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Cocktail Dresses
Shop Cocktail Dresses
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Last Monday I got hit by a car; I survived.
Bruised and thoroughly shaken up, I insisted on making dinner the next night, much to Keith's annoyance. I could've cooked something, he said. You should be resting.
He's right — I should've been resting, and the short amount of prep time our meal took left me sore, aching and in desperate need of my prescribed Percocet. That said, the recipe I'd chosen couldn't have been any simpler. I like to think I would've been able to manage it even if I had been seriously injured, something I hope I never have to put to the test.
The beauty of this soup is that you literally throw the majority of the ingredients into a pot, slap on its lid, and walk away. Soon thereafter, doped up on painkillers or not, you'll smell the most amazing fragrances emerging from your kitchen. If you happen to be doped up on painkillers, these alluring aromas will likely have the power to lift you up off of the sofa and gently waft you towards the pot, much like the sweet perfume of a blueberry pie cooling on a windowsill in an old Merrie Melodies cartoon.
When I was younger, my mother frequently made a chicken noodle soup that I now realize must have been inspired by Vietnamese phở; at the time, I just thought it was delicious, though the skinny, silvery noodles my mom used were too squirrely to catch on a spoon. Later I learned these were cellophane noodles, also called vermicelli or bean thread noodles, but when I was growing up I called them "swimming noodles," since they too often slid off of my cutlery and back into the broth as smoothly as a fish.
To avoid frustration while eating this soup, I recommend using both spoon and fork, something that is only tricky if your head is cloudy with narcotics and acetaminophen.
Pork Noodle Soup with Cinnamon + Anise, from Gourmet
Makes four to six portions
2 ½ pounds country-style pork ribs
6 cups water
2/3 cup soy sauce
2/3 cup Chinese Shaoxing wine or medium-dry Sherry
¼ cup packed dark brown sugar
1 head garlic, halved crosswise
3 3-inch cinnamon sticks
1 whole star anise (I used two)
5 ½ ounces cellophane noodles
Chopped cilantro and sliced scallions for garnish
- Gently simmer all ingredients except noodles in a 6-quart heavy pot, covered, skimming as needed, until pork is very tender, 1 ½ to 2 hours.
- Transfer pork to a bowl. Discard bones, spices, and garlic. Coarsely shred meat. Skim fat from broth, then return meat and bring to a simmer. Rinse noodles, then stir into broth and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until noodles are translucent and tender, about 6 minutes.

subset: commoncrawl


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You might not need a shiny, rounded and elegant touchscreen network music player that connects to the world via Wi-Fi or Ethernet. But once you lay your hands on the Squeezebox Touch, you'll probably want one. Like an upscale Chumby, this gorgeous device sits on your nightstand or next to your stereo, bringing you music from any computer in your house, or tunes originating at radio stations or via music apps from anywhere in the world.
Logitech has done a great job with the Squeezebox Touch. Its best attribute is its 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen, every bit as good as the near-perfect gold-standard screen of the iPhone and iPad. Once we extinguished the Squeezebox's annoying sound effects, its responsiveness was a delight. The user interface is not quite so polished, though, particularly inside the individual apps. For instance, we downloaded the Pandora app, and found it perplexing at first to find the menu entry that allows you to change stations.
Pandora is just the beginning, though. Logitech introduced Squeezebox Apps, so far offering dozens of ways to get music and other stuff from The Cloud to your ears. The usual suspects are there, including Rhapsody, Shoutcast, Sirius Internet Radio (subscription required), and Napster. There's even a Facebook app in there. Let's hope this aggregation grows to something much bigger.
Squeezebox Touch aims to please with its touchy-feelyness, giving you a sophisticated alarm clock that lets you designate different days and multiple alarms, along with a variety of sounds to go with them. We like the capability of adjusting the volume of the crescendo alarm. Our only complaint is that it won't allow us to wake up to Pandora, as the Chumby does.
But the Squeezebox goes way beyond Chumby when it comes to outputs. You can plug a couple of RCA jacks into the back and connect it to your stereo system, or you hook it up using the optical or coaxial audio ports. Most of the time, we connected its headphone jack to a pair of powered speakers and subwoofer. Even though it was playing Internet radio most the time, the resulting sound was superb.
Squeezebox doesn't stop just at Internet radio. Install a small applet on your PC, and it dutifully finds all the music there, letting you play your favorite tunes over the network on your Squeezebox. You can also wake up to your chosen playlists. It all works beautifully.
While $300 is a lot to spend on a clock radio, the Squeezebox Touch's convenience and sound quality appeals to novices and maybe even an audiophile or two. Its matching remote makes it fit in well with your home stereo, and its excellent touchscreen makes the Chumby hardware look positively stone-aged. Even with its flaws, we're still delighted with the Squeezebox Touch, and highly recommend it.
Via Logitech


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Victims are grilled in military sex-assault investigations
Seven months after an Air Force recruiter's assistant told investigators her boss sexually assaulted her in an office supply room, the young woman was summoned to meet his defense attorneys.
Although she had no lawyer to represent her, and no prosecutor accompanied her to the interview, she felt comfortable entering their office alone in January at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland.
Prosecutors told her it was routine. And she anticipated the defense questions to roughly track the same territory she covered with prosecutors, centered on the facts of her account.
Not so in the military justice system, in which sexual assault victims often face hours of questions from defense attorneys outside the presence of prosecutors with no one to advise them on their legal rights, a common practice that has no match in civilian criminal courts.
The defense attorney leading the questions, Maj. Willie Babor, soon took the interview to personal ground.
Was she aware the defendant, Tech. Sgt. Jaime Rodriguez, had a family and children? Babor asked. Did she know her accusations against Rodriguez carried the death penalty? How would she feel about his children growing up without a father?
She was shocked. She was even more confused when Babor started asking for details of her sexual history and problems in her marriage.
Before the three-hour interview was over, Babor had prompted the 20-year-old airman to name her previous sexual partners, identify anyone who'd witnessed her drink alcohol underage and sign a memo stating Rodriguez used no "force" against her — a term she equated with violence that causes injury, she said.
"I had no idea what questions I didn't have to answer," said the Air Force analyst, identified as Victim 9 in Rodriguez's trial last week. "It was very overwhelming. I just wanted to crawl under a rock."
Her case illustrates a little-known aspect of the military judicial system that often grants defense lawyers a degree of access to victims that is almost unheard of in civilian criminal courts, according to military law experts, victims and advocates.
Many victims also face intrusive and irrelevant questions at evidentiary hearings where commanders, who are not legally trained judges, can grant wide latitude to defense attorneys seeking to impeach a witness's credibility.
The impact on victims can be humiliating. Some said interviews with defense attorneys shook their conviction to pursue charges and forced them to relive the sexual assaults they already had detailed in written statements and discussions with investigators and prosecutors.
"The rights of victims are commonly being trampled," said Nancy Parrish, president of the victim advocacy group Protect Our Defenders. "It's intimidating for the victim, and without counsel of their own, they can be re-victimized."
The Pentagon faces a deepening scandal over rampant sexual assault in its ranks and the mistreatment of victims. Federal lawmakers are battling over how far to go in imposing reforms.
A seven-month San Antonio Express-News investigation presented in May documented a pattern of psychiatric discharges for troops who disclosed assaults while some commanders stifle reports and perpetrators often evade punishment.
Much of the controversy has focused on how few cases reach criminal prosecution.
Fear of retaliation and distrust of the military justice system help suppress reporting of the crimes. An estimated 89 percent of victims do not disclose unwanted sexual contact, compared with about 65 percent who do not report in the civilian system. Of the 3,374 reports of sexual assault last year involving 2,900 accused offenders, only 302 went to courts-martial.
But the difficulties victims face in the cases that do reach courts-martial has been largely overlooked. Military officials acknowledge they must increase victim confidence in the justice system if they are to stem sexual assaults in the armed forces, estimated at 26,000 in 2012.
At a congressional hearing in January, Lt. Gen. Richard Harding, the Air Force judge advocate general, said one in three victims who initially agreed to participate in prosecutions dropped out of the process last year before their cases reached trial.
"I believe that, had these victims been represented by their own attorney, many of them would not have declined to cooperate in holding the offender accountable," Harding said at the hearing.
Evidence rules ignored
Military law requires equal access to witnesses for both the defense and prosecution, and a similar rule applies in civilian courts. In both systems, neither defense attorneys nor prosecutors can block access to witnesses.
However, the interpretation of those rules and how that plays out in practice in the civilian and military realms is starkly different, experts said.
"In the military system, judges interpret that as requiring victims to make themselves available to defense counsel for some sort of interview," said Roger Canaff, a former civilian prosecutor who now is an adviser to military prosecutions. "I'm not aware of any civilian jurisdiction where there is a common custom or a general requirement that victims be interviewed by defense counsel prior to trial."
Bexar County First Assistant District Attorney Cliff Herberg said civilian prosecutors tell victims they're free to speak with defense counsel. But prosecutors also emphasize they want to be present for any questions. Such interviews are "almost unheard of" Herberg said.
Military victims also face evidentiary hearings to determine whether cases proceed to courts-martial. Commanders who are not legally trained as judges serve as investigating officers who oversee the hearings.
Evidentiary hearings "often involve inadmissible questions and oftentimes the investigating officer is not familiar with the rules of evidence," Canaff said.
While some states have similar civilian proceedings, most do not. Legally trained judges who oversee those preliminary hearings are better equipped than investigating officers to determine whether questions from the defense stray too far from the relevant facts, Canaff said.
As a result, advocates said victims can face questions about childhood sexual abuse, their sexual orientation and the number of sexual partners.
"They're being harangued by defense counsel with no protection," said Parrish, with Protect Our Defenders. "These questions are extremely offensive and have no bearing on whether the accused committed sexual assault that night."
Is it fair?
Military defense attorneys say the idea behind the interviews is to provide both sides with fair access to evidence.
Prosecutors represent the government — not victims. And prosecutors must be careful not to be perceived as providing victims with legal advice or obstructing justice, experts said. For that reason, military prosecutors typically do not attend defense interviews with victims.
In the view of some prosecutors, those meetings also can provide a glimpse of the defense strategy and benefit the case against the accused. It also may allow victims to gain some comfort with the questions they will face in front of jurors and make them better witnesses on the stand.
Retired Army Lt. Col. Geoffrey Corn, a professor at South Texas College of Law in Houston, said defense attorneys have an ethical obligation to zealously represent clients, and that means rooting out information that may shows inconsistencies in a witness' account or bad motives.
Other military law experts said granting legal standing to attorneys for victims is dangerous because it creates an appearance that the victim was conclusively abused and the accused is presumptively guilty.
In response to widespread sexual abuse of young recruits at Lackland, the Air Force started a pilot program in January that provides lawyers for victims.
Known as Special Victims Counsel, the group of attorneys so far has helped about 300 victims. Attorneys in the program now are struggling to establish how far they can go in court to represent their clients.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., included a subcommittee measure last week in the National Defense Authorization Act that would create a Special Victims Counsel program in every branch of the service. The proposal would allow victims to request legal representation to protect their rights during the process.
"We must ensure that victims have counsel to protect their interests throughout this process," Gillibrand said. "The only way out of this crisis is to create more trust in the system so more victims are not afraid to come forward."
Air Force Maj. John Bellflower, who was appointed to represent Victim 9 in Rodriguez's case after she spoke to Babor, was kicked out of the courtroom before a pretrial hearing on a defense request to interview her again.
Although the judge didn't require another interview, Bellflower said it was unfair that his client had no voice in the decision. He believes the system puts too much pressure on victims to grant such interviews.
The law "says both sides should have equal access to witnesses in the case. But the government doesn't own her," he said. "They have pieces of evidence — documents that they can turn over. She is not a piece of paper. She has rights."
Babor declined to comment on the case but complained to Judge Col. Donald Eller Jr. at a hearing last week that prosecutors were improperly portraying his tactics as unethical.
Defense Department studies show the prosecution process exacts a toll on victims. A mere one in three troops who reported unwanted sexual contact to military authorities last year said they would make the same decision again, a Pentagon survey shows.
Intimidating victims
Kimberly Hanks testified as the victim in a now-infamous case at Aviano Air Base, where a general tossed out a jury's conviction of aggravated sexual assault. Hanks spent 4.5 hours in interviews with attorneys for the accused pilot, Lt. Col. James Wilkerson.
His first attorney questioned Hanks about her divorce and sexual history, including the age at which she became sexually active. Hanks, a 49-year-old physician assistant who works as a civilian contractor, declined to answer those questions because she viewed them as irrelevant to her case. The attorney kept pressing.
"They try to intimidate you," Hanks said.
A second attorney for Wilkerson, Frank Spinner, brought a forensic psychologist to a follow-up interview, another common tactic. The psychologist asked similar questions.
After Hanks again declined to answer questions about her sexual history and ended the interview to return to work, Spinner won a pretrial hearing to explore what she called "the floating head theory."
The contention was that Hanks had superimposed the head of a previous attacker on Wilkerson. A judge ultimately did not allow Spinner to ask the same questions in front of jurors, she said. But Hanks said things might have gone the other way if she had not had the benefit of life experience to resist the intrusive questions.
"I'm not the normal person who goes through this. I'm older," she said. "They were very frustrated. I think they're used to young victims answering those questions."
Some victims said prosecutors encouraged or even pressured them to speak to the defense. Rebekah Lampman, an Iraq war veteran, still was at a trauma center in Temple recovering from a rape by a fellow Fort Hood soldier when his defense attorney called her cellphone asking questions.
Although a prosecutor in her case said an interview wasn't mandatory and Lampman could wait until she finished treatment, the prosecutor pressured her to quickly submit to questions, she said.
The prosecutor "kind of used a little bit of intimidation saying we have to get this done," Lampman said.
Virginia Messick was among 10 recruits victimized at Lackland by Staff Sgt. Luis Walker, a basic training instructor now serving 20 years in prison.
Like other victims, prosecutors told Messick that, while not mandatory, it was "a good idea" to give an interview to Walker's attorneys before trial. She said they asked about her alcohol use, difficulties with her ex-husband and any sexual experiences in a previous job as a bartender.
She questioned the wisdom of talking to them and felt like they used it to manipulate her on the witness stand.
The woman identified as Victim 9 in Rodriguez's case, who now is 22, said her experience with defense attorneys made her feel like she was the one on trial. It was only later, after talking to prosecutors and her attorney, that she fully grasped the potential impact of the memo Babor led her to sign.
"He never provided me with the legal definition of force," she said. "He knew exactly what I thought force meant."
Although defense attorneys tried and failed to introduce the memo at trial, she spent months fearful that they would dredge up intimate and embarrassing details of her life in front of jurors.
"There are reasons why victims don't want to come forward, because they fear they're going to get treated like that," she said.


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Beloved internet and information activist Aaron Swartz took his life a few days ago. Since then, the internet has been in a state of networked mourning as renowned digerati and freedom fighters share personal stories of Aaron alongside their rage and frustration.
For while it was no secret that Aaron struggled with depression, it was also no secret that recent years have been particularly hellish: Exactly two years before his suicide on January 11, Aaron was arrested. Seven months later he was charged with a host of counts under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (among other statutes). The U.S. government actively pursued this case at a level disproportionate to the purported damage, using their position of authority to bully.
As I wrote earlier in raw emotional form, I adored Aaron for all his brilliance and flaws, his passion and stubbornness. Although I, and others, are still struggling to make sense of the loss, his suicide raises a host of significant issues that need to be publicly discussed.
Because like the other cases brought against hackers across the country, the case against Aaron isn't just about technology providing new means for people to act independently and enact democracy. It isn't even really about justice and national security. It's about a broader, systemic battle.
It's about power.
In recent years, hackers and geeks have challenged the status quo, calling into question the legitimacy of countless political moves and other powerful organizations' actions that take place under the umbrella of national interests and information security.
Reasonable people can disagree about the tactics and where and when a particular approach pushes too far, but in many cases, hackers' intentions have been valiant. Some are focused on freeing information while others are concerned with protecting innocent users from corporate laziness by fixing known vulnerabilities. Many of the beliefs that Aaron stood for – the liberation of knowledge, open access to information, code as free speech, and the use of code to make the world better – are core values in the hacker community. Numerous activist geeks have attempted to liberate information, combat corruption, and challenge unchecked power in many forms.
The hacker ethic may be peculiar to outsiders. But it stems from a deep commitment to justice, fairness, and freedom. Anthropologist Gabriella Coleman describes in her phenomenal book Coding Freedom how hacker ethic gets encoded into both technical and political practice. (Fittingly, you can download the book for free.)
Because of these central values and beliefs, many hackers are confounded by systems of power that stick to the letters but ignore broader principles. Much public effort has been put into controlling and harmonizing geek resistance, squashing rebellion, and punishing whoever authorities can get their hands on for whatever crimes they can charge.
But most geeks operate in gray zones, making it hard for them to be pinned down.
It's in this context that Aaron's stunt to free JSTOR's material using MIT's network gave federal agents enough evidence to bring him to trial so they could use him as an example, condemning him before the trial even began. All for the performance of justice.
Yet many hackers see themselves as – and are genuinely trying to be – contemporary freedom fighters. In Swartz's case, those in power used him, reframing his information liberation project as a story of a vicious hacker whose terroristic acts are meant to destroy democracy. Credible experts were already scheduled to testify against the government's claims, to share that "I know a criminal hack when I see it, and Aaron's downloading of journal articles from an unlocked closet is not an offense worth 35 years in jail." (Note, Aaron had been offered 6 months, but only if he would plead guilty to a series of felony charges he didn't feel he was guilty of.)
Why should this matter to you? Especially if you didn't know Aaron Swartz, aren't a hacker, or think this has nothing to do with you?
Because the whole point of a functioning democracy – the very principles this country was founded on – is to always question the uses and abuses of power in order to prevent autocratic tyranny from emerging. The reason you see so many internet commenters raging against the machine right now is because the people in power have been unable to see past acts like Aaron's and understand the intentions and activism driving it.
I, like others, often disagreed with Aaron's particular approach to freeing the world's information, but I didn't disagree with him about the goal. What's going on isn't about undermining democracy, but about preserving democracy in a networked world.
So there is a lot of justifiable outrage out there. Many people want the heads of the key administrators who helped create the context in which Aaron took his life. MIT's administration has decided to do an internal investigation into the university's decision to act when JSTOR dropped the case. Members of the hacktivist collective Anonymous even leveraged loopholes in MIT servers to publicly demand justice.
But we should also fear the likelihood that Aaron will be turned into a martyr: an abstraction of a geek activist destroyed by the state.
Not much can be gained from reifying the us-versus-them game that got us here in the first place. It doesn't help any one or any cause to incite more individual geek cowboys as they haphazardly throw themselves against the powers that be.
There are many paths of activism and ways to create cultural change. Some are self-destructive because the kinds of risk-taking involved often result in being targeted. Others are more focused around coordinated organizing.
When Aaron organized others to rally – as he did in SOPA/PIPA and with many of his other actions to combat self-serving manipulation of information – he was phenomenally successful at getting collective buy-in. At making a difference by working with and through others. By not just hacking, but building things.
What haunted him to his end were the repercussions of a lone ranger action – at trying to make a difference by working alone. When people who don't know Aaron celebrate him, they focus on this aspect, the part that acted as an individual agent of change. The part that made him especially vulnerable.
So what I really hope comes out of this tragedy is some serious community reflection about the tactics of change-making and activism employed by geeks to combat abuses of power. If we want to achieve our core values and goals – whatever they are – I don't think we'll ever make a difference by creating more martyrs in a cultural war. We need to find another way. We can't afford to allow powerful entities destroy our passionate savants.
Aaron's funeral was yesterday. What Aaron should be remembered for is not what he did as an individual, but how he empowered so many others – and provided a foundation for change and activism that went far beyond him.
Editor's Note: Adapted by the author for Wired from a previous post on her blog.
Wired Opinion Editor: Sonal Chokshi @smc90


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Attention Illinois residents! Some of the best genealogy resources online are available for free through the Try-It! Illinois Database trial October 1 – November 30 2011.
This twelfth annual statewide database trial is sponsored by Secretary of State and State Librarian Jesse White and the Illinois State Library. Try-It! Illinois offers library staff and patrons to survey and evaluate a wide variety of electronic resources. Thanks to the partnerships between the Illinois State Library and the participating electronic resource vendors, there is no charge for accessing these databases during Try-It! Illinois.
Due to the nature of this program, libraries are asked not to post the Try-It! Illinois login and password on the Internet, on Web sites or in publicly archived e-newsletters. To access these resources, please contact your local Illinois Library and pick up a login information sheet in person!
Due to the absolutely astounding offering of databases, I've compiled a "must see" list of genealogy resources available during the trial:
- African American Heritage
- America`s GenealogyBank
- America`s Historical Newspapers
- America's Obituaries & Death Notices
- American Broadsides and Ephemera
- Digital Sanborn Maps Geo Edition
- Fold3 History & Genealogy Archives Plus
- Historic Map Works
- Historical Chicago Defender (1909-1975)
- Historical Chicago Tribune (1849 – 1985)
- Historical New York Times (1851 – 2006)
- Newspaper Source Plus
- NewspaperARCHIVE.com (world newspapers from 1700's onward!)
- ProQuest Obituaries
Here is a recommended list of auxiliary resources which may assist you with your research:
- African-American History Online
- American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collections: Series 1
- American History
- Daily Life America
- Daily Life Through History
- Daily Life World Folklore and Folklife
- Dictionary of Irish Biography
- p4A Antiques Reference database
The Try-It Illinois database trial is a great way for patrons to give libraries valuable observations and feedback regarding online databases. So please let your librarian know what you enjoyed and what tools you found useful!
See you at the library!


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Hopkinsville, KY entrepreneur of the early 1900s
Metcalfe Flowers was founded in 1902 by Hopkinsville businessman Thomas Lee Metcalfe (T. L. Metcalfe). Today, the business still operates in its original building on the corner of 7th and Liberty.
In addition to his flower business in Hopkinsville, T. L. Metcalfe had greenhouses at Madisonville, Kentucky, and at Jackson, Clarksville, and Springfield, Tennessee. He also owned and operated the Hopkinsville Steam Laundry and the Avalon, an assembly hall where organizations could hold meetings and luncheons.
Metcalfe published a bi-weekly newspaper in Hopkinsville, as well. The Independent, one of eight newspapers listed for Hopkinsville in the 1899 National Newspaper Directory and Gazetteer, came out on Tuesdays and Fridays, and had a circulation of 1500.
The flower business
Metcalfe's advertisements for floral workers give some insight to the nature of his flower business:
HELP WANTED— A young man assistant to foreman in growing carnations and roses principally; must also be able to do design work and some little outside gardening; wages $10 per week with room and washing: board can be had for $3 per week. Address T. L. Metcalfe, Hopkinsville, Ky. (Source: March 7, 1907, Weekly Florists Review.)
HELP WANTED — At once, a first-class grower of roses, carnations and pot stuff, also a good designer, who can act as working foreman of 35,000 feet of glass; salary $15.00 per week for first year; house furnished and laundry free. Address at once, with reference. T. L. Metcalfe, Hopkinsville, Ky. (Source: March 2, 1911, Florists Review.)The laundry
As owner of the Hopkinsville Steam Laundry, Metcalfe invented and patented a shipping hamper for laundries in 1904. The hamper was designed to "provide a simple, inexpensive, and efficient basket or hamper of great strength and durability designed for use by laundries for shipping clothes and adapted to be conveniently handled without liability of breaking or otherwise injuring it." (Source: Metcalfe's patent drawings and application.)
Citizen of Hopkinsville
T. L. Metcalfe is mentioned several times in Charles Meachem's history of Christian County. Meachem recorded that Metcalfe gave away 1500 carnations to school children as part of Hopkinsville's 1910 celebration of the laying of the cornerstone of the new high school. (This would have been the old Hopkinsville High School on Walnut Street -- a building which has been torn down.)
Meachem also lists T. L. Metcalfe as a member of the Odd Fellows Lodge in Hopkinsville and as a near-winner of a contest in which the number of perfectly-formed seeds in a large pumpkin were guessed.
Also of interest
Mr. Metcalfe was once in a train wreck near Clarksville, Tennessee. He suffered cuts and bruises during the wreck but gathered his senses and rescued three people from the burning cars before escaping himself. Fire consumed the train cars within seven minutes. (Source: March 2, 1911, Florists Review.)
T.L. Metcalfe's father was a minister, and his maternal grandfather, Whitfield Killebrew, was an early settler in Montgomery County, Tennessee.
The Sixth General Catalogue of Sigma Alpha Epsilon records that T. L. Metcalfe was born in 1864 and married Clara Orr in 1895. I do not know the date of T. L. Metcalfe's death.
Researching this entrepreneur
I stopped at Metcalfe Flowers today to ask about its founder, but none of the employees could tell me anything but his name and the date that the business was founded. However, that was enough to find a surprising amount of information about T. L. Metcalfe on the internet.
While researching T. L. Metcalfe tonight, I've felt respect for his spirit of entrepreneurism. He seems to have been a very capable businessman. I think he'd be shocked at all the bail-outs of 2008 and 2009.


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In the past I read several times about Stars of David decorating the walls around the old city of Jerusalem. I even went to take a photo of the one that was supposed to be on the dung gate - but couldn't find it. Recently Rafi Kfir, lecturer and owner of the Ahavat Yerushalayim company, told me on the phone where are these Stars of David on the walls of Jerusalem. He told me about two places but I found a third one by myself. I enjoyed so much riding in the car slowly along the walls searching for these symbols...
Anyhow I didn't know what's behind this phenomenon until I stumbled upon an article about Sultan Suleiman (1494-1566) the Magnificent who built these walls (1535-1538).
It was Sultan Suleiman's messianic consciousness which led him to develop the link between himself and King Solomon.
From the above excerpt readers may conclude that the Stars of David on the Walls of Jerusalem are not merely aesthetic Muslim decorations but that they are connected to the Jewish sources, to King Solomon.


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Fill in the Consultation to end Third party Puppy and Kitten sales
Save Me Trust Announcement Thursday 8th February 2018 Save Me has been working to end third party puppy sales in Britain since 2015. We have been working with the wonderful Marc Abraham and Pup Aid, better known as TV's Marc the Vet to ensure that the government also includes a number of other measures that will stop the suffering of dogs in Britain today.
Save Me CEO, Anne Brummer said; " We are pleased that Michael Gove has listened and responded to the need for better control of third-party sales, the licensing of breeders, that Mum should always be present and interacting with the puppies and kitten.
Our concerns regarding the sales of puppies and kittens that are weak, underdeveloped or under 8 weeks of age and have been bred by the breeder have been included in the consultation as well as the requirement for the new owner to be present at the point of sale. We believe this will stop the sales of puppies and kittens online.
If you were to see a puppy farmer's premises you would probably find it quite easy to see that the conditions are not adequate or acceptable, particularly if you asked to see their kennelling conditions. However, most puppy and kitten farmers will transport their puppies across the country to dealers, who then sell them from the internet, pet shops, free newspapers or even motorway service stations and this makes it a lot more difficult to identify where the puppy originated from.
'Some people still don't get it. Dogs being treated as a commodity. And cats too. Sold in shops or in the Internet. With no regard for their welfare beyond what is necessary to keep this shameful trade going. Puppy farms where dogs (and cats) suffer their whole lives as slaves kept alive only for breeding. IT WILL END SOON. And not a moment too soon. And in the meantime - NEVER buy a dog or a cat - RESCUE an abandoned creature and give it a loving home. There are so many waiting to be adopted. Bri'
Here are a few tips to protect you from a rogue Puppy and Kitten farmer
- Ask to see the kitten or puppy's mother, which should be present.
- See the puppy or kitten in it's breeding environment and ask to look at the kennelling conditions. If the puppy or kitten wasn't raised by the breeder or you suspect the conditions are not right, then DO NOT buy the puppy or kitten.
- For a pedigree puppy or kitten always go to a reliable and reputable Kennel Club Assured Breeder which you can find here. If you want to find breeders currently with puppies or kittens visit the Kennel Club's Find a Puppy website here. Assured Breeders will appear at the top of the search with purple scheme logos next to their name.
- Be prepared to be put on a waiting list – a healthy puppy or kitten is well worth waiting for.
- Ask if you can return the puppy or kitten if things don't work out. Responsible and reputable breeders will always say yes.
- Be suspicious of a breeder selling more than one (maximum two) breeds, unless you are sure of their credentials.
- Consider alternatives to buying a pedigree puppy or kitten like getting a rescue dog or pup. Click here to find a breed rescue puppy.
- Buy a puppy or kitten from a pet shop – these have often come from puppy or kitten farms.
- Pick your puppy or kitten up from a 'neutral location' such as a motorway service station. The offer to meet you half way is a common tactic used by puppy or kitten farm dealers.
- Never buy a puppy or kitten to "rescue it". Your just creating space for the dealer to breed more puppies or kittens.
- Be fooled by a fake Kennel Club pedigree certificate. These are often used by puppy or kitten farmers who are already operating illegally and are unlikely to have any qualms about forging paperwork. Very few puppy or kitten farmers will register their litters with the Kennel Club. If in doubt check with the Kennel Club.
We encourage the animal loving public to respond to the consultation process and remain confident of the government will legislate on the outcome in due course.
Fill in the Consultation Link here


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Given the overwhelming body of evidence that points to the power or high quality early childhood education, it saddens us to think that there are "coveted spots" and that parents have to pitch tents to get kids into kindergarten classrooms. This investment pays high dividends and the folks in Sacramento need to be provided with unfettered access. We would advocate that all of the parents "occupy" the school grounds until all children are registered.
STORY: Parents Camp For Kindergarten Registration At Lincoln Crossing Elementary School In California (VIDEO)


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SCHEUERLE Fahrzeugfabrik, a subsidiary of the Transporter Industry International Group (TII Group), has once again secured the title of "Germany's Innovation Leader" this year. - Wed, 24 Jun 2020 10:02:00 CESTCargotec's Kalmar and MacGregor to help drive development of connected automated waterborne transport through participation in AEGIS project
Cargotec's Kalmar and MacGregor have announced their joint participation in AEGIS (Advanced, Efficient and Green Intermodal Systems), a three-year project funded by the EU's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme. - Wed, 03 Jun 2020 01:33:00 CESTHGV road transport – more utilisation through adaptation
There will be a much greater need for flexibility in the future, both for transport service providers working on behalf of other companies and for large companies with their own fleets of vehicles, - Fri, 29 May 2020 11:46:00 CEST


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I don't think you could find two more different men in the fur trade than these two men.
Anderson was a gentleman who studied Latin but not Greek, and could quote from Homer and other great classical writers -- Birnie was the son of a tanner who spoke in a rough Scottish brogue (of which he was very proud) and who read little more than "Scott's novels."
Yet, it appears, they got on very well.
James Birnie was the son of a tanner, and grandson of a shoemaker; an uncle apprenticed as a saddler -- but James chose a different career and joined the fur trade of the North West Comany in 1816.
He spent two years in Lachine "learning the French language of the fur trade."
In 1818 he left Lachine and crossed the country with the Lachine brigade and Edmonton brigade, and finally the Columbia express.
By November 1818 he was in the Columbia and a few months later was trapping for furs with Donald McKenzie in the Snake River district.
I suspect he was a valuable man in the North West Company, because he knew how to prepare the furs that the other men trapped.
In spring 1820 he accompanied the men who delivered the beaver pelts to the company's headquarters at Fort George (Astoria), and there he married Charlot Beaulieu, daughter of a free-trader named Beaulieu who hung around Spokane House and the Snake district.
In 1821 the North West Company was taken over by the HBC, and James Birnie was re-engaged while other men were released from the new Company's service.
In 1822 he was placed in charge of Spokane House, and kept the post's journals for two years.
On August 15, 1822, Charlot Birnie gave birth to their first daughter, Betsy, who would eventually marry Alexander Caulfield Anderson.
Birnie was at Fort Vancouver in 1824 when his son was born, and at Fort Okanagan when Governor Simpson arrived at the post.
Simpson took an immediate dislike to Birnie, saying that he was "useful in the Columbia as he can make himself understood among several of the Tribes and knows the country well; but not particularly active, nor has he much firmness: deficient in point of education; a loose talking fellow who seldom considers it necessary to confine himself to the truth."
Simpson always held a poor education against a man, and there is plenty of proof that Birnie did not have a good education.
But I suspect that Simpson, who had worked hard to cover up his illegitimate past in Scotland, found that Birnie's Scottish brogue reminded him of it.
Birnie was in charge of Spokane House in summer 1825, and planted the first crop of potatoes at the new Fort Colvile which was to be built that summer.
In spring 1826, Birnie crossed the Rocky Mountains with the outgoing express, and at Edmonton House they joined the Saskatchewan boats and travelled all the way to York Factory, on Hudson's Bay.
Governor Simpson's cousin, Lieutenant Aemelius Simpson, travelled with Birnie on the return journey from York Factory to Fort Vancouver, and he kept a journal of the trip.
In 1825 Birnie was assigned to the Thompson's River post (Kamloops), but never made it there.
Instead we find him at Fort Vancouver, helping in the construction of the second post.(Fort Vancouver was moved to a location closer to the river shortly after it was constructed for the first time.)
In November 1826 Birnie travelled south with dispatches for Chief Trader A.R. McLeod, leader of the first trapping expedition south to the Umpqua River.
In October 1827, Birnie was sent to the Nez Perce fort to assist and strengthen the express party as they travelled downriver to the headquarters -- one of the two Chinookian tribes at The Dalles had been more hostile than usual and McLoughlin worried about the express' safety.
In July 1828 Birnie signed a new contract with the company; in September he was still at Fort Vanocuver but in October he had built a new post at the Dalles of the Columbia River to prevent the Natives' furs from falling into the hands of an American competitor.
As the best trading place near the Dalles was amongst the Wishram Natives who tended to be more hostile to traders than their neighbours, the nervous American trader set up his camp close to Birnie's post for protection.
By April he had gone, and Birnie closed his post.
In 1830 Birnie was acting as doctor for the many fur traders who fell sick from the "intermittent fever" or malaria that attacked Fort Vancouver that year.
The botanist David Douglas may have been one of his patients; Peter Skene Ogden was also taken seriously ill.
On March 14, 1833, Birnie boarded the Dryad and sailed north to his new posting at Fort Simpson, on the Northwest coast close to Russian territory.
Alexander Caulfield Anderson was one of the men on the Dryad, and he and Birnie became fast friends (probably because Betsy was also travelling north on the Dryad with her father).
On this journey north, Anderson determined to marry Betsy Birnie when she was old enough (she was only 11 years old).
Birnie remained at Fort Simpson while Anderson served at Fort McLoughlin to the south.
They met again a year later when both men accompanied Peter Skene Ogden to the Stikine River to set up a post in the interior.
They were repulsed, and returned to Fort Simpson to rebuild it in a new location.
Birnie remained behind, and Anderson followed Peter Skene Ogden into New Caledonia; they would not see each other for many years.
On his return to Fort Vancouver, Birnie was re-assigned to Fort George (Astoria) where he remained for many years.
In 1837 his daughter Betsy travelled up the brigade trail to marry Alexander Anderson.
Birnie acted as pilot for many of the ships that entered the Columbia River, and he guided them upriver to Fort Vancouver.
Some missionaries who arrived at the river mouth wrote their memoirs, giving an excellent description of both James Birnie and his wife, Charlot.
These missionaries had ignored Birnie's signals to find the safe crossing of the bar, but made it safely into the river in spite of that.
They told Birnie it was a miracle they made it across.
Birnie agreed with the Catholic missionaries that "God had saved them ... but in order that a second miracle might not be necessary he would ... guide them through the banks that lay between them and the fort [Vancouver.]"
He welcomed them to his house, and fed them two huge dinners, one of which included some blackberry pies baked by Charlot, his wife.
(I grew up on blackberry pies -- I guess it is part of my heritage.)
The missionaries were delighted by the Birnie family, but shocked that the Birnie women did not drink wine with their dinner.
Out of politeness, they too declined to have wine.
The missionaries would have described Charlot as a pretty woman with bright eyes and dark glassy hair, as another pioneer woman described her.
James was a big man; a broad-shouldered and deep-chested man who stood 6 feet tall.
In 1843, Francis Ermatinger described Birnie in a letter to his brother, Edward: "Birnie remains at Fort George and has children enough for a colony. He looks as young as ever, and is as fat and lazy as a man ought to be, when he is thought no more of than he is by Sir George [Simpson]."
Ermatinger knew something that Birnie did not -- that George Simpson had tried to have John McLoughlin retire Birnie with a pension of 60 pound per annum for seven years!
McLoughlin had refused to do so, saying privately that the Governor should do his dirty work himself, but telling Simpson he had no good man to replace Birnie.
When a frustrated Birnie finally retired from the HBC in 1846, he chose to settle in a place he called "Birnie's Retreat," on the north bank of the Columbia River halfway between Fort George and Fort Vancouver.
He might have chosen the north bank because he thought it might remain British territory, while the south bank would almost certainly go to the Americans.
It did not; the new boundary line ran along the 49th parallel, hundreds of miles to the north of Birnie's property.
Before Birnie left the company's employee, he had the Fort George men clear his land and build the store and house.
When he moved in, he brought with him some cattle which he had pastured on the Clatsop plains, and sixteen Native employees he had rescued from the slave trade that flourished up and down the coast.
Birnie opened his store to business, and almost immediately did well.
The American settlers travelled up and down the river and almost all stopped at the Birnie store.
Dried salmon sold for $20.00 a barrel, butter was $1.00 lb., lard was 60 cts.; fine shirts sold for $2.50 and whiskey for $3.00 a gallon.
Soon his son in law Anderson retired from the fur trade and settled beside him.
Birnie's Retreat was renamed Cathlamet, and the village became the social centre of the area around Fort Vancouver.
Charlot became a confident, self assured hostess who welcomed visitors into her home and entertained them on the porch that offered a spectacular view of the river and a bookcase filled with Birnie's volumes of Scott's novels.
But Cathlamet has remained isolated; even today it has one gravel road leading in and only one stop sign in the entire county!
But Birnie began to show confusion and Thomas Lowe warned, "In any transactions you have with Mr. Birnie endeavour to have everything put in black and white, and for God's sake leave nothing to be understood, as I have always found that these understandings are looked upon by him as the principal part of the bargain, and generally prove a fruitful source of misunderstanding afterwards."
To Anderson, Lowe wrote of Charlot, "I also know how difficult it is to reason with Mrs. Birnie. Her grief is most poignant at times and in these paroxysms it is fruitless to endeavour to console her."
They had plenty to mourn.
By 1854, two daughters and one son were buried in the little churchyard at the top of the hills, and three Anderson children were also buried there.
From early days, James Birnie had flown a handmade American flag above the store, which he cheerfully dipped at every passing ship.
He was sixty eight years old when he died in December 1864.
It was his last wish that he be buried in that handmade flag on his death.
Auld James Birnie, Laird of Cathlamet, died at home and was buried in the little churchyard at the top of the hill, carefully wrapped in his homemade American flag.
Charlot lived twelve more years in comfort, surrounded by her surviving children.
She died on July 7, 1878, and was buried beside her husband in the little cemetary at the top of the hill.
James and Charlot's shared grave has the largest stone in the pioneer cemetary, befitting of their standing as the founders of Cathlamet.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Alexander Caulfield Anderson and James Birnie
Posted by Nancy Marguerite Anderson at 2:58 PM
Labels: James Birnie
2 comments:
- AnonymousMay 22, 2010 at 9:00 AM
hello... hapi blogging... have a nice day! just visiting here....ReplyDelete
Wonderfully researched story. Very interesting indeed.ReplyDelete
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Martyrs Probus, Tarachus, and Andronicus, at Tarsus in Cilicia
The Martyrs Tarachus, Probus, and Andronicus suffered for Christ in the year 304 at Tarsus in Cilicia. When the pagans ordered him to offer sacrifice to idols, the old soldier Tarachus replied that he would offer a pure heart to the one true God instead of sacrifices of blood. Seeing the firmness of the saint's confession the true Faith, the proconsul gave them all over to torture.
"When my body suffers," Saint Probus said to the idol worshippers, "then my soul is healed and invigorated." The tormentors refined their tortures, such as their rage could invent, and then they tore the bodies of the saints apart. Christians secretly took up the relics of the saints and buried them.


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"X-Men: First Class" may get a "Kick-Ass" director.
Matthew Vaughn is in talks to direct the Fox film, according to Entertainment Weekly.
The helmer has a brief history with the Marvel comics franchise – he reportedly walked away from "X-Men: The Last Stand" after a deal was on the table. (Brett Ratner went on to direct the film.)
Matthew's latest turn in the director's chair, last month's comic book-based "Kick-Ass," has earned $68 million worldwide on a reported $30 million budget.
The "X-Men" prequel, set to focus on the early days of the mutant superhero team and based on the comic book series of the same name, has gone through a number of shake-ups since development began in late 2008.
In November 2008, Variety reported that "Gossip Girl" and "Chuck" creator Josh Schwartz would script the film, but news came a year later that Jamie Moss ("Street Kings") was the current writer.
Bryan Singer, who directed "X-Men" and "X2," was initially set to direct but backed out due to scheduling conflicts with his latest effort, "Jack the Giant Killer" – instead, he will serve as a producer on the film.
Another new "X-Men" film, the follow-up to "X-Men Origins: Wolverine," is also in the early stages of development, with Hugh Jackman set to reprise the title role.
Related Content from AccessHollywood.com:
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VIEW THE PHOTOS: 'X-Men Origins: Wolverine' Scenes & Stars
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MORE ACCESS ON THESE TOPICS: Geek Chic - Movies - Hugh Jackman - Gossip Girl - Marvel


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Women runners way better than men at pacing
When it comes to pacing, women runners have men beat.
A study of 91,929 runners in 14 marathons noted that after the halfway point, men generally slow down by nearly 16%, while women slow down just 12%, Mic.com reports.
Scientists consider a 30% second-half drop in speed as a major slowdown—and this happened to some 14% of men, but just 5% of women.
Even experienced male runners were more likely than experienced women to see their speed decrease in the second half of a marathon.
Meanwhile, an earlier study noted by the Wall Street Journal found that women were more likely than men to run the second half of a race faster than the first.
One explanation is tied to the fact that "men will burn a greater percentage of carbohydrates for fuel than women," a researcher tells the New York Times.
Women burn more fat, and people have more fat than stored carbohydrates in our bodies.
The result: "Men typically run out of fuel and bonk or hit the wall earlier than women do." Then there's the fact that men use a "risky" running strategy. "They start out fast and just hope they can hold on," the researcher says. (If marathons are too much, running just a few minutes a day seems to have health benefits.)
Newser is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the Web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.


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Polly Toynbee is a recipient of a lot of hatred on the web from a lot of people- she lectured about the blogosphere and the press gazette reported on her lecture this week. Iain Dale has written a cogent article criticising her piece and being relatively positive about some of her comments. His agreement with her that its worth considering how difficult political choices are and be tolerant of politicians is something that I agree with. I want to discuss one point that she raises which I think illustrates something rather interesting about the blogosphere as opposed to the traditional media.
In the traditional media, as people often point out there is a choice of very few options- you have the Guardian, the Sun, the Times etc- who all appoint people of the same kind of experience. Most of those who write about politics in the mainstream media are people who hang around Westminster and talk a lot to politicians- many of them write pieces of incredible insight based upon these contacts they make at Westminster and Toynbee is right to say that that is an incredibly good way of thinking and writing about politics:
here is a skill in crafting a column with a beginning, a middle and an end, a coherent argument and at least three facts readers don't know, preferably information gleaned from talking to the leading players in the case.
She is right that this is one approach but as later in the speech she confessed her experience as BBC social affairs correspendent struggling to get her views in instead of the Westminster lads on the politics of social affairs that isn't the only perspective. One element of this can be seen in the rather difficult analysis of Islam that is produced often in the papers- some commentators seem not to understand at all that a religion is not a timeless thing or a regionless thing but varies- statements like Islam is peaceful or warlike are nonsense- some Muslims are peaceful, some aren't. The majority at the moment live in peace.
What the blogosphere does offer is a place where people can write who know more about specific issues and take a more academic attitude. There are virtues to being away from Westminster and being a consumer of articles, books, manuscripts and a professional in some other way of life. I'm always intrigued by policeman's blogs, nurses blogs and academic blogs. There are blogs like Iain Dale's which are more like the journalist's but most of them are out there talking about their author's knowledge of some area. Indeed the majority of blogs aren't actually political but they may deal tangentially with political issues.
Personally that's where my interest in blogs lies- its that kind of supplement to the media that I think they can provide- say with Juan Cole's blog about the Middle East being a prime example- that I am really concerned. In that way the blogs can actually improve output by providing another perspective- not supplanting the media but just providing a different way of looking at the world.


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Novatherm Depilatory Gel - 20 oz.
Reduces adhesion to skin. Unique depilatory gel employs Epillyss? patented Bior?sine C3 which makes this wax an excellent vasodilatator and helps reduce adhesion to the skin. This gel wax enjoys an exceptional texture and a shiny red colour as a result of the trace-elements in the formula. Suitable for all types of skin and hairs.
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Have you noticed my new blog design..
I promised in my last post that I will share the projects I am currently working on..
So here I am back with some new Post-it-Notes Fridge Magnets..
But before I move on to today's project I will answer some questions..
I often get a lot of questions about how do I make my projects..what is the process behind creating my designs...etc.. etc..
& the truth is.. There is no fixed process..
I go with the flow...
I gather things I would like to use...
( If I have some new supplies then 99% chances are that I will use them :) )
Then I try to arrange them... mix & match... maybe add something else to add interest.. like pearls, rhinestones, ribbons, flowers etc..& experiment till I am satisfied & then I glue them up..
Simple.. :)
The only thing to keep in mind is that you have to experiment & sometimes take some risks to come up with a great idea & design...
Now lets move on to Post-it-Notes...
After searching so many places I finally got my hands on Kraft CS..
& I LOVE it.. :)
And I want to use it in all my projects...
And that is the reason behind my last 2 cards being Kraft based.. hehehe..
I also got vintage Photo & have been using it like crazy.. :)
So when I sat down to make these beauties.. these 2 things were the first things I took..
I also got some pretty PPs (from FMI, A5) & a variety of leaves recently..
So.. I started working & came up with these..
I didn't want to cover the beautiful designs so I just inked the edges with Vintage Photo & added some pearls, rhinestones, holographic glitter glue to most of them..
The 4 post-its in the 1st photo had white spaces on the top where I added some paper roses & leaves..
The springy thing was made with the leftover stems of the roses..
They look much more prettier in person..
All of the above are made from a single sheet of A5 PP.. !!!
I made all of these in a matter of few hours.. Fast na.. :)
There are more designs of Post-it-notes but will share them in my next post..
There are more designs of Post-it-notes but will share them in my next post..
Do visit my facebook page for some closeup shots..
Those of you in India who are looking for Kraft CS can visit my store..
Supplies Used:
Thank you for visiting..


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Global Sourcing Supplier - "Hong Kong Li Seng Co Ltd "is a huge or small quantity supplier of Lace Fabric, Laces, Crochet, Trimmings for the apparel, Craft and all home furnishing industries.
Have sample for your PP Sample, Counter Sample and Bulk Production
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Took care of all the glitches — Thanks to everyone's help in catching them.Sorry it took so long =(. For those who don't know already, to kill the boss you have to wait till he turns red =).
This is not your standard music based game. It is an experimental game to test how music and platformers can mix. You do not have to play to the rhythm, but rather the rhythm plays with you.
This is an exciting combination of Music and Platformer Genres, with 4 stages that have 4 different play mechanics. It IS all centered around your average platform game, but with a very large and musical twist. This is probably my most original flash I've made in a while.
Caution: The game is pretty tough, and it will most definitly take you more than one try to make it through the whole thing. The final boss is pretty challenging, but very possible to beat.
Song available for download from the NG audio portal. Songs are found here :


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California Governor Jerry Brown has hired a "jobs czar" to help reduce the state's high unemployment.
On the surface, that makes a lot of sense. After all, California's unemployment rate is 12.0 percent, nearly 3 points above the national rate of 9.1 percent and second only to neighboring Nevada's 12.9 percent.
But a closer look at the governor's appointment raises serious questions.
Within Brown's executive branch lies the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, a cabinet-level position. Even more confusing is that the agency houses the California Economic Strategy Panel, whose mandate is "to develop a statewide vision and strategic initiatives...for economic growth and competitiveness."
Doesn't "economic growth" mean jobs?
All this is even more curious, given that Brown has gone on a binge to reduce government waste. He's recalled 48,000 state-owned cell phones and sold thousands of state-owned vehicles in an effort to save money, not to mention billions of dollars of cuts in the 2011-2012 state budget.
U.S. & World
News from around the country and around the globe
Why, then, hire someone to do a job that others are already supposed to do?
Brown's new appointee is the latest example of an executive branch in need of serious pruning. For example, if California elects an Insurance Commissioner, why does the executive branch also have a Department of Consumer Affairs? Or why do two cabinet-level agencies--the Business, Transportation and Housing Agency and the Health and Human Services Agency--each have departments dealing with managed health care? In fact, the executive branch seems replete with duplication in all kinds of policy areas.
In fairness, Jerry Brown did not create this mess. He's actually called for the elimination of the several state agencies including the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board and the California Post-Secondary Education Commission.
Still, the size and complexity of the state's executive branch has been swelling for years. And adding a "jobs czar" next to jobs-developing agencies already in place doesn't seem to make things better.


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Sunday, April 17, 2011
Another theory on the origin of our "Beaulieu brothers."
I had spent the day on my blog posting my notions of where the men I call "Our Beaulieu brothers" might have come from.
The quote was written by George Orwell in 1946, and said: "The point is that we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right.
"Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time; the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield."
As genealogists, our false beliefs might not bump up against solid reality on a battlefield, but they can, and do, create plenty of heated arguments as we descendents search in different places for our ancestors' trail.
One descendent searches the Minnesota archives for stories about his Rondeau/Beaulieu ancestors, another "Old Man Beaulieu" descendent collects stories in the Athabasca district, while I search fur trade records and French-Canadian genealogy records on the PRDH and ancestry.ca.
None of us are successful in finding out who our ancestors are, but we have plenty of discussions and we share our information with all other family members, so they can enter the discussion.
I think we may just be confusing them, but that, too, is okay.
We are all confused.
I have searched the PRDH and the Drouin records and set up family trees online which have not collected any new information.
I have now come to the conclusion that either our brothers are not brothers at all and we have been chasing false leads through fur trade history -- or our three brothers were born in the wilds outside Quebec, and were probably already Metis.
One other Beaulieu descendent agrees with me on this, and has collected stories that support that belief, and shared them with us.
She says that when the fur trader Peter Pond arrived at Great Slave Lake on his first visit, he met the child, Francois "Old Man" Beaulieu, and his uncle Jacques.
She suggests that the voyageur who accompanied Alexander Mackenzie on his trip to the Pacific Ocean in 1793 was the father of Francois "Old Man" Beaulieu.
She also suggests that this elder Francois had a French father and a Cree mother, and was a former employee of the Compagnie des Sioux, begun in 1827.
And another titbit -- there were said to have originally been three Beaulieu brothers in the region, and suggests that their names were Jacques, Francois, and Pierre.
The Beaulieu family was already well established in the area for some years when Cuthbert Grant and Peter Pond arrived there.
So, let us look at our story this way:
Our story evolves around Peter Pond's arrival at Great Slave Lake -- when did his first visit occur?
As a twenty five year old, Pond left Milford, Conn., to join the fur trade in the Detroit area.
By 1776 he was in the area south of the Athabaska and wintered at Sturgeon River, Saskatchewan.
It was not until 1778 that he pushed north into the Athabasca and wintered on the Athabasca River 40 miles from the lake -- Athabasca lake, I presume, not Great Slave Lake.
In 1781-2 he wintered at Lac la Ronge, Saskatchewan; it wasn't until the spring of 1783 that Pond returned to the Athabasca, and learning the location of Great Slave Lake came into contact with the Beaulieu brothers there.
In 1784 he left the Athabasca and never returned.
I am not sure if anyone is really certain of the date of Pond's visit to Great Slave Lake, but let us work with 1783.
A French Canadian named Beaulieu, an employee of the Compagnie des Sioux, arrived at Great Slave Lake some years before Peter Pond arrived there -- maybe 1760?
He took a Cree Wife, and by 1783 -- when Pond visited -- was well established with a family of three sons.
If the first of these three boys was perhaps Jacques or Zacharie, born about 1765 -- this boy would have been about eighteen years old when Peter Pond arrived at Great Slave Lake.
He would have been mature enough to take charge of the situation.
But we have always said that he and his two brothers were French Canadians -- in this scenario these three brother are already French-Canadian & Cree Metis.
The second of these boys might have been Francois I, who took a Chipewyan woman named Ethiba as a wife and had children who would have been young when Alexander Mackenzie arrived there in 1793.
If he was about twenty five years old when he accompanied Mackenzie to the west coast, he was born about 1768, and he would have been fifteen when Peter Pond arrived.
But it was his son, Francois II (Old Man Beaulieu) who claimed to be fifteen years old when Peter Pond arrived at Great Slave Lake!
The third boy might have been younger -- too young to join his brother on the voyage west with Alexander Mackenzie in 1793.
If he was born about 1775, he would have been eighteen years old when Mackenzie came to Great Slave Lake, and eight or so when Peter Pond arrived.
Was his name Pierre, or was it Joseph???
If Joseph, he was old enough in 1801 to have joined the fur trade and gone to Red River to be counted in the North West Company's Red River records -- twenty six years old.
In 1805 he was experienced enough in the fur trade to be labelled a voyageur contre-maitre -- "master voyageur."
In 1807 when he met David Thompson he was thirty two years old, and had a daughter, Charlot, born in 1805 when he was thirty years old.
His second daughter, Josephine, was born in what later became Montana, in 1809 or thereabouts when he was 34 years old.
In 1811 he was thirty six years old and a free trapper.
In 1818 his eldest daughter Charlot married James Birnie, and Birnie heard the story that this Beaulieu's brother had accompanied Alexander Mackenzie from Great Slave Lake to the west coast in 1793.
A slight interruption: I think that is important -- I think that this Joseph Beaulieu was present when he saw his older brother leave Great Slave Lake with Mackenzie.
These French Canadian voyageurs were not literate; his presence as a child in the Athabasca district helps explain how he knew of his brother's adventures.
To continue his story: This Beaulieu brother remained in the territory west of the mountains until about 1820, when he was forty five years old and relatively old for the hard work of a voyageur and a free trader/trapper.
Sometime after Charlot's marriage to James Birnie, he disappeared and "returned to Montreal."
I wonder where he really settled down.
His older brother, Francois, also disappeared from the Athabasca.
I wonder what was "Home" to them?
All this is theory, but I think we need to consider this story as a possiblity.
The only hitch in the story is Francois II's claims that he was at the North West arm of the Great Slave Lake when Peter Pond arrived in 1783.
I think he adopted his father's memories and wove them into his own.
I like this story.
It explains how there was a well established French Canadian and Metis community at Great Slave Lake when Peter Pond arrived.
It explains how these men were adult enough to have been established at Great Slave Lake for a number of years before Pond arrived, and still be young enough to have enjoyed the adventures that Francois I celebrated with Alexander Mackenzie, and Joseph with David Thompson.
I think it all works.
But I think we'll never be able to prove it.
I think I have created a false belief that will, eventually, bump up against solid reality -- and that solid reality will be this: that we can only guess where these men come from, but we will never be able to prove it.
5 comments:
Old Man Beaulieu was apparently a very controversial man (became a freeman amongst other traits). I once linked up with one of his descendant that works for Park Canada (Wood Buffalo in the NWT). I was told that his grave is only known to a few elederly and kept secret. A Metis book I once borrowed from my library had a full page on this person. Absolutely fascinating story. I share the same last name although have no family relationship whatsoever as far as I have been able to determine.ReplyDelete
I talk to a bunch of Old Man Beaulieu descendants (there are many). If you want more information I can put you in touch with them. Contact me directly. Some of them also read this blog.ReplyDelete
I like your theory. One thing to keep in mind, in the 1700s, if the father was French and the mother was from an indigenous nation, the children can be called Canadien. I have a nice example dating back to 1715 or 1716 that attests to this. Thus, the first Beaulieu could easily have been called Canadien (with a capital c) even if he was métis (with a small m) as one could be Canadien and have mixed ancestry.ReplyDelete
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These Teens Are Crazy: 17-Year Old Boy Snatched His Sister's Braids Out & Left Her Bald & Beat Up His Grandmother + 15-Year-Old Girl "My Door Says Boy Cause I Love Boys And Penis"
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The Jungle Book Full DurationFull The Jungle Book For Free with duration 120 Min and broadcast on 2016-04-15 and MPAA rating is 14.
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|TransGens Discussion Group
- Program/Event:
- Transgender Initiative, Events for Families, Events for Youth
- Event date:
- Saturday, October 10, 2020 10am - 12pm
- Location:
- LGBT Center of Raleigh, 119 E Hargett St, Raleigh NC 27601
- Center Room:
- Conference Room
- Event Contact:
- Cheryl Hiser
- Contact Phone:
- 919-832-4484
- Contact E-mail:
- firstname.lastname@example.com
A discussion group for parents and their adolescent transgender or gender non-conforming children. Program is geared toward adolescents in middle and high school (6th-12th grades) and their parents.
We will get to know each other and have open discussion about transition-related topics. Meetings may occasionally have specific topics or guided discussion. Please contact Cheryl at firstname.lastname@example.com if you have questions or a proposed topic for discussion.
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New Video – Guideline – Mr. Jay
Austrian rockers Guideline have released a new video, "Mr. Jay" in support of their album, Traveler on Midway.Vodpod videos no longer available.
Like what you hear? You can download three songs, "Mr. Jay", "But I'm Not",and "Into the Wild" from the new disc at Guideline's website. Traveler on Midway will be released on January 21st, 2011!
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Tag Archives: dragon ball
Out of Continues Ep 294
This week, I'm with Adrian as we talk about vertical vs horizontal character progression. After that, we cover gaming news on Nioh, Hawken, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Street Fighter V, and more! Stafa http://media.techpodcasts.com/outofcontinues/p/outofcontinues.com/assets/audio/OOCep294.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: … Continue reading
Posted in Out of Continues, Podcasts Tagged dbz, dragon ball, dragon ball super, dragon ball z, Hawken, horizon, Justice League, Nintendo, nintendo switch, nioh, out of continues, podcast, sfv, sfv arcade edition, Stafa, steam, street fighter v arcade edition, the tick, vertical character progression, vertical vs horizontal character progression, video games, videogames Comments Off on Out of Continues Ep 294


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Study After Nicolas Poussin: God Surrounded by Angels (from the Della Torre Palace)
- Artist:
- Jean-Honoré Fragonard (French, 1732-1806)
- Date:
- 1760-61
- Medium:
- Black chalk on paper
- Dimensions:
- 17-3/4 x 13 in. (45.1 x 33.0 cm)
- Credit Line:
- The Norton Simon Foundation
- Accession Number:
- Copyright:
- © The Norton Simon Foundation
Abbe Jean Claude Richard de Saint-Non.
Comtesse de Bearn-Behague, Paris (began acquiring the drawings in 1894, sold 1927 to;
Hon. Irwin Laughlin, Meridian House, Washington, D.C., by descent to his daughter;
Mrs. Hubert Chanler, Geneso, New York (sale, London, Sotheby's, 10 June 1959, lot 17, to);
[Maggs Brothers, Ltd., London].
Private Collection.
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Sullivan's legacy
For all the Hook stories on the ouster of UVA President Teresa Sullivan, click HERE.Read more on: Teresa Sullivan
5 comments
Ms Dragas must go.
"My vote was an indication of my dissatisfaction with the process and the decision that lead to the resignation of Terry Sullivan. I have not been presented with evidence that I believe merits asking for her resignation, nor have I ever indicated that I would be willing to support such an effort. Given an opportunity I would have also voted to support her reinstatement. It is my opinion that the process leading to her resignation was flawed. I am convinced that in the future the Board of Visitors will always meet in a scheduled meeting to discuss issues involving the President."
Heywood Fralin - one of the most respected, honest and generous men in Virginia who served two terms on the BOV of Virginia Tech and two terms on the BOV of the University where he served as Rector.
Appreciate's Fralin's vote and words.
Disagree for his call to move on so quickly and support interim Commerce Dean. I don't want to unite behind a BOV that does not have the confidence of the faculty without 1) explanation of change, reinstatement ,of Sullivan 2) resignation of BOV, 3) reforming the appointment process for BOV to have representation of non-corporate interests and have majority faculty, students, parents, staff-that's democracy.
Sullivan's statement to the Board is controlling, she was on the right track and the BOV wants to change that track to include a corporitizing of the University. we should not move on until we have had a full accounting
Dragos and Kington must go. Dr. Sullivan should be re-instated.
Dr. Sullivan respected the University's reputation and was improving upon it.
It is a miscarriage of justice and unbelievable greed.
I am writing in response to the Op-Ed by Paul Tudor Jones, published in yesterday's Daily Progress.
I believe that Mr. Jones' comments about undergraduate admission and yield at the University of Virginia, however well intended, were misleading, and need to be placed in context.
Of undergraduate admission at UVA, Mr. Jones wrote:
"UVA's most recent reported admissions yield is just 43%, which means the rate at which students accept a place at UVA after receiving an acceptance letter from Peabody Hall is well under half…and falling. Harvard's yield rate is more than 80 percent, Yale's is 68 percent and Stanford's is 73 percent. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill reports a 56 percent yield rate, 13 points higher than that of UVA."
In response, I would like to note:
1) Our number one priority is enrolling an academically strong and diverse class. The academic caliber of enrolling students at the University of Virginia has increased every year for the past five years, breaking records each year for SAT mean (1351 in 2012) and percent ranked in the top 10 percent of the class (93% in 2012).
2) At 43%, our yield rate this year is the same as it was in 2011, although it has declined since the elimination of our binding Early Decision program in 2008. Students admitted under Early Decision plans commit to enroll if admitted, resulting in a higher yield for those schools compared to those without Early Decision plans. We eliminated our ED program in 2007 due to the lack of socioeconomic diversity in that application pool. Nationally, many of our peers have experienced a similar decline as application volume has exploded at selective colleges and universities. At UVA for example, we have seen a 52% increase in applications since 2008 with over 28,200 students vying for 3,360 places in the first-year class this year. Our admission offer rate was 29%, also a record low.
3) Our current yield rate ranks #12 in the US News Top 25 National Research University rankings, ahead of Johns Hopkins, Duke, Chicago, Georgetown, and Northwestern, all ranked higher overall in the U.S. News rankings.
4) Harvard, Yale, and Stanford are private institutions with admission budgets four to five times larger than ours at UVA. These and other Ivy-caliber private schools also have massive financial aid budgets compared to their public peers like Virginia; therefore, the net price of attendance at these schools can be much lower for students and their families. Research shows that cost of attendance is the second biggest factor in a student's college choice, after academic reputation.
5) UNC-Chapel Hill also has an admission budget that dwarfs ours at UVA, and it should be noted that 82% of the enrolling students at Chapel Hill are North Carolinians. State residents yield at a much higher rate than non-residents in part because of the lower total cost for tuition and fees. At UVA, 67% of our enrolling students are Virginians, which means we have a higher percentage of non-residents enrolling each year. Comparing yields between UNC and UVA, therefore, is misleading unless one understands these important details of context.
Given the confusion and misinformation about the role of yield in college admission, I felt it was important to provide this clarification. The Office of Undergraduate Admission is committed to excellence, integrity, and the enrollment of a class the University community can be proud of. The object of our aim, as Jefferson might say, is indeed "to make this Establishment the most eminent in the United States," but it is also to follow Jefferson's vision of an institution "based on the illimitable freedom of the human mind." We look for and find students who are academic stars but who also exhibit outstanding personal qualities and character. With the help of our alumni, faculty, current students, and friends, we have been highly successful in enrolling talented scholars who continue to shape the University and the world around them.
Greg W. Roberts
Dean of Undergraduate Admission
University of Virginia


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Old party returns to govern changed Mexico
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[November 30, 2012]
(AP) -- The political party that ruled Mexico for seven straight decades is back, assuring Mexicans there's no chance of a return to what some called "the perfect dictatorship" that was marked by a mixture of populist handouts, rigged votes and occasional bloodshed.
The Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, reclaims the presidency Saturday after 12 years out of power, and President-elect Enrique Pena Nieto calls it a crowning moment of an effort to reform and modernize the party that ruled without interruption from 1929 to 2000.
He promises an agenda of free enterprise, efficiency and accountability. He's pushing for reforms that could bring major new private investment in Mexico's crucial but creaking state-owned oil industry, changes that have been blocked for decades by nationalist suspicion of foreign meddling in the oil business.
PRI leaders acknowledge the party is returning to power in a Mexico radically different from what it was in the party's heyday. The nation has an open, market-oriented economy, a freer, more aggressive press, an opposition that can communicate at the speed of the Internet and a population that knows the PRI can be kicked out of power.
"The skeptics say that the PRI will return to the past, as if such a thing were possible," PRI leader Pedro Joaquin Coldwell told a party gathering earlier this month. "It's not, because this is a different country."
Yet critics already see hints of a yearning for the old days of an imperial presidency in some of the measures the PRI is pushing through Congress.
A bill proposed by Pena Nieto would gather the police and security apparatus under the control of the Interior Department, an office long used by the PRI to co-opt or pressure opponents, rig elections and strong-arm the media.
PRI leaders say the measure would unify a fractured security apparatus and produce a more coordinated strategy in Mexico's fight against drug cartels.
Political analyst Raymundo Riva Palacio says a return to the old ways is unlikely, noting there are now independent electoral authorities, judges and rights groups to help keep authorities in line. "I don't think they'll try to restore the old regime, like we saw in the 1970s," he said.
But Alejandro Sanchez, the assistant leader of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, warns of an attempt "to return to the authoritarian regime of the 1970s, when torture, contempt for opponents and impunity were the norm."
The PRI no longer holds a majority in Congress, so it will probably have to negotiate more.
PRI members in Congress, who include several autocratic labor leaders, this month successfully maneuvered to block a measure that would have required secret ballots in union elections and approval by union members of proposed contracts.
The PRI also supported a bill that would give federal and state auditors more authority to block spending by state governors, who currently face little fiscal oversight. That may help curb the unchecked power governors have acquired since the PRI lost power, but some critics see the measure as a bid to return to the days when presidents controlled the states from Mexico City.
Another PRI proposal would restore the president's ability to hire and fire hundreds of mid-level government officials at will, removing the posts from civil service protections. Sen. Javier Corral of the National Action Party, which has held the presidency for 12 years, said the PRI "wants to bring back the old custom that has done so much damage in Mexico, of treating power as booty, and giving out these jobs according to the party's criteria."
The PRI was widely seen as an able if autocratic party from 1929 to the mid-1960s, with strong economic growth and government hand-out programs balancing the corruption and lack of truly free elections.
But repeated harsh crackdowns on unions, students and other protesters inspired opposition movements in the 1960s and 1970s, and economic mismanagement and graft fed rampant inflation and led to recurring economic crises that repeatedly slammed the middle class in the regime's final quarter-century in power.
"We have learned from the mistakes we made," Coldwell, the PRI's leader, told a local radio station. "The people have given us a chance, and we have to be very conscious of the fact that if we don't do well, they won't give us a third chance."
[to top of second column]
In fact, the PRI had already begun changing in the 1980s. Stung by public outrage over some of the economic messes it had made, the party oversaw the privatization of inefficient state-owned industries that were once vast reservoirs of patronage jobs. It gradually allowed electoral reforms that finally gave opponents a chance to win elections.
During its time in power, the conservative National Action Party tried to lend a more informal air to the presidency. The office also became weaker in the face of the rising independence of the Supreme Court as well as state governors, many from opposition parties who owed no allegiance to the president. Opposition also increased in Congress.
Ruben Aguilar, who was a spokesman for then President Vicente Fox, the National Action candidate who defeated the PRI in 2000, said he's willing to give the PRI "the benefit of the doubt," in part because the party is known for pragmatism. It never had much ideology beyond keeping itself in power, and returning to old abuses could be suicidal.
"If they tried to return to the old ways, it would be very clumsy, very shortsighted," Aguilar said.
Some things are clearly gone forever, such as the PRI's role as "daddy government," handing out state-built housing and jobs at state-owned enterprises. The government firms have been privatized and the oil-fattened government budgets have shrunk.
Instead, Pena Nieto aims to fulfill his main promise, to create more job and boost economic growth, by going even further in developing the private sector. He also pledges to preserve the main achievement of the two National Action Party presidents: responsible government finances and macro-economic stability.
The PRI was never a classic, bloodthirsty dictatorship. It often bought off enemies and pardoned when it could.
When students at the national university pelted President Luis Echeverria with rocks in 1975, blaming him for ordering the shooting of student protesters seven years before, Echeverria simply left the campus.
While Echeverria imprisoned leftist rebels or allowed them to vanish in the maw of the security system, his successor pardoned those who remained jailed, giving rise to a generation of opposition politicians.
Many Mexicans retain a cynical fondness for the old party's populism, as reflected in one old saying that translates roughly: "They stole, but at least they let others get what they dropped."
Some expect a comeback of the PRI political style that combined a devotion to high-flown rhetoric, strict obedience among party members and an unquestioned respect for the authority of the president.
"I think we're going to see a lot of the old informal rules come back," said Andrew Selee, director of the Washington-based Mexico Institute.
He noted PRI members show tight party discipline and try to keep political disputes behind closed doors. That could reinforce the PRI's claim that it knows how to govern efficiently, unlike the two National Action presidents, who at times seemed to flounder.
The PRI's discipline is enshrined in another old saying. Counseling against jostling for political position, late PRI union boss Fidel Velazquez counseled, "He who moves around doesn't show up in the photo."
Press; By MARK STEVENSON]
Copyright 2012 The Associated
Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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My craziest Christmas memory is when I got caught opening my Christmas gifts early. I got my ass BEAT! – Willie
I'd always "act" surprised on Christmas because I would ALWAYS snoop around the house and car when my mom was sleep or at work to see what she bought me waaay before Christmas! If it was clothing, I would try everything on and walk around the house & put everything back in the box before she wrapped it! Haha – Jasmine
I remember always receiving only one gift for my birthday and Christmas, since my birthday is right before Christmas. My mom used to have us open all of the crappy gifts which weren't on our list and say " Well ya'll start picking up the paper and put away your toys" as if that was the end of it. As soon as the tears would start coming down our faces, my uncles would walk through the door with all that we had asked for! – Nina
I always remember snooping for our gifts…even unwrapping them sometimes. But the memory that always stands out is the year my father died. My mother and her friends filled our entire living room with toys (I was 6 at the time)! they were lined up all around the room and around the tree. It was like we went to sleep and woke up to Santa's workshop! We found out later they were in debt for months after but every year we do Christmas in a major way – with or without gifts! – Kenny
We'd like to hear your memories too! Feel free to post here or on the KRAVE Magazine FB page.
Happy Holidays!


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Under Her Thumb
Under Her Thumb: Erotic Stories of Female Domination will whet your appetite for all things Fem Dom. The book is a feast to be savored, whether your desires lean toward the bottom, the top, or you are simply curious. "Quiet" by Andrea Zanin will prepare you for all that is to come, and whether your interests lie in the loving submission of Lawrence Westerman's "Her Majesty's Plaything," boys wrestling for the opportunity to please their mistress in Laura Antoniou's "Blame Spartacus" or the ultimate domination of Valerie Alexander's "La Sexorcista," you will find what you're looking for, and more under her thumb. From a foreword by Midori to stories by greats like Rachel Kramer Bussel, D. L. King, Teresa Noelle Roberts, Dominic Santi and more, you won't want to put the book down; but you'll have to from time to time.
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