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text: Roy Johnson of Northbrook, Oct. 4, 2003, loving husband of Marilyn; beloved brother-in-law of Bob Anderson, Bud Cain, Bill Koch and Jeanne Elven. Visitation Wednesday, 10 a.m. until time of funeral service 11 a.m. at N.H. Scott & Hebblethwaite Funeral Home, 1240 Waukegan Rd., Glenview (2 blks South of Lake Ave. on West side). Interment Ridgewood Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to American Heart Association, Dept. 77-3968 Chicago, IL 60678-3968. Funeral info 847-998-1020.

subset: commoncrawl


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With some 53,000 refugees a year finding new homes in the United States, one group of six in the crowd hardly seems worth noticing. But when they are North Koreans bearing fresh accounts of abuses committed by their communist state and the horrors undergone to escape them, they quickly grab attention.
The six touched down on American soil May 5, the first time in more than 50 years the United States has taken North Koreans as refugees. Protection surrounding them and their useful escape route was tight: no names, and no identifying the Southeast Asian nation they came through. Disclosing those details could endanger the refugees' families remaining in North Korea.
Nonetheless, they have told other parts of their stories. The group's path to freedom began when some members contacted South Korean pastor Chun Ki Won in 2003. Rev. Chun is a well-known activist on the Underground Railroad, which smuggles North Korean refugees to safety, often first through hostile territory such as China and then Southeast Asia.
At least two of the women crossed the peril-fraught border with China in 1998 and 2003 and then found themselves sold into forced marriages with Chinese men. According to The Wall Street Journal, one endured severe beatings from her husband. The other suffered farm labor so excruciating she injured her back and could not walk for almost a year. China later repatriated her and as punishment for absconding, North Korea cycled her through its network of prison camps, thought to hold some 200,000 inmates. She later escaped back into China.
Such harrowing stories are typical, by activist accounts. Tim Peters, another ardent underground railroader, heads the Seoul-based nonprofit Helping Hands Korea. He estimates almost three-quarters of women refugees fall prey to traffickers in China. His group focuses on aiding North Koreans in worst crisis in China, which repatriates captured North Koreans despite their almost certain risk of punishment and even execution.
[Excerpt of an article by Priya Abraham, WORLD Magazine]


text:
Ground work...
TRuck eyeing where the first hole will be dug.
Daddy Not A Cowboy (DNaC) starting that first hole.
Yeehaw.... first hole is dug!! LOL
And cemented...Then it was break time... LMAO!
Then TRuck's girlfriend came over, she is holding onto the end of a string that we have tied at the end of last stall corner pin. When the men needed to dig a new hole she would tighten the string. Thus, hopefully we have a nice straight line for the back of the stalls.
Hole #5 was the last one we dug. DNaC figured we would wait for more man power, when our boys would be out.~~~~~~~~
The boys are here! This is last weekend.
We started with the front yard work.
This turned into many hours of hard labor, even though on paper it sure seemed like it should not have taken that long, but digging, lining up block and laying flagstone sure did.
Here are pics of the end result.
(before we had wood steps off the porch and no walkway to the driveway)
*I say driveway, but it is really the drive around the house kind of driveway.
These same kind of blocks that are forming the steps, we stood up to make the block divider for the grass areas.
The walk along the house that we removed the flagstone and lined the area with plastic, then redid the flagstone (like putting together a puzzle). Mattress, JDrums and Kevo all had a piece in this.
The small walkway to the driveway. On the right and the left of this walkway will be the grass areas.We leveled the area for the round pen and also redid our easement, but I don't have pics. There was a spot that kept large puddles after it rained and TRuck smoothed it out and built up the sides. We will see how it does with the next heavy rains.
That was Saturday's (8/30/08) accomplishments.
Sunday (8/31) morning, we are all refreshed and ready to go again...
All the temporary panels have been moved away except the front of the stalls, which we keep because of the gates.
Jackie making sure all is going well...
Most of the no-climb fence is attached, we used a fence puller hooked to one of our trucks for a tight fit.
Toby comes in to visit and check things out.
6 comments
Wow, what a lot of projects! It's great your boys are there to help. I am eagerly awaiting the picture of the round pen! The flagstone looks great, too.ReplyDelete
What a great crew! Would you consider renting them out? I love the colors of the walkway. And that fencing looks great for safety. As one who has done a bit of fence hole digging, i can say that you were right to wait for the strong boys to help.ReplyDelete
WoW! Look at all you guys got done!!! Thats darn neat. Glad the boys all came home to help out too. I LOVE the walkway. That just looks fantastic.ReplyDelete
Dont get me started on your fences...hehe... I am sitting here drooling over those!!
So... did you wear the guys out too much? Are they going to be willing to chip in and do more? ;)
Glad you're back! LOVE the new look, especially that pic at the top. Love that!ReplyDelete
You have been busy busy!! Looks fantastic! Lots of work, but you had some good help there!
We missed you!
That looks like some serious work. I'm exhausted just from looking at the pictures and now I'm gonna take a nap.ReplyDelete
Sounds like your yard is up and great. How fun is that. We were going to do the front yard, but then that is where the haystack went. LOL Saved me from working so much. Glad for boys. My brothers and hubby sure have done a ton of work around here.ReplyDelete
Thank you for coming by, we appreciate all your comments! We hope you enjoy your time here and will come back often.


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Power the printer off. Press and hold the paper feed button and power back on. Keep the paper button held down until a sheet of paper is fed. This will print a nozzle check. To do a head clean press and hold the ink button for 5 seconds.
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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3650663102986653762014-10-05T00:21:52.213-07:00The Unflinching PanelComic books and the wraiths generated therein.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-64973603765078973412010-04-17T07:27:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:27:54.744-07:00What is it about that Parker fellow?*Originally posted 3/31/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

o-lee crap, Sunny Day Real Estate's made it to the overhead at Chapterhouse, and I feel like such a dweeb for having missed most of their oeuvre.

So, I have a lot of posts on here about the depiction of sex, gender, etc. in comics, and ways I feel the industry falls short of my rather lofty social expectations. Well, then this guy comes along and throws up a post that makes me quite, quite happy on many levels.

Responsibility and repercussions seem to have long-standing resonance in the comic book collector world, seemingly without regard to genre. That said, those are subjects I feel that just about any of these genres could explore admirably. Spider-Man's flubs and social misalignment stand as the primary example of this, yet perhaps other, less central matters could explore these topics, in smaller details in the margins and corners.

One element few people wish to touch in post-human stories without absurd amounts of pathos are responsibilities around the extraordinary abilities. How does the way Superman flies differ from Wonder Woman? Can we get some little side notes on the ways that Peter Parker satisfies his predatory Spider instincts in the bedroom, like the way his fingers stick to skin, or the unorthodox positions his flexibility allows? How do characters who convert back and forth between solid and energy forms feel about having guts one moment, and a nuclear fusion/fission reaction the next? How much does Wolverine really use his eyes when he can smell what you ate on your sixteenth birthday in your sweat, and what does it mean when he decides to look at you? I really would like to see a little more of how individual and alien the lives of post-humans are to humanity, in those little ways that each of us differ.

Although Marvel's scientific experiments gone awry exemplified the element of trauma in the awakening of post-humanity in an individual, even Superman carries an element of this phenomenon in the revelation of his extraterrestrial heritage. A boy grows up in a middle-of-nowhere town that, to this day, probably gets one bar on a cell phone, worrying about things like fixing the tractor and that godforsaken social studies test, when he starts ripping steel in half and shooting fire out of his eyes if he gets a half-mast from Lana Lang's thong strap peeking out from her Dungarees. Eventually, Pa takes him into the cellar and shows him this contraption that seriously can-not have come from anywhere we know, lighting up in the dark in increasingly subtle ways and incongruous color schemes that make no sense under a yellow sun. Something lights up, and a defeated, terrified scientist fellow appears like Leia out of R2D2, with a voice ringing with that despair that comes from wishing that you just weren't right. This man, this weird ghost-man, has these little gestures and features that drill right into the boy's heart while he listens to this mysteriously familiar guy address himself as the kid's birth father. The dude's already staring into the proverbial void while preparing to fire his child out into the physical one. The end of Krypton must have been absolutely gruesome. He's left, this confused tween boy, with the usual maddening drug trip of puberty, the confusion of coming from a completely inaccessible origin, and heretofore unexplainable abilities and physiological functions that he has to learn to manage on the fly (pun totally not intended, but kept in.) That sounds pretty traumatic to me.

In what ways does post-humanity process this trauma? How does the nature of the trauma creep up for these people? Does Cyclops of the X-Men rub the back of his head before getting on a plane after falling out of one and hitting his head as a child? Does Luke Cage's unbreakable skin ever itch, and how does it register touch? How does Carol Danvers feel about her body, even having a body, when her consciousness and form have drifted up and down the vibrational wavelength?

Comics do cover trauma, yet often times the characters seem to feel sorry for themselves until someone comes along for them to hit, and in hitting this someone, they find the strength in themselves to project their problems onto some stupid thug with pimped out riot gear and feel contentment in mauling their fellow man over what's "right," or saving some morons from a burning building to renew their basic sense of humanity. Savagery and compassion are to superheroes what boredom and disappointment are to us; part of the deal. If we take into account that a superhero will, most likely, save someone in trouble, then what would pose to them the real challenge of living their "everyday" lives and permitting themselves to feel their woundedness? What can a superhuman accomplish with a little humility, flexibility and ingenuity?Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-54356012934521124072010-04-17T07:23:00.001-07:002010-04-17T07:23:50.317-07:00The Snarling Well Hvergelmir*Originally posted 2/12/10 on Black Elixir Neat*

Since I just don't give enough of a fuck to load up my iTunes with all manner of music, I'm starting to get sick of everything media related. I can feel the sun dig in its heels and tear up at the prospect of diving into Pisces, after spending a month in the unfeeling chaos of the void reminiscent of Aquarius. It's like locking someone in a dark room for a month with nothing but their neuroses to keep them company, then tearing them out only to submerge them in the ocean of the screaming dead. Boy, I'm a chipper one!

Look, I could take the piss and pretend that I like wearing long vests and babble about all the good people you meet amongst the dead, but it's still fucking jarring, especially when you aren't some goobery medium convinced that the universe speaks in linear sentences and coherent faces, only discernible by those with "special powers" or some bullshit like that.

I've been stuck playing Dante's Inferno a whole bunch during my less productively oriented moments. I keep going and going through the game, scrambling through all of the various puzzles and the like, smacking monsters about the face and generally going through all of this gory catharsis, but then my ears key in to the pervasive shrieks and gargles of pain that constantly waft through the environments, all vicious and stomach-turning.

There's some point where I begin to question what the game's really doing. Some passive-aggressive sort might dither about the level of violence in the game, but seriously: it's a game dealing with the Crusades and the Renaissance vision of Hell. On some level, the game actually makes Hell the infected anal sore of the cosmos instead of a cheesy black metal album cover, but on another, certain circles could have stood to have been examined in more excruciating notions of hypocrisy or have had some form of elucidation. The City of Dis, the circle relating to Heresy, kind of left me cold. I mean, D&D undead wizard things with goofy magic staffs, under the name of Pagans? Come the fuck on. Pagans gave the Church fucking Christmas in December, Mother Mary (cognate with the Latin mare, meaning sea), incarnating and resurrecting godhood, and... hold on a sec... HELL! Oh, but why no Pale Queen in the Darkness? Why offer us as the only powerful women of Hell some stupid giant half-naked "Egyptian" with a Glasgow smile climbing a massive cocktower and Dante's sylphid paramore in a pathetic virgin/whore complex? Maybe I'm just too into this kind of thing, but it'd be nice to see the nasty soddering done where the Christian dualist ethos tried to nestle its way into the black womb of Hel, where the cosmogony starts to fall apart and point to its own failures at unifying humanity with Creation, or in fact where it pulls humanity away from Creation so forcefully that one might take a look at the devilishly fabricated dreck such as national origin or creed and vomit on the face of God upon realizing how such associations lead us into the sterility of binary thought.

I demand games of a higher caliber and sophistication of thought than this. It needn't be so goddamn rare. It's fucking lame, and I'm sick of excuses as to the perpetuation of this crap. I want Kratos to fight Atalanta. I want to see vicious, corrupt industrialists with ovaries that commoners swear shoot buckshot and sulfuric acid. I want more of Amanda Waller and Helena Cain. I want to see women antagonists capable of such intricate and brilliant cruelty that none dare consider them some misunderstood soul deserving of empathy, and none would venture to consider themselves lucky to run afoul of them. I want the anti-Lilith, not some blustering gasbag with a mouth full of talk kept closed by a smug smirk holding back the urge to wretch all over her shoulder-padded jacket at her sheer ineptitude at being anything other than a mild frustration and vague sexual interest to a protagonist. If anything, a higher caliber of female villain might hopefully stir some more interesting female heroes.

I want too much from the world of media. The expression of the collective dream has become a vapid, derivative waste. We've become so quick to excuse diversions of our attention toward the manipulations of our time and resources, if only to fuel the self-flagellation that diverts our psychic and emotional ability to heal. We're placid miscarriages still dangling from the rotting placenta of retrospective, in desperate need of resuscitation and a fucking belly button. I want to remember blood, pain, vigor and victory. We deserve life, in all its teeth, venom and horns.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-89648972648946232812010-04-17T07:21:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:21:02.402-07:00Tesla's Wireless Electricity in the Erogenous Zones*Originally published 11/28/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Mmkay. Pluto has entered Capricorn. Thank Fucking God, the God of Fucking. Planetary position's as meaningless as everything else, but to go on association, the transformative essence of Pluto applies to the fundamental Structure of our human perspective when in Capricorn. That's neither here nor there, but I guess I have some hopes for certain fundamental changes. I want to change the world to be more accepting so that I don't have to act demonstratively. It's selfish and stupid.

Anyhow, gender identity's been on my mind a lot lately. Of course, I could go on about Batwoman for days. I could talk about how Greg Rucka has written her as a full human being and how that seems so fucking mind-blowing in the reactionary field of superhero comics. I could write about how her scary straight-browed mask offsets the chalk-white skin and blood-red lips, how her body language becomes both intimidating and arousing simultaneously, how White Town's "Your Woman" goes through my head when she flirts with her future Big Ex and future Question, Officer Renee Montoya.

Thing is, I don't know that this should feel as special as it does. I should be more critical of the stilted dialogue during the Baroque Horror of Gotham moments with the Religion of Crime. Frankly, it says something to me about the world that Batwoman doesn't get a title all her own. I can complain that DC Entertainment "should" have done a Batwoman book, but as a retailer, I don't think that it would sell as well as it would within Detective. I'm kind of sad that a character as human as she is seen as new and innovative for a lead role, that LGBTQIA characters most often flesh out ensemble casts as something separate or novel.

There's also the shapeshifter/intersexed character problem that dogs me. "Shapeshifter" as character type seems to carry the dichotomy of Trickster/Sociopath, and, with the exception of a few X-Men or aliens, seem mostly male/masculine in disposition. Mystique, the most high-profile of the feminine shapeshifters in the superhero genre, is a notably oversexed sociopath, all the way to fighting Wolverine while naked and carrying all sorts of phallic artillery. Her callousness seems only portrayed through her cavalier use of sex appeal and through few other outlets. We could argue that it's "part of her character," but she's barely a character in contrast to the potential she has. Secret Invasion, where Earth has been invaded by a shapeshifting species of extraterrestrials, exemplifies this by displaying the War Skrulls as bulky, steroidy Man-Dudes with the ladyshaped ones acting in a more manipulative role. Why does it take so damned long for media to move forward? As much as I love Mad Men, I feel frustrated that a show that takes place in the early 1960s seems more relevant than the most bleeding-edge dramas.

Sure, I get it: it's comic books. Most somatypes are relegated into extremes and visual shorthand due to the limitations of publishing, as well as a given artist's skill. I'm as incapable of living up to Batman's physique as the lady sitting next to me is to Wonder Woman, but with so many opportunities to explore the fallacy of any identity, especially in a genre where identity is writ so large, the stagnation feels like a waste.

Having LGBTQIA characters work in comics would, in my opinion, come through making it less of a big deal. A character's gender identity, or rather gender tendencies, act as window dressing for the person beneath all of those motivations. In the words of Mark Renton, "It has everything to do with aesthetics and fuck all to do with morality." I'm getting kind of tired of two women getting intimate as being seen as "hawt" and marketed toward this weird harem fantasy for the hetero male. Maybe I take all of this too seriously. Maybe it's that focus on sensory intimacy as, well, intimate that makes this whole scenario seem more frustrating than it should be. Maybe I just want the world to change so I don't have to think about how to act like a Man all the fucking time.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-31406890999319613392010-04-17T07:19:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:19:04.805-07:00Spitting Out Golden Apple, Rinsing the Mouth Out with Mes*Originally posted 11/25/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Unfettered information shrieks through the mind at a terrible pace when stimulated and given little chance to absorb. The focus of the mind narrows to increase the velocity of the information's processing, yet more often than not a bottleneck occurs for those who tend toward a visual-simultaneous information processing method to their mind. The proverbial log jam thus creates anxiety, since the perspective views all of this information building on itself from all angles instead of a single line. Of course, non-physically-oriented anxiety leads to abstract sources for solutions; imaginary cobra problems require imaginary mongooses.

So anyhow, Assassin's Creed II can share some blame for the length of time it's taken between posts, yet it can take a lot of credit for inspiring this Town Madman to rattle his box full of thingamajigs and scream to high heaven once more. The first Assassin's Creed dropped us into the Crusades of the 13th Century CE, highlighting the effect that dogmatic organized religion has had on civilization, primarily for the worse but without being uncouth about it. While the player operates the Assassin Altair (pronounced all tahyEER), the main character of the game is a fellow from 20 minutes into the future, Desmond Miles. The premise comes from a corporation interacting with his memories to find a particular maguffin artifact, the Apple of Eden, presented as a gold sphere that contains all human knowledge (but of course, not all human wisdom). So, Desmond gets into a machine which allows him to operate within his own memories, synchronizing with the actions of his ancestor, Altair. This ancestor in question had, as far as the first game went, very little in the way of personality, and was a bit like Mr. Spock with a hard-on for libertarianism. You had only so much you could do in the first game, and the gameplay eventually became something you had to do to get on with the story... until you beat the game and have the development of a) Desmond developing similar ESP to Altair and b) the entire lab in which Desmond was imprisoned covered in strange glyphs and symbols, most (if not all) of which come from real sources. (Nazca plains animals, Hebrew phrases, Quran scripture, Newgrange spirals, etc).

The second game comes right after the weirdness of the first, and shoves us immediately into a game whose scale goes absolutely berserk in both macrocosm and microcosm. Desmond escapes the corporation to a hideout of others who belong to the Assassin bloodline (or cause or whatever). Their machine's better, of course (cuz it's made by a cute girl! Haw!) and the premise of the current game is Desmond learning through the memories he accesses with this machine the ins and outs of Assassin training.

Now, let's clarify: "Assassin" in this game comes from a hypothesis of a radical, rational humanist sect coming off of the Ismaili sect of Islam, rather than the mercenary. It doesn't overtly recognize the notion that "assassin" was a pejorative epithet of the Ismaili made by opposing sects and picked up by Christian scholars. While the games use history as incredible window dressings for the game, it does digress wildly.

This round, the Assassins cue him up for the career of his ancestor Ezio Auditore da Firenze. Ezio begins as a pugnacious rich kid who isn't quite used to consequence. In contrast to the angular, cold features of Altair, Ezio has rounded, earthy features. The only real mark that possibly sets him as worth mentioning is a from a split lip he received from a rock to the face during a very demonstrative brawl with a rival family. Once the story requires he accept his role as Assassin, he goes through various stages of helplessness. Where he had been used to punching and yelling, he must now work in secret, skulking in crowds and ducking into alleyways to avoid detection. The designers put a lot of work in the subtlety of his emotional shift from extroverted snarls and barks to cautious speech and chilled stares at odd corners of the room.

One of my favorite things on this game is the introduction of money. Not only does Ezio have numerous ways to gain income (completing side quests, treasure hunting, looting bodies, pickpocketing, maintaining his villa) and utilize income (artwork, weapons, throwing money to distract minstrels and guards, hiring courtesans, thieves and mercenaries, bribing town criers), the power money has becomes more emphasized in this game. Most of the targets in this game have more of an economic influence than religious, although the Church still plays a large part of the story. Lorenzo de Medici has a strong connection with the character, and yet he challenges the player's perceptions of their actions. Aside from the assassinations that move the story forward, Lorenzo sends contracts through carrier pigeons to different cities for you to collect and act on. After about five, I began to wonder about these contracts myself, and exactly how many people Lorenzo wanted me to kill for good reason, how many he wanted me to kill for his own purposes, and how many out of pure paranoia. I've stopped doing those missions altogether, and with the amount of things to do, I don't feel that bad about it.

For me, one of the most important features in the game comes from the glyphs hidden throughout the world on important landmarks in Italy, and the Codex pages penned by Altair after the events of the previous game. These unlock computer code written by the previous person to enter the Animus, which opens into puzzles that bring into question contentious moments in human history (Oppenheimer, Gandhi, JFK, Nikola Tesla, Atilla the Hun, etc) This is where we get into the meat of what the game wants to express ideologically. How does a person fight a war against ideas? What will a person find himself willing to do when rational humanism devolves into atheism and nihilism? What is the responsible use of knowledge? How does a person fight a battle against ideas? How do we outgrow civilization and how can we initiate this next stage in our species' evolution?

I feel like Assassin's Creed will be the next Metal Gear series, and I hope that we'll be able to see this kind of sophistication in subject in future games.Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-42200493400919906892010-04-17T07:16:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:16:40.639-07:00Ajna Heat Vision, Anahata Super Strength*Originally posted 11/7/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Lately, in very ordinary ways, I've been dunked in the well of Myth for sustenance. The offer to cover one coworker's shift at the comic book store has spun out into two weeks straight of counter-jockeying, bagging, pricing, grading, reading, bag checks, and so on. One tarot reading tends to spill into three at the drop of a hat, and astrological Samhain snorts in laughter at my attempts to act skeptical, rational and detached.

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, "Hero" derives from the same route as servare, to protect. This said, one wonders how much stock "protectors" receive. What of the abstract preservation brought through development? The moment in Flex Mentallo when Vic Sage remembers the magic word has stuck with me, and I wonder: what would we consider a super-shaman, super-sadhu, or other such figure? In one way, the attribution of post-human bombast with these social roles might seem counterintuitive, yet there's that there show Avatar that made many transcendental concepts accessible for even eight-year-olds. How would we strip down the scriptural trappings and faces given to the basic ideals that underpin philosophy and paint them in bright primary colors? Would the character really need to wear their briefs on the outside? Does the character require a secret identity? How does identity play into a role of non-civilized living and liberation? How does a person apply extranormality to their position? How does the individual explore a genius phenomenon that gives reason to their manifestation in the reality continuum? How about the super-construction worker or super-chef? Need post-humanity remain purely defined by militarism, with uniforms and stripping of the individual into sickening self-deification and strong reference to deeds as noble in and of themselves?

So now, the caffeine has worn off. Whoops.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-80620459759573620732010-04-17T07:14:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:14:56.481-07:00The Lion in Winter*Originally published 10/23/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Still going on comic books. My feelings on and around them are going through a putrefaction for a variety of reasons, so I may as well get some curd from the fermentation.

Andrew Hickey, the Mindless Ones, and others have touched on a lot of these points. All eight people who read this blog, if you like the comics rambles I've been doing, check these guys out.

I've always dug legacy heroes. If anyone got the opportunity to watch "Son of Rambow," the little Mormon boy shows a lot of how Little Ben interacted with and conceived of the universe. I didn't feel right as playing the established character, as most of what I experienced of, say, the Justice League or Marvel characters were from continuity dense works bought sporadically or from the mini-comics I'd get in the Super Powers action figures. I had it in mind that Hal Jordan meant little to me outside of a name, that Superman may or may not have had that Superplane thing, and that Batman seriously didn't have a shiny blue costume for fighting Mr. Freeze. So most of the time I'd conceive of some derivative, some new fellow who would receive endorsement from the Big Grown Up Heroes who had their grown-up things to handle that I didn't recognize all that well. (I'm still waiting for editorial to treat Green Lantern more like The Wire and less like G.I. Joe meets Star Trek.) That said, whenever some young buck would take over the mantle from the Big Grown Up Hero, I'd be excited to no end. For me, it showed that it was possible to take that idea popularized by these unassailable, emotionally inscrutable things made to look like people and make it viable through change.

Unfortunately, most comic book readers never saw it that way. The idea of growing up into a hero meant needing to grow up, and that scares a lot of them. Somehow, "growing up" means things like "get married, have kids, feel guilty about enjoying yourself, overdo it, get chided by Mother-wife-thing." Thus, comics became normalcy. The popular, emotionally inscrutable fellows in the costume became fundamental pillars instead of benchmarks. To my perspective, it's like being mad that Barry Sanders isn't playing football any more. Just because he isn't out there doesn't mean that his contributions to football and the masculine identity aren't valid.

Also, some characters were poor, poor excuses for follow-ups. Ben Reilly had a convoluted origin involving genetics, enough so that he contributed little as a stand-in Spider-Man. He had little with which I could associate, while Peter Parker's acceptance of an ambivalent totem due to an acceptance of his less-than-stellar traits and his desire to redeem them at all costs was something universal. Kyle Rayner had the greatest potential as Hal Jordan's replacement as Green Lantern, yet he was kept too closely in check by shortcomings on both writing and editorial staff. He never showed us what a visually-oriented person could manifest if given the ultimate artistry kit, and he had nothing of a relatable personality, except for the inferiority complex manifested in his appearances in JLA. The entire Marvel Next line, for all of the interesting details, had been far too sanitized. None of the characters dealt with anything heavier than a slightly bad day or a bombastic, vague cosmic threat.

However, some characters taking up mantles were quite successful. Wally West, the original Kid Flash, graduated from sidekick to full-fledged Flash, and with it he brought a hyperkinetic, childlike enthusiasm that the doddering, stiff Barry Allen lacked. Bucky Barnes was retrofitted as a damaged, dark young man who had been a part of numerous questionable moments in history, and his accession to Captain America after the ethical perfection of Steve Rogers gave him a path to show that he was, beneath the wretched history and rightful political cynicism, capable of altruism and evolution.

With that, however, Barry Allen and Steve Rogers have returned to remind us that comics are governed more by fear more than by possibility. The past returns, and with it a message that our futures are useless and meaningless in the face of nostalgia. Wolverine, along with the return of his memories, has been gifted with a son, a successor. However, his successor is a morally bankrupt, manipulative horror, capable of cruelties that even his hard-boiled father cannot match. The same goes for Bruce Banner's son, Skaar. The younger generation is seen as a blight and a terror, bloodthirsty monsters who would sooner eat a live kitten than save one from a tree. The future holds nothing but aggression and pain in the world of Superheroes these days. Those who empathized with the characters who had bad fathers are now perpetuating the same Zeus/Kronos complex that had damaged them.

I really hope that this is a last-ditch effort before the human spirit kick-starts itself into the realms of the impossible, where science and religion aren't seen as proving what doesn't exist, but as displaying what can become manifest.Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-73348651560279197052010-04-17T07:12:00.003-07:002010-05-05T07:14:23.103-07:00Patagia*Originally published 10/20/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Thanks to B.L. Donnelly, Batman and related material have gotten a lot of mental airplay over here. Batman has strong roots in the Mystery Man pulps, not to mention Aristotlean philosophy (as often exemplified by Frank Miller's literature). However, I choose to examine the phenomenon of what allowed "Batman" to form as an idea and take the reins.

The canon of Batman's genesis goes as follows. Thomas Wayne, inheritor of the preposterously exhorbitant Wayne family fortune (money as superpower), goes to medical school and becomes a surgeon. Somewhere along the way, he falls for a powerfully idealistic woman named Martha. The two marry and have a son, named Bruce. Although often estranged from other youths and easily startled, Bruce had a good heart and a singularity for a brain. The family resided at Wayne Manor, which has a rich history. Set over a vast cave network, Bruce had his first encounter with live bats after tripping into a well. The event left him shaken, but otherwise unscathed. Most scribes put Bruce at around 7-10 years old when he and his parents set out to see Mask of Zorro on the big screen, as an endulgence for Bruce. This endulgence coincided with a very strong desire, or perhaps even need, for liquid assets in a gentleman named Joe Chill. Agitated by circumstance and possibly other stimulants (or lack of opiates), Joe Chill attempts to mug the Wayne family and in the scuffle shoots the parents before scrambling away from the devastated child.

Here's where the recounting gets shaky. The point at which Bruce re-encountered the bat shifts and changes often, implying a moment out of time. This is where I feel that Bruce interfaced with something much, much bigger than his individual consciousness, the moment in time that sent ripples through his short life. The well of bats didn't exist in Bob Kane's original story, instead coming from later authors. That said, it has been used repeatedly since its inception. Bruce was, nevertheless, left with nothing off of which he could project a Paternal or Maternal role directly, which left him open in that moment of trauma to recognize the Living Idea Being which he identified through the same sensation as a child trapped in a well with an endless stream of bats flying past him. Many authors have projected the idea of what he must have felt, yet it all seemed to ring strangely. It seemed clear-cut and softened, neglecting the raw uncertainty that comes from the loss of fundamental psychological rudders.

As with all great works, Batman started out in utter dreck. Bruce, understandably, felt responsible for the loss of his parents. He pleaded for hedonism's sake; he wanted to see one of his favorite action characters ride around on the big screen when he could experience the same from recording equipment at home. He wanted his mother to wear pearls to make the excursion a noteworthy event. If we take a step back and remember Bruce's exploratory and literate nature, he perhaps "remembered" sacrificial rites in Dionysian tradition, in which the vessel would receive the greatest accolades and endulgence before getting ripped to shreds. Seeing meaning in everything, this seemingly random event may have been part of a larger process of manifestation. If they hadn't gone out, and if he hadn't wanted to make a gaudy spectacle of it, his parents wouldn't have died. Bruce's sense of self-chastisement made any sense of enjoyment for its own sake something to be discarded. Bruce Wayne was responsible, so Bruce had to be cast out as the lead role. The child had such an aversion to the psyche responsible for the sacrifice of his parents on the altar of crime that he chose to embody everything that would send Bruce Wayne running: discipline, vigilance, and control. He chose the trauma in the well as his starting point. Considering Bruce Wayne as co-conspirator, he chose the very thing that would make the boy panic, and used it as his template for future endeavors. The Bat requires the absence of a commanding figure or figures before introducing itself. Bruce Wayne became the puppet, the unwanted thing that the controlling consciousness would use to avert people's attention to its doings. Despite continuing his Father's business and his Mother's philanthropic work, Bruce Wayne would do his best to come across as an idiot and dilettante, in order that the consciousness could return to lashing out at this vague "crime" thing of which Bruce was an unconscious part, using the spirit of the animal that brought the boy to quivering trauma. He would act as the vessel of the Bat.

I don't know how relevant, cohesive or sane any of this sounds, but I'm going to keep at it.

So, a man in a Bat costume runs around, ruthlessly mangling and mutilating those who would choose to bring pain to others through illegal means all throughout his city. Much of this, however, was beating the living shit out of drug addicts and other people whom life handed the short end of the stick. Chances are, Batman began in an ugly, ugly place. Just as it required the sacrifice of two outstanding people, the Bat-monster must have chewed on a lot of furniture and shat on a lot of carpets before the controlling consciousness could get a leash on it. Batman would now give rise to his antithesis, as if to create limits for himself. This he would manifest in the autocratic need for violence and justice in the Man, who would carelessly knock an externally unremarkable fellow into a vat of chemicals, out of which would arise The Joker.

Just as Batman became defined as Not Bruce, this Joker would become defined as Not Anonymous. Every act would be an indulgence. Everything would be seen as a source of amusement. The Joker has no alter ego, for his world is all for fun, and thus he has no need to act in shadow or in secret. The terrorization of the Bat-monster run rampant has consequences with the Joker. No one is an anonymous vessel for crime when a person chooses to become the opposite of their fears instead of the embodiment of them.

The Joker's inception perhaps initiated the Robin scenario as well. Seeing the effects of his works, Batman would perhaps see a unique opportunity in the newly orphaned Dick Grayson, already a child so different than the young Bruce Wayne of an equivalent age. The forgotten Little Boy Bruce found a peer, and Batman found a person in whom he could affect change without terrorizing. Although Robin and Joker share red and green elements in their appearance, Robin chooses yellow which complements the Joker's purple. From here, the Robin figure would act as the synthesis of Joker and Batman.

Grayson would eventually distance himself from Batman. Many authors have attempted to cover this disagreement, yet the result remains the same. He would take a new sobriquet not from the polarity of Batman and Joker, but instead from Superman's mythology, something foreign to the Matter of Gotham. The next Robin, Jason Todd, would not escape the polarity. Jason lacked the discipline that Grayson had learned as an acrobat, and had no desire to develop it. This would, inevitably, lead him to fall into the Joker's hands, or rather his repeated crowbar blows and explosives. Jason at first hung like a scarecrow, a bogeyman story to spook aspiring Robins. He would rise later as the consummate counterpoint, dressing in the rags and castoffs of others to attempt to put a name to his senseless rage. He would come to embody the self-loathing of young Bruce Wayne, the all-consuming sense of abandonment that would burn through whatever stupid outfit he'd put on. The third Robin, Tim Drake, was more of a mirror for Batman. Although he dressed in the colors of Robin, the vibrance and hyper-activity of Dick and Jason gave way to a predatory coolness and diamond-like intellect. Tim was the Detective personified, scouring for solutions to the mysteries that would present themselves before him. Unfortunately, Tim's emotional center hadn't the years of processing that Batman was afforded, and after his father's death, he would retreat into the indestructible mind of his for any and all trauma. When he sought initially to become the next Batman, the "death" of Bruce Wayne brought him to evolve the idea of what being Robin meant in and of itself, without connection to a Batman. Donning one of Jason Todd's Robin-derivative costumes, Tim would step out to solve the mystery of Bruce Wayne's death.

I think this is all I can do for now. There's a lot more to say on the matter, but the Mindless Ones have said it before and have said it better than I have. It's sometimes just nice to vomit information.Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-54301074166843812182010-04-17T07:11:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:11:05.794-07:00The Hangman's Banner*Originally posted 10/17/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

I just could not get through the snarls, today. They run too deep and too far, but I may as well get them out of my system. The Internet is our collective Shadow, and I may as well own it.

I love comics. I dare say, I will love comics for a long time, especially those silly superhero ones. That said, the past year has made the Superhero comic into a form of rage-inducing tedium. Meandering hipster chatter about the creation of an issue replaces content, even though that little smidge of content's fucking great. A story with a novel and inventive take becomes bogged down in grindhouse camp and devolves into '90s-style posturing and flexing on who can claim the "baddest ass" title while mowing down redshirts in rockin' cool ways. The bad guys had supposedly won the day in Marvel's Dark Reign, yet after the inception it's become increasingly flaccid and uninspired. We're on the fifth Marvel Zombies iteration, with a sixth, now including zombie superhero monkeys, in the wings. Superman is on some new version of Krypton, and guess what?!? Kryptonians are still the same stiff, dull, soulless alien tropes I've had to suffer through for so many years. I mean, there's no artwork on an alien world aside from architecture, everyone's clothes are plastic, nothing wears down, and everyone has a stick in their ass. Spacemen can say "Fuck." You hear that? Little green men have probably called someone an "unwashed anal bead" or some equivalent. I mean, seriously: where are the rude people, the working class, the sports fans in space? Why don't I see Non of the New Kryptonian military pissing on a building and knocking it over after too much Superlager? Ohhhh wait, speaking of dense and uninteresting aliens, let's get into the great big DC jam-bo-ree called Blackest Night! I barely know any of the characters coming back from the dead, and I have to deal with every dickface who's read DC since they were 8 staring down their nose at the latecomers for not giving a shit about Magpie, Hawkman's unrequited love, the Dibny's, and Necron.

The Batman property, so far, has kept afloat. All anyone needs to know is Bruce Wayne's dead, the first Robin is now Batman, and his biological son is now Robin. From there, it's all crazy adventure. The world of Batman has burst open with possibility, and one needn't have read it for eons to enjoy the story. It feels... unburdened, and I like that a lot.

Well, that's that.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-2818602996961136652010-04-17T07:08:00.000-07:002010-04-17T07:08:32.779-07:00Metropolis vs. Transylvania: A Guidebook to Modern Dreck*Originally posted 9/11/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

Yup. Feeling a lot better, today. Just like any cycle, the uncomfortable skin has been shed and new eyes look outward into the opened system until it finds the closure, and newer eyes manifest. Yay Lunar Churning!

"America: Fuck yeah."- Team America theme.

"Are you being sarcastic?" "I don't know any more." -Simpsons "Hullabalooza" episode in the '90s.

Today's been all Superman and Vampires; Final Crisis in a nutshell, I guess.

I wish people could see the Evil Empire in themselves, and I'm not talking about just the Suits and gelled-hair yuppies; I'm talking every person who involves themselves in this mess. If we attempt to push it away, we end up the "enemy" of the Evil Empire, raising flags in opposition and presenting them with a target as much as we ourselves have painted one on "them," with the presumption of an Us vs. Them scenario. It's been exploited too damned much.

See, that's something we forget about Superman: he doesn't give a flying fuck what Lex Luthor does in his spare time unless it fucks with people. He doesn't hate Lex, since Lex is just the opposite end of the Superman spectrum of amplified humanity. Lex's brilliance is all geared toward reflection and validation, where Superman's actions are, in his mind, just what he does. He places no more importance on moving the Earth in and out of orbit than he does saving that kitten from a tree. He doesn't agonize over what he can't do, but enjoys what he does. To put in simply, Lex is the separation of self from collective, and Superman is in unity.

I guess when we're considering the Sun and Superman, we can get into vampires as well. I'm a bad blogger cuz I forgot the link, but someone put down that vampires fear the notion of self-sacrifice that the Cross embodies. The idea that someone chooses to avoid a predator/prey relationship, to avoid victimization for one's own benefit, makes the Vampiric essence go cross-eyed. The lack of a reflection represents just that: lack of reflection. The Vampire, despite being a night creature, has a remarkable lack of self-awareness. The instinct and Will to Power override all higher cognitive aspects. It's the sociopathic aspect of the animal instinct and solitary non-mammalian critter. The coldness and deadness are remarkably reptilian (If I hear any bollocks about Lizard People I am going to fucking scream). Warmth has a metaphor in human language as reciprocity, and the lack of it displays that inner Void so well. There's no way to fake Dead Body Cold. It's too chilly and squamous to pass off as bad circulation. The wooden stake, fire, and sunlight represent pretty much the same thing: Life. The stake was cut from a living entity and will eventually decompose. Fire is a chemical reaction with remarkably life-like characteristics. The Sun, our relative position to it, etc. is that reductionist source of Life. All three act like Wilhelm Reich muscle memory to send the frozen essence back into the living cycle of elements. Garlic seems so basic that it's confounding. It's a bulb, it's living potential, it promotes circulation, it's an overwhelming spice... it just seems the opposite end of the vampiric spectrum of Subterranean Entities.

Vampires, to me, feel more Saturnian than anything else, and getting acquainted with that sort of energy in oneself's pretty daunting, but useful. Vampires have gone from Apotropaic funerary ritual to modern Frost Giant, calcified elements of human nature that require recirculation when left unaware. Like Frost Giants, their position is ambivalent instead of purely pernicious, not unlike the "Asura" in Hindu literature. The key comes to getting that Vampiric part to see itself in the mirror, to enact that self-recognition that accompanies a cognition of one's soul. (I'm of the idea that everything condemned to existence has a soul, but self-awareness and sentience have the unique prerogative to examine it.)

When we consider the Killer of Monsters, from the Winchesters, to Buffy Summers, to Batman, to Thor, we consider the symbolic utilization of destructive instincts for the cause of Life. Sam Winchester flirts with his possession of demon blood, Batman toes the line of power-mad and oppressive Hades, and Thor's brutality and characteristics make him almost indistinguishable from the Giants he bludgeons to death. That said, all have romantic ties, for good or for ill, to members of their quarry. Sam and Ruby, Dean and Anna the Angel, Buffy with both Angel and Spike, Batman to Thalia al-Ghul and Catwoman, and Thor to Jarnsaxa.

In conclusion, to be effective in counteracting the demons which we feel compelled to spit upon and villify, we must understand sacrifice without power-over, we must understand the deed as villainous instead of the perpetrator, and we must, in some way, romance that evil in order to combat it effectively. Love is what conquers all of it, and in the end the poles shall collapse on themselves and become distinct from their previous nature, just to find new oppositions and repeat the process. (Thor and Jormundgand annihilate each other, and find reconciliation in Magni and Modi, a dual-divinity at Rangarok.)Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-74600558225235196242010-04-17T06:52:00.000-07:002010-04-17T06:52:37.882-07:00A Playground Covered in Vines*Originally posted 3/29/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

So, Saturn's the only planet in retrograde right now, but a lot of weeeeird elements of dredging up repressed or forgotten memories seem to be a theme.For one, Bleach started this awesome storyline that took place long before the "present" of the series. Two, Dollhouse's new episode features psychedelics and unveiling of repressed memories. Three, Brendan and I have been getting into the third season of Venture Brothers, once again with many episodes dealing with the elements of the story's "past."

It's not that big of a deal, and I might be making more of something out of nothing since I can loosen my sphincter over doing psychoactives these days, yet I'd rather follow the connecting elements than let them just dangle as if they had no personal relevance. I am experiencing it, after all.

Bleach doesn't necessarily make itself into the "best cartoon series ever" category, but its soapy long-form story, subtitles and style-heavy visuals make it a good subject for iTunes shuffle experiments. Usually, I pick a song that fits the tone of the opening credits for the story arc, and just let the shuffle go from there. It lines up more often than not, but sometimes the shuffle starts working in verrrry mysterious ways.

I could go into the elements in Dollhouse, but I won't. It's too fresh. However, I would like to touch on the half of Venture Brothers season 3. The episodes seem to be structured more around film than TV plots this season, and it's getting real freakin' heavy real freakin' fast. Regardless of the intent of the writers and directors while working on the series, the interrelated nature of some of these characters gets mind-blowing: Dean Venture and the Ape Monster/Boxing Orangutan manifesting after his freakout, Hank and Dermott, Brock trapped in a room with the Atom-like fellow, the Moppets in general. I feel fucking dense looking at some of these elements. I feel like a silly, small little man probably looking too hard at something meant to be a gag, but I feel like there's something else there. The "strange places" feel really, really strange in that David Lynch kind of way, where it's juuuust familiar enough that characters seem more parts of a gestalt than framing for gags. I know what it's building towards since I've seen the last episode (and only the last episode before this viewing), but the material leading up to it just makes the end even more striking.

Well, guess what I'm gonna have to do?! Yaaaaay regression. Fuck.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-89734618407511537362010-04-17T06:48:00.000-07:002010-04-17T06:48:38.456-07:00Planted Zygote Narrative*Originally posted 3/8/09 on Black Elixir Neat*

It's been a weekend of eating ducks, bats, and a dry, curt laugh watching people funnel out of a theater.

The trailers before Watchmen, aside from that Night at the Museum crap, were pretty freakin' cool. Transformers looks like the "bad robots fuck things up, good robots stop 'em" formula from the first, but this time without any of those pesky character moments. Leave your left hemisphere at home. Say, does anyone else get really uncomfortable when folks have a very strong opinion against Shia LaBeouf? I mean, sure, he's a little geeky for the action movie roles he's in, but the sheer amount of venom folks spit about him seems a little out of proportion.

On a whole other track, the trailer for the next Harry Potter film is probably one of the best trailers I've seen in forever. It's everything I wish a trailer was: archetypal whisps of the plot, psychedelic shifts in imagery, a handfull of reaction moments to remind us of terror, quick cuts between a series of dread-inducing yet unrelated scenes with nothing given away aside from the notion that Everything's Going to Hell. Sure, we've all got it in our heads what happens in Half-Blood Prince (I fell off the wagon at Goblet, but working in a bookstore handled that just fine), yet the movie stil seems to paint this picture that we're not going to know what Unspeakable Blackness will drag through these characters. If this movie came out when I was 8 (in a magic world where we had that kind of special effects tech in the early '90s), this would have been the movie that I'd make a big fuss to see. Shit, I'm 18 years older than that and I want to see it.

The last of the trailers worth mentioning was, of course, Star Trek. Mo-Ther-Fuckers. Having watched all iterations of the damned show, even a few episodes of the epicly dull Enterprise, the preview of this movie might be the first time I've ever experienced a hard-on for the franchise. I mean, the little snippet of the space battle looked, well, exciting for once. Mmmmaybe this time someone will have the foresight to install seatbelts in the Enterprise for when "the inertial dampeners go offline" or whatever shitty line they give for the cue to flop about like a spaz.

So, here's my problem with the Watchmen: the audience. Thus far, that's my only valid gripe about the movie. If you don't mind having questions raised without any easy answers, if your emotional maturity has evolved past that of a prepubescent boy, if you can handle having no immediately discernible mustache-twirling antagonist, and if you really like good musical cues, then this movie's for you. If you're afraid of seeing penises, then maybe you'd be better off with Madea Goes to Jail.

That's that, folks.Benhttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-365066310298665376.post-18826041312707280082010-04-12T15:07:00.000-07:002010-04-12T15:10:35.845-07:00Mitosis God-vomitHey folks, here's the first post on yet another blog where some chap wants to dither on about comics and post-human media. Whoopity doo.Benhttp://firstname.lastname@example.com


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In Ghana, the NDC party are back in power. This party, which has languished in the opposition for two elections and eight years since founder and former President J. Rawlings left power in compliance with constitutional limits, has played by the rules and won through. Their rivals, the NPP, also played fair and lost by only the barest of margins.
This is all very fine, as for once the parties are little different on policy and mostly simply quantify some existing political rivalries in the country. But getting a party into that is strongly anti-corruption and anti-smuggling seems to have been a big part of the choice.
I know we shrug our shoulders and say "T.I.A." a lot around this weblog, especially about West Africa. And yes, this wasn't a flawless election. None the less, this time let's amend that standing comment:
"This Is how Africa should be."
Bravo, Ghana! Congratulations, President-elect John Atta Mills.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Third time through
Posted by L.Douglas Garrett at 6:35 AM
Labels: West Africa
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Christmas Party!!!
Hey everybody!! The Christams Party is upon us! This is one of the best decorated i've ever seen but nothing beats the Halloween Party!! There are 2 Free Items , 1 Old and 1 New! The First is the Famous Santa Hat which is at the Snow Forts:
The Reindeer Hats at the Dock:
The New Pin is a Wreath and is Located in the Attic of the Lodge:
There are so many fun things you can do with the decorations, try some out. Here are some of the BEST DECORATED ROOMS:
Have a good Christmas!
4 Responses to "Christmas Party!!!"
Cool info… it blinds me too!! My fav room is the nightclub – best… music… ever!!
lol boopy


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Tom Villarreal never disappoints with his edits and this new one he filmed with help from Justin Butts for his new sponsors, Crooks And Castles, is a good proof of that. This guy can nose manual, can go fast and also get some original stuff pulled.
12 Mar 2013
Crooks And Castles – Tom Villarreal Edit
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Nothing happened last weekend. I didn't get stabbed, and I didn't have to defensively display my sidearm. I may have come across as a little rude, but nothing happened.
2 relevant videos from Mr. Colion Noir:
If you have trouble downloading, right-click the link below and save as...
Episode 51: Nothing Happened


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It has been almost three years since we were able to take Peacock to the Washington D.C. Temple to be sealed to our eternal family. YEAH!!
Here are the memories that I recorded a few years ago:
"We drove out there on a Thursday night and then got up and played most of the day Friday ... had to hit Tyson's Court!! Friday evening, we went back to our hotel room, changed into our Sunday clothes and headed towards the temple. It think it was supposed to be a 20 minute drive to the temple, but it turned into a drive that took an hour & a half because of rush hour traffic. Because we were running late by the time we got to the temple, there wasn't time for photos before our appointment.
Our wonderful friends Seth & Jane met us there. We're so happy that we could have someone join us for this special occasion. The girls were taken into a special children's room with toys, snacks, beds & some very fun grandma-like caregivers. Hubby & I worked on the appropriate paperwork and then we were ready to begin.
Seth, Jane, Hubby & I met in front of the sealing room and a few minutes later our girls came down the hall with their caregivers. Tears came to my eyes as I watched my girls coming nearer to me. They looked so beautiful in their white dresses. I can still see them now in my mind. An image I hope to never forget! Seth graciously accepted the duty of acting as one of our witnesses and before we knew it, Peacock was eternally ours!
After the ceremony, we were able to take a couple quick pictures outside, but by that time it was dark & rather chilly. Afterwards, our family, along with Seth & Jane, went to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner to celebrate."
I think I'll break out the "I am Special Today" plate next week & make Peacock a meal & dessert of her choice to celebrate this special occasion.


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Hi Guys and Happy Happy Friday! I wanted to share this Sweet Chili Salmon recipe because it's one of the easiest ways I prepare salmon but also one of the tastiest! I try to make a cold water fish entrée for my family at least once a week although I hope to increase that sometime soon. If you were able to catch this post, I discussed the benefits of cold water fish for the eyes. But cold water fish, which is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, has whole body health benefits! Although getting your omega-3s is important, you should also be careful and avoid eating fish high in mercury, especially when you're feeding small children or if you're pregnant or breastfeeding.
When preparing this dish, you should let the salmon marinate for at least an hour to really allow a bunch of flavor, but this recipe only calls for about 12 minutes of actual cooking time! It's deliciousness and simplicity keeps this dish on repeat in my kitchen. Enjoy it over some quinoa or coconut cauliflower rice!
6 oz salmon fillets
Kosher salt
Thai sweet chili sauce (I use the Blue Dragon brand)
Green onions (chopped)
1. Place salmon fillets in a baking dish. Add a pinch of salt to each fillet.
2. Add 1 1/2 Tbsp sweet chili sauce to each fillet. Rub or brush the sauce all over the top and sides of fillets. Cover and let marinate for at least 1 hour (and up to 24 hours).
3. When ready to cook make sure top oven rack is 6" from heat and turn broiler on High. Cover baking sheet with parchment paper and spray with coconut oil spray. Place fillets on prepared baking sheet and brush each with 1/2 Tbsp more sweet chili sauce. Broil for 7 minutes rotating the baking sheet halfway through. Remove from oven, brush each fillet with 1/2 Tbsp more sweet chili sauce and broil for another 5 minutes (make sure to check periodically after 4 minutes to ensure salmon isn't burning).
4. Top fillets with chopped green onions.
5. Serve over quinoa or cauliflower rice (as shown).


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Tested Steps To Obtain Better Outcomes with Video Marketing By Miami SEO ExpertsVideo marketing is now much more commonplace in online marketing and especially in the IM niche market. We strongly believe that non-IM markets are open to video, even so it really depends on the market and demographics. Certainly there are markets with higher educated men and women who mostly want to read. However, there are still many markets and people who like receiving videos. The one aspect of video marketing is that it adds to the power of your relationship marketing you should be doing with your list or site visitors. There really is an added bonding that can happen when your audience sees you and hears your voice.
Miami SEO Experts
People can get weary of anything even in video format, and so all you will need to do is include different types of video content. If you are stuck on that one, then how about working on a few videos where you are in them and basically talking to your market. True enough, that is nothing completely new and we have looked at lots of videos like that, and the effect is always much more powerful. Not all online marketers are at ease doing that, and that is understandable. The sole point we are making is that you can achieve much more in the way of building a stronger bond with your audience. But just imagine about the effect you can have with your market if you do turn up in a video or two. They get to find out who you are, and they furthermore have a chance to hear your voice, too. That is really excellent check here stuff to do, and you'll forge a more robust relationship with them.
It is common understanding that the average online viewer is fairly awful with the way in which they read. Scanning online information is the common practice at least in the very beginning when they land on a site. What occurs is if they like what they are skimming, then they are going to slow it down and read the material. You can conquer that propensity people have by creating videos that are informative and certainly require less reading. Regrettably, it is just a reality that people are more willing to sit through a video than make the effort to read an article or sales copy. It is challenging to speak in generalities because there are different situations, plus people will take the time to read something lengthy, too. We will maintain that it is a lot easier to get peoples' awareness using a video.
There are limits when using video, and there are certainly things it is possible to do less than optimally. We have seen a lot of negative feedback about the automatic play videos that are sometimes used. That becomes even more important if you have any other text, or copy, on something like your squeeze page. It has probably happened to you when the video auto started while you were reading the copy. People generally are not very fascinated in jokes that are not funny or hearing about your personal history. Do not forget to give people command over your video so they may stop it or what ever they need to do.


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The purpose of The Constitution is to limit the power of the federal government, not the American people.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Saturday Night Live Mocks Obama: A Different Take
The left is beside themselves over this atrocity. CNN yesterday had a great deal of programming dedicated to "fact-checking" Saturday Night Live, even pointing to politifact.org as a source for proof that Obama is indeed delivering in promises kept, and in doing so perpetuated the concept that Obama is indeed a darling of the "drive-by media." They even went so far as to have Wolf Blitzer's analyst lead her segment by saying "SNL couldn't have been more off the mark. Obama on Obama - well, not really."
Meanwhile, many on the right are ecstatic that a mainstream comic or comedy team finally decided that President Obama is fair game. Late night comics including Jay Leno, Jimmy Fallon, Conan O'Brien, and David Letterman have treated Obama like the plague, as it has seemed that the concept of commenting about the humor surrounding the teleprompter, the glass door, and other events was completely taboo. To the extreme, Rush Limbaugh, in a somewhat deserved moment of self-aggrandizement, said that it was nice to see the comics finally catching up to him.
I hold a different opinion on this issue. As pointed out by Glenn Beck on yesterday's television program, this is quite possibly just as much a warning shot across the bow towards the president from the far left as it is a moment of humor.
As previously mentioned, for at least two years now candidate and president Barack Obama has been off limits for comedy. For years we heard about George W. Bush's intellect, or in the eyes of comics and leftist pundits the lack thereof. Hardly a week would go by without a joke made about a grammatical error or a "Bushism"of some sort. Yet surprisingly, this very prominent attempt at a laugh at the expense of President Obama was not for something simple and common; rather it was over serious issues of policy.
President Obama has a well known attachment to his teleprompter; he has had one of them crumble in front of a crowd during a speech, and one was either programmed incorrectly or could not keep up with him. There have certainly been other moments of this presidency over which many have been able to laugh, but SNL may have an agenda larger than what we saw live on Saturday night.
After all, it is certainly believed by many on the left, and quite possibly some inside the SNL camp, that Tina Fey's mockery of Sarah Palin helped diminish the intensity of support for the vice-presidential nominee during the campaign. Therefore, the crew of SNL may very well feel a bit emboldened, and believe that it has become a serious part of the political discourse. Additionally, Jon Stewart's The Daily Show has become a gathering place for young people with strong interests in politics. And while certainly Stewart is funny and at times can be accurate, his show, as well as SNL, has sometimes become dangerously close to being considered newsworthy by liberals who really wish to reinforce their own predisposed belief system.
Therefore, as SNL picked four very serious campaign promises as topics for 'humor,' perhaps humor has become more serious than ever. Of course, given the fact that many Obama voters were interviewed at the time of the election and proven to have little working knowledge of current political events, perhaps Saturday Night Live is today's "news division" at NBC.
6 comments:
- Opus #6 said...
I thought at the time I first saw it that the lefties were trying to "goad Obama into pursuing the left wing agenda". Yes, this is a warning shot across his bow. The right can do blogging and tea partying. The left can make mince meat out of him on national shows. It is a hard world when you can't please all of the people all of the time.
- October 6, 2009 at 8:19 PM
- Soloman said...
Opus - I'll bet it's a harder world when you can't please almost any of the people any of the time, which is where Obama is finding himself these days.
Not that I have ANY sympathy for him, after all, he promised hope and change.
All we can do is hope for him to change.. lol...
- October 6, 2009 at 8:37 PM
- Pedaling said...
i see what you are saying.
there's an agenda in this skit-
for sure!
- October 7, 2009 at 10:33 AM
- Amusing Bunni said...
I hope it becomes open season on obummer now...they need to keep hammering him every week, like they did Mrs. Palin. It's all about ratings, and they are getting them with this! Guy does a good obama too...the stuttering imbecilic look, yup, that's barry.
- October 7, 2009 at 7:13 PM
- Soloman said...
Pedaling.. it's going to be interesting to see how the comedy around Obama progresses, and if they run more along the lines of an agenda, or if they lighten it up to just more poking fun.
- October 7, 2009 at 7:18 PM
- Soloman said...
Bunni -
I hope they make fun of him too - a ton!
However, if making fun of him seems more like a policy statement, which is what I saw in this... then I'm a bit nervous about them saying anything at all, because he is smart and he will catch on to what they're doing, and he just might start following their requests / marching orders.
- October 7, 2009 at 7:19 PM


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Pay per click campaigns are a fantastic method of getting your brand name out there quickly. For instant visibility on Google, a Google Adwords campaign is unbeatable. They can be used to advertise a special offer or to kick-start a longer running search engine optimisation campaign. But should you manage it yourself, or get someone else to do the work? After all, the adverts are only a sentence or two, so do you really need someone else to design it for you?
Actually, as you'd expect, there's more to it than that. Before you go anywhere near Google Adwords you need to research your keywords, balancing relevance against popularity and cost per click. Then you can design you adverts, and despite being so short, there are ways to write them which are known to result in more clicks. A Google Adwords Management company will know how to write the adverts so they attract attention, gain more clicks and are still readable.
Once your pay per click adverts are up and running you might think it's time to sit back and reap the rewards…nope! If you don't keep on top of it you will find that you are spending money without getting the desired results. A good Google Adwords manager will continually monitor the performance of each keyword and the impact of bid changes is tracked carefully. By having your pay per click campaigns managed, you could actually reduce your expenditure – a dedicated Adwords manager will work to make the most out of your budget by increasing click through rates and conversions while keeping costs low.
For further information on how Ikroh PPC Management can help you increase your Return On Investment please see http://www.ikroh.com/google-adwords-management.html or call us now on 01908 379 938.


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text: Carrot Cake Cupcakes Makes 18 cupcakes CUPCAKES 2¼ cups all-purpose flour 1½ cups firmly packed light brown sugar 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon ½ teaspoon salt 1½ cups grated carrots ¾ cup vegetable oil 4 large eggs 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract FROSTING 4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature 6 tablespoons (¾ stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 cups powdered sugar DECORATIONS ½ cup shredded coconut, toasted Jelly beans or speckled malted milk chocolate eggs To make the cupcakes, preheat the oven to 325°F. Line 18 cups of two standard muffin pans with paper or foil liners. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. In a medium bowl, combine the carrots, oil, eggs, and vanilla and stir until blended. Add the carrot mixture to the flour mixture and stir gently just until blended. Divide the batter evenly among the prepared muffin cups, filling them only three-quarters full. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean, 16 to 18 minutes. Remove the pans from the oven and set them on a wire rack. Let the cupcakes cool in the pans for about 10 minutes, then transfer them to the rack. Let cool completely. To make the frosting, in a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla on medium speed until smooth, about 2 minutes. Turn off the mixer and scrape down the bowl with a rubber spatula. Sift the powdered sugar into the bowl, then beat on low speed until blended. Using a small icing spatula, frost the cupcakes. Sprinkle the icing with the toasted coconut to create "nests," then top each cupcake with three candies so that they look like "eggs." Serve. Excerpted from American Girl Parties: Delicious Recipes for Holidays and Fun Occasions by American Girl, Williams- Sonoma All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.