text:
Nelson Lodge, St. Neots
A leading supplier and distributor of luxury, performance and specialist textiles to the global leaders in hospitality, healthcare and retail, Vision are proud to be providers of a number of unmatched global services including full turnkey services, product sourcing, quality assurance and vendor development ensuring our customers get a total textile solution.
Working in conjunction with a number of prominent healthcare providers up and down the UK, we're proud to be a design partner for some of the most recognisable names in the industry and our highly skilled interior design team have helped to create some of the most inspiring interiors designed specifically for the end-user.
One of our most recent projects, Nelson Lodge in St. Neots, is a 64-bed Anchor care home. As sole suppliers to Anchor, Vision worked in conjunction with our partners, LNT Construction, to create a clean and comfortable care home with meticulously thought-out finishes and bright, spacious and airy surroundings situated in the heart of Cambridgeshire.
Anchor, a not-for-profit organisation, provides purpose-built retirement properties and specialist care homes in over 1,000 locations across the country and work to create high-quality environments for over 40,000 people up and down the UK.
The five-year sole supplier contract for Anchor came into effect in June and means that Vision will supply all of the groups' soft furnishings, linens and accessories to their entire refurbishment projects.
Nelson Lodge, St Neots
One of Anchor's newest openings, Nelson Lodge officially opened on 16th March and benefits from a hair and beauty salon, social lounges, quiet lounges, a tea room and landscaped gardens throughout as well as a number of energy-saving initiatives including renewable energy sources, underfloor heating and solar thermal panels.
Our partner on the project, LNT Construction, are the UK's leading purpose-built residential care home developer and have built over 100 care homes since 2000 alone. Providing fully equipped and furnished luxury care homes for the elderly and those living with dementia, LNT's Head of Interior Design, Hiedi Lazenby, worked closely with National Account Manager for Vision's Healthcare Division, Kim Reed, on this prestigious project.
The Brief
Kim, who led the project for Vision, said: "We worked alongside LNT's Head of Interior Design Hiedi Lazenby to ensure the products we supplied fit the brief; we had to ensure the entire range of products we used were fit for purpose whilst being aesthetically pleasing and within budget for their new build 64-bed care home for Anchor – England's largest not-for-profit provider of housing and care to older people."
How Did Vision Achieve the Brief?
Kim said: "Vision supplied the bespoke window dressings, soft furnishings, linens and garden furniture at Nelson Lodge. We also installed all of the window dressings within the care home. We supplied the window dressings to the entire facility including bedrooms, communal areas, corridors, reception, bathroom and offices."
Soft Furnishings
Kim continued: "In partnership with Hiedi, we ensured that a design standard was in place and that it met Anchor's expectations. The mood boards which were created included some of Vision's own inherently flame retardant printed fabrics.
"The 64 bedrooms of Nelson Lodge are all split across three different colour schemes to offer a point of difference and aid in wayfinding for residents. We manufactured the quilted bed runners and cushions in each room to coordinate with the design and colour of the curtains, upholstery, wall colours and floor coverings.
"All curtains and roman blinds were lined with a cream flame retardant blackout lining, as standard, which helps to block external light from entering. This makes them ideal for use in resident bedrooms. Blackout curtains are also energy-saving as they keep the heat from escaping in the winter whilst preventing the hot sun from heating up the room in summer and work to block or muffle outdoor noise.
"The curtain fabrics were printed on a sateen base cloth which offers a smooth feel and a silky, glossy finish whilst draping; ultimately this offers a subtle touch of luxury."
Kim said: "Vision supplied the bed linen – 100% polyester, flame retardant, white satin stripe bed linen as this type of bedding provides a real touch of luxury with a hotel look whilst, at the same time, being extremely hardwearing and long-lasting. Vision's flame retardant satin stripe linen benefits from a vertical stripe on both the duvet cover and the pillowcase; this is particularly useful when used in healthcare settings as the stripe runs in the same direction causing less confusion to residents with visual impairments.
"We used bed runners to dress the bed rather than full bedspreads as they are a quick and easy way for the housekeeping staff to dress the room. Also, bed runners remove any possible trip to slip hazards as sometimes can occur with full-length bedspreads proving them particularly useful in healthcare facilities.
"All of the bedrooms within Nelson Lodge benefit from two-inch net pleat voile curtains which aim to create a contemporary and fresh look with added privacy for the residents. The window blinds have been fitted with a snap break system in the chain of the blind and this aspect acts as an essential anti-ligature safety feature. Essentially, the cord will snap when at least six kilos of pressure is applied to it.
"The curtains were supplied to a modern specification with most headings being chrome eyelets on matching curtains poles. This provides a stylish yet neat finish as they stack back easily. Eyelet curtains have a natural weave and so this feature saves time for the housekeeping staff as they can be pushed back easily eliminating the need for dressing the window."
"The towels supplied are of superior quality; all are 500gsm weight and 100% cotton so they are incredibly soft, absorbent and durable."
Colour Schemes
"Working alongside Hiedi, we ensured that all communal areas encompassed a variety of colour and texture. Each room was designed with its own theme in mind, for example, the tea shop was inspired by a country-style tea room. For this room, we ensured that a selection of pastel colours were used along with pretty, floral designs.
Finally, Kim added: "Considerate design, colour and texture is important to all building users, but especially for those with reduced vision. It was paramount that we incorporated a level of visual contrast between colours on adjacent surfaces and it was especially important to take into consideration where the contrast was located so as to ensure a safe yet comfortable and visually appealing environment for the resident."
What the Client Had to Say
Hiedi Lazenby, Head of Interior Design & Landscaping at LNT Construction, said: "LNT Construction have worked with Vision for over nine years. They provide us with a quality service including supply and installation of all our bedding, window coverings and towels for every new build project that we hand over.
"I specifically designed the interior of the St. Neots care home for Anchor to a standard design that we have implemented in several homes that we have recently constructed. When presenting the mood boards to the client, this includes using some of Vision's own fabrics within the mood boards themselves.
"I deal directly with Kim who always ensures a smooth installation, on time. We consistently use Vision as we trust them to supply a quality to our required budgets."


text:
Since 2017, Wooden Wedding Creations has been creating custom accessories and decorations for brides and grooms across Canada. We also work with wedding guests to create memorable and unique wedding gifts.
Using the finest materials and the latest in wood working technology, we are always up to help you create the perfect item for your wedding day!
Contact us to begin your custom project.
Created is what we call our "ready to ship items".
From cuff links and earrings to cheeseboards and coasters - we carry a number of products in stock and can ship on a moments notice. These items are not personalized, but please check out the custom section on our Etsy Shop or send us a message to order a custom product.
Use the button below to view our Created product listings on Etsy.
About Us
Hi! We are Steven & Gabrielle. The creative masterminds behind Wooden Wedding Creations.
We are naturally imaginative people with a relentless desire to create and innovate. We felt that sharing our talents in graphic design (Gabrielle) and laser engraving/cutting & woodworking (Steven) could benefit brides- & grooms-to-be and challenge us to hone our skills.
We hope that our talents can be used to make your big day extra-special!
Contact Us
We would love to hear from you! Please use the form below to contact us with an inquiry or with your design inspiration and we can start the creative process!

subset: commoncrawl


text:
At Untangle Addiction, we believe there are strong underlying forces driving every addiction that must be understood, overturned and uprooted to correct the problem. We refuse to believe those of us and our loved ones who are afflicted with addiction are moral failures. So much essential information surrounding the conversation of addiction is ignored, avoided, or misunderstood. We want to fix that. Dr. Marcus De Carvalho, M.D., founder of The Center for a Healthy Mind and Wellbeing, is championing the cause to bring a better understanding of addiction to the public and help all those who are affected.
Receive high-quality content in your inbox from Dr. De Carvalho. We are creating newsletters, eBooks, and more informative content to empower you with knowledge. Understand the science behind the addiction, learn about cutting-edge new breakthroughs, and get exclusive offers by signing up for our email list.
Be the first to receive information on events hosted by Dr. De Carvalho and exclusive access to his recorded talks. We're working hard to bring the discussion of addiction to you by promoting engagement in your community.
Join a fellowship of like-minded, caring people having a conversation surrounding the challenges, hope, and inspiration we share. We believe conversation is one of the most powerful tools we have for steering the addiction problem toward a solution.
Marcus De Carvalho is a Medical Doctor who specializes in addiction medicine and psychiatry. He is board certified and is a diplomat of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, Inc. Dr. De Carvalho is the president and founder of The Center for a Healthy Mind and Wellbeing. Dr. De Carvalho is also credentialed at local hospitals where he treats patients who are in need of medical detox from addictive substances or are in need of psychiatric stabilization.
Dr. De Carvalho possesses a wealth of knowledge in psychiatric and addiction medicine. He is an expert in a number of disorders and diseases and is often consulted by local news outlets concerning issues of addiction and psychiatric health matters. Recently Dr. De Carvalho was interviewed on NBC's First Coast living about the opioid epidemic in Jacksonville. Passionate about addiction medicine, he believes that every person deserves the opportunity to regain a life that allows them to become a functional member of society and to lead a happy, fulfilling life.


text:
Tag Archives: writing
I am motivated to write because it is what I am meant to do. It is not a choice — it is what I am. I did not choose writing — it chose me. And I believe it is necessarily that way. Anyone doing this for some other reason should not be.
The world does not care if you write or not, so to be successful you have to be so good that your work is better than all the other available distractions.
You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.
The freelance life is one that seems envious.
In fact, I envied it so much during times I was working fulltime in an office, that I made it my mission to one day be able to do it fulltime. Now that I have reached that point, I can tell you it comes with many downfalls (lack of benefits, lack of reliable income, trying to get paid on time, saving for tax time, needing finance and business skills you never learned at your Arts College), but it also comes with many perks.
Being able to work wherever you want – whenever you want – is the part that immediately appealed to me most. Being chained to a desk or an office for 8+ hours a day is not, and has never been, an enjoyable concept to me. No matter how many times I've tried to do it.
I like being able to wake up at 11am, stay pantsless til 2pm, grab a coffee and lunch by 2:30, and stay up til 3 or 4am on a weeknight. I like not having to worry about having an office wardrobe.
In the words of Bukowski:
How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 8:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?
That perfectly summarizes my feelings on that whole archaic idea of what work should look like.
If you are similarly inclined to have control over your day, keep your own schedule, and answer only to yourself, you might be the kind of person who prefers freelancing to a regular job.
Being a night owl and an introvert, it definitely suits my natural habits much more than the forced fake smiles and douchey coworkers you sometimes have to deal with in the confines of working for someone else.
In order to freelance successfully, you do need a few tools.
I am nothing without my Samsung Galaxy S5. I have an external battery case for it so it never dies. I am perpetually checking email and tweeting no matter where I am or what time of day it is.
A fast, reliable internet connection. Unless you want to only work at cafe's and libraries, you'll want a good strong internet connection at home because most freelance jobs require a ton of online time.
A comfortable workspace. That might be Starbucks or the library, but I generally prefer the comfort of my bed, my couch, or my little office area in my room. Surround this space with things that inspire you to work. I have a poster from Copyblogger about writing all day every day printed out above m desk, as well as a Tim Gunn talking bobble head that spits out his best motivating quotes with the push of a button. It's sometimes all I need to get writing.
Coffee. Or caffeine in some form you enjoy it. Green tea. Chocolate. Coke. Green juice if you're a health nut. Whatever works for you to keep you alert and get your day going.
Most importantly though, is a computer. Many are MAC loyal but for freelance writers, paying that much is outrageous. Unless you're willing to live with your parents all through your 20s – it's not happening. And that's okay because a writer won't be editing videos or doing anything a MAC is famous for.
My 17″ Samsung laptop is my main writing and working tool when at home, but when I am out and about – back home, at my boyfriends house, at a client's office, at Starbucks – I am always with my ASUS Transformer tablet.
As I've mentioned before, it has become my right hand when I'm not home, and I am infinitely more productive (and less cranky, because it's not heavy) with it in my life. A tablet you can type comfortably on is one of the most helpful tools of freelance life, if you ask me (she says as she writes this post on her ASUS at a Starbucks).
I'm required to disclose the relationship between my site and Intel Canada, but all opinions stated above are my own!
Whatever you choose, however many roads you travel, I hope that you choose not to be a lady. I hope you will find some way to break the rules and make a little trouble out there.
By now you all definitely know I am obsessed with Lena Dunham – she is younger than me and she's already achieved every dream I've ever had for my life. I adore her talent, her persistence, her self confidence, the hard work she put in to get where she is, and the way she is changing the worlds perception of what beauty is.
Her first book, a collection of essays titled Not That Kind Of Girl comes out September 30th, and to promote it she's going on a book tour.
Her Toronto stop will coincide with the upcoming, highly recommended, hilarious comedy festival JFL42.
On September 20th at the Sony Centre she will be interviewed by Jian Ghomeshi, give a reading from the book, and open it up for what is likely to be a fascinating audience Q&A. I am BEYOND excited for this.
Lucky for you, if you want to be there too, you can enter to win one of five pairs of passes to see her courtesy of my friends at JFL42. Follow them on Twitter @JFL42 and find them on Facebook as well.
To win, you must be a subscriber to the weekly post recap newsletter. If you are already a subscriber, just leave a comment below using the email you used to subscribe, so I know you want your name thrown in the hat.
If you're new, just enter your email into the form below and after you hit the confirmation email you will be entered.
If you want a bonus entry, Facebook fans can, as usual, like/comment or share my page's status about this giveaway on Facebook.
Followers can retweet my tweet about this giveaway on Twitter.
And Insta followers can like my photo on Instagram about this giveaway once it's posted.
You have until September 16th at midnight to enter – winners will be contacted via the email they used to subscribe the next day.


text:
Likitech was founded in 2004 as the sole distributor of renowned membrane tank manufacturer Global Water Solutions in Spain and Portugal.
As of 2008 and thanks to the introduction of ABWater, brand focused in water treatment especially in point of use systems, the company becomes a specialised water sector distributor of reference throughout Spain. This fact was noticed by Franklin Electric and so Likitech was granted the commercialization of their E-Tech premium stainless steel pumps.
2011 was a key year for Likitech with the introduction of E-Tech EV (vertical) and EH (horizontal) centrifugal multistage pumps, together with Coverco 4â rewindable submersible oil filled motors and IMPO pumps. The strategy of the company has been to succeed along with the Franklin Electric Group and its core values which has enhanced the access of the company to extremely competitive segments such as HVAC and water treatment.
At the present, Likitech S.L.U. is the commercial division of Molist Group, which distributes systems and components related to water accumulation (pressure tanks for water), pumps, water treatment and water distribution markets as well as accessories for HVAC and fluid circulation markets.
Since the beginning, in 2005, we have continuously been growing expanding our product catalogue and achieving distribution agreements with the most renowned manufacturing companies worldwide, in order to offer the best products with a solid technical service and warranty.
Our products are the true reflection of the core values of the Company, which were introduced 30 years ago by our suppliers such as Franklin Electric and Global Water Solutions. Quality, availability, customer service, innovation and value are the common denominator of our products, chosen to satisfy our market needs.
Your Water Partner


text:
Are you an undergraduate at UWM studying Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, or Russian? The Center for International Education and the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies may have some wonderful opportunities for you! UWM's Center for International … Continue Reading »
Graduate fellowships for summer 2017 for the study of Brazilian Portuguese and other Latin American and Caribbean languages
UWM's Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies will be awarding Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) fellowships for summer 2017 to UWM graduate students for the study of Brazilian Portuguese or other less-commonly taught languages of Latin America and … Continue Reading »


text:
Tyler and Brittany met over 10 years ago when they were teenagers. With the passing of time, Tyler and Brittany's friendship grew into something deeper and lifelong.
Brittany's mom tells us that the Jewish custom of having a ketubah is something she had read about eight years ago. She was fascinated with Jewish tradition and her love for Jewish customs "flowed over" to Brittany. She tells us: "It just seemed like the "right" thing to include this Jewish custom into their non-Jewish wedding ceremony." The ketubah was one of the details Brittany wanted included in her wedding ceremony even before their engagement. Tyler and Brittany believe wholeheartedly that marriage is a covenant, not to be taken lightly, and the ketubah exemplifies their beliefs.
Brittany poured over the different ketubot that we offer and felt that a photo ketubah best fit their home décor and because their engagement pictures were so good they believed it would be a beautiful piece of art. The picture was taken in Montevallo, Alabama at "Flower Hill" which is the President's Mansion at the University of Montevallo where Brittany graduated from College. To make it even more beautiful, they had it printed on canvas and had us add a "gallery wrap." That means they can simply sign it and hang it up for display – the picture simply "wraps" around the stretchers and gives the piece a very modern look without needing a frame. Cool!
Their honeymoon plans are currently up in the air because of the Gulf Coast situation. They do have an extended trip to Jackson Hole, Wyoming planned for later in the year. "Mom" has promised us pictures of the wedding. We hope to bring you an updated post with them soon.
K. C. Walensky


text:
Board of Directors
Charles Fabrikant
Non-Executive Chairman of the Board
Mr. Fabrikant has been a member of our board of directors and has served as Non-Executive Chairman of the Board since June 1, 2017. Mr. Fabrikant is the Executive Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Executive Officer of SEACOR Holdings and several of its subsidiaries. Effective February 23, 2015, Mr. Fabrikant was appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of SEACOR Holdings, a position he had resigned from in September 2010 when he was designated Executive Chairman of the Board of SEACOR Holdings. Mr. Fabrikant is a Director of Diamond Offshore Drilling, Inc., a contract oil and gas driller, and Era Group Inc., an international helicopter operator. In addition, he is President of Fabrikant International Corporation, a privately owned corporation engaged in marine investments.
John Gellert
President, Chief Executive Officer, and Director
Mr. Gellert has been President and Chief Executive Officer since our formation and a member of our board of directors since June 1, 2017. In his previous appointment, Mr. Gellert was Co-Chief Operating Officer of SEACOR Holdings Inc. since February 23, 2015, and from May 2004 to February 2015, Mr. Gellert was Senior Vice President of SEACOR Holdings Inc. In July 2005, Mr. Gellert was appointed President of SEACOR Holdings Inc.'s Offshore Marine Services segment, a capacity in which he served until his current appointment. From June 1992, when Mr. Gellert joined SEACOR Holdings Inc. until July 2005, he had various financial, analytical, chartering and marketing roles within SEACOR Holdings Inc. In addition, Mr. Gellert is an officer and director of certain SEACOR Marine subsidiaries.
Andrew R. Morse
Mr. Morse has been a member of our board of directors since his appointment on May 10, 2017. Mr. Morse served on the SEACOR Holdings board of directors from June 1998 to May 10, 2017. Mr. Morse has been a Managing Director and Senior Portfolio Manager of Morse, Towey and White, a wholly-owned wealth management unit of High Tower Advisors Inc., a Chicago based firm of investment advisors since July 31, 2010. In addition, Mr. Morse has served on the Board of Directors and on the Audit Committee of High Tower Advisors Inc. from July 31, 2010 until January 2018. Mr. Morse was a managing director and senior portfolio manager of UBS Financial Services, Inc., from October 2001 until July 2010. Mr. Morse was Senior Vice President-Investments of Salomon Smith Barney Inc. of New York, an investment banking firm, and Smith Barney Inc., its predecessor, from March 1993 to October 2001. Mr. Morse sits on numerous philanthropic boards and is Treasurer of the American Committee of the Weizmann Institute of Science and serves on the Management Committee of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel. Mr. Morse served as a director of Seabulk International, Inc., both before and following its merger with SEACOR Holdings in July 2005 until March 2006. In December 2015, Mr. Morse became a member of the Board of Managers of KGP Realty, a private residential property management company.
R. Christopher Regan
Mr. Regan has been a member of our board of directors since his appointment on May 10, 2017. Mr. Regan served on the SEACOR Holdings board of directors from September 7, 2005 to May 10, 2017. Mr. Regan is Co-Founder and, since March 2002, Managing Director, of The Chartis Group, a management consultancy group offering strategic, operational, risk management, governance and compliance advice to U.S. healthcare providers, suppliers and payers. Prior to co-founding The Chartis Group in 2001, Mr. Regan served from March 2001 to December 2001 as President of H-Works, a healthcare management consulting firm and a division of The Advisory Board Company. From January 2000 through December 2000, Mr. Regan served as Senior Vice President of Channelpoint, Inc., a healthcare information services company. Mr. Regan also serves as a Trustee of Hamilton College and Ascension Ventures.
Evan Behrens
Mr. Behrens has been a member of our board of directors since June 1, 2017. Mr. Behrens currently serves as Managing Partner of Behrens Investment Group, an investment firm. Previously, Mr. Behrens served as Senior Vice President of Business Development at SEACOR Holdings from January 2008 to May 2017, where in addition to his corporate responsibilities, Mr. Behrens originated, led and managed discrete operating companies and investments. While at SEACOR Holdings, Mr. Behrens served as the Chairman of the Board of Trailer Bridge Inc., a Jones Act container shipping company operating in the Caribbean, and was the Managing Member of Illinois Corn Processors Inc. Prior to joining SEACOR Holdings, Mr. Behrens served as a partner at Level Global Investors and, previous to that, founded and managed B Capital Advisors (formerly Behrens Rubinoff Capital Partners). Earlier, Mr. Behrens worked as a Senior Portfolio Manager at SAC Capital managing both equity and credit portfolios and contributed in a research capacity at Odyssey Partners/Ulysses Management. Mr. Behrens also oversaw the domestic portion of the special situations group at Banque Paribas, which focused on risk arbitrage, distressed, and special situations. At present, Mr. Behrens is also a board member of Oppenheimer Holdings Inc. (NYSE: OPY) and Harte Hanks Inc. (NYSE: HHS). Previously, Mr. Behrens served as a board member of Sidewinder Drilling LLC, Continental Insurance Group, Ltd (a division of public company, HC2 (NASDAQ:HCHC)), Penford Corporation (formerly a NASDAQ listed company), Global Marine Systems Limited, and Stemline Therapeutics. Mr. Behrens was also the Lead Director of the Oppenheimer and Co. Global Chartist Fund LLC; a founding board member of Natan; and a former member of the Visiting Committee of the College of the University of Chicago. Mr. Behrens obtained an A.B. degree in Political Science from the University of Chicago.
Julie Persily
Ms. Persily has been a member of our board of directors since April 27, 2018. Since 2013, Ms. Persily has served on the board of directors of CM Finance Inc., a NASDAQ listed company business development company that invests in middle market companies, as a member of its audit, valuation and nominating committees and as chair of its compensation committee, and since 2017 has served on the board of directors of Runway Growth Credit, a business development company that provides secured loans to early stage growth and venture-backed companies in the U.S., as a member of its audit and governance committees. Ms. Persily has a deep breadth of experience in the finance and capital market industries, having held various roles at Citigroup for nearly 10 years, including serving as the co-head of Citigroup's leveraged finance group for over two years and head of acquisition finance prior thereto. Ms. Persily also formerly served as co-Head of Leveraged Finance and Capital Markets at Nomura Securities. Ms. Persily holds a BA in Economics and Psychology from Columbia College and an MBA in Finance and Accounting from Columbia Business School.
Robert D. Abendschein
Mr. Abendschein has been a member of our board of directors since April 27, 2018. Mr. Abendschein is currently the Chief Executive Officer and a director of Venari Resources LLC ("Venari"), where he is responsible for developing and executing deep water strategy, exploration, appraisal, development projects and mergers and acquisitions. Mr. Abendschein is the chairman of Venari's Technical Committee and works closely with Venari's four principal investors to create value and manage equity. From 2000 through August 2017, Mr. Abendschein held various corporate and executive roles at Anadarko Petroleum ("Anadarko"), including as Vice President of Anadarko's Deep Water division from 2015 to 2017 and as Vice President of Anadarko's Exploration and Production Services division from 2013 to 2015. Mr. Abendschein currently serves on the board of directors of Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion as chairman of its trustee committee, and as a member of the board of directors of the National Ocean Industries Association and the Offshore Energy Center, which positions he has held since 2014. Since 2008, Mr. Abendschein has served on the board of directors of United Way of Montgomery County, and since 2014 has served as its chairman. Mr. Abendschein holds a BBS in Petroleum Engineering from Texas A&M University.


text:
Baltimore-born and -raised
Phoebe Jean Dunne, the one-woman musical alchemist who concocts a genre-defying breed of hybrid pop as Phoebe Jean and the Air Force, has a radical idea for the followup to her Heartbreakers debut. "On my next album I'm going to try something totally different and actually know what I'm doing first," Dunne says, erupting into an infectious laugh. The French label Lentonia Records releases that debut June 12, and Dunne was in Paris in late May and early June to tour and do publicity (in addition to earlier shows in Germany and the Netherlands). For this interview she's Skypeing via iPod, and as she leans over to hear her interviewer over its small speakers, her dark, curly hair, a New Romantic pouf with a personality all its own, persistently falls into her eyes, and she intermittently shakes it back or brushes it behind an ear.
She's not being faux modest confessing that she didn't know what she was doing. Musicians regularly have to learn the recording process on the job early in their careers. Dunne recorded Heartbreakers by herself wherever she happened to be—bedrooms, bathrooms, cars. Perhaps she would start with a beat, then maybe add a bass line, a melody, and eventually run through a heap of vocal tracks, adding and subtracting layers until she found her sound. "For me, making music is about space," she says. "I'm not a trained musician. I don't understand how to have control of the composition before I go into it. I just start with something and then I fill in the gaps with something else. I build [a song] up, track after track after track, and then I'll go in and I'll subtract things out, tons of editing, and, like, 50, 60 vocal takes, and then spend an afternoon chopping them and basically writing the song through the takes."
The process sounds labor intensive and piecemeal, but the final product feels organic. Heartbreakers delivers 14 songs of personal fortitude following intense emotional blows. A haunting, languid hip-hop beat pushes "Facts of Nature" along its slinking stroll, which Dunne opens with the stark scene-setting a cappella: "It has not all been wasted/ I cry, it's all I've tasted/ It must be all I'm facing/ 'cause still my heart be racing." A stabbing pair of keyboard notes puts a
shower-scene rhythm behind Dunne's ethereal vocals in "Surefire." With its bouncing beat and Dunne's floating vocals, album opener "King Size Bed" offers a slice of cloud-skipping, the Dø-ish dreampop, while the stripped-down beat and vibrating keyboard melody of "December 20th" is a dose of Lizzy Mercier Descloux's "Birdy Num Num"-ish atmospheric instrumental interlude.
In fact, Heartbreakers' closest attitude analogy may be a late-1970s/early-1980s ZE Records label mate of cultural explorer Descloux: Cristina Monet-Palaci. With her voice's high register and breathy undertow, her music's basis in the beats of urban hip-hop and dance clubs, and her lyrics' detached engagement, Dunne explores that oddly agreeable place where splinter-group postpunk throb hits populist disco to birth some ornery fun, a vibe where radio pop meets underground good time. Her music isn't as New Wave-y shiny, and Dunne doesn't embrace the same degree of fearless irony, but Heartbreakers contains enough of a streak of decadent grit to lend it a bit of Monet-Palaci's gutter-posh brio.
Her musical ideas were definitely shaped by all reaches of the map. "Being from Baltimore, you can't escape the club sounds, and that has influenced me definitely," she says. "But I love a lot of music. My mom listened to a lot of music from West Africa. My dad loved Bob Dylan and some '60s music. I love Diana Ross and Motown, a lot of old dub, roots reggae. I used to go down to Sound Garden in Fells Point and discover new music, [but] I kind of totally stopped doing that. I don't really consume anything now except what's on the radio or old records or things my friends are doing."
One of those friends, Pozsi B. Kolor, created Heartbreakers' cover art and suggested its sequencing, an ordering that gives the album a distinct flow. It's an impressive debut for someone who didn't start calling herself a musician until 2009, when a stranger at a party in Berlin asked her what she did; she was visiting a friend, her first trip to Europe. He invited her to play a party, which led to more shows, which led to Lentonia asking her to record a single, which led to Heartbreakers.
And just as Dunne's musical output is her own distillation of the music she's consumed, the thematic terrain her lyrics traverse has a personal trajectory as well. On Thanksgiving Day 1997, the small aircraft her father was piloting crashed on Cape Cod. She was on board. "When I was 14, the plane went down and unfortunately he passed away and his girlfriend also," Dunne says. "But me and my sister and my dog survived. It was pretty crazy.
"You know, the album's called Heartbreakers, and that was one of the first heartbreaks I felt," she continues. "But the way I feel about that is sort of the way I feel about all heartbreaks, which is that in the end it's actually a blessing in the sense that when you feel some real intense pain and sadness and you're faced with a lot of challenges, it sort of breaks your heart open in a way, and then you have all this space that you can fill with beautiful things. So if you have the courage and patience and luck to be able to fill that back up, in the end you're more full. And it's only through these hard things that you learn anything."
Phoebe Jean and the Air Force plays July 19 at Sonar. For more information visit


text:
Under Construction. Completion August 2019. SPECTACULAR PANORAMIC WATER VIEWS from every level of this stunning contemporary-Mediterranean custom waterfront home with endless upgrades in the gated community of Marina Bay. Located 7 minutes to downtown St Pete, 5,100+ sq. ft. of living space with magnificent large terraces on every level, including a top-floor observation deck and bonus room. Brilliantly designed Master Suite features his-and-her Master Bathrooms joined together by an impressively appointed shower. ENORMOUS 2,900 sq. ft. 10-car garage for toys, hobbies, cars, workshop. Ensuite baths in bedrooms 2 and 3 with Jack-and-Jill bath for bedrooms 4 and 5, plus a study or Bedroom 6. Prewired whole-home integration system for cameras, security, audio/video and outdoor TV's on all terraces. Subzero, Wolfe appliance suite. GAS: cooking, tankless hot water, fireplace, and Generac GENERATOR on auto-transfer switch for ultimate convenience and peace of mind. Large profile 24"x24" marble floors throughout; wood in all bedrooms. Marble terraces and pool deck perfect for large gatherings and entertaining with unobstructed intracoastal wide water views on 400'+ channel. Generous walk-in-pantry, stunning dining room. Great room features 122" retractable projection screen for movie night and sporting events. Custom elevator and spiral staircase to observation level. A boater's paradise with deep water boat slip. Spectacular infinity-edge pool and spa with glass tile and fountain for ultimate waterfront living. Simply magnificent!
Listing courtesy of SUNCHASE REALTY LLC.
StellarMLS is the source of this information via Internet Data Exchange Program. All listing information is deemed reliable but not guaranteed and should be independently verified through personal inspection by appropriate professionals. Listings displayed on this website may be subject to prior sale or removal from sale. Availability of any listing should always be independently verified. Listing information is provided for consumer personal, non-commercial use, solely to identify potential properties for potential purchase. All other use is strictly prohibited and may violate relevant federal and state law. Data last updated on


text:
Firefighter Walk - Duluth to White Bear Lake | St. Paul Photographer
When my friend of almost 20 years told me he was going to walk from Duluth to White Bear Lake to raise money for an all-terrain rescue vehicle, I told him he was crazy. He agreed with me, but did it anyway.
Not to see him walk alone, two other firefighters from the White Bear Lake Fire Department vowed to join him. They were dropped off on a Friday morning and walked 16-20 hour days, arriving home the following Tuesday morning.
Along the way they encountered amazing outpourings of support. As news of their adventure spread, well wishers greeted them with donations and supplies, and Fire Chiefs in various towns offered them a roof to sleep under.
I met up with them four miles from their final destination and walked in with them, documenting the last leg of their journey. The emotion of the day was incredible, culminating when they were reunited with their families, young boys looked at them like heroes and tears were held back as they recounted their story to news crews.
Here are a few highlights....


text:
For full access, Log in or Subscribe Now and get 4 weeks free!
Question: I started getting Social Security in 2012 at age 62, and my husband also started in 2012, at age 64. At the time, I received my small Social Security because it was the best amount at that time. Does this new law mean that I may be able to collect more money from my husband's Social Security? —L.B.
Answer: Andy Landis, author of "Social Security: The Inside Story," had this to say:
Probably not. Sorry about that! When you both filed, they would have paid you each the most possible, whether on your own Social Security or as a spouse. The same math should apply today, and the new law didn't change the rules for you. Still, it doesn't hurt to call 800-SSA-1213 and ask.
- Actionable trading strategies
- Easy-to-follow guidance
- Weekly market navigational tool


text:
Amir Khan's estranged wife Faryal apologizes to her husband, in-laws
LONDON (92 News) – Boxer Amir Khan's wife Faryal Makhdoom has on Thursday apologized to her husband and in-laws.
In a twitter message, she thanked her supporter for being there for her during her darkest hours. "Your love and support helped me immensely and I feel so humbled with your prayers."
Makhdoom said: "As you know, the past three months have been really tough on me and my marriage. Matters haven't been helped by the fact that my husband has been out of the ring for quite sometime… it's been very stressful for us as a couple, and a family. I now recognize that all this infighting between me and my in laws has had a terrible effect on my husband and I… and for that I would like to sincerely apologize."
"My mother and father in law are the elders of our family and as such deserve love and respect just as much as my own parents do and I've said things in the past out of anger… I didn't really mean and regret now," she added.
Makhdoom said that going forth will also be a priority for her as her daughter and unborn child do not deserve a broken home and wanted to put the difference behind and start afresh.


text:
CONVIVIUM: Your journey into business and world religions is a fascinating, largely unknown story, but I want to start with your religion. You were raised Catholic. Is that where your curiosity about religion started?
DON MORRISON: I was raised Catholic. And there are some difficult elements within it. Just yesterday, I was in Boston and I went to this monastery, the order of St. John the Evangelist. It's an Episcopalian Monastery, Benedictine. They have holy water. It was the first time I've seen an Anglican-Episcopalian edifice with holy water. It's a complicated thing, holy water. Another issue that piqued my interest was transubstantiation. The issue, for me, is one best left to the theologians because it's too complex. I still believe that there's something ontological and important that happens when a person gestures toward the altar to receive communion. I fail to see the difference whether the altar is Anglican or Catholic. That being said, my father, who was a convert to Roman Catholicism, said, "Be careful that you don't find yourself inventing your own religion."
C: Which I think we probably all do to a certain extent.
DM: I agree!
C: To a certain extent, it's human nature to select what appeals to us most.
DM: True, and what I find is that in the Catholic and, broadly speaking, Christian traditions, there is a richness that lies on the other side of the Enlightenment that's been repressed. We're now in the process of rediscovery, and it has a profound impact on how a person goes through a process of transformation, which lies at the very heart of the two New Testament Commandments.
C: This reminds me, somewhat, of G.K Chesterton. In fact, we do a reading group with some of the people at Cardus, where we get together quarterly. We read a book and then we discuss it for its applicability to Cardus, but also for our own adaptation. Last week, as it happens, we were discussing Chesterton's Orthodoxy, and at the beginning he has this wonderful line about that happy moment when you set out in search of New South Wales and with a gush of joyful tears discover that you are really in Old South Wales. You've gone full circle and come home again.
It seems to me that your instinct or impulse or desire is to actually bring Old South Wales over to New South Wales and have the two of them together so that the new and the old coexist rather than one overtaking and replacing the other.
DM: I think what I'm doing is pointing at something. As it says in Ecclesiastes: There's nothing new under the sun.
We all have a role to play. I'm profoundly influenced by Thomas Merton, who felt that he became a better Catholic, a better Trappist, for having opened himself up to learn from others. But it never at any time changed the strength and the roots to which he had committed himself.
I'm doing a lot of work right now on trying to understand people that have been pointing at this tradition called the Perennial philosophy in which there is a golden thread that weaves its way through all religions. This means you're living in a bit of a paradox. On the one hand, you've got the differences that are faith-based, theologically dogma-based. But on the other hand, you've got this deep spiritual restlessness that we all have. This restlessness can be affirmed through certain practices, and those practices are embedded in the Catholic and Christian tradition just as other faiths have their own practices. What strikes me as interesting is that there are some common elements to those practices. For example, prayer and contemplative practices bear a lot of similarity to each other. His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, is very quick to point out that Buddhism is not a theological religion. But I don't need to embrace the theology of Buddhism to benefit from learning some of the methods and practices it employs.
C: There's a wonderful book I love. I don't know if you know the author – a monk called David Steindl-Rast. He's a Benedictine monk.
DM: Oh, I've met him. He blessed my rosary. He is a beautiful human being.
C: He and a Zen master have a long discussion about the relationship between practice and the point at which you ultimately have to buy in. If you don't want to call it theology, you have to buy the underlying concept. It's a delicate balance, but you can still share a common ground up to that point.
DM: Right. There's a gentleman by the name of Schuon. He's a German who came to America; he just passed away in the late '80s or early '90s. I just discovered him, but he does a good job of architecting the various religions and the place of demarcation and how each of them stands on their own merits. He's the first person to go past the conceptual description of what it is that we all have in common. The reason he has credibility is because he has lived with Muslims. He lived with Vedanta Hindus. He lived with Buddhists. He lived a long life and then he came back and wrote about it.
Huston Smith has also been one of the most significant contributors to comparative religion in the 20th century. He said that this fellow, Schuon, is arguably the most thoughtful on this topic of comparative religion and this notion of Perennial philosophy – what I refer to as the Golden Thread that weaves its way through all the different religions that we all share in common. Academics give me a hard time because I'm not an academic, and they say be careful that you're not being syncretistic. But I don't think I am. I'm saying you have to live inside the paradox of respecting differences and then look for things you can learn from without in any way compromising the firm ground that you stand on.
C: I came up against this recently in someone who believed that the multiplicity of faiths necessarily negates the possibility of there actually being one truth. I said, "Do you realize that after the first three moves in the game of chess, there are 121 million possible moves that could be made? At the beginning of a game of chess, there are more possible moves than there are molecules in the universe. But there's only one right move to end the game."
The idea that there being a multiplicity of probable answers negates the possibility of a single real answer is nonsensical in the literal sense. It is non-sense. It defies reality.
DM: What a wonderful metaphor.
C: One thing I found interesting in reading about your work is that a lot of people explore these kinds of ideas at midlife or even in their late 30s when the kids are starting to grow up. But from the sounds of it, these are questions that have been there from the beginning for you.
DM: Yes. I was at St. Mike's High School and in Grade 11 or Grade 12 we started a program looking at comparative religions. I was attracted to Hinduism because of these practices around inner transformation. Then I thought, "What's better than this?" Then I started studying Buddhism. Then I went down to the university and I bought a book and started reading it. Then I got to university, and I just happened to have purchased a Thomas Merton book; so the whole thing then just became a complete circle back into Christianity and I became extremely curious about the lives of the saints and what happened to them.
I know this sounds absurd, but I was interested in causality and then the life of prayer and then my own responsibilities in my own life for how I should conduct myself. I said all the way along that I felt that I had been the poster child for living a spiritual life because I have failed so miserably in maintaining the discipline. There are other people I know who are much better in that they commit themselves to something and they stick with it.
C: The discipline of practice?
DM: Yes. Because in 1989, I became a lay Benedictine, and it requires a certain set of things that a person will do; and the views that I have come to is that I think the world needs a lay order that encourages a daily discipline, but not one that is stripped down and remanufactured from the rhythm of the multiple hours of the monastic. Because it's very reading-based and there has to be an element that's reading-oriented, there should be other things in it that deal with contemplative practice with instruction on how to live inside the marketplace because you're not in the monastery.
C: Reading David Steindl-Rast, especially The Music of Silence, brings alive the notion from the monastic life, which we actually could incorporate, that at a certain point within the hours, you simply stop what you're doing for a given interval. You put it down. You pause prayerfully. Then you pick things up again and continue on. It's an idea that says stop for five minutes, just pause and think about what you're doing. You don't have to wear a robe and rope to see the good of this, do you?
DM: I think there'd be a transformative effect on the world if people did that. The interesting thing is, when you travel in the Middle East, they do that. I mean Muslims actually do that, and it's accepted for them to sit in a meeting with their prayer beads, but here, if you start doing that, everybody thinks you're trying to make a point and it's egotistical and that sort of thing.
A lot of my motivation is that I think what's happened to us is that we believe that we go to church on Sunday. I mean you charge yourself up and you're good for a week. I think that the monks have it right and some parts of the world have it right where all you have to do is stop for a few minutes. The question then becomes what do you do in a few minutes. It doesn't have to be complex. It can be reflective. It could be pure silence. It could have some element of cognitive reflection.
C: It's become quite New Age and pop culture-ish to talk about mindful awareness, but there is a deep practice beneath it. Thich Nhat Hanh says communication begins with something as basic as mindful awareness of the way you walk, with your step, actually being aware that you're putting one foot in front of the other. It's a very simple thing to do. How did you, though, having made the transition into the business world, coming first through the banking world, balance that desire, that thirst for inquiry into faith, with the corporate life? Did you have to screen those two things off?
DM: I think I wrestled with it in the early years; I thought I was a bit schizophrenic.
C: What was the difficulty?
DM: One of the things that the Dalai Lama says is you can't very well lose your identity until you have one, which you really develop in your 20s and 30s. Richard Rohr, who is a Franciscan priest and very like David Steindl-Rast, has written eloquently on this topic of the inner journey. In his book Falling Upward, Rohr talks about two journeys in life. The first journey is making a success of your life, and the second journey is a spiritual one.
My view of myself is, because I have this curiosity that I didn't ask for, I really messed myself up. I am very grateful for having been messed up, but I characterize it the same way that Thomas Merton characterizes his career. He uses the Biblical reference of Jonah and the Whale. In his second biography, The Sign of Jonah, he says that Jonah is walking along toward his destination and the whale swallows him and takes him in the opposite direction. Merton says, "All my life, I feel I've been travelling in the belly of a paradox, but it takes age and reflection of life to see the paradox, rather than when you're younger and you're in it."
The problem I had was immediately when things began to go wrong in business, I thought, "I've got to leave here. I've got to become a priest." I wrestled with that profoundly. In fact, the gentleman who's the dean of the Anglican Cathedral here in Toronto was encouraging me to be a priest; and the gentleman who was the archbishop was encouraging me not to be.
C: I thought the vignette I read of an Oblate priest throwing a book across the room and telling you to get your priorities in order was wonderful advice for a young man. A friend of mine says postmodernism means writing books made for throwing out the window. Maybe we should have a spirituality of throwing books across the room to help us get our priorities in order.
DM: It was like a slap across the face.
C: But you felt this deep internal struggle between pulling back from the world and being engaged with it?
DM: I still do. We don't often get to do the things we want to do. I remember when I was in Grade 13 at St. Mike's and there was a young guy walking around with a U of T jacket on that said Forestry on the back. I thought, "I so admire him because he knows exactly what he wants to do." I'm 62 years old and I'm still trying to determine what I'm supposed to be doing. Despite being a father and a husband and now a grandfather, I still struggle with that. But I think that's fine. I think we're meant to struggle. Right?
C: Yes, there is that saying that recurs in some of the Buddhist literature I've read: "Do what you are doing. Whatever it is you're doing, just do that." And that's what you're doing. There is a simplicity to that, isn't there?
DM: There is. Roshi Joan Halifax, who's a friend of mine, loves watching me struggle. When we were in Nepal together a few years ago, I was having fits because the plane was late – being the business guy, I'm thinking this is ridiculous. They're running a business and serving customers. The plane should be here on time. Then she said, "How is that working for you?"
You brought up the notion of mindfulness and the cultivation of presence. I think that's a good stepping stone. It's not the end game of why a person ought to pray in silence, but this notion of being present, I think the benefit of it is the extent to which you're more open to the other person rather than showing up with an agenda, rather than showing up with the focus on you trying to guide them toward a prescribed outcome.
You're less inclined to be control-oriented and you're just in the moment and allowing the moment to manifest itself. These are great insights to help us with how we actually run companies, too, actually.
C: There is a line from Thich Nhat Hanh: "When I am drinking my tea, I am 100 per cent drinking my tea. Why would I do anything else?" If you're going to drink tea, you might as well just drink your tea in that moment.
Can you tell me a bit about the pressure, and that duality I guess we could call it, that you struggled with in the business world as you achieved the success that you did. Was that an external pressure or was that entirely something that you carried with you because you had no guidance in how to resolve it?
DM: It was an internal restlessness. I came to the conclusion, and what I would write in my journal was, that it actually doesn't matter contextually what you're doing. It matters how you're doing what you're doing. It's a state of being. I could rationalize it somewhat that way. I came to terms with the fact that I wasn't going to go into the priesthood and that this is where I was meant to be, and that was that.
Part of it is how you mature in your orientation toward developing yourself internally. There is a great book called The Untethered Soul, by Michael Singer. One of the first lines in the second chapter talks about beginning to discover that this whole inner journey actually has nothing to do with you. I accentuate that with something that Jean Vanier said last year when I visited him. He said it's all very well and good, Don, that you're talking about this life of prayer and contemplative practice, but you have to be careful that this doesn't become an exercise in self-absorption.
I've seen many, many people embarking on the mindfulness movement and transcendental meditation, and what they're trying to do is acquire something when in fact this is an exercise in letting go. If you want to find who you are, you have to let go; and the last thing you have to let go of is the need to be a good person. This whole subject of legacy and all that stuff, you have to let go. You can see the genuineness of people who have let go because they have suffered the pain of even the need to be good. What begins to manifest is a genuine humility.
C: As opposed to an ethicalism of ticking off binary boxes: done good, didn't do so good, done great, done bad?
DM: Right. Living a moral and ethical life is not enough. The golden rule is an important element in a person's life, and goodness knows we all need more of that when you take a look at business and political leadership here in North America.
C: Right.
DM: We'd do well just to make that the object of our attention societally. Individually, there's another path that needs to be walked beyond living an ethical life, and that deals with this process of self-transformation and the ingredient that most people are not willing to step up to. It's this notion of letting go.
What's implicit is the willingness to put yourself in a posture of acceptance and humility. I don't think these things are just ideas. They are a real way of living. This is a great disappointment, I think, of the age of Enlightenment in that we are supposed to reason our way through everything.
The great spiritual tradition of the Church got derailed with the age of Enlightenment. Merton is eloquent on this point. He talks about Descartes saying that the sum of the highest aspirations of the human being is our capacity to reason. Contrast that with the decision to engage in a practice in which the very nature of that practice has to do with communion.
C: How does that play itself out for a late 20-something to mid-40-something, man or woman, in the corporate environment, in a world where such things as humility and acceptance and even gratitude are lipstick on a pig in a sense. They're what we put on in order to get something else that we want. Put another way, how is it possible to live that way in a corporate environment where the idea of competition is mother's milk. You have to compete to get ahead. How do we balance those things out?
DM: A lot of things in life require walking in a paradox. The first journey is you've been given all these skills and talents. It's your responsibility to manifest and grow and build those skills and talents in your career, in your chosen career. Juxtaposed against this is the guy who wrote the book The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari. I have a real problem with a culture that encourages you to be a success and the moment that you are, you're supposed to sell everything. I think it's a false humility. So, what you say to those 20- and 30-year-olds is, balance your time, build a career. It's just that at some point, for some people, it's going to happen when they're 20. For most people, it's going to happen in their 40s and 50s. There's another voice that comes and the question is: Is this enough?
Living inside the paradox is a matter of balance. Don't be unethical when you're pursuing success. Tell the truth, keep promises, that sort of thing. You have to maintain that foundation of integrity, but be ambitious and be competitive; and then we can talk later about the next journey, which is you have to lose all that.
C: I love your golf story, too, about being four up on a very good golfer and and then putting too far past the hole to lose the round on the very last hole. I was playing golf once with a teaching pro and a couple other guys. I didn''t know the other guys, but one got up on a tee box and whacked the ball right into the woods. He lost his temper and threw his driver down and started swearing. Finally, he stormed off the tee box and said, "I don't do that. I don't hit the ball like that." And the teaching pro said, "I think you just did. Let's go and find your ball in the woods."
DM: "That's not me." Well, actually it is you. Now do something about it.
C: It's not acceptance as, "Oh, I failed. I'm a failure and failure therefore is good." No, it's actually what happened. It's what's in front of you. That's what's in front of you. Play the shot from where you have to. That's a very Buddhist wisdom.
DM: Yes. What's encouraging is it's also a very Christian wisdom, too. Merton points it out. We tend to use Eastern examples, but I think if you've read Saint John of the Cross, he talks about mortification of the appetite and opening yourself to something that you can't control. That caused even Mother Teresa so much angst in her later life, but what you're opening yourself to is the caprice of grace. You can open yourself to it, but you can't manufacture it.
I mean the Trinity either reciprocates in some fashion or not, so you're not in control. This Taoist idea of effortless action I think is really embodied. If you go back and read the Wisdom of the Desert and the Desert Fathers, they're saying exactly the same thing. That, to me, is very encouraging that the early spiritual writers in Catholicism/Christianity were essentially saying the same thing.
C: There absolutely is that dimension of acceptance within Christianity. People often say to me: "How can you profess a Christian faith in a world like this?" I say, "You know what? I actually believe that human beings are capable of nailing God to a tree. I actually happen to believe that. You may not, but I do."
If we're capable of doing that, pretty much everything we've done since then is not such a big surprise. Some of it may be a bit extreme, but it's not that surprising. This is what we're capable of doing, and I'm not being cynical when I say that. It's just the way things are. The lyrics of that beautiful Negro spiritual ask: "Were you there when they crucified my Lord; sometimes it causes me to tremble." Actually, yes, I was there. It wasn't the outside world that crucified Him. It was me, and that requires acceptance. It's not easy to admit it, but that's who we are – who I am – so how do we deal with it? What do we learn from it?
DM: Yes. Simultaneously, and Biblically stated, we are created in the image and likeness of God. I don't think there's enough time spent reflecting on that. I have holy cards that go back to the '30s, with ancestors that have passed away, and the first thing the holy card says is: "You're decrepit and you should be asking for forgiveness for your sins before you do anything." I think we've come a long way to understanding that there's a paradox between the need to ask for forgiveness but not dwelling on this brokenness, that there's this other aspect that speaks to our potential; not our potential for worldly greatness but our potential for compassion in connecting and communion. Then the question, which is the curiosity I've had since I was 16, becomes: What do you have to do in your life to cultivate that?
C: And you're coming closer to an answer?
DM: My answer is to study what the great religions, particularly Christianity/Catholicism, have to say. I refer to myself as an apophatic junkie. There are two different kinds of prayer. There is thinking prayer, and there is prayer of silence. I haven't let go of the need for silence in the mind. I'm very grateful that people like John Main have developed the Word into Silence mantra in the Christian tradition and that Father Thomas Keating, in particular, has developed Centring Prayer as a movement.
In my world, it is imperative that a person stop and find time for silent prayer. It's not just a good thing. It's an imperative thing. If a person chooses to really live the two New Testament commandments to the best of their ability, I think they need to stop and quiet their mind every day for a certain amount of time. The second thing they need is to commit themselves to living an examined life. Here, we Christians can learn a lot about this from the Buddhists. They're very good at giving mental exercises for reflecting on our fears, angers, self-loathing, hatred, envy.
When I talk about letting go, I'm saying that we're trying to learn our way toward letting go of the negative aspects of the monkey chatter in our head that drags us down, and then the other monkey chatter that's in our head that creates this artificial illusion that we're better than other people. All these things have to come down. There's the silence, there's the self-reflection and then I believe that people need to have a rhythm of what you have talked about in your own life where you pray and find certain things.
Quite frankly, I'm very, very sacramental. I respect other strains of Christianity, but I feel that I'm blessed and fortunate that I've been exposed to the part of Christianity that is deeply sacramental. We have to rediscover that. For example, the sacrament of confession is really this exercise. It is like Saint Ignatius of Loyola's spiritual exercises.
C: One of the great gifts of certainly the Roman Catholic Church is that sacramental awareness. It's the sense of being embodied, actually physically happening in the world. It's a catalyst for deeper spiritual life.
DM: It's a catalyst for communion experience. I agree with that.
C: There's a story from many years ago that leads me to question how we act on those things in the world when we're still given to our basic human impulses, basically giving in to our nervous system, to our fight or flight or that part of our brain. There's a friend I worked with for many, many years and really admire. He's a very, very devout Catholic but also given to quite severe fits of temper. He convinced a co-worker to go to a prayer breakfast one day. When he picked the co-worker up, he had a Bible on the dashboard of his vehicle. As they were driving to the prayer breakfast, somebody cut him off, and my friend began shouting obscenities at the other driver. The Bible skidded across the dashboard and landed in the co-worker's lap. The passenger looked at my friend and said, "Who are you? I have your Bible in my lap. We're on our way to a prayer breakfast. And you're swearing your head off at somebody who just cut you off in traffic. Who are you?" I think it's a question that the world does ask us. Maybe not quite under those circumstances, of course, but the world does ask, "Who are you?" What answer do we bring?
DM: Well, again, Saul says something that sounds contradictory. On the one hand, I don't like to judge anybody. Having said that, in business, rare is the occasion when anger should be used as a control mechanism. If ever. You can express your disappointment in somebody without needing to be angry. My first point is I have a preference for not judging somebody. Having said that, we are human and we're going to be imperfect, so we're striving for an ideal; and the ideal to me is the two New Testament Commandments.
If you're getting up every day and you're reflecting on gratefulness, and if you are spending time in silence for a period of time every day and you are committed to a life of self-examination, my view is something transformative happens even though you don't see the causality because we tend to want to see it at an intellectual level. A person is transformed if someone commits himself or herself to living the life of the two New Testament Commandments and adopts a pattern and a rhythm in his or her life. They will transform themselves so that the wilful exercise of trying to be compassionate transforms itself from being an active will to actually a state of being. You actually become compassionate. The 10 Commandments become the 10 promises.
C: Now that is a transformation.
DM: I think it is beautiful. I reflected on this. I thought, "Well, if a person goes through a process of transformation, they can't commit murder, they can't be jealous, they can't lie, because they've been transformed. Not to say you don't trip, but if you commit yourself to a seven-day rhythm in your life, you'll be transformed and you won't be able to see the causality. I actually believe, honest to God believe, that it actually impacts the person on a cellular level, and then there are other changes that will occur in their life.
C: There is evidence that it impacts us at the neurological level, isn't there?
DM: Yes. Richard Davidson in Madison, Wis., has put an MRI machine on monks, contrasting them to normative states. There's great value in understanding that you can use the mind to change the architecture of the brain. You can actually rewire the brain to become compassionate.
C: The Magi brought the Christ Child frankincense and myrrh. I have no idea what frankincense or myrrh is. But if we bring the world our gifts as we perfect them, however imperfect our frankincense or myrrh might be, and the world is skeptical about what we're bringing, how do we as people of faith deal with that? How, if our gifts are looked on with a jaundiced eye, do we not let that point of contact dissuade us from the rightness of the path we're following?
DM: That presumes the efficacy and the value of the gifts we've brought is only valid if it's validated externally. I don't believe that. The validity is the internal transformation. We are fascinated with the lives of the saints. We are intrigued by the commitment of the early martyrs. Do you think the martyrs had any idea when they accepted their Christian faith that they would give their lives in the Roman Colosseum? Today, those stories get repeated. They would say, "I'm dying in front of these people who are putting me to death because of my faith." But their story lives on.
Sister Faustina, who was just canonized a saint, was rejected by all of her peers who were holy women living in a convent. Sister Mary Alacoque, who had visions of the Sacred Heart, was treated like dirt by her family and was ostracized. There was this brilliance that came from inside of them regardless of how they were judged by the rest of the world. I think that we're called upon to develop fortitude and courage to be internally referenced and less inclined to judge our value based on what other people think.
C: I guess the question becomes a very broad one given the world in which we live. Is it possible to live that way?
DM: Yes.
C: Yes?
DM: It is definitely. Yes.
C: This year, from what I'm gathering, your life has been a process of learning that it is possible and how it's possible.
DM: One of the things I'm struck by is how people will come back to me and they will say, "You were the best leader I ever had and I want to learn from you." I say to them, "Well, the one thing I can say I did for you is I just got out of the way." It's what I didn't do that allowed you to be as good as you were.
C: But is that possible in a competitive world such as business?
DM: I actually think that we're entering into a time where a person can be extremely competitive and focused. The other night, I was talking about leading with purpose and I was talking about how institutions – if you want to go down this path – business schools have been too results based. They have to spend more time helping to cultivate leadership that understands the complexity of human relationships. What we're trying to do, and some business schools are, is introduce Dan Goldman's concept of emotional intelligence and healthy self-awareness.
These attributes in business lead toward more of a JFK than a Donald Trump. Strength coming from within, good judgment in listening to others but still feeling the conviction and the need. Because, I mean, if we had Donald Trump with his finger on the button in 1962, none of us would be here. It's a fortunate thing that the world had Kennedy in the White House at that time, as it was that they had Khrushchev on the other side, by the way. It's in the letters, their correspondence, that they conspired to prevent their respective military leaders from pushing the button.
Why? Kennedy had very, very healthy self-awareness and so I think, in a non-religious sense, this is what we're trying to cultivate in our leaders. What's the opposite of this? I think what we're discovering is that this notion of being narcissistic and effective principally at self-promotion is very, very superficial. I mean, unfortunately, that's still evident in our political system. I don't think politics today, at least in Canada or the United States, is an honourable profession. They're elected officials so we're not getting the best and brightest. It's a very strong statement but that will change.
I do believe a person can live and not just the life of integrity in business but one in which they seek to provide this other form of leadership. It's not about smarmy compassion. It's this notion of back to your point about presence and humility and being other directed rather than feeling that you need to have all the answers.
C: Just to come full circle, Chesterton suffered a period as a young man of almost debilitating solipsism, a descent into what he called a small circle of self. In a lot of his writings, particularly in Orthodoxy, he uses that metaphor that when we draw this circle around ourselves, when we are what we believe in, which is different from doing things in the world, that's actually a form of insanity. At least it's a precursor to insanity when we believe we are the world. [We're not.] The world is a multiplicity of things as you just said. Orthodoxy was written a century ago, but I often wonder if that isn't really one of the fundamental things that has gone off the rails. We've immersed ourselves in a misunderstanding of what it means to be who you are, and yet continue to believe that the world is something other than you. That's the conundrum, isn't it?
DM: That's the darkness, too. I think anybody who is committed to life and personal growth has experienced that, if they're being honest. Sometimes that darkness is because you've done everything in your power to create what you think is your right path and all you're getting is blocks. Then you're sucked down into a vortex of victimhood. That victimhood thing actually has a sweetness to it that many people will fall into and stay there, and what happens then is they will have a layer of anger that will carry them through the rest of their lives unless they come out of it.
Others will realize that the victimhood thing is just another example of their own narcissism and they have to let go. You even have to let go of the sense of failure. I mean I've had instances in my life where I was really feeling sorry for myself and I felt that I was justified in feeling sorry for myself. And until I was willing to realize that that was essentially destructive behaviour, I wasn't going to move.
C: I said once said to a friend of mine, "Oh, I'm just feeling sorry for myself." She said, "Well, there's nothing wrong with feeling sorry for yourself for a little while." Then she said, "Okay. Time's up."
DM: Time's up. Yes. I have gone through periods of my life holding on to my intellectual understanding of what it means to be spiritually enlightened. I've been in just as much darkness as anybody else has. Anybody who embarks on a spiritual journey and commits themselves to this letting go thing is going to be challenged along the way with things, including failure in a whole variety of forms, and then it's how do you deal with it.
C: At Convivium, we seek to foster a sense of faith in common life and we mean that in two different ways. We want there to be a place for faith and to live a life that Canadians share, but the other dimension of it is that we actually believe common life exists and it's possible to engage in a commonality. You can actually have faith that there is such a thing as a common life and the two dovetail together. Is that consistent with the way you've approached things?
DM: I don't know what you mean by common life.
C: That whatever we do, there's a shared aspect to it.
DM: Totally. Yes.
C: I mean we can explore, we can come to a deep understanding about our religions, but in terms of common life, we have to stand beside people of other religions every day on the bus going downtown. We share commonalities we don't even know we have, and there needs to be a gesture of faith to the importance of that commonality.
DM: What you have just described is what I call living inside the paradox, and the paradox is that, yes, we're all different in our faith. I mean it's very interesting. I can see it in a diagram, but we have something in common and this thing that we have in common, there'll be academics and critics of this and they will accuse us of this notion of syncretism. There's not syncretism because we're not trying to homogenize everything into one religion. We're actually saying that two things that seem contradictory can actually coexist. One, the diversity of the world of religions; and two, that we actually have a great deal in common, so I believe that. I will say that there are a lot of people who are people of faith that wouldn't necessarily agree with what we've been saying. I have a person that I know who is of a particular faith – I won't say which faith – but what he's done is drawn a line around people of his faith. They're there and the rest of us are over here. Now, you can jump inside that square if you want to, but then you have to adhere to their faith and their beliefs.
There are a lot of people like that and I would say first of all, I don't think it's right; but I'm not going to deny them, so when we have that conversation, I don't take it upon myself to feel responsible to convince them otherwise. I think it's a world of balance. My hope is that the people who live inside those faith quartiles begin to have a higher degree of tolerance for people who tend to see the paradox.
C: That really is the teaching of the Gift of the Magi, isn't it? I mean they come from afar. They bring a gift. They go back to their own lands by a different route in order to avoid doing what they've been asked to do, and they take a gift back with them because they're open to that process of giving and receiving at the same time.
DM: Lovely.


text:
Belgian Beer Tour
Some people's idea of a beer adventure is checking out that pub two streets over from the local. The true beer connoisseur is a different breed. Designed with the fancy suds aficionado in mind, this eight-day trip takes you to the ancestral home of Trappis (...)
Price: $1,999
Price: $1,999


text:
Founded in 2015, the Baton Rouge Events Association (BREA) is a group for professional event planners and suppliers to network and gain additional training in their field.
Mission Statement
Our mission is to provide a unique support system for the Greater Baton Rouge special events industry through professional development, unique networking opportunities, and business exchange while maintaining and facilitating the highest standards of excellence and professionalism.
Board of Directors Priscilla Simpson PRESIDENT Director of Events and Operations, Shaw Center for the Arts Jennifer Gomez IMMEDIATE PAST PRESIDENT Mansion Coordinator, Louisiana State Governor's Mansion Tiffany Pilgrim VICE PRESIDENT OF DEVELOPMENT Co-Owner, August Events Haley Soileau VICE PRESIDENT OF PROGRAMS Director of Sales, Provisions on Perkins Robert Blanchard VICE PRESIDENT OF PHILANTHROPY Owner, Premier Sound Services and American Audio Visual Lindy Davis VICE PRESIDENT OF MARKETING Owner, Drakes Catering Tonga Christy VICE PRESIDENT OF MEMBERSHIP Owner, House of Redd's Event Design Atelier Stacy Simon FOUNDING BOARD MEMBER Director of Projects, Visit Baton Rouge Renee L. Bourgeois FOUNDING BOARD MEMBER Event & Marketing Facility Rentals Coordinator, LSU Museum of Art Nancy Carter DIRECTOR Owner, Carter Companies


text:
Taco Bell just relaunched its website under the ta.co URL "to speak directly with the brand's core millennial fans," according to a company announcement. In real terms, that means it's now much easier to order whatever you want at Taco Bell, then skip the line to pick it up. Here's how the website has brought ordering faux-Mexican fast food into the future.
1. You no longer have to use a smartphone. Taco Bell already launched online ordering through its smartphone app, but the new desktop version makes it even easier to visualize what extra salsa might look like on your taco.
2. You can customize everything. Want to make your burrito vegan? Or just want to pour guacamole and bacon on your entire order? Why not? Taco Bell lets you.
3. The best URL on the Internet is now taken. If you go to ta.co on your browser, it redirects you to tacobell.com. No telling how much that cost the company.
4. You can get discounts on your already-cheap food. If you sign up for an account on the website, you can get exclusive deals sent to you.
5. The site saves your previous orders. So if you have an unstoppable craving for a Crunchwrap Supreme every Tuesday at 11 p.m., you don't have to enter the order every time.
6. If you really want to know, Taco Bell will tell you how unhealthy your order is. The site now has a nutrition calculator. We're pretty sure you don't want to know, though.
7. Taco Bell is now a news site. The website's "The Feed" section features news articles about musicians, celebrities, and of course, tacos. There's even an article about Olivia Mears, aka "Taco Belle," who creates outfits from wrappers.
8. This website means there's more to come. According to Taco Bell, delivery is being tested in certain markets, and the website will be a big part of that. In restaurants, there will also be ordering kiosks to customize on the spot, and a "virtual kitchen" where you can see how your food is made. And down the road, the Taco Bell app will become "gamified." In case you really have spare time on your hands.
From: Delish


text:
The United States has honoured the cleric who saved about 300 people, mostly Christians, from being killed by rampaging suspected herdsmen during the crisis in Jos, Plateau State months ago.
Imam Abdullahi Abubakar had sheltered fleeing residents in his mosque and house, thereby making them out of reach for the suspected herdsmen who killed no fewer than 200 persons.
President Buhari had promised to award Abubakar with a national honour.
The cleric was recognized and honoured at an event organised by the US embassy in Jos.
Facebook Comments


text:
USA winger Shea wants another loan spell to boost World Cup hopes
Brek Shea admits he would be willing to consider a loan move away from Stoke City in order to keep his World Cup dream alive.
The United States international is currently back at the Britannia Stadium after returning early from a stint at Championship side Barnsley.
He did not enjoy the best of times at Oakwell, with an angry confrontation with supporters following a 5-0 defeat to Huddersfield Town leading him to be sent back back to the Potters.
The 24-year-old winger, who signed for Stoke from FC Dallas in January 2013, claims he is willing to fight for a place in Mark Hughes' plans if given an opportunity to compete for a regular role.
He has, however, found first-team opportunities hard to come by and acknowledges that he may need to look elsewhere for game time if he is to take in a trip to Brazil this summer.
On the end of his stint at Barnsley and his plans for the future, Shea said in Stoke paper The Sentinel: "I had an altercation with a gentleman and I think the fans took it that I had a go at the club, but I was only frustrated with one guy. I'm over that and happy to be back at Stoke.
"At the time I was upset, but now I've left it behind me. I can't really change what happened.
"The passion of the fans over here is crazy, in a good way, but when things don't go their way they are upset with their players and that can get out of hand.
"I've had a lot of experiences, whether good or bad, and I've got to learn from them. Hopefully I can earn a spot in this team. I have to keep my head down, work hard and hope I get my chance. I have to show the gaffer I am good enough to play."
On the possibility of heading out on loan again, Shea added: "I need to be playing for the World Cup. I really want to go because I enjoy playing for my country."


text: The perfect cup of tea requires good tea, the right temperature water, and the correct amount of time to steep. This is the perfect solution to the last part of the equation. Set the timer and go find a comfy seat; when it rings you needn't get up again to turn it off. Pull out your Harney and Sons tea sachet, add some of your favorite honey with a bendy spoon, and let the healing begin.


text:
Whether you're looking to host a business dinner, gather your employees for a celebration, or give a staff member a fitting send-off into retirement, Romano's is Hamilton's preferred corporate events venue. Bring your event to life with unmistakable Italian charm and flavour. From gourmet thin-crust pizzas made in our open kitchen, to an exquisite wine list featuring bold Pinot Grigio and Chianti selections, we have an extensive menu to suit every taste. Romano's is Hamilton's corporate event venue of choice for companies small and large. We would be delighted to host your next event, contact us today.
Romano's is the ideal location for company parties in Hamilton. We're situated at the convergence of the Red Hill Parkway and the Lincoln Alexander Parkway, easily accessible from all the major highways, and offer ample free parking. The main dining area provides a cozy, but lively backdrop for smaller Hamilton company parties, while our banquet room accommodates up to 100 guests. We invite you and your employees to enjoy our delicious cuisine in an authentic Italian setting.
Celebrate the holidays by treating your staff to a festive evening of fun and authentic Italian food. Our beautifully decorated banquet hall perfectly captures the cheer of the holiday season. An exquisite menu prepared by our chef de cuisine can be done prix fixe, a la carte or buffet style, and features dishes from the many regions of Italy. To see why dozens of local businesses select us year after year, book your corporate Christmas party in Hamilton at Romano's. You will certainly find yourself on the "nice list" of your employees!
Please allow 24 hours for event booking confirmation


text:
Surviving The Era has released a music video from their upcoming album, Parallax.
The music video is for "Queen of The Sea" features the band, comprised of Jake Cooley (Drums)
Kevin Cortez (Guitar), Seth Borges (Bass/Vox/Keys), Ryan Sollom (Vocals), and Kyle Newton (Guitar) performing the single.
Give the video a watch here!
Surviving The Era formed in 2014 and hit the scene with a unique and inspired vision to energize the music scene. Since their formation, they've played over a hundred shows and festivals and have supported acts such as He Is Legend, Oleander, Stroke 9, Must be the Holy Ghost, Children 18:3, and Burn Halo.
Seth Borges, the vocalist and bassist for Surviving the Era said: "Parallax is about perception. It describes the effect of when an object appears as if it has moved because the viewer has changed their position. Similarly, music is a personal experience for everyone, and our perception of music can change over time based on where we are in life, even though the music itself never changes. We put our hearts into every song we write, and our ultimate hope is that people can connect with it and gain new perception of these songs as they move through their journey in life."
Parallax is set for a CD release party on June 18th at Sacramento's "First Festival." You can order tickets here!
Follow the band on social media as they lead up to their album release!
Surviving The Era: Official Website // Facebook // Twitter // Instagram


text:
3 Simple Mental Health Boosters for the New Year
At the end of each year, many people like to reflect on accomplishments and potential improvements for next year. Whether you call them goals or intentions, here are 3 tips that can benefit your mental health for the start of a new year:
- Take better care of yourself physically. Getting enough sleep, exercise, nourishing yourself with the right foods and ensuring you are scheduling regular medical check ups (dental cleanings, yearly physical) are important ways to stay emotionally healthy. When your physical health begins to suffer, so does your emotional health. Staying on top of these things are critical elements in self care
- Do something you love for 30 minutes every day. Whether it is reading, going for a walk, listening to your favorite pod cast, or meditating, allow yourself 30 minutes every day to do it. Engaging in an activity that you love will improve your mood and can contribute to your overall well-being, in addition to allowing you a built-in break and a chance for fun or relaxation.
- Set healthy boundaries with others. Sometimes we give other people too much power in our lives. Letting our family members, significant other, children or boss control our actions may come across as being kind or agreeable, but it is not always healthy. Define your limits with those around you, and do so directly, without anger.
These are just a few healthy tips to instill for the new year, or even right now. It's never too soon to take charge of your emotional and physical well-being!
Best wishes for a happy (and improved) new year!


text:
Subscribe to our blog - click here.
Rock Springs, WY -- A contractor who died after falling 45 feet at a power plant has been identified.
The coroner has identified the contractor as 53 year old Marvin Dean Ortega. He fell from scaffolding while working at a power plant on Tuesday afternoon.
Ortega was an independent contractor (the most likely contractor to get injured on the job). He was working on emissions control equipment. An investigation is being conducted to determine if the worker was following safety protocols.


text:
"Why re-release a game that's perfectly adequate but doesn't do anything particularly noteworthy or special?" Rogue Trooper Redux review by Tom McShea. Here we have in a nutshell the ill-conceived attitude that plagues contemporary gaming reviews, although it is also applicable to other mediums. Too often these days, I find myself reading critiques of games, movies and TV shows where the author feels that the product has failed because it is not exceptional. Such reviews will frequently cite numerous positive factors or attributes and reference how the product has been competently assembled. Yet in the final summation, the author will then full back upon the stock criticism that in spite of all this, the game does not "re-invent the wheel" or set a new "benchmark". It is just "adequate". However, I believe that this is a much misunderstood and frequently misused word. And that its reoccurring use stems from a culture of unrealistic expectations.
The Oxford Dictionary defines the word "adequate" as follows. Satisfactory or acceptable in quality or quantity. The word has its origin in the early 17th century and derives from Latin adaequatus meaning "made equal to", being the past participle of the verb adaequare. Now we have a clear definition, let us consider in what context we would use the word in day-to-day life. Often, when I am hungry I will avail myself of specific chains of restaurants or fast food outlets. They provide satisfactory meals, conveniently at an acceptable price. Therefore, they are adequate. If I was unhappy with any aspect of the food or the service that was provided, then I would not use the word adequate to begin with. If you have to qualify somethings adequacy, then it is not adequate. So, with this in mind there are many things that can be classified as adequate; food, drink, a book, music, a box girder bridge or a drunken sexual dalliance. The moment you apply the term to something, you are clearly stating that it is "not shit". If you are using the word to mean anything other than its dictionary definition, then you're using it using it incorrectly.
Contrary to what certain quarters of the media and pop culture may tell you, life isn't a never-ending series of high octane, boisterous, spiritually fulfilling events that engage all your senses and leave you sated. Day-to-day living is mainly routine, predictable and yes, you've guessed it, adequate (if you're lucky). In fact, for an ever-growing group of the population adequacy is giving way to shit. The reason fun and enjoyable events stand out is because they are not frequent and the punctuate the mundane with brief periods of joy. Any addict will tell you that too much of your "drug of choice" ultimately negates the high you gain from it. Hence not only is adequate a functional and succinct word, it also represents a state of being that is integral too our lives. Like oxygen, it can be argued that humans need a specific amount of adequacy in their lives. An excess either way is not desirable but the right amount in your life provides a context and a scale against which other experiences can be measured and quantified.
So, returning from philosophical musings to the thrust of this post about gaming, I think people should think long and hard before they decided to label a game adequate. If you are trying to crowbar the word into your review as a pejorative, then simply dispense with it and clearly state what you think is wrong. The reality of the situation is that many game releases each year are adequate. Those like Tom McShea who seem to expect the "noteworthy and special" need to recalibrate their personal desires. It is impossible for the video game industry or indeed any other, to continuously innovate and perpetuate a market where every new title pushes boundaries. This why for every L.A Noire there is a Vendetta: Curse of Raven's Cry. Therefore, let us as a gaming community, look to our personal lexicon and start using the English language properly when framing out thoughts. I believe that it is important to precisely say what we mean, or else how can we mean what we say?