she can make him weak and turn him over to his enemies. Each time she asks, Samson gives her an answer which buys him more time but doesn’t give her the truth. He seems to know she is manipulating him, but he seems to not want to leave her or address it out of his love for her.
Finally, she wears him down and he gives in to tell her the secret behind his strength; his long hair. She cuts it and he is turned over to his enemies. She selfishly used his love for her in a way to get what she wanted and ultimately for things which were not good for him.
The love you have for your spouse and the love that your spouse has for you should not be used for self-serving reasons or in ways to hurt the other. In what ways have you been actively or passively nagging your spouse to do something which may not be in their best interest? In what ways do you feel nagged by your spouse for something which is not in your best interest? Ask your spouse to answer these same questions and discuss the answers.
Dear Lord, You are pure in your desires for our relationship with You and with each other. I thank you for giving me stories in the Bible that show us what not to do and areas which guide us in what to do. Help me to search out my heart and change things I am doing to manipulate my closest relationships for my own good. Amen. | English | NL | aa6c6b9a5350399bd0d8e5a15b4e4b62b5b003dc1ab40d86767030baddd00d8c |
Critically endangered sea turtle chomps on tourist's arm
Loggerhead turtles are a critically endangered species that roam throughout the Caribbean. They are found in Mexico, Belize and the waters all around Central and South America. They grow to an enormous size, reaching weights well over 1,000lbs. They have giant heads and powerful jaws that are capable of cracking large conch shells with ease. Although they are not usually aggressive with people, they do have the ability to inflict serious bites and people are well advised to not approach them too closely.
These swimmers were enjoying a snorkel tour at a marine park off the island of San Pedro, Belize. It's an area where the rays, sharks and turtles are protected and they come and go freely. They have little fear of humans and they will not harm those who are respectful and careful. One of the familiar faces here is a juvenile loggerhead named Scarface. He was injured when he was very young and he has lost one eye. It is believed that he received his facial wound from a boat propeller. He is recognizable, not only due to the large scar on his face, but also due to his curious nature and his tendency to curiously check out tourists and their belongings.
Conch fishermen come here to clean their catch and the remnants make their way back into the ocean. Rays, sharks, and loggerheads enjoy the scraps and the fishermen have a soft spot for this friendly turtle. They often feed him and he will eat constantly if they have enough food to spare.
One of the other things that Scarface is known for is approaching tourists very closely. He is a delight to photograph and to play with, but he is very young. Just like a young puppy, he has not learned that he cannot bite everything. He occasionally clamps his formidable jaws on cameras, snorkels, and even swimmers themselves. This swimmer was very amused by his playful nature and he didn't see what was about to happen as Scarface bit down on the side of his arm. Like a huge vise, Scarface squeezed and pulled, trying to see if the arm was edible. Luckily, the swimmer was wearing a neoprene wetsuit and it cushioned the bite, but he was left with a nasty bruise and a cut that left a scar.
Knowing that he was in a marine park, being chewed on by a protected species, the swimmer was very reluctant to treat the curious turtle roughly. Fortunately, Scarface recognized the error of his ways and released his hold after about fifteen seconds. He swam off with what appeared to be a huge turtle grin. It's hard to be upset with such a playful turtle who is merely investigating the possibility of a meal.
Scarface quickly made his way to another tourist and promptly tried to eat her camera. Scarface is famous for such antics and you can find him in many videos on Rumble and YouTube. | English | NL | 47f3959f281c85c498c0fcb10b76e967afa382f7c70b9711d2baa182250bd229 |
Job is not happy with how the Lord has treated him. You would think that Job would be rather content considering that the Lord has blessed him, and allowed him to enjoy a great life. However, now we hear why Job is so upset as he even uses the counselors own words to describe his suffering. Why would Job be so upset if he is merely using the counselors own words to describe his suffering?
Job is getting his case ready before the Lord and he will not back down no matter what the counselors say to him. Job is one who feels the weight of this age, the pursuit of the Lord, and majesty of God. He knows that God is majestic and Job breaks forth in a wonderful declaration of the Lord’s majesty. So, why is Job so frustrated?
We can imagine the frustration that Job feels in the midst of this trial. His counselors accuse him of sinning, he has been told to repent, and Job has no idea what sinful thing he has done to deserve this trial. None of the counselors consider that maybe Job’s problem is not directly his sin, but his righteousness. Job is brought to a breaking point to make explicit that he is really righteous and he wants to appeal to God. So, when can our righteousness become a problem? Or is our righteousness never a problem? | English | NL | f0d8bbd6eb4e29ef19428d74de9e745bdc9f2cdeae6d6913c480682f10cbe737 |
A man who tricked staff at a Kenilworth hotel into giving him a key card to a drunken woman’s room by posing as her partner is likely to be facing a prison sentence.
Kieran Sodhi had denied a charge of trespass with intent to commit a sexual offence after letting himself into the woman’s room at the Chesford Grange Hotel in January last year.
But after more than seven hours a jury at Warwick Crown Court found him guilty by a majority of 11-1, although they could not reach a verdict on a further charge of sexual assault.
The case was adjourned for the prosecution to consider whether to ask for a retrial on that allegation, and for a pre-sentence report to be prepared on him.
Sodhi (30) of Spoonley Wood Court, Littleover, Derby, was granted bail, but Judge Andrew Lockhart QC warned: “In granting you bail, I give you absolutely no promises that the final outcome will not be a custodial sentence.”
Prosecutor Alex Warren said that in January last year Sodhi was staying at the Chesford Grange for a works do, and the woman, who was in her 20s, was also attending a function there and staying overnight.
She had too much to drink and, incapable of standing unaided, was helped back to her room by two men from her party at around one in the morning, using her key card to get in.
Sodhi, who had met her on a previous occasion and had been talking to her during the evening when they had both gone outside for a cigarette, had a room on a different floor.
But as the two men were putting her on the bed, fully clothed, they saw Sodhi outside her room, and he asked whether she was OK and told them that she needed to be given some water.
They said they would give her some tap water, but he was insistent he would get some from the bar, and they were concerned about his intentions, so waited with her in the room.
When he had not returned after 20 minutes, they left, with her still lying on the bed fully clothed.
“She has no recollection of being put to bed. The next thing she remembers is waking up the next morning to the sound of a mobile phone alarm.
“She realised it was not her phone, and that there was somebody else in her room with her. It was the defendant.
“She was under the covers in bed, undressed and wearing only her knickers, and the defendant was sitting on the other side of the double bed, fully clothed.”
She asked if anything had gone on, and he said no, and that he was just looking after her, and she told him to get out – and after later speaking to her mother, the police were contacted.
CCTV recordings showed Sodhi going to her room after she had been taken there, and then leaving and, after going outside, getting a glass of water from the bar.
He then went to the reception desk where, the jury heard, he claimed to be her partner and asked for a duplicate key card to her room.
Having seen information she had provided when she had checked in, Sodhi was able to answer a security question about her home address, and was issued with a key card which he used to let himself into her room.
He left after a while, leaving the key card behind, and returned to his own room, but at just after three in the morning, having changed his clothes, he again went to reception.
He told a female receptionist his girlfriend was asleep and he did not want to wake her, and was again given a duplicate key card after answering the security question.
Sodhi let himself into the young woman’s room at 3.09am and did not return to his own room until 7.32 after she had woken and told him to get out.
Giving evidence, Sodhi claimed he had acted only out of concern for her wellbeing, because a cousin of his had died after choking on his own vomit after getting drunk.
He denied lying to get a key card, claiming he had given an honest account to the receptionists he spoke to – and that both of them had given him a card without asking a security question.
Asked by his solicitor Nick Devine whether he had ‘any sexual designs on her,’ he replied: “No.”
He said that after checking on her, he had gone back to his own room, but could not sleep because of noise from another room, so had decided to get dressed and go home – but wanted to check on her again before leaving, as he had told her he would do.
“When you went in on the subsequent occasion was it your intention to commit a sexual act?” asked Mr Devine. Sodhi, who denied removing the woman’s clothes, again replied: “No.”
But Mr Warren put to the jury that ‘the only reasonable inference’ was that Sodhi had taken off her clothing and that he had ‘intended to commit a sexual offence on her or an offence of voyeurism by watching her asleep.’ | English | NL | b83bf93444c64049aeb23f2b7f5fadc027bb4b154b78c4df5943b76816dad64f |
I write several different types of poems. I even write sonnets sometimes. The one below is a narrative poem, which to some isn’t a poem at all. It’s prose broken up into lines. Maybe. But sometimes a thought or event is best expressed that way, and and why deny a thing its most fitting suit of clothes? This poem, I think, would’ve lost its essential truth and comedy dressed up as any other thing. It was first published a few years back in Mr. Jack Marlowe’s Gutter Eloquence, but I have since reworked it a bit.
I was the last one on what I thought was the right bus.
I asked the driver to make sure. He said something
that in English sounded like “crossing.” The only problem
was he was speaking German,
and I’d just taken up the language. I asked him again.
He scratched his forehead just above his nose.
He repeated himself angrily. I still didn’t understand.
I tried to simplify. “Sooo, Leipzig?”
“Ja, ja…” he said.
“Danke schön …”
I sat down a few seats behind him.
I kept an eye on him in the rearview mirror.
Above his head there was a digital clock with red numbers.
It was 6:03. At 6:05 the bus was scheduled to depart.
At 6:04 he grabbed the top of the steering wheel
with both hands
and peered at the door with his sharp vulture’s eye.
At 6:04 and about 30 seconds he began pummeling
the gum that was in his mouth,
his jaw working more furiously than ever.
6:05. BANG! He slammed the door shut, pumped the gas,
went tearing around the bend.
I looked out the window. There was a guy running
alongside the bus, his necktie streaming
over his left shoulder, a briefcase banging
against his leg,
one arm frantically waving.
He kept a pretty good pace with us all the way
to the end of the parking lot,
but then we took a sharp left onto the main road.
He was a couple seconds late. | English | NL | 07465873515a93b9f8d5c7f5088389365a085dc0bd6ed93ac8de65bae30aeb25 |
Private Cecil Theobald Coate, service number 44447
This is a portrait of Private Cecil Theobald Coate, service number 44447, of the 24th Reinforcements, NZEF.
Cecil was born in Wellington on 15 December 1889. As a young man he was a keen cricket and soccer player for the Karori clubs, and worked as a Clerk for the Wellington Harbour Board. He married Nora Maud Furness on 15 March 1916.
He had volunteered for military service in 1915, but was rejected for having varicose veins. In December 1916, after conscription was introduced, his name was drawn in the second ballot, and he attested for service on 28 December.
He was posted to train with the 25th Reinforcements on 8 January 1917. On 2 February he was transferred to the 24th Reinforcements.
Cecil sailed from Wellington on 5 April 1917. Cecil probably had this portrait taken shortly before sailing. In England, he underwent further training at Sling Camp with the 4th Reserve Battalion, Auckland-Wellington Regiment from 11 June to 6 July, when he was sent to France. On 24 July he joined the 7th Company of the 3rd Battalion, Wellington Infantry Regiment.
On 4 October, during the Battalion's attack on Gravenstafel, Cecil was hit in his face by an enemy bullet. He was admitted the same day to No. 3 NZ Field Ambulance, then to No. 3 Australian Casualty Clearing Station and on 5 October he was sent far behind the lines to hospital at Le Treport, on the French coast. Cecil was very lucky, although a medical report noted in March 1918 that the wound had caused him 'periodic attacks of frontal neuralgia.'
On 23 December Cecil was posted to the 3rd Reserve Battalion of the Wellington Infantry Regiment and except for one week's leave in September, served with them until he embarked for New Zealand on 7 February 1919.
On the 23 April 1919 he was discharged from service as 'No longer Physically fit for War service on account of Wounds received in action.'
Cecil lived in Wellington for the rest of his life where continued to work for the Harbour Board. He died on the 14 November 1950 aged 60.
Colourised By Brendan Graham 2018 from an original black and white Image courtesy of Te Papa (B.046296) | English | NL | 235d57727f318b9d804973f3a8f7cc075ec79a82cd8f3bac6c682955d4b507cd |
Virtus Sex: Author's Cut, Virtus Saga #1
Published By: eXtasy Books
Author: Laura Tolomei
Publish Date: April 26, 2019
Series: Virtus #1
Word Count: 139610
Heat Level: 4 Flames
Categories: Fantasy, GLBT, Menage, Multiple Partners, Paranormal, Erotica
Her breath caught in her throat as she turned around to answer. Like the first time she had seen him, he gave the impression of being too big for the available space, his magnificent body more attractive than ever with the long black strands dripping tiny streaks of water on a bare chest that displayed an impressive set of muscles before narrowing to the waist, wrapped by the blanket. She also could not help feeling his heat, but even if temptation to touch him seemed irresistible, she knew better. “Much.” Then she turned to face the fire, so she would not have to look at him. “This whole situation is funny. Here I am with a person I thought I’d never see again for the rest of my life, forced to spend another night together.” The hint of a smile curved her lips. “I guess, when you’re back in a girl’s life, you make sure she notices it…even if she’d rather have nothing to do with you.” She made it sound like an afterthought, though her stomach crunched painfully at the obvious lie.
He regarded her coolly, then called her bluff. “My dear, you’re not a prisoner, you know. You’re free to leave whenever you want.”
“Right!” She quipped hotly. “As if I’d ride out in the middle of a storm.”
He chuckled. “I meant when the weather calms down, but I’d be surprised if you did. It must’ve taken a lot of guts—”
“I’d call it stupidity.”
“I’m sorry.” Raising his head, he looked at her apologetically. “I don’t know you or what your life has been like. I shouldn’t have asked.”
“No, forgive me. I shouldn’t have answered like that. I’m glad for the opportunity to do something with my life, really. I’d have wandered aimlessly in search of…” She shrugged as her voice trailed off. “Something, and it’s not as bad as it seems. We’ve been friends before, so I don’t see why we can’t be again.” She turned to him, but her confidence vanished upon realizing how much she wanted to touch him. Yeah, sure as if I could ever be friends with someone who turns my stomach upside down simply by looking at him! Her heart was racing, her thighs tingled and a strange throb between her legs did not make things any easier.
“I’m not sure I can think of you as a friend,” was his cold reply.
Of course not. What a stupid fool to think even—
“Damn!” Grabbing her shoulders, he cursed again. “I might regret this for the rest of my life, but the gods know I want more, much more.”
Closing his mouth on hers, Prince Caldwell took their conversation to a completely different level, drawing her closer while his tongue carefully explored the warm opening, making her head spin and her body heat out of control.
Prince Charles’s throaty whisper boomed in her head as he caught sight of her poised on the windowsill of his room. I’m so glad you came to see me.
Sure he was. Since he had fallen ill, Sophia Caldwell had locked him in his bedroom and kept everyone out. Not little Ylianor, though. She climbed through the window every day to visit him, sitting by his bed and holding his hand tightly. Most of the times, she did not even dare breathe, lest she disturbed him, for she could tell how weak he really was. That funny way his lights had of shutting down was something she had only seen in an old horse. And then the horse had died, so she presumed Prince Charles would, too. But she refused to think it would happen any time soon.
So am I, Father. Jumping down, she neared his bed.
He winced. You know I’m not your father. Yes, she knew the term disturbed him. John is your father.
I know, but... Ill at ease, she shifted her feet, staring at them as though they were the most fascinating things in the world. It just seems so right...
Truth was—her nine-year-old self lacked the proper word to express how deeply she felt about him.
His eyes flashed in disagreement, but he did not repeat what he had told her a thousand times already—about how wrong it was for her to think of him as her father.
And you know I’m right. She stomped her feet to prove her point. If he’s really my father, why can’t I talk to him like I can to you? Without opening my mouth, I mean.
Ah, Princess, it doesn’t work like that. He chuckled softly.
Then tell me how it works, Father. But this she had not shared seeing how exhausted he was, more than any of the previous times before.
Suddenly, a noise at the door had her scurrying away, after placing a soft kiss on his cheek.
Gotta run now. Whatever happened, she dreaded Sophia catching her inside the room. It would mean the end of her stolen times with Prince Charles, and she did not have the heart to stand it. Someone’s coming, so I’ll see you tomorrow—
No, wait. Already balanced on the windowsill, one leg dangled outside, while the other was still inside, gaze locking on his burning eyes. Don’t ever forget that I love you, sweet princess.
No, Father, please don’t go! She rushed back, cold fear gripping her stomach as all his lights went off all together, all at once.
Just promise. After this final painful breath, his eyes closed, and the room went completely dark.
I promise, Father. Holding on bravely, she tried to stifle the pain threatening to swallow her whole. But how could she now that her world had gone eerily silent and empty?
Upon riding away from the village, it seemed hardly a coincidence that she relived Prince Charles’s dying moment. Then again, she did not believe in coincidences for everything always happened for a purpose. And having just burned her father’s body in the town’s square seemed enough of a purpose.
She knew she had looked distant and cold through it all. Deeply lost in herself was how she had felt, unable to handle the many, too many, lights flashing around her. As if the giant blaze had not been enough! But shutting off everyone’s lights sparking brighter than the dancing flames was an impossible task. So she had withdrawn further into herself, the place she knew best, and stared at the void that had seemed her future.
Then David and Starlet had changed everything. Up until their arrival, hard reasoning had almost convinced her to leave the village, if not the district all together. Yet here she was, returning home, rushing through the front gate and curving around the hills to reach the top. So what had changed?
And no, she did not want to think of the unexpected kiss that had spun her senses to a place they had no business going. | English | NL | f6de9ca8a48e1e5f825310670745792a7f863aba92cc82120c027080463ec5ce |
Paul A. Hiznay passed away on Saturday, August 18, 2018. Born in Wyoming, PA, on January 12, 1931, Paul was the son of Joseph and Mary Hiznay. He was raised in Wyoming, PA, and graduated from Wyoming Memorial High School with honors. Paul graduated with a B.S. degree from the University of Scranton in 1952 and an M.S. degree from the University of Delaware in 1955, both in biological sciences. He served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War and was a member of the American Legion. Paul had a 35-year distinguished career as a sales and marketing executive with Union Carbide Corporation and Mona Industries.
Paul is survived by his dear beloved wife of 63 years, Lorraine (Brunza) Hiznay; his two sons, Joseph and Mark; and three grandchildren.
Paul and Lorraine have had a residence in Warren since 1987 and would spend summers and holidays during his working years. Following his retirement, Paul and Lorraine were able to spend more time in The Valley. Paul enjoyed the scenic outdoors of Vermont as well as traveling to the many places of interest in the state. He was an avid golfer and a member of Sugarbush Resort Golf Club.
Services in Vermont will be private.
Memorial contributions can be made to the Wounded Warrior Volunteer Association, 2002 Sawdust Road, Spring, TX 77380.
To send online condolences visit www.perkinsparker.com. | English | NL | 33bd9b568a54d1120f04048e5cdc57a2cbf1709d2b3a141f6ff42200de7b602e |
Gould (born Coxon) was the wife of the prominent ornithologist and naturalist, John Gould. Throughout her married life, she worked alongside her husband in illustrating and lithographing plates for his many books on birds and other wildlife. She also worked on book illustrations for Edward Lear (who taught her lithography on her husband’s request) and Charles Darwin’s ‘Zoology of the Voyage of HMS Beagle’.
Gould was born in Ramsgate, and was a governess before her marriage. As John Gould’s wife, she and her older children travelled with him in 1838 on a 2-year scientific voyage to | English | NL | 1f47f11ec70157e4a147c1204fcb5911296c3592d1a8e0b806e00663bbe92aeb |
Some 260 years have passed since Jenna Fox discovered that she was an android built by her parents to preserve her existence. By transferring her memories in a brain scan to an artificial body, they had tried to resuscitate their daughter from the coma she was in after a car accident that landed Jenna's two friends (Kara and Locke) in a similar position. At the end of that story (The Adoration of Jenna Fox), Jenna had destroyed the memory cubes holding the scans of her two friends, in order to prevent anyone from attempting such a thing again.
But no one counted on someone keeping a back-up.
Now, a power-hungry scientist has discovered the data and reanimated Kara and Locke in new super bodies. He's determined to use them as examples of his new technology and will stop at nothing to exploit his new resources. But Kara and Locke have their own ideas. Spending 260 years in a memory chip has impacted them differently, but they are both agreed on an objective: escape and find Jenna Fox. To do so, they must navigate a world that is very different from the one they knew, as well as come to understand what changes have occurred to them in all these years.
The original story was an introverted drama about parental love gone too far. Until the final pages, you didn't even realize how much the story was even veering into science fiction. The sequel shoots for a much grander scale: launching immediately into the science and the ethics questions that Adoration just hinted at. The scope is much greater as well, with action spanning the country and numerous characters. It's a night and day difference and Inheritance lacks the intimacy of its predecessor. For those who like a sequel to resemble the original, that may be a bit hard to take, but that doesn't mean that this is a bad read -- it just makes reading both books unnecessary.
I didn't care for the ending of the book, which seemed to wrap up everything a bit too neatly (and was awfully rushed to boot!), but I liked the story itself. The characters are interesting and the details are rich. I found it to be a satisfying sci fi escape novel. | English | NL | f520ff2d6d29c4ef196ee9c1138331291c13635eda26e540bf5f13579312818e |
As he was hastily and wearily glancing through the window at Gare du Nord, Michel felt as if he recalled Christophe's face at least twice a minute. Christophe's face was big and long, slow and thoughtful; but above all it was pale, pale as if Brussels had suddenly leaned inside through the window and spread all the fog from its bosom along his features. They were sitting in Christophe's flat somewhere in the vicinity of the Southern railway station. Christophe's mouth was wide and oblong. He was opening it. Christophe was talking. He was always talking in Michel's memory, and every time it was his face that turned up first. Christophe, talking. Arranging phonemes into strongly stressed words. Words into sentences. Short, prompt sentences. Christophe, gesturing with his lips. As if someone had turned off the sound without knowing. Only seconds, moments later, the sound broke into the image.
The good thing about this whole business is that every time can be the last one, said Christophe. He always said it first. Sometimes last too. Sometimes it was all he said. It depended on where Michel was and what was going on around him. Not that much on that he didn't feel like thinking. In fact, there wasn't much thinking involved. Christophe's words came by themselves, they invaded the space behind his eyes and spawned like an unstoppable, dangerous virus. Every time can be the last one, Michel. Good, isn't it? Even better when it's up to you to decide. And not up to those who catch you. Christophe's face laughed. There might have been dimples in his cheeks. The bad thing - well, the bad thing is that you can get caught. But you don't get caught as a rule. In fact, it's not even too likely. All you need is a firm plan. And it's a damn simple thing. Christophe leaned closer through Michel's mind. He pushed away a cup of coffee sitting on the bare table in front of him. White Brussels fog was hanging behind his back. Michel could nearly smell it. Let's say that the odds of waking them are fifty per cent, Christophe's mouth went on. But they're not. They're not even this high. Twenty-five. At highest. A generous estimation. Bear in mind that people are tired, who knows where they have been hanging about with them rucksacks and all. And then, said the image of Christophe. And then. If they do wake up, your odds to beat it before anything dawns on them are at least sixty - no way, eighty per cent. Here's where all your advantage lies. A human being needs at least a few seconds to get conscious when he wakes up. You are wide-awake, of course. Like a rabbit. And at least as fast. Christophe rapped on the table with the rim of his hand. Pop - and you're gone. Get it? Of course you get it. Why am I telling you this?
Michel closed his eyes and tried to trace himself in the picture. Himself, listening. Looking into Christophe's face. Nodding hesitatingly. White fog was snapping between his eyelids and scrambling up his nostrils. Odds are totally slim, Christophe said. Negligible. They practically don't exist. OK, they do. But only if you repeat it many times. Hundred times or so. Then it can happen. Once. Twice. A perfect theory of probability. Christophe seemed to be laughing. Laughing was easy for Christophe. He never even thought before stretching his lips over his cheeks. Michel thought that it couldn't be all that simple. Laughter was a complicated matter, and people were taking it all too lightly. Christophe looked through the window. He cleared his throat. Brussels, he said. The capital of the Union. It's great to live in this hollow city, isn't it? To stare at diplomats carrying their putrescent facades around. Putrescent, yes. That's exactly what he said. Not decaying. Not rotten. Putrescent. Indeed he could remember every word. And all this safety, Christophe went on. This wonderful make-believe of safety. How come that nobody ever doubts it? How come? Come to think of it, we really couldn't find a better city to live in. We're so damn lucky, aren't we? Aren't we, Michel?
Down the hall resounded a hoarse, burnished call of someone gasping under a heavy backpack. Michel winced. Christophe's voice went silent and his image was covered by colours and shapes of the interior of a second class compartment. Michel cast a brief glance at the hall. He almost expected the fog to invade from there, having escaped from his memory and burst out, into a heated August evening lazing about the ground of Paris. Brussels, fog. Paris, smog-wrapped sun. He was early. Of course he was early. He could hardly wait for the train, darting inside as soon the nearest door opened. He needed room. He had to have it. It was the first step. Be alone. Alone. Be with nobody. The steps of whoever the voice belonged to thumped past his door, dispersing into the back of the hall. Michel sighed with relief. I don't want anybody in here. Please. The air behind the window was yellow, and the glass dammed movements and noises from the other side. Inside it was serene. Almost idyllic. Christophe's face twinkled in the air behind the luggage rack, its pieces oozing back into the close-up. Michel narrowed his eyes and waited for the voice. Brussels, Christophe said. A name you'll never find mentioned as a place where caution is recommended. Rome, Milan, Amsterdam - yes. This is where everybody's holding on to their wallets, shivering at the sight of lurking natives. But Brussels - p-lease. Christophe flattened his voice to an official, stilted tone of a reporter on the national TV. Brussels. Come on. This is where politics is. This is where the great, bright Europe is. You won't say you doubt it? Christophe burst into a short, angular laughter. Michel ventured a smile in his mind. Christophe got serious. I'm telling you, he said. I'm telling you. It's all true. People believe it as if it was the only truth in the world. If they as much as feel that nobody makes any fuss in the streets, you've immediately got them walking around with open bags and unbuttoned coats. This race is incredible. In-cre-di-ble. Christophe's voice acquired a greyish, tough nuance. Michel thought he could say something; that he was expected to say something. But he kept nodding. It seemed. He was used to nodding; with a slow, balanced movement learnt from countless situations when this was the easiest way.
The doors in the hall were smacking open and closed. Densely scattered steps were sliding over the floor, varicoloured voices babbling on. Michel glanced at the clock which dictated an impending departure. Nobody came in. Not yet. As if there was a universal, unspoken agreement about him being untouchable. The most important thing is to be alone, said Christophe as he took him along for the first time. Tell them you're waiting for friends, tell them you've got AIDS, tell them anything. As long as they clear off. To stumble upon an insomniac who sees it all is a top catastrophe. You're left with nothing. All you can do is stare into the air, wishing for Brussels to come soon. And counting your loss as you go. Bleak, right.
The compartment door was thrust open. Michel turned frantically.
"Vacant?" asked a small gasping creature with a pair of round dark eyes. It had an Italian accent. At least it sounded like that.
"No," Michel said. He spread his arms as if in regret. "I'm waiting for my friends."
"Okay." The creature nodded, turned around and shouted a couple of prompt words. Then it closed the door.
Michel found his hands shaking. He looked at the wall in front of him, hoping against hope that the train was about to leave. Come on, he thought. Take off. Leave those who are running gasping through the station building, hoping they might still catch the train. Those coming with the sole intention of crowding his compartment. I'm on time, he thought. And you're not. It's not fair.
The minute hand was hanging on the fifth scratch with all its weight. They should have departed. They should have departed indeed. Michel cursed French railways in his mind. Have you heard of Switzerland, you lazy asses? A minute's delay is a disaster. This is what I call developed. Not you. Clinging to the hand with his eyes he eavesdropped with one ear. The sounds were dying down. High time, Michel shouted in his mind. High time. A light beckoned somewhere in the distance. The train moved.
Michel waited for another few seconds for the steps to die down in the hall. Then he fell back on his seat and gasped with relief. He knew it was over. They weren't coming. There was no danger. He took cigarettes from the pocket of his shirt and lit up. Mind what you wear, Christophe would say. It's crucial to keep up appearances. Wear frayed jeans and they'll all point their fingers at you. Be all dressed up and nobody will doubt. Silly world, isn't it? Michel nodded in his mind and peeked at his leather shoes which rested shiny and clean on the floor. He might have been the only person in the whole train not wearing a pair of battered trainers or at least a sweaty T-shirt. Not that it was that important, but it was still an emergency exit. Nobody will see me, thought Michel. Hopefully. Hopefully. The train gained full speed, plunging peacefully and steadily into the night.
Michel stared at the darkness thoughtlessly, striving not to be drawn back to the state of painful alertness by the silence that prevailed. He tried not to remember that he had an intention. That he was not just an aimless, accidental tourist who went to see Paris out of simple interest. In fact he didn't know why anybody should find Paris interesting. He took Paris for granted, a huge rotting capital somewhere close, thinking like most of his fellow citizens that it was full of pretentious French and nothing more. Come to think of it, Europe itself wasn't much of a thing, at least its supposedly developed and organised part with disappearing borders which were rapidly turning it into a single country growing more monotonous each day. A country which never ceased to intrigue. Which intrigued practically everybody on this train. Including the foreign girl sitting opposite him carrying a cigarette to her mouth in regular slow intervals, thinking absent-eyed about who knows what. But it had to be like that after all. The more intriguing they found Europe the better. They made him be here. They provided an intention. An intention.
Christophe called it side earnings. Police called it petty crime. Needless to say, Christophe roared at this expression. Petty crime, he said, what on earth could that mean? Taking small things? Things shorter than half a metre-I don't know, narrower than ten centimetres? Is it still petty crime to nick a ten times ten plastic sheet from a garden? Is it? Christophe reached for the cigarette box sitting on the table between them. Now seriously, he said. If you steal a car it is not petty crime. If you steal a wallet it is petty crime. And it doesn't matter whether you've stolen one of five cars or the whole property. Is it fair? Christophe's voice rose to the half-hysteric tone. Say it - is it fair? Michel winced, shaking his head ardently. See, Christophe said and lit a cigarette. His voice calmed down to a tepid, resigned tone of an old man. So it goes. In this society. Some have it all and others have none.
Crime, said Michel rolling the word in his mouth as if it was a bite of something that might be poisonous. He clenched his teeth so that his gums tickled. Despite all, we're talking*Š crime. Christophe waved his hand. Come on, he said. Come on. We're no criminals, us. Our task is to warn the society there's something rotten in it. To make it realise it's eating itself from within. If there's something in it for us, so much for the better. Michel observed him slowly and reluctantly. Christophe smiled at him, encouragingly, like at a child who's afraid to wade into the water. No reason to worry, Michel, said Christophe. Are you afraid they'll get you? Is this it? He was watching him, long, for a second or two which spanned out towards eternity under his steep look. Michel remembered the feeling in detail, the panic search for the word, the one and the proper word which could exactly summarise everything bustling inside him and bluntly crashing against his brain. And the simultaneous awareness that there was no such word, that there never had been and that it may come but in long years, after all those periods he couldn't see the end of. If ever. Nonsense, Michel, said Christophe. I mean, this is really nonsense. I was scared too when I tried it first, I can't lie. But it only took another time to see it's simple like ABC. I told you-a plan. You need a plan. And we've got one, don't we? Michel shook his head. He said this was not what troubled him, that he was not afraid and that he knew what his chances were. Christophe smiled, in relief, as if he was proven not guilty after a long interrogation. It's a deal then, he said. Come over tomorrow so I can show you the details.
Details. A word typical of Christophe. Details were everything that didn't fall into the main category, the intention. They were means leading to a goal, the one and only goal, the one glittering through Christophe's being and voice like a unique, priceless token. Awakening. Awakening of the society. Which led to positive anarchy, as Christophe called the condition of the world's bliss. He didn't mention it many times, but when he did he sounded like a prophet. My mission will be completed when this fucking world is fair, he'd add sometimes. Michel never even attempted to think so broadly. Michel was merely there. He was a detail and seemed to be OK with it just as much as Christophe. A detail which can be dropped whenever he pleases. And which could re-enter anytime.
The afternoon Christophe and him did the first trip - that was a part of Christophe's terminology too - seemed so close he could almost touch it like a double windowpane in front of him. It was cold and humid, so typical that it felt as if November itself was enough to build an impenetrable wall between the Sun on one side and Brussels on the other. Christophe and him were pacing towards the cathedral more or less silently. Michel was afraid to meet an acquaintance who might ask him where he was going, or even invite him somewhere warm, for a beer. There wasn't a soul. Nobody was out in this weather except diplomats and tourists. Christophe noticed his uncertainty. Don't stare, he hissed in his ear. Pretend you're going somewhere. Pretend you're running some terribly important errand. Pretend you're not thinking about anything. Michel nodded sharply. They were walking towards Manneken Pis, the most overrated of all Belgium's sights, which, like any other day, gathered a crowd of Japanese tourists with their cameras pointed upwards. Michel had wondered before about how many tons of such pictures, perfectly identical, cluttered the already crowded Japanese homes. This time his mind was empty. He was indeed thinking of nothing at all. Christophe accelerated his pace and briefly bumped his hip against a thin middle-aged Japanese. Sorry, he said with a remorseful look as the man lowered his camera and looked at him. Crowds, you see. The Japanese flashed a trained smile immediately shifting his look back up. Michel followed Christophe down the street and then around the corner. It was two or three hundred metres further on that Christophe turned to him. So there, he said. Easy, isn't it? Michel sent him a wondering look. Have you - I mean, have you really? he asked. Christophe nodded. He smiled. Yes, he said. Simple, isn't it? The guy has pockets holding a gallon and wide as the Scheldt. His wallet, of course, in the right one. This rule never fails - and even if it did, you see straight away which pocket sags. Like on a sale. Someone has to do it, damnit! Michel was watching him, nodding hastily. Christophe walked on. As they entered a short, narrow street without any people he opened the wallet, pulled the money out and quickly examined it. Then he hastily flung the wallet in a dustbin. Seventeen hundred, he said. Average. Everybody's more or less on plastic these days. This job won't make you rich. You'll survive alright, but you'll never be rich. He laughed, and Michel winced instinctively turning his head to see if someone was watching. There was nobody. There was nobody in the whole wacky city to see them. He felt a short pang of relief. Now you, Christophe's voice said. Michel gaped as if he was proposed to fly to Mars just like that, on willpower alone. Christophe was smiling encouragingly. Come on, he said. We agreed. You see there's nothing to it, or though? Michel gave a prolonged nod. But we can't just go back, can we, he said. Somebody could recognise us. Christophe waved his hand. No way, he said. That's for amateurs. Kleptomaniacs. Rich uptown kids with full stomachs who steal out of sheer wantonness. So that some innocent immigrant can then take the flak. Fucking world. Christophe's face acquired an air of exalted seriousness like each time he came across an injustice. He was silent for a moment. We're going to another place, he said then. In front of the Parliament. Fantastic spot, you'll see. Hundreds of absent-minded diplomats with unzipped bags. An incredibly trusting population. Well, they can afford not to give a damn about money. The state refunds it, tenfold. From our money, dammit. He went silent again. After all, he said then, it can't do any harm if you start making changes at the top. They'll start thinking sooner or later. Right, Michel? Michel nodded automatically. Christophe turned around, nodded, and together they started walking back, towards the centre. Michel tried to calm down his heart which climbed higher, towards his throat, with every step. He was thinking about what would follow. Follow. How he'd stretch out on the sofa reading a good book. How he'd go to the bar and say hello to the lads in the evening. How he'd call Marianne who might be just bored enough to let him into her narrow rented bed. How he could still say no, decide against it, get out and let Christophe dismiss him with a disappointed sigh. It was ever so simple. Nevertheless he felt as if he was programmed, as if Christophe was holding a remote control in his hand pushing the buttons absently, without thinking. He couldn't leave. He had to make it through the task. It got warmer with every step, and as they approached the Parliament to a hundred metres his memory became hazy. A cloud sat there, dark and thick like ink, hot and sticky like porridge. There was nothing inside. Not a thing.
He remembered the woman only by her smell. Maybe that's why he never forgot it. She could have been old or young, attractive or the type you look at with some lame mercy before forgetting her. He didn't know a thing. She wore a bag, alright. With a zip undone. You didn't have to remember such things, they went without saying. He didn't touch her, at least he couldn't feel it. There was nothing between them, not even an awareness that his fingers instantly reached into the centre of one of her worlds. Just the smell, faint, fresh like a bunch of some lilies got stuck in his nostrils and escorted him through a dark narrow tunnel, to the end where Christophe's face blinked before him, grinning from ear to ear. Well done, mate, said Christophe. That was bloody professional. I can't believe it was your first time. You must be a natural talent. They were already walking on, through some obscure, unknown alleys. Christophe handed him two thousand francs and some small change. An ideal target, he said. You're lucky. Do this a couple of times a week and you'll be quite well off. Michel nodded. Of course. Again. He said he wasn't feeling well and that he wanted to go home. Christophe nodded sympathetically. Sure, off you go, he said. See you, right? Yes, said Michel. He dragged himself down the streets as if he'd never seen them before. Narrow and threatening they wiggled and opened in front of him while his nostrils were choking with the smell of lilies and his back pocket was burning with money, his side earnings, his petty crime. It can still be the last time, he thought. Last time. Last time. He spotted his reflection in the glass. It was nine months later and he was there. | English | NL | 9e550499d8288e361b8e9ed1c344dac1bcde4eb20721bb779bf06beb85c4e6be |
ADVENTURES IN WIZARD-LAND
She had found a passage through the rocks which they had never noticed before!
" Come along !" cried Cyril joyously at the sight of it. " Come along ! we'll go on a voyage of discovery !"
Down the passage they went, far and carefully, for there was onlya glimmerof light in a thin streak peeping through, because the rocks all but joined at the top, and the ground was uneven and slippery. But in spite of their caution they got a sudden start, for they became aware of a silent brook flowing deep and swiftly by, at their feet: another step and they would have been in it. The Twins, rather startled, looked at one another, and then without further thought they just jumped across. Jumped into an open space—into Moonlight. There was actually a full moon overhead, but with such seams and lines about it that it bore the appearance of being pieced together like a geographical puzzle.
" Cyril, look there !" whispered Dulcie, pressing close up to him, as soon as she found words.
In the white light there stood an immense rock. In it there was a wooden door with hewn-out steps leading up to it. A nice red door it was, with a green knocker upon it in the shape of a mouth smiling a welcome. Of course they went up to it, climbed the steps, which were high and difficult, and | English | NL | a269e5e073e46af276ba50daac7a7992f88ce0924f653e822922f10873a26212 |
Tony and I got married when I was 31. Until then I had taken care of myself and things just worked out fine. When we got married, Tony took such good care of me. He loved to cook, knew how to clean and could manage my finances too. When I became a mother three years later, things changed suddenly! Not only was on my own as mother to my child, but we also moved to Italy and I was totally alone. There was no-one to help me be a mother. I didn’t know anyone; I didn’t speak the language and our neighbors were strangers to me.
I was now my child’s mother! I realized that if my child was going to be fed, changed or cleaned, I would have to do it. If my child needed help, I would have to help her. I had no external help to be a mother, but I found some help from another source. My great need made me look to the Holy Spirit.
As a mother, I often needed help and comfort for myself and The Holy Spirit was just that for me. But He also helped me to help and comfort my child. He helped me in practical ways. There were times when I didn’t know what to do for my child. Thank God for the Holy Spirit and the prayer language of praying in the Spirit. Many times I just prayed in tongues and answers came to my heart; practical answers to help me care for my child’s soul, her body and her spirit. Many times the interpretation of what I prayed came to me and I knew what to do.
I found out that if I followed Him in everything I did for my children, I got it right. Other people may be able to give you ideas about how to be a good mother. But no-one knows your child like God and, by the help of His Spirit, you can have help that is personal and precise for you and your children.
John 14:16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever. | English | NL | 018fca27b6d31c94b83bf9d00213d692e937a7e9dbd8abf6c6d621e6fc3da9ae |
its been awhile, 4+ years, wow. We will have to get better at keeping up the blog.
This is a neat project and a great application of 3D printing in a commercial space.
There is a local company that supplies hard to find, generally out of production, replacement hardware mainly for windows in doors in the residential and commercial space.
The owner came to E3 with a problem. There were literally hundreds of high end sliding doors in a local condo building that had various small components that had worn out over time. Replacements were not available from the OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer). Replacing each door set would cost thousands of dollars and was not financially feasible yet residents were upset about their non lockable sliding doors in this high rise.
There were two parts The first was the sliding lever which the user moves to engage or disengage the internal latch. The second was the internal latch. The lever was made from an injection molded plastic with a steel pin insert. The latch was diecast from inexpensive metal.
E3 took available samples and reverse engineered the original parts and designed drop in replacements which could be 3D printed from high strength nylon. The parts could be produced and sold to the customer for a low price and high value. ie., they were able to avoid the cost of entire door replacements. | English | NL | f04e581a7d95e720f46d5ed51d8b3c50ae5c15dca9e214d7dd4321435c4b08fa |
The Stone Boy
Arnold drew his overalls and raveling gray sweater over his naked body. In the other narrow bed his brother Eugene went on sleeping, undisturbed by the alarm clock’s rusty ring. Arnold, watching his brother sleeping, felt a peculiar dismay; he was nine, six years younger than Eugie and in their waking hours it was he who was subordinate. To dispel emphatically his uneasy advantage over his sleeping brother, he threw himself on the hump of Eugie’s body.
“Get up! Get up!” he cried.
Arnold felt his brother twist away and saw the blankets lifted in a great wing, and, all in an instant, he was lying on his back under the covers with only his face showing, like a baby, and Eugie was sprawled on top of him.
“Whassa matter with you?” asked Eugie in sleepy anger, his face hanging close.
“Get up,” Arnold repeated. “You said you’d pick peas with me.” Stupidly, Eugie gazed around the room as if to see if morning had come into it yet. Arnold began to laugh deliriously making soft, snorting noises, and was thrown off the bed. He got up from the floor and went down the stairs, the laughter continuing, like hiccups, against his will. But when he opened the staircase door and entered the parlor, be hunched up his shoulders and was quiet because his parents slept in the bedroom downstairs.
Arnold lifted his .22 caliber rifle from the rack on the kitchen wall. It was an old lever-action Winchester that his father had given him because nobody else used it any more. On their way down to the garden he and Eugie would go by the lake, and if there were any ducks on it he’d take a shot at them. Standing on the stool before the cupboard, he searched on the top shelf in the confusion of medicines and ointments for man and beast and found a small yellow box of .22 cartridges. Then he sat down on the stool and began to load his gun.
It was cold in the kitchen so early, but later in the day, when his mother canned the peas, the heat from the wood stove would be almost unbearable. Yesterday she had finished preserving the huckleberries that the family had picked along the mountain, and before that she had canned all the cherries his father had brought from the warehouse in Corinth. Sometimes, on these summer days, Arnold would deliberately come out from the shade where he was playing and make himself as uncomfortable as his mother was in the kitchen by standing in the sun until the sweat ran down his body.
Eugie came clomping down the stairs and into the kitchen, his head drooping with sleepiness. From his perch on the stool Arnold watched Eugie slip on his green knit cap. Eugie didn’t really need a cap; he hadn’t had a haircut in a long time and his brown curls grew thick and matted, close around his ears and down his neck, tapering there to a whorl.
Eugie passed his left hand through his hair before he set his cap down with his right. The very way he slipped his cap on was an announcement of his status; almost everything he did was a reminder that he was eldest–first he, then Nora, then Arnold–and called attention to how tall he was (almost as tall as his father), how long his legs were, how small he was in the hips, and what a neat dip above his buttocks his thick-soled logger’s boots gave him. Arnold never tired of watching Eugie offer silent praise unto himself. He wondered, as he sat enthralled, if when he got to be Eugie’s age he would still be undersized and his hair still straight.
Eugie eyed the gun. “Don’t you know this ain’t duck season?” he asked gruffly, as if he were the sheriff.
“No, I don’t know,” Arnold said with a snigger.
Eugie picked up the tin washtub for the peas, unbolted the door with his free hand and kicked it open. Then, lifting the tub to his head, he went clomping down the back steps.
Arnold followed, closing the door behind him.
The sky was faintly gray, almost white. The mountains behind the farm made the sun climb a Iong way to show itself. Several miles to the south, where the range opened up, hung an orange mist, but the valley in which the farm lay was still cold and colorless.
Eugie opened the gate to the yard and the boys passed between the barn and the row of chicken houses, their feet stirring up the carpet of brown feathers dropped by the molting chickens. They paused before going down the slope to the lake. A fluky morning wind ran among the shocks of wheat that covered the slope. It sent a shimmer northward across the lake, gently moving the rushes that formed an island in the center. Killdeer, their white markings flashing, skimmed the water, crying their shrill, sweet cry. And there at the south end of the lake were four wild ducks, swimming out from the willows into open water.
Arnold followed Eugie down the slope, stealing as his brother did, from one shock of wheat to another. Eugie paused before climbing through the wire fence that divided the wheatfield from the marshy pasture around the lake. They were screened from the ducks by the willows along the lake’s edge.
“If you hit your duck, you want me to go in after it?” Eugie said.
“If you want,”
Arnold said. Eugie lowered his eyelids, leaving silts of mocking blue. “You’d drown ‘fore you got to it, them legs of yours are so puny,” he said He shoved the tub under the fence and, pressing down the center wire, climbed through into the pasture. Arnold pressed down the bottom wire, thrust a leg through and leaned forward to bring the
other leg after. His rifle caught on the wire and he jerked at it. The air was rocked by the sound of the shot. Feeling foolish; he lifted his face, baring it to an expected shower of derision from his brother. But Eugie did not turn around. Instead, from his crouching position, he fell to his knees and then pitched forward onto his face. The ducks rose up crying from the lake, cleared the mountain background and beat away northward across the pale sky.
Then Arnold saw it, under the tendril of hair at the nape of the neck–a slow rising of bright blood. It had an obnoxious movement, like that of a parasite.
“Hey, Eugie,” he said again. He was feeling the same discomfort he had felt when he had watched Eugie sleeping; his brother didn’t know that he was lying face down in the pasture. Again he said, “Hey, Eugie,” An anxious nudge in his voice. But Eugie was as still as the morning about them. Arnold set his rifle on the ground and stood up. He picked up the tub and, dragging it behind him, walked along by the willows to the garden fence and climbed through. He went down on his knees among the tangled vines. The pods were cold with the night, but his hands were strange to him, and not until some time had passed did he realize that the pods were numbing his fingers. He picked from the top of the vine first, then lifted the vine to look underneath for pods and then moved on to the next.
It was a warmth on his back, like a large hand laid firmly there, that made him raise his head. Way up the slope the gray farmhouse was struck by the sun. While his head had been bent the land had grown bright around him.
When he got up his legs were so stiff that he had to go down on his knees again to ease the pain. Then, walking sideways, he dragged the tub, half full of peas, up the slope.
The kitchen was warm now; a fire was roaring in the stove with a closed-up, rushing sound. His mother was spooning eggs from a pot of boiling water and putting them into a bowl. Her short brown hair was uncombed and fell forward across her eyes as she bent her head. Nora was lifting a frying pan full of trout from the stove, holding the handle with a dish towel. His father had just come in from bringing the cows from the north pasture to the barn, and was sitting on the stool, unbuttoning his red plaid Mackinaw.
“Did you boys fill the tub?” his mother asked.
“They ought of by now,” his father said. “They went out of the house an hour ago. Eugie woke me up comin’ downstairs. I heard you shootin’–did you get a duck?”
“No,” Arnold said. They would want to know why Eugie wasn’t coming in for breakfast he thought. “Eugie’s dead,” he told them.
They stared at him. The pitch cracked in the stove. “You kids playin’ a joke?” his father asked.
“Where’s Eugene?” his mother asked scoldingly. She wanted, Arnold knew, to see his eyes,
and when he had glanced at her she put the bowl and spoon down on the stove and walked past him. His father stood up and went out the door after her. Nora followed them with little skipping steps, as if afraid to be left alone.
Arnold went into the barn, down along the foddering passage past the cows waiting to be milked, and climbed into the loft. After a few minutes he heard a terrifying sound coming toward the house. His parents and Nora were returning from the willows, and sounds sharp as knives were rising from his mother’s breast and carrying over the sloping fields. In a short while he heard his father go down the back steps, slam the car door and drive away.
Arnold lay still as a fugitive, listening to the cows eating close by. If his parents never called him, he thought, he would stay up in the loft forever, out of the way. In the night he would sneak down for a drink of water from the faucet over the trough and for whatever food they left for him by the barn.
The rattle of his father’s car as it turned down the lane recalled him to the present. He heard voices of his Uncle Andy and Aunt Alice as they and his father went past the barn to the lake. He could feel the morning growing heavier with sun. Someone, probably Nora, had let the chickens out of their coops and they were cackling in the yard. After a while another car turned down the road off the highway. The car drew to a stop and be heard the voices of strange men. The men also went past the barn and down to the lake. The undertakers, whom his father must have phoned from Uncle Andy’s house, had arrived from Corinth. Then he heard everybody come back and heard the car turn around and leave.
“Arnold!” It was his father calling from the yard. He climbed down the ladder and went out into the sun, picking wisps of hay from his overalls.
Corinth, nine miles away, was the county seat. Arnold sat in the front seat of the old Ford between his father, who was driving, and Uncle Andy; no one spoke. Uncle Andy was his mother’s brother, and he bad been fond of Eugie because Eugie had resembled him. Andy bad taken Eugie hunting and had given him a knife and a lot of things, and now Andy, his eyes narrowed, sat tall and stiff beside Arnold.
Arnold’s father parked the car before the courthouse. It was a two-story brick building with a lamp on each side of the bottom step. They went up the wide stone steps, Arnold and his father going first, and entered the darkly paneled hallway. The shirt-sleeved man in the sheriff’s office said that the sheriff was at Carlson’s Parlor, examining the Curwing boy.
Andy went off to get the sheriff while Arnold and his father waited on a bench in the corridor. Arnold felt his father watching him, and be lifted his eyes with painful casualness to the announcement on the opposite wall, of the Corinth County Annual Rodeo, and then to the clock with its loudly clucking pendulum. After he had come down from the loft his father and Uncle Andy had stood in the yard with him and asked him to tell them everything, and he had explained to them how the gun had caught on the wire. But when they had asked him why he hadn’t run back to the house to tell his parents, he had had no answer–all he could say was that he had gone down into the garden to pick the peas. His father had stared at him in a pale, puzzled way, and it was then that he had felt his father and the others set their cold, turbulent silence against him. Arnold shifted on the bench, his only feeling a small one of compunction imposed by his father’s eyes.
At a quarter past nine Andy and the sheriff came in. They all went into the sheriff’s private office, and Arnold was sent forward to sit in the chair by the sheriff’s desk; his father and Andy sat down on the bench against the wall. The sheriff lumped down into his swivel chair and swung toward Arnold. He was an old man with white hair like wheat stubble. His restless green eyes made him seem not to be in his office but to be hurrying and bobbing around somewhere else.
“What did you say your name was?” the sheriff asked.
“Arnold,” he replied; but he could not remember telling the sheriff his name before.
“What were you doing with a .22, Arnold?”
“It’s mine,” he said.
“Okay. What were you going to shoot?”
“Some ducks,” he replied.
“Out of season?” He nodded. “Were you and your brother good friends?” What did he mean–good friends? Eugie was his brother. That was different from a friend,
Arnold thought. A best friend was your own age, but Eugie was almost a man. Eugie had had a way of looking at him, slyly and mockingly and yet confidentially, that had summed up how they both felt about being brothers. Arnold had wanted to be with Eugie more than with anybody else but he couldn’t say they had been good friends.
“Did they ever quarrel?” the sheriff asked his father.
“Not that I know,” his father replied. “It seemed to me that Arnold cared a lot for Eugie.”
“Did you?” the sheriff asked Arnold. If it seemed so to his father, then it was so. Arnold nodded. “Were you mad at him this morning?”
“How did you happen to shoot him?”
“We was crawlin’ through the fence.”
“Yes?” “An’ the gun got caught on the wire.”
“Seems the hammer must of caught,” his father put in.
“All right, that’s what happened,” said the sheriff. “But what I want you to tell me is this. Why didn’t you go back to the house and tell your father right away? Why did you go and pick peas for an hour?”
Arnold gazed over his shoulder at his father, expecting his father to have an answer for this also. But his father’s eyes, larger and even lighter blue than usual, were fixed upon him curiously. Arnold picked at a callus in his right palm. It seemed odd now that he had not run back to the house and wakened his father, but he could not remember why he had not. They were all waiting for him to answer.
“I come down to pick peas,” be said.
“Didn’t you think,” asked the sheriff, stepping carefully from word to word “that it was more important for you to go tell your parents what had happened?”
“The sun was gonna come up,” Arnold said.
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“It’s better to pick peas while they’re cool.”
The sheriff swung away from him, laid both hands flat on his desk. “Well, all I can say is,” he said across to Arnold father and Uncle Andy, “He’s either a moron or he’s so reasonable that he’s way ahead of us.” He gave a challenging snort. “It’s come to my notice that the, most reasonable guys are mean ones. They don’t feel nothing.” For a moment the three men sat still. Then the sheriff lifted his hand like a man taking an oath. “Take him home,” he said.
Andy uncrossed his legs. “You don’t want him?”
“Not now,” replied the sheriff. “Maybe in a few years.”
Arnold’s father stood up. He held his hat against his chest. “The gun ain’t his no more,” he
smiled wanly. Arnold went first through the hallway, hearing behind him the heels of his father and Uncle Andy striking the floor boards. He went down the steps ahead of them and climbed into the back seat of the car. Andy paused as he was getting into the front seat and gazed back at Arnold, and Arnold saw that his uncle’s eyes had absorbed the knowingness from the sheriff’s eyes. Andy and his father and the sheriff had discovered what made him go down into the garden. It was because he was cruel, the sheriff had said, and didn’t care about his brother. Was that the reason? Arnold lowered his eyelids meekly against his uncle’s stare.
The rest of the day he did his tasks around the farm keeping apart from the family. At evening when he saw his father stomp tiredly into the house, Arnold did not put down his hammer and leave the chicken coop he was repairing. He was afraid that they did not want him to eat supper with them. But in a few minutes another fear that they would go to the trouble of calling him and that he would be made conspicuous by his tardiness made him follow his father into the house. As he went through the kitchen he saw the jars of peas standing in rows on the workbench, a reproach to him. No one spoke at supper, and his mother, who sat next to him, leaned her head in her hand all through the meal, curving her fingers over her eyes so as not to see him. They were finishing their small, silent supper when the visitors began to arrive, knocking hard on the back door. The men were coming from their farms now that it was growing dark and they could not work any more.
Old Man Matthews, gray and stocky, came first, with his two sons, Orion, the elder, and Clint, who was Eugie’s age. As the callers entered the parlor, where the family ate, Arnold sat down in a rocking chair. Even as he had been undecided before supper whether to remain outside or take his place at the table, he now thought that he should go upstairs, and yet he stayed to avoid being conspicuous by his absence. f he stayed, he thought, as he always stayed and listened when visitors came, they would see that he was only Arnold and not the person the sheriff thought he was. He sat with his arms crossed and his hands tucked into his armpits and did not lift his eyes.
The Matthews men had hardly settled down around the table, after Arnold’s mother and Nora had cleared away the dishes, when another car rattled down the road and someone else rapped on the back door. This time it was Sullivan, a spare and sandy man, so nimble of gesture and expression that Arnold had never been able to catch more than a few of his meanings. Sullivan, in dusty jeans, sat down in the other rocker, shot out his skinny legs and began to talk in his fast way, recalling everything that Eugene had ever said to him. The other men interrupted to tell of occasions they remembered, and after a time Clint’s young voice, hoarse like Eugene’s had been, broke in to tell about the time Eugene had beat him in a wrestling match.
Out in the kitchen the voices of Orion’s wife and of Mrs. Sullivan mingled with Nora’s voice but not, Arnold noticed, his mother’s. Then dry little Mr. Cram came, leaving large Mrs. Cram in the kitchen, and there was no chair left for Mr. Cram to sit in. No one asked Arnold to get up and he was unable to rise. He knew that the story had got around to them during the day about how he had gone and picked peas after he had shot his brother, and he knew that although they were talking only about Eugie they were thinking about him and if he got up, if he’ moved even his foot, they would all be alerted. Then Uncle Andy arrived and leaned his tall, lanky body against the doorjamb and there were two men standing.
Presently Arnold was aware that the talk had stopped. He knew without looking up that the men were watching him.
“Not a tear in his eye,” said Andy, and Arnold knew that it was his uncle who had gestured the men to attention.
“He don’t give a hoot, is that how it goes?” asked Sullivan, trippingly.
“He’s a reasonable fellow,” Andy explained. “That’s what the sheriff said. It’s us who ain’t reasonable. If we’d of shot our brother, we’d of come runnin’ back to the house, like a baby.
Well, we’d of been unreasonable. What would of been the use of actin’ like that? If your brother is shot dead, he’s shot dead. What’s the use of gettin’ emotional about it? The thing to do is go down to the garden and pick peas. Am I right?”
The men around the room shifted their heavy, satisfying weight of unreasonableness.
Matthews’ son Orion said: “If I’d of done what he done, Pa would’ve hung my pelt by the side of that big coyote in the barn.”
Arnold sat in the rocker until the last man had filed out. While his family was out in the kitchen bidding the callers good night and the cars were driving away down the lane to the highway, he picked up one of the kerosene lamps and slipped quickly up the stairs. In his room he undressed by lamplight, although he and Eugie had always undressed in the dark, and not until he was lying in his bed did he blow out the flame He felt nothing, not any grief. There was only the same immense silence and crawling inside of him; it was the way the house and fields felt under a merciless sun.
He awoke suddenly. He knew that his father was out the yard, closing the doors of the chicken houses so that the chickens could not roam out too early and fall prey to the coyotes that came down from the mountains at daybreak. The sound that had wakened him was the step of his father as he got up from the rocker and went down the back steps. And he knew that his mother was awake in her bed. Throwing off the covers, he rose swiftly, went down the stairs and across the dark parlor to his parents’ room. He rapped on the door. “Mother?” From the closed room her voice rose to him a seeking and retreating voice.
“Mother?” he asked insistently. He had expected her to realize that he wanted to go down on his knees by her bed and tell her that Eugie was dead. She did not know it yet, nobody knew it, and yet she was sitting up in bed, waiting to be told, waiting for him to confirm her dread. He had expected her to tell him to come in, to allow him to dig his head into her blankets and tell her about the terror he had felt when he had knelt beside Eugie. He had come to clasp her in his arms and, in his terror, to pommel her breasts with his head. He put his hand upon the knob.
“Go back to bed, Arnold,” she called sharply. But he waited. “Go back! Is night when you get afraid?” At first he did not understand. Then, silently, he left the door and for a stricken moment stood by the rocker.
Outside everything was still. The fences, the shocks of wheat seen through the window before him were so still it was as if they moved and breathed in the daytime and had fallen silent with the lateness of the hour. It was a silence that seemed to observe his father, a figure moving alone around the yard, his lantern casting a circle of light by his feet. In a few minutes his father would enter the dark house, the lantern still lighting his way.
Arnold was suddenly aware that he was naked. He had thrown off his blankets and come down the stairs to tell his mother how he felt about Eugie, but she had refused to listen to him and his nakedness had become unpardonable. At once he went back up the stairs, fleeing from his father’s lantern.
At breakfast he kept his eyelids lowered as if to deny the humiliating night. Nora, sitting at his left, did not pass the pitcher of milk to him and he did not ask for it. He would never again, he vowed, ask them for anything, and he ate his fried eggs and potatoes only because everybody ate meals–the cattle ate, and the cats; it was customary for everybody to eat
“Nora, you gonna keep that pitcher for yourself?” his father asked. Nora lowered her head unsurely. “Pass it on to Arnold,” his father said. Nora put her hands in her lap.
His father picked up the metal pitcher and set It down at Arnold’s plate. Arnold, pretending to be deaf to the discord, did not glance up but relief rained over his shoulders at the thought that his parents recognized him again. They must have lain awake after his father had come in from the yard: had they realized together why he had come down the stairs and knocked at their door? “Bessie’s missin’ this morning,” his father called out to his mother, who had gone into the kitchen. “She went up the mountain last night and had her calf, most likely. Somebody’s got to go up and find her ‘fore the coyotes get the calf.”
That had been Eugie’s job, Arnold thought. Eugie would climb the cattle trails in search of a newborn calf and come down the mountain carrying the calf across his back, with the cow running down along behind him, mooing in alarm
Arnold ate the few more forkfuls of his breakfast, put hands on the edge of the table and pushed back his chair. If he went for the calf he’d be away from the farm all morning. He could switch the cow down the mountain and the calf would run along at its mother’s side.
When he passed through the kitchen his mother was setting a kettle of water on the stove. “Where you going? she asked awkwardly.
“Up to get the calf,” he replied, averting his face.
“Arnold?” At the door he paused reluctantly, his back to her knowing that she was seeking him out, as his father was doing and he called upon his pride to protect him from them. “Was you knocking at my door last night?” He looked over his shoulder at her, his eyes narrow and dry. “What’d you want?” she asked humbly.
“I didn’t want nothing,” he said flatly. Then he went out the door and down the back steps, his legs trembling from the fright his answer gave him. | English | NL | 4c66c2b8817c641fc74a150e71b638d13c111c9a428d2ac4121035c472b7fcf6 |
Five years after he’s lost off the coast of South America, presumed dead, Captain Robert Nash escapes cruel captivity, and returns to London and the bride he loves, but barely knows. When he stumbles back into the family home, he’s appalled to find himself gate-crashing the party celebrating his wife’s engagement to another man.
No red-blooded naval officer takes a challenge like this lying down; but five years is a long time, and beautiful, passionate Morwenna has clearly found a life without him. Can he win back the wife who gave him a reason to survive his ordeal? Or will the woman who haunts his every thought remain eternally out of reach?
Love lost and found? Or love lost forever?
Since hearing of her beloved husband’s death, Morwenna Nash has been mired in grief. After five bleak years without him, she must summon every ounce of courage and determination to become a Dashing Widow and rejoin the social whirl. She owes it to her young daughter to break free of old sorrow and find a new purpose in life, even if that means accepting a loveless marriage.
It’s a miracle when Robert returns from the grave, and despite the awkward circumstances of his arrival, she’s overjoyed that her husband has come back to her at last. But after years of suffering, he’s not the handsome, laughing charmer she remembers. Instead he’s a grim shadow of his former dashing self. He can’t hide how much he still wants her—but does passion equal love?
Can Morwenna and Robert bridge the chasm of absence, suffering and mistrust, and find the way back to each other?
An international e-book release ~ 30th June 2017
Nash House, Berkeley Square, London, October 1829
There was a tall screen set up near the fire. Morwenna had never imagined feeling shy with the man who had shown her that her body was made for pleasure and love. But right now, nothing short of a pistol to the head could make her undress in front of Robert.
Like the frightened mouse she so despised, Morwenna snatched up the nightdress spread over the bed and scuttled behind the screen. There she collapsed on a padded stool and stared blindly into space.
It took her a shaming amount of time to find the heart to remove slippers and stockings. She even managed to take off her drawers and petticoats.
Her skin itched with awareness, although the room outside was so quiet that she could almost believe she was alone. But she was vividly conscious that her husband could hear every rustle from behind the screen.
“Blast…” she muttered.
“What is it?” a deep voice inquired from much closer than where she’d left him.
She was blushing like fire. Absurd, when they’d been naked together so many times. “I can’t unlace my gown.”
He appeared around the side of the screen. “Let me help.”
She wanted to say no. But she’d look an utter fool going to bed in her finery. She lifted her slippery fall of hair out of the way and presented her back. “Thank you.”
He’d done this for her before, of course. In those heady, too brief days after their wedding. When she’d imagined a lifetime as Robert Nash’s wife.
But still she jumped when his fingers brushed her nape. A sizzle of heat rippled down her spine, and her stomach lurched.
He began to tug at the fastenings with a clumsiness she didn’t remember, and she realized that he was trembling again. She was so preternaturally aware of his closeness, she felt every faint hesitation in his fingers.
When it seemed to take him forever to finish, the breath snagged in her throat. She was seeing colored lights in front of her eyes before she remembered to take another breath.
Then she realized Robert was holding his breath, too.
That salty smell was rich in her nostrils, mingled with the underlying spice that was his alone. She’d never been so conscious of his height and power, even when she’d come to his bed as a virgin bride.
After about a hundred years, he reached her waist and briefly rested his hands on her hips.
The urgency to feel him invade her body became overwhelming. She wasn’t sure what she thought of this man who returned to her from his watery grave. But her body gave no heed to her mind’s havering. Her body only knew that after a long famine, pleasure beckoned at last.
After a mere second, he released her. She made herself straighten, preparatory to stepping away, when she felt a tug on the laces of her stays.
A soft whoosh of breath escaped her. This was like torture.
This time his touch was sure, and she soon felt her corset sag. She reached up to clutch her bodice, before it slipped down to disgrace modesty. Although modesty was surely out of place when she stood before her husband.
For another bristling second, he remained behind her. Close enough to touch her. But not touching her.
She felt like she hung suspended over a precipice.
Morwenna quivered as she imagined those large hands, more disturbing than before with their scars and calluses, hauling her back into his body. Starting to sway, she bit her lip and shut her eyes.
She sagged like her unlaced corset when he moved back. “All set?”
The crack in his voice hinted that unlacing her had been as fraught for him as for her. But that knowledge was more threat than reassurance.
“Th-thank you,” she forced out.
She turned to look at him, but he’d left her alone behind the screen. Had he always moved so quietly? She shivered again. She had no idea what Robert was thinking, beyond the fact that despite his attempts to hide it, he hadn’t stopped wanting her.
Oh, dear. She was so keyed up, she was likely to snap into pieces before the night was over. In a rush, she flung off her clothes and had a quick wash, hating the way the touch of her hand made her imagine other, harder hands stroking her skin.
Once she’d pulled her filmy nightdress over her head, she loitered far too long behind the screen. She felt…bashful. Silly as it was to admit, when she’d been married for six years. A woman of twenty-six with a child shouldn’t feel like an untried girl.
Still, she required a mammoth amount of will to step into the open.
“Oh,” she said, struck as inarticulate as Robert had been downstairs.
He was sitting up in the bed, bare-chested, with the blankets pulled to his waist. Was he naked? With another of those dizzying lurches in her stomach, she supposed he must be.
“Come to bed,” he said softly, and her blush rose again. | English | NL | aa6c6643809b6a72718d4072bcd0c4dbc354771d8776c4239fe0e7c5a57fb013 |
Most people will normally notice at least a slight itch and rash on their skin after applying the larvae, however, this is not always the case. Please contact us if you are concerned the larvae have not made it intact and we will help you to decide on the best course of action. As it is possible, with the first dose especially, to have no itch or rash even though the larvae have penetrated the skin, it is essential that you wait at least 3 weeks before having a replacement dose.
It is very important to make sure you don’t double up on doses as it can lead to extremely strong side effects. Some new hosts have reported having very noticeable intestinal side effects in the weeks after applying their dose, even though they did not have any reaction on their skin.
In cases where it is agreed that the dose was not viable we will reship to you free of charge.
Similarly, if the dose has not arrived within 21 days of being shipped, we will send a replacement dose free of charge. | English | NL | 6b68bc4ea217eb028f90485ee02b3ad1514d78aa891378fe3f8bdeedbcfc2f7b |
A strange stillness hung over the restaurant; it was one of those rare moments when the orchestra was not discoursing the strains of the Ice-cream Sailor waltz.
"Did I ever tell you," asked Clovis of his friend, "the tragedy of music at mealtimes?
"It was a gala evening at the Grand Sybaris Hotel, and a special dinner was being served in the Amethyst dining-hall. The Amethyst dining-hall had almost a European reputation, especially with that section of Europe which is historically identified with the Jordan Valley. Its cooking was beyond reproach, and its orchestra was sufficiently highly salaried to be above criticism. Thither came in shoals the intensely musical and the almost intensely musical, who are very many, and in still greater numbers the merely musical, who know how Tschaikowsky's name is pronounced and can recognize several of Chopin's nocturnes if you give them due warning; these eat in the nervous, detached manner of roebuck feeding in the open, and keep anxious ears cocked towards the orchestra for the first hint of a recognizable melody.
" 'Ah, yes, Pagliacci,' they murmur, as the opening strains follow hot upon the soup, and if no contradiction is forthcoming from any better-informed quarter they break forth into subdued humming by way of supplementing the efforts of the musicians. Sometimes the melody starts on level terms with the soup, in which case the banqueters contrive somehow to hum between the spoonfuls; the facial expression of enthusiasts who are punctuating potage St. Germain with Pagliacci is not beautiful, but it should be seen by those who are bent on observing all sides of life. One cannot discount the unpleasant things of this world merely by looking the other way.
"In addition to the aforementioned types the restaurant was patronized by a fair sprinkling of the absolutely non-musical; their presence in the dining-hall could only be explained on the supposition that they had come there to dine.
"The earlier stages of the dinner had worn off. The wine lists had been consulted, by some with the blank embarrassment of a school-boy suddenly called on to locate a Minor Prophet in the tangled hinterland of the Old Testament, by others with the severe scrutiny which suggests that they have visited most of the higher-priced wines in their own homes and probed their family weaknesses. The diners who chose their wine in the latter fashion always gave their orders in a penetrating voice, with a plentiful garnishing of stage directions. By insisting on having your bottle pointing to the north when the cork is being drawn, and calling the waiter Max, you may induce an impression on your guests which hours of laboured boasting might be powerless to achieve. For this purpose, however, the guests must be chosen as carefully as the wine.
"Standing aside from the revellers in the shadow of a massive pillar was an interested spectator who was assuredly of the feast, and yet not in it. Monsieur Aristide Saucourt was the chef of the Grand Sybaris Hotel, and if he had an equal in his profession he had never acknowledged the fact. In his own domain he was a potentate, hedged around with the cold brutality that Genius expects rather than excuses in her children; he never forgave, and those who served him were careful that there should be little to forgive. In the outer world, the world which devoured his creations, he was an influence; how profound or how shallow an influence he never attempted to guess. It is the penalty and the safeguard of genius that it computes itself by troy weight in a world that measures by vulgar hundredweights.
Once in a way the great man would be seized with a desire to watch the effect of his master-efforts, just as the guiding brain of Krupp's might wish at a supreme moment to intrude into the firing line of an artillery duel. And such an occasion was the present. For the first time in the history of the Grand Sybaris Hotel, he was presenting to its guests the dish which he had brought to that pitch of perfection which almost amounts to scandal. Canetons a la mode d'Ambleve. In thin gilt lettering on the creamy white of the menu how little those words conveyed to the bulk of the imperfectly educated diners. And yet how much specialized effort had been lavished, how much carefully treasured lore had been ungarnered, before those six words could be written. In the Department of Deux-Sevres ducklings had lived peculiar and beautiful lives and died in the odour of satiety to furnish the main theme of the dish; champignons, which even a purist for Saxon English would have hesitated to address as mushrooms, had contributed their languorous atrophied bodies to the garnishing, and a sauce devised in the twilight reign of the Fifteenth Louis had been summoned back from the imperishable past to take its part in the wonderful confection. Thus far had human effort laboured to achieve the desired result; the rest had been left to human genius - the genius of Aristide Saucourt.
"And now the moment had arrived for the serving of the great dish, the dish which world-weary Grand Dukes and market-obsessed money magnates counted among their happiest memories. And at the same moment something else happened. The leader of the highly salaried orchestra placed his violin caressingly against his chin, lowered his eyelids, and floated into a sea of melody.
" 'Hark!' said most of the diners, 'he is playing "The Chaplet." '
"They knew it was 'The Chaplet' because they had heard it played at luncheon and afternoon tea, and at supper the night before, and had not had time to forget.
" 'Yes, he is playing "The Chaplet," ' they reassured one another. The general voice was unanimous on the subject. The orchestra had already played it eleven times that day, four times by desire and seven times from force of habit, but the familiar strains were greeted with the rapture due to a revelation. A murmur of much humming rose from half the tables in the room, and some of the more overwrought listeners laid down knife and fork in order to be able to burst in with loud clappings at the earliest permissible moment.
"And the Canetons a la mode d'Ambleve? In stupefied, sickened wonder Aristide watched them grow cold in total neglect, or suffer the almost worse indignity of perfunctory pecking and listless munching while the banqueters lavished their approval and applause on the music-makers. Calves' liver and bacon, with parsley sauce, could hardly have figured more ignominiously in the evening's entertainment. And while the master of culinary art leaned back against the sheltering pillar, choking with a horrible brain-searing rage that could find no outlet for its agony, the orchestra leader was bowing his acknowledgments of the hand-clappings that rose in a storm around him. Turning to his colleagues he nodded the signal for an encore. But before the violin had been lifted anew into position there came from the shadow of the pillar an explosive negative.
" 'Noh! Noh! You do not play thot again!'
"The musician turned in furious astonishment. Had he taken warning from the look in the other man's eyes he might have acted differently. But the admiring plaudits were ringing in his ears, and he snarled out sharply, 'That is for me to decide.'
" 'Noh! You play thot never again,' shouted the chef, and the next moment he had flung himself violently upon the loathed being who had supplanted him in the world's esteem. A large metal tureen, filled to the brim with steaming soup, had just been placed on a side table in readiness for a late party of diners; before the waiting staff or the guests had time to realize what was happening, Aristide had dragged his struggling victim up to the table and plunged his head deep down into the almost boiling contents of the tureen. At the further end of the room the diners were still spasmodically applauding in view of an encore.
"Whether the leader of the orchestra died from drowning by soup, or from the shock to his professional vanity, or was scalded to death, the doctors were never wholly able to agree. Monsieur Aristide Saucourt, who now lives in complete retirement, always inclined to the drowning theory." | English | NL | d6a57571272d348bcbf862a11d0fb18ff3f9ab94bd11f9a658f9f346490711f3 |
I pulled up on his tool, rotating my mouth on it. With just the end still in my mouth I ran my language around it, then flicked it. At once I was stroking the others of his shaft with my hand. Shawn was moaning already. I possibly could taste the salty pre cum dripping from his cock. I reduced my mouth down his penis again, then pulled straight back up. Again I ran my language about his tip. Reducing myself on his dick again, this time I took it all in, I was serious throating him. When it had been completely in I held it there, scrubbing my tongue along his shaft.
Shawn was moaning and I realized it wouldn't be long. I squeezed his balls and he opportunity his load. I swallowed that just like another fill was squirted in to my mouth. Then another. After many more little pictures he finally stopped. I continued to suck on his cock, draining the rest of his cum. Ultimately I taken up. Whoa you have got to go. I claimed taking a look at the clock. It had been 11:10, the Anderson's could possibly be home at any moment. We equally jumped to your feet, locating our extracted apparel and finding dressed. At the doorway we kissed again. In the same way he was going to open the doorway an automobile pulled in the driveway.'Rapid out the back. I claimed dragging him to your kitchen wherever there is a back door. One last kiss and he was gone. I raced back again to the living room, opened a book and pretended to be understanding once the Anderson's stepped in. Hello Brandi, how every thing move? asked Mrs Anderson. No problem, the kids visited sleep in the same way expected.
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Lord it felt therefore excellent, his penis sent all the way in me. Quickly we got our flow planning, his tool sliding in and out of me, Shawn pressing up to meet me every time I got down. I leaned forward, promoting my weight on the back of the chair to either side of Shawn's head. My breasts put in his face, his tongue achieved out to lick my erect nipples. His fingers were on my bum, squeezing my cheeks, alternately taking my cheeks apart and moving them together. His sides rose off the chair driving his tool as strong because it would go. I leaned ahead, pressing my tits in to his face. I really could experience his mouth start using in a big section of my tit, his tongue moving on my nipple. I support my position, letting Shawn do all the task, moving up in me, dragging right back before driving up into me again. I want you doggie style.
Shawn claimed while pressing out slightly. I pulled off him, got on the floor on my fingers and knees. He was directly behind me, his penis slapped on my butt a couple of times. He reached below me, found my pussy, exposed it up and led his penis into me. He Free Adult Webcams | Online Sexcams | Watch Live Sex Cam | Girls Live Sex Cam | Live Sex Shows Free | Live Sex Porn Show | Cams Free Sex | Free Live Porn | Free Xxx Sex Cam | Livesexcams | wasted no time and packed as serious because it would go. I gasped as I didn't expect the pushed he forced into me with. He taken right back and jammed it in again. He made it happen a next time and this time around I pressed back. His fingers were on my hips, pulling me back to meet his every thrust. Oh yeah Shawn fuck me! I moaned and he condemned in to me again. And again. I forced back against him, trying to get his tool just a little deeper. Come on Shawn give me your entire cock. It slammed into me again. He was not holding back, he was fucking me with everything he had. He pressed in again and again. I am gonna cum. Shawn moaned.'Do not cum in me. I claimed while dragging away from him. Shawn fell back contrary to the chair, his tool throbbing. I spun about, grabbed his smooth tool and drew it into my mouth. I really could taste myself on his penis as I bobbed up and down on it.
Oh God Brandi I love when you do that. Shawn moaned. I taken right back and then heavy throated him again. I held it there again, applied my language on him, drawing as hard as I could. Shawn hips removed down the chair in an attempt to have actually deeper, but my face was correct against his body. He could not go any deeper. After a couple of seconds with this I taken off. Allows get these off. I said pulling his shorts down. He removed his hips to greatly help me. His tool stood at interest, gleaming with my saliva. I stood up and pulled down my pajama feet and my adorable white panties all at once. Then I climbed on top of Shawn, wrapped my fingers around his mind, leaned over and kissed him. His fingers were on my nude bum, falling up and down.
Mrs Anderson compensated me the usual 20 bucks. I packed up my points and Mr Anderson went me house as usual. Sex Cams Xxx We existed many miles out and even though I possibly could have lent my parent's car Mr Anderson generally volunteered to choose me up and decline me off. In this manner he could also spend a couple of minutes with my folks. He and my dad had worked together a long time ago and have remained buddies ever since. In route house we exchanged a little bit of little talk. Turns out he was interesting a client of his, attempting to close some huge deal. A couple of blocks from his home he drawn down the key road onto a part street with a couple of properties on it. All the lights were out on the houses. He drawn the vehicle sideways of the road, turned it off. Got time for the typical? he requested while turning towards me. You realize I will have time for you personally Mr Anderson. I claimed as I reached over, undid his strip gear, undid his pants and fly.
The only real mild in the automobile was from a nearby road mild, adequate to see what I was doing. Hitting in I found his penis, semi hard. He lifted his hips somewhat and taken down his pants so I'd free usage of his dick and balls. He resolved back to his seat as I began to stroke his cock. As I stroked it became harder. Yes you have this type of wonderful touch. Mr Anderson moaned. With my other give I cupped his balls, rubbed them lightly. Thanks Mr Anderson. I prefer just how your tool feels in my hand. Another reason Mr Anderson always went me is I would usually provide him a give work or suck him down along the way home. This began right back following my senior year of high school. Mr Anderson always had anything for me. Several occasions the on the road home he built suggestive remarks but I did not respond. Onetime though after he made several these comments I responded by wondering to see his cock. Well he pulled it out and ever since that time it Live Porn Chat | Bbw Live Sex Cams | Xxx Cams Free | Live Cam Adult | Leve Sex Cam | Cams Sex Online | Live Sex Cam 18 | Free Live Show Porn | Latina Milf Valery | Chat Live Cam Sex | had been a pretty normal thing. Leaning over I licked the tip of his cock. He moaned, he set his hand on my head. I continued to swing his penis while licking his tip.
I licked the lower of the end, then as much as the hole. Licking throughout the gap before I pushed the end of my tongue into it. An additional lick about the end then I drew the entire head in. Mr Anderson moaned. I altered myself by getting up on my knees on the seat. Kneeling on the chair I leaned over and needed his cock in my mouth again. Catching it about the beds base I bobbed up and down about it, at once rubbing my tongue all the it. His one give began to roam. It roamed down my back. Due to the way I was positioned my sweatshirt had ridden on me, revealing my decrease back. His hand was now on my subjected back, scrubbing it. As I continued to draw his tool and play with his balls his hand continued to roam. It moved up my back, getting the sweatshirt with it. When it got high enough for him to appreciate I was not carrying a bra his give tucked to my front side and straight away begun to massage my breast. His penis also got harder while he did this. You have such good nipples. He moaned, his fingers tweaking my nipples. As I drew on his penis I carefully scratched his balls which my nails. He moaned.
His hand left my breasts. I was a bit unhappy as he was carrying out a real great job with them. His give returned to my straight back, built their way right down to my ass. He rubbed my butt a few times over my pajamas. Then it tucked below them, and under my panties. His hand was now on my blank ass. He applied my bum while I extended to work on his cock. Removing my give from his tool I gradually strong throated him. He was somewhat heavier than Shawn but about
the same length. I truly had no problem deep throating Mr Anderson but I could not do it for long. I taken straight back somewhat and drew it all in again.
His give slid further down my bum, his hands found my pussy. He covered along my pussy several occasions, then sent a hand in me. I moaned a little together with his penis in my own mouth. Then I drawn off his dick, lay up while pulling his give away. No touchy for you personally Mr Anderson, remember. Those were the floor principle we had set time ago. I'd touch and suck him, but he was not to the touch me. I didn't brain stroking him but fucking was out of the question. Properly I believed probably you had changed you mind, After all after all you could i'd like to feel your tits. Consider it an additional benefit night for you. But number more. Usually you can just get me house now. No that won't be necessary. Please keep on together with your services. Not quite so fast Mr Anderson. I got his hand, the one which was on my bum, with the finger which was in me. I forced the finger under his nose. Like the way in which I smell? He took a deep breath. Yes that scents nice. I pressed the finger in his mouth. Like just how I taste? He moaned as he drew his finger clean. Before he could actually answer I delivered to his cock. Licking it in as I ran my language all over it. My hands cupping his balls, contracting them lightly. His give dropped on my back again, rubbing up and down carefully, driving my sweatshirt up higher and larger on me. Not stopping him I extended to work his cock with my mouth. His give reached about, found my tits and started to wipe my nipples. Instantly his cock became harder, I sucked harder. I packed his balls a little harder, he moaned. His hands pinched my erect nipples lightly, it believed therefore good. But it had been also Cam Girl Sex Live | Redhead Sex Chat | Free Cams Chat | Xxx Com Sex | Free Chat Live Porn | Cam Online Girls | Sayalhilus Chat | Anal Sex Makes Her Squirt | Live Sex Web Cams | Free Live Sex Web Cams And Chat | creating him more excited. Opening wide I slid his dick completely in, my nose constrained against his body. His sides started initially to push up, he was finding close.
After holding his cock heavy in my own neck for several seconds I supported off. I wrapped one hand around the beds base of his penis and stroked it, while I sucked and licked the tip. He was just starting to moan very nearly low end, his fingers grabbing my nipples a little harder. His sides were today thrusting trying to operate a vehicle his tool deeper. Sucking only the end, my give stroked his tool while another squeezed his balls. Instantly he opportunity his load, catching me off guard. Normally he didn't cum that quickly but he should have been excited to be pressing my tits. I sucked on his tool as he opportunity again and again. His sides were driving up as he shot. I sucked down his cum as fast as he shot it. Shortly he settled back into his chair, his cock slowly deflating while I extended to draw on it. I'd to suck all of the cum as I didn't desire to keep any obvious track for Mrs Anderson to find. Dragging down as I lay up, my hand still carefully patting his cock. His hand tucked from my tit. That was good. he said while considering me. His eyes were on my chest. Looking down I saw my sweatshirt was pushed over my tits, therefore he can see them in the poor light. Rapidly I pulled my sweatshirt down. That was not actually necessary now was it? He asked. I did not answer, but noticed his tool was leaking even more cum. I leaned over and sucked the final of his cum from him. Sure thanks, you're always therefore neat. He explained as I sat back my seat. He set his pants and we extended home. When he pulled in the driveway he taken out his budget, taken out fifty bucks, handing it to me. Thanks again for watching the guys tonight. I jumped Female Live Sex Cams Por | Live Sex Chat Xxx | Free Sex Porn Chat | Camssex | Porn Chat | Girl Porn Chat | My Adult Cam | Asian Free Sex Cams | Adult Porn Chat Room | Free Porn Chat Site | out and closed the door. As I was walking towards my home he folded down his window. I do believe we might require you again a few weeks, is that ok? Undoubtedly, only allow me to know. and I ran in the house.
Which needless to say I did. After canceling these were sleeping I grabbed my telephone and delivered a text message. Merely a easy one boat, Prepared? Almost straight away the telephone went off, a reply nightmare yes be there in 5. It had been from Shawn my boyfriend. I met him recently at town college we attended. Since we both lived at home we needed advantage of each prospect that individuals surely got to be alone. I did not usually have Shawn over when bab ysitting but we'd equally been active with midterms days gone by handful of weeks. I understand I wanted it, and I am positive he did. As I waited for Shawn I thought about draining off my pajama feet and my oversized sweatshirt, answering the entranceway when he pulled in mere my panties (I was not wearing a bra tonight). But I chickened out, what if it had been somebody else. I would never manage to explain that.
Ultimately the brats settled down and were sleeping. It'd almost been an hour since the past time I seen any sound from them. I peeked inside their room to ensure these were sleeping. They had added power or something tonight and wouldn't head to sleep. I was child sitting those two boy, twins Zack and Ryan, age 5. Their parents and mine were friends and I have been their babysitter very nearly because the afternoon the boys were born. Really they were not brats, only two small children who had a ton of power, until you had something different in the offing and these were stopping it from happening.
Whoa whats your run Brandi? Its been a little while, and I skip you. I replied still hoping to get his freezer down. Properly only slow down, that's number purpose to dash it. Oh and the Anderson's Sex Chat Cams | Free Webcam Porn Chat | Private Free Sex Cams | Free Adult Online Chat | Free Live Sex Can | Free Sex Cam Online | Diamond1429 | Adult Xxx Online | Live Camssex | Www Sex Free Live | said they'll be house around 11:30. It was now 10:35. Why did you wait therefore well before contacting me? Shawn requested while leaning right back contrary to the supply of the chair, along with his fingers behind his head. I was today ready to have his zip down. Dragging down his lingerie I wrapped my give around his cock. It was already hard. The kids wouldn't visit sleep. And I want to make sure they certainly were resting when you got over. I squeezed my give on his penis and began to swing it. Always thinking aren't you Brandi. Yes I am. I claimed as I lowered my mouth onto his cock. I engulfed it, using almost all of it in. I love licking cock. Ever since I first tried it within my senior year in senior school, I loved it. I enjoy the way the people respond, their moans, their on the job my head. I really like style and experience of a penis in my mouth. I enjoy the energy it offers me over a guy.
Five full minutes passed, it looked like an hour. I sat on the couch flipping thru the stations on TV, getting out of bed twice to appear out the window. Another five minutes, this is eliminating me. I couldn't wait, I was therefore moist in anticipation, it have been a couple of months because we were alone together, it had been eliminating me. Ultimately there is a small hit at the door. I ran around, taken it open. There clearly was Shawn. He came in, we embraced and kissed. Our tongues met, exploring each other. I was keeping him restricted, his fingers were on my ass. After about one minute I pulled away, closed the door. Holding my give he led me to the couch. We sat down and embraced again, our lips achieved again. His fingers were on my straight back, scrubbing up and down. At first therefore were mine, but then I reached for his pants. I pulled the strip belt loose, unsnapped his trousers then attempted to move the zip down. Shawn forced back. | English | NL | 3e42ed04ee691e5098f58e1130d2e17681a08aefbd666e17939cfd8bd99a30b1 |
- When the main sentence is positive, the tag is negative. When the main sentence is negative, the tag is positive.
- The noun in the first part becomes a pronoun in the tag
- The second part (the tag) consists of a verb and pronoun only. A question tag repeats the helping verb of the main sentence.
- John isn't coming here, is he?
- George didn't know you, did he?
- David was watching a movie, wasn't he?
- The children won't go on vacation, will they?
- Joe has gone home, hasn't he?
- Your parents have been to Europe, haven't they?
- She can drive, can't she?
- If the main verb is "to be", the question tag repeats it.
- This is your dog, isn't it?
- That wasn't your mom, was it?
- These movies are wonderful, aren't they?
If there is no helping word in the main sentence, we use do, does or did in the tag question.
- They go to school by bus, don't they?
- They escaped immediately, didn't they?
- He comes here every day, doesn't he?
- They went to America, didn't they?
- After suggestions with "let's" and after offers, we use a tag with 'shall' (mainly in British English).
- Let's dance, shall we?
- I'll turn on the T.V, shall I?
- After the imperative, we use a tag with 'will'.
- For example,
- Get the newspaper, will you? | English | NL | ab0f757ee13585ece4102e49d641fde208f6daf94b99662be662f64a055d9873 |
On April 10th, I was shown the following vision:
I saw a group of women in a room. Everyone was scurrying around in excitement about the news they had just received – Jesus was coming! I immediately knew it was the 10 virgins Jesus talked about in Matthew 25:1-13.
Suddenly the women split into two groups and the mood completely changed. A group of five held out their hands before the other five, with an intense look of expectancy, as they asked them to share their oil to fill their lamps.
The scene changed and I saw a large group of people in a field, like an open air theater. There was a mighty man of God speaking to the group. I knew instantly he was highly anointed to go out and preach everywhere as led by the Holy Spirit. But the Lord showed me there were people in the crowd that shouldn’t be there.
Those that shouldn’t be there were saints called to be mighty men and women of God. They had also been called to speak to others under the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit. But instead, they were in the crowd attempting to draw from the anointing of the speaker! I saw them with their hands extended out towards him, with the same look of expectancy as the 5 foolish virgins as they asked others to share their oil.
End of Vision
The Lord pointed out several things:
The wise virgins maintained an intimate relationship with their Bridegroom. This is made clear when the door was slammed shut on the foolish virgins, because Jesus told them, “I never knew you.” (Matt. 25:11-12)The oil comes at a price – it will cost you. The only way to have intimacy with your Bridegroom, to be known by Him, is to be willing to give up everything for Him – including your time. Spending time communing with Him in prayer, the study of His Word, and sitting in His presence, will be the desire of your heart. If you truly love Him, you will seek Him above all else.
The foolish virgins, also depicted as the saints in the crowd, were not willing to pay the cost to develop intimacy with their Bridegroom. When the call when out, “Jesus is coming,” they knew they didn’t have enough oil to make it. But instead of seeking God for what only He can supply, they looked to man to supply their need.
The Lord showed me this is happening within the Church on a grand scale right now. Although we are to be encouraged and inspired by the anointing of God on other members within the Body of Christ, acting as iron sharpening iron for one another, the ONLY source for the “oil” is through God Himself! There is NO OTHER WAY!
This is why our Lord Jesus Christ has been grieved in His spirit. He knows the Father is about to begin the selection process! And just as in the time of Esther, and in the parable of the 10 virgins, when many are called and invited to go through the purification process, and to grow in intimacy with their Bridegroom, He knows not all will be chosen! He is heavy-hearted because many will have to be told, “Depart from Me, I never knew you!”
The Lord wants His people to understand, now is the time to stop chasing after other lovers, other words from individuals, and our own works. Now is the time to spend sitting with Him, learning about Him, and loving on Him. Now is the time to cast aside the distractions of this world, and actively pursue the very One we claim to love! Soon – it will be too late!
Rev. 19:7-9, “Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready. And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints…”
Eph. 5:27, “…that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.”
Matthew 25:1-14, “Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Now five of them were wise, and five were foolish. Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them, but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom is coming….And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise answered, ‘No, lest there should not be enough for us and you; but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’ And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those whose who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut.
Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us!’ But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’
Matthew 7:21-23, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, have we not prophesied in Yyour Name, cast out demons…and done many wonders in Your Name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!”
Jeremiah 29:13, “You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart.”
John 14:6, “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man comes to the Father, but by Me.” | English | NL | 6bba32ce835840482dee2b8645704696bc4ee83db3fc572727c6600ce1746356 |
Q: Are there difference types of repentance? What I mean is, when King Saul was confronted by Samuel for disobeying God, he said he obeyed God. When Samuel confronted him again, he said he had transgressed the commandments, and to pardon his sin, and let him worship as he didn’t want to be rejected as the king over Israel.
A: The answer to your question is a big yes! The Apostle Paul made this statement in 2 Corinthians 7:10, “For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.”
Godly sorrow leads to real repentance. This means that a person is sorrowful because he or she affronted God with disobedience and betrayed Him by dishonoring Him. In such times a reproach is brought to God’s very character. King David, who understood godly sorrow put it best, “Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest and be clear when thou judgest (Psalm 51:4).
There are more than a few examples in Scriptures that show the other repentance: that of worldly sorrow. When you consider Saul, he was not sorrowful over displeasing God because of his disobedience; rather, he feared paying the consequences for his actions—that of being rejected as king. His show of repentance did not have anything to do with righting his relationship with His Creator, but keeping God off his back in order to maintain his position as king. The main purpose for godly repentance is to get on the same page with God about a matter to ensure reconciliation with Him and restoration of relationship.
Another good example of worldly sorrow is Esau. He did not value his birthright; therefore, he sold it. Since blessings walk hand in hand in maintaining the birthright, Esau lost the blessing as well. He was sorrowful over losing the blessing, but not over his casual or disinterested attitude towards his birthright. When he was bemoaning his loss, he lied by implying his brother stole both from him (Genesis 27:36). However, God had a different take on it.
It says that God hated Esau, but loved Jacob (Romans 9:13). There is a debate as to what this Scripture implies, but the one thing that is clearly brought out is that Esau was considered a fornicator, a profane person (Hebrews 12:16-17). Even though he showed sorrow, it was a fleshly sorrow, tied to self-pity of the old man and the world’s way of avoiding the consequences. Since his sorrow came from that which was not of God, it tells us he could find no place of repentance.
True repentance comes from a state of brokenness, not over the personal cost of sin, but over what it does to God and one’s relationship with Him. To those who have true sorrow, they will be more concerned over their broken relationship with God than paying some worldly consequence. They will fear displeasing God more than losing something that has no real eternal value to it.
Another man who showed worldly repentance was Judas Iscariot (Matthew 27:3). It says that he repented, but he never really owed up to the fact that he betrayed the Son of God. He acknowledged he betrayed an innocent man, but he never repented for the selfish motive and ruthless attitude that opened him up to become an instrument of Satan. Instead of humbling himself before God, confessing his real sin and seeking forgiveness and restoration, he went out and hung himself.
Real repentance will always result in reconciliation with God. The real tragedy of sin is that it breaks relationship with God. Godly repentance will first seek to have this relationship restored. | English | NL | 0a0163fac1c81323eff096d07dd11e65a0fb14a4abf353b7d586209a0e5ee2a5 |
No it's not going to stop till you wise up...
Singing along loud with the radio, driving through the pelting rain. She barely paid attention to the road. She was still thinking about her dream. The problem with dreaming was, it all seemed so real. Her waking thoughts and actions were what seemed surreal. Get up out of bed. Shower. Get dressed. Go to work. Do your job. Have lunch. Work some more. Come home. Do some chores. Eat dinner. Watch television. Fuck, if you are lucky. Over and over, the same thing day in, day out.
But she had to do these things. These mundane pieces of her life helped her crawl from one day to the next. It felt as though once he had left, the entire world had drained of color and meaning. Nothing made sense any more. Why exist? She didn't know. Growling a little under her breath, she shrugged these thoughts off and went about her day.
Her job as an art dealer actually required very little in the way of deep thinking for her; it was like second nature. Therefore, she was free to dwell on other things through the day. But today was different. She had just received a new painting from a fairly new and anonymous artist. At first glance, it didn't seem very special. And the title, "My Dark-Locked Angel", seemed fitting enough for it. But then she looked a little closer. Ethereal beauty of a woman, painted with soft features, as though looking at her through a fog. Wings barely visible, folded behind. Cradling a man in her arms, his face turned into her, away from view. The woman with wings was crying. Both had dark, curly hair. Hmm.
"Gorgeous, isn't it?" The voice coming up from behind startled her out of her reverie. She blinked a little at the man beside her. "The painting, you like it?".
"Oh...yes. Very..." She paused, searching for words. This painting reminded her of something. She couldn't quite say what. "...it doesn't seem like much at first, but then it starts to - grow on you."
"Yes, Mariana, you are right. It does." He paused. "I am not one to get myself involved in a co-worker's personal life but...are you okay? No, really. Do you need to take some time off?"
Closed eyes. Breathe, keep breathing. Eyes wide open, unflinching, and lying through her teeth. "No, Jack, I will be fine. Thank you, though."
Jack sighed. "Fair enough. It just seems as though since the accident -"
Mariana glared. "Don't. I don't want to talk about that. I'm fine. Now, who is the artist of this painting?" That's right, change the subject. Don't let him know about how often you can't sleep at night, like he couldn't tell from the baggage under your eyes.
Jack shrugged. "No idea. It was sent to us early this morning via FedEx. You'd have to ask Diane, she's the one who signed for it." He took a long glance at the painting, then at Mariana. "Listen, I have to go. You can take care of the details on this one. I'll go over it with you later." He walked out the door, shutting it behind him.
She sighed and stared at the painting again. She looked for clues, a signature, anything to give her an idea of who the painter was. Nothing. Not a damn thing."How am I supposed to sell a painting when I have no information?" Grumbling to herself, she set to work.
Later that day, while driving home, she continued to mull over it, partly because she needed to shift her focus away from the fact that she was driving. Being in a vehicle still bothered her. She likely would stop feeling this way with time, but for now...
Why would someone who created something so beautiful not want to take credit for it? How can I sell something with no background? Should I just make it up? And once it is sold, where does the artist's cut go? Fuck. This is crazy. I'm going to have to tell Jack to do this one on his own. I have enough going on. I don't need this.
She was, of course, lying to herself again. She not only needed this work, she wanted it. She had to do this. It would keep her mind off of other things. On and on she mulled it over in her head until she got home.
Inside the house. Light on her answering machine blinking. Should I check it? Why? Nobody I care about would be calling. By nobody, she meant him, of course. God, how she missed him. She decided to check the machine anyway.
Beep! "Mari, it's yer ma. What are you doing for the holiday? Your father and I thought you might like to-" Click. She would listen to that one later.
Beep! "Miss Waters? It's Dr. Neilsson from University Hospital. We were wondering if you could come by some time soon, there are forms that still need to be filled out..." The rest of the words were lost on her as she broke down sobbing on her livingroom floor. When is it going to end? I can't do this, I can't take much more of this.
She wiped her tears away and went into the kitchen. Opened up the bottle of vodka she found on top of the refrigerator. Proceeded to get very, very drunk. "I'm sorry, Aidan." She said it out loud. Like he was around to hear it. God, she only wished...
At eight a.m., Mariana drunkenly lifted her head from the kitchen table. Dry-mouthed and nauseous, she looked around her environment a moment, blinking. "Oh fuck." She was late for work again. She downed a glass of water and headed for the shower, not caring about the time. "Jack will forgive me."
She turned the water on to hot, and tried to process what she had to do today. She thought of everything except the fact that she had to go down to the hospital. That could wait. She didn't have the strength to do that. Not yet. And besides, that new painting was in. She smiled a little at the thought of it and hummed through the rest of her shower. | English | NL | f6757df5c8a5f79e536820bc403c7545c558ea2b2c26aedfd0f1b543b9b2ba3a |
Gellert was John Locke's science teacher at Cowin Heights High School. After rescuing 16-year-old John from being locked inside a school locker, Gellert told John that he had a call from Portland from a Dr. Alpert on behalf of Mittelos Laboratories, who worked with chemistry and new technologies. Mittelos was looking for young, bright minds and they wanted John to go to their summer camp. When Locke asked how they knew about him, the teacher suggested that they had sent a representative to a science fair at Costa Mesa where John had presented a display. John got upset and told Gellert that he was not a scientist, but the type of person who was interested in sports and cars. Gellert kindly told him that even if he wanted to be more like the popular boys at school, it was just not who he was. He said that John simply couldn't be a super-hero, to which John responded, "Don't tell me what I can't do!" and walked out. ("Cabin Fever")
- During casting he was described as: Gellert. Any ethnicity, 30s -40s. High school chemistry teacher, intelligent and understanding, he offers a bright student the chance of a lifetime but becomes resentful when the offer is refused. Co-star. | English | NL | f7144fbf3f553844a5829627e232dc245419252be20c1b6ca9b68c1080adfcda |
The next day was ushered in by merry peals of bells, and by the firing of the Tower guns; flags were hoisted on many of the church-steeples; the usual demonstrations were made in honour of the anniversary of the King’s birthday; and every man went about his pleasure or business as if the city were in perfect order, and there were no half-smouldering embers in its secret places, which, on the approach of night, would kindle up again and scatter ruin and dismay abroad. The leaders of the riot, rendered still more daring by the success of last night and by the booty they had acquired, kept steadily together, and only thought of implicating the mass of their followers so deeply that no hope of pardon or reward might tempt them to betray their more notorious confederates into the hands of justice.
Indeed, the sense of having gone too far to be forgiven, held the timid together no less than the bold. Many who would readily have pointed out the foremost rioters and given evidence against them, felt that escape by that means was hopeless, when their every act had been observed by scores of people who had taken no part in the disturbances; who had suffered in their persons, peace, or property, by the outrages of the mob; who would be most willing witnesses; and whom the government would, no doubt, prefer to any King’s evidence that might be offered. Many of this class had deserted their usual occupations on the Saturday morning; some had been seen by their employers active in the tumult; others knew they must be suspected, and that they would be discharged if they returned; others had been desperate from the beginning, and comforted themselves with the homely proverb, that, being hanged at all, they might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. They all hoped and believed, in a greater or less degree, that the government they seemed to have paralysed, would, in its terror, come to terms with them in the end, and suffer them to make their own conditions. The least sanguine among them reasoned with himself that, at the worst, they were too many to be all punished, and that he had as good a chance of escape as any other man. The great mass never reasoned or thought at all, but were stimulated by their own headlong passions, by poverty, by ignorance, by the love of mischief, and the hope of plunder.
One other circumstance is worthy of remark; and that is, that from the moment of their first outbreak at Westminster, every symptom of order or preconcerted arrangement among them vanished. When they divided into parties and ran to different quarters of the town, it was on the spontaneous suggestion of the moment. Each party swelled as it went along, like rivers as they roll towards the sea; new leaders sprang up as they were wanted, disappeared when the necessity was over, and reappeared at the next crisis. Each tumult took shape and form from the circumstances of the moment; sober workmen, going home from their day’s labour, were seen to cast down their baskets of tools and become rioters in an instant; mere boys on errands did the like. In a word, a moral plague ran through the city. The noise, and hurry, and excitement, had for hundreds and hundreds an attraction they had no firmness to resist. The contagion spread like a dread fever: an infectious madness, as yet not near its height, seized on new victims every hour, and society began to tremble at their ravings.
It was between two and three o’clock in the afternoon when Gashford looked into the lair described in the last chapter, and seeing only Barnaby and Dennis there, inquired for Hugh.
He was out, Barnaby told him; had gone out more than an hour ago; and had not yet returned.
‘Dennis!’ said the smiling secretary, in his smoothest voice, as he sat down cross-legged on a barrel, ‘Dennis!’
The hangman struggled into a sitting posture directly, and with his eyes wide open, looked towards him.
‘How do you do, Dennis?’ said Gashford, nodding. ‘I hope you have suffered no inconvenience from your late exertions, Dennis?’
‘I always will say of you, Muster Gashford,’ returned the hangman, staring at him, ‘that that ‘ere quiet way of yours might almost wake a dead man. It is,’ he added, with a muttered oath—still staring at him in a thoughtful manner—‘so awful sly!’
‘So distinct, eh Dennis?’
‘Distinct!’ he answered, scratching his head, and keeping his eyes upon the secretary’s face; ‘I seem to hear it, Muster Gashford, in my wery bones.’
‘I am very glad your sense of hearing is so sharp, and that I succeed in making myself so intelligible,’ said Gashford, in his unvarying, even tone. ‘Where is your friend?’
Mr Dennis looked round as in expectation of beholding him asleep upon his bed of straw; then remembering he had seen him go out, replied:
‘I can’t say where he is, Muster Gashford, I expected him back afore now. I hope it isn’t time that we was busy, Muster Gashford?’
‘Nay,’ said the secretary, ‘who should know that as well as you? How can I tell you, Dennis? You are perfect master of your own actions, you know, and accountable to nobody—except sometimes to the law, eh?’
Dennis, who was very much baffled by the cool matter-of-course manner of this reply, recovered his self-possession on his professional pursuits being referred to, and pointing towards Barnaby, shook his head and frowned.
‘Hush!’ cried Barnaby.
‘Ah! Do hush about that, Muster Gashford,’ said the hangman in a low voice, ‘pop’lar prejudices—you always forget—well, Barnaby, my lad, what’s the matter?’
‘I hear him coming,’ he answered: ‘Hark! Do you mark that? That’s his foot! Bless you, I know his step, and his dog’s too. Tramp, tramp, pit-pat, on they come together, and, ha ha ha!—and here they are!’ he cried, joyfully welcoming Hugh with both hands, and then patting him fondly on the back, as if instead of being the rough companion he was, he had been one of the most prepossessing of men. ‘Here he is, and safe too! I am glad to see him back again, old Hugh!’
‘I’m a Turk if he don’t give me a warmer welcome always than any man of sense,’ said Hugh, shaking hands with him with a kind of ferocious friendship, strange enough to see. ‘How are you, boy?’
‘Hearty!’ cried Barnaby, waving his hat. ‘Ha ha ha! And merry too, Hugh! And ready to do anything for the good cause, and the right, and to help the kind, mild, pale-faced gentleman—the lord they used so ill—eh, Hugh?’
‘Ay!’ returned his friend, dropping his hand, and looking at Gashford for an instant with a changed expression before he spoke to him. ‘Good day, master!’
‘And good day to you,’ replied the secretary, nursing his leg.
‘And many good days—whole years of them, I hope. You are heated.’
‘So would you have been, master,’ said Hugh, wiping his face, ‘if you’d been running here as fast as I have.’
‘You know the news, then? Yes, I supposed you would have heard it.’
‘News! what news?’
‘You don’t?’ cried Gashford, raising his eyebrows with an exclamation of surprise. ‘Dear me! Come; then I AM the first to make you acquainted with your distinguished position, after all. Do you see the King’s Arms a-top?’ he smilingly asked, as he took a large paper from his pocket, unfolded it, and held it out for Hugh’s inspection.
‘Well!’ said Hugh. ‘What’s that to me?’
‘Much. A great deal,’ replied the secretary. ‘Read it.’
‘I told you, the first time I saw you, that I couldn’t read,’ said Hugh, impatiently. ‘What in the Devil’s name’s inside of it?’
‘It is a proclamation from the King in Council,’ said Gashford, ‘dated to-day, and offering a reward of five hundred pounds—five hundred pounds is a great deal of money, and a large temptation to some people—to any one who will discover the person or persons most active in demolishing those chapels on Saturday night.’
‘Is that all?’ cried Hugh, with an indifferent air. ‘I knew of that.’
‘Truly I might have known you did,’ said Gashford, smiling, and folding up the document again. ‘Your friend, I might have guessed—indeed I did guess—was sure to tell you.’
‘My friend!’ stammered Hugh, with an unsuccessful effort to appear surprised. ‘What friend?’
‘Tut tut—do you suppose I don’t know where you have been?’ retorted Gashford, rubbing his hands, and beating the back of one on the palm of the other, and looking at him with a cunning eye. ‘How dull you think me! Shall I say his name?’
‘No,’ said Hugh, with a hasty glance towards Dennis.
‘You have also heard from him, no doubt,’ resumed the secretary, after a moment’s pause, ‘that the rioters who have been taken (poor fellows) are committed for trial, and that some very active witnesses have had the temerity to appear against them. Among others—’ and here he clenched his teeth, as if he would suppress by force some violent words that rose upon his tongue; and spoke very slowly. ‘Among others, a gentleman who saw the work going on in Warwick Street; a Catholic gentleman; one Haredale.’
Hugh would have prevented his uttering the word, but it was out already. Hearing the name, Barnaby turned swiftly round.
‘Duty, duty, bold Barnaby!’ cried Hugh, assuming his wildest and most rapid manner, and thrusting into his hand his staff and flag which leant against the wall. ‘Mount guard without loss of time, for we are off upon our expedition. Up, Dennis, and get ready! Take care that no one turns the straw upon my bed, brave Barnaby; we know what’s underneath it—eh? Now, master, quick! What you have to say, say speedily, for the little captain and a cluster of ‘em are in the fields, and only waiting for us. Sharp’s the word, and strike’s the action. Quick!’
Barnaby was not proof against this bustle and despatch. The look of mingled astonishment and anger which had appeared in his face when he turned towards them, faded from it as the words passed from his memory, like breath from a polished mirror; and grasping the weapon which Hugh forced upon him, he proudly took his station at the door, beyond their hearing.
‘You might have spoiled our plans, master,’ said Hugh. ‘YOU, too, of all men!’
‘Who would have supposed that HE would be so quick?’ urged Gashford.
‘He’s as quick sometimes—I don’t mean with his hands, for that you know, but with his head—as you or any man,’ said Hugh. ‘Dennis, it’s time we were going; they’re waiting for us; I came to tell you. Reach me my stick and belt. Here! Lend a hand, master. Fling this over my shoulder, and buckle it behind, will you?’
‘Brisk as ever!’ said the secretary, adjusting it for him as he desired.
‘A man need be brisk to-day; there’s brisk work a-foot.’
‘There is, is there?’ said Gashford. He said it with such a provoking assumption of ignorance, that Hugh, looking over his shoulder and angrily down upon him, replied:
‘Is there! You know there is! Who knows better than you, master, that the first great step to be taken is to make examples of these witnesses, and frighten all men from appearing against us or any of our body, any more?’
‘There’s one we know of,’ returned Gashford, with an expressive smile, ‘who is at least as well informed upon that subject as you or I.’
‘If we mean the same gentleman, as I suppose we do,’ Hugh rejoined softly, ‘I tell you this—he’s as good and quick information about everything as—’ here he paused and looked round, as if to make sure that the person in question was not within hearing, ‘as Old Nick himself. Have you done that, master? How slow you are!’
‘It’s quite fast now,’ said Gashford, rising. ‘I say—you didn’t find that your friend disapproved of to-day’s little expedition? Ha ha ha! It is fortunate it jumps so well with the witness policy; for, once planned, it must have been carried out. And now you are going, eh?’
‘Now we are going, master!’ Hugh replied. ‘Any parting words?’
‘Oh dear, no,’ said Gashford sweetly. ‘None!’
‘You’re sure?’ cried Hugh, nudging the grinning Dennis.
‘Quite sure, eh, Muster Gashford?’ chuckled the hangman.
Gashford paused a moment, struggling with his caution and his malice; then putting himself between the two men, and laying a hand upon the arm of each, said, in a cramped whisper:
‘Do not, my good friends—I am sure you will not—forget our talk one night—in your house, Dennis—about this person. No mercy, no quarter, no two beams of his house to be left standing where the builder placed them! Fire, the saying goes, is a good servant, but a bad master. Make it his master; he deserves no better. But I am sure you will be firm, I am sure you will be very resolute, I am sure you will remember that he thirsts for your lives, and those of all your brave companions. If you ever acted like staunch fellows, you will do so to-day. Won’t you, Dennis—won’t you, Hugh?’
The two looked at him, and at each other; then bursting into a roar of laughter, brandished their staves above their heads, shook hands, and hurried out.
When they had been gone a little time, Gashford followed. They were yet in sight, and hastening to that part of the adjacent fields in which their fellows had already mustered; Hugh was looking back, and flourishing his hat to Barnaby, who, delighted with his trust, replied in the same way, and then resumed his pacing up and down before the stable-door, where his feet had worn a path already. And when Gashford himself was far distant, and looked back for the last time, he was still walking to and fro, with the same measured tread; the most devoted and the blithest champion that ever maintained a post, and felt his heart lifted up with a brave sense of duty, and determination to defend it to the last.
Smiling at the simplicity of the poor idiot, Gashford betook himself to Welbeck Street by a different path from that which he knew the rioters would take, and sitting down behind a curtain in one of the upper windows of Lord George Gordon’s house, waited impatiently for their coming. They were so long, that although he knew it had been settled they should come that way, he had a misgiving they must have changed their plans and taken some other route. But at length the roar of voices was heard in the neighbouring fields, and soon afterwards they came thronging past, in a great body.
However, they were not all, nor nearly all, in one body, but were, as he soon found, divided into four parties, each of which stopped before the house to give three cheers, and then went on; the leaders crying out in what direction they were going, and calling on the spectators to join them. The first detachment, carrying, by way of banners, some relics of the havoc they had made in Moorfields, proclaimed that they were on their way to Chelsea, whence they would return in the same order, to make of the spoil they bore, a great bonfire, near at hand. The second gave out that they were bound for Wapping, to destroy a chapel; the third, that their place of destination was East Smithfield, and their object the same. All this was done in broad, bright, summer day. Gay carriages and chairs stopped to let them pass, or turned back to avoid them; people on foot stood aside in doorways, or perhaps knocked and begged permission to stand at a window, or in the hall, until the rioters had passed: but nobody interfered with them; and when they had gone by, everything went on as usual.
There still remained the fourth body, and for that the secretary looked with a most intense eagerness. At last it came up. It was numerous, and composed of picked men; for as he gazed down among them, he recognised many upturned faces which he knew well—those of Simon Tappertit, Hugh, and Dennis in the front, of course. They halted and cheered, as the others had done; but when they moved again, they did not, like them, proclaim what design they had. Hugh merely raised his hat upon the bludgeon he carried, and glancing at a spectator on the opposite side of the way, was gone.
Gashford followed the direction of his glance instinctively, and saw, standing on the pavement, and wearing the blue cockade, Sir John Chester. He held his hat an inch or two above his head, to propitiate the mob; and, resting gracefully on his cane, smiling pleasantly, and displaying his dress and person to the very best advantage, looked on in the most tranquil state imaginable. For all that, and quick and dexterous as he was, Gashford had seen him recognise Hugh with the air of a patron. He had no longer any eyes for the crowd, but fixed his keen regards upon Sir John.
He stood in the same place and posture until the last man in the concourse had turned the corner of the street; then very deliberately took the blue cockade out of his hat; put it carefully in his pocket, ready for the next emergency; refreshed himself with a pinch of snuff; put up his box; and was walking slowly off, when a passing carriage stopped, and a lady’s hand let down the glass. Sir John’s hat was off again immediately. After a minute’s conversation at the carriage-window, in which it was apparent that he was vastly entertaining on the subject of the mob, he stepped lightly in, and was driven away.
The secretary smiled, but he had other thoughts to dwell upon, and soon dismissed the topic. Dinner was brought him, but he sent it down untasted; and, in restless pacings up and down the room, and constant glances at the clock, and many futile efforts to sit down and read, or go to sleep, or look out of the window, consumed four weary hours. When the dial told him thus much time had crept away, he stole upstairs to the top of the house, and coming out upon the roof sat down, with his face towards the east.
Heedless of the fresh air that blew upon his heated brow, of the pleasant meadows from which he turned, of the piles of roofs and chimneys upon which he looked, of the smoke and rising mist he vainly sought to pierce, of the shrill cries of children at their evening sports, the distant hum and turmoil of the town, the cheerful country breath that rustled past to meet it, and to droop, and die; he watched, and watched, till it was dark save for the specks of light that twinkled in the streets below and far away—and, as the darkness deepened, strained his gaze and grew more eager yet.
‘Nothing but gloom in that direction, still!’ he muttered restlessly. ‘Dog! where is the redness in the sky, you promised me!’
Alternatively, you can use the menu bar to access all the chapters and additional content for Barnaby Rudge. | English | NL | 9458b6ffcfdbbfbfd397f8df3d452a50e1fe07943ade063c562eb5e23d04a650 |
If you believe with your whole heart and feel so utterly connected to someone that you feel you are married to them, would that be constituted as a marriage in the eyes of God? Adam and Eve did not have any ceremony. When did the first ceremony take place and what were the reasons such a ceremony was called for when none was used before? Must one be married by a “man of God” (i.e. a preacher)? Would a marriage by a justice of the peace (a man of law and not God) be a marriage in the eyes of God or just in the eyes of man?
The question you are referring to presented God’s view of marriage. Marriage is more than just a warm feeling or even a strong feeling towards another person. It is commitment. Malachi 2:14 says it well,
. . . the LORD has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. (NASB) Malachi 2:14
In Malachi 2:14, God rebuked the men for divorcing their wives. He referred to the wives as companions or friends and then says they are “wives by covenant.” Notice that she is a wife by covenant and not because she feels like she is a companion or has feelings of friendship. She is not a wife because she feels married. She is a wife because she has made a formal covenant or commitment to remain with him.
Adam and Eve were unusual. God married them. There was no one else around “who could do the job.” Today most governments require a ceremony of some sort to legalize the marriage. God expects us to obey our government (Romans 13). So this requires some human to perform the marriage. A wedding ceremony alone does not make a marriage. It also involves a heart issue.
Sex does not make a marriage in God’s eyes. 1 Corinthians 6:16 helps us understand this.
Or do you not know that the one who joins himself to a harlot is one body with her? For He says, “THE TWO WILL BECOME ONE FLESH.” (NASB) 1 Corinthians 6:16
This wonderful passage tells us that when a man has sex with a harlot or prostitute, he becomes one body with her. Many people teach that when a man and a woman became one body, they are married. But this cannot be true since he calls the woman a harlot. In this passage the harlot is not the man’s wife. The harlot does not become a wife; she is still a harlot unless there is a commitment between them. Marriage is not just a commitment made before some individual. Marriage is also a commitment of the heart.
If your feelings for this man are strong and he is a Christian, having similar feelings for you, I would encourage the two of you to discuss marriage. If you a living with this man, God calls that sin. If he is not a Christian, you must stop seeing him. Such a marriage would not be blessed by God. Ask for the Holy Spirit to give you wisdom. | English | NL | 8f4b3100673e614928679028da39de99cd97ec6a54f7504dda37d41f2e0c506e |
Analytic and Synthetic Cubism
Cubism's most popular period was between 1907 and 1914, although the aesthetic lasted well into the 1930s. Early Cubist works, roughly those produced between 1907 and 1912, were part of a stage known as Analytical Cubism. The later stage, Synthetic Cubism, ran from about 1913 to 1920 [source: Guggenheim].
In Analytical Cubist paintings, subjects were typically at least somewhat recognizable. Picasso's 1907 "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" and Braque's 1908 "Large Nude" obviously depict female forms. His "Arlequin," 1909, is recognizably a man. These early Cubist works were often composed of muted tones. While "breaking down," or analyzing, imagery, they still maintained some vestige of visual realism. Paintings were often more detailed, with images gathered tightly toward the center of the work, growing sparser toward the edges. The muted colors drew attention to the subtle shifting of perspective that embodied the artist's viewpoint.
Synthetic Cubism took the movement to its extreme -- all sense of three-dimensionality disappeared. Instead of breaking down and reassembling facets of the original image, it was a matter of synthesizing entirely new, expansive structures. Sometimes the subject was recognizable as a unified structure; at other times, it was hardly legible. Instead, artists started using collage methods; overlapping various media; and including words, graphics and patterns, to achieve a desired thematic result. Colors were much brighter, geometric forms were more distinct, and textures began to emerge with additives like sand, paper or gesso. Picasso's "Bowl of Fruit" and Braque's "Bottle, Newspaper, Pipe and Glass" are in the Synthetic style.
Art historians distinguish between Analytical and Synthetic, signifying the progression of the Cubist movement. In the end, though, the time limits of Analytical and Synthetic are rather flexible. Works partly fitting the Analytical aesthetic were produced after 1912, and paintings with features of Synthetic Cubism date back to the start of the movement.
Picasso and Braque are considered the founders of Cubism, and their work is central to the movement as a whole. They're not, however, the only important Cubists. | English | NL | 7761eaf6acaf859d0a365ba2c7d21916bc9acc332cdfd37400b51c03a2038d0d |
My brother fell on the stairs. It’s my leg, he said, it’s doing it again. He slid all the way down, holding his right knee with both hands to stop the convulsions. Then his left leg started shaking. By now he was on his back on the landing. George, he said. George. I hadn’t heard him say my name like that since we were kids. An older brother stood for something then, an older sibling could protect his bro from hurt and bullies. Not from this. Jesus, I said, and Wait—as if there were someone I could call on to truly stop all this. I’ll call 999, I said, we’ll get an ambulance. No, he said. By now his whole body was shaking. Put something between his teeth, I thought. I don’t know where that came from, some Boy’s Life article? This was meant to stop him choking on his tongue. But he was breathing fine, though even his head shook now. I put a pillow under his head so it wouldn’t bang on the floor. I’m calling 999, I told him and ran into the kitchen. My hands were shaking too, it took me three tries to dial. 999, a woman said. We need an ambulance, I said, it’s my brother. All right, darling, the woman said. She had one of those voices with strata in it: a level of humor, a tranche of concern, a stratum of affection. Of course the affection was illusory, but that’s what it felt like. It’s all right, she said again. Tell me what’s wrong, is he breathing? Yeah, he’s breathing, but he’s in convulsions. I’m OK, Louis called from the landing, I don’t need an ambulance. Yes you do, I yelled back. All right, love, the woman said, I’m sending an ambulance now. It’s stopping, Louis said, I don’t need one. We were trying to get home, he’d only just left hospital, he didn’t want to go back in. He says it’s stopping, I told the woman. Maybe he doesn’t need an ambulance. It’s on its way, she said, it’ll be there in three minutes. I realized this landline summoned an address on her screen. It’s stopping, Louis called, I don’t want one OK? He says he doesn’t want one, I told the woman, I’m not sure … I hesitated; can you cancel that? Yes, she said, if you’re sure. But if it starts up again, I continued, can you send one again? I don’t know why I asked that question. Of course 999 could send an ambulance again, that was their job. Maybe I just wanted to stay on the line with someone who knew how to deal with a brother who went into convulsions for reasons that in the deepest sense I could not grasp. But she knew all that; even through the static of London phone lines she’d figured it out. Of course, darling, she said. You can call us anytime. Thank you, I said. I didn’t want her to hang up. In those few moments I’d fallen in love with her—or rather, we’d gone straight to the part of love that is caring, that is help. Thank you, I repeated. Take care of your brother, she said, and I went back to him. He was lying quietly, exhausted but not shaking. I sat down next to him on the floor. I’ll be fine, he said, I’ll be fine. If it happens again, I said, I’m calling 999.
*The British emergency number, the equivalent of 911 in the US
The first girl I decided to kiss was Sophie Eberstadt. I never did because I got stopped dead by the proboscis problem: how do you avoid bumping noses as lip meets lip? The fact that you simply angle your face so as to dock your schnozz beside hers never occurred to me. I was a moron in such matters. Far as I knew my parents never fucked, they never touched each other. And as for sex education—they never even mentioned the stork. I found out about the stork from friends. I saw dogs hump in the park and for years assumed a girl’s sexual parts were in her butt and we all made love like poodles. By the fetid stream in back of my French grandmother’s garden the village bad-hat showed me and my brother how to choke the chicken but we were so young we couldn’t fathom what he was doing. He liked torturing frogs so we figured anything he did was cruel. My real education started when I came upon Fanny Hill in my dad’s bookshelf. It was a revelation: “He sheathed it now up to the hilt … their motions were too rapid for nature to support such fury long.” I spent my teens masturbating to 18th century meter. To this day the pronoun “thee” gets me hard.
A week before high school ended my best female friend Vicky decided it was time. Late one night she summoned me to her duplex on Park Avenue. Her parents were Viennese Jews who had got out before Anschluss, bringing with them the contents of several castles which they mostly sold off. Vicky led me on tiptoe through dim hallways hung with medieval tapestries, past suits of armor, rusty halberds. It was like Scooby Doo, minus ghosts. There was even a chastity belt. It was not on Vicky. Her bedroom was in the penthouse. Vicky led me there and all the lights of New York seemed to shine brighter as she peeled off my clothes. She reached out one hand to touch what Fanny Hill would have called my “red headed champion” and I came immediately, profusely, over a Shiraz. Five minutes later I came inside her. For the next three weeks I went through agonies, certain despite all probabilities that I had got her pregnant. Ten years later Vicky left her husband for a rabbi and died in childbirth. Long before that happened we met again in Paris. In a nightclub I said I wanted to sleep with her again. She refused. I spent the night on the airline terminal floor. “If you hadn’t assumed you could,” she told me later, “I would have let you,” proving—as if I needed proof—that my sex education might be making strides, but I’d learned next to nothing about women.
Titles lie. We know that. They screw a handle onto a city with the idea you can pick it up one-fingered. A story is a city, no, more than that, it’s world not luggage, it won’t fit in the overhead compartment. This one begins here, as all stories start, with silence
and then, a different beat
They stand on the southeast corner of 96th Street, always: the younger dressed in sweat clothes too large for him. He is twenty, thirty, it’s hard to say, the different planes of his face, though all seem to make sense on their own, don’t quite mesh as a whole. They translate into an expression of incredulity, or wonder, if that isn’t the same thing—panic, quite possibly.
The other man’s face coheres. Its lines and folds write a cursive of exhaustion that my curiosity about his companion leads me to read. And in that message, in subtext of tendons, in sag of back, and how he looks away—away from his companion, and somehow away from everything else as well; it’s not shiftiness or fear, but—of course I’m reading my own thoughts into his. Yet I am sure he’s feeling an amazement equal to the other man’s, that this street, this second, should contain him as he is now, explosive with needs that for the first time he knows for sure are as absolute as they are impossible to fulfill. He is older than the first man, his hair, his beard stubble are gray. He wears a battered raincoat, slacks, a shirt too big for him. His eyes are spaniel-brown. The younger man advances toward the curb, then, when he realizes the other is not following, stops, half turns. He does this twice. He plucks at his companion’s sleeve, tries to pull him forward. The fourth time he does this he asks, too loud, We go now, Daddy? He pulls his sleeve. We go now?
The other man, his father, does not move. Everything has gone too haywire for his mind to fathom. It is safer to stand on the corner, away from traffic, and not move at all anymore forever, though his son does not feel the same. All his life he has followed as his dad led him over the curb and safely through teeming traffic to the far side. So that now he keeps plucking, taking a step, and turning back, and on every fourth try saying We go now, Daddy? We go now? …
You wonder what any of this has to do with titles, or the graywater tools of writing. I’ll tell you, then, the title I might give this piece. It comes from a scene I observed when I was twelve, when for the first time I became conscious of the need to understand the behavior of people whose circumstances I could only guess at, whose actions made me sad, whose lives I could do nothing to affect. The title was going to be, How I became a writer–
but titles lie. And finally all that’s left is a boy watching two strangers stand on a street corner, preserved by and isolated in a silence that existed somehow like a bubble amid surrounding cars. | English | NL | ba867fc98f5cee4749b96069bcab240cff39778d5cfbb1797494601848813563 |
Teer Majuk Mun and his family were forced from their home in Pajut in November 2015 by violence, resettling near Poktap. In June 2016, Teer was brought by his mother and uncle to the John Dau Foundation facility, and he was in very bad shape.
Teer was suffering from malnutrition as well as other medical complications, which qualified him for our stabilization center. The John Dau Foundation staff at Poktap didn’t waste a single minute to help young Teer. As a consequence of his condition, he was suffering from convulsions, high fever, yellowing of the skin, sunken eyes and a lack of appetite. For two weeks, he was treated with therapeutic feeding and medication from our nursing staff. Teer was given formula rich in protein and nutrients as well as ReSoMal, an oral rehydration salt. After two weeks, his condition was improving, and he was responding well to treatment.
John Dau Foundation staff moved Teer to our Outpatient Therapeutic Program (OTP). In the OTP, Teer was moved from formula to Plumpy Nut, a peanut-based paste that is used to treat severe acute malnutrition; Plumpy Nut contains fats, dietary fiber, carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins and minerals. He was also treated with amoxicillin and a deworming medication to help fight infection.
Before and after!
Eventually Teer showed great improvement. When our staff checks for malnutrition they measure a patient's mid-upper arm circumference (or MUAC) using a special tape measure that uses the colors green, yellow and red to indicate the severity of malnutrition. When Teer was admitted, his MUAC was 11.6 cm. After his MUAC was measured at 12.1 cm, Teer was referred to our Targeted Supplementary Feeding Program (TSFP).
The TSFP is designed to rehabilitate moderately malnourished children. While he was in the TSFP, Teer received Plumpy Sup, another type of supplementary food designed to prevent a slide back into severe malnutrition. He was also treated for malaria while he was at the TSFP. After three weeks, his MUAC improved from 12.1 cm to 13.3 cm.
Teer has been discharged from our program. When he arrived, he was sick and malnourished, but when he left he did so as a happy, healthy baby boy.
Teer’s story is just one of many. The John Dau Foundation works with hundreds like Teer and his family. We are transforming healthcare in South Sudan. | English | NL | bcebb5ec23a04f1db5298c51fab4a45811636ff3eee303eac5b5a61521afaf5a |
With less than two weeks to go until our brand new “Little Engines Gala” we are delighted to announce our second visiting locomotive, London & South Western Railway ‘Beattie well tank’ 2-4-0WT 30587 courtesy of the Bodmin & Wenford Railway (BWR). Similar locomotives, but designed and owned by the Midland Railway, operated the branch in the very first years that the Railway was open in the nineteenth century.
30587 was one of a class of 85, designed by Joseph Hamilton Beattie, the CME of the London & South Western Railway. These locomotives were designed in consultation with and built by Beyer Peacock at their works at Gorton, Manchester. Originally numbered 298, 30587 was completed in 1874 under the direction of William George Beattie who had succeeded his father in 1871.
Initially the engine worked at Nine Elms in London, the class having proved itself capable of handling the heavy loads and high speeds demanded of them. However, with the arrival of larger locomotives, the class members were transferred to sheds outside the London area. Most of the engines had been scrapped by 1898 with the exception of 3 members of the class which were transferred to the Bodmin and Wadebridge Railway in 1895 to work the sharp curves of that railway’s freight branch to Wenford Bridge carrying china clay traffic to the main line. They were finally withdrawn in 1962 and replaced by GWR 0-6-0PT dock tanks, outlasting the rest of the class by a staggering 64 years.
30587, one of two in preservation, was selected for the national collection. It was stored at various locations before being taken to the Flour Mill Workshops in 2001 in the Forest of Dean for restoration to working order, entering traffic on the BWR in 2002. Withdrawn in 2012 for overhaul it returned to action in 2013. | English | NL | 9edf1d9812aeab560ad4e62764ec04aa50ab745725eaa384e0da4fa8d010ffb5 |
He feels very sorry for this act, but cannot show his true emotions. Okonkwo never showed any emotions openly, unless it be the emotion of anger. In his novel, Things Fall Apart, the Nigerian author Chinua Achebe illustrates the making of modern hero. Despite his several honourable characteristics and his high status in the Igbo society, he fails to correct his tragic flaws and eventually suffers a terrible downfall. His need to find the truth and help his people was what led to his eminent downfall. If you can find a tragic hero in a story, it is called a tragedy. .
Things Fall Apart is clearly a tragedy because the protagonist was a man of greatness who met a disastrous end. The character must have high status position, but also have nobility and virtue. But aren't we trying a little too hard to find a tragic flaw in this man? The elements of a tragic hero include hamartia… 1375 Words 6 Pages A tragic hero is a character that is both protagonist and antagonist, throughout the action they make as a person. Paris had come tothe Capulet tomb to innocently place flowers for his 'dead' fiance. Okonkwo, being the tempered and stubborn person he is, he could no longer handle his culture being ripped out from right underneath of him. An increasing amount of contemporary literature traces its origins back to the early works of Greece.
The sudden fall from greatness to nothing provides a sense of contrast 10. Even though Okonkwo does not act like a regular hero, he still has a noble structure, makes mistakes throughout life, and experiences a great downfall. Their tragic flaw, arrogance and rashness, which they both possessed, ended up being the cause for both of their downfalls. In all, he made four trips to and from the caves. Swearing his love for Juliet during the balcony scene, and askingher to marry him. Okonkwo 's father was seen as a disappointment from his son 's point of view.
He knew because they had let the other messenger escape. The first passage I have chosen discusses. His tragic flaw was curiosity. To discipline Nwoye, he becomes very rough on his son. The theory oRomeo's tragic flaw is his impetuosity, his rashness ofaction before thinking thoroughly. Also, he must be someone that people can relate to, and, therefore, must have the same human problems and must go through life with the same obstacles of ordinary people.
At first, we see Okonkwo as an arrogant, hardworking, warrior. Okonkwo's most significant challenge originates within himself. Every person has his faults but with Okonkwo, they ultimately lead to his downfall. The first novel is when Britain was turning Nigeria into a colony. He wanted Nwoye to grow into a tough young man. Okonkwo resists change at every step and instead resorts to violence toward anything he perceived as a threat to his culture or values.
His fame rested on solid personal achievements. The audience must feel pity and fear for the character 6. Even though Iago used extreme manipulation to get Othello to be jealous, Iago did not really have to try very hard to get Othello in a jealous state of mind. There are multiple character traits that a tragic hero possesses. Such an intriguing title, because everything will eventually fall apart. This shows us that Okonkwo has an ordinary positive human quality which is fondness and caring for other people. After some time, Oedipus finally addressed that it cannot be denied any longer.
Then they came to the tree from. Okonkwo hates him for his laziness and typically female traits. As the Christian missionaries spend more time with the members of the village, Nwoye becomes interested in this new religion. In essence, from their words come the moral: pride goes before a fall. He is a fierce warrior that already participated in two wars and killed multiple men. His anger almost causes him to kill his second wife with a gun. In the novel, Things Fall Apart, Achebe defines Okonkwo as the tragic hero because his weakness was his own pride which emphasizes how pride can lead to a terrible downfall.
Okonkwo always needed be involved in an activity, he never wanted to look lazy. He clearly holds ambition in contempt. The men beat drums and fire their guns. They bear no malice to Okonkwo, but the laws of the Igbo must be obeyed. Depressed and mourning the soon-to-be-death of his beloved Igbo society, Okonkwo commits suicide.
In typical Greek tragedies, the main character is driven to reach a goal that would prove him or her to be worthy of public admiration of the other characters. He is not jealous at all at the start of the play, when he sends Desdemona to join him in the company of Iago no jealousy there. That was why he had called him a woman. That man was one of the greatest men in Umuofia. Anagnorisis- His actions result in an increase of self- awareness and self-knowledge 5. The second condition for a character to be a tragic hero according to Aristotle is that he should share common human qualities and concerns.
While fate does in deed lend a hand in events surrounding a tragic hero, there must be some element of free choice available to the character. When these things are in question he physically harms his family and emotionally beats himself up. But, after a while, the Christians were still there unscathed, showing that the gods are ineffective. An increasing amount of contemporary literature traces its origins back to the early works of Greece. Unoka is looked down upon in his tribe for his laziness and Okonkwo feels ashamed, and he really wants respect from the clan. They had broken into tumult instead of action Pg. | English | NL | d000cca858fb08c6f380eebf5139d6f2d75f9af50527646a8a53e55d169d3b91 |
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