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Then in 1994 the computer entered my life.
The contradiction between limitation on the one hand, unlimited freedom and no physical borders on the other hand, created new impulses and insights to explore the possibilities of the medium. My fascination for this platform was born.
I have travelled a long way obtaining the necessary technical skills,studying and experiecing the do's and the don;ts, preparing and presenting concepts of visual artists for the web. It has now become the art form for myself to express and to tell my story.
The images, the words, the colours, the sounds, the motions, they're all ready there. It is like a palet with paint, a keyboard characters,covered with jpg., gif, wave, MP3,mov., doc. and other files. They're at my disposition and I will put them in a new, different context. They form the remains of my travels trough my mind, the virtual world, the real world and life.
Marjan van Mourik (1958) studied art-history and multimedia.
More about that Playmobiel exhibition that just opened in Amsterdam. I was particularly intrigued by the software for mobile phones that can scan drawings and transform them into beats, so i asked Ubi de Feo, one of its developers to give me more details about it. He also uploaded images from the show on flickr.
It's called RadarFunk and was conceived by Pips:Lab (initial concept) and TwoDotOne (mobile transposition and additional concepting).
TwoThingsDotOne and Pips:Lab' 3D graffiti
You might have heard of the guys. TwoDotOne was involved in the design of Nokia's new flagship store in Moscow and collaborated to TwoThingsDotOne, a kind of magic coloring books application but for grown-ups to play on walls. Pips:Lab does very nice 3D light graffiti. For example, their luma2solator installation invites the audience to create their own lumasol lightgraffities (photographs recorded with a long shutterspeed). The visitor has 30 seconds to make a drawing with spraycans that produce light. The build-in flash makes it possible to not only see the lightgraffity but also the creating artist. A soundtrack offers the visitor instructions of how the machine is operated (video.)
How does RadarFunk work?
Users are invited to frame one of the several patterns, shoot a picture, and the player starts sending notes to the server.
Framing exactly the center of the image can produce a regular beat, but moving a bit off center can give a shuffle result (swing).
What's the technology behind the installation?
Several dj's have created some beats, then the beats have been exported as text files. A Director application created by Pips:Lab's founder Keez Duyves converts the text files to color patterns.
The mobile system uses a J2ME application developed by TwoDotOne, it is always connected to a computer ...
The PLAYMOBIEL exhibition showcases artists whose work explores mobile phone technology in playful way. The casting is pretty impressive.
Scanner composed music using tapped phone conversations; Blast Theory is famous for their mixed reality games; Arno Coenen designed a floor mosaic based on the interface of a Nokia telephone; Gerald Van Der Kaap handed out a mobile phone plus free minutes to a girl from Amsterdam to film and photograph herself; Leonard van Munster made a few hardware projects using the cell phone as a remote control device (image on the right); Esther Polak uses GPS to visualise the tracks of people resulting in a drawing; together with twodotone, PIPS:lab developed a software for mobile phones that can scan drawings and transform them into beats; Aryan Kaganof shot a feature film on mobile phone cameras; Kate Pemberton designs logo's and designs as wallpapers for the cell phone as well as cross stitching patterns; etc.
Apart from the show at the Arti space, a parallel exhibition will be accessible all over the world by mobile phone. By sending a text message PLAYMOB ON to 3553, you will be sent a short audiovisual work of art to your mobile phone every day of the exhibition. You can also use the ShotCode">ShotCode of PLAYMOBIEL: this 2D barcode contains an encoded link to a website. By taking a picture using your camera phone, you get direct access to the website.
Playmobiel, at Arti, in Amsterdam, from June 10 till July 8.
call to artist
Project Creo: Digital Divide/Digital Provide November 10 – December 31, 2006
Call for Entries Deadline to submit proposals: August 15, 2006 Notification date: September 15, 2006
We're looking for artists whose works explore ideas of how the digital revolution has improved and divided our society, utilizing the same technology they are critiquing. The Center is primarily seeking proposals that create interactive environments that will engage visitors to the space. All work is insured while on exhibition.
Proposal must contain the following information: •Current artist resume, including address, phone number and email •Brief artist statement •Proposed work or installation for Digital Divide/Digital Provide, including drawing of the proposed piece, approximate size, materials utilized, hardware needed, amount of time needed for installation, etc. •Slides, video, cd or photographs of your current work •Self addressed, stamped envelope •Support materials, including past press (optional)
Please contact Melissa Christiano, Project Creo Director with questions regarding submission at (727) 822-7872 or email email@example.com
Send all proposals to: The Arts Center Attn: Melissa Christiano 719 Central Avenue St. Petersburg, FL 33701
An evening of live sight & sound from Mixel Pixel and Yip-Yip as they perform alongside, or rather, inside their various video creations.
Hailing from the murky swamps of Florida, spaced invaders Yip-Yip (http://www.yip-yip.com) will muck it up with their alien freak beats. Prepare to be annihilated by these tetris terminator twins!
Homegrown New Yorkers Mixel Pixel (http://www.mixelpixel.com) promise to pop-sate you with live accompaniment to their animated music videos, made by Mixel Pixel's own Rob Corradetti, as well as other stars such as Noah Lyon, Devin Clark, Papperad, and Ricard Rivera.
Sunday June 11th 7:30 PM & 10 PM (two shows) Monkeytown 58 N. 3rd between Wythe & Kent $8
Images Festival (Toronto) 2007 call for Installation, New Media, Performance submissions
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS IMAGES FESTIVAL 2007 Toronto, Ontario, CANADA
The Images Festival annually exhibits a selection of media arts installations, new media artworks and "Live Images" performance as part of our annual festival. Images works with several Toronto galleries and other alternative exhibition spaces to show media art installations which incorporate the moving image, interactive media and performativity.
Please check our web archive for information on our exhibition history http://www.imagesfestival.com
Among the artists whose installations and new media works have been featured in past festivals: Harun Farocki, Pipilotti Rist, Steve McQueen, Stan Douglas,Bjørn Melhus, David Rokeby, Masashi Iwasaki & Tadasu Takamine, Jane & Louise Wilson, John Greyson, Bob Ostertag & Pierre Hébert, Gustavo Artigas, Carolee Schneemann, Judy Radul, Richard Fung, Luke Jerram, Paulette Phillips, Joe Kelly, Nell Tenhaaf, Jean-François Guiton, Daniel Olson, Deanna Bowen, Haruki Nishijima, Gebhard Sengmüller, Marion Coutts, Willy LeMaitre & Eric Rosenzweig, Adriana Arenas Ilian, Michael Snow, Althea Thauberger, Taras Polataiko, Dara Gellman & Leslie Peters, Michelle Teran, badpacket.
DATES Early deadline for receipt of entries: 30 June 2006 (NO ENTRY FEE!)
PDF's of submission & guideline forms are downloadable at http://www.imagesfestival.com/generic.php?id=28&heading=submissions
For more information, or to have a submission form sent to you please contact <firstname.lastname@example.com>
Best regards,
THE IMAGES FESTIVAL 448-401 Richmond Street West Toronto. Ontario M5V 3A8 Canada T 416.971.8405 F 416.971.7412 http://www.imagesfestival.com
20th Edition>>>> 5-14 April 2007 >>>>>>


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Collins wrote,
Every moment gets thrown out like so much garbage - which, in a sense, is what the past is. Memory is a toxin, and its overretention - the constant replaying of the past - is the hallmark of stress disorders and clinical depression. The elimination of memory is a bodily function, like the elimination of urine. Stop urinating and you have renal failure: stop forgetting and you go mad.So, what if I've been looking at it backwards? What if Bud's "splinter skills" - remembering volumes of video dialogue with appropriate inflection and dialect, remembering the lyrics to every song he's ever heard, remembering the track number of every song on every CD, entering a store he was in once before several years ago and knowing instantly what he played with there - what if all these things are not because of an extraordinary ability or even an obsessive compulsion to remember?
What if they are because of a diminished capacity to forget?
The more I think about it, the more sense it makes. Perhaps Bud is overretaining some one-off interaction with a dog that happened so quickly I didn't even see it, but has rendered him pathologically fearful of dogs ever since. Perhaps it's the overretention of information that produces scripting echolalia; if he is unable to forget these lines, maybe obsessively reciting them is the only means he has of purging, of letting off some steam. Perhaps it's the overretention of memory that prevents him from cycling down with the rest of us at sunset, that keeps him sleepless, that wakes him early.
Doesn't it make sense that he'd be reluctant to interact with new people if he ran the risk of having to carry them all with him forever? Wouldn't it make him want to stick to the videos, the experiences, the foods, the everything he already knows he likes if he knew he wouldn't be able to sort out and discard the videos, experiences, foods, and everything that he didn't like? Wouldn't it make him want to put his hands over his ears in new situations to try to keep some of it from getting in?
Maybe this is where the computer metaphor for the autistic brain makes sense. Perhaps Bud's brain has enormous capacity for memory, but is unable to selectively delete the contents of his hard drive that he no longer needs. Maybe he needs help to defrag.
I think about the imperative messages I deliver to him all day in an effort to help him to focus, tune in, and attend to the world around him:
"Listen, Bud."
"Pay attention."
"Look at this."
Perhaps I'm overlooking the most important imperative of all:
"Forget about it."

subset: commoncrawl


text:
In association with the Changing the Face of Medicine traveling exhibit, the Eccles Library is hosting a series of events. Please join us on Monday, September 10, 2012 from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. for the Changing the Face of Medicine: Across Generations, Across Disciplines panel discussion. This event is located in the library's History of Medicine Room on the upper level (northeast corner). Light refreshments will be served at 10:15 a.m.
The panel is being moderated by Harriet Hopf, M.D., Professor, Department of Anesthesiology and Director of the University of Utah's School of Medicine's Women in Medicine and Science Program.
Local panelists include:
- Lisa Cannon-Albright, Ph.D., Professor Biomedical Informatics and Director of Genetic Epidemiology Division
- Lauren Clark, R.N., Ph.D., Professor, College of Nursing
- Kathleen Digre, M.D., Professor of Neurology and Ophthalmology, School of Medicine
- Karen Gunning, Pharm.D., Associate Professor, Director of the Primary Care Pharmacy Residency, College of Pharmacy
- Tricia Hauschild, MD, Resident, General Surgery
The National Library of Medicine exhibit, Changing the Face of Medicine: Celebrating American's Women in Health Care, is on display from August 23 to October 7 on the main level of the library. The exhibit is an interesting examination of the women who have made a difference to the health and well being of the American public. Discover the women who have made a difference to general practice, public health, research, surgery, and more by visiting the exhibit. Open daily during regular library hours.


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I created this track based on an inside joke from college. When I was in school, we did a production of Guys & Dolls. I played the character Arvide. He has the line "Coffee's so good, I don't understand why it's not a sin!" The way I delivered that line just seemed to crack people up! So, I incorporated it as the hook for this song.
I also wanted to create something dance-able; the line tends to lend itself to that style. Besides, it's simply more fun setting something to a four-on-the-floor beat. I also created an animated video because I thought it would emphasize the light-hearted nature of the track.
To create something that I considered "more dance-able," I kept the mixing focus on the kick drum and the bass line, and not the higher-frequency keyboard elements. Lyrically it meant always maintaining a sense of forward motion which is aided by the words of the main hook falling on downbeats and not syncopated beats:
Cof- Beat 3 So - Beat 4 Good - Beat 1, next measure.
I also tend to be quite verbose. I had to limit my nagging desire to add more verses and lyrical content. Limiting the amount of words as well as the frequency of harmonic rhythm (chord changes) makes it even more likely that the listener will focus on the beat and move to it as well. The result is (hopefully) more dancing!
David Taylor wrote and performed the song "Coffee's So Good" in its entirety, all rights reserved 2013. He is a Chicago-based songwriter, music producer, author, singer and playwright. He is also known as The Intrepid Songwriter. He has done work for McDonald's, Disney, written music for TV pilots & film and worked with artists like jazz great Dave Koz & newcomer Richard Kincaid. He has also had songs in the Top 20 and Top 40, and is a public speaker at varied music industry-related events, and in support of music education.
On this track:
David Taylor, vocals/mixing/and everything else
"Singletrack" is CAR's Artist Story for Chicago performers in which songwriters, bands, playwrights, actors and writers discuss the creation of a recorded work alongside audio or video clips of the performance. To submit your song for consideration, please email our researchers.
David Taylor


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|Perl: the Markov chain saw
Re^2: selecting columns from a tab-separated-values fileby ibm1620 (Monk)
|on Jan 22, 2013 at 04:09 UTC ( #1014563=note: print w/replies, xml )
|Need Help??
Yes, 10^9 records. The entire file is more like 80GB, since there are frequent empty fields. I estimated the time for my Perl program to pass the entire file to be around 5 hours. Don't know how much faster cat is, but it's GOT to be faster than that (I'm not at work at the moment).
In Section Seekers of Perl Wisdom


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Mine is the generation of American children who grew up in between iterations of The Mickey Mouse Club. Still, when late 1970's peanut better commercials brought Annette Funicello to our television screen, I fell in love like the generation of teenaged boys before me.
Today, Annette Funicello succumbed to complications of multiple sclerosis after more than twenty years fighting the disease she shared with us.
While some people don't like to say that we "fight" MS, Annette was always open about our disease and was once quoted as saying, ""I think you only have two choices in this kind of situation. Either you give in to it or you fight it. I intend to fight."
Well, fight she did.
While filming a spoof of the 1960's "Beach" films she made famous with teen heartthrob, Frankie Avalon, she noticed the first of what we all know to be MS symptoms. By the time a reunion tour with Avalon drew to a close in the early '90s there was no denying that something was wrong. She was officially diagnosed in 1992.
When I heard my doctor confirm, "You have multiple sclerosis", Annette was the first person I thought of. She had been open enough about her MS that even I, someone who knew nothing about MS, knew she had the disease. I remembered her as a beautiful actor, singer and dancer who I'd last seen interviewed in a wheel chair and whose life with MS the 1995 TV movie "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" was made.
I always hoped I might get the chance to meet Annette one day. I even teased my father that I might have the chance. He might have had the Mickey Mouse ears tucked in a trunk from his childhood, I chided, but I was now part of a much more exclusive club with the actress, The MS Club.
I won't, of course, get that chance now. But that doesn't mean I can't say how much her struggles were mine, how her triumphs I shared and how I cared about her life with multiple sclerosis because my life is with MS.
Her children, Gina, Jacky and Jason Gilardi, released a statement earlier today saying, in part, ""She is no longer suffering anymore and is now dancing in heaven. We love and will miss her terribly." I truly hope she is dancing and I, too, will miss her terribly… even if I never had the chance to meet our lovely warrior.
Rest quietly, Mouseketeer.
Wishing you and your family the best of health.
You can also follow me via our Life With MS Facebook page, on Twitter, and in our group on MS Connection.org. Also, check out our bi-monthly MS blog for the United Kingdom, look for our very special new monthly blog for the National MS Society, and don't forget to check out TrevisLGleason.com.
Photo credit: Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images
Important: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and not Everyday Health.


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By M. Alex JohnsonReporter
George Zimmerman is in custody in Florida and will be charged with second-degree murder in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, authorities announced Wednesday. His attorney said he would plead not guilty. "We did not come to this decision lightly," Angela Corey, the special prosecutor appointed by Florida Gov. Rick Scott to re-examine the case, said at a news conference in Jacksonville.Corey had previously said she wouldn't present the case to a grand jury, which took first-degree murder off the table. Second-degree murder carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Zimmerman's attorney, Mark O'Mara — who took the case late Wednesday after Zimmerman's previous attorneys withdrew — said Zimmerman would plead not guilty and that he would seek Zimmerman's release on bond Thursday.
"I think he's troubled by the fact the state decided to charge him," O'Mara said "... I would think anyone charged with second-degree murder would be scared." Corey said she decided last week to seek the charge but needed several days to make sure all details were in order. She said she had informed Martin's parents, Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton. In a brief statement in Washington at a news conference at a gathering of the National Action Network, Fulton said: "We just wanted an arrest, and we got it, and I say thank you. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Jesus."
Ben Crump, the attorney for Martin's parents, said the decision was about "justice, justice and only justice." He said it was important that Zimmerman have a fair trial, even though "we believe in ourhearts that he was wrong to kill Trayvon Martin." Corey refused to discuss details of the case, saying she was committed to protecting the interests of both Martin and Zimmerman.
"So much information on this case has gotten released that should never have been released," she said. Under Florida law, Zimmerman, 28, must be taken before a judge within 24 hours of his return to Seminole County, where he has acknowledged he shot and killed Martin, 17, in the town of Sanford on Feb. 26. Corey wouldn't say where he was being held to protect his safety.
Scott, who appointed Corey after Seminole County authorities declined to bring charges, said in a statement that the matter "is now in the hands of the judicial system and I am confident justice will prevail."
Zimmerman, whose father is white and whose mother is Peruvian, says he shot Martin, who was black, in self-defense after following him in a gated community in Sanford. Police questioned Zimmerman but decided against pressing charges. The lack of an arrest or charges had sparked protests nationwide, with critics alleging that Zimmerman confronted Martin because of his race. Zimmerman's supporters deny that. The decision whether to arrest Zimmerman was delayed for several weeks because Zimmerman had indicated that he would argue self-defense under Florida's so-called Stand Your Ground law, which shields subjects from prosecution if a judge determines that the shooting was justified to protect life or proerty.
Corey called the law "a tough affirmative defense to overcome," but she said, "If 'Stand Your Ground' becomes an issue, we will fight that affirmative defense."
O'Mara, Zimmerman's attorney, told reporters that he didn't think Zimmerman could get a fair hearing "today" because "the emotions are just running high in Central Florida."
"I am hoping the hatred settles down," he said. A federal civil rights investigation is also under way, but U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday that the Justice Department had to meet a "high bar" to bring any charges.
The main federal role is to "support the state in its ongoing investigation," Holder told reporters Wednesday morning in Washington. At the same time, he said, the Justice Department is conducting its "own thorough and parallel investigation" to try to resolve the case "in as fair and complete a way and as quickly as we can."
Kerry Sanders and Pete Williams of NBC News and NBC station WESH of Orlando, Fla., contributed to this report by M. Alex Johnson of MSNBC.


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Hadoop World Rackspace Hosting has spent the past two years helping craft the OpenStack cloud control freak and getting it running its public and private cloud services. And now, to get more of the IT wallet, Rackspace wants to peddle more services atop OpenStack, whether it is humming in your shop or in its own glass houses. And one of the first services that Rackspace wants to plunk on top of OpenStack with a price tag on it is, not surprisingly, the Hadoop big data muncher.
As a proponent of full open source cloud control software, it is not surprise at all that Rackspace has partnered up with Hortonworks rather than Cloudera, MapR Technologies, or Greenplum, all of which have some proprietary code in their Hadoop distributions.
To be fair, Greenplum, the big data arm of storage giant EMC, has just opened up its Chorus management tool for Hadoop and data warehouse clusters and the only proprietary Hadoop code it ships is a repackaged version of MapR's M5 Edition called Greenplum MR; you can get a supported version of the Apache Hadoop stack called Greenplum HD, which has no proprietary stuff in it.
Every one of the major Hadoop distributors can trace its roots back to Yahoo!, where the MapReduce computing methodology and distributed file system were cloned from ideas based on systems in use by Google several generations ago to run its search engine.
Cloudera has Doug Cutting, Hadoop's creator, on its payroll as well as many other heavy hitters from inside the former Hadoop factory at Yahoo! But Hortonworks is literally a spin out of the Yahoo! tech team that worked on Hadoop after the search engine company open sourced it under an Apache license in 2006 and has the most stringent view of Hadoop being open source, down to the last bit.
"This is our first foray into Hadoop and a good alignment for us," Huw Edwards, manager of corporate development at Rackspace, tells El Reg, adding that while the deal is by no means exclusive and Rackspace is keeping its options open, and the fact that OpenStack and the Hortonworks Data Platform are completely open source makes both Rackspace and its clients feel more comfortable about not getting vendor lock-in.
Of course, the irony is that if there is only one true open source and supported version of Hadoop, then that is a kind of lock in, too. You need two vendors living on a shoestring to really be free, and the odds are the market will create a couple alternatives.
The details are a bit sketchy right now, but the plan is for Rackspace to work with Hortonworks to streamline the operation of HDP 1.0, which just shipped in June, with the Rackspace Cloud and tuned to work well with OpenStack.
One of the issues the companies are working on is moving data from a set of Cloud Servers, the name for virtual servers on Rackspace's cloudy infrastructure, to its Cloud Files object storage. Rackspace will allow customers to puff up and suck down Hadoop clouds on demand so they don't have to invest in infrastructure over the long haul if their jobs don't demand it.
So, for instance, you might collect telemetry data in real-time and plunk it directly into the Cloud Files service, but only chew on it every couple of hours, days, or weeks depending on your business and the nature of the data. Either way, you only fire up the Cloud Servers to do the chewing when you need to, and when you are not chewing, you can turn off the capacity and not spend money.
This Hadoop public cloud service will be followed by a private cloud offering that will have Rackspace techies manage a private cloud built to the same specs inside your own data center, much as it does with OpenStack infrastructure clouds today.
The Hadoop public cloud service will be available in early 2013, Edwards says, with the private Hadoop cloud service coming sometime in late 2013. You can contact Rackspace now if you want to do a custom engagement before the Hadoop big data service is available, or to get in line for the beta program.
By the way, Rackspace is by no means a newbie to Hadoop. The company has a number of customers using its hosted servers to run Hadoop clusters on bare metal, but as Edwards points out, this requires a significant capital investment on the front end. Rackspace has customers using Cloudera, MapR, Greenplum, and Hortonworks distros on these hosted machines.
Now it will be coming up against Amazon Web Services' Elastic MapReduce service, which runs the Apache Hadoop distribution as a service as well as the MapR M5 Edition. It won't be long – okay, on second thought, maybe it will be long – before Oracle, IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell all fire up Hadoop clusters on their clouds.
With a new CEO and ex-Googler Marissa Mayer at the helm and the company flush with $3.6bn, you have to wonder if Mayer is thinking that maybe letting Hortonworks go was a bad idea. If her former employer demonstrated anything, it was that constantly inventing, smashing, and reinventing server, storage, database, file systems, and other technologies is the only way to extract big profits out of the intertubes. ®


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From our home this weekend.
I finally got the Lup candle holder I've been eyeing for almost a year now. It's one of my favorite things at the moment, I love the thin black lines and shapes.
What's one of your current favorite things?
Other Stories
16 comments:
So lovely, I do understand you favoring, it's so beautiful :-) my favorite right now is my new camera, my new crush :-) have a happy day and thank you for your lovely photos!ReplyDelete
So cool candle holder! So simple, and love that it´s black.ReplyDelete
It is so pretty indeed! My favourite thing is the Loop wardrobe (also by Hay) we've bought a few weeks ago. I looove it. I think I even like my clothes better when they are displayed on it. ;)ReplyDelete
Lup is one of my favourites too! But if I have to choose just one thing I guess it have to be my small Eames LTR Occasional table... Love it! :)ReplyDelete
this candleholder is definitely a favourite! HAY is one of my favourite brands along with Ferm Living :)ReplyDelete
The candle holder is stunning!! Looks beautiful!ReplyDelete
What a cool twist on a candle holder! It suits your living room perfectly ; )ReplyDelete
Thank you for the inspiration. I love your blog! Best wishes from Johan (Sweden)ReplyDelete
Love these! My current favorite is the growing light though it seems to bring out all the clutter (and dust)in our home. Need to organize and maybe minimize:)ReplyDelete
great holder!!!ReplyDelete
Really cool candle holder! Today my favorite thing is the new rug that just arrived yesterday! I loved the old one, but it is too big for the new (and tiny) apartment. Great excuse to get a new one, right? ;)ReplyDelete
amazing candle holder. favourite thing right now? edison bulbs galore from home depot (and so affordable!)ReplyDelete
I'm in love with the chair, it's on my wishlist, so you can see on my blog ( homemarit.blogspot.nl)ReplyDelete
I love it, it´s just so cool and simple! And love your home, with that scandinavian feeling.ReplyDelete
I´ve been having my eyes on the Kubus candle holder for a while now...
I wish I had your decorating skills! Gorgeous.ReplyDelete
Your pictures are always beautiful. I love your blog and inspire me ;)ReplyDelete
Thank you for your comments, I love hearing from you!
Questions, comments or sponsorship inquires, please contact me via the 'contact' link.


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Just as addicting as the first
Plants vs. Zombies launched in 2009 on the PC and absolutely changed the face of tower defense games. It was a cultural phenomenon, inspiring even the most infrequent of gamers to play for hours on end, popping off one zombie's head after another with reckless abandon.
But the original game was also a premium purchase, and with $20, you got every bit of content right away. The sequel, Plants vs. Zombies 2, offers up a very different approach -- it's free-to-play only, and, at first, it's launching exclusively on iOS devices.
Everything about this approach has disaster written all over it, but somehow, Plants vs. Zombies 2 actually pulls through mostly unscathed.
Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time (Android, iPad [tested on an iPad Mini], iPhone [reviewed on an iPhone 5])
Developer: Popcap
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: August 15, 2013 (iOS) / TBA (Android)
MSRP: Free (with microtransactions)
Plants vs. Zombies 2 starts off innocently enough. Just like the first game, you'll defend your house in a grid-based fashion from a typical zombie horde, using the same basic plants and structures. Then your neighbor Crazy Dave has to go and eat a taco. But it's not just any taco, as it happens to be the best taco ever made -- and good enough to go back and time for.
Of course, Dave's talking time machine doesn't quite work as planned, and you end up traveling across time and space, battling zombies for no apparent reason. Without a doubt the entire narrative is just an excuse to travel through time and explore various historical locales -- but that's completely okay with me, because time traveling happens to be a ton of fun.
Actually playing the game is just as easy as the first, simply collecting sun to pay for and place towers (plants). In addition to the same tried-and-true strategies of the original (placing sun-producing Sunflowers in the back, with Peashooters in the middle to fend off zombies), you'll encounter a ton of fresh faces, like the Bonk Choy, a melee fighter that can't shoot projectiles, but packs a huge punch if properly protected, or the Spring Bean, a unit that can launch zombies into the water for an instant kill.
You'll traverse across three worlds in the launch edition of the game, including Ancient Egypt, the Pirate Seas, and the Wild West. Each realm has specially themed zombies, like a Pharaoh-suit zombie that uses the staff of Ra to steal sun, and so on. But different shades of zombie aren't the only variants in these new levels, as there are also unique mechanics like limited space and planks in the Pirate world, and maneuverable mine carts in the Wild West.
You can buy every level outright with an in-app-purchase, or you can just go through the game in a linear fashion. Thankfully, I didn't encounter paywalls of any kind that were progress related, so it is definitely possible to clear Plants vs. Zombies 2 without buying stages. Unfortunately the mini-game selection is pretty skimpy and you'll only get to occasionally experience a fresh gametype, which is a big step down from the cavalcade of diversions in the original.
If you've played Plants vs. Zombies on a touch device, you've arguably played the best version of the game, and the smooth control scheme faithfully translates into the sequel. All you have to do to place plants or collect sun currency is to tap them, or tap wherever you want your plants to go. I had zero issues controlling the game on an iPad given the larger screen real estate, and outside of the occasional mis-tap on the iPhone, I didn't have much trouble in general.
The brand new mechanics in It's About Time also work great with a touch screen. These come in the form of plant food that buffs one unit at a time temporarily, and offensive magic powers (inconsequential things like pinching zombie's heads off) that cost gold to cast. Although the powers are a pretty throwaway addition, plant food is easily my favorite welcome change for the sequel, as it adds a whole new layer of strategy that wasn't present in the original.
Now, instead of simply planting your towers in a perfect formation and calling it a day, you can use plant food to spring special powers that are unique to every single plant. For instance, the Sunflower will generate more sun power on the spot, the Cabbagepult will launch projectiles randomly across the entire map, and the Wallnut will don a suit of armor for extra defense.
Knowing when to use these abilities (and on what plants) is key to your success in Plants vs. Zombies 2, and it kept me a bit more engaged in some of the later levels. Plant food isn't an IAP-only item, either -- throughout each map, defeating glowing zombies will earn you single-use packets of plant food. You can also restock plant food or use powers by spending in-game gold (which I'll get to later).
As you may have noticed from the info box above, the game is free -- so it has terrible microtransactions, right? Well, surprisingly, not really! At least, not yet it doesn't. The only content that's walled off is a small selection of plants for $3 each -- mostly legacy plants from the first game (the Squash, Imitator, Snow Pea, Jalapeno, Torchwood, and the Power Lily) that won't make or break your enjoyment in the slightest.
Of course, it's always possible that EA will add "freemium" unlocks for other worlds and crucial plants down the line, as the game is already hinting at future updates. As it stands I'm actually quite surprised at how well IAPs have been handled in Plants vs. Zombies 2, especially given the fact that it's free.
There are other microtransactions available in the form of boosts (like starting with more sun), and the ability to straight-up purchase gold. Again, these IAPs do not break the game, as you can still very much complete the entire experience without them. Having said that, they're basically cheats you can pay for, and the gold costs are so high that it's very unlikely you'll be able to use them consistently without paying real money, if that matters to you.
Launching Plants vs. Zombies 2 exclusively on iOS platforms first is a really odd choice for a game that was originally a big-hitter for the PC, but it may very well pay off -- especially given the fact that the game is actually good. So long as EA and PopCap don't eventually ruin the game through greedy in-app purchases, the base game at launch is a treat, and worth a download from every iOS owner out there. What you're getting is basically more of that classic Plants vs. Zombie experience, with just enough tweaks to keep it interesting -- and that's more than enough for me.
Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time reviewed by Chris Carter
A hallmark of excellence. There may be flaws, but they are negligible and won't cause massive damage.
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Leek Edjeh Simanim Recipe #1 :
by my mother in law- Shirley Mamiye:
Leek is one of the "simanim "(or symbols) that we use on our Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year) table that symbolizes the fact that we would like to get rid of our enemies.
Swiss chard is another symbol which means "to remove" or "throw out' as translated by the Arabic word "sillek".
No better way to express that sentiment on Rosh Hashanah than with yummy sautéed "edjehs".
Edjeh sandwiches typically made their way into all of our parent's brown bagged lunches when they attended the public school system in the 30's and 40's. It was a delicious easy "pack and go in a pita" (which was then called Syrian bread). Little did their Aleppo born mothers realize that their kids would be so terribly embarrassed to eat their very un-American looking parsley-potato variations of "edjeh" that were snuggled in a foreign round white pocket bread.
LOL- Fast forward 80 years later- I google "Edjeh" and find the top "edjeh" search on America's very own Martha Stewart!!(Sent in to Martha by my friend Suzanne Sasson of Kitchen Caboodles).
Since Syrian Jews have adopted so many Ashkenaz foods over the years, (like challah and matzo ball soup), maybe the web will finally allow us to return the favor, and share our Syrian simanim versions with the rest of the Jewish community. My mother in law is so creative with all of her dishes, and I am always amazed that she whips up her leek and swiss chard versions of edjeh by the end of the summer each year.
Her swiss chard edjeh contains chopped meat so as not to confuse her guests with the leek edjeh version which is meatless.
Remember that you can eat these edjeh sandwiches way after Rosh Hashanah! Delicious on Sukkot or as a Shabbat lunch.
Edjeh Leek Simanim Recipe #1 for Rosh Hashanah:
by my mother in law- Shirley Mamiye:
- 1 bunch of leek- cleaned and diced, discard heavy green leaves ( I saute the leek for 2 minutes before mixing with other ingredients).
- 4 eggs
- 1/4 c matzo meal
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp allspice
- 1 lb chop meat
- Mix all together in a bowl with a fork.
- Spoon latkes sized circles into a heated fry in a pan that has a coating of oil.
- When underside of edjeh is brown, turn over and fry other side.
- When done, place on paper towel to drain.
- Place on a tray with wax paper, freeze and when frozen place in a food storage bag.
- Before serving warm on a tray at 350 degrees.
Swiss Chard Edjeh:
- 2 bunches, wash very well
- boil in water for 2 minutes
- drain and chop
- add 4 eggs, matzo meal, salt allspice cinnamon, and a chopped onion.
- Fry latkes sized edjehs as above.
Leek Edjeh Simanim recipe #2:
From The Kosher Foodies- By identical kosher gourmand twins-Jessica and Stephanie.
"We actually make our leeks into small latkes, quite similar to the tasty Chanukah treat. They're delicious this way – crispy, tasty, and small. Not breaded like onion rings, but with the same flavor."
- 2-3 large leeks, or 4-5 small leeks, washed well and chopped (don't try to grate them on a box grater. They will get stringy)
- 1/2 cup breadcrumbs or matzah meal
- 2 eggs
- Egg white from one egg
- Salt and pepper
- Vegetable oil, for frying
1. Prepare oil for frying: pour about 1/2 inch of oil into a high-walled pan. Place on burner over medium heat.
2. Combine leeks, eggs, and breadcrumbs. Mix to combine. Check consistency. If it's too dry, add the egg white. If too wet, add more bread crumbs. The batter should be loose but be able to come together into a ball if squeezed. Add salt and pepper.
3. Using a tablespoon measure, scoop out batter into balls.
4. Test the frying oil with a tiny amount of batter. Make sure it sizzles but doesn't burn. Prepare a plate or tray to drain the patties after frying. I used a paper towel-lined plate. My grandmother used to use brown paper bags (yes, the ones from the grocery store). Alton brown uses a cooling rack on top of a towel-lined cookie sheet. That's probably the best idea if you can do it.
5. Using a slotted spoon, drop the batter, one at a time, into the oil, flattening into patties as you drop them. Only put 5-4 in the oil at a time, because you don't want the temperature to drop too much and the patties to get soggy.
6. After one minute, they should be brown. Flip the patties. Fry on the other side for a minute. Remove from oil with slotted spoon and place on draining plate. Repeat until all are fried.
7. Sprinkle with salt when still warm.
8. Serve along with the bracha: "that those who hate us be cut away"
Shana tova!


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Welcome to another round of commentary and links.
Books: Since my last roundup of links, I have finished all the Phryne Fisher books (excellent and a lovely combo of knowing what I'd get out of them, and still having interesting bits).
Other recent reads include Code Name: Verity by Elizabeth Wein, which I found fascinating both for narrative structure and character voice, and for the time period (which is WWII.) It is not an easy book to read (without giving away plot spoilers, any book in Nazi-occupied France is not precisely going to be cheerful, really) but it has some delightful moments of friendship and brilliance and joy in amongst the horrible. (Also the pleasant realisation when I looked up her bio that I'd read and loved a number of her short stories, previously.)
Likewise, I adored Phoebe North's Starglass which is about a generational starship about to reach its destination, with a bunch of interesting cultural twists (70% of the original population were Jewish, but a lot of it has shifted over the generations in interesting ways.)
Currently reading Monster of God: The Man-Eating Predator in the Jungles of History and the Mind by David Quammen, which is about – well, apex predators, people, their interactions, and is a fascinating mix of ecology, zoology, and history and therefore exceedingly up my alley.
Watching: As you can guess from my reading, I have now also watched Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, and loved them (though also finding it fascinating how they differ from the books: I am mostly fine with the changes, but there are some substantial ones.) I'm looking forward to being able to get the second season here in the US. I then did a detour through Warehouse 13 and am currently part way through Eureka and enjoying them for knitting watching.
Beautiful things:
- Giant horsehead sculptures on the Scottish skyline.
- From a couple of years ago, but the Polish cast of Les Miserables does a flash mob performance of "One Day More" in a Polish shopping mall. (I adore this musical, and have since I was, y'know, 13 or so, but this video caught my attention for the body language and sheer fun they're having with it.)
- The Piano Guys do a mash-up of Vivaldi's Winter and the song "Let It Go" from Frozen. Also with the joy in what they're doing.
- Ursula Vernon's Morally Ambiguous Honey Badgers (along with the best Valentine ever) This exchange also produced a lot more art, some of it from my most excellent friend Elise, who has commentary on and links to the larger exchange of badger ideas.
- Baroque dance. (Particularly interesting for the links of two different dancers dancing the same piece.)
- IT Security for you and your library: I was at Blake's presentation about this at Computers in Libraries in 2013, and the writeup is excellent and useful.
- Sarah Houghton takes on two recent bits of library-land controversy, one about the ALA Code of Conduct, one on the piece that ran in Slate about "This is what a librarian looks like". She includes links to other useful discussions of both.
- The excellent Nancy Sims talks about copyright in regard to academic publishing norms, whether copyediting changes the copyright considerations, and other related details.
Codes of contact: So, there's been rather a lot of discussion in the library world about codes of contact for conventions and other things. Various links of relevance.
- Besides Sarah's piece above, Lisa Rabey has a roundup of links.
- Andromeda Yelton has a piece in Library Journal with more links and a lot more context.
- The Ada Initiative on how to design a code of conduct for your community.
- John Scalzi had a post about Arisia's code of conduct working, and why conventions and other organisations should want one.
Other things:
- The problems of doing oral history about exceedingly difficult, complicated, and illegal events. (Metafilter has some additional links of interest.)
- Mountain lions in Los Angeles and related places.
- How to build a perfect refugee camp : Turkey, apparently, has done some really fascinating things about building a refugee camp that actually mostly works.
- A report from a zooarchaeology meeting focusing on equids – links to some more fascinating info, but the one I found particularly interesting was the size changes pre and post medieval period in London.
- Trying barley water has been on my list of interesting historical recipes for a while now. (What, you're suprised I have a list of interesting historical recipes?) I liked this post with historical summary a lot.


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Summit raises hope North Korea will release 3 US detainees
TOKYO (AP) — Hopes for the release of three American citizens imprisoned in North Korea got a big boost by the news of a possible summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
Freeing the prisoners would be relatively low-hanging fruit and a sign of goodwill by Kim. It would also mark something of a personal success for Trump, who has highlighted the issue since last June, when University of Virginia student Otto Warmbier died days after North Korea turned him over to American authorities.
Trump banned Americans from traveling to the North in response and featured Warmbier's father prominently in his State of the Union speech in January.
A look at who the current American prisoners are and what a prison sentence in North Korea can entail:
All three Americans now doing time in the North are men, and all three are ethnic Koreans.
Two of them — Tony Kim and Kim Hak Song — were instructors at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology prior to their arrest and conviction. They are accused of anti-state activities and trying to overthrow the government. The university, which has not been linked to their arrests, is the only privately funded college in the North, founded in 2010 on donations from Christian groups.
Tony Kim, who taught accounting, has been in custody since April last year and is serving a 15-year sentence. Kim Hak Song, an agriculture specialist and evangelical minister who resided with his wife in China, was taken into custody about a month later. He remains in custody, but it's not clear whether he has been sentenced or what his current status is.
The third and longest-serving prisoner, Kim Dong Chul, is a former Virginia resident who reportedly claims to have been the president of a trade and hotel services company in Rason, a special economic zone on the North Korean border with Russia. He was sentenced in April 2016 to 10 years in prison with hard labor after being convicted of espionage.
Suspects are often arrested when they try to leave North Korea. Warmbier, who was charged with anti-state crimes and the attempted theft of a propaganda banner, and Tony Kim were taken into custody at Pyongyang's international airport. Kim Hak Song was taken while on a train on his way home to China.
Before being put on trial, detainees are often held in a house-arrest-type situation at their hotel, and some say they were expected to pay the hotel bill for the extra days. They may also be moved to guesthouses or places where they are less likely to be seen by others while the investigation is underway.
Suspects are pushed hard to sign a confession, which many recant after they leave the country, and guilt is generally assumed by the time the case reaches a judge, or a panel of three judges. With little doubt about the outcome, rarely do the proceedings take more than one day — or even a few hours — to complete.
Foreigners charged with serious crimes such as espionage generally have their cases sent directly to the Supreme Court.
Americans aren't thrown into the same prison system as North Koreans.
Kenneth Bae, a missionary from Washington state who spent two years in prison, said he was kept for the most part in a foreigners-only work camp. It's possible it was, in fact, meant only for him — he never saw another prisoner there.
In an interview in Pyongyang, the capital, just before his 2016 release, Bae told The Associated Press that he was moved from the work camp to a hospital because of failing health and weight loss. He said he was then sent back to the work camp, which he believed was located not far outside Pyongyang. He said he did a lot of digging and farm-related labor.
Bae, who was also accused of trying to overthrow the government, said after his release that his cell was small and barren and he was frequently interrogated early on. But he said he was never beaten and was allowed to keep his Bible and pray openly.
The United States and North Korea do not have diplomatic relations. The Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang acts as a go-between when an American is detained.
North Korea claims that releasing American prisoners before they have completed their sentences is a "humanitarian" decision that must be made by Kim Jong Un himself. So, without any U.S. diplomats or legal advocates on the ground, getting a release often requires a trip by a senior U.S. statesman.
Former President Bill Clinton went to North Korea in 2009 to get two journalists, Euna Lee and Laura Ling, who had crossed into the country illegally from China and were given 12-year sentences. Former CIA director James Clapper visited in November 2014 to bring home Bae and tourist Matthew Miller, who was charged with espionage.
Former President Jimmy Carter — who since leaving office has traveled to North Korea three times and even met with Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Un's grandfather — brought home Christian missionary Aijalon Gomes in 2010. Gomes had been sentenced to eight years of hard labor for illegal entry and hostile acts against the government.
Joseph Yun, the top U.S. negotiator with North Korea at the time, was the official who went to get Warmbier.
Eric Talmadge is the AP's Pyongyang bureau chief. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram: @erictalmadge


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The Value of 168 is a centerpiece of the corporate culture of RPM International. It reminds us to use the time we are given on this earth to do the best we can… with our families, with our business and with our communities.
As a corporate citizen, we recognize that we have responsibilities to many constituents. For our shareholders, we seek to give them superior returns on their investment and have done so, significantly outpacing both the Standard & Poor's 500 and our peer group in total return over multi-year periods. For our employees, we recognize the need to provide a nurturing work environment, and have done so with benefits that includes both, a defined pension plan and 401(k) match, outstanding health care benefits and a matching program for charitable gifts. With customers, we seek to provide high value with long-term relationships, and our success in achieving this goal is evidenced by our leading market share positions across most of our brands. We also recognize that we need to make a positive impact on the communities where we work and live.
Like most businesses, RPM provides cash contributions to a number of worthy non-profits in our community. In our case, we have donated or pledged nearly $7 million to approximately 260 philanthropic organizations over the past five years. More importantly, RPM often multiplies the value of its cash contributions with the human energy necessary to fulfill unmet needs, launch new ideas in community service and bring private sector expertise to bear in the non-profit sector. Our community involvement is not just signing checks; it's partnering with select non-profits to deliver programs and services to constituents that go well beyond the impact of monetary donations.
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Benedict Cumberbatch went on Sesame Street and did a math bit with Murray and the Count. It's cute, I guess. I don't have any fond nostalgia for Sesame Street—I only remember watching it at school when it was raining and we couldn't go outside at recess—so I have no real opinion about celebrities going on the show beyond it is a thing that they do and I bet taping a segment with any combination of Sesame Street/Muppets characters is probably loads of fun. Everyone always looks like they're having a really good time when they do these bits.
What I do have an opinion on is how great Cumberbatch looks in this video. Because holy cow, HE LOOKS GREAT. (Lainey: but not dashing!) So enjoy, Cumber Collective. Here is Benedict Sherlock in a terrific suit, looking f*cking great, being cute and adorable with some puppets, pretending to not know how to count. …That entertains kids? Really?


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So, sit back, relax and get ready to read the longest race recap of your life. Hey, if I had my go-to vodka-tonics for everyone, I'd be passing them out, so cheers to imaginary celebratory drinks. But, on the bright side, 26.2 miles is a long way to run, and at least you don't have to run it and you only have to read about it. And yes, I did run the full. It was kind of a secret thing, I guess, but some people knew about it, some didn't. I felt really disappointed in myself after San Diego and I wanted to give it another whack without the pressure I put on myself. I do that sometimes, if you couldn't tell. So that's what that was about. Onward to the recap!
The day before the marathon, I went to the expo, and I HATE, nay loathe, expos. I hate how grabby and pushy and out of control people are. It's like they've never seen a gu before or they've never seen any type of running apparel in their life. It's like the scene in mean girls where everyone becomes animals and crazy fights break out in the cafeteria. Thus, with my hatred for them, I quickly grabbed my bib, my shirt and peaced out. I also parked on a side street and my meter was only holding 25 minutes worth of time because I had no change with me, so I had to get back quickly. I got home and here's where things got a little interesting. I had a mini-breakdown and freaked out for about three hours. I may or may not have had a panic attack in the Marshall's dressing room, but that is neither here, nor there. I was starting to think about San Diego and how much it sucked and how I didn't want it to happen again. It all began when I realized that my tank I had bought for my race was not perfect. I was too scared to wear it on marathon day because I had a small adjustment made, and if it was a training run, I would have totally rocked it, but Sunday was not a training run, I was searching for more than another crappy race, no pun intended. I found another shirt that I ended up wearing that was BRIGHT orange. I like to call it road cone orange. You will see a picture of me next to a road cone, and yes, it's definitely the same color. Anyways, after a few pep talks with friends, I was feeling much better and my hyperventilation about the race was under control.
I met up with some folks from twitter and a few runners I was friends with for a carb load and did some serious work on a whole pizza by myself and it was nothing but deliciousness.
I left dinner and went home and made my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and cut them up and placed them into the respective snack sized bags. I will do a whole post on these, because I'm receiving questions of how this works. It's an art form I tell you and I will let you in on my secrets. I went to bed around 8:45pm after picking up my room and laying out all my race clothes. This was a mistake because I didn't put my D-chip (timing chip) on my shoe at this time, and would be sad about this later, but I was thankfully able to fall asleep pretty quickly. Possibly with help from the NyQuil I took. :)
I slept pretty soundly but I woke up around 3:30 on marathon morning and couldn't fall back asleep. I just creeped on facebook and twitter for a while and then when 4:30 came around I decided it would be okay to get up. I was nervous I would be incredibly tired later on, but there was no way I was falling back asleep. I got up, made some nuun and then hopped in the shower. I decided to try to get my monkey buns going since I wasn't wearing an as fun shirt as my tank I had planned on. NINE RUBBER BANDS LATER, my hair was secure. Yes, I had NINE rubber bands holding my hair down, but it NEVER moved throughout the entire race. I also have a TON of hair, so therefore it was necessary. I was surprised that it never moved, but alas, I really loved running with them. I got ready, ate a pro-max bar and felt good about the race. Here's my morning tweet: "Guess what, today IS NOT going to suck like San Diego. Today is going to be great! Now, just took a pre-race shower and going to do my hair," I tweeted throughout the morning and race so I could remember things. I had a feeling that the day was going to be awesome. I just kept telling myself, you KNOW this course, you RUN this town! I got pretty pumped up and was ready to go!
Then, obviously, I had to share this with the twitter universe, "Yup. I knew it. Today is the most excellent day ever. My monkey buns are PERFECT hair!" My hair was perfect, which therefore leads to an only wonderful day right? I woke up and Shea took me down to the starting line which was a little nerve-racking. We live right in the center of the course… with a LOT of one-way streets surrounding our house. We were trapped in a few places for a little while since so many streets were blocked off, but I just kept telling myself that it was okay and that we had more than enough time and we would get there in time. In the car about half way there, I realized I forgot my chip for my shoe to be chipped time. I was SO sad and I almost freaked out, but then I realized, you know what, I have my garmin, it will time me just fine, and it's not a big deal. There's nothing I can do about it now, so it's not worth getting freaked out over. FYI: I asked again for a new one at the starting area, but everyone was just confused and I couldn't get the chip anymore, they didn't have any extra.
Back to the arrival, finally we got there around 6:30ish and I walked over to the starting line. The race started at 7:00 am. I was ready to go but I had the urge to go to the bathroom. Nervous poops if you will. Well the lines for the bathroom were RIDICULOUS. I know I wasn't the most prompt person to get there, but seriously, they were like 60 people deep. I knew it wasn't going to happen so I went to check my bags and just told myself,"You know what, there will be a porta-potty a ways into the race, just stop there you freaking baby and man up."
Getting into the corrals was a bit chaotic but I crept in and moved forward into the 'wave' area and randomly saw my friend Punk Rock Runner in wave 3. I lined up with him and I think that this is what helped me immensely. We started off and I didn't start off too fast and like when I was racing back in high school. I just cruised along and told myself that I just had a long ways to go. The morning was PERFECT. The weather was great and I ran with Punkie for a while and then lost him in the pack. I just kept powering through, I was checking my garmin and at around mile 3 I realized that I was going to be okay. I hadn't felt horrible, my stomach was happy with me thus far and I was just cruising along and loving life. I still had to go to the bathroom, but I held it until mile 8 and just kept checking down the miles.
The smiles started at mile 4 and they never went away. In this picture I look like a complete goon because I'm smiling so much, but I was just incredibly happy! I remember cruising down PCH in the heart of downtown Long Beach and being surrounded by people and the big buildings and I almost had tears in my eyes, the sun was just rising over the buildings and I kept thinking, "This is it! This is my city and I OWN THIS!" I was so excited and my heart was so full of joy. It sounds so lame, but it was the best feeling ever.
Mile 6, I ate my first sandwich and tweeted this, "10k at 55:55 feeling fing greT!!!! Today is my day!!!!! 1sandwich down!!! Wahoooooooooio" Running and tweeting = not the best spelling, but I was so happy that I felt good. I wanted to keep those updated who were going to try to track me online so I decided to tweet throughout the race. It's really not that hard. I would just whip out my phone from my iFitness belt and then get on twitter and read some inspiring messages and just type back something quick. There were always people around me, but I was never boxed in or anything or scared that I would hit people. I thought to myself at this point, I only have 20 miles to go. I've done that before and I can do it right now! I saw Billy riding around on his bike and that cheered me up and I was just in the zone, some weird happy zone. Billy also handed me little bottles of nuun and water throughout the race and he was a lifesaver. Mile 8 was a quick stop to the bathroom and then back on the course. I felt great after that.
Around mile 9, I started getting really giddy. I was almost to mile 10, and at mile ten there were only 16 miles to go. That's just like a long training run. We also passed my house right at mile 10ish, and I looked down my street and smiled at everyone nearby. It was my home turf! I just kept thinking, "I do it all the time, every day, I CAN do this." This was when the biggest goofiest smile became plastered to my face and it never left after this moment. The miles between around 12-20 were cool because you could see the people ahead of you, including the winners of the race running to the finish. I saw Punkie again and a few other friends and smiled and cheered for them. My spirits were soaring. I ate my 2nd sandwich at mile 12 and then burped for a while which was horrible. Once we got to the halfway point, I tweeted this, "Mule 13 at 1:56!!!!!! Saw team Hoyt!!!! Rocking lb!!!!!!!!!!!! " Again, my apologies for the horrible spelling. If you haven't heard of Team Hoyt, you can see their story here, grab some Kleenex too. Come to find out, I THOUGHT I saw them and felt so inspired and great but it was a team that was like them and actually really wasn't them. Either way, they were super inspiring and I knew that I was half way done. I COULD do this.
Mile 16-18 were a blur besides the GIANT grin on my face. I remember being pretty freaking happy the entire time, and I was smiling and waving at everyone and bobbing my head to the music and sometimes, yes I was mouthing the words. It was a WEIRD but AMAZING feeling. I said stuff in my head like, "This is how it's suppose to be!" and "This is it!! FINALLY!!" It was the race I dreamed of, seriously, it was all I wanted. I saw the time on my watch and I was just so happy with how things were going. I slapped hands and told people to cheer for us as we ran through Long Beach State, and was on FIRE, the good kind. I ate some sport beans at mile 16 and around mile 17 I took an orange from some guy. It was right around mile 18.5 I saw my cousin and I was so excited she came out. She passed me off a bottle of nuun that I grabbed and ran with for about 2 miles and drank from. She snapped this pic of me as I ran by.
I think it was around this point that I realized I might break four hours, which was my goal. I wanted to do that, but I just didn't know if I had it in me, especially after San Diego and my little broken spirit. I saw some more cheerers and just kept cruising and I saw some balloons in front of me. It was the FOUR HOUR PACE GROUP! I had talked to a girl earlier in the race who asked me what my goals were, and I said, "Um, break four?" Just saying that to her scared me, because I almost didn't want to verbalize it and then hit some crazy wall at mile 20. She told me I looked really strong and was right on pace and I should just keep going. It was her 11th marathon. I said "Alright! Thanks!" and left her behind me. So when I saw the pace group I was excited and just kept smiling and running. Then, this happened, "Just PASSEs the four. Hourpace group!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm going to try to hold on!!!!!! No matter what, I can't stop smiling!!!!!" Which made me so happy, and I couldn't stop smiling, because I was getting closer and closer to breaking four hours. Wait, do you realize how much I was smiling? Did I mention that? All of a sudden I was at mile 20. 6.2 miles to go! The smile was SO huge when I saw that number and I guess my joy called for twitter cussing. "Passed mile 20 bitches!!!!! 2:59!!!!! 6.2 to gooooooooo"
I just kept running and around mile 22 is where my feet started to hurt. I just kept telling myself, "Well you know what, if it didn't hurt, EVERYONE would be doing it!" and "This is SUPPOSE to hurt! Come ON, only 6 miles to go!" I kept passing people, left and right, and I realized that starting in the back of the race was the absolute best idea ever for me personally. I know in high school my coaches always knew I LOVED the chase. They would get mad at me because I would stay with a girl the whole race and never take the lead until the last 800 or 400. This made them freak out, but I just do really well running like that. I also think I love to chase people when I race because then I "know" my goal. Well today it was like one giant chase of everyone! I also realized if I start out with people around my 'pace' I get so caught up with the people around me and I can't hang on like that and then I die. Yesterday, starting from the back meant that I was passing everyone! Another goal I had was not to walk at all and Sunday I NEVER walked, which was amazing. I felt great the entire race.
Slowly, the miles kept ticking away, and I kept going, thinking each step was closer to the finish line, and closer to being done and closer to breaking 4 hours. "Mile 22 at 3:15. Yaaaaaaaaaaaa haven't walked yet! I'm feeling line I'm on druggfggs" I would read some replies to me from twitter and just wanted to keep doing so good! I felt so great. I took lemonade from a little girl around mile 22.5 after chugging up a somewhat tiring hill. Then, I started to hurt at mile 23.5 and a friend saw me and ran with me for a bit which kept me going, and finally I told him, "You know what, I'm close, I can do this, I gotta focus and do this!" I pumped up the jams and just kept chugging away. It seemed like throughout the entire race my music was perfect. I only had to skip a few songs but for the most part I was just rocking out to some sweet jams that totally matched my mood and giddiness. Also, around this time is where the barrage of pictures began.
See, told you my shirt is seriously the same color as the road cones! I figured if I died on the course somewhere at least no one would run me over :) I also got this shirt because I will stand out in night running, if I ever do some night running this winter.
There's that happy face! So, incredibly happy I can't even explain it to you.
The Long Beach "beach" in the background. I LOVE this city. :)
Yay! Me next to my twin, the road cone. :) This was right at mile 24 and obviously I was SUPER excited. I have never seen a picture like this before. What the HECK was I thinking? Jazz hands much? Billy is also taking some sweet pictures of me on his bike. So thankful for great friends like him and my other friend Nina who cheered for me and snapped some great shots as well.
Yup, don't worry, the jazz hands didn't end there!
Um yea, so about those shorts. They were new and a birthday gift from my friend Ann who I have been doing all my long training runs with. I hadn't worn the shorts before but she was running Chicago the same day I was running Long Beach and wanted to wear them to remind me of her running across the country at the same time. Now don't get me wrong, I LOVE the shorts. But, um, I might as well worn some bunsies because these are like sprint racing shorts! I'm sorry to the entire city of Long Beach for the showcase of my butt the entire race.
That's when I told Billy to not take a picture behind me because my butt was hanging out. I, as shown above, tried to cover it up. He was telling me, "Oh, thanks for making me look like a GIANT PERV!" ha ha, I didn't realize it but yes, it did make him look rather… interesting. :)
I ran with Billy who was on a bike for a while, who was a freaking pack mule for me out there and saved me big time, and then, out of NOWHERE, my little brother pulls up next to me on his beach cruiser. TEARY!
He rode the last mile and a half with me and then veered off the course to meet me with my cousin at the finish line. Yes, seriously. The fact that Baby Koo showed up was totally unexpected, but the route had gone by his house and he had just missed me, and rode his bike all the way down the path to meet up with me. When he rolled up next to me he was sweaty and was like, "What's up?" My brother is a typical California surfer boy and has that super laid back attitude. He is three years younger than me and a lifeguard at a local beach and just him rolling up in his slippers and cruising with me was such a treat. I was so excited he came out and was also very shocked. He kept saying things like, "Dude, you ran so far. I'm so tired from biking here! This was like FOUR MILES!" :) He was hilarious and kept me going until the end. I listened to some Kanye "Stronger" and just kept telling myself that the finish line was so close and I was going to break four and I couldn't dilly dally! I had to make it there in time. The last .2 I just flew down the downhill and into the chute and got my medal, with a huge grin across my face. I had done it. I finished according to Claude, 3:55:37, and though it wasn't "official", and yes, someone told me already it didn't count since I'm an idiot and forgot my chip, it's still freaking official in my book and I didn't stop Claude ever, I swear on my life! :) There were moments when I thought I had turned him off or stopped him and I constantly was checking my time and making sure he was ticking away. As soon as I crossed the finish line, and I made sure I was well past it, I stopped Claude, to this glorious, GLORIOUS number.
WELL hello there pretty number 3!! I was so happy. After I was done I immediately drank two chocolate milks and someone handed me a cup with some 'protein balls?' I'd never heard of them but I ate two and they were delicious, even though they are called protein balls. They were passing out cupcakes and I took one but I just wasn't famished and didn't want to eat it so I put it in my cup and gave it to my brother. :)
Baby Koo and I after the race, on his beach cruiser.
YAY! I was so happy he was there. :) And that is the cupcake, in the cup!
My cousin who came out and helped me out along the course. Looks like we both love Nike with those shirts :) So glad she was there and could hand me off some nuun. She also kept some of my twitter friends updated too!
Starting the LONG walk back to the car. Ha ha, that took me a while but I still felt great and yup, you guessed it, couldn't stop smiling!
I got to the finish and I had that feeling that was missing from San Diego, that feeling like, oh yea marathon, WHAT NOW?! And I felt accomplished and amazing and still to this day cannot stop smiling. That feeling was surely missing from San Diego. After San Diego I felt defeated and hurt. I am working on a different post and I will get it done soon that is touching on some emotional things that I was feeling after LB compared to SD, because I swore up and down I would NEVER run another marathon. Well guess what, I ran another one, dominated it, and can't wait for my next one. Crazy? YES!
For all those who care, here are my splits.
.55 (according to garmin, I suck at running tangents) – 4:33
My Garmin said my average pace was 8:53 per mile. According to the race results, if I would have been chip timed, (grrrrrr!) my 3:55 would have brought me in about 16th in my age group, 180th female and 750th overall, which is pretty darn good, considering the race had a lot of entrants.
Here are some race logistics for those who care too. I took water at almost every water stop and drank it while running. I also ate at mile 6 (pb and j) 12 (pb and j) 16 (6 sport beans) 20 (15 sport beans). I took an orange at mile 18 and also drank a lot of nuun and mostly stuck to water on the course but had 2 cups of power aide as well. I also "stopped" at the "Kool-n-fit" stations and allowed them to spray both the front and back of both my legs. That was amazingly BOMB and I think helped a lot. At mile 23ish I took some lemonade from a little girl. I randomly ran by a 'Vaseline' board and grabbed a ton of and put it in between my thighs so I wouldn't chafe even though I had body glide already on around mile 14. It was kind of weird, but worked like a charm because I didn't chafe anywhere.
My shirt is by Nike, which I got at Marshalls. My shorts are by New Balance and this is the link to some that are identical, but have a little bit longer inseam which makes them more wearer friendly, unless you want your butt to be out and about like mine was. I was wearing the iFitness belt and had my Nathan detachable pouch attached to it.
Of course, the day wouldn't be complete without an ice bath! I DIED in this one. I think the combination of a ton of 'kool-n-fit' and the ice was a little intense because I was dying, but I hung tight for 15 minutes and I know it will help in recovery. As for how I felt the day after? Well, you may or may not be surprised but I still can't stop smiling. My feet are what hurts the most, and my quads hurt when I walk, but hey, I ran a marathon right? I did a recovery run of 1.3 miles in 13.54 last night but I still was in happyland about my excellent race. I used the stick after and that was pretty painful! As for today, I feel back to about 75%, which is decent for just kicking serious marathon butt. I'm sure people who saw me running last night thought I was some kind of crazy. I was grimacing and just focusing on getting my feet moving and quads shaken out. I won't be running again until at least Friday. I know giving my feet and toes the proper time to heal is important, but I can't wait to run again! I came back with one bloody toe and three relatively large blisters, and only one is painful but it's healing up nicely.
So as of right now, I'm still so happy, and I can't wait to run my next marathon. Yup, there's more in the works! I'll let you in on those plans soon, but I'm just going to sit and glow for a while.
Thank you to all the words of encouragement, the pep talks I've had, the friends I've met and made throughout this journey, and all those who never stopped believing in me. I knew I would finally have my race and it happened in a glorious fashion. I am SO happy to report how it went, because it was all I dreamed that my perfect race would hold. Literally last night before I fell asleep, I thought, did that really happen? Amazing, and yes, I woke up this morning with a smile still on my face.


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|The word 'H' connotes many meaning for this boutique hotel. It can represent exciting holidays,
the wholesomeness of a home, a house for anyone, an institution for hospitality or just simply spending
a lot heck of sleeping time in one of the most comfortable bed other than your bed at home.
Total happiness should sum up what H. Boutique Hotel stands for.
True to what a boutique hotel represents, H. Boutique Hotel conforms to international standards in terms of world-class design, provision of hi-tech/high standard amenities, and par-excellence in service to our clientele.
Just entering the lobby alone can transport anyone from the different world outside of the hotel. The sleek design of the whole lobby with it's modern- classy furniture and fixtures marks and suggest a high standard ambiance most notable people can identify with.
There is a large flat screen cable TV for clients and guests to enjoy while on queue from our courteous receptionists or when simply enjoying a moment of relaxation at the bar section of the lobby.
With 40 rooms to occupy, the H. Boutique Hotel's superior and deluxe rooms are bigger
than any hotel rooms you can find in this area boasting at least 35 sq. meters each.
Unlike big hotels, H. Boutique Hotel claims of par excellence in service since there are only
48 rooms and the quota per client in terms of customer assistance is at full pledge.
There is also the 32 international cable TV channels provided 24 hours on a large flat screens viewable comfortably from your world-class bedding or from any corner of the room, as well as door key cards for security locks.
Furthermore, most people are very kin with how their bathrooms look and feel as this has become a comfort zone for many. These aspects were put in mind and considered during the construction and design.
The hot and cold shower heads alone produces a rain-like water spray with controllable water pressure to soothe your aching body while enjoying the bathe right after your rigorous tour of Pattaya or at any time of the day. The verandah in each room is not to be forgotten to mention as even the chairs and the coffee table are of utmost quality providing our clients who smoke or even those who do not smoke a great comfortable viewing of the outside areas which depends what corner each client is booked. The street side will have a viewing of the busy street downstairs and in upper sections, a general view of a good part of Pattaya by day and night. On the other side, there is a nature view of trees and plantations of the nearby empty properties and on upper rooms, also a general view of a good part of Pattaya by day and night.
All room ambiance is culminated by the color motif our interior designer have balanced altogether between velvet shades of violet, white and earth tone colors in order augment total comfort during your stay with us.
|Superior Room (size: 24 sq.m.)
Deluxe Room
(size: 28 sq.m.)
|The first floor of H. Boutique Hotel also prides of its own Italian and Indian restaurants.
There is no need for clients to walk far looking for that exotic taste of Indian food as we have that from our Saffron Indian restaurant.
Likewise, our clients will find our internationally acclaimed Italian menu from our very own Italian restaurant, Oliva.
|The hotel and the restaurants provide broadband internet to all its client's and guests so they can still be connected
to the world while holidaying with us. CCTV in and around the hotel compound is installed and the local police are watching
the security for the whole building and its residents.
As per location, H. Boutique Hotel is in the middle of a busy red-light street where entertainment never sleeps. It is also just a few meters away on the famous Pattaya beach. You can walk to Central Department store and many other shopping malls as well as stroll towards the famous 'Walking Street' for a complete night-out.
|One of the finest boutique hotel in Pattaya, Thailand. A hotel walking distance to Pattaya beach,
Pattaya walking street and Pattaya shopping areas. It is also a 15 minutes ride to Jomtien Beach, Pattaya.


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Amy Rogers
Amy Rogers is the author of Hungry for Home: Stories of Food from Across the Carolinas and Red Pepper Fudge and Blue Ribbon Biscuits. Her writing has also been featured in Cornbread Nation 1: The Best of Southern Food Writing, the Oxford American, and the Charlotte Observer. She is founding publisher of the award-winning Novello Festival Press. She received a Creative Artist Fellowship from the Arts and Science Council, and was the first person to receive the award for non-fiction writing. Her reporting has also won multiple awards from the N.C. Working Press Association. She has been Writer in Residence at the Wildacres Center, and a program presenter at dozens of events, festivals, arts centers, schools, and other venues. Amy Rogers considers herself "Southern by choice," and is a food and culture commentator for NPR station WFAE.
What's your favorite childhood food memory? Watching my mother in a gorgeous cocktail dress sneak into the kitchen before a party so she could eat some real food.
What's your typical breakfast? Coffee, with a side order of extra coffee
What can you always find in your fridge? Half-and-half. Because you can put it in coffee, tea, cereal, frittatas, and lots of leftover things like tomatoes, potatoes and shellfish to make cream-of-whatever soup.
Kitchen tool(s) you can't live without? I lived and cooked wonderful meals for literally decades with only one chef's knife. I now have others but rarely use them.
If you aren't in the kitchen, where are you? Visiting farm stands, markets, cafes, friends' homes – anywhere there's food to be sampled and enjoyed.