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Best Movies
The Weekly Listicle: Celebrating Monstrous Matchups
"Vampires versus werewolves" is only one of the time-tested feuds that film and television have offered for our amusement. This week, Brett Harrison Davinger and I (Dan Fields) take a look at some other monstrous matchups, scary skirmishes, and curious critter clashes.
Are your eyes wide and watery? Limbs prickly with anticipation? Your heart torn between a swoon and a scream? Chances are you're all primed up for this weekend's premiere of Twilight: Breaking Dawn, Part 1, which signals the beginning of the end for yet another massive pop culture phenomenon. It is also the latest entry in the "two-part finale" trend that is quickly becoming its own viable subgenre.
As we brace for the penultimate showdown between Bella and Edward and Jacob and Rufus and Sandy and Shadowfeather and Skinwalker (don't bother correcting me; I drew the line at Harry Potter) let us meditate on the fundamental conflict that all of us, Twilight fans and snide detractors alike, can appreciate. I refer, of course, to the age-old feud between vampires and werewolves. Warring supernatural (or at least non-human) factions are a crucial element of science fiction and fantasy since time immemorial. The involvement of the human race in such a story may be incidental. At other times it is either the possession or destruction of humans that brings the various forces together in combat. In any case, vamps versus wolves is only one of the time-tested feuds that film and television have offered for our amusement. This week, Brett Harrison Davinger and I (Dan Fields) take a look at some other monstrous matchups, scary skirmishes, and curious critter clashes. Now please keep your voice down, and for the safety of the human race, try not to take sides.
Alien vs. Predator (dir. Paul W. S. Anderson, 2004) and
Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (dir. the Brothers Strause, 2007)
[SCENE: The world's top scientific minds and eccentric billionaire Lance Henriksen are staring at a holographic image the size of the room they are in. It is clearly a gigantic pyramid reminiscent of an Aztec ruin.]
SOMEONE IN THE ROOM: What the hell is that?
LANCE HENRIKSEN: My experts tell me… it's a pyramid.
Let us be clear up front. These are not great films. In most measurable ways these are not even good films. However, they represent such a monumental movie crossover that those of us interested in both the Alien and Predator franchises flocked to them anyway. Even now, remembering how bad they were, I find myself tempted to hunt up the double-DVD pack… not to watch it, just to have it around.
Alien(s) vs. Predator was already well established as a pop culture franchise before these movies came about. Initially a series of pulpy comic books which envisioned the two scary aliens in the same universe, the concept managed to become at least two really great video games. Anyone who played Aliens vs. Predator Parts 1 and 2 as first-person shooters on the PC knows what I mean. Apparently the newest version for next-gen consoles was a flop. Shame!
Behold a world in which the Predators are breeding those nasty aliens for ritual hunts. In the first film a group of sexy young scientists blunder into an ancient temple/hunting ground far below Antarctica. Unfortunately, John Carpenter's Thing is not also there. It seems like a really cool premise, but the writing categorically sucks and the cast of nobodies leave a great deal to be desired.
No sooner than the events of the first film come to a satisfactory close for the human race than things get a heck of a lot worse. A stray baby alien (you know, the kind that pop out of you at the dinner table) has sneaked aboard one of the departing Predators and causes mayhem as a terrifying hybrid of what already qualified as nature's two most perfect killing machines.
In the ensuing mayhem, the Predators crash land back on earth, allowing the aliens to sneak out into the public at large. This film, in tone and execution, comes much closer to the spirit of a really good Alien/Predator crossover, but still falls flat compared to the impact of its ancestors. In the case of the first film, it seems director Paul W. S. Anderson could not match even the flawed beauty of Event Horizon. And the Brothers Strause, though respected in the special effects industry, could have held out for a really strong script and made the sequel truly excellent. These films are a pair of legendary disappointments, but are still infinitely more watchable than Predators or the third and fourth chapters of the Alien saga.
Mothra vs. Godzilla (dir. Ishirō Honda, 1964)
Mothra vs. Godzilla may stand in for any number of kaiju (Japanese movie monster) crossovers, but as one of the most familiar and popular it deserves a special place at the top. Godzilla, the reptilian darling of the Toho studio, has done a lot of stomping across Tokyo over the years, but is by no means the only host of giant monster brawls. The Daiei company built its own rival kaiju universe around Gamera, the giant turtle whose fierce but friendly attitude has captured its own devoted audience.
The saga of Godzilla, who slumbers beneath the sea and stirs only for the odd typhoon or nuclear blast, is a fairly straightforward monster formula. Mothra, however, has a rather more complicated mythology. Ruling as a deity over her own island, she is chiefly interested in breeding larvae to carry on her legacy. When one of her eggs washes ashore in a storm, interloping humans attempt to capture and exploit it.
Now stay with me… a warning to leave the giant moth egg alone comes in the form of tiny twin priestesses called the Shobijin. Their function is to express the will of Mothra to the outside world and help protect her progeny. Their pleas fail to prevent humans from tampering with and seizing Mothra's egg, or from preventing nuclear tests on their home island.
When Godzilla happens by for his latest assault on metropolitan Japan, the humans realize that an ally as powerful as Mothra might be a good thing to have. They attempt to make peace with Mothra and her worshipers, with no success. Even the Shobijin cannot appeal to the good graces of their insect goddess, as the loss of her egg and her impending death has presumably left her in a towering funk.
The ailing Mothra could never be induced to sacrifice herself for Japan. However, she is still willing to risk life and wing for her babies. Once Godzilla makes a move on her egg, the fight is on. Despite Godzilla's unchallenged ability to stomp hotels and melt tanks with a single breath, he gets a pretty good run for his money from the giant all-powerful moth mother. Subjected to the indignity of being dragged around by his tail, the fearsome lizard ends up looking like a fool as Mothra and her hatchlings save the day.
True Blood (created and produced by Alan Ball, 2008-present)
You thought vampires and werewolves could stir up trouble among themselves? Alan Ball's True Blood, based on a series of novels by Charlaine Harris, unpacks the concept exponentially by staging a battle royale with just about every conceivable supernatural entity. The vampires hate the werewolves, the werewolves hate the shapeshifters, the shapeshifters hate the skinwalkers, the witches hate everyone but especially the vampires, and the human race has little choice but to live in constant mortal dread.
Cast your minds back to the early days of Sookie Stackhouse, the sassy young waitress who flouted the social order by romancing a gentleman vampire named Bill Compton. In the world of True Blood, vampires walk the night freely among human society. However, the human race is less than welcoming to the unmasked night creatures, and especially in little towns like Bon Temps, Louisiana. Most of Sookie's friends and family discourage the union, as do Bill's vampire cohorts. A cultural war is brewing, and radical factions on both sides are simply aching to draw first blood.
The tighter Sookie clings to Bill, the more bizarre and dangerous their life together becomes. In the first season, a killer stalks Bon Temps hoping to eliminate all vampire/human relationships. Just when that problems seems to be solved, stranger things begin coming out of the woodwork.
Rather than steer straight into werewolf lore, season two takes an unexpected turn by introducing a maenad – ancient Bacchanalian nymph – who puts the whole town under a dangerous and sexy spell. The vampires of True Blood are already dangerously divided among themselves, but must frequently drop mutual hostilities to combat a common enemy. The maenad plot takes up most of season 2, leaving a clear opening for werewolves at the beginning of season three.
Bear in mind that Sookie's friend, especially her closest friend Tara Thornton, tend to get mixed up and damaged in these adventures. Before long the cast has branched into so many distinct storylines that each character gets only a small portion of a given episode. As with ensemble shows like Twin Peaks, everyone can have their own character to root for.
Considering the unorthodox trail blazed in season two, it seems natural that the variety of species in True Blood should become wider and stranger as the series progresses. In addition to werewolves, we meet general-purpose shapeshifters, plus the rogue variety that can turn into other people. Local bar owner Sam Merlotte is a shifter, and in meeting other like himself he usually gets entangled in some woeful story or another. We also discover, thanks to Sookie's oversexed brother Jason Stackhouse, that with enough inbreeding one can cultivate a whole brood of were-panthers.
Oh, and don't forget fairies. They have plenty to add on the subject of vampires, and are as intent as everyone else in keeping Sookie out of Bill's hands. And just when you were ready to relax, here come the necromancers. Those who embrace witchcraft at various levels also constitute a threat to vampire well-being, and you can be sure of some nasty confrontations.
True Blood's fourth season recently ended on a high-adrenaline cliffhanger. What lurks up the road for our various heroes and villains? Only time can tell. The vast and imaginatively crafted world of the show has established only one firm rule for itself: anything can happen, and will. Let's see The Vampire Diaries – or Twilight: The Hastily Spun-Off Series if you prefer – compete with that (Hint: it can't).
Star Trek (creator Gene Roddenberry, 1966-PRESENT)
When you're traveling the galaxy, going where no man has gone before, meeting new people, trying new ales, you're going to run into groups of creatures who want to destroy other groups of creatures. While these shows mostly let us identify with the "humans" (as they generally are the star/Captain), the intergalactic tiffs extend well beyond us v. aliens. There's Klingons v. Romulans, Vulcans v. Romulans, humans v. Romulans– Romulans are dicks. The most common bad guy in the Star Trek universe, Romulans played the villains in numerous episodes and films, including J.J. Abrams' Star Trek. The Ferengi are another species out solely for themselves, but they behave more as manipulative traders than warriors.
At least the Romulans and the Ferengi have humanoid properties. They can be reasoned with, they have weaknesses, they can be destroyed. Some entities beyond the stars are God-like creatures, all-powerful, at least to the best of our conceptions. These beings might not always have a pure antagonism towards inferior species, but they nevertheless enjoy studying them, messing with them, and maybe destroying them afterward. Like the Q Collective or the Metrons, who forced Kirk to fight a Crocodile Man.
And, of course, many planets spread out across the universe are involved in their own civil wars. Admittedly, I'm not a Star Trek expert and many species seems primarily humanoid so I can't recall many of them. However, notable examples include the Son'a and the Ba'ku in Star Trek: Insurrection ("Browns and beige people, earth tones!") and the Ekosians and Zeons in The Original Series' Nazi parallel episode "Patterns of Force."
Even though Earthlings seemed to get over most of their personal issues and divisions by the 23nd century, that doesn't mean that interstellar racial conflict ended. It's easier for people to get along when there's another, larger enemy who we can combine our hate against. Adrian Veidt realized it, and he's the smartest man on Earth
Doctor Who (creator Sydney Newman, 1963-PRESENT)
The Doctor might look like a human, but he isn't. He's a Time Lord from Gallifrey, and his (and his species) greatest enemy is The Daleks.
Originally featured in The Doctor's second adventure, The Daleks quickly emerged as a dangerous foe. These entities (mutants in a metal suit) threatened Earth and many other galaxies for numerous centuries. They even practically exterminated Earthlings in 2164, causing The Doctor's granddaughter to stay behind and assist with the rebuilding.
The Doctor's constant interference with the Daleks' plans of world domination easily ran afoul of the species, but nothing pissed them off more than the events of Genesis of the Daleks. In that story, the Fourth Doctor travels to the past on a mission to stop the creation of the Daleks. Unwilling to commit genocide and in fear of the effect it would have on the time stream, The Doctor simply retards their progress by about a thousand years.
This action is said to have been the catalyst for The Last Great Time War. Throughout time and space, the Daleks and the Time Lords battled each other to near extinction. However, when Rassilon, the Time Lord's leader and founder, threatened to destroy the rest of creation to preserve his species, The Doctor destroyed his home planet in order to save everyone else's. In doing so, he became the Last of the Time Lords and started harboring a tortured past. Although their numbers were diminished, several Daleks survived and continued to wreak havoc on the rest of the galaxy.
The Simpsons: Itchy & Scratchy (creator Matt Groening, 1988-PRESENT)
Violent speciesism happens often in cartoons. Tom and Jerry. Sylvester and Tweety. Daffy and Bugs. Donald and Mickey.
Since the 1920s, Itchy and Scratchy has played a significant role on the alternate America pop culture landscape. Stolen by Roger Meyers, Sr., Itchy and Scratchy served as the genesis of our more than 80-year-old tradition of extreme cartoon violence. Starting with Steamboat Itchy (though the two had been featured in separate cartoons earlier), over the next many decades, they expanded into other realms: commercials for Laramie cigarettes; a Westworld style theme park; an Oscar winning feature film; an X-rated one from the 1970s co-starring R. Crumb's Fritz the Cat; and a short lived variety show with other, less successful spinoff characters. Though Disgruntled Goat had his moments.
Nevertheless, the animated shorts remain their most lasting legacy, and directors such as Oliver Stone and Quentin Tarantino have directed their own episodes. The cat and mouse go at each other's throats, with Itchy regularly getting the upper hand using guns, knives, bombs, missiles, light bulbs, lasers, medical devices, and broken baby bottles. Although prone to monosyllabic sounds, the two animals can talk in full sentences, and they have done so more often over the past few years. Attempts by parents groups to tone down the violence and by studio executives to add more marketable characters have failed, and the cat and mouse remain the classic pairing.
The Last Starfighter (dir. Nick Castle, 1984)
When Xur, a former member of the Rylan Star League, was chosen by the Ko-Dan Emperor to obtain control of Rylos and several other planets, the RSL needed soldiers to assist in its battle. To defend against the encroaching invasion, it sent video games throughout the universe and recruited the high scorers, just like the U.S. Army does.
Although The Last Starfighter is a human (Alex Rogan), the war spreads across numerous star systems. The troops in the Star League come from a variety of different planets and contain different looks that showcase the myriad of alien cultures affected by this war. It's like the Green Lantern Corps, except these fighters seem more competent and cooler. Alex even befriends a reptilian creature as his copilot.
Like Tron, though to a lesser extent, The Last Starfighter has retained cult popularity over the past three decades. Kevin Smith mixed the concept with Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in one episode of his short-lived Clerks cartoon series. Also, Trey Parker and Matt Stone have referenced the movie in both Team America: World Police and South Park (specifically, the Go God Go two-parter).


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Sable Wristlet Clutch
Regular price $108.00
Unit price
The always popular Sable clutch, crafted in our vintage leather hide, is a simple grab & go clutch made chic with a unique circular handle for convenience. Inside you will find a slim, yet spacious, interior for your smartphone, keys, credit cards, ID, and lipstick.
- Brushed Antique Brass hardware
- Zip closure
- Interior: Back wall zip pocket ; Front wall 6 slot credit card wall on top of bill slot
- Fits up to an iPhone 8 Plus
- 10" W x 6" H x 0.5" D


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There's almost no reason for any normal person to get excited about the beta release of open source WebOS, but for those of us who still can't come to grips with the fact that Palm's stunted mobile OS was an abject failure, there's still a faint beacon of light to soothe the soul.
Did Elon Musk Regret Buying Twitter? | Walter Isaacson Interview
So what does this all mean? Well now it has been retooled for use on underpowered desktops! And that's fine, but is anyone really going to bother with this code? Probably not, which is sad. It may be a taxidermied husk of its former self (which HP gutted with its bare hands), but whatever, at least it's not on a printer—for now. [TechCrunch]


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Saturday, August 18, 2012
And Here's The Explanation
6 comments:
Margaret Maud Tully appears to have married an Archie Mailhot (b. 30 May 1883) and to have had her mother Carrie living with her. Archie and Margaret appear to have never had children and lived in Chicago at least until 1942.ReplyDelete
According to his WWII draft card, Archie worked as a Foreman at the Pullman Standard (railroad) Car Works.Replies
Thanks for that tip, Iggy. You know I'll be following this one up further :)Delete
P.s., neither of these ladies look like they were in any of the Wrightsville beach photos. :)ReplyDeleteReplies
Ah, the beach photos...I tried checking that one out further when I visited with some Tully/McGonagle relatives in Chicago last month. I'm still leaning toward your suggestions there...Delete
I think you're right on in your conclusions about Edna's notations. When I was indexing the 1940 census, I noticed several times that the informant put forth incorrect relationships because in midstream he/she stopped saying how a person was related to the HEAD of the household and started saying how the person was related to him/herself.ReplyDeleteReplies
Good reminder, Wendy, about the difficulty of relying solely on data based on memory--plus the double whammy of passing that memory through the recording techniques of a third party.Delete
And thank you for your work in indexing the 1940 census! It's remarkable how quickly that mammoth task was accomplished.


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« All Events / Spring Fling
- This event has passed.
Spring Fling
May 2 @ 9:00 am - 4:00 pm
|Recurring Event (See all)
An event every day that begins at 9:00 am, repeating until May 7, 2023
During the spring season, thousands of migratory songbirds arrive at stopover habitat along the coast in Quintana. At Spring Fling, Gulf Coast Bird Observatory volunteers and staff provide local birding information, bird checklists, sell snacks, post the daily bird list on the white board, and help identify birds for novice birders.
You can find the Sanctuary by going to 814 N. Lamar in Quintana.


text: Hi friends, Does any one know any method to use ip address instead of hostname which I have to register as a valid DNS record due to the fact that I want to install ispconfig on a server with valid IP address. I would like to test ispconfig capabilities before assigning the name and registration of that name. Thank you,


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Swedish Mora Knives, Unissued, multiple manufacturers. 1970-1990 manufactured.
Genuine soldier home model comb, made in Estonian SSR, 1980´s
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Finnish Army Military manual, for Mosin-Nagant m/1891, original 2nd print run 1940.
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text:
Paul and Jordan realize the brilliance of duct taping a flashlight to a gun barrel, while more Doctor Who fodder was recorded for a future outtakes episode. Jonah and Paul also express amazement there's no Sugar Race racing based on the arcade title found in Wreck-It Ralph. Finally, the podcast eulogizes Roger Ebert.
The news for the week includes:
- Disney shuts down LucasArts, cancels Star Wars 1313, Star Wars: First Assault
- Thief to feature "classic mode", removing all assists
- Microsoft has a clear path to developing Killer Instinct after an agreement with Fox
- The Witcher 3 confirmed to be DRM-free
- Bethesda confirms "new version of Doom 4" being worked on, Rage 2 cancelled
There's also Listener Feedback, and the Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm contest is still open – a winner will be announced next week.


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- Get link
- Other Apps
Ah! We love these so much!!!!ReplyDelete
Brilliant! As a killer of plants I love this.ReplyDelete
This is such a brilliant idea! Love how natural and real it looks! Definitely pinning...and hopefully doing too, once I find that "free time" I keep hearing about! ;)ReplyDelete
these are so creative!!!!!! hugsReplyDelete
Adorable! I want these on my desk at work... time to get crafting.ReplyDelete
Oh my goodness!!! These are so cute.ReplyDelete
P.S. I found you through the link party on
Those are precious!! Visiting via Do Tell Tuesday.ReplyDelete
Got to admit I've killed a few succulents so this sounds like an idea for me.ReplyDelete
"100% maintenance free" speaks to my heart! Thanks for sharing this great idea. Visiting via "MadeInADay" linkupReplyDelete
These are so adorable and look so easy! I'd love it if you linked up to The Makers link party going on at my blog :)ReplyDelete
A plant I won't kill! Love these - such a great idea and they look so adorable too. They caught my eye over at the Twirl And Take A Bow Party.ReplyDelete
Marie @ The Interior Frugalista
This is amazing! Just pinned! Lovely idea!ReplyDelete
Have a fabulous week!
Hugs from Portugal,
Ana Love Craft
great idea for those people that kill plants and they look awesome!ReplyDelete
How cute are those! And they look real. Awesome project!ReplyDelete
Stopping by via Home & Garden Thursdays :) I definitely prefer faux plants, and these are just the cutest!ReplyDelete
These are fabulous!!! Really great idea and they turned out gorgeous. I would love if you linked up at Link it or Lump it this week http://www.sohosonnet.com/link-it-or-lump-it/link-it-or-lump-it-link-party-27/ReplyDelete
Sonnet at SohoSonnet
Cute cute cute. What a smart idea. Thanks so much for linking up at The Makers. :)ReplyDelete
This is my kind of plant!! Thanks for letting us know...I love them. Thanks for sharing on the Thursday Blog Hop!!ReplyDelete
These are great! I love succulents, and I am trying to keep one on my bedside table, but my two year old keeps pulling it out! Think I'll try to knock one of those out today, thanks for posting this!ReplyDelete
Oh, I love this idea! Not that succulents are terribly hard to care for, but I love the idea of felt ones even more! Pinned!ReplyDelete
- Tasha @ Designer Trapped in a Lawyer's Body {www.designertrapped.com}
I love it! My hubby doesn't like indoor plants because of the mess potential--these are perfect.ReplyDelete
Love this idea so much!! As easy as succulents are to maintain this is 100% maintenance free! Love it girlReplyDelete
Super cute!!!! And huge plus that I won't be able to kill the plant!ReplyDelete
I'm not too good with plants, so these are a perfect alternative. I love them!!ReplyDelete
I love that these won't die. I killed my last batch of succulents. So sad. Pinning to try later!ReplyDelete
Such a fun little project, and finally some plants I can't kill! Thanks for sharing at Fridays Unfolded!ReplyDelete
Thank you so much for sharing your beautiful project on The Inspiration Board at homework. You were featured today!ReplyDelete
Have a wonderful weekend.
carolyn ~ homeworkReplies
Thanks for the feature Carolyn!Delete
these are seriously amazing. they look SO real!!! Hi! Just stopping by to let you know you have been featured at Nap-Time Creations from the Create Link Inspire party. I've got some fabulous fabric themes features this week. So glad to have you part of the group. I've spread the word {and tagged you} around my social media. Would love if you could help to spread the word as well. Thanks and see you at the party next week! EmilyReplyDeleteReplies
Thanks for including this project in your features Emily!Delete
I am in love with this project! I am sharing on my FB page this afternoon:)ReplyDelete
These are so perfect for me! I'm a plant killer extraordinaire! Pinning of course. And thanks so much for sharing at our Super Saturday party!ReplyDelete
:) Linda
You & your son are both super talented! I am featuring you today on my Saturday Spotlights. Come by and share or grab a featured button. Thanks for linking up yersterday at Craft Frenzy Friday! http://pickledokra.blogspot.com/2014/03/saturday-spotlight-3.htmlReplyDeleteReplies
Thanks for the feature Charlie!Delete
Such a clever idea! These look so much like real succulents. Lovely!ReplyDelete
I think I'd prefer these, to be honest! I don't do as well with real plants.ReplyDelete
These are very beautiful - you did a great job!
These are so cute!! I found you on the Countdown blog hop & now I'm your newest GFC follower!ReplyDelete
PS – I would also like to invite you to a networking blog hop that lasts 1 month long: "The Chain Linky CLIMB" on my blog– Thank you! Chain Linky CLIMB
These are so cute, I think I could "grow" them. Thanks for sharing.ReplyDelete
Love them! They look great!ReplyDelete
I bet from a distance you wouldn't be able to tell they weren't real. Love them. Great job.ReplyDelete
I love these! I saw them on the Bloggers Brag Party. These would be a fun gift for an older person who can't take care of real plants, but still wants some green in their home.ReplyDeleteReplies
Great idea Barb! I love it!Delete
Totally adorable!ReplyDelete
These are really cute! And they look real. My kind of plant, I couldn't kill them (-;ReplyDelete
This just might be the greatest tutorial I've ever seen. Love all things felt and all succulents!ReplyDelete
- AnonymousMarch 4, 2014 at 8:03 AM
I love your idea for the Hens and Chicks.ReplyDelete
Thank you for sharing with the Clever Chicks Blog Hop! I hope you'll join us again next week!
Kathy Shea Mormino
The Chicken Chick
Very cute!ReplyDelete
Again, thanks for joining the Link Up this week!
So cool...and seriously I thought they were real when I first saw them! Yeah, I know that's the point but still!ReplyDelete
Also, hello from Be Inspired!
leelee @ paperbagstyling.blogspot.comReplies
LOL! :) Thanks LeeLee!Delete
Bonnie, these look amazing and so real. Thanks so much for linking up as always to Thriving on Thursdays at Domesblissity. I'm featuring this one at tomorrow's party.ReplyDelete
Anne xxReplies
Thanks for the feature Anne!Delete
These are marvelous, Bonnie - I am delighted to share that your post will be featured in this week's Home and Garden Thursday,ReplyDelete
Thanks for the feature Kathy!Delete
They look so real. I love this idea. Thanks tons for linking to Inspire Me. Hugs, MartyReplyDelete
These are cute & looked real. I have pinned. Stopping by from the Bloggers Brags Pinterest Party. I am also following you on social media.ReplyDelete
Until I clicked your tutorial I thought they were real! Great job. Very creative. Thanks so much for sharing at All Things Pretty.ReplyDelete
Stopping by to thank you for sharing at Share it One More Time at One More Time events and let you know you have been featured …Hope to see you again at this weeks Party! TammyReplyDeleteReplies
Thanks for the feature Tammy!Delete
These are super cute--and no maintenance! Love it. Thanks for linking up to the Do Tell Tuesday party. Hope to see you again tonight!ReplyDelete
Such a great idea!! I can't keep plants alive in my house. Thanks for linking up at Take it on Tuesday!ReplyDelete
~ Betsy @ Romance on a dime
Bonnie- Your Felt Succulents are the WINNER of the April Pinterest Challenge! Out of 5 judges every single one voted for your succulents as one of their top choices!! Amazing job and congratulations!! Here is the post http://www.sohosonnet.com/crafts-and-diy/april-pinterest-challenge-winner-diy-felt-succulents-from-pin-junkie/ReplyDeleteReplies
Thank you so much Sonnet!Delete
Hi Bonnie!ReplyDelete
Thank you so much for sharing with us at Retro Repin! I chose to feature these Felt Succulents this week and hope you stop by to link up again!
~ Robin
I love this! I'm doing this but on a big ole wreath!ReplyDelete
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Because it's the sole unfinished room in my house, my laundry room is my project in waiting.
I love browsing laundry room ideas for inspiration, and my favorites incorporate multiple purposes into an otherwise underused space.
Now that washers and dryers are less noisy, people don't mind setting up a gift-wrapping station into laundry room shelves. You might see a craft or scrapbooking station among laundry room cabinets and decor. Some people are even including laundry into mudrooms and bathrooms. I say it's smart!
Check out these laundry room photos I grabbed (mostly from houzz.com) exemplifying some multipurpose room ideas.
Haven't you always wanted a corner office?
This laundry room, while less chic, makes space for everything in cute, colorful containers and includes a counter space for folding, wrapping and crafting.


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• minatory •
min-ê-tor-i • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Adjective
Meaning: Menacing, threatening, ominous.
Notes: The Latin verb that lies behind minatory also produced several other variations with essentially the same meaning, including minacious and its noun, minacity, minatorial, and menacing itself from the verb menace. All mean approximately the same thing. Minatorily, with the I replacing Y, works as an adverb.
In Play: In its most literal sense, today's Good Word refers to threats that project over or into something: "The minatory clouds hanging over the horizon were the only blemish on an otherwise perfect day in the country." Today, however, the meaning has long since diffused from its literal sense: "Dad was very polite, but the minatory smile on his face made it clear he wanted the garage cleaned in the very near future." You may also use this adjective as a noun indicating a threat of some kind: "The boss sent his minatories to the plant floor to make sure everyone was hard at work."
Word History: Today's Good Word was borrowed from minatoire, the Middle French version of Latin minatorius, an adjective from the verb minari "to threaten". This word comes from a Proto-Indo-European root mon-/men- "to jut out, project". This root is usually found in words referring to parts of the body that jut out, such as Latin mentum "chin" and German Mund "mouth"; in fact, the same root underlies mouth, which lost the N somewhere along the way to Modern English. The O-variant underlies Latin mon(t)s "mountain", which English borrowed from Latin's descendant, French, as mount and mountain. Did you know that amount is related to mountain? It started out as Latin ad montem "to the hill", which Old French converted to amont "uphill, upward". English borrowed this word for its noun amount. (We owe a mountain of gratitude to Lew Jury for suggesting today's unusual word.)
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Come visit our website at <http://www.alphadictionary.com> for more Good Words and other language resources!


text: Have you noticed someone who has gone above and beyond or out of their way to make a difference? It could be a mom or dad, co-worker, or friend...the sky is the limit. Blanca from Mornings with Jerry & Blanca wants to recognize them! Nominate someone you know here. Then listen in each Friday at 7:40am to hear who gets selected.


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Saturday, January 13, 2007
KamlaLebur Kheer or Orange Kheer
Jump to Recipe
...Orange Kheer in want of a better name. Kamlalebu in Bengal, is what is Narangi, Santra or Orange in different parts of India.
Kamlalebu or Orange is a fruit which I closely associate with the mild Winters back home in India. Come winter and the markets would flood with these small round glossy skinned orange colored beauties. The Darjeeling Orange I am familiar with were grown in Orchards in the hills of Darjeeling and would come down to the plains of West Bengal around the months of November-December
By then the finals and later the half-yearly's would be over and school would break for a reasonably long stretch of winter vacation. Every day after our mid morning bath the ritual would be to head for the terrace or chaat with oranges in one hand and a book in the other.
Sitting there soaking up the soft orange sun, peeling the oranges, popping one koa (or segment) after other , the sweet juice exploding the taste buds and being lost in the novel which had been neglected for the exams or the Anandamela ( a very popular childern's magazine in Bengali) which had arrived just that morning…that was life, warm, sweet and carefree.
My Ma like most other Bengali households would make this Kamlalebur Kheer during these months and serve it as a dessert with luchi & alurdum or by itself. It is pretty easy to make and considering the very little effort that goes into it, it's heavenly to taste.
What you Need
Whole Milk ~ 1 litre
Sweetened Condensed Milk ~ 1 can
Sugar ~ 1/2 cup
Clementines or Oranges ~ 7 or 8 . I used clementines , you can try with other sweet oranges like mandarin oranges. You can also use canned mandarin oranges.
How I Did It
Peel the oranges and separete out the segments
Take out the transparent thin film/skin and the white thread like thingy from each of the segments and make small pieces
Heat Milk in a deep pan
Bring the milk to boil and then stir it intermittently
Add a can of condensed milk and continue the process of stirring
When the milk has reduced a little add the sugar
Keep on stirring continuously at medium heat till the milk has reduces to almost ¼ the initial volume. By this time the color of the milk would take on a creamy hue and it would have thickened. Continuous stirring is necessary else the milk may stick to the bottom and burn
The consistency is now like smooth kheer
Pour in a serving bowl and put in the refrigerator.
After 2 hours or when it has cooled down add the orange pieces and refrigerate for 3 to 4 hours
Serve chilled
Note: I made this yesterday night but it tastes even better when I am having it right now in the morning, all that overnight saoking has made the milk/kheer soak up the orange flavor
Updated on April 15th, 2013: To make a quick and cheater's version of this dish, in a sauce pan add 1/2 cup milk + 1 cup condensed milk. Mix and bring to a boil. Keep stirring and let the milk thicken. will be done in like 15 mins or so. Now pour in a serving glass bowl and chill in refrigerator. Once cool add the orange segments.
Here in the US I was initially and even now baffled with the choice of Oranges offered. Product of various mutation I have a varying choice from Navel Oranges to California Oranges and the Valencia to the Mandarin orange and I still am not sure which I should pick
The closest that I have found to the small, sweet Orange popular in India, known as Kamlalebu in Bengali is a fruit called Clementine. Clementines are commonly called mikan in Japan, satsuma in the UK and Southern United States, and clementine or tangerine in Canada. Its fruit is sweet and usually seedless, about the size of a mandarin orange (Citrus reticulata), smaller than an orange. One of the distinguishing features of the clementine is the distinctive thin, leathery skin dotted with large and prominent oil glands, which is lightly attached around the fruit; enabling it to peeled very easily in comparison to other citrus fruits. They are widely available in the US from November to January-February
What I like about Clementines is that they peel very easily and easily separate into several juicy segments a feature similar to my familiar Orange in India. Since Clementine too is a hybrid but between Tangerine and pomerans, I am not sure if the Orange or Santra or kamlalebu in India was also a Clementine or some other hybrid of orange
I am sending this over for this weeks Kalyn's Weekend Herb Blogging to Coffe & CornBread. Hope all of you like this simple and delicious dessert
Trivia:It has been proposed that Clementine was "originally an accidental hybrid said to have been discovered by Father Clément Rodier in the garden of his orphanage in Misserghin, Algeria."
30 comments:
- AnonymousJanuary 13, 2007 1:47 PM
Sitting there soaking up the soft orange sun, peeling the oranges, popping one koa (or segment) after other , the sweet juice exploding the taste buds and being lost in the novel which had been neglected for the exams or the Anandamela ( a very popular childern's magazine in Bengali) which had arrived just that morning…that was life, warm, sweet and carefree.ReplyDelete
Ah.....you've made me heavily nostalgic. Those were certainly the days. Especially if you were in a West Bengal-board school, winters would be extra-special due to the long end-of-classes vacation.
Good Kamlalebu, of the same consistency and sweetness of the Darjeeling ones is tough to find in the US (as you mentioned). Occasionally I will find a box of South African or South American clementines that are nice and sweet.
Sandeepa,DD was reading over my shoulders "that looks really yummy" was her comment. We have plans to make it real soon. I have the same problem, still overwhelmed with all the choice of oranges. The easily peelable oranges that we get back home were called Kamala oranges.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousJanuary 13, 2007 2:05 PM
Hi SandeepaReplyDelete
Super easy desert. I have never tried bengali cusine, now I got ur blog so will try some from ur's.
Yeah Bongo, those were the days. I really miss soaking up the sun. Not a season here is worthwhile for that either it's too warm or too cold outsideReplyDelete
Indo, This dessert is very easy to make also and Guessing that DD is your 8yr old you can ask her to help you doing this
Yeah maybe all bengali cuisine may not exactly suit your tastbeuds but the Desserts surely will :)
Sandeepa..you brought back some fond memories of life in India..How I loved to go on the terrace and read those "amar chitra Kathas" "Mandrake the Magician's comics...and of course, there was always something to eat..Guavas sprinkled with chilis and salt, Jamuns...mangoes..whatever!ReplyDelete
I've been eating a LOT of tangerines lately...and using it in a kheer is an excellent idea.
Orange Kheer sounds good....will try it... never had it before, but won't be long...i be making one soon.ReplyDelete
Hi Sandeepa,what a novel idea!! Looks delicious and thank you for the recipe.We just bought a huge bag of Oranges,guess I have make this!!:)) Happy Sankranti!ReplyDelete
Sandeepa, beautiful write-up lady as always. Loved reading each and every word of it. Brought back all the old memories. Thankx a bunch and the photos are also as juicey and beautiful as the oranges.ReplyDelete
I love the way you share your stories and views in your comments. And the Mandrake, my hubby loves those and Phantom and the other day he was talking about "Bahadur", did you read that ?
Missed you the last week, good to see you back in circuit
I am sure you are going to turn this into a one more beautiful creation but be careful about the oranges you use, they should be sweet & small
Just wrote a comment on your post and now see you here :) Thank You
Sandeepa...well written post..ReplyDelete
Kheer looks delicious..we just brought some sweet navel oranges...will these work for this recipe?.
- AnonymousJanuary 14, 2007 6:38 AM
What a lovely post!!! I love the way you write, almost like talking to us!!! :)ReplyDelete
The combo sounds amazing..... orange and kheer!!!1 Never knew they would go together!!!!! And your first pic of oranges is super!!! Have you seen my painting of orange??? And coincodently, the place where I stay is also called as Mandrin Gardens!!!!! WAH!!! too much of orange heheheeh
- AnonymousJanuary 14, 2007 11:36 AM
My dear friend Sandeepa, great to see your comment. Yea been really busy but meaning to post a recipe later today I hope. Many thanks for passing by and saying hi…it heartens me know to know that I have such lovely friends as yourself…take care and thanks again…my best wishes to you and your family….have a great weekend….catch you laterReplyDelete
- AnonymousJanuary 14, 2007 12:52 PM
Love this recipe-kheer with fresh oranges! Will try it sometime for sure! Thanks, Sandeepa!ReplyDelete
great sweet.Thanks fro sharing it.It is not only easy to preapare also a bengali traditional sweet.Happy sankranti to u and ur family members
Lovely recipe ..I guess its more of a orange basundi...I can smell the oranges from your pix.ReplyDelete
it certainly a very healthy dessert/breakfast! I like the fragrance from its skin!ReplyDelete
Just saw your Still Life, very very beautiful, you are really talented
I am not very sure, as long as the orange is sweet and you can make small pieces (as in Pic 3) it should be fine
Vani & DilipJi
Yeah it's not like "traditional" traditional, but most bengali household makes it during winter
Thanks for dropping by
It's too sweet and full of calories for breakfast but I would love to have it any time :)
Very interesting. It sounds like a lovely combination of flavors.ReplyDelete
Thanks Kalyn though I think you will not have this because it does not fall in the South Beach category. Can you add splenda instead of sugar to make it South Beach ?ReplyDelete
- AnonymousMarch 17, 2008 5:34 PM
Wow - this looks really yummy. I have been looking for this recipe for a long time. Do you have the recipe for Aam-kheer?ReplyDelete
I came to your beautiful blog through One hot stove. This is one lovely recipe which I would love to make. Do you by any chance know what I could use to replace the sweetened condensed milk? This is an old post of yours, but in case you still want to know, The Indian oranges are wrongly called oranges and are actually maderines. Since I have studied botany, i know it for sure. :)ReplyDelete
And Clementines are a variety of maderines.
Got this link thru Nupur and this was one fantastic kheer! I did hv my doubts over citrus n milk combo..but no longer..this sure is a keeper sweet! It surely tastes too good after maturing for a day!!! Thks so much to you and Nupur!ReplyDelete
Hello Sandeepa,ReplyDelete
Wonderfully easy recipe! Keep up the great work!!
- AnonymousFebruary 09, 2009 12:05 PM
You have replicated childhood memories so beautifully in this lovely post. Incidentally I just did a post on Orange Kheer on my site.ReplyDelete
This comment has been removed by the author.ReplyDelete
Hi Sandeepa,ReplyDelete
Hope I got your name right. :) I am a Bengali bachelor living in South Africa for a while. And although for a lot of years I have eaten in restaurants and had take aways for lunch and supper everyday. Suddenly the Bangali Khaddo Roshik( The food connossiuer Maybe this is not the literal translation. But I believe that we Bengalis are experts in appreciating good food) has come to the fore.
And even though I had never ever had any relation to the kitchen except to make my self a cup of tea or pour a bowl of cereal I have started to cook and without any recipes to go (Bangali moms only pass their cooking secrets to their daughters sadly not to their sons) by, am using memory of how the things used to taste back home and cook them accordingly. And on top a lot of condiments and oils esp Shorsher tel are not available here.
I have made payesh, alu sheddho, bangla biriyani, aloo phulkopir chocchori, beguni etc and I think they came out pretty well. I had a few friends of mine taste these and even though none of them is Indian they were all impressed. In fact the ladies were more than impressed :) (Maybe me not having a penchant for hot food made it easier, as everything I cook as called in restaurant lingo here is "mild")
I was going through your blog and am impressed I think we should make a serious effort to preserve our bengali ranna especially with people staying overseas. So this is a step in the right direction
A few suggestions, maybe you should add pictures of the food in different stages of its preparation, that way for Noobs like me can get an idea if we are doing it right. Like for your kheer recipe I am not sure about what yoy mean when you say about reducing the milk to 1/4th if I could see how it looks maybe it will make it easier. Although yes a lot of things might not be very clear in a picture but some of them might (Oh I am sorry I saw some of your other recipes and I see that some of them have pics of the food in between as well :)
Another, maybe I havent noticed it and you actually have it. You should have a section for other visitors to post their recipes and from them you could feature some of them.
Anyways thanks for all the recipes will definitely try cooking them and will also let you know what I used in lieu of whatever is not available here..
Wish you, your family and all the readers of your blog "Happy Holidays"........
Thank you for the lovely story and the recipe. I will certainly try this out. One question for you, have you ever tried this kheer in a microwave? Do let me know.ReplyDelete
Thanks again for such a visual treat.
This and roshomalai were by far my favourite desserts, especially when my amma (thakuma) made it! I am lazy, so instead of stirring milk for hours trying to thicken it, I start with a can of evaporated milk, and add half that can of heavy cream and let it thicken. The consistency turns out beautifully, and I add just enough sugar to taste. I find condensed milk cloyingly sweet sometimes. Lovely post, again! Makes me so nostalgic!ReplyDelete
Lovely recipe Sandeepadi. I'm going to make it in Mumbai and pass on the recipe to my sister in the US too. I have used evaporated milk to make "basundi" and I've also used half n half + 2% milk in equal proportions. In the latter, one can control the sugar content but of course the fat content remains. Another cheat is to make a fine paste with 2 slices of white bread without the crust and whole milk - then you can do away with the condensed milk, half n half et all and use this mixture + whole milk. One adds the bread paste after the milk has boiled 15-20 minutes. This gives you a delicious cheer without the tediousness and there is no bread taste.ReplyDelete
I made this today and it was so delicious. I like how thick and creamy it is. I find many traditional Indian kheer's too much on the thin side for my liking of pudding.ReplyDelete


text:
My "virtual and augmented reality" week: simply mind–blowing!
Seeking out new experiences - you know, they always tell you you need to "get out of your comfort zone" and "think out of the box" - last month I enrolled in a 5-day course on Augmented Reality, organised by Fastweb Digital Academy and taught by two young guys, Luca Raho and Alessio Marzoli, of Forge Reply, a company, within the Reply Group, specialised in videogame development and virtual reality projects.
I'm not a developer nor I work for a tech company. So you might wonder how I came about taking such a course. Let's start with what we all already know: digital tools and technologies are having a profound impact on the global economy. To make the most of these opportunities and stay ahead of competitors, companies in all industries need to recruit digitally engaged professionals.
Despite this urgent demand, levels of digital skills worldwide are staggeringly low. To tackle this issue, many initiatives have been launched and the Fastweb Digital Academy is one of these, with the additional benefit that courses are free to attend thanks to the financial support of Cariplo Factory.
This was an opportunity too good to be missed: I wanted to do something very strange and unfamiliar and that's why I ended up studying Augmented Reality.
As you would expect in any good course, we started with a bit of theory to understand the difference between virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR).
To put it simply, VR is a digital replica of the real world and you need some kind of headset to access it (such as google cardboard, Playstation VR, Samsung Gear VR). On the other hand, AR is about adding digital content to the real world. An example of AR I'm sure you know about, is Pokemon Go where your smartphone camera shows the real world around you but with the addition of a Pokemon.
How does AR work?
The second part of the course was very practical and I was introduced to the programming language C# and the software Unity, used to create 2D and 3D games. These lessons were very technical and, honestly, the most difficult part. In fact, it takes years of study to master a programming language. Notheless, it's always useful to be exposed to something new: now I know what a game developer does and all the knowledge and skills he needs to master!
In fact, to create a believable virtual world, you need to know about physics (if your character in the game throws a ball up in the air, this ball can't travel forever up in the sky but needs to fall back to the ground at a certain point), perspective and geometry (you need to know that objects far away from the camera must appear smaller) and then it's important to add the correct light so that objects have shadows in the proper position as they have in the real world.
While discussing these issues in class and having studied humanities at college and university, I could not stop thinking about Leonardo da Vinci and his studies on geometric perspective - just think about the perfect space he painted in the Last Supper - studies on colours when he painted mountains in blue tones knowing that this is how they appear to our eyes when looking at them far in the horizon and on lights when he added shadows to his figures to convey the idea of a 3d body.
I was introduced also to polygon mesh, a collection of faces that defines the shape of a polyhedral object in 3D computer graphics and solid modelling. With his fascination for geometry, the golden ration and the human body Leonardo da Vinci would have been a superb 3D modeller. The idea that shapes from the real world can be recreated with the use of cubes can also be found in Cezanne's paintings, whose works area at the origin of Cubism.
This brief digression into the history of art can just show how the humanities and the STEM subjects are not at all two worlds apart.
Let's go back now to AR to see how the "magic" effect is created. To put it very simply the software recognises a "marker" and then shows you the additional digital content. A marker can be anything: an image, audio, gps coordinates etc.
There's also a special type of markers, Vumarks (called like that because they were invented by a company called Vuforia. Vumarks are an evolution of bar codes. Vumarks allow the freedom for a customised and branded design while simultaneously encoding data and acting as an AR target.
As there's no better way to learn than trying out things for yourself, the course tutor guided us in the creation of a simple AR application: choose an image and instruct the software to show a cube when it detects the target image in front of the camera. It sounds very easy to do but it's not, believe me!
As target image I chose the front cover of a book by Roald Dahl and instructed the software to show a blue cube when it recognised the target image in front of the camera. You can see the result in the picture to the right: it worked!
Area 360 - Applications of VR and AR
On the last day of the course we students headed to Lomazzo, near Como, to visit Area360 and experience first hand the latest headsets for virtual and augmented reality. Area360 is the Reply Center featuring laboratories dedicated to the development and testing of immersive virtual reality and augmented reality solutions. We definitely had fun!
In the photo collage below you can see me in a cave, a virtual reality room: it's a three-wall setting + floor and the virtual environment is projected on these walls. You need a VR headset to see it (and those cool slippers too!). The VR glasses also have "antennas"so that the computer knows when you turn your head and it projects accordingly images on the walls.
Apart from the obvious use of these technologies in the gaming industry, virtual reality is also used for design purposes and prototyping. Let's say, you're an architect working on a new office development. Thanks to virtual reality, your client can already experience the office, virtually walk into it and give feedback on how the design could be improved.
Virtual reality supports also companies making custumized products. At Area360 we were told that one of their clients is a luxury car manufacturer which makes customized cars. The manufacturer uses VR to show the future car owner how the car will look like, inside and outside, in order to get his approval before going into production.
Another interesting use in the health sector. For example, Forge Reply built a cave for the hospital Istituto Auxologico in Milan. The cave is used for cognitive rehab therapy.
Then I tried on also Microsoft Hololens (the headset I'm wearing in the main picture opening this post).
It's a device for mixed reality. Mixed reality lets the user see the real world while adding virtual objects. These virtual objects are anchored to the real world. Let's say there's a virtual castle sitting on top of your kitchen table: in mixed reality, if you walk around, the object holds its position on the table and if you get closer, the castle appears bigger to your eyes. It's not like in AR where the virtual object sits in front of your eyes and as you move around, just the real world changes around you. The virtual object stays the same with regard to its position and its size as perceived by our eyes.
For mixed reality to work, great computational power is required. As you move around, the software needs constantly and quickly re-map the environment around you and show the virtual object accordingly. In fact, with Microsoft Hololens you're "wearing a pc" as the device runs Windows operating system.
By the way, if you wonder what I'm looking at in the picture where I'm down on my knees, wearing the Hololens, it's a 3D car, perfectly defined in all its details. I could even see inside the cabin!
Thrown into this frenzy of virtual, augmented and mixed reality, now that the course is over I'm still trying any possible device I come across. While visiting the Accademia Carrara Museum in Bergamo last weekend I took the augmented reality guided tour (picture to the right). It's a set of glasses which can show additional content in front of your eyes, while still being able to see the real world around you: just imagine something to be projected on a portion of the lens, so that you can see it right in front of you.
The whole device is not so comfortable to wear, though: a piece of hardware, the size of a smartphone, hanging from your neck, the glasses and the also ear pods....Nontheless, I'm very confident as these technologies are evolving fast and constantly improving the user experience.
Stay tuned for technology of the future!
Useful links
EU initiatives to tackle digital skills shortage


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In addition to general repair books (check catalog), the Business, Science & Technology Center offers schematics for repair of consumer electronics items through the following resources (specific models and schematics are *not* listed in our catalog)
- Online Schematics
- SAMS Photofact Repair Manuals (database accessible only in Main Library) - online PDF files from 1946 to present are accessible through computers. Files may be downloaded to a flash drive, or printed. See How to Find Schematics in SAMS Photofact Online.
- Printed Schematics (available only in the Main Library)
- Rider's Perpetual Trouble Shooters Manual - schematic diagrams of radios and televisions into the 1940s. BST has many of these manuals on paper for in-library use, although retrieval may take a few days as they are stored offsite.
For help with finding schematics, talk to staff at the 4th Floor Business, Science & Technology Center desk.


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I'm a big supporter of Team GB. They have great players - just the midfield features Jill Scott, Rachel Yankey, Fara Williams, Anita Asante. There's Kelly Smith, Ellen White, Alex Scott - all fantastic and very experienced players. England (Team GB is England w/ a few players from Scotland) beat Japan 2-0 in the World Cup. They beat the US in a friendly a few months before that. They lost to France in the quarterfinals on penalties. (That left us with a lot to talk about as manager Hope Powell complained to the press that too few of the players wanted to take the penalty shots. The media storm created by that was perhaps even worse than that created recently by Solo. There was talk of Powell's retirement from the England team.)
Team GB is a legacy team. If within the men's game there is a romance to playing for the countries that "invented" football, the women who take the field at Wembley tomorrow honor a far more heroic past. For fifty years of women were banned from football pitches. Where at the end of WWI, people turned out in huge numbers (far exceeding attendance at women's league matches in England and the US) by the 1970s (when the game was decriminalized) it was a nearly universal object for derision.
But off the grid, behind that history of prohibition and hostility women played on. If the FA banned women's football and created a culture in which the idea of women playing the game seemed ridiculous, they also created a football underground. The ban produced a punk-rock oppositional zone for gender non-conforming girls and women to find each other. By this I don't mean that women footballers circa 1970 were gay punks and labor organizers. But rather that the history of women's football is that of a counter-culture - far more powerfully than is true of the men's game, even given its working class roots. How many men are bullied and harassed off of football pitches, for being men? (Histories of women's teams through the 70s and 80s can include stories of women being physically assaulted for taking pitches - telling men to get off the field you've paid for could be dangerous.)
I just love the women of those generations and the legacy they've given us - a legacy of outspoken, pig-headed, delusional figures like Hope Powell - who fought her way through circumspect and hostile boys, proved herself amongst them, played for women's teams through years when doing so was seen as a ridiculous waste of time, then slugged it out with the FA. As she put it in an interview, "I will not be bullied."
And she won't take anything less than that level of determination from her squad.
My emotional attachment to this team is complicated. They have contributed some of the most exciting matches to the recent history of the women's game. It has been generally true that you can count on Brazil for entertaining football - technical skill, theatrics, gamesmanship, emotion and drama. The women's team has everything the men's team is famous for. Except money and institutional backing.
It was easy to root for them when they played Germany - when they were the underdog, the talented side proving themselves to an indifferent CBF (the organization managing the sport in Brazil). They have pleaded for help from the CBF for years. In 2007, while at the Women's World Cup, the team's players wrote and signed a letter of complaint to the federation. They complained that not only was the team under-supported, the CBF routinely failed to direct awards money to the team. There was no clarity regarding financial support for players, and no consistency in material support for the team's training.
They thought things would improve when they won a silver medal at the 2004 Olympics. They gave the heavily favored USWNT a run for the money (Abby Wambach who put the game away in its waning minutes). Given their outstanding performance there, the Brazilian thought maybe things would get better for them. But their future success would only highlight the potential that was going to waste. Year after year.
At the 2011 World Cup, the team went into competition wearing the uniform for the men's side. That's as big a symbolic statement as a federation can make - they do not order team kits specific to the women's side (and so their shirts had stars for all the World Cup trophies won by the men). The women complained publicly about these problems in 2007. Little has changed. Lost in reports regarding the profound corruption at the highest levels of Brazilian football is the impact of this lack of professionalism must have on the women's team. It's dire.
|Brazil's women ask their federation for support, holding up a banner at the 2007 Women's World Cup award ceremony.
The team's semifinal win (4-1) against Germany in the 2008 Olympics remains one of my favorite viewing experiences. In that match they broke Germany's defense. Better teams (including the US) had tried and failed. It was a very physical game, but it was a game that also featured fantastic technical ability and a certain ruthlessness. Both teams tried to knock their opponent out of rhythm. Brazil played like a real team. Their first goal was a telepathic collaboration between three of the game's absolute best: Formiga, Marta and Cristiane. They never connected like that in the final, though. The USWNT took all the wind out of their sails, and took the trophy with one goal scored in extra-time.
Imagine that over and over again you find yourself inches from a trophy. You have not just one of the best players in the world on your squad (Marta), but two (Cristiane) - and a host of others who are absolute all-stars (Formiga - playing in her fifth Olympics). But you never get to the winner's circle - after so many years, maybe you stop thinking that you can. Because the grim reality of it all soaks in: the world is full of talented players. You need more.
Cut to last year's World Cup tournament. The team's performance in the game against the USWNT was heartbreaking. As much as I was rooting for the American women, I was rooting for a great performance from Brazil. Yes, they almost knocked the US out of the tournament. They were so close. But they played angry.
They didn't play with the kind of focused anger Wambach used to avenge herself against Colombia's Lady Andrade. Last year, Brazil played like they were angry at the world - like the USWNT had everything that they have been fighting for and have been denied. Like they were frustrated and like they were very tired of being frustrated. It looks to me like the battle with the CBF is breaking them. I guess they were just playing by the 'by any means necessary' playbook. Infamously, at about 115 minutes Erika plopped herself down on the field and just lay there, faking injury and eating up nearly four minutes of the game. After watching that, I wondered if I could ever want to see them win anything again, ever.
I still can't believe that happened.
In this tournament, Brazil has yet to be tested. Five unanswered goals against Cameroon isn't really a game. To score only one against New Zealand - late in the match, too - it doesn't bode well.
Whatever the outcome, Team GB and Brazil are both heading to the quarterfinals. They are playing to avoid moving on to face the second place finisher in group F: right now, that's likely to be the reigning World Cup champions. If it's not, then it's formidable
*I never trust this kind of information, as people have a tendency to frame every big women's event as a "first," even when history says otherwise. (The launch for the FA Women's Super League was staged at Wembley, but no matches have been played there.)


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Traditional Resin Incense Benzoin 10g
by EARTHWORKS
Sold out
Original price $4.99 - Original price $4.99
Original price
$4.99 - $4.99
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Instructions: Sit charcoal on a charcoal burner. Light charcoal until it begins to ignite then place a small amount of resin on the charcoal.
Warning: Keep away from drafts. Always burn incense on a fireproof surface. Never leave burning incense unattended.
Properties: Brings prosperity and purifies.


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If you haven't looked recently, Microsoft does occasionally update its Windows 7 Themes page with new themepacks, providing your PC desktop with high quality background photos, color and sound schemes, and more. And sure enough, there are some nice new ones there now (I particularly like the Bing ones), including some fun themes for the holidays:
There are some other fun new themes in there, too, including one for Halo: Reach.
Thanks to Marlon H. for the link.
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Thank you to Robert Fortnam for sharing his remarkable story detailing his 19 months spent as a POW. The museum's recent interview with Mr. Fortnam was covered by the Concord Monitor.
Our goal is to combine aviation preservation and educational outreach activities with social events that provide an opportunity for members to experience interesting and informative events and to share their passion for aviation history with good friends and good times.
© 2010-2022 NH Aviation Historic Society
27 Navigator Rd., Londonderry, NH 03053 · Tel 603-669-4820 · Email Us


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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Eighty-five percent of women who inherit mutations in a gene called BRCA develop breast cancer, and 65 percent with the same mutation develop ovarian cancer. Despite intense study, the exact way the gene predisposes patients to breast and ovarian cancer remained a mystery--until now.
MIT researchers report in the Oct. 24 issue of Science a new reason why mutations in the BRCA gene affect a tumor-suppressor protein that plays an important role in repairing damaged DNA.
"Based on the information gained from this newly identified role, we can now begin to understand part of the mechanism for how [the tumor suppressor protein] BRCA1 and a related protein, PTIP, relay the DNA damage signal and how BRCA1 helps control the DNA repair process," said Michael B. Yaffe, associate professor of biology in MIT's Center for Cancer Research and one of the study's authors.
"In addition, we can now use this information to design new anticancer drugs that target the BRCT domain-containing proteins that are found in several proteins, including the tumor suppressor protein BRCA1," he said. "Even though long-term loss of BRCT domain function is bad because it causes cancer, short-term loss can actually be helpful by making tumor cells more sensitive to radiation and chemotherapy," Yaffe said.
Many proteins help repair DNA that's damaged through normal wear and tear as it replicates. Without the protein-to-protein signaling network that marshals the forces of cancer-fighting proteins throughout the body, we would develop tumors far more frequently.
To decipher the precise functions of proteins on a molecular level, Yaffe and colleagues developed a screen to detect the proteins that respond to "911 calls" from damaged DNA. Using this screen, he and biology graduate students Isaac A. Manke and Drew M. Lowery and postdoctoral associate Ahnco Nguyen found that you need two similar chunks of a protein molecule, called BRCT domains, working together to help form protein-repair complexes when DNA is damaged. Loss of the binding function causes cancer because the tumor-suppressing, DNA-repairing proteins are not activated to do this job.
Yaffe works on mapping the signaling networks in protein-to-protein interactions, which go beyond the DNA repair system. Researchers currently understand the functions of only around 10 to 20 percent of the 100,000 proteins in our bodies. Those 100,000 proteins may be involved in only a few hundred vital pathways that control virtually all of our body functions, from stem cells that become organs, bones, muscles, neurons, etc., to cells that cause our bodies to age and die.
Part of what makes this identification task so daunting is that these myriad proteins all talk to each other in complex ways, and some may "pinch hit" for others.
Proteins are made up of modules strung together like beads on a string. When proteins communicate with each other to form multiprotein complexes, the modules on one protein bind to short sequences on other proteins. Often, this type of binding only occurs when the short sequences have been chemically changed by the addition of a phosphate group. A family of enzymes called protein kinases sticks these phosphates on the short sequences in a process called phosphorylation.
Yaffe likened the scenario to a basketball being stuck onto the outside of a building. For a protein, a phosphate group only a few atoms long represents a tiny structural change (as would a basketball stuck on a building), yet it sets into motion a complicated string of events. Only when the phosphate group is present will proteins assemble or change their activity.
Based on this information, Yaffe and colleagues made short separate phosphorylated modules and went fishing. Knowing that kinases determined where to stick the phosphate groups, he chose a set of kinases that are known to deal with cells that have damaged DNA. He found that two similar chunks, or domains, on the BRCA1 and PTIP protein molecules function together as a single module to bind to a specific site. The mutation in the BRCA1 gene that causes cancer disables the ability of the molecule to bind, making BRCA1 incapable of doing its cancer-fighting job.
Yaffe's group has pinpointed and analyzed some 80 snippets of different proteins. "I think our approach is the most direct approach to identifying protein function," he said. Other approaches rely on knocking out a particular protein and observing the result. Even if the result is dramatic, you still don't know exactly what has occurred or why, because so many proteins interact in such complex ways.
"Not only does our approach tell you the biochemical function of a protein molecule, it tells you which proteins are likely to interact with it and the actual mechanism that is likely to be at work. You can use this information to solve the X-ray structure and look, in atomic detail, at how they're working," Yaffe said. Once you know the players in a particular function, you can try to make a drug that would enhance or inhibit its function.
This work is supported by the National Institutes of Health and a Burroughs-Wellcome Career Development Award.


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All of our Gourmet and Booster dishes have been reworked by our 2 star chef, Marc Meurin, in close collaboration with our dietitians.
You will thereby be able to enjoy both effective and delicious meals.
Diet Expert is a leader in the slimming field and a reference point for thousands of people.
Diet Expert provides you with a method that enables you to lose weight very rapidly* according to body type.
Quality slimming products developed according to specifications drawn up by our dietitians and R&D.
These products are delicious thanks to our taste expert: Marc Meurin, Michelin starred Chef.
A slimming consultant provides remote selection assistance and a qualified dietitian calls you each week to guide you in your program.
Online tools are available to you as well as constant support from our community which is very active in our forum and on social networking sites.
Diet Expert also offers you access to the Coach Club site with which "you benefit from doing exercise from the comfort of your home with no restrictions!
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Blackhawks top Wild 2-1 in OT to advance
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Patrick Kane scored on a backhand at 9:40 of overtime to lift the Chicago Blackhawks to a 2-1 victory over the Minnesota Wild in Game 6 to clinch their second-round Western Conference series on Tuesday night.
Kris Versteeg scored at 1:58 of the first and Corey Crawford came up with tough save after tough save among his 34 stops for the Blackhawks, who advanced to the Western Conference finals to meet either Anaheim or Los Angeles. Anaheim leads that series 3-2 and Game 6 is Wednesday night in Los Angeles.
Erik Haula scored and Ilya Bryzgalov stopped 25 shots for the Wild, who pushed a frenetic pace for much of the night but missed prime chances to score.
They paid for it in the extra period, when a simple dump-in by Brent Seabrook took an unusual bounce back toward the slot. The puck slid past Peter Regin but not Kane, who deked once and flipped it into the net.


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Public Relations Question: What Role Should Your Internal Communications Team Play in a Crisis?
By Gerard Braud –
We are asking corporate communicators and public relations professionals, "What role should your internal communications team play during a crisis?" We want to hear your best advice for this corporate communications question. When have you seen an internal communications team handle a crisis well? Or, have you seen unqualified or unprepared employees have to come together to make crucial decisions for their organization in a crisis? If your organization doesn't have an internal communications team and that team is you, what role do you play? Comment here and on our social media accounts and subscribe to the weekly question on the BraudCast YouTube Channel to participate each week.
This question is one of a series of discussion questions about media relations, crisis communications, public relations, and social media. Yes, YOU are invited to share your bite size bits of best practices each week. Here is how:
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Former terrorists held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo, Cuba were detected by U.S. intelligence agencies recently working with Islamist rebels in Syria, according to U.S. officials.
The al Qaeda-linked terrorists in Syria are part of a group called the Al Nusrah Front that is fighting alongside the Free Syrian Army (FSA), the rebels opposing the Bashar al-Assad regime in the civil war.
The number and names of the former Guantanamo inmates were not disclosed.
A Pentagon spokesman declined to comment, citing a policy of not discussing intelligence matters on Syria.
However, the al Qaeda parolees who are re-engaging in terrorism further highlight the problem of releasing prisoners from the U.S. Naval Base prison in Cuba.
U.S. intelligence agencies recently reported that 168 terrorists of 602 detainees that were transferred to other countries from Guantanamo rejoined terrorist groups or otherwise took part in insurgent and terrorist activities. Many of the released terrorists are being held by foreign governments or were killed.
"They're not only in Syria but in adjoining countries," said one official familiar with intelligence reports. "A number of Gitmo parolees have graduated out of their rehab programs and returned to the fight."
The official was referring to several programs run by governments in the Middle East and North African states that use special "rehabilitation" program designed to re-educate Islamist terrorists and prevent them from returning to violent jihadism.
Saudi Arabia's government has claimed that its terrorism rehabilitation program has converted former terrorists.
However, U.S. critics have said many Islamist radicals are able to fool the government officials running those programs into believing they have changed and then they flee and re-join terrorist groups.
Frank Gaffney, director of the Center for Security Policy, said both the Obama and George W. Bush administrations mistakenly released terrorists from Guantanamo under the misguided notion they could be rehabilitated.
"You cannot take the terrorists out of jihad by letting them go from Gitmo and rehabilitating them, or otherwise pretending that they have been transformed into previously dangerous but no longer threatening people," Gaffney said in an interview.
"The truth is as long as they are adherents to the doctrine of Sharia [Islamic law], you can't take the jihad out of terrorists, and therefore you cannot take the terrorism out of jihad," he said.
Disclosure that former Gitmo terrorists are fighting in Syria comes as al Qaeda is experiencing a resurgence in North Africa and the Middle East, despite U.S. counterterrorism activities that have led to the deaths of key al Qaeda leaders and commanders.
Recent al Qaeda attacks took place in Libya in September and last month in Algeria.
According to the most recent Director of National Intelligence report on former Guantanamo inmates returning to terrorism, 95 of the 602 terrorists released from the prison are confirmed to have returned to the practice of Islamist terrorism, with a total of 56 terrorists on the loose and other killed or in custody. The report, using data current as of July 19, stated another 73 terrorists released from Guantanamo are suspected of re-engaging in terrorism, with 43 at large.
The report stated that based on the past 10 years, "we assess that if additional detainees are transferred without conditions from GTMO, some will reengage in terrorist or insurgent activities."
"Transfers to countries with ongoing conflicts and internal stability as well as active recruitment by insurgent and terrorist organizations pose a particular problem," the report said.
The report said former Guantanamo terrorists "routinely communicate with each other, families of other former detainees and previous associates who are members of terrorist organizations."
The communications vary from reminiscing about their prison experience to planning terrorist operations," the report said.
"We assess that some GTMO detainees transferred in the future also will communicate with other former GTMO detainees and persons in terrorist organizations," the report said.
The Treasury Department in December designated Al Nusrah Front as a terrorist organization in Syria that is seeking to subvert Syrian opposition forces.
However, the U.S. government response to the influx of al Qaeda in Syria has been to ignore the problem, two U.S. officials said.
No direct action intelligence or military operations have been carried out against the group or its leaders as part of the Obama administration's hands-off approach to dealing with Syria.
"The United States will continue to aggressively pursue those who undermine the desires of the Syrian people to realize a representative government that does not employ violence against its own people," Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence David S. Cohen said in announcing the financial sanctions against Al Nusrah.
The Treasury identified two Al Nusrah leaders. They are Maysar Ali Musa Abdallah al-Juburi and Anas Hasan Khattab.
Al-Juburi, an Iraqi, moved from Mosul, Iraq to Syria in late 2011 and became the religious and military commander of Al Nusrah Front in eastern Syria since the middle of 2012. He ran a training camp for the group and was linked to an attack against a U.S. military checkpoint in Ninawa province Iraq in 2004.
Khattab, a Syrian, helped form the Al Nusrah Front for Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) and "communicated periodically with AQI leadership to receive financial and material assistance and helped facilitate funding and weapons for Al Nusrah Front," a Treasury statement said.
"Khattab works closely with al Qaeda-linked facilitators to provide logistical support to Al Nusrah Front."
The State Department announced on Monday that it was closing a special office devoted to prisoner resettlement from the Guantanamo prison, and reassigned its director. A State Department official told the New York Times that closing the office did not mean efforts to shut down the prison had been abandoned.
President Barack Obama promised to close the Guantanamo prison but reversed himself shortly after taking office in 2009.
The fiscal 2013 Defense Authorization Act signed by the president Jan. 3 requires the government to certify that before any prisoners are transferred from Guantanamo to other countries there is a limited risk they will re-engage in terrorism.
Obama, in a signing statement Jan. 3, opposed the restrictions and said they were an effort by Congress "to foreclose my ability to shut down the Guantanamo Bay detention facility."
"I continue to believe that operating the facility weakens our national security by wasting resources, damaging our relationships with key allies, and strengthening our enemies," Obama said.
According to a Jan. 12 report in the Middle East news outlet Al-Monitor, activities by the group Jabhat al-Nusra, as the Al Nusrah Front is also called, in the Syrian civil war are raising concerns about terrorist infiltration of the Syrian opposition forces.
"Many fear that its power is increasing as the opposition gains strength, especially now that some political and military analysts argue that the end is approaching for the Syrian regime," Lebanon-based journalist Mohammad Harfoush stated.
"Jabhat al-Nusra is alleged to include Islamist extremists who plan to implement their personal agendas once Bashar al-Assad's regime falls and Syria enters a transitional phase," he said.
Al Nusrah advocates the creation of an Islamist state in Syria. The group has claimed responsibility for several bombings in Syria, including a blast at the Air Force Intelligence Directorate building in Harasata last fall.
Published under: Al Qaeda , Al-Nusra , Guantanamo , Media , Middle East , Obama Administration , Syria