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And here's the demo sheet so you see what the other image is... you can also check out my post here.
Totally love the great mother and how she's taking care of those little rabbits. I used my vintage photo distress inks again on the edge of those digis. I added some ribbon from my stash.
Here's a side-view so you see the depth of those little ornaments. Really fun!!!
- Crafting by design - anything goes
- Inklings and yarns - Anything goes
- Digi-makeover-challenge - Lots of layers... there's really a lot here!!!
So hope you have liked this... and hope you will be going to the store to check out the great deals!
I'm doing a little giveaway to celebrate 450 followers come and join in http://crafting-vicky.blogspot.ca/2013/10/giveaway-celebration-for-450-followers.html


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The past week we have been hit by bugs.
Both the creepy crawly kind and the kind that make you sick! And let me tell you, dealing with chiggers and a stomach bug is no fun at all. Now that we are finally over the vomiting, we are now getting colds. At least Adam sprayed for the chiggers. Those bugs are horrible. Like mosquitoes on steroids! Hopefully you all have no idea what a chigger bite feels like because I wish I didn't. :)
BUT even when sick, my boys are cutie pies and I cant resist taking pictures. And can I get a hallelujah on getting all three kiddos in a picture? You have no idea what I had to do....
Brothers. They are getting so close. Love them.
My mini me. He does so well with pictures. He really is the sweetest child.
This one, oh help me, is a wild man!
But oh so cute! And also TEN months old. Lets not mention that again though :) Still in denial!
freckly goodness...
And also, it is officially summer!! whoop!

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After watching film until I had become one with the monitor and clicker, I finally threw in the towel as far as writing full pieces on the draft. As is ever the case, there were a few people I couldn't get to and several stories that asked to be told, but I lost the race with time and health. Here are some of the players that I still thought were worth writing about:
Datone Jones - UCLA - 6-4, 283 lb.
Living out here in California, I watched a lot of Datone Jones's work for UCLA. He's a very impressive player, and his physical skills are not in question. He's got a decent explosion, he's got good size and strength, and his technique is coming along well. I like him. Some mocks have linked him to Denver, and with good reason, especially following the Dumervil departure debacle.
I also have to acknowledge that Jones drives even his supporters crazy with his tendency to lose concentration at times; he can be dominating, but suddenly put in a lackluster effort. In the NFL - and especially if he's playing under Jack Del Rio - that's unforgivable.
On the other hand, when his head is in the right place, he's an extremely productive player who brings to the table speed off the edge, a good level of technique for a college player, and the physical gifts to be a starting right defensive end. He is also a vocal leader both on the field and in the locker room.
That's what makes his sudden lapses particularly perplexing - and irritating. Despite that flaw, he's got the size, strength (his 29 reps on the bench at combine matched what he shows on film) and the speed to be a very good DE. His technique is, as it is with most of them, a work in progress, but there's a lot to like in his hand use and his cornering - he can drop his hips, and dip and rip with the best of them. He can get to the QB and he can set an edge, as well as being effective in pursuit. I found it interesting that a lot of people have compared him to Robert Ayers - he has tons of potential, but it didn't come out until his senior season, and even then, he did have some 'off' series.
Although Jones has shown himself to be sometimes erratic, I don't take that too far. He's also an unusually gifted player - which is one reason that when he isn't focused, it shows. If he were 15 lb heavier, he'd be ranked highly as a 3-technique pass-rushing DT. As it is, he could roll to the DT in college - he isn't big enough for that in the NFL at this point, but it could easily happen. He uses his hands well, extends his arms when he can't get inside the OL's hand position, has quick feet, and knows how to turn slightly to 'get skinny' and cut through (or 'press') a gap in the LOS.
His upside is purely predicated on his adherence to his craft: he's got all the natural gifts and ability he could need. It's going to up to him to prove that he's got the head and the heart. If he passes the interviews, he's an interesting option.
Damontre Moore - Texas A&M - 6-4, 250 lb
Oddly enough, I've had an uncomfortable feeling when watching this player for a long time. With the glow still lingering from Von Miller's time at the same school and Damontre taking over Miller's joker role, I really wanted to like Moore. I saw him do some very good things, but I was surprised at how often he was stymied.
When he put up only 12 repetitions of the 225 pound bar at the combine, I had part of my answer. He got that up to 19 at his Pro Day, but he tweaked a hamstring in agility drills and couldn't improve on his lackluster 4.94-second forty-yard dash combine time or finish his workout, and it didn't help his cause. His tape will still see him drafted highly - I just don't know that it will be Round 1. He's slender, but so is Greg Hardy, and that hasn't stopped him. He could be best as an odd-front LB whose role includes a lot of pass rushing.
I don't think that the bench press is big by itself, and alone, the speed issue doesn't bother me much. However, his trouble with them fits into what did bug me when watching several games during the season. I saw him having trouble getting the right leverage to move past or through players that he should have been able to handle with ease. There was a lot that he could get away with in college that won't fly in the pros, where every player is very good.
I'm not saying that he's not a good player - he is. I'd be cautious with him in terms of the role Denver wants to fill, though. He's not an easy fit in Denver's scheme. He's light in weight as well as low in strength for a DE, and Denver's been moving to a bigger, stronger, versatile line. When you add the scheme point into his speed and strength issues, I'd put him at 'buyer beware'.
He'd be coming in as a pass-rush specialist and a special teamer - good areas for the team to improve, but also a limited role. That's common among lower round players drafted into the NFL, but not high-round ones. My issue is whether his weaknesses could be too much for him to be effective in the pro game, especially in a starting role. Working as more of a linebacker in an odd-front defense and having more powerful players in front of him chould help his efforts.
Eric Herman - University of Ohio - 6-4, 320 lb
During the Combine, Mike Mayock made the comment that Eric Herman, a guard out of the University of Ohio, may be the single toughest man in the 2013 Draft. I managed to find some of his film, and I watched him as much as he was shown at the combine, and from the little I could find on him, I'd tentatively agree with Mayock. You may not hear his name called until Saturday, but outstanding athletic talent isn't everything. Last season, a lot of folks called Derek Wolfe 'just' an effort guy. This kid has that same kind of attitude, and the size to back it up.
Herman comes from a small school. As such, he doesn't get the attention a Division I player would. If that hypothetical player played the way Herman does, they'd get noticed right away. He has good size for an NFL guard. He still struggles to keep his pad level low enough (a very common issue for players coming out of college) but he's got a mean streak, loves to pancake defenders, finishes to the whistle, is very, very strong, and is coming along fine with his technique.
I think that he's a fine example of why so many NFL offensive linemen are taken late or come out as college free agents, yet go on to very successful careers. I expect that he will do the same. Denver may be fine in their OL interior, but he's going to make some team better. I thought that he deserves some press.
Bjoern Werner - Florida State - 6-3, 266 lb
Werner is a very interesting guy. I read that Mel Kiper has predicted that he'll drop to the second round, and I hope that's true - mostly because I think the Broncos are probably going to trade down a little bit (if they can find a trade partner), and I'd love to see them pick this young man up. There are several good early choices for Denver - he is certainly one of them.
He grew up in Germany and he's late in coming to football. If you leave that aside for a moment, you see a highly athletic player who has speed, quickness, plenty of power, and who can put on even more size if desired. He was ranked is a first-team All-American by eight organizations, and added a second-team All-American ranking with two more. When you put on the film, it's easy to see why. Unlike Margus Hunt, he's been in the game long enough to really have developed his technique. When you add that to his natural skills, you've got a very solid player. He's the kind of 'won't disappoint' choice that a team needs with a late first- or early second-round pick.
He's learned quickly so far, and he's just going to get better. It's interesting - there was a time when the NFL 'discovered' the traditionally black colleges, and the draft changed because of it. The same happened with small schools to a different extent. Football is truly becoming international at this point, and several of the top players in the draft including Werner, Margus Hunt, Jesse Williams, Menelik Watson, and Ezekiel 'Ziggy' Ansah all grew up in other countries. I imagine that in the NFL, like the NBA, this will become increasingly common, and it's a nice trend to see. I hope more young men around the globe are drawn to the sport.
There are literally dozens more players that impressed me who are in this draft. Every year is different, but this crop is unusual in the quality of players who will go in the middle, upper middle, and even late rounds. I've seen several who I'd expect to have impressive careers. For a team like Denver, which has the potential to win out and who has a few needs that are certain to be addressed in the draft, that's a comforting circumstance.
I've no doubt that John Elway has his draft team ready and his approaches, given the many variables for a late first round start, worked out. This will be the first year without Brian Xanders, so I'll be interested in how and whether they move around - with Xanders gone, will they still maintain their ability to move around? It's going to be fun to find out.


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So Shanghai... 28C everyday..never saw the sun. Humidity you could cut with a knife and skin sticky with smog, sweat and sunscreen...and what an attractive bunch we all made at the end of each day.
The usual suspects were mostly absent, but we managed a foray into the Xinyang Markets to watch haggling over shoes, undies and phone covers.... only to find them starting cheaper again around the corner. But fun to watch the boys more experienced in such ventures haggle like pros.
And no Facebook!!!!!!!!Aaaaaaaagh!!!!First thing we all did arriving in Sydney... was catch up on FB. That's probably a bad thing... but there ya go... FB junkies all.
Aussie team shot well. Some strong performances... Especially Mike Brosnan. Watched Damsbo fight hard for every match (including Mike) and finally get defeated by Angel Ramirez who went on to take 3rd. Saw Dietmar lose a whole arrow in the finals to a busted nock... always heart breaking to watch a match go down like that. But Dietmar finished with class and Reo shot like a machine.. and Miss Jamie shot a world record... kicking arse my dear :)
Shooting: I felt great in ranking, but shot crap.
I won my first match against Pamela from Hong Kong China and then got soundly beaten by Ms Diane Watson of USA. Did that thing of barely dropping a point in practice and then dropping everything in the match. I shot bad. Nothing to report there. Working on a few things including bow arm and head space and feeling okay with the progress. Not unhappy with final world cup for the year.
And a sensitive subject came up. I was asked that I not inject insulin in public. It was suggested that this was insensitive to people who are uncomfortable around illness and needles. May as well ask me to not breathe in public...teaspoon of cement people...it's not hurting you and I don't feel ashamed about living.
Loved Shanghai. It's a fascinating place. Would like more time to explore... maybe next year :)
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Spring. :) So new indoor range.. 24hr access assuming there's no forklifts in the way and temperature control. Got my tunes plugged in and no one to mind my horrendous off key singing along. One step closer to getting my world sorted the way I want it :)
New season and new world cup. I leave for Shanghai on Saturday and I dearly wish I had more time to practice at 50m. Main focus for August was the bow arm elbow and shoulder and the bow hand. Contact with the string is generally a good way of checking how I'm doing...and the massive bruise i'm sporting on my left arm is probably a heads up I haven't got it right.... yes I did test it without the arm guard... gotta be sure :D
Made it famous this week on the front page of the Diabetes Tasmania magazine. Doing my bit for diabetes and archery awareness in one hit :)
So last round for the year... wish me luck... it's the season of the moon festival... surely a lucky week...and if not at least we can always eat moon cakes.
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HarperCollins Publishers
Andrew Carrington is the ideal Regency gentleman: heir to an earldom, wealthy, handsome, athletic—and gay. When he decides to do his duty to his family, he wants marriage on his terms: an honest arrangement, with no disruption to his way of life. But in the penniless, spirited—and curvaceous—Phyllida Lewis, a self-educated author of romances, Andrew gets more than he bargained for, perhaps even love. And when he meets honorable, shrewd—and hunky—Matthew Thornby, son of a self-made baronet, Andrew seems to have everything a man could desire, until a spy and blackmailer tries to ruin him and his friends.
Review by T J Pennington (WARNING: Review has many spoilers)
I get the feeling that this book garnered the attention it did because the romance reviewers were, by and large, not familiar with stories involving gay or bisexual characters and therefore found this kind of romance new and daring. I, on the other hand, have read, proofread, written and published both, and I know a great many people who have done the same. Consequently, I'm not looking at this book as something innovative, but as part of a long-established genre.
Originally published by AuthorHouse on September 12, 2005 (and re-published by Harper Collins on April 29, 2008), it is the tale of a peer's nephew named Andrew Carrington, who wants to marry a young woman named Phyllida Lewis. Andrew is rich and needs an heir. He's also homosexual.
We know that the story takes place in 1812 because the Prime Minister is assassinated at the end of the book, and Spencer Perceval, the only British Prime Minister to be assassinated, died on May 11, 1812. Now…in 1812, mind you, when homosexuality was a hanging offense and even being rumored to be homosexual got you three to six months in Newgate…Phyllida not only knows that Andrew is gay but talks about it casually and states that she has no objection to men of that sort.
"Well," I can hear people whispering, "perhaps Phyllida is ahead of her time. Perhaps she is simply less prejudiced than most people in her era. That's possible, right?" But then the situation with Andrew and Phyllida gets better.
Phyllida agrees to consider Andrew as a prospective husband. He comes to her mother's house to visit her. Her mother immediately leaves Phil without herself or another older woman as a chaperone (which would be enough to ruin the young woman socially) and exits stage left with Andrew's friend and lover, Verney. Andrew and Phyllida talk, mostly about sex and marriage, for five minutes. Then he convinces her to sit in his lap, gives her a French kiss, puts her hand on his erection and starts pinching and stroking one of her nipples.
Five minutes after meeting her.
Now, I don't know about you, but if someone started forcing me to stroke him and grabbing my nipple five minutes after meeting me, that guy would get a knee to the crotch and a punch in the nose. I cannot think of any society in which Andrew's behavior is acceptable, never mind the heavily mannered world of the Regency. At the very least, I would expect Phyllida to slap the rude, crude bastard's face and flounce out of the room, not press herself against his erection. This is a young woman who has already turned down one suitor for being "debauched," after all.
Never mind the implication that gayness can be fixed by the right woman. Because Phil's so awesomely female that she instantly turns Andrew, who has previously had no attraction to women, bisexual. *headdesk *
I could accept the idea of a straight man suppressing homosexual impulses for years until one day he couldn't ignore them any longer. But that's not the case here. What we have is a gay man in a heteronormative society which is strongly geared toward male/female pairings and marriages who somehow fails to notice until he's in his mid-thirties that he's actually interested in women as well as men. I cannot shake the feeling that Andrew should have recognized this attraction a little earlier.
Moreover, we get other contradictions. Phyllida states that she's twenty-two and "not on the shelf"– which I think is supposed to mean that she's not yet a spinster. However, the term and the attitude are both wrong. The Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue says that at the time "on the shelf" meant "pawned." And a woman of twenty-two, four years past her first season, would be decidedly long in the tooth as far as the marriage market was concerned.
Of course, the heroine is blessed with every virtue. We are told this before we are shown it. We are informed that Phyllida has inherited her father's good looks and her mother's brains, that she is independent, the picture of maidenly innocence, generous, dutiful, modest and the prettiest girl in the county. She is also a somewhat successful writer of gothic romances. The only reason that such a paragon is unmarried, of course, is not that no one has proposed–but that she has never found a man that she wishes to wed.
Phyllida is oddly knowledgeable about homosexuality for a young lady of her time, and oddly casual about it too. I found this jarring. I ended up reading over her first speech about Andrew several times. "Did she really say that the man doesn't care for women?" I found myself asking. "Does she know what that means? And…wait a second! She 'doesn't have any objection to men of that sort'? Moreover, she comfortably engages in "a technical but spicy discussion of the safest way to express unnatural relationships between men, sexual acts not confined to the standard one between men and women, and other interesting topics" at her publisher's. I tried to imagine Jane Austen or the Bronte sisters having such a discussion with their publishers, and nearly broke my brain.
As I read on, however, I learned that Phyllida's attitude was not so strange. Phyllida, you see, inhabits the world of OK Homo. It is common knowledge that Andrew Carrington—whose name makes me think of the old soap opera, Dynasty–is a sodomite; this is established early on. Now, according to A History of Criminal Law: The Movement for Reform, 1750-1833 by Leon Radzinowicz, the penalty for sodomy and what was termed "the crime against nature" (a catch-all term which could mean oral sex, homosexual acts in general, bestiality…oh, and sodomy itself) was deprivation of clergy (no last-minute confessions or forgiveness from God, in other words) and death by hanging. Provided that penetration and emission could both be proven, both the top AND the bottom would be hanged…provided that the bottom was aged fourteen or over. If the bottom was under fourteen, he was not guilty of a felony, though the top was.
Yet, despite the fact that homosexual acts are allegedly a crime in this book, as they were in real life, nothing happens to Andrew—or to Monkton, Verney or any of the members of the Brotherhood of Philander. The gay club is never raided, though everyone knows it is a gay club and that sexual acts take place on the premises. Andrew's younger brother is not only aware of his brother's homosexuality, but—I suppose jokingly, though it's not funny—asks Andrew not to expect him to service Andrew on his knees as one of his male lovers would. No, really. He says that.
"Just as long as you don't ask me to do what your ganymedes do on their knees," Richard said. "Although considering the fate you've spared me [by paying all his debts], I'd accept that as a fair trade."
Nor is Richard the only one saying inappropriate things. Andrew's sister Lady Fanshawe gossips about her brother's sexual orientation to his new bride and thinks nothing of it. Phyllida herself speaks openly and before witnesses about Andrew having male lovers; she's reproved for speaking "brazenly," but Andrew suffers no adverse consequences at all. Indeed, his sexuality is discussed openly at dances, at parties, and at the theatre by all and sundry, and it is no more than a topic of curiosity—and a bet. Yes, all of upper-crust society is knows that Andrew has a taste for men, and is betting on whether or not he can consummate the marriage and get Phyllida with child. Phyllida is told about this bet on at least twelve separate occasions. Andrew's sexual preference is certainly not a criminal matter; it's a source of amusement. I could not help but wonder why the Brotherhood of Philander, with its devotion to secrecy, needed to exist in the first place.
As the book goes on, it becomes clear that not only is this the world of OK Homo, but also a large proportion of the cast is a) bisexual and b) attracted to everyone else. Phyllida starts things off by declaring that Lady Fanshawe, Andrew's sister, is "magnetically, erotically fascinating," which I think is rather hard to misunderstand. Andrew, of course, is proclaimed to be gay throughout but can't get enough of Phyllida in bed, so I'll say that he's bi. An allegedly bisexual actor and his equally bisexual actress sister both find Phyllida charming and fascinating. Lord Isham, the founder of the Brotherhood of Philander is married, and his male lover, Lord Rupert, is the father of one of Isham's supposed sons. Isham, Isham's wife and Rupert give Phyllida marital advice and quite a lot of information about how their menagé a trois works. Andrew's doctor is both the physician for the Brotherhood of Philander and one of Andrew's former lovers, yet he finds Phyllida appealing and doesn't doubt for a minute that Andrew could have fallen in love with a woman. And of course, Monkton—a self-described completely homosexual man who reminded me of the camp Anthony Blanche in Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited –tells Phyllida after a few minutes acquaintance that she inspires irresistible lust even in him.
Please note that the common denominator for all of this het lust in the non-straight is Phyllida, for Phyllida is the anti-gay. It even says so in the text. Here Monkton speaks to her:
"Have you looked in the glass lately? I mean within the past five years? You are beautiful. Not perhaps in the current ideal, but in a much more meaningful way, a carnal way, that men find irresistible, even men like me, to an extent. For the majority, those who are closer to the middle of the spectrum, like Carrington, you must appear as a very dainty morsel indeed."
Look at what Monkton is saying:
1) There's a spectrum of sexuality—a concept that popularized by the Kinsey Reports [Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948 ) and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953).] Monkton mentioning it, therefore, is a blatant anachronism.
2) The majority of people are in the middle of the spectrum and therefore bisexual. This is an anachronistic opinion based on an anachronism—heterosexuality would definitely have been regarded as the norm in 1812. And speaking of alternate sexuality to a respectable married woman after only a few minutes acquaintance? In the heavily mannered world of the Regency? This is not merely anachronistic; it is surrealistic.
3) Beauty means more if it inspires lust.
4) Phyllida is so desirable, she can even make a completely homosexual man lust after her and find her irresistible.
I dislike this last intensely, for it says that homosexuality is something that can be changed if a gay man just meets the right woman. This is not a pro-gay attitude; it's a reactionary one. It's the basis of the whole idea that homosexuality is a condition that can and should be cured. That such an attitude exists in a novel rife with homosexuality and bisexuality I find deplorable.
But Monkton doesn't stop there. I could have passed off his previous comment as exaggeration or sarcasm if he had, but no.
"…you have true beauty, and wit and intelligence. And while you are neither spiteful nor cruel, you have not allowed your natural kindness and generosity to cloud the shining purity of your malice. There is a remarkable openness in your conversation, with just the hint of acid that makes for a perfect bouquet, like a dry wine of superior vintage."
You would think that anything that praised malice and acidity would be a back-handed compliment at best. However, Monkton has already told Phyllida that he finds most women dull and insipid and that he likes her wit and her sense of humor, so this is praise for what ought to be a flaw, as well as laudation for all of her other virtues.
There were moments that I had to struggle to read on. For example, Phyllida's mother "eye[s] her daughter in her lush nakedness with gloating admiration" and makes a point of cutting twenty-two-year-old Phyllida's pubic hair…for no clear and convincing reason. She says that Andrew "won't want a dirty bush down there"–but since Andrew has no experience with women whatsoever, I don't see why he would care. It seems more like an excuse to get close to her adult daughter's genitalia. I'm not a fan of incest, lesbian or otherwise…and yet Mrs. Lewis's actions strongly hint that this is not your average mother-daughter relationship.
Herendeen also produces quite the worst sexual scenes and sexual descriptions I've ever read. The gay sex scenes are brief and vague to the point of non-existence and focus on Andrew verbally flagellating his partners for being willing to have sex with him. It reads as if the author has no idea how gay sex even works, anatomically and emotionally, and is trying desperately to skim over the details.
Yet the het sex is no better. In the honeymoon scene, Andrew coyly refers to his penis as his "beef bayonet," and acts as if he thinks is a very witty and sexy phrase. He also compares female arousal to "ordinary female sliminess" and thinks of Phyllida's dampness as "clear mucus." I found it most peculiar that an allegedly bisexual man who described things in such terms would want to have sex with a woman at all. Phyllida, for her part, thinks of "fucking," "screwing" and "rape," terms which a gently reared young lady of the Regency almost certainly would not use, and observes that "[t]he sound of him pulling out" was "a sucking, farting sound." If any of this sounds even remotely attractive, I'm not telling it right.
It's very strange, incidentally, that Phyllida thinks in terms of marital rape. The concept simply didn't exist during the Regency. I can remember when the question of whether a woman could be raped by her husband first arose, in fact—during the 1970s. Before that, a woman was legally presumed to be "in a constant state of readiness for her husband"–that her body was his property, and that by marrying him, she'd already said yes. That, given the time and the place, is the concept that Phyllida should logically have. She doesn't have to like it, and I do not expect that she would. But she should be aware that any man she married would have total access to her body at all times, because that's the norm for her world. Instead, she repeatedly protests, screams and whines that she's been raped…after thinking, time and again, how much she desires Andrew, and after eagerly and enthusiastically responding to her husband's advances. It's mad, illogical, anachronistic behavior, and it makes about as much sense as a member of the Boston Tea Party protesting the war with Iraq.
However, when Phyllida actually is assaulted by her husband's steward, she doesn't even think of rape, although there is no question that is what he's attempting. Even more ludicrous is the fact that the attempted rapist blackmails her into silence by threatening to tell all "[a]bout your sodomite husband and all his friends at the Brotherhood of Philander"–even though Phyllida knows perfectly well that everyone already knows about her sodomite husband and all his friends at the Brotherhood of Philander. An author cannot create tension by stressing a danger that's already been shown to be negligible.
Not only is marital rape a topic in the novel, but so are inheritance, divorce and illegitimacy. Unfortunately, they, too, are mentioned in a way that betrays the author's ignorance. Francis Newburn (Andrew's uncle, the earl) states the following:
"Better have it out now," Newburn said. "No point in having someone else's brat inheriting the title when it's too late to do anything about it. Better a divorce now than the entire estate passing to the by-blow of an actor or a libertine."
Let me count the ways in which that little speech is wrong.
First, the matter of inheritance. Newburn has no sons of his own who would inherit the title and his property. His younger brother, Andrew's father, would inherit, but he's dead. Andrew, Newburn's oldest nephew, is the closest male relative that Newburn has. Assuming that the closest male relative is eligible to inherit—which wasn't always the case, but seems to be so here–Andrew will inherit both his uncle's title and his uncle's estate. The only ways that he could fail to inherit would be if he were a minor at the time of his uncle's death (and even then he'd inherit when he came of age), a bankrupt, insane, or dead. Francis Newburn has no say in the matter of who will have the title after him. (And being a scandalous and disgraceful person never stopped anyone from inheriting, though Andrew doesn't seem to know this.)
Secondly, Newburn speaks as if divorce were commonplace and easy to obtain. Prior to the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857, divorce was very, very difficult to get. It cost hundreds of pounds, dragged on for years and required the passing of a private act of Parliament. Only four women ever got divorces by act of Parliament. Furthermore, a divorced couple would not be allowed to remarry in the church, as their ex-spouses were still alive. This would rather inconvenience anyone like a peer or a peer's heir, i.e. Andrew, who needed to sire a legitimate son.
Third, illegitimacy. If a wife had an affair and got pregnant–which Newburn is as good as telling Phyllida he thinks she's going to do—it was up to the husband to accept or reject the child. If he accepted the child, the child was, under the law, his. (Before the days of DNA testing, it would be rather hard to disprove parentage, after all.) Newburn shouldn't be focusing on Phyllida; he should be trying to persuade Andrew to reject any child Andrew isn't absolutely certain is his, because Andrew is the one who can confer or deny legitimacy to his wife's offspring.
Newburn is protesting situations that do not exist, and is proposing solutions that do not exist, either. I must say that I consider this strange for a work that has been described as "meticulously researched."
There are other bits that make no sense in the social context of the novel. For example, the matter of servants. Andrew has a staff of twenty at his townhouse, including a butler. Yet no servant ever answers the door or announces visitors, as would be the duty of a footman or butler. Instead, guests—and I use the term loosely–just walk right in off the street and announce themselves loudly to all and sundry, in the hopes of finding the master or mistress of the house at home. (For some reason, Yardley the butler never locks the front door.)
Then, too, Andrew hires Nan, a scullery maid, to act as Phyllida's lady's maid. This is patently ridiculous; the two jobs were light-years apart in terms of training and social status. No jumped-up girl from the scullery, whose job would have involved stoking the kitchen stove, emptying chamber pots, scrubbing the kitchen and the pantry, setting the table and washing dishes, pots and pans, would ever be a lady's maid. Ladies' maids were companions to their mistress, second only to the housekeeper in terms of status. They took care of the mistress's hair and clothes, packed for her, helped her change five or six times a day, and accompanied her on trips to country houses. It was an enviable position in the servant hierarchy, and everyone upstairs and downstairs would know it. For Andrew to promote a Cockney scullery maid to such a job, he'd have to be extraordinarily ignorant of the norms of his own class and society, extraordinarily insulting toward his new wife, or both.
Phyllida also isn't familiar with the society of her day, though she should be. For example, she claims that the Season begins after Easter. This is erroneous. The Season began when Parliament sat for the first time. This could be anytime from after Christmas through January. Admittedly, things did tend to pick up a bit after Easter (and no wonder, given the difficulties of riding in a horse-drawn carriage across unpaved, unplowed, icy roads), but nevertheless, the Season started in the winter.
Stranger than the characters' vast ignorance of the world around them are the odd contradictions in Phyllida's personality. She's a demure and innocent young miss while also possessing a fiery temper, coarse manners and cursing like a stevedore. She is supposed to be a businesswoman who deals with editors and publishers. Yet at the same time, she is so naive that she has no idea that the average upper-class Regency woman is NOT wearing a "low-cut bodice that expose[s] the top of the nipples" or a "net tunic over the sheer underskirt through which the dark triangle at the top of her thighs showed as a dim shadow" in public.
This is not to say that diaphanous clothing never existed in England. It did, circa 1789, during the Directoire period. However, it only lasted a few years. "[B]y 1812," writes Venetia Murray in An Elegant Madness: High Society in Regency England, "they [N.B. the English] had gone back to their false bosoms and familiar corsets."
You would think that Phyllida would recognize that the diaphanous clothes are of a fashion twenty-three years out of date. Most young women would stick at wearing the hopelessly out-of-fashion garments that their mothers used to wear. And surely a young woman brought up in a small, conservative village would press for something slightly more modest. The only conclusion I can draw is that Phyllida is the Regency's proto-nudist.
I have mentioned Phyllida being a writer of gothic romances. There is nothing wrong with that; gothics were indeed being written at the time. However, gothic fiction of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was very different from the stories that Phyllida writes. Books that readers of gothics would have read—for Frankenstein, The Vampyre, tales by Hawthorne and Poe, as well as Jane Austen's parody of gothic fiction, Northanger Abbey, had not yet been written in 1812—would have been The Monk (1796) by Matthew Gregory Lewis, The Italian (1797) by Ann Radcliffe, Clermont (1797) and The Children of the Abbey (1800) by Regina Maria Roche, and Wieland (1797) by Charles Brockton Brown.
But Phyllida does not write about terror, curses, ghosts, demons, madness, the evils of science, or the power of the Devil, which would have been typical for gothic fiction. No. She writes about the villainous Lord Iskander who wants Melisande, a woman he is holding captive and with whom he has already had orgasmic sex, to give him a blowjob.
This might qualify as gothic romance nowadays. It is not, however, what would have qualified as gothic back then.
As for sex being so blatantly portrayed in a novel of the time—not in a mainstream press. Possibly in an underground press, but not a mainstream one. The precedent was set in 1727 when Edmund Curl, an English publisher, was convicted for disturbing the peace for publishing Venus in the Cloister, in which two nuns merely talk about sex. Obviously, disturbing the peace is not a felony, and yet a lawsuit is a lawsuit. I doubt if Phyllida's publisher would agree to publish anything that might get him, his publishing company or foolish Phyllida into legal trouble; mud has a nasty habit of sticking.
Phyllida also speaks of earning her own income through writing. This made me hurl the book across the room in fury, for it's blatantly wrong, as the 1836 Caroline Norton case attests. Caroline Norton was a member of upper-class society who tried to separate from her husband. After she left her husband, Norton made it impossible for her to see her children, cut off all access to the marital property and charged Caroline and Lord Melbourne with adultery. The court case was unsuccessful, but it wore on for years. Caroline tried getting a divorce from Norton on the grounds of cruelty after the adultery case ended. She failed, for his behavior was not considered cruelty under the law.
Without any other income, Caroline began selling stories and poems. However, Caroline was still legally married—and her husband, as was his legal right, claimed a great deal of what she earned as his property.
The Caroline Norton case was the impetus for reform of the laws regarding married women and property. And the laws were changed, yes. But the Married Women's Property Law was not passed until 1882…seventy years from Phyllida's time.
So Phyllida, like Caroline Norton, has no legal rights. Any money she earns from her books belongs to Andrew. Phyllida's contract with her publisher is now null and void, because any contracts made by an unmarried woman dissolved the day she married; all of her property was belonged to her husband. And Phyllida cannot re-negotiate a new one on her own, for no married woman could make a contract without her husband's consent, or sign one without her husband being co-signer. It's most peculiar that the author missed all of this, seeing as how it impacts her subplot of Phyllida as writer. It's not as if the information were inaccessible. I found it in two minutes.
I must add that Phyllida has a most peculiar morality. She doesn't understand why her husband's brother, Dick, is considered a rake when he's notorious for seducing women and, on at least one occasion, got a widow pregnant with his illegitimate son. I was under the impression that this was the kind of behavior that one could expect from a rake. As far as Phyllida is concerned, however, Dick just likes women, and what's wrong with that? She also considers Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet to be guilty of two sins—the sins of disbedience to their parents and another that isn't specified…though she seems unaware that the two were married. At the same time, she gets sexually turned on by seeing a young allegedly bisexual actor dry-hump her husband in front of her, and, when the actor apologizes for his behavior, tells him with a soft smile, a laugh and shining eyes, "There is nothing to forgive, Mr. Powyl. I am delighted that Andrew has such an interesting friend."
Phyllida reminds me very strongly of the original characters who populate every fandom—the ones who are shy yet outspoken, happy yet harboring a secret sorrow, loving yet friendless, calm but ill-tempered. The author seems to want her to have things not only both ways, but every which way. I kept wishing that Herendeen would pick one set of traits for Phyllida and stick with them for the rest of the book.
Also, there is a great deal wrong with Andrew. He is continually presented as having come to terms with his sexuality and having absolutely no shame, yet he angrily addresses the men he has sex with as "sluts" and "whores," and curses Harry Swain, when he receives Harry's "Dear John" letter, as a "whoring cunt" and "a goddamned two-timing bitch." He does this whether he's talking to a rentboy, an actor or a fellow nobleman. (Personally I found it interesting that all of the words that Andrew uses to revile men are words about women. This goes a long way toward dissuading me that he likes or respects women, much less loves Phyllida.)
He also spends a great deal of time brooding about whether the alleged love of his life, Harry, has been physically faithful to him for the three years that he has been in the army. Yet Andrew has been rather blatantly unfaithful to Harry Swain…with, as near as I can tell, half the male population of England. Nor does he bother to write to the man he supposedly loves and tell him, "Oh, by the way, I'm married now, but don't worry, I still love you." He is, to be blunt, a selfish and emotionally frozen creature who lacks the ability to speak to anyone he's been physically intimate with as if they are human beings.
Yet, at the same time, Andrew behaves like a stereotypical queen. He not only bursts into tears when Harry breaks things off with him because Harry's fallen in love with someone else—and after three years of playing around, I can hardly believe Andrew is heartbroken–he also goes into shock and needs brandy to revive him, then vomits and faints. This doesn't fit Andrew's previous behavior; I can only conclude that Herendeen thinks that this is how a gay man, regardless of his personality, would inevitably act under emotional stress. More practical questions— such as "Why didn't Andrew enlist in the same company as Harry, if he wanted to be with Harry?" and "Why didn't Harry get any leave in three years?"–are simply never answered.
Quite a few other stereotypes are trotted out and claimed to be facts, too. For example, Andrew's doctor, Reginald Stevens, informs Phyllida that "[t]hree years is a ridiculously long time to hold onto the memory of a love affair," though it's clear that the love affair ended that morning and not three years ago. Nor does Stevens qualify his statement by adding that it's a long time "if one of the men is away at war" or "given the fact that couples who love each other can't be together openly." This sounds like a reiteration of a stereotype I remember hearing when I was growing up in the 1970s and 1980s: that homosexual men simply could not commit in any relationship. Phyllida, for her part, wonders whether Harry Swain played husband or wife in his relationship with Andrew…another persistent stereotype.
And then there is Matthew Thornby. He is allegedly the love of Andrew's life, though he doesn't show up until almost three hundred pages in. I was not convinced that Andrew loved him; he acted the same way toward Matthew that he did toward all of his sexual partners, swearing at and reviling him. That he was sexually attracted, I had no doubt. I simply did not believe that Andrew could be in everlastingly true love with Matthew after a little small talk and a quick screw outside. I think that a little getting to know each other and building a friendship between the two men would have been nice—but no. Sex first.
Herendeen cannot seem to keep details about Thornby straight. He bounces between speaking the King's English flawlessly and dropping into the broad accent of a Yorkshire farmer—as if everyone from Yorkshire spoke the same way. He's described as being quite wealthy, the son of a baronet who earned his money through cotton and of sufficient social stature to attend White's and Almack's…yet Andrew tries to hire him as his secretary for two hundred pounds a year on the grounds that "it's more than you're getting now" as "a wage slave, grubbing in that wretched warehouse in the City or wherever you go." And oh, yes, he's quite serious. He's trying to place his lover in his household, yes, but Andrew really thinks he's doing the man a favor by giving him a good job. Andrew never wonders once how anyone who "grubbed in a warehouse" could afford to associate with him in the first place.
But then, there is a lot of confusion in this book. On one page, Phyllida is punching her husband for having sex with her; a few pages later, she's dreaming about how amazing the sex felt and wondering when they'll do it again. In another section, Phyllida and Nan dress up like men so that they can get into the Brotherhood of Philander to spy; a page or so later, she's teaching Nan, one of their neighbors and Nan's male prostitute lover how to read by using one of her novels as a primer. There is talk about lords wanting a career in politics (members of the peerage couldn't run for the House of Commons), a muddling of corporal punishment and capital punishment, the suggestion that peers were exempt from hanging (they weren't—though they were entitled to be hanged with a silk rope rather than one made from hemp), and a convoluted spy plot that involves a government official who deals with espionage putting a spy of French ancestry in Andrew's house as an employee, and the spy then trying to blackmail homosexual men who are very obviously out. The spy, Philip Turner, was passing on coded messages about the Brotherhood of Philander—no, he didn't know anything about it until he was brought to the club. Turner is completely straight and repulsed by homosexuality; no, he's bisexual; no, he's homosexual and repulsed by women. Turner is an English agent; no, he's an American and a former slave working for the French, but he's still guilty of treason because he was spying on England.
The language, too, is somewhat jarring—inaccurate to a distracting degree. For example, there is a reference to a gentleman's club for gays as "an exclusive madge house." I looked it up in Grose's Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1811). "Madge" was the slang term for a woman's private parts. A "madge cull"–someone severed or separated from a woman's private parts—was a male homosexual. So the club most emphatically has the wrong name—it might as well be called a pussy palace.
On the other hand, readers are also confronted with language that could not possibly have been used in 1812. "Gold digger," in the sense of "woman who pursues men for their money," was first recorded in 1915; "plaster saint," in 1890; "teenager," in 1941. "Making love," in the sense of having sex, was first used in the USA in the 1950s; before then, it was a synonym for courting or wooing someone. "Migraine" is surprisingly legal—the word has been around since 1373—but I have to admit that I've heard the terms "megrims" and "sick headaches" used more often in books of the time.
A diligent proofreader who was unafraid to use a red pen would have done wonders…but this copy of the book was published by AuthorHouse, and AuthorHouse does not proofread, edit or even read the manuscripts they publish.
Doubtless at this point some people are fuming. I can hear them from here. "You're being far too critical! She did her best! What do you want, a history textbook?"
No. No, I don't. However, when a book is being sold as a historical novel—and the blurb cites the fact that this takes place in the Regency twice and praises it for "taking the reader to a little-known side of Regency life" once—I expect the novel to include well-written history interwoven with the plot. I do not like being jarred from a book with a reaction of "Wait, WHAT did the author just say?" every two pages or so. I don't enjoy finding blatant error after blatant error in a book lauded for its attention to historical detail. What troubles me is that it wouldn't have been hard to find and use correct historical information, and yet the author didn't bother to do so—or, if she did, did not bother to incorporate it into the story. I am at a loss to understand why.
The writer herself says in an afterword that since the book is a romance, she considers it to be a form of fantasy fiction. This may well be her wish-fulfillment fantasy—given the idealization of her beautiful, virtuous, sexually desirable romance novelist heroine who is loved and wanted by all men, I don't doubt it for an instant—but it is not fantasy fiction. That's a different genre altogether. If the book is being sold as a historical, then saying after the novel is done that it only contains "elements of fact" and that she "wanted to create a mood, not a gussied-up history lesson" by using anachronistic language demonstrates rather clearly that Herendeen is writing in the wrong genre. She should not be writing historicals if she doesn't want to bother with history or research. Since she could not be bothered to get one thing right in this book, and chose to make excuses for her sloppy work afterwards, I must conclude that she cares nothing for either.
Rating: one star. The best that I can say about it is that the work, at least, was Herendeen's. It simply wasn't good work.
A native New Yorker and lifelong resident of Brooklyn, Ann Herendeen has worked as a researcher for an urban planning consultant; an advertising media planner; a public and academic business reference librarian; a trademarks monitor for an intellectual property law firm; and a cataloging librarian specializing in natural history. Ann is a graduate of Princeton University, where she majored in English while maintaining a strong interest in English history.
Buy Phyllida & the Brotherhood of Philander from Amazon UK : Amazon USA
Filed under: 1 star, 19th Century, Fiction, Regency |


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So, second attempt today. As Julie was on Mount Finlayson yesterday we hiked up Mount Wells today. We took the bus to Colwood (or was it or Langford? I was sleepy :>) and met with Dominic and Vanessa. It was a comparably short walk up but nature and the view were still amazing.
On the way up


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|my tomatoes
**Kimmy's Garden ** ' My story of life after brain surgery ' and living with Liposarcoma ' 'Fill your life with what you know to be beautiful ' LIVE LAUGH LOVE
Thursday, 29 December 2011
If in Doubt .......don't !
Meaning I'm still in a bit of a mood, actually it feels hormonal more than anything which i guess is still possible ? I went through menopause rather quickly at the beginning of the year ,cant remember really but today its definitely like hormones raging ! I am tearful ,and very inclined to snap at anyone and anything! hence the if in doubt ! don't say a word! either to me or visa versa! . Hope I improve by New Year as I'm going to a party at C's , its mainly just us girls and I'm looking forward to it .....I hope I feel okay that day ...I am still sleeping a lot of the afternoon away and so I hope I can get motivated enough to enjoy going . The support worker was supposed to start today but I put her off till next week as 4 oclock in the afternoon is just the wrong time for me as I 'm usually in the land of nod . ,I expected her last week ,and she didn't show so I guess next week we will get the show on the road as I changed time to morning .
I took some pics of my scar so look away as i thought it was all healed ,nearly there though ,actuaaly no i won't cos it ain't exactly 'beautiful' ! will wait till its looking a bit better ,i put lots of aqueous cream on tonight to help with the scabing as of course i do pick at it, sorry gross i know but i think it's something most people do . pleas excuse typing again too ,,i have a bit of dropsy again ive noticed so a bit weak on the right again,. so heres some pics of my tomatos!! how exciteing huh ,just wish we had some sun to ripen them !
Posted by Kim Murray at Thursday, December 29, 2011
1 comment:
- Anonymous29 December 2011 at 4:51 AM
I would totally pick the scab as well! I have a little cut on my leg that I was about to pick today. I really hope you're okay for the New Years party! I'm loving home grown tomatoes at the moment, must eat at least 5 everyday xoReplyDelete
.Hi there ! All your comments are welcome ,ask me anything you like and I will try to answer ! don't be shy . Have a great day .
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Natalie Dormer Poses Topless For 'GQ' In Sexy New Shoot
The 'Game of Thrones' star left little to the imagination in the April issue, and inside the interview proved to be just as exciting as she admitted she is a total adrenaline junkie! This royal looks positively stunning in her revealing spread!
Natalie Dormer , (who plays Joffrey's soon-to-be queen on Game of Thrones), traded in her crown for something a little more comfortable when she posed topless in the April issue of GQ. The 32-year-old stunner is now opening up to the mag about her exciting year and her love of adrenaline!
Natalie Dormer Topless On 'GQ':
Our favorite royal goes punk rock, trading in her signature long auburn locks for her new half shaved head as the stunning actress stripped down in a series of sexy photos. Her new look — which she owes to her role as Cressida in the final two installments of The Hunger Games, seems to match her fearless outlook on life.
"I love going out of my comfort zone — I live to go out of my comfort zone. Obviously, you have quieter years than others – you don't go jumping out of a play every day," she tells the mag. Clearly this has been quite the year for Natalie. Winning the heart of Joffrey and, now, with her new role in The Hunger Games, we are sure to be seeing plenty more of this actress!
Natalie looks amazing as she poses, completely topless, wearing nothing more than a pair of black Emilio Pucci shorts while giving a smoldering look to the camera. In another shot the star oozes with sex appeal while laying on a bed in a black Calvin Klein tank dress while draped in a fur blanket.
The star looks stunning– and this is certainly another side of the actress that we have not seen before. We love that she loves to push herself and likes to stray from her comfort zone. She clearly is a brave girl and we admire her for being able to be so comfortable in her own skin!
Make sure to check out Natalie's full interview in the April issue of GQ — on newsstands now.
— Caitlin Beck


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digitalmars.D - Signal and Slots
- Aux2 (10/10) Mar 08 2012 Today I tried std.signals for the first time. I've been using Qt
Today I tried std.signals for the first time. I've been using Qt for the past 4 years, and a noticeable difference to me is how simple it is to set up signals and slots with std.signals. But there are two things that I wish were different: 1. thread safe signals and slots. I really like this feature in Qt, and I'm wondering if this is something that will be addressed in future releases of Phobos? 2. unable to connect a signal to another signal. And this? Also, how stable is std.signals? Is it set in stone, or is it going to change ?
Mar 08 2012


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The next time trial is Tuesday August 18th. Meet at Mark's house. First rider is off at 5:30. Riders can start anytime between 5:30 and 6:30. The course will be a full race lap blockhouse style. Make sure to come out and get your preview. There will be some changes for this years course.
No cost to ride. $5 donation requested for timing supplies.
See you there!!
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Next Time Trial August 18th
Posted by 2008 Blockhouse Roll at 6:30 PM
1 comment:
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Tuesday, February 06, 2007
UKIP strategy draws blood
Then in the aftermath of a blaze of publicity for the slow re-branding of UKIP into the Independence Party, we find Edward Leigh of the Cornerstone (unkindly nicknamed Tombstone) Group firing both barrels at the Cameronian vacuum. Though of course to save his blushes he repeats the transparent lie that UKIP are a 'single issue' party. Well I suppose he is right if a simngle issue is the issue of Independence, and all that that entails. Add this to Tim 'Con Home' Montgomrie's rallying cry for UKIP in the Times last week and a picture emerges.
They are in the words of the Baroness, "Frit".
For pity's sake, Labour are in meltdown and the Tories are running scared of UKIP!
3 comments:
- Mike Wood said...
Meanwhile UKIP's new party name seems to have lasted about as long as one of Chad Noble's parties. Very Social and Liberal Democratic Party
- 8:28 am
My own view is this. Why when conservative and UKIP as a base premise have things they could agree on, are they breaking and and splitting the vote.
This divide and conquer aspect leaves both weaker than if they were united.
I watched the video and Farage and Dan Hannan were on the same side - which is basically where they should be!
I wish the conservatives would simply work with UKIP, and that UKIP would focus on attacking the more meaty targets of labour and pro euro units.
All across Europe, the people who do not share the 'euro' dream spend excessive amounts of energy, resource, finance, time and effort squabbling and fighting each other, while fundamentally not providing solid and worthwhile opposition to the federalists.
Long Term, UKIP and conservatives not being able to work together simply means those who oppose them can rub their hands with Glee.
I dispair at the shambolic efforts in the face of euro federalism.
- 1:18 pm
Thanks for that Mike, as far as I understand what he meant to say is the anti-social and Liberal Democratic Party
Up to a point Lord Copper. And I am glad you got a format that worked for you.
The problem is , of course, that UKIP have a sea green incorruptable, 'irreducable core' approach to the EU issue, which shared by a number of Tories, who if they support the Better Off Out campaign of the Freedom Association. These people will not be attacked by UKIP, indeed they will no doubt get UKIP's active support.
That being said UKIP is happy to work with the Tories and No2ID, happy to work with those Tories that belive in a high choice low tax society. It's just that that brand of conservatism is not at the top of Dave's agenda.
- 4:17 pm


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A comment on yesterday's post from Milday:
"… Your experience with the warrior and the subsequent grouping that you were 'forced' to do in order to progress is something that lots of people claim to be phobic of. I've heard complaints about forced grouping so often. Last time it was while reading on the FFXIV main storyline, the end of which leading you to a dungeon that required you to have some players join you… What is so bad about that? Why do people feel entitled to being able to solo everything on a multiplayer game?"
People are afraid of rejection, Gevlon notwithstanding. They don't want to group up because they:
Might be ignored when they whisper someone.
Might be seen to perform poorly and be afraid of getting a poor server reputation.
Might meet players they don't like that pester them afterwards.
Etc, etc, etc. But what it mostly goes back to is the situation of not putting your hand up in school even when you are 99% sure you have the right answer. The risk of being wrong in front of your peers is not worth it. This is not irrational, because the humiliation is real and tangible, and a good many people carry this into adult life. And usually the ones who are the most vocal in their ridicule are the ones who are living in the most fear. It goes along the lines of, show me a homophobe and I will show you a closet homosexual. Deflecting attention away from ones own weakness or fears is a common tactic, particularly in video games. So we have players who ridicule based out of fear and players who are ridiculed. Quite a lot of angst there.
Blizzard got around this with the much maligned LFG system. Much maligned by players like me who don't have any social anxiety hangups. But most probably a lifeline to players with social issues. If you're reading this and thinking that it is ridiculous to have these sort of fears when you're sitting at a computer literally thousands of miles from your antagonists, you need to try and have some empathy and put yourself in these people's shoes. Perhaps the person who is afraid of being ridiculed in real life is driven to despair when they can't even escape this sort of behaviour when they're at a computer screen.
I have no hesitation in whispering people, putting calls out on general chat, or whatever. I even make a point to thank random players who univitedly buff me when they're running past. You wouldn't believe the positive response a whispered "thx for the buff" can get you. My friends list is getting so long I could start my own guild soon. And I didn't used to be like this. In my early adult life just the act of stepping onto a bus used to fill me with social anxiety. I would always try and sit in the same place and keep my head down. But one day I decided that enough was enough and I sat in a different seat. And I looked at the people around me. Little steps, but they add up. If you're freaked out about social interaction in a video game just take it in little steps. You're not aiming to be the life of the party. You're aiming to have a life.


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It's been another great week in the community garden. Even with temperatures in the 90s all week, it did fine without a weeding or watering since last Sunday. The cilantro has all gone to seed, so there will be a lot of homegrown corriander in our future. The squash are taking over the garden, and the onions seem to be doing the least well. I didn't pick any this week to give them time to rebound a bit. I really do need to thin my beets – those that have had plenty of space have matured pretty quickly, but lots of plants are very cramped. There's even a peanut-sized watermelon growing.
This week, I got a big bunch of kale, two heads of broccoli (the first time I've grown it!) a few smallish bulls blood beeds, with their reddish leaves, THREE artichokes, including one fairly large one, some tomatillo and ground cherries, and a winter squash! The squash is a Rouge d'Vif Etamps – and I'm not sure what I'll do with it. I wasn't expecting it to ripen for another few months, but here it is – and there are plenty more small ones on the vines.


text: Strategic Assessment Archived Information Text Size a a a Print Page ContentOverviewIn July 2011, the Western Australian Ministers for Planning and Environment and the Commonwealth Minister for the Environment agreed to undertake a Strategic Assessment of the Perth and Peel regions (Strategic Assessment) under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act). The Strategic Assessment is being led by the Department of the Premier and Cabinet (DPC). In this role DPC works closely with the Commonwealth Department of Environment (DoE) and various State Government bodies including the Departments of Planning (DoP), Parks and Wildlife (Parks and Wildlife), Water (DoW), Environmental Regulation (DER), and Mines and Petroleum (DMP), and the Western Australian Planning Commission (WAPC) and the Office of the Environmental Protection Authority (OEPA).The Strategic Assessment will address the impact on matters of national environmental significance (MNES) of the future development of the Perth and Peel regions required to support a population of 3.5 million people, including urban, industrial, rural-residential and infrastructure development and basic raw materials extraction. The Strategic Assessment has been progressed in consideration of 'Directions 2031 and beyond – metropolitan planning beyond the horizon' and has been undertaken in collaboration with the preparation of the draft Perth and Peel @3.5million suite of documents, including the four draft sub-regional planning frameworks for the South Metropolitan and Peel, North-West, North East, and Central sub-regions. This collaborative approach has provided the opportunity to avoid, mitigate and offset the environmental impact of future development at a strategic scale and consequently achieve improved long term environmental outcomes in comparison to continued project by project assessment.In addition to addressing Commonwealth requirements for a Strategic Assessment under Part 10 of the EPBC Act, the Strategic Assessment will also respond to the section 16(e) strategic advice prepared by the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) under the Environmental Protection Act 1986 (WA) (EP Act). The strategic advice provides guidance to the WA Minister for Environment for future decision-making on State environmental matters under the EP Act within the Perth and Peel regions. The purpose of the Strategic Assessment is to:significantly reduce the need for project by project assessment under the EPBC Act in the Perth and Peel regions and streamline related processes under the EP Act;deliver an effective long term and strategic response to key environmental issues in the Perth and Peel regions, for example, Carnaby's Cockatoo and water quality in the Peel-Harvey estuary;provide greater certainty to industry as to which areas can be developed and what the obligations will be in terms of avoidance, mitigation and offsets; andprovide greater certainty in terms of long term land supply to meet the needs of a city of 3.5 million.The Strategic Assessment is being undertaken in the context of the significant growth that is projected for the Perth and Peel regions over the coming decades. Recent projections have estimated that by 2026, the State's population will grow to 3,274,000 with the Perth and Peel regions projected to have a population of approximately 2,637,000. It is intended that the Strategic Assessment will look even further beyond this, and examine the environmental impacts of the Perth and Peel regions growing to 3.5 million and how these impacts can be avoided, mitigated or managed.Key documentsThe Strategic Assessment will be comprised of:a plan to address MNES and State environmental factors (Strategic Conservation Plan), including a series of Action Plans; andassessment reports of the impacts on MNES and State environmental factors associated with implementing the Strategic Conservation Plan (MNES and State Impact Assessment Reports).Based on current timeframes, drafts of the above Strategic Assessment documents will be released for a 3 month public comment period by early 2016. The WAPC's draft 'Perth and Peel @3.5million' suite of documents, including the four draft sub-regional planning frameworks were released for public comment on 1 May 2015, which closed on 31 July 2015. Final sub-regional planning documents will be prepared in collaboration with the Strategic Assessment process.On 7 August 2015 the EPA released its interim s.16(e) strategic advice to the Minister for Environment (interim advice) which outlines the:strategic environmental implications of the proposed future development for a city of 3.5 million people as outlined in the draft sub-regional planning frameworks developed by the WAPC; andpolicy and guidance that can be used to optimise subsequent approval processes to ensure environmental outcomes are delivered in the most efficient and timely manner.The EPA's interim advice delivers recommendations focusing on air and water quality, and improving the health of the Swan and Canning rivers and Peel-Harvey Estuary, as well as measures to protect biodiversity, the marine environment, human health, heritage and amenity.The EPA will deliver its final strategic advice in 2016. Process UpdateTerms of referenceThe draft terms of reference for the Strategic Assessment of the Perth-Peel region were released for public comment on Friday 26 August and closed on Friday 7 October 2011. The State revised the terms of reference in light of public comments received and the Commonwealth Minister for Environment approved the final terms of reference in May 2012. View a copy of the Strategic Assessment Agreement including the final terms of reference (PDF 496KB).Following public comment on the draft terms of reference the State and Commonwealth Government agreed to extend the northern boundary of the Strategic Assessment to include the Gnangara, Pinjar and Yanchep pine plantations to ensure that matters of State and national environmental significance in this region are assessed as part of the Strategic Assessment. View a map of the amended boundary (PDF 300KB). ConsultationStakeholder Reference Group The Stakeholder Reference Group (SRG) has been established to allow regular engagement with key stakeholder groups prior to the public release of key policy and assessment documents.The inaugural meeting of the SRG was held on 29 November 2012, and was chaired by Mr Jim Limerick. The Terms of Reference for the Stakeholder Reference Group (PDF 543KB) detail the purpose, function and membership of the SRG.The following organisations, covering a broad spectrum of stakeholders interests, are represented at the meetings:Urban Development Institute of Australia (WA)Planning Institute of Australia (WA)WWF - AustraliaHousing Industry AssociationCement, Concrete and Aggregates AustraliaProperty Council of Australia (WA)Peel-Harvey Catchment CouncilEnvironmental Consultants Association (WA)Conservation Council of Western AustraliaLocal government representatives.The meetings are also attended by government representatives from: the Department of the Premier and Cabinetthe Department of Parks and Wildlifethe Department of Environment Regulationthe Department of Planningthe Department of Mines and Petroleumthe Department of Water the Office of the Environmental Protection Authority. A representative from the Commonwealth Department of the Environment attends as an observer. Copies of the Chair's reports of past meetings are now available: 29 November 2012 1 February 2013 28 March 2013 23 May 2013 11 July 2013 17 September 2013 26 November 2013 6 March 2014 15 September 2014 5 February 2015 30 April 2015 23 July 2015 2 Sept 2015 Presentations given at the 2 September 2015 Stakeholder Reference Group meeting: Co-location of Infrastructure - DPC and DoP.pdf EPA Interim Strategic Advice - Paul Vogel - EPA.pdfPresentations given at the 23 July 2015 Stakeholder Reference Group meeting: Implementation Framework and Conservation Commitments Presentation - DPC 23 July 2015 Offsets - approaching revegetation 'strategically' - Jason Hick, Environmental Consultants Association (WA) Inc Presentations given at the 30 April 2015 Stakeholder Reference Group meeting:Strategic Conservation Plan Presentation - Open LinesStrategic Conservation Plan Overview HandoutCommonwealth DotE Presentation - Tim WyndhamPresentations given at the 5 February 2015 Stakeholder Reference Group meeting: Implementation of Strategic Assessments under the EPBC Act - Peter Hemphill Melbourne SIA & Program Lessons Learnt - Implementation - Adrian Vlok Underpinnings of Strategic Assessments - Conceptual Issues - Evan JonesThe last meeting was held on 26 November 2015.Public commentThere will also be a three month public comment period on drafts of the following key policy and assessment documents:the Strategic Conservation Planthe Impact Assessment Report Based on current timelines, the objective is to release these documents for public comment in 2015. Further InformationWhat is the EPBC Act?The EPBC Act provides a legal framework to protect and manage nationally and internationally significant flora, fauna, ecological communities, wetlands and heritage places defined in the EPBC Act as matters of national environmental significance.In Western Australia, if a proposed development or activity is likely to have a significant impact on MNES, approval may be required from the Commonwealth Environment Minister before that activity can go ahead.MNES in the Perth and Peel regions to which the EPBC Act applies include:national heritage placeswetlands of international importance (or 'Ramsar' wetlands)nationally threatened species and ecological communitiesmigratory species.What is a Strategic Assessment?Strategic assessments under the EPBC Act encourage a bigger picture approach to assess how biodiversity, environmental and heritage values that are MNES can be protected, while allowing sustainable development. This is achieved through addressing a number of individual actions or a class of actions, by several proponents, on a regional scale that would otherwise be assessed on a project-by-project basis. As well as helping to protect Australia's unique biodiversity, this type of assessment also benefits the community, developers, industry and government by cutting red tape and providing long-term certainty.Information and resourcesGeneral information on the strategic assessment process and the legislative requirements under the EPBC Act can be found on the DoE website.If you would like to receive additional information, including notification about opportunities for public comment please contact us by email at firstname.lastname@example.com. In your email, please include your name, organisation name (if applicable) and mailing address. General enquiries can also be directed to this email.The following documents are available to download: Chart of the Strategic Assessment of Perth-Peel Region (PDF 137KB) Fact Sheet for the Strategic Assessment of the Perth and Peel Regions Map - Amended boundary for the Strategic Assessment (PDF 300KB).Related links:Department of Parks and Wildlife - www.dpaw.wa.gov.auDepartment of Planning - www.planning.wa.gov.auOffice of the Environmental Protection Authority - www.epa.wa.gov.auDepartment of the Environment - www.environment.gov.au September 2015


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With all the hype of it being December and the excitement of Christmas looming, November all but flew out of my mind as a thing of the past.
However, all is not lost as by some stroke of sheer luck, I remembered!
So without further ado...
1. Starlytes Vanilla Créme candle.
8. Twinings Orange, Mango & Cinnamon Tea
9. Tesco Gingerbread Men
Thanks for reading, beautiful!


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Thank you for visiting our past auction result archives. If you have an item identical (or similar) to this auction lot, please call, write or contact us to discuss. We will be able to help you.
Lot # 69 (of 1525) < Previous Lot | Next Lot >
Circa 1910 Cy Young Tobacco Tin
Starting Bid - $2,000.00, Sold For - $4,930.00
Extremely rare and exceptionally high-grade example of the Cy Young Tobacco tin. The Cy Young Cigar tin is one of only two early tobacco tins which feature the likeness of a specific baseball player. The other is the legendary Ty Cobb Tobacco tin. The Cy Young tin is of a similar rarity to the Ty Cobb Tobacco tin, with just a few more examples known to exist (approximately ten or twelve). The cylindrical tin features a portrait of Cy Young on each side, surrounded by small baseball illustrations on the side of each portrait, as well as the words "By Permission of Cy Young," with "Cy Young" appearing as a facsimile signature. A small box on the side indicates that the cigars were "manufactured to retail at not more than 5 cents." It is likely that this tin actually sat on the counter of the cigar store dispensing cigars one at a time as well as helping to sell entire tins of 50 cigars at a time. The Cy Young tobacco tin is one of the most outstanding and attractive baseball advertising display pieces of the era, and one of the few to feature the likeness of the great Cy Young. Few advertising items are as well known outside of baseball collecting circles. Like the Ty Cobb tin, the Cy Young tin is valued not just in the baseball world, but is also highly prized as one of the rarest and most valuable of all tins in the (non-baseball) advertising and tobacco tin collecting hobby. This is an extremely high-grade example for any early tin. Bright, crisp, and clean, in Excellent condition with just a few small scattered areas of minor rusting (which is almost always the case with early tins) which does not affect the design or perfect portraits of Cy Young. This is a beauty and one of the best of the few known examples of this significant rarity. Dimensions: 5 inches in height and diameter. Reserve $2,000. Estimate $4,000/$8,000. SOLD FOR $4,930.00
(Click the smaller thumbnails to the left and right (if any) to cycle through each photo in the gallery of images for this lot.)


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We fought more than 200 years with British for freedom of our land. Indo-Pakistani war and Indo china war were happened for Jammu Kashmir land dispute and Himalayan land dispute. So many agitations in India for separate land i.e. Telangana, Vidarbha, Mithilanchal, Saurashtra, Harit Pradesh, and Bundelkhand. Funny thing is… SATYAM (No related to land except software), such a big tech company collapsed due to greedy investments on land through MAYTAS and others. Matter of fact everybody loves land…. land is life, basis of all wealth and a factor of production. Now everybody's passion is land because…the land appreciation value is very high comparatively with other savings like gold, fixed deposits, bonds, shares and securities. The land value is cherished more than 5 times in past ten years.
Before independence most of land was acquired by few land lords (Zamindars). Since independence, there has been voluntary and government initiated land reforms for distribution of land among the landless farmers. Jawaharlal Nehru initiated ceiling on lands to abolish landlord system. Land to tiller is the slogan of peasant's movement in 1970s became very intense. Now the history repeating… present economic reforms are creating Ultra Modern Zamindars in the form of Industrialists. The land ceiling systems is applicable to agriculture lands only not for industrial lands, those limitations are advantages to the industrialist to acquire the land as much as they want. The governments are allotting thousands of hectares of land to big industrialists in the name of SEZ, IT industries, Airports, Seaports and other Projects. Reliance, Tata and Adani Group have got 4,830 hectare land from Gujarat state. GMR group (Grandhi Mallikarjuna Rao) got 5500 acres of land for free to construct the Shamshabad Airport, but the Government share is very nominal. The Government of Andhra Pradesh allotted the land to Vanpic (Vaderevu – Nizampatnam Port& Industrial Corridor- Nimmagadda Prasad) around 10,000 acres. I can mention so many like 1300 acres to Jindal group (Savitri Jindal) near Visakhapatnam, 1000 acres to Vedanta Resources (Anil Agarwal) in Orissa and Tata and Essar 6500 acres of land in Chattisgarh. I have a right to believe that Chief Ministers are functioning as Property dealers
In fact farmers need the land, because that is their livelihood, they care for the land. The recent economic reforms are intend to forcible acquisition of agriculture land in thousands of acres that belonged to small farmers in the name of industries, mining, dams and others projects. The economic liberalization programs are completely neglected the land distribution among the landless farmers. Indian farmers are very small and peasants who are holding an average farm land of lessthan 1 hectare (2.5 acres) and some of them do farming by taking lands on rent basis (Tenant farmers). Present economic reforms are promoting the privatization of natural resources, it cause to moving the farmers out of agriculture and some times may be lead to insurgency (Maoists in Chattisgarh, west Bengal, Orissa, and Jharkhand). We need mutually beneficial reforms which can restore the pride of agriculture and ensure the industrial growth. We must protect our 600 million farmers to make sure our food security and food self sufficiency which is our country's priority


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Hit Exchange News
It's no secret, TimTech has been very focused on Sitizens and our new project to branch this business out into the rest of the internet. We truly believe we have found a perfect mix between traffic exchange and social game and we want the world to know about it. So we have tried a few things that most 'internet marketers' might be shocked at (especially our advertising budget) but we decided to do things different and instead of spending money on 'typical' advertising, we created a contest…..
Actually it's 3 contests and they happen every week. The player who refers the most, gets a cash prize. The player that arrives at sites the most, get a cash prize. And finally the player that explores the most, get a cash prize as well.
Here's the kicker….Cash prize.
Now I understand marketing and I understand that credits, upgrades and banner impressions have value but here's a problem we have with it. You can say $1000 in cash and prizes and never have to really invest a penny. You see, as an owner of a traffic exchange you can fabricate banners, text ads and credits. They don't really cost anything, so it looks really cool to say we're giving away the farm when in fact, you don't really have anything invested.
But then along comes a contest where people can win real cash and well…$1000 cash and $1000 cash & prizes look the same…
For the record, I have nothing against giving away upgrades and credits…Heck I think it's brilliant on a business side of things especially if you are working with a limited budget…I guess I just want some more disclosure. If you are giving away 100 bucks cash and 900 bucks worth of prizes..Say there is $100 cash prize and 900 dollars worth of upgrades…That way the members get full disclosure and people know exactly what they are being rewarded with.
What do you think? Make sense? Or is Jon thinking too much into it….lol
Have a great day!
To your success.
Barb :)
adKreator the Easiest splashpage kreator...


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This Perfect Heels Rescue Balm by this works is created to transform dry and cracked heels and skin into super soft and supple feet that you'll love to show off. Enriched with natural and nourishing ingredients, this fast acting treatment works to reconstuct the skin barrier to leave the skin silky and with a radiant glow.
Containing Ecocert Cotton thistle to regenerate, Lemon to detoxify and Lavender to rejuvenate, this powerful regenerating balm will leave your feet looking and feeling younger. K.D.
Directions of use:
- Massage into heels and feet as often as required, exfoliating before use for the best results.


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Thursday, 20 December 2012
Fearful symmetry
at just before quarter past 12 in the am, on Thursday the 20th December, I finished reading Life of Pi
Not bad going considering i only started reading it in early December, not so great considering I bought the book from a charity shop at least two years ago, and not so great considering it won the man booker prize in 2002, so must be at least ten years old by now
But I had promised myself that I would read it before the film came out, (with a UK release date of the 20th, yep, that's today, I reckon that it's fair to count that as a win on y part) although as I started seeing a few more trailers for the film, I couldn't help but think that it looked a bit dull...
yet, I decided to go ahead and read it, regardless of whether the film appealed or not
and it was a fascinating read! to a point. to an almost specific and exact point.
the book lays out a lot of background, life in India, growing up at a zoo, building identity and finding three different religions.
and it was almost just as good when we are castaway with Pi, aboard a life boat with a Bengal Tiger and a handful of other Pondicherry Zoo survivors, although this was only entertaining to a point, to the point at which you wonder where else the story can actually go.
and then it goes slightly surreal, firstly delirious, then verging on sci-fi, and then just rather odd as it cannonballs towards the almost unsatisfying end.
and I'm still unsure whether I still wanna bother seeing it or not, although now I am slightly more curious to see what has and what has not made it into the film from the book
and all the reviews I have heard so far have unanimously agreed that the film is visually amazing, which it very well may be with special effects at their peak, but is the film any good??!....
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Avatar ushered it in – only for Alice in Wonderland to have worked better without it, while Toy Story 3seemed completely indifferent to it. 3D has arrived, but has it really sunk its teeth in yet?
When you find yourself submerged in a dark polluted lake, and suddenly, out from the gnarled weeds and empty cans in one knicker-soiling second, a shoal of thrashing piranhas makes its way towards you, you know that 3D has finally found its purpose.
Piranha 3D makes no false claims to cinematic originality, but in doing so comes up trumps. It wears its gimmicks on its sleeve, the poster telling us to expect a Piranha/Jaws rehash while announcing glorious 3D as the unique selling point. Doing exactly what it promises, its refreshingly satisfying fun. By focusing purely on the visuals, in Alice in Wonderland Tim Burton neglected his talent for telling a good story, somehow managing to turn Lewis Carol's psychedelic tale into 2 hours of grey, limp austerity. Even James Cameron missed the three-dimensional point, more than anything else wowing audiences with just how annoying it is to watch a film from between the leaves of a tropical bush. But in the horror genre, 3D seems to have made itself useful.
Juggling predictably cheap shocks with almost unbearable tension, Piranha 3D drags us down into that phobia-rich territory of the dark, unexplored watery depths and puts us face to face with those hidden carnivores we always suspected since that first beach holiday to Devon. With 3D horror, that pane of glass which protects us from on-screen danger has been shattered.
In this example, a pick and mix assortment of actors – all selected, presumably, from wet t-shirt competitions rather than auditions – make their way through a script full of lines that sounded better on the trailer: An earthquake has split the floor of a lake somewhere in America, opening up a sealed-off underwater cave unfortunately inhabited by prehistoric man-eating fish. And all this just in time for the boat parties of spring break. Aquatic experts are drafted in from afar, while the police have a hard time evacuating drunk teens from the waters, etc etc.
But despite this thrill-by-numbers plot, you can't fault Piranha 3D for being unfocused. Its lean 90 minutes afford little room for the fatty plot stunts and (inevitably dull) characterisation dialogues in which the third dimension becomes obsolete. What we get instead is set piece after grizzly set piece of dire situation, all of which end with the inevitable satisfaction of the kill, (which, by the way, range from predictable and swift to imaginative and memorable).
There's an erotic subplot in there too, with Kelly Brook as the porn star shooting out on the lake threatening to capsize the film with her avid gyrating, but before long the gore flows thick and fast enough to prevent any long-term erections. Breasts, for example: one minute they're having tequila drizzled over them, and the next they having chunks torn out of them. You're never quite sure where to look. The producers evidently did their research when aiming a hook for the testosterone-haemorrhaging 17 year olds males in the audience, although viewers with blood still remaining in their head might see Brook and co's slow-mo nude swimming as the shameless, fun and unapologetic joke that it is.
Considering his subject matter he probably didn't have much choice, but director Alexandre Aja seems fine to let his film loose into the pools of absurdity – a piranha spitting out the porn-director's over-worked penis, for example, or a desiccated victim making a sudden and unwelcome encore – before reeling it back to just this side of believability (almost).
It all makes for bloody good fun that meat-eaters and pescatarians alike should lap up. And for the first time I left the cinema convinced that 3D is here to stay...


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Guess what Brendan Tompkins was talking about - shoveling model of e-learning examplied by Microsoft eLearning site. With a 50" Sony Plasma WEGA High Definition TV, it is the same.
The e in e-learning is NOT the electronic gadget that is being thrown in to help you motivated!
Tagged as elearning bad example


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BEDFORD (CBSDFW.COM) – Had some North Texans not donated blood, they might have never known they were infected with the West Nile Virus.
Each pint of blood donated to Carter Blood Care is tested for West Nile Virus and other infectious diseases, such as HIV, Hepatitis B and C, syphilis and Chagas Disease.
Creative Testing Solutions tests every pint of blood donated in North Texas. This year, the lab has seen an unusually high number of samples testing positive for the West Nile Virus, according to Morris Dixon, Director of Operations at Creating Testing Solutions.
"The number of positive samples in the Dallas/Fort Worth area this year will more than we've had in total for the last 9 years," he said. "Last year we did not have a positive donor in the testing system. This year we are well over 40 samples."
Positive blood samples change color. When that happens the lab notifies Carter Blood Care, who then notifies the donor.
Many times, the donor had no idea they were infected.
"There are some healthy people out there that wouldn't know normally and it just so happens they donated blood," said Dr. Laurie Sutor M.D., the Vice President of Medical and Technical Services.
Sutor said up to 80% infected with the virus show no symptoms.
"Over the years we have found a positive donor in the testing system and notified the blood donor before the donor is actually very ill at all," Dixon said.
Infected blood is thrown out.
"It hasn't really affected our blood supply though. The testing that we do removes any kind of affected units from the blood supply so there is no danger to the blood supply," Dr. Sutor said.
The good news is the blood supply has remains steady, but August is a notoriously slow month for donations.
"The heat keeps people away so we want to encourage people to donate," Dr. Sutor said.


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Tuesday, 20 May 2014
Which way to go??
7 comments:
I think when i was growing up, my parents did not give me the confidence of decision making, it was not that they were bad but it was the way it was then .. nowadays I have seen kids are given more power to make decisions..ReplyDelete
Yes it was all our fault we tried to please everyone then rather than trying ot do what we wanted to do ..
rightly said ..
Exactly the same I feel because when others take decision for us we lack in making decision by our own.Delete
I welcome you again..your presence here is always valuable
True ... there is always this dilemma, but then, with time we learn :-)ReplyDelete
I have one guide in such situations - I will listen to all the advises from "elders" and do exactly the reverse of what the majority of them tell me. It always works, trust me :PReplyDelete
Destination InfinityReplies
Hahaha... That always work I guess :DDelete


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Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and wife Callista Gingrich arrive on the West Front of the Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 21, 2013, for the Presidential Barack Obama's ceremonial swearing-in ceremony during the 57th Presidential Inauguration. (AP Photo/Win McNamee, Pool)
Newt 'n' Cally showed up at the inauguration yesterday, for some reason, and my goodness, our Beloved Moon Goddess's superb full-length mink coat was to die for! And Newt's Burberry wasn't too shabby, either. The Blaze (I know, I know), however, reports this amusing anecdote:
"There's Jill Biden!" one attendee remarked, looking at the live feed of the event projected on the jumbo screen put up in front of the Capitol building. After a moment of getting a better look at the woman on the screen and seeing that it was actually Callista Gingrich, wife of former Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, the attendee and a few others laughed then booed loudly.
Ha ha ha... yeaaaaah, that's not Jill Biden.
The commenters at The Blaze made a feeble attempt to gin up outrage over the booing, but their hearts just weren't in it.


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The mind is a beautiful thing - especially a child's mind. The following article by Sarah J Holt explores a variety of ways to exercise a child's brain so they will develop better learning skills. It wouldn't hurt the adults either. Enjoy the article.
As children are growing up they are developing thinking, as well as behavioral, patterns. Using these 6 brain exercises for children is one way to help them develop these skills for better functioning and mental abilities for life.
Word Searches/Crosswords
They make many books for kids that contain word searches and crosswords. These are great activities for children to exercise their brains by using the focus and thinking that they require. Crossword puzzles are also a great family activity, where one person can read off the clue and tell how many letters are involved and everyone else can guess.
Memory Exercises
Working with memory exercises can be one of the easiest brain exercises for children, since it can be done in the car while driving or almost anywhere else. Starting when they are young we naturally do these exercises by teaching them how to spell their names, and what their phone numbers and addresses are. We can expand on this by having them work on remembering poems, songs, and the names from family trees.
Memorizing helps children use their brain to focus and retain the information. It also is a very useful skill since a lot of education is based on memorizing, such as learning the number facts for math or learning a list of spelling words.
Obstacle Courses For The Brain
We all have heard of obstacle courses that require physical exercises, but we can also set up ones that include brain exercises for children. An obstacle course for the brain can combine both physical and brain exercises, or focus exclusively on the latter. You can make stations along a physical obstacle course where they can only proceed to the next station after they complete a mental task, such as a short crossword puzzle or word problem. You can also set it up where they have stations throughout the house where they have to complete a series of mental tasks all lined up along the floor or a table.
Write Or Draw Left-Handed (Or Right-Handed)
A great way to exercise the brain is to use the non-dominant hand for writing or drawing. This can be fun to see who can tell what was written or drawn afterwards. Another option is to draw a picture where one-half is done with the dominant hand and then afterwards it is copied onto the other half by the non-dominant hand. These are brain exercises for children that encourage both sides of their brain to work together.
While brain exercises for children can be simple and fun the payoffs can be huge. By using these brain exercises the children are learning to exercise an important part of the body.
Sarah Holt writes for IncreaseBrainpower.com. For more Math Games, and to get the Brain Power Newsletter and other free gifts, visit: http://www.IncreaseBrainPower.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sarah_J_Holt
How about you? Do you have any special brain games?
Write it down,