From the Western Hemisphere, the new moon occurring on Friday, Sept. 30, is a Black Moon. Officially, it occurs at 8:11 p.m. Eastern Time (5:11 p.m. Pacific Time).
I had not heard that word in a million years! Now this! BOOM!
When news broke that the CIA had colluded with literary magazines to produce cultural propaganda throughout the Cold War, a debate began that has never been resolved. The story continues to unfold, with the reputations of some of America’s best-loved literary figures—including Peter Matthiessen, George Plimpton, and Richard Wright—tarnished as their work for the intelligence agency has come to light. Finks is a tale of two CIAs, and how they blurred the line between propaganda and literature. One CIA created literary magazines that promoted American and European writers and cultural freedom, while the other toppled governments, using assassination and censorship as political tools. Defenders of the “cultural” CIA argue that it should have been lauded for boosting interest in the arts and freedom of thought, but the two CIAs had the same undercover goals, and shared many of the same methods: deception, subterfuge and intimidation. Finks demonstrates how the good-versus-bad CIA is a false divide, and that the cultural Cold Warriors again and again used anti-Communism as a lever to spy relentlessly on leftists, and indeed writers of all political inclinations, and thereby pushed U.S. democracy a little closer to the Soviet model of the surveillance state.
Craters and boreholes dot the former Soviet Union nuclear test site Semipalatinsk. (Photo: CTBTO/CC BY 2.0)
The Polygon in the former Soviet closed city Semipalatinsk (known today as Semey) was the primary nuclear test site of the Soviet Union. In total, 456 nuclear tests were conducted here between 1949 and 1989, including 340 underground and 116 atmospheric explosions. Altogether, the number of nuclear explosions at Semipalatinsk equals more than 2,500 Hiroshima bombs. A huge number of craters, partly filled with water, testify to these experiments.
Located relatively close to a major settlements, this is also the site of one of the most horrible legacies of the Cold War era: where the Soviet Union tested nuclear bombs on civilians. The military conducted these nuclear tests without regard to the health effects on the 200,000 residents of the Semipalatinsk area, who weren't evacuated or warned during the actual explosions. Residents noticed health terrible problems soon after the first tests, and though the site was finally closed in 1989, the legacy of the nuclear tests lingers on. An area of more than 18,000 square kilometers is heavily contaminated and over a million people have been diagnosed with health problems. Nevertheless, even today people continue to live in the Polygon area.
big hate: There are more tigers in captivity in AMERICA than wild tigers in the entire world.
The exact number of captive tigers in this country isn’t known, because many of them live in people’s backyards or unaccredited zoos, and the legality of their ownership varies widely by state and even by circumstance. We travelled to Louisiana to see a 550-pound Siberian-Bengal tiger who lives at a truck stop, and the man who’s fought very hard to persuade Louisiana lawmakers he’s not a criminal.
All photos from Michael Sandlin’s website
See more photos, and learn more about Michael Sandlin’s effort to keep Tony at the Tiger Truck Stop here. Learn more about the Animal Legal Defense Fund‘s campaign to rehome Tony here.
Josh Halverson (Mdewakantonwan Sioux) who won the Songwriter of the Year Award at the Native American Music Awards in 2013 for his Cd, One Shot, earned a last minute three-chair turn during The Voice Blind Auditions as his wife and young son, Thunderbird, watched backstage. Josh, who is a cattle rancher from Texas performed a haunting version of Bob Dylan's "Forever Young". Once Miley Cyrus, Alicia Keys, and Blake Sheldon hit their buttons, they all turned around to fight for Halverson. Although Blake brought out his best cattle talk, Halverson chose to join Team Alicia.
I feel like a BOOM went off in my head looking at this photo!
Ringling Bros. “Congress of Freaks” circa 1924. Wikimedia Commons
On May 19, 1884, the Ringling Bros.’ Circus officially opened for business, capitalizing on the extreme and bizarre to earn profit. It worked: For many years, the most popular component of the circus was the “Freak Show.”
‘Devenir chêvre’, or ‘to become a goat’, means to get angry. This is interesting when contrasted with the English idiom ‘to get your goat’.
The origins of this phrase are founded in the fact that goats used to be housed with cattle, as it was believed they had a calming effect. Consequently, if you ‘got someone’s goat’ it would result in agitated cattle. The French obviously had other ideas about the temperament of goats. According to Expressio, goats were brusque and aggressive, hence the use of ‘devenir chêvre’ to denote someone getting angry.
As a law student, Bryan Stevenson was sent to a maximum security prison to meet a man on death row. The man told Stevenson he’d never met an African-American lawyer, and the two of them talked for hours. It was a day that changed Stevenson’s life. He’s spent the last 30 years working to get people off of death row, but has also spent the final hours with men he could not save from execution. He argues that each of us is deserving of mercy.
Learn more about Bryan Stevenson in his book,Just Mercy.
"Model Wookie Mayer turns sixty this fall. (me too) Aside from her obvious good genes and bone structure, I think a lot of her beauty comes from her natural style – unfussy hair, toned body, minimal makeup. I’m taking note of the less is more approach…let skin show through a lightly bronzed face, add color to lips, keep eyes bright and natural. A few wrinkles actually look appropriate and add to her appeal."
I'm not quite ready for my close-up (working on it though) BOOM
Located about halfway between Hawaii and Australia, this Micronesian Island chain should be a heavenly place on Earth. Unfortunately that is not at all the case. Its residents were forcibly relocated when the U.S. took possession of the islands in 1946, and over the next 12 years sent 23 nuclear bombs raining down on this slice of paradise, rendering it uninhabitable to this day. During the first practical test of a hydrogen bomb at Bikini, 23 members of a Japanese fishing boat crew that were supposedly at a safe distance were contaminated by the blast, and the scandal that rocked the nation was epic. It eventually became the inspiration for the movie Godzilla, in which a radioactive monster rises from a U.S. nuclear test and attacks Japan. To this day, the islands sadly remain a paradise of staggering beauty and potential that no one can safely experience.
1.5 Billion Birds Lost in North America Since 1970s
By Nika Knight | EW
North America has lost more than 1.5 billion birds over the past 40 years, says the most comprehensive survey of landbird populations in Canada and the U.S. to date, and 86 species are threatened with total extinction—all thanks to human-caused habitat destruction and climate change.
Golden-winged warblers are one of the North American species most at risk for complete extinction. Caleb Putnam / Flickr
"Among those 86 species, 22 have already lost at least half of their population since 1970 and are projected to lose another 50 percent of their numbers within the next 40 years," reported the Canadian Press. "For at least six species, this 'half-life' window is fewer than 20 years."
"The information on urgency is quite alarming," study co-author Judith Kennedy of Environment Canada said to the Canadian Press. "We're really getting down to the dregs of some of these populations."
"I don't want my grandchild to go out in the forest and not hear the songbirds in the spring and that seems to be where we're headed right now," Andrew Couturier, senior analyst at Bird Studies Canada and a co-author of the report, told the Globe and Mail. The report by Canadian conservation group Partners in Flight was released in August but was first widely reported on Wednesday by the Canadian Press and Globe and Mail. The California condor, Gunnison sage grouse, ivory-billed woodpecker and Bachman's warbler are a few of the more well-known species on Partners in Flight's "Red Watch List," meaning they are the most at risk of extinction. Those facing the most dramatic population declines are grassland birds, sagebrush and desert scrub species "and forest species dependent on specialized structural features or natural disturbance," the report says. Indeed, another recent study just confirmed that the habitat of endangered sage grouses in 11 western U.S. states is being torn up because of "rampant" oil, gas and gold mining, precipitating the devastating loss of most of their chicks, the Washington Post reported Thursday. The Globe and Mail noted:
"Even relatively abundant birds are dwindling in number, the report says. Chimney swifts, field sparrows and short-eared owls are among the common species that have lost more than half of their populations since 1970 and are expected to lose half of their current level in 40 years or less."
"Birds are often a bellwether of broader ecological health," Kennedy said to the Globe and Mail. Kennedy "noted that sickly birds were an early warning sign of the environmental damage caused by the pesticide DDT a generation ago."
"In some ways, the status of these birds could indicate the status of our own health," Kennedy warned.
This article was reposted with permission from our media associate Common Dreams.
Typing in TheNew Yorker’s deserted offices on a summer night in 1942, Seymour Krim, 20 years old and briefly employed at the magazine, wrote to my father, William Saroyan, who would soon turn 34 and was just then at the height of his fame. Still, with his draft notice and marriage to my mother only a few months away, my father’s moment as the literary golden boy of the Depression years was soon to pass.- Aram Saroyan
Here is Krim, a young man addressing his elder and better, a wunderkind of the literary moment:
The office is acutely quiet at this particular hour in eternity, and I’ve got some particular points about a number of things to hit you with. You’re such a goddamned exhibitionist, put on such a wonderful show, that it is difficult if not impossible to speak with you seriously and cogently without an audience; I’m taking this opportunity, this medium, this hour, in fact, to try and put across to you something of what I feel and think. Amen.
All artists, I feel, however their plea of objectivity, create their characters in their own image; you’re no exception, in fact, your specific glory is the original and unique quality with which you endow the fragments of your imagination. Fine, all right — but: without discipline, which you lack, the very beauty of your men and women is ineffably scarred by excess; the poetic metaphysic, which you sing, becomes pretentious and adolescent; the very wonderful sadness and joy, the whole synthesis, at once noble and tragic and magical is lost, ruined; lifeless. Your defects glare like hot neon bulbs: sloppiness, confusion, rootlessness, affectation, pretense, laziness (work does not mean writing one play after another; work means making as perfect as possible the specific product) and a lot more. Notice, I am not criticizing you outside of your genre; I am not telling you that you are anti-intellectual (afraid of abstract scientific method and the truth it finds), a romantic, unrealistic (you don’t realize, for instance, that political action in an industrialized society must be collective; that your “poetic anarchism” is made up of fine, beautiful words, but is impractical by definition in the complex mélange — economic, psychologic, and biologic – of modern society) a poor academic thinker (by academic, I mean using accredited methods of philosophic investigation based on palpable, objective knowledge), etc.
You are lacking in all the points mentioned; but I can’t take you to task on those grounds; they are your limitations — congenital, hereditary, they will be with you to some extent as long as you live and write — they are your defects and, at times, because you are not encumbered by pedagogical humility (concerning your lack of knowledge), they are your good points. What I am shouting about is your abuse, not of what you lack and will always limit you as an artist, but of your talents. You abuse your genius, your particular glorious talents by sloppiness, excess, failure to cut it to the bone, affectations, etc.
You were the white-haired boy in American letters for a while: and Christ! you deserved it. When I was fifteen and sixteen and seventeen and now twenty, you made me laugh and cry and marvel at the human creation. You touched the very core of the miracle time and time again: what lovely charm, what wondrous mystery, what infinite love! What a noble sonofabitch you are! I followed your stuff up through the years — from puberty, to young manhood —and you widened the eyes of my soul continuously, brought supernal music and god-like poems out of parts of experience that are now always magical and incredibly lovely to me.
I say that to let you know where I stand: we always are more vehement criticizing things we respect and admire more than those which leave us apathetic. It seems to me a lousy utterly shameless crime to masturbate with your gifts when a little hard work could change the thing into a wonderful lay — you follow my figure of speech, I hope. “My Heart’s in the Highlands” was a clear, clean, wonderful fable; Jesus, how you laid bare the human heart! But look — you were working with the Group (all right, maybe you thought some of them were phony, etc., but they and Bobby Lewis provided you with that directorial discipline, that impersonal, professional hand that is a necessary evil to the artist); Time of Your Life and Love’s… Song were done by Dowling, I think.
“The Beautiful People” was your own and it showed it: the artist is so close to his own work that his view becomes warped, malformed, the emphasis is placed in the wrong place. The “People” showed that clearly; what was a profound myth, in your conception, became a novelty, a burlesque of your own talents. It needed cutting, concrete integration, it had to be worked on. The symbolism — instead of being filled with love and charm and golden music of angels — became top-heavy, Loring became a mockery of something true, the spontaneous glisten of your words, ideas, became too rich, too satiate, the shadow and color wasn’t evenly dappled, the whole goddamn thing, in fact, needed pruning, rewriting, considered direction by someone other than yourself.
Unless you get to work on the two plays you’re doing now, the same thing will happen.
You’re surrounded by jerks, ass-kissers, sycophants.
The whole swift, rootless, shystering, incestuous Broadway existence swallows your work now; hell, you were a kid from Frisco ten years ago, freezing in a four-dollar a week room, yet you had the world by the nuts. Jesus, how I remember that old phonograph in your early stories, and I nearly broke my prick laughing when you burned all those wonderful books in wonderful foreign languages, to keep warm; not laughing at you, Saroyan, but with you, with you like fine music at the whole human comedy. What’s happened? You’ve gone soft, the fat life, the liquor, the cunts. You should have married a fine, round, jolly, wise peasant woman and had thirteen kids. I mean it.
I’ve said this much so far, so let me add that you haven’t got too much consideration for others. Don’t get me ass-wise: what I mean is that you walk with the angels so much, that in normal human intercourse, you embarrass people. Like today. You force me to hurt Bodenheim’s feelings, you exploit me before others. As though you said, “Look here, boys and girls,. Ain’t this kid a riot? Smart, knows all the big words, outspoken, sincere. Look at this American character, Mr. Seymour.” In other words, instead of wanting to listen to what I want to say to you, you’re more interested in the impression on an audience, more in the exhibition than the use.
I’m not a fresh, wise, smart, bright young man. I’m a hell of a lot more. I’ll do work some day, probably in the novel, maybe the drama. I’ll have to prove that, to myself as well as you and a million others. My conception of existence is entirely different than yours. My life and outlook is taut, swift, burning, hyper-sensitive, living in a world of jazz and narcotics and class-war, and unemployment, and seeing my Jewish friends being disgraced on the streets. But, hell, we all sense this monstrous, noble, tragic, wonderful miracle in different ways, and I respect and admire your genius and that of Tom Wolfe and Faulkner and O’Neill and Malraux and Joyce and even Odets (I’m Jewish don’t forget, and I can sense things in his work that hit me directly) and ten other great men. So if I’ve said things, been a smart bastard, don’t be offended; my goddamn pride makes it impossible to call you Sir, to show you the respect and deference which you deserve from a kid who has nothing to show for the big game he talks.
One thing, Saroyan. This kid Schloss is really on the ball. He’s intelligent, creative, swift, can act, write, take shorthand like an ace (he’s modest, he can’t throw the shit like me, but don’t let it deceive you). Give him a job: secretary, stage manager, actor, let him work on the Human Comedy with you, and Christ! you’ll see real talent. He’s got the discipline, the independent judgement, the critical mind to make your show. I’m not crapping; that kid amazes me sometimes, he’s so quick on the trigger. Before I sign off, even if you don’t take the advice of this mercurial genius, the best of luck on the whole production, no crap, that comes from the heart.
[Director, Producer, and Editor - Dave Kaufman | Paintings by Holton Rower ] Acrylic over wood. The artist's name is Holton Rower out of New York and the technique is called "Pour".
For me, this blog BOOM and the (now dead) Thought Bombs is defined by simply breaking myths, shattering old thoughts, while looking at the many myths we’ve accepted without questioning, and so many stories we were taught in our history class and grade school were invented, slanted and definitely not true.
Lakota scholar and author Vine Deloria said in a speech that he hoped that young scholars after him would search for truth, find real history, explore mysteries and never give up. This blog is an answer to that call…
The election season reminds me - no PRESIDENT can change EVERYTHING - none has and none ever will. It's simply one branch of government. If Obama could have changed everything/anything - he would have - but remember how he was blocked. We are living the 1% demand on democracy. Is it really right?
In the Caucasus, a Bronze Age site hints at embalming with honey.
by Paul Salopek
Tbilisi, Georgia, 41°41'48" N, 44°48'01" E
Three years ago, on the banks of the Alazani River in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, the archaeologist Zurab Makharadze cut into a 40-foot-high burial mound that bulged above the surrounding green farmland. “One of our botanists noticed it first,” Makharadze said of the odor wafting up from some of the unearthed artifacts. “She was in the laboratory, working her microscope. She was analyzing samples. She started smiling.” The samples, in this case, were wild berries—offerings left for the entombed dead. Their aroma: thick and intensely sweet, but with musky undertones, with hints of molasses. The berries were astonishingly well preserved. They were still red. They were 4,300 years old. They had been carefully cured with ancient honey. Other items found inside the Bronze Age grave site, called Ananauri 3, were far more spectacular: In a collapsed burial chamber built of logs sat two full-size wagons, complete with ox yokes (domesticated horses had yet to arrive in the south Caucasus during this remote era); beautiful golden jewelry; amber beads traded either from the Baltic region or India; and a trove of astonishingly intact textiles, leather, and basketry. Whoever lay buried inside the mound had been an important chief or religious leader. Six other bodies were interred with him, possibly slaves. Ananauri 3 will add richly to our knowledge of an obscure people called the Martkopi and Bedeni, who farmed grains and raised cattle in the waning centuries of a vast Transcaucasian civilization known as the Araxes-Kura culture. But what struck me, as Makharadze laid out his immensely old treasures on a table at the Otar Lordkipanidze Archaeology Center in Tbilisi, was a delicious biological grace note: The task of archaeologists has been assisted by prehistoric bees. “Wet clay kept many of the artifacts from rotting,” said Makharadze, a big, shy, red-faced man with a bull chest and the square jaw of a boxer. “But these people used honey to embalm many burial objects. They knew what they were doing.”
Archaeologist Zurab Makharadze and a bushel of 4,000-year-old nuts. Photograph by Paul Salopek
Not only the wild berries—ground cherries—but also bushels of other ceremonial offerings in the tomb, such as hazel nuts, were slathered in honey. So were wicker baskets of chestnuts. Even some of the weavings and other organic perishables may have been honey coated. This was done to supply the souls of the departed with all the sustenance and tools they would require in a better world. Walking for more than two years north from Africa into the Middle East, and then east from Turkey into the Caucasus, a key caloric ingredient of this strange journey has been local honey. In hot Arabia, I ate desert honey as clear as air. In the icy mountains of Anatolia, I ate old, crystallized honey that looked like snow. Packed with energy, honey is a walker’s rocket fuel. I also know it makes a good ointment against burns. Honey, of course, has been touted for millennia as a cure-all. “It causes heat, cleans sores and ulcers, softens hard ulcers of the lips, heals carbuncles and running sores,” wrote Hippocrates, the Greek clinician, in the fourth century B.C. Less well known are its mummifying powers. Honey’s extremely high sugar content acts much like salt: It sucks water from bacteria, essentially drying the microbes to death. Honey also contains small amounts of hydrogen peroxide, which of course is antiseptic. Slather honey on wild berries, then, or on nuts, and you create the perfect afterlife snack—food with a shelf life that is eternal. The same applies to corpses. Herodotus noted that the ancient Assyrians embalmed their dead in honey. And after he died in 323 B.C., Alexander the Great was reportedly immersed in a golden sarcophagus brimming with honey. His subjects wanted to keep him presentable for public display.
Sept. 14, 1947 – Birth of actor, Sam Neill in Omagh, Co Tyrone, Ireland (Eire). He first achieved leading roles in films such as Omen III: The Final Conflict and Dead Calm and on television in Reilly, Ace of Spies. He won a broad international audience in 1993 for his roles as Alisdair Stewart in The Piano and Dr. Alan Grant in Jurassic Park, a role he reprised in 2001’s Jurassic Park III. Neill also had notable roles in Merlin, The Hunt for Red October and The Tudors. In 2016, he starred in Hunt for the Wilderpeople alongside Julian Dennison, to great acclaim. He holds New Zealand, British and Irish nationality, but identifies primarily as a New Zealander.
The alchemical symbol of apotheosis, the transformation of man into god, is traditionally represented by an image of a hand with other symbols, including skulls, crowns, stars, fish, keys, lanterns, astrological symbols and the all-seeing eye. The Hand of the Mysteries goes by many other names, including the Hand of the Master Mason, Hand of the Philosopher, and the Emblematic Hand of Mysteries. It is said that the hand holds the keys to divinity, and is used as an invitation to discover the ‘great secrets.’
The Prime Directive serves as the Federation’s philosophical backbone, no matter how often our favorite Trek heroes bend and break its values in order to save the day. How does this policy match up with current space exploration procedures, colonial Earth history and our most dangerous terrestrial ideas? Robert, Joe and Christian explore in this special LIVE Stuff to Blow Your Mind presentation from Star Trek: Mission New York.
String theorist Edward Witten says consciousness will remain a mystery. Some mind-ponderers, notably philosopher Colin McGinn, argue that consciousness is unsolvable. Philosopher Owen Flanagan calls these pessimists mysterians, after the 60Õs-era rock group Question Mark and the Mysterians. Recently, physicist Edward Witten came out as a mysterian. Witten is regarded with awe by his fellow physicists, some of whom have compared him to Einstein and Newton. He is largely responsible for the popularity of string theory over the past several decades. String theory holds that all of nature's forces stem from infinitesimal particles wriggling in a hyperspace consisting of many extra dimensions.
Ways to Reduce our Reliance on Corporations (and exposure to ads)
After much thought, and some insight from readers I decided to put this list together. I do not attempt to do all of this perfectly, certainly there are many areas where it is hard to be as discerning. You do not have to move to the country and grow your own food to opt out of some unhealthy corporate dependencies (though this is a beautiful thing to do if you choose).
And to be honest it becomes much harder to take time now that I have two small children to care for. Certainly we all have our own contradictions and there are some areas where the options are quite limited (internet providers, insurance, etc.). But we do our best to make some healthier choices for our family, and to show our children that they have power over what goes into their bodies and minds. I see the mind as no different than the body, what you put into determines and effects your mental health on a daily basis.
Simply put I want to increase the soulful, life sustaining, mind expanding stuff, and decrease or eliminate the junk food. Each of us has to draw their own lines where it feels most comfortable. I give myself permission to change and grow on the journey. Many things that once felt okay for me, no longer do and in some areas there is room for improvement. I am finding this journey to be more “self directed” in the world incredibly satisfying and soulful. Making things, clothing my children, cooking from scratch, have made my life more meaningful and rich. Taking a hard line on blogads lets me sleep well at night and makes me feel good about what I am teaching my kids. That we do have a choice.
👇I would love it if you have anything to add, please put it in the comments. 1. Use your purchasing power as a political statement. Shop locally, ethically and in moderation. Ask the question “What do I really need?” While you cannot remove yourself entirely from mass culture, and for those who may not want to make their own clothing, (in some cases I still shop with Amazon when I cannot find it anywhere else), you can research companies and choose one whose ethics and practices are more mindful. Commit the time to seek out alternatives. We used a non-profit cell phone provider called Earth Tones for years, who were committed to political action in various forms and funded a variety of environmental projects. I use Etsy quite a bit for more homemade options and supplies.
2. Turn off the TV. (need I explain this one?) I will say that after I got rid of the television many years ago, my productivity soared and my imagination flourished. I read much more. I believe there is a correlation to my career beginning to do really well and my giving up TV. My brain became rewired and much less passive as a result. I still watch movies and the occasional series, but I get to choose where and how (no ads).
3. Make your own stuff as much as possible. I have begun making my own cleaning products with simple ingredients, and recently I purchased a great resource to help with all kinds of things that you can do yourself. I highly recommend the book Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World by Kelly Coyne & Erik Knutzen (I don’t need to add that I have no connection to the authors). Having looked at many books in this category I can safely say that if you are interested in homesteading or just getting off the consumer treadmill, this book will help you do it. I am soon going to try giving up the bottle (of shampoo that is), and give some of their alternatives a try. I’ll let you know how it goes. I already gave up hair color during my second pregnancy, choosing to let my grey hairs go loose and wild!
4. Use an Ad-Blocker program for the web. While this does little to actively stop the advertising, it does cut down on the visual overload and the adcreep we experience while surfing. I use Adblock Plus, which was created by a friend of mine. It is totally free and works like a charm. I’ve used it for years and love it.
6. Support media that is ethical and ad free. I have cut down on what sites I visit regularly, choosing ones that are ad-free over ones with ads. I do value when people write about products they like if they are things that I enjoy using (in my case wool, books, environmentally friendly clothing/toys, recipes), but now they must be ad free for me to trust them. In some cases this has been a really hard choice, as some were sites that I enjoyed (a few written by friends I love). But in almost ALL cases, as the ads increased on a site, so did the feeling that the writing began to serve the advertising.
7. Participate in Collaborative Consumption, interactions and economies that involve swapping, sharing, bartering, trading and renting.
8. Begin to perceive value in different ways, not just in terms of money. In the book The Good Life, authors Helen and Scott Nearing felt that having cut and stacked fire-wood that they acquired themselves, was better than money in the bank. It provided more for them physically and spiritually (in the work) and also in keeping them warm throughout the season. What about looking at your skills as being of incredible value in your life? Your ability to sew, cook, knit, grow, build, etc.?
9. Ride a bike or take public transit. Obvious I know, but I had to add it.
10. Use raw materials more, packaged products less. I suppose this goes under #1 and #3.
11. Buy used.
12. Repair your old things. I recently taught myself how to darn socks and sweaters. It is incredibly satisfying. I also learned to repair wool items using needle felting, it’s like magic.
13. Change your language. Name the object, not the brand (i.e. Kleenex v.s. tissue). Words are powerful. -from Kelsi
14. Choose independent businesses over chains. Use public spaces, museums, galleries, bookshops. -from Johnny, Diana & M
15. Pay with cash. When you use debit the bank gets a fee from the vendor. When you use cash the money goes to the owner of the shop. -from Diana
16. Don’t buy bottled water (carry reusable bottles). -from Jeanette
17. Become a minimalist. Cut down on your worldly possessions. -from Anne
BOOM! I love this guy Thomas Jane (kinda weird name but i like him) more on IMDB
Thomas Jane was born on February 22, 1969 in Baltimore, Maryland, USA as Thomas Elliott. He is an actor and producer, known for The Mist (2007), Deep Blue Sea (1999) and Dreamcatcher (2003). He was previously married to Patricia Arquette and Ayesha Hauer.
Standoff is a 2016 American thriller film starring Laurence Fishburne and Thomas Jane. Not exactly a thriller but horror... murder, rampage, grossly violent... I rate ythis one 4 STARS
Recap: A young girl, Bird (Ballentine) with her aunt's boyfriend waiting at the car, visits the grave of her parents on the anniversary of their deaths, witnesses and photographs a hitman (Fishburne) killing people attending a funeral. He kills her aunt's boyfriend, Roger, and tries to kill her too, but she flees into the woods. Bird comes across the house of a war veteran, Carter (Jane), who vows to protect her. Arriving at the house, Sade shoots at Carter, who grabs a shotgun and shoots back. They exchange words and gunfire, and both are wounded. During a break in the gunfire, Sade tries to talk Carter into sending Bird down so he can kill her. Carter refuses, and they both pause to patch up their wounds and prepare for the next round. Carter sends the girl for some light bulbs, which he breaks and throws down the stairs, alerting Sade to the fact that he "ain't no farmer." Carter finds out from the girl what happened in the cemetery and that she has a picture of Sade's face. Sade, in the downstairs of the house, starts going through Carter's possessions and finds a picture of Carter in military uniform with his wife and son. He tries to convince Carter he is also ex-military and he understands why Carter is protecting Bird. Carter lets him know he is aware that Bird has a picture of him and that is why he is after her.
Meanwhile, a sheriff's deputy happens upon the abandoned cars at the cemetery. In the house, a resting Carter is dreaming about a tragedy that happened to his son. He wakes up and sends Bird to get a bottle of alcohol. She returns with the drink and his son's teddy bear, which he angrily tells her to put back. Sade finds and starts to read a letter Carter had written his wife, taking blame for the death of their son. In the letter, he states he knew she blamed him for the death and didn't blame her for leaving him. Sade realizes that Carter had packed up and written the letter as he was contemplating suicide. He snidely encourages him to go ahead. Bird tells Carter that her dad told her she had "no quit in her" and wonders if she will see her dad when she dies. She asks Carter why his wife left him and he said the house reminded her of their son. They hug and Sade shoots a round, gaining the attention of the deputy (played by Watson) who was looking around for the cars' owners. The light in the house starts to fade and Carter now needs to get Bird out as he only has one shot remaining and in the dark he can't protect her.
VICE
R |2015 ‧ Thriller/Action
A self-aware, artificial human (Ambyr Childers) becomes caught in the crossfire between a cop (Thomas Jane) and the creator (Bruce Willis) of an exclusive resort where paying customers play out their wildest fantasies.
I rate this one 4.5 STARS. (reminder to self: ban A.I. worldwide)
Skid (a mini-dachshund) understood every word I said (that rascal) (this isn't his photo)
...The study found that dogs recognized each word independently from one another, and responded differently to them according to the way in which the trainers said the word.
“Humans seem to be the only species which uses words and intonation for communicating emotions, feelings, inner states,” Andics told NPR. “To find that dogs have a very similar neural mechanism to tell apart meaningful words from meaningless sound sequences is, I think, really amazing.” READ
[Skid and I had the exact same birthday too - TODAY!)
Things you might not know about Bruce Schneier [Bruce Schneier eats 0s and 1s for breakfast. And snacks on pi...In Liars and Outliers I talk about security as a tax on the honest. ]
An R&B vocalist affiliated with the outlandish hip-hop crew Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All, Frank Ocean (Christopher "Lonny" Breaux) was born and raised in New Orleans. The aspiring songwriter and singer had just moved into his dorm at the University of New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina hit.
With his future under water, Ocean immediately left the academic life behind and moved to L.A. to give music a shot. He cut some demos at a friend's home studio, shopped them around town, and eventually landed a songwriting deal that would find him working for Justin Bieber, John Legend, and Brandy.
Some of this work was alongside Christopher "Tricky" Stewart, a fellow songwriter and producer who would convince Ocean to sign a solo artist deal with Def Jam in late 2009. It was also around this time he met Odd Future and began writing music for the crew while making guest appearances on their mixtapes. In February 2011, as Odd Future were making waves, Ocean broke out on his own with the Nostalgia, Ultra mixtape, issued through his Tumblr blog.
Later in the year, he appeared on Tyler, the Creator's Goblin ("She," "Window"), Beyoncé's 4 ("I Miss You"), and Jay-Z and Kanye West's Watch the Throne ("No Church in the Wild," "Made in America"). Def Jam's plan for the release of Nostalgia, Lite -- an EP-length version of the mixtape -- was scrapped, yet the songs "Novacane" (produced by Stewart) and "Swim Good" (MIDI Mafia) were released as singles with accompanying videos. The former reached number 17 on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop chart. The latter peaked at number 70.
By the end of the year, several publications listed Nostalgia, Ultra as one of 2011's best releases. While his association with Def Jam had been strained, Ocean nonetheless proceeded with the making of his official debut album, working beside the likes of Malay, Om'Mas Keith, and Pharrell Williams as fellow producers. The album, Channel Orange, was previewed for journalists at a handful of listening events. Some writers alleged that certain lyrics on the album revealed Ocean's bisexuality. Ocean subsequently published a screen shot of a TextEdit file (entitled "thank you's") that included details of a romantic relationship -- his first love -- with a male. On July 10, six days after the post, Channel Orange was released by Def Jam as a download, while the CD version was issued the following week. Along with featured appearances from Earl Sweatshirt, John Mayer, and André 3000, the album involved material about unrequited love, as well as class and drug dependency -- all delivered with Ocean's descriptive storytelling and understated yet expressive vocals. The album would go on to be an all-around success, receiving nearly universal critical acclaim, a spot on the Billboard 200, and a host of Grammy nominations. ~ David Jeffries & Andy Kellman
good quote: Basically, a system in which men control the resources and women have little-to-no say in how society is run is detrimental to the survival of the human race. - Taryn Hillin (Source)
When news broke that the CIA had colluded with literary magazines to produce cultural propaganda throughout the Cold War, a debate began that has never been resolved. The story continues to unfold, with the reputations of some of America’s best-loved literary figures—including Peter Matthiessen, George Plimpton, and Richard Wright—tarnished as their work for the intelligence agency has come to light.
I'm not quite ready for my close-up (working on it though) BOOM
Golden-winged warblers are one of the North American species most at risk for complete extinction. Caleb Putnam / Flickr
