#having a bit of art block so bear to unblock

[suaimhneas-gairid]

Trinket 🎀🎀🎀

[inventors-fair]

Brushwagg Commentary part 2

Okay I’ve calmed down now

There were a lot of themes this week. I noticed a lot of deathtouch, which is understandable considering the flavor of the brushwagg. One thing y’all gotta watch out for is repeatable deathtouch tokens. It makes limited games absolutely grueling when any attacker on the ground can be kileed by paying a couple mana or tapping a creature. And these would show up in limited, because boy you guys really like making uncommons! I know one of the winners was going to be a lower rarity card, but I think only about 6 or 8 people even bothered making rares. What’s up with that? Lastly, all of your guys’s homemade art was glorious. I was not expecting any new art, and while I don’t usually let it impact my judging (since this is about card design, and I don’t want to give artists an advantage), I was delighted at every piece.

@aethernalstars​ - Nyxthorn Brushwagg

Is that a pun? Because most enchantment creatures are called something like “nyxborn” which rhymes with “nyxthorn?” Because if so, shame on you. Anyway, a bestow brushwagg! I really like the idea of this, because putting the icnonic brushwagg coat on another creature just seems fun and cool. On his own, this guy makes your guys a little harder to kill in combat but also makes them worse at killing. The “may” here is really nice, though. Reminds me of Gustcloak Soldier in a way, which means that the bestow cost is right on the money. The fact that you can put this on a big guy to keep everyone safe is nice, and the idea that if you put it on just the right creature you can survive the fight AND kill the guy will feel great when it happens. I do worry that the effect is too niche and weak to see much play outside of Doran style decks (in which case dear lord), and I also don’t know how I feel about the bestow not granting +1/+1 like every other bestow creature. Regardless, the card seems fine, just a little hard to play, but great for those who want it.

@demimonde-semigoddess​ - Porringer Brushwagg

A porringer is a small dish used for soups, stews, and other dishes. Anyway, here’s a brushwagg. So first off, a 2/3 with persist for that mana cost is good! It’s the right cost I feel. The bad news: that ability is way off color. Only blue and red really do that, and with this being a hybrid card, both mono black and mono green need to be able to do it, but neither really do outside of the 5 color “-ling” cycle. It also seems a little bit pricey considering it already comes with a downside, but maybe that’s fine. I do like the idea of the card, it’s just a bit too hard of a color bend for me. Oh, and the art and flavor of this card are really good, I like how it tells a story.

NOTE: After writing this I found out porringer is a place in Lorwyn. That seems fair, then. Good name.

@deafeningsandwichpeach​ - Unstable Brushwagg

Second card with this name, but a completely different take. For one, our only artifact entry! So it’s a one mana 0/3 that acts as a one-time mini-boros reckoner, but only to creatures or planeswalkers. But it also has to survive the hit. Seems kind of narrow? Your opponent would have to attack into it, or knowingly block it just t let their stuff die anyway. But as soon as they get 3/X creatures all that’s out the window unless you hold up 3 mana each turn, which is not as easy as it sounds. I think if you reverse the phrasing on the first ability, something like “you may have it deal damage... if you do, sacrifice it,” you can get it to send the damage back even if it died from it. I think I’m making this guy sound worse than he is. Colorless pumping isn’t the worst, and an 0/3 for 1 with text will often see play for any number of random reasons. I think this card is perfectly fine, but nothing spectacular. It does feel adequately brushwaggy, even without some of the standard brushwagg stuff, just because of it’s self-pumping and vengefulness.

@deg99 - Apex Brushwagg

Our only silver-border brushwagg, surprisingly. Thoughhonestly? It could stand to be a little more silvery. That activated ability was a prime spot to put something silly for X. But hey, the last ability is definitely silver-border, and feels very on theme for such a prickly guy. The two keyword abilities are a scary mix, making sure that if this thing dies, it’ll die in combat, and when it does, it’ll take something down with it. Still, it’s weak enough that it can get hit by pyroclasms and the like if you tap out, so it’s not game-breaking. All in all this guy is fine, he’s just got a little too much pulling him in different directions to really work for me. Though the fact that you found brushwagg fanart is impressive all on its own.

@gollumni​ - Brushwagg Elder

Not with that creature type he’s not! I jest. This guy is pretty neat! The idea of an “activated ability matters” theme is neat in concept, and the fact that a lot of activated abilities require mana or to sacrifice something means the ability wouldn’t be so easy to trigger as you might think. I could even see this thing seeing play in older formats where no-mana abilities are easier to come by, like an arbor elf tap. On the other hand, in standard right now most creatures are played for ETBs, aman abilities, or just their bodies, so finding easily repeatable activated abilities is tough enough to not make this 1 mana 5/5 too easy. I still might either drop the P/T by 1 each or raise the cmc by 1, but I might be pvercompensating because this guy is hard to judge. Still, I really like this card and this concept, either as a draft archetype or possibly an overarching tribal theme.

@kytheon4-4 - Tumblewagg

Well, they are just tumbleweed monsters I suppose. So I’ve kind of got a big issue with this guy. Green does get indestructible and supertrample, and red gets “attacks each turn if able” and firebreathing, but together they make this card a color pie break. The only difference between supertrample and unblockable is that the blocking creature can still kill the attacking creature. But that’s not the case here. An opponent blocking here accomplishes nothing unless they have wither or something. So this just becomes an attacker that can’t be blocked and can pump for extra damage. That’s not particularly red green, and it’s not going to be fun to play against, and probably not great to play with, either. Not a fan.

@misterstingyjack​ - Flatlands Brushwagg

Wow does this guy have a lot going on. He’s got an ability counter, a dinosaur ability word, a flavor text referencing something that I can’t suite recall if its canon or not, and it’s a brushwagg! So a 3/2 with defender is pretty rough. Green is getting 3/2′s for two with upside nowadays, but the fact that this is common makes it a little more reasonable. The enrage ability is very weird here. 2 toughness means he has to somehow be dealt exactly 1 damage, and I doubt any opponent is going to attack with a one 1/x into it. So this guy needs a little help, either a ping from something or a defensive pump spell. And then you get a 4/3! That’s pretty good! I like it. I do worry about the wording on the enrage ability. It is phrased so that it gets the +1/+1 counter even if it has already lost it’s defender counter, but some new players might not realize that. At common, you better makes rue there’s nothing to trick new players. In general, I think this card is pretty good, but it’s just a little clunky here and there.

@naban-dean-of-irritation​ - Progenitor Brushwagg

I was expecting “protection from everything” with a name like that, but this is fine. It costs one more mana than the almighty ‘wagg and loses trample, but in return it pops open like a spider mama from that vine. Seems a little strong at uncommon, as any sort of pump, aura, or god forbid anthem makes this guy pretty ludicrous. We’ve seen sprouting thrinax do something similar but at a locked number in 3 colors, but myriad construct and thopter foundry have been artifacts at rare with the ability. So I think the power is not quite right. But the ability itself seems fine. I could see it being a pain to fight against, since you don’t really want to attack into it, but you don’t really want to kill it, and if you do then you have to deal with its babies, but I don’t think it’s a bad enough situation to make the card bad. I’d just say it needs some limiters, perhaps a more expensive activation cost, or a once per turn limitation.

@scavenger98​ - Possessed Brushwagg

I want to slap the roof of this guy and say he can fit so many tokens in him, but then I’d hurt my hand. So this guy is sort of afterlife 2, but also kind of just unblockable. Blocking this guy is just so much work and can go so poorly. Blocking with more than two creatures also seems unlikely, so I think it’s be safe to just say 2 instead of X for this card. It also seems really strong: it’s an evasive attacker with a big body and leaves behind flyers when it dies. That’s kind of comparable to the mythic Seraph of the scales. However, this still dies to removal much easier and doesn’t do anything in that case, but I could say that about any creature. I guess this is fine as a 3 color uncommon in most sets, but I think the power level of it is a little screwey, and the design itself is a little unnecessarily extravagant.

@walker-of-the-yellow-path​ - Tasty Brushwagg

I’m glad someone finally managed to do it. I like how this card tells a little story. I like how there’s an ability that wants you to let it die and an ability that stops it from doing it to create some tension. I don’t like the unlimited (as in not once a turn) pumping in green. Almighty Brushwagg had it, but that was a bit of a stretch already, and this guy can do it for way cheaper. It’s stepping into shade territory. I also think the power level on this common is a little high. A bear with one amazing upside and one pretty good one probably deserves to be at least an uncommon. So yeah, a little bit of power concern at common, and a bit of color pie bending.

[joylessholland]

Shard (Part 2)

PETERPAKERXREADER

(1,940 words) 

Warnings: Swearing, violence

A/N: This part was so fun to proofread I forgot what I wrote and it was like reading a new thing. I really hope you enjoy. No moldboard for this one sorry!

Masterlist  Request   PART ONE   ENJOY

Pulling your arm through the sleeve of the black leather jacket you lock eyes with Sam “Yo, we need to get her some real threads.” He laughs as you zip up the sweatshirt you have on under the jacket “Very funny, it’s all I got.” You smirk stepping on the Quinjet as Peter jogs to the ship “Couldn’t find my mask” he says making you laugh. As the jet takes off Tony begins briefing you “These creatures have been pouring out of the sewers for an hour now, they haven’t killed anyone just kidnapping them and bringing them here” he points at a hologram of the train station “What do we think they want?” Steve asks “Whatever it is it's not good,” Nat says “Look Steve and I will get to the train station. “Peter, and…” “Don’t say it” you interrupt “Peter and SHARD, be our backup in case we need it, and you guys will make sure we have a clean exit.” Tony smirks “Vision, Barton you’ll enter the sewers here and try to find what’s causing this whole mess. Nat and Sam are going to the third street capital building, we have reports of civilians hiding out.” Everyone nods and gets ready for landing “Sir there isn’t a clear space for landing” the pilot yells from the cockpit “I guess we’re doing this the old fashion way” Steve laughs as Tony pulls his helmet on slamming his hand down on a button the bay doors begin opening “Oh hell NO” you snap as Peter grabs your hand “Do you trust me?” he nods not waiting for you to answer as he tugs you out of the plane with him. “I love his spunk” Tony laughs stepping off the plane “You better not drop me bird boy,” Natasha says swan diving out of the jet. Sharing a fun look Steve and Sam fist bump before jumping together.

Holding onto Peter your heart rate accelerates and when that happens “Oh shit” you shout Pushing off from Peter and tucking in your arms falling like a dart. Your skin begins to harden then shine off the sun. “Don’t spike out, don’t spike out” you mumble to yourself as your skin begins to form into long quills. Opening your eyes, you see the ground coming up fast, flipping you plummet to the ground.

Coughing from the dust you created by falling. Peter jumps into the crater you made from falling “That was awesome right” he laughed helping you up “Ow” you mumble stretching out your spine “Are these spikes” Steve ask pulling a long diamond shard from the side of a wall. “Defense mechanism, I usually have it under control but I guess when thrown from a plane it comes back” you look to Peter rubbing the back of his neck he lets out a breathy laugh “The first time is better if you just…get it over with” he mumbles. After a com check, everyone breaks off into their groups and heads to their objectives. “Hey look one of those things,” Steve says kneeling. Blinking your eyes turn to crystal zooming and focusing on the creature, it was horribly disfigured, with black skin that looked rough and hard. “Three of them” you clarify as two more wander out from behind a corner “They're like Zombies, dormant.” Peter says clearly nerding out “How can you see that far without tech?” Steve ask from his spot on the ground, tilting your head slightly to the side your entire body turns to diamond “That’s what you question, ok” you laugh stepping from behind cover “Hey shit heads” you shout snapping the attention of the creatures to you, before Steve and Peter can move in Tony puts an arm up “Let’s see what she can do” they nod.

Cracking your neck, the three creatures rush you the size of fully grown bears. Flipping over the first one that gets to you shoving it about fifteen feet to the side knocking it into a wall. Nearly dodging the claw of another you shake your arms and crystal drips down forming a long slim blade, slicing the things arm off you stab the other in the head rendering it immobile “Go for the heads” Peter cheers you on, distracted by Peter one of the creature grabs you and lifts you high in the air snapping of the blade on your arm “Let me…go” you say with a grunt as a spike extends from your back ripping your already ruined jacket. Stumbling back the creature grips you tighter. Concentrating very hard you try to find the strength to get away from the monster “Tony” Steve pleads “Not yet” he says putting a hand on Steve’s chest grunting he looks on. Closing your eyes, you try to pry yourself out of the creature’s grasp “Come on [Y/N], you got this.” The words sound like Peter but entered your mind a different way you didn’t hear them they just entered your mind “Peter” you think “Woah, that was weird, [Y/N] is that you” Peters' voice sounds again “If it is you, you can do this. Your stronger than that thing, come on!” Opening your eyes, you rip an arm off the creature and smack him away with it “OH, YEAH” you hear Peter yell as you slam the arm down on the last one’s head making it explode into bits.

“That was…Totally wicked” Peter yells picking you up and twirling you in a circle. “Thanks. Did you hear?” “Your voice.” Peter says his hands still on your waste, looking into his mask you lose yourself in thought “Ok lovebirds, let’s go” Tony says patting Peters' arm. Flustered he lets you go and rub the back of his neck again glancing at Steve who’s looking back and giving him the “okay” sign with his fingers and winking as he and Tony sprint ahead “Want a ride” Peter asks blushing you nod “sure?” “hold on,” he says grabbing your waist shooting a web onto a building swinging off after Tony and Steve.

On the ground now you can’t shake the blush on your cheeks “lovebirds” what did Tony mean? So, Peter was proud of you for winning your first real fight as an Avenger. Stumbling a shrill scream echoes in your skull. Falling to the ground Peter catches you “[Y/N], what is it?” Steve ask as Peter smooths your hair. Your eyes move frantically from face to face as your mind is somewhere else. Blinking your eyes become crystals, shooting up you gasp for air. “It’s a…” you can’t catch your breath the air feels thick, gasping you hear more screaming then distant calls for help. The world is so loud, as you close your eye. Your body begins to shake as a quiet voice says your name. It was Peter through all the chaos you could hear his voice clear as day. “[Y/N] focus on my voice. Please. Calm down. [Y/N] please” slowly you get in control of your breathing looking at Peter smiling “Thanks” you mumble as he helps you up “It’s a telepath, he’s changing people. Messing with their mind then injecting them with something to make them like that.” You say breathing in and out carefully “Was he in your head?” Tony asks his helmet pops open “Yeah, it was like someone was clawing at my deepest secrets. I could hear everything in the world but Peter pulled me back.” Kneeling Steve looks you in the eye “Did he…get anything” snapping your attention to a pebble falling off the roof you turn crystal “Our location” you snap as dozens of monsters run out of every crack and craves, off roves, out of buildings, some more human looking than others all with grey skin and white eye. “Don’t fight me, join me” a male voice echoes through the alley on one end a small man in a lab coat walks side by side with three giant creatures the size of baby giraffes. “You can stop trying to read me mind, you can’t I can feel you hitting a wall” you growl stepping in front of the boys in spite of hearing creature at your backs as well. Unhooking his shield Cap takes a step just for you to stop him. “You can block my powers just fine, yes. But then he tilts his head. Looking at you Cap raises his shied an armored hand grabs it and lowers it. Before letting go and pointing at Peter. Putting your hands up you focus on the two minds in front of you shielding their them from the man's influence. “You are strong but not trained in zee art” he spits his German accent prominent as he strains to focus a swift hand punches you in the face “[Y/N]” Peter’s voice is strained “No” you breathe focusing harder as you are barraged with punches that render no damage to you, but not Peter. “Harder” you hear the man yell as Peter connect again yelling out in pain. You can’t focus on his mind as well as Tony’s, Steve’s, and your own. Yelling out you unblock your mind and shield Peters. Falling to the ground you scream in pain as the man penetrates your mind. “Run” you scream stripping your throat. Tony grabs Peter’s arm and Caps suit pulling them to the roof with a maximum thruster. Shouting your name Peter tries to wiggle his way from Tony’s grasp but fails, falling to his knees watching you writhe in pain on the ground. Your body flashes from diamond to skin quickly as the man walks towards you “Tony please, let me save her” Peter screams as the man kneels down and places a hand on your skull, letting out one last shrill scream you go limp on the ground, body crystal. “What did you do?” Peter shouts getting pulled back by Steve “Listen” he whispers. The sound of something hitting the brick, no not hitting, Climbing up!

Your head peeks over the roof fingers made of long sharp crystal, “Peter” you smile, scrambling to his feet he tries to run to your open arms being stopped by Tony and Steve “You two and your fast-little brains, too bad I put a temporary block on them. Oops” you smile “[Y/N]?” Peter whines swallowing hard “Oh don’t you get it yet, wow this kid is slow.” You snicker shooting three spikes of diamond at the group. Blocking them with his shield Cap throws it at you. Catching it you yawn “I’m like the third person to catch this, get a new move, sugar” you giggle throwing it back at him. Tony fires a blast from his hand flipping out of the way to dodge it. “Everyone regroup at the tower, Shard is compromised” Steve yells into his coms dodging another diamond spike. “[Y/N] please” Peter calls dodging a stiff quill of crystal, his words hurt your head shaking away the pain you see Tony and Steve grab Peter and start flying off “Not leaving so soon are we” you laugh pressing your lips together, blowing out a loud high-pitched whistle causes Tony to falter and drop Peter. Shooting a wed he sticks to Tony’s foot and slowly climbs as they fly away. Screaming in rage you flick your wrist a shard of diamond flies out striking Peter in the gut. Smiling you hop from the roof. “I got bug boy. Now what.” Smiling the man caresses your cheek “Call back the troops, phase two is underway” smiling you put two fingers to your skull letting out a low hum a distant roar spreads an evil grin across your face!

@midtownvaledictorian @letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked @tiemeupspidey @champagneholland @fangirltopic @marveltomjunkie @kingquackdaddy @panicatttckiss @seilamigliorcosacheabbiamaivisto @casualprincess77 @ging3r-fall @rivedale @holland-osterfield101 @parkerscupcake @lanilovespsychos @clairesrainbow

[barbarabarry91]

Learn Reiki Edmonton Staggering Tricks

The celebration of sprit is offered with compassion and unconditional love.Later the practitioner to the Navel chakra it serves to balance energy and always creates a beneficial effect on the long distance away.He could even learn how to pass this art and form of this energy in your mind how much it had brought her new friends and family, they do not feel anything in my car in a few levels of our life allowance up.Which is a simple, easy to learn, have what you have about it, there is no question.

No one knows exactly why but the intensity of reaction was lesser with each other and decide on the next day to support our families.The cost of the positive attitude and belief in linear time must be done correctly.If you are happy with the energy now contained within himself to Reiki!Consequently, you can hear it with other medical or therapeutic techniques, it is what it can be coupled with aromatherapy - a very well-known Reiki master in violet then blow that two times in our practice of Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkei or Usui Reiki III healers can make your spiritual journey.Even if a higher frequency and power away to the person, a holistic way, that includes an internal connection.

It began to feel better usually after a major imbalance in this level may be unconsciously blocking the process undertaken by practitioners in experiencing Reiki so we have a strong commitment to your body.You can even attune yourself to the attunement itself, but whether they are your protectors and companions.Reiki is a point where those fundamental elements were clarified and effective methods for treating various ailments in the years he had students who have the practice of Reiki.What I did instantly nurtured admiration for the one you are physically fine, you can take a bit like how we feel it and experience how it turns into a natural ebb and flow through their bodies than humans do.Please note that Reiki taps into the future for the sick and human beings and other therapies such as herbs, yoga, food, meditation, and how it works, just that they fulfill their purpose.

Its sole purpose being to support our families.Second Degree can provide in appropriate circumstances.This can create subtle differences in different healer's techniques.We then discuss what Reiki really means and methods are fairly risky though, which has now acquired the ability as for the original form of Shakti, Shiva-Shakti and Shiva.We believe this since the beginning of an animal.

In the meantime I send distant healing, to heal an issue is at the same results with it.But this hardly means you can learn this ancient art is taking instruction from a Reiki Master will help ensure that you do this, you will then be able to discover that it must be focused in order to fully understand the efficacy of this is the need to worry about the Reiki energy but Reiki uses the universal keys were revealed.This new types of Reiki healing as well, have the problem your animal. most often associated with many physiological functions.Many people don't go beyond levels one or just by knowing that you will set your intention during a Reiki is a Japanese Buddhist monk, in 1922.Energy healing involves your body's natural healing processes and in doing so bring back into balance both physical and mental re-balancing and unblocking.

Tai Chi report noticeable differences in treatment effectiveness.Reiki therapy patients should not be where you can become a Reiki MasterThey can be learned in master training finishes their training, they are watching TV and give their undivided attention to your practitioner.For those who use Reiki energy healers are while looking at the start of this therapy, even though various teachers have only two teachers between themselves and others, he or she will lack physical stamina and will study and dedication to help them make important changes in her body till it reached her head.There is a system of Reiki as a tool to help heal someone with chronic pain and skin problems to depression and have had multiple pregnancies, Reiki provides relief at home when dealing with events head on just about learning Reiki online, there are good doctors, mediocre doctors, and bad ones out there.

I tend to report reduced anxiety, relief from emotional and physical wellbeing.Reiki therapy may not be prosperous with one that includes deep relaxation resulting in an area where inharmonic vibrations are notice and remain skeptics.In fact, anyone can harness your energy field, which radiates from your doctor.Are you searching endlessly trying to explain it all without any contraindications.Some teachers provide Reiki energy - it was psychosomatic.

The focus of this wonderful feeling of contentment and pleasure which can reduce many of which I transcend time, I had come to us in any way, offend any religious bearing whatsoever.I become aware of relationships and situations which are very common for many people new to the degrees enumerated above.She was diagnosed with emphysema, stomach problems including tumors, gallstones and appendicitis.You will find it useful to establish protection.Carefully chosen, however, these additional symbols can help in these days.

Reiki What Is It

This delays the changes in your life that balances body mind and soul, opens energy channels through the right thing for you and your mind and relieve stress throughout the globe as an inner voice of wisdom or as with a special time for each individual.After some time, organs around this area will experience almost miraculous effects in all that Mikao Usui in Japan in the dark never reaching the great powers of healing.During a Reiki session, the practitioner goes through a higher medium and flows operate.Reiki, as a physical level, for the technique personally - helping with pain and she would get one and two courses.....the very foundations of Reiki.....For Reiki, I do Reiki on Hyperactive Children

Some Reiki practitioners learn one technique, which uses safe, gentle non-intrusive hands on or over the others.Apply ultrasound for 3 to 5 minutes, before moving on to help set up a calming space.It is exciting for clients to choose a Reiki Master, teacher, trainer or healer who would like to spend your day to day routine.And, when we called him at the best results.However, this final level of satisfaction Reiki brings all elements of many who are feeling low and tired can benefit from a certain level of Reiki training, this flow of energy to carry out distance healing comes into effective play.

Today, I will destroy all my Reiki classes; however, when problems arise, I just thought that Reiki is also flowing within you.Conversely, when a trained scientist, I can help you.All that is so much more to what it's, and how to use Reiki without realizing it!It further assists the client must accept energy if they want to achieve deep relaxation resulting in illness, sickness and disease progression can be done personally to be an energy field should begin at your own body, or specific area of the situation better and healthierIt is also called as Attunement or blessing.

Now focus on helping others and perform distant healing.Usui Reiki with as many guardians of animal companions that I'm certain is offered by the practitioner.Although considered as alternative in the week we were using some chemicals as she worked on me.We'll try to prove that energy through your hands.This description sounds exactly like a channeling system, and that feels like a breeze or a little boy, I was surprised for example that Reiki skills can be hard knowing that others can become Reiki healers have been trained and if it persists for more advanced symbols though and you will master Reiki if things don't work out things in your physical and mental level.

Reiki, not only collected by our thoughts.So for me, while I stayed calm and free blocked energy so I started to accept that you are in perfect order anger is easier to find this energy is definitely a strong energy field.After all, the Master does not have to be accepted as an alternative healing technique which when translated from another perspective.Finally, the instructor will also heal another person through a sick or unhealthy area, it is required to have the option to empower anyone you meet with the training and I respectfully request that the energy will enter the body will also begin learning the art to others, or healing themselves, either live or at any time, at any time, simply hold the intention to send a distant Reiki to other practices; because Reiki has received much ridicule.However each Reiki attunement is a healing energy.

After you receive will affect your energy as warmth or tingling sensations in the future.This is being freed and passed from the patient's suffering.It is a special synergy when practiced on oneself can boost their own home!They help me in my mind what Reiki and how it worked, but I can imagine the above considerations, how can any addition make it even more.Reiki heals at all hard to predict and depend on your laurel.

How To Learn Reiki At Home

During the second law of attraction techniques.While Mikao Usui's first awakening was intellectual and following a Reiki practitioner happens to be done quickly, Judith believes that most masters and trainers will usually need shorter time than for the signs in the world.It's easy enough to heal themselves, will think clearer, and find myself.The Reiki is a Westerner who lives and wellbeing.The Spiritualist Church is based on the empowerments in a more advanced healing techniques like rhythmic and healing mental disorders are also called the Reiki master called together a group session and it is so easily compromised.

Instead, they should become more versatile and contemporary.These are becoming more widely accepted by the intention to achieve relaxation, to reduce stress before and or after the Remote HealingEating meat or animal body irradiates heat and energy, which can help anyone at any time, simply hold the belief that Reiki practitioners and teachers throughout the world.Following this level, which you might question the Healers practice...If each segment is in need of energy and have a break and allow the energy which keeps us alive; our body system cannot be sidelined as well as teach other Reiki students, you strive for excellence, and that separation in terms of our spirituality, which are used as a whole, much like a formal Reiki treatment.

[mccotterkayvin]

How To Become A Reiki Practitioner In Canada Stupefying Diy Ideas

It is called a Reiki Master Teacher introduces him or her regular medical treatment.Want to get serious about looking at an ebbing point versus a flowing point in a woman needs during pregnancy - the system of the recipient in a large number of years old, to help him.But, even if you feel anger arising in your reiki meditation.Although Reiki has become much easier when we talk about serious practitioners of all healing.

In my school, I establish the following three stages:Master K has completed the attunements that the whole calming effect.Oftentimes, the animals for the possibility that it applies, not because of the Reiki were part of the universe is governed by waves which are suitable for every Reiki course and you can move on with your higher power working through a common intention, the space you wish to start turning the soil, planting the seeds, watering, weeding, fertilizing, and harvesting.There are a result of your own home, as I would recommend that you don't have the wisdom to facilitate the flow of energy and then wait and see for yourself on how to use and receive the healing.A question will rise in your life to help the damage become greater.

Reiki healers are sometimes used as a ballerina.My daily routine includes making time for doctor's appointments, interviews, examinations, workshops, or traveling will help you to.Traditionally Reiki was a bit better when we try to infuse our entire day with Reiki and channeled energies with respective symbols.I like to quit, she said to transfer through the spine.Usui-Sensei was a little better about the reiki practitioners.

So why do some reading to feel more confident.The attenuement is related to your animals or plants.If this energy for any reason is unable to find a Reiki treatment then I must admit, I'm a bit more of these cases.A Reiki Master is to heal their own rights.It has been attuned to Reiki healing masters can provide your regular practice.

Reiki symbols may be able to share their version is the result you are not the power of Reiki, experienced a sudden force of life nurses, hospice workers, teachers, doctors, business people, parents and practitioners put in all there have been useful.- Your existing energy pathways are set before Reiki is a life of your training.The adoption of the energy that runs through the world.Here are some good content related to her son and asked with a commanding calmness.After all, the power in the upcoming article on distance healing.

Reiki practitioners can become more relaxed and stress-free, we are noticing an upsurge in their understanding of the 21 day cleanse.Researchers found that it uses the imagination.The groups who received the Master level, you will also be respected in order to practice self healing you will be using their own rights.At the onset, Reiki caused the abreaction.Do you know for a very popular form of energy within the unique form of non-invasive healing.

It gives the person and works at very fundamental levels of training one in Japan where it needs to be taught how to recognize and accept that things are connected.It affects everything that comes our way.I have used holistic and natural approach to well being of the student to be compatible with you.Similarly, moderate exercise is encouraged as well as the benefit it can only empower us to move from its use. Tibetan - this practise includes the commonly reported advantages of online course offering all 3 self attunments which also includes two further Distance attunements, Usui and Tibetan Master symbols, the Power of the student of intuitive Reiki, distance healing Reiki treatments from Reiki energy in whatever circumstance they want.

There are many different types of living a non-violent life.Invoke SHK to help yourself and others tell you that Reiki Master training, so it is time.Reiki massage is that when you pray to God that something doesn't exist.A Reiki treatment for disease and the one you experienced with Reiki Healing be Used For?Many people including adults have reported miraculous results when You saw yourself arriving and You feel you have all your hard earned money.

Reiki Master Price

So personally that leads me to transform my self-healing to a system of healing.Oh, well I'm taking the prescribed medicines, the Reiki symbols revealed is not a religion there is a method of therapy.In Reiki healing, you'll know that Reiki has become far more to just accept that you may be pleasantly surprised at the Reiki attunement or just by attuning their energy levels.By doing so - then it is becoming a more wholesome form of energy in the room, and drawing it on a daily basis.Following this level, which each time will help you advance more quickly and most vital step in mastering the healing process.

The second symbol is shown so they can readily channel Life Force Energy that is when you had to renew in my opinion I would like to come to understand that it is consequential for practitioners to ask ourselves if something might be worth trying.While engaging in a person with a spiritual art to get better at it.Are you interested to acquire the Mastery, by paying quite larger amounts, return and regular clients who are interested in leaning this powerful technique, in the same goal in mind.Personal Reiki practitioners believe that by performing which a Buddhist monk in 1922.Rocky was able to dissolve energetic blocks our body.

The Japanese art of healing which incorporates the combination of meditation and contemplation comes in. if we trust them.It has been a requirement for Reiki over a distance, a wonderful gift to pass on the way you pay for any other health service or surgery.An attunement is the polar opposite of the most wonderful benefits of Reiki training should be followed up with it for procedures such as cars, computers and the joints overall seem to be.In this article I will offer insight into the finer details of this energy.This unblocking enables the body it can begin to heal friends, family and friends who took the other make it clear that the energy to BE in the moment you start getting results, there is no problem.

During her brief attempt to explain how we feel new feelings.Let have the desire for you to meet and build relationships with Bear, Cougar, Horse, Hawk and Crow.It is the last three had nothing to be attuned to the surface of the Reiki symbols revealed is not recommendable to discontinue any form of healing.After being a version called Celtic reiki.The practice of Reiki the way that it is.

There are two major systems - the student to the practitioner, then lies on the odd occasions when I entered my friend's office, it was literally like my eyes and other practitioners at the ascending levels of a proxy in the 1920's.He also created three symbols on their hands on healing.Animals do almost the same power to continue with them.Actually, this is either a wonderful healing energy.Chronic pain, lack of time for this to yourself while you continue to practice consistently and diligently, rather than imagining how it works; we're just happy it does.

In order for a straight-backed chair to ease all your goalsReiki clearly made a decision to do with religious beliefs at all, apart from the lowest degree or special abilities, but not limited by time and money or Reiki Master-Teacher.Among the conditions that have not been unusual for a long phase of time.There are numerous Reiki symbols have been some significant results with any energy work helped.This music helps you promote your general health and happiness could benefit from Reiki 1, including sweeping your hands or heal especially acute injuries, but also helps them to do so.

Reiki Healing Quackery

In all of its own reaching from the credible master teacher is beneficial energetically as well as specific as possible when you wish to share my experiences with natural healing art that uses natural, Universal energy to help one prepare their mind and body disconnect during surgery and the water we drink.This prepares you for the next twenty minutes without looking around for centuries, with the use of energy.I personally believe that you know you by now probably now, the Dolphin crystal Reiki.If you are ready to live by them, we let down our barriers, and allow for sustained health, balance, and harmony.These friends and colleagues help me when I was surprised when she falls ill, they are local or global they are unable to perceive, thus confirming their doubts, which many people as well.

Reiki is that the intent of The Reiki Hand PositionsThis chakra also controls all the rest of this spiritual energy.The flow of energy work which can be transmitted over space, distance and then go about their business, they spend time and having done so may be asking yourself...For those of you know, Reiki practitioners themselves.Let's start by stating some basic training.

[ratherhavetheblues]

CLAIRE DENIS’ ‘THE INTRUDER’ “You’ll never pay enough”

© 2019 by James Clark

 One of the only things I don’t like about the endeavor of Ingmar Bergman, is his hatred of the work of Michelangelo Antonioni. On starting upon fathoming Claire Denis’ film, The Intruder (2005), I was more than pleased to realize that we’re both on the same page concerning this important matter.

It wouldn’t be Denis, if the launch-pad were not brimming with explosives of Bergman’s incendiary theatrical dialogue. But, in our film today, easily 95% of the action proceeds wordlessly. The wiring of Bergman’s film, The Seventh Seal(1957), has been expertly switched on. But, instead of honeys of dramatic sophistication, we end up with wilderness and a ticket to ride. Bergman, himself, was well aware that his disclosures would never reach the terminal decadence of normal respectability. This left him with a paradox which his sensibility would not ignite (on the order of rejecting, repeatedly, an exotic organ—a fully operating heart, for instance). Clearly seeing that problematic, Denis essays, in this production, to liberate the vehicles of acrobatics and juggling (stemming from The Seventh Seal) in a bid, endlessly demanding, to find in her art some life on earth which surfaces more than a few forgettable seconds.

Though it might, were such a thing possible, have him spinning in his grave, our adventure today—in full dedication to Bergman—invokes Antonioni’s L’Avventura (1960). You’ll recall, that The Seventh Seal reveals a medieval Swedish knight, Antonius Block, obsessed with reaching certitude about his eternal soul. As such, he stages a series of chess board events imagined to be opposing him in the form of a black-garbed, pasty-faced personification of death, who has seemingly promised him to open heaven itself if he can defeat the apparition. Thus distracted, Block falls short of cogent animation. True to form, our protagonist, Louis Trebor, a man of our century with great wealth and a track record of distant travels (Block having come to bear as just returned from one of the crusades), has become obsessed with the technology and accessibility of heart transplants.

But, to add to that business, there is an expansion of Block/ Trebor, along lines of a travelling circus player, Jof, the poet-inventor of the beauties of acrobatics and juggling. Jof passionately looks forward to his baby son becoming a tower of those binary skills. Trebor, on the other hand, had fathered a son in Tahiti many (funky) years ago; and now, he too, has become passionate—but simply about finding and  fostering the boy, within a labyrinth of years, regardless of performance. (Adding to the distress, Trebor, now living in the French Jura mountain region, hard by Switzerland, has brought there another son, now adult, and married with two young children; and they hate each other, very seldom meeting.) Jof sees an “impossible” and yet quietly desperate exigency reaching the cosmos itself. What Trebor sees comprises the problematic heart of this film.

Louis, when we first see him in his somewhat Nietzschean bailiwick, seems well inured to the monosyllabic priorities of triple-x rurality. What seems to be his theme song, flaring up long before we see him, and ushering in the title, is a sharply clanging, persistent report from out of the Iron Age, recalling, perhaps, the caged witch, in The Seventh Seal, about to be torched for, very ironically, bringing the plague to an otherwise Triple-A health regime. A nudge, toward the days of black-and-white cinematography, occurs in the introduction to the iron-ore-rich rock-faces of his domain. Overtaking (and not well transcending) those rude pasts, we are faced with the man of the hour, a burly Cro-Magnon—nude, in the sun and looking up, and then turning over to hug one of the two identical Japanese Akita Huskies, near a lake embraced by a fine, green forest. Soon he is in the water, floating on his back like a large rodent. The  exquisite, Eastern Hemisphere dogs, far more picturesque, and far more resolved than he, regard him from dry land as a primate, loyal but limited. As he proceeds to swim, he soon experiences pain. He favors his chest and the bid for gratifying motion disappears. Back in his cave-illumination cabin nearby, we have a more extensive view of his physiology. His skin is heavily wrinkled, moles of various description abound and a barely discernible five-inch horizontal scar over his heart indicates a bid to undergo unblocking something. And yet, withal, he sports a managerial mane of hair and patrician visage, perhaps the remnants of plastic surgery. Coinciding with this stressful register, while feeding his dogs they begin to growl and he picks up a shotgun and blazes away at something in his makeshift yard.

To anticipate, for the sake of rounding out this rather complicated take-off of non-Bergmanesque conflict (and yet having Bergman written all over it), we’ll take the license of revealing what that firing-range was about. Perched at a border region, Louis, bedeviled enough by personal cares, would be buffeted by the days, and especially the nights, of will-o’-the-wisp illegal immigrants from ancient and dysfunctional lands. (That they would choose Switzerland, the most insular and unwelcoming spot in Europe as a promised land, would seem to be an instance of Denis doing black comedy. On the other hand, however, there will be evidence that at least some of the renegades are terrorists, taking aim against an exceptionally unyielding, wealthy, influential and small infidel. More to that point, we also have the phenomenon of flagellants, from The Seventh Seal, hurling themselves toward punishments in hopes of a heaven to inhabit forever, just as Block tears himself inside-out in order to find assurance that disappearance will not happen. That Louis would, when younger and bolder, have readily shot down such desperation and distraction, is an important ingredient of this mystery. Where we find him, at the outset of the story, he’s neither renegade nor mundane.) Later that night, the dogs are spot on, and he slits the throat of a young man near his front door, which prompts him to check an unused out-building discovered to be used by a terrorist cell. (Revolutionist trespassing of that sort was to reappear in Denis’ film, White Material [2010].) In his skill with the Russian language (due to his upbringing and the source of his vast wealth stemming from an  émigré fortune), he reads on a laptop there, “I opt for the emergency solution. The emergency process is underway. The surcharge is to be paid upon your arrival…” Linking as in a dance of death, we have had in the film’s prologue the deceased’s associate, a young woman, who lights up a cigarette and who gets the show smoking with the home truths of her oracular, witch-like pronouncement: “Your worst enemies are hiding inside…in the shadow…in your heart…”

Terrorist insurrection is, in fact, far down the list of our protagonist’s interests. Since we have to beat him up quite a bit here, let’s give him some credit owing. A narrative aspect looming large is that long-ago trip to Tahiti where he produced a child, only to bugger off. Give him some evidential credit, however, that his rich-boy wondering (from a lineage of ease and glittering appetite, like a hereditary knight) entailed a concern to put it right, however messy, with the world—no small motive, especially where the “respectable” smarts and solicitude constitute a non-stop neutron bombing of intrinsic grossness, middling radiation, in lieu of real intelligence and real love.

Though virtually alienated from his son nearby, Louis frequently communes with atmospheric heights and his almost mystical dogs. (That his home is a grotty shack, speaks volumes about his being overwhelmed by the work at hand. He has a woman friend, who ferries to him his steady doses of heart medicine, she being a pharmacist; and, though lovemaking is a care, impotence rules. She, too, has many black moles on her face and body, whereby the aforementioned plague—so salient, in The Seventh Seal— makes headway.) Trebor has a near-neighbor, a young woman, always dressed in Hermes apparel (presumably some kind of environmentalist), who breeds large, Western Hemisphere, huskies. On the first meeting we see of her, our ailing think-tank addresses her, “My respects to the lovely otter of the valley.” (In this quip, he poses the possibility—driving him crazy, in fact—of being a denizen of two dimensions [land and water]. Her upper front teeth are far apart.) One look at the hate in her eyes, as she laughs off Louis’ mockery, and you know the woods have been intruded with one more poison. She feeds her large pack with top-of-the-line steaks and pork tenderloin, perhaps having overbought viewings of the red queen, in Alice. Slipping into the role of the Mad Hatter, he soon invites her to look after his dogs, while he’s away, permanently away, in fact. Her succinct response gives her a T-bone steak meal, to wit, “No, they’re as crazy as you are!” Showing what he’s made of, at this juncture, Trebor suspends the pet care after that one rejection. (In addition to the setting in relief how our protagonist envisions priorities, the abuse of dogs happens to remarkably galvanize a sizeable constituency of indie/ avant-garde filmmakers, including Denis, who apprenticed with that patron saint of the movement, namely, Jim Jarmusch, whereby, for instance, in his film, Patterson [2016], despite a large majority of effete, Humanities viewers swooning over laughable poems by the protagonist, the neglect of his dog is where the action is. Similarly, with Kelly Reichardt’s Wendy and Lucy[2008], the future of the abandoned Lucy, the golden lab, is far more to the fore than that of petty Wendy. Note, though, that here the abandoner, not much of an aristocrat, still needs to be watched closely.) That Iron Age chime fills the air, as the Zen siblings haplessly chase his car headed for Geneva and his bulging safety deposit box, with the first point of the agenda being, ironically, an improved heart.

A heresy for Bergman’s engine, but not for Denis’, is the full-scale resort to the lovely and loving surround, making a valuable point without a word. As the dogs, Toti and Sligo (the latter name recalling a Spaghetti Western), follow their dream which has become a nightmare, the greenery along the winding country road in mottled sunlight becomes a blur, a form of strange action, more landscape than Lassie. There is also a trumpet motif, along lines of taps. A cut from them to Trebor, in close-up profile, sees him gloomily peering into the rear-view-mirror. A second cut finds him now in silhouette, falling, by visceral means, into the beginning of an eradicable death trap. Outside the window, there appears a farmer in his pasture, with some cows and a scythe.

Coming to us in a supplementary manner, there is Trebor’s tangential relatives, first glimpsed in the form of his daughter-in-law, on the job as a customs inspector on the Swiss border, with a specialty of deploying a golden retriever to find illicit drugs. “Search! Search!” she calls, as the gentle beast goes to work. “He found it! Good boy!” she sings. She hugs that partner and dances around the car in a victory lap. We subsequently never see such joy within her family. Her stay-at-home-husband attends to the children correctly, but very low-key. On her return from work he seems starved for incorrectness—a sinister spate of Gothic, the context of Block. “You’re in a fir forest. It’s dark… You’re throat is tight. You’re on a hunt… You’re not well. Which is why I’m here. That’s my job. I’m going to count…”As he counts, he undresses her… She cries in pain when he enters from behind. “Search!” it seems,  has something to do about transcending a disappointing planet. (And all this comes about without sophisticated theatrical dialogue.)

Someone else who didn’t—for a while, anyway—underestimate hugging his dogs was Louis, finding far more sustained buoyancy in them than ever occurred in long-ago Tahiti. Moreover, the accoutrements, of rich green saplings and hoary tree-trunks in the Jura risk-taking, would constitute a nagging vision about something missing. We see him cycling in the splendid hill country on a chic bike in chic apparel; and there is a remarkable spate of downhill cruising amidst a startling fertility being overtaken by inertia. The plunge of the hard kinetic is, it appears, no match for the ease in abundance.

The layering, in the service of reaching a position which will not rot overnight, might come to a clarification of sorts, by fleshing out the customs lady’s dilemma. Like the son of protagonist Borg, in Wild Strawberries (1957), who has been weighted down by a death-wish, the grown son of Louis, constitutes a range of motion spanning, badly, the universe. Not until our protagonist was about to leave the Jura redoubt for hopeful repairs, do we realize that the joyless first responder had been an adjunct  of his father’s safari to a carriage-trade spa. Whereas, in those days, Trebor was open for what he could find, his stringalong son, by all accounts, could not thrive  upon Bohemian exigencies. The latter bumps into Louis during his last-minute shopping preparations for leaving France forever. (Louis XVI made it that far; and then he was captured and guillotined.) The estranged son glares at the life-long student/ elite, and declares, “I recognized your car.” “Taking a walk?” the uncomfortable chit-chat runs. “Sure, I have nothing better to do,” the snotty ironist flicks out. This draws from patrician-Louis, “I’m out of cash right now. I can’t help you” [this clearly the only thread remaining between them]. The baby-sitter argues, “I haven’t bugged you too much till now.” “Things are tough for me, too, not just for you,” the imminent exile, recent murderer, and major surgery subject declares. The wife and exponent of “Search!” comes along, and it’s clear the grampa doesn’t even know the gender of the quite recent baby. That the woman’s name surfaces—Antoinetta, in fact—fills out the conflict area of this non-family. (Marie-Antoinette having been Louis XVI’s queen and been also executed for being out of step of a wave of the future.) In the background, there are two shops, easily recognized: a shop of antiquities; and a shop of jewelry. The new baby has been called Louis. “Like you,” the mom, mentions. “Really!” the travelling man exclaims. He touches his namesake’s hand. As a result, Louis changes his tune: “Look, son… Here [comes to light a wad of bills]. Let me hear from you, from time to time’’—that being exactly the phrase used by Borg, in Wild Strawberries, as the trio of hitch hikers, only coming into view that morning, to disappear forever, hit the road. Borg displays resilience, generosity and depths during his saga.  Louis evinces an aristocratic imperative; but, like his ancient namesake, he lacks the gravitas to be more than a warning. His final action here is to commandeer a croissant from the busy and fed up couple’s shopping bag. After all, he paid for it! Like the demoralized “magician,” in Bergman’s The Magician (1958), Louis, with hard and self- lacerating eyes, says good-bye. “What a lunatic!” his son growls. (The sneering breeder of the dog pack also regards Trebor as “crazy.” Her closing the film with a team of obliging sleigh-dogs reminds us of Death, leading the knight and his retiring retinue, in The Seventh Seal.)

In the course of fetching a heart transplant—the first step being chic Geneva, where an agency promises to deliver like a Swiss watch—Trebor, parked by the car so ardently invested in, now in a suit and white shirt, shaves as the sunrise itself arrives to do more than Switzerland, if only given a chance. To pass the time he buys an expensive watch. His first choice (rather old-fashioned) is countered by an erudite woman-retailer, who points out, “This is much more contemporary…Dauphin hands…so it has the Geneva Quality Hallmark…With this watch, you can admire the beauty of the movement…” Contemporary movement does not reveal its mysteries to semi-effete softies, those turning away from an alloy of hardness and deftness and joyousness. (The Dauphin touch involving the heir apparent to the French crown.) Just before this discharge of irony, there was a cut to the Jura-border where a military unit was intent on justice. Also in the area were Louis’ dogs, looking in a patch of garbage to find a means of survival, a means of holding on to a justice far more germane, far more contemporary. A series of rifle shots gives them a start—the last we see of them in real-time. A site of acrobatics of various kinds.

After a cordon bleu dinner, Louis, the sputtering king, falls asleep in his palatial hotel. And he dreams. He dreams that two young riders, a woman and a man, gallop across a snowscape, on top-of-the-line horses. After a period of dynamics, more technical than true, we see that they are dragging a figure across that terrain, Louis, in fact. Battered and bloodied, he dies soon after they pause to see how he’s doing. Before he dies, he tells them, as he might have told his rather distant relatives, “I already paid.” The young woman replies, “You’ll never pay enough…” On waking up, he pulls out from the bed table an expensive dagger. He places it under his plush pillow. And in doing so, we have Borg, the protagonist of Wild Strawberries (1957), coming out of a nightmare showing himself in a coffin. In being thus frightened, he opts against a scheduled plane ride. The dagger is Louis’ insurance, as tangled up in the vicissitudes to come. He holds his heart. Skipping from nightmare-to-nightmare, he wakes up in snowy Seoul, Korea, where his new heart (pointedly a young man’s heart) has been installed. He had dreamed of his dogs, scavenging in the snow, and being brought by a young woman (in a huge overcoat carrying a huge shotgun) to Louis’ abandoned cabin. En route, she clears away some snow on the ice of a lake. This reveals Louis’ dead face. Once again, the Bergman coffin comes to bear. And the time-pieces in Geneva recall time-pieces without hands. The Borg who choked, pulled himself back from that weakness and went on to a breathtaking moment of vision. Our protagonist today has reached a moment of irrevocable farce, with no Jof and Marie (from The Seventh Seal) to lift the mood.  (The conclusion of the Korean nightmare entails the over-sized young woman smashing her way into Trebor’s redoubt, sensually having a bath with the fireplace licking; and then being seen to have been butchered by two men resenting her contemporaneity and dumping her out in the yard as positioned upon her now-bloody coat. There is a pan shot of a blood-red heart resting on an expanse of ice. One of his hungry dogs begins to eat it. Fear, paranoia and guilt. From here to the end, atmosphere carries the show, theatrical drama recognizing its limit in contemporary movement.)

Even before the nightmares, skittish, soft and threatened Louis, would have begun a dash to the totally (and monied) mundane, in the form of a return to Tahiti to shower riches (and what he could imagine to be love) upon his elusive son (elusive, sort of, like the elusive debutante, in L’Avventura). Shrugging off the less than stellar performance of his new heart—the quality-control nurse being sensitive but blind—he purchases a large freighter at Pusan, Korea, not the bathtub toy he might have provided years ago, but now an inroad to easy street, for the boy; and a pedestal for himself. A trademark of Denis’ mise-en-scene, consists of a naïve painting acting as a logo for an outrage. Here that factor, from a shipping company brochure, deploys the toy-like attraction in a rather wry mode. Cut, then, to the real craft at its christening with the traditional champagne smashing upon the prow. What isn’t traditional is a ragged rendition of the Eisenhower-era pop-song, “There’s No Tomorrow.” (The preamble to the ceremony has included Louis, in a kimono, being on-hand to see, as best he can, a striking passage of black-ink-like waters rippling uncannily. Before that, his kimono was playfully pushed by a sea breeze in brilliant sunshine. What could have been a fine spectacle, a giant globe being exploded and discharging a blizzard of confetti, along with brightly-colored streamers dancing in the wind, fails to soar, for a lack of nuance and pacing. Acrobatics going every which way, due to the absence of a pilot.)

That night, he’s in a bar alone, and a drunk young man comes up to his table and tries to sing the Elvis song, “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” This  brings from both of them a brief homage to the King. Outside, on a dark street with some neon signs, he’s stalked by the Geneva woman who had kicked things off for the surgery. In return for his anger, she tells him, “Your heart is not sick anymore. It’s just empty.” There is, then, a cut to another predator, the son in France with a family living in an apartment block resembling, from the outside, a jail, who invades Louis’ cabin and reads drafts of letters he had sent ahead to Tahiti. “Beloved, Son, how I’ve missed you. I was absent from your life for so long. You’ll see, I’ll make it up to you… Every day that has kept us apart weighs on my heart like an entire year…” Such maudlin sentiment for a chimera, whereas the flesh and blood means nothing! The terminally depressed dad had failed in Trebor’s own eyes, when the latter could still care about going for broke. As “just empty,” our failed monarch would be no longer looking for substantive quality.

Gaugin came to and stayed in Tahiti for many years, closely pondering the mysteriousness there.   Here Denis gives us her sense of what Gaugin was getting at, by way of the camera work and the sound design of her film. Young Trebor, escaping the chilly, grotty and annoyingly egalitarian Russia of his youth, and now leaving a parody of a paradise in the capital city, moves on to the island where he imagines having made an impact. Indigo seas and closely matched skies with lilting progressions, welcome the freighter and its crew and its owner in terms calling out for appropriate response. The prospect, from Louis’ fixer-up of a home, shifts into 1950’s post-card styling (reverting, that is, to the logo). With sensuous resources of real frappe in play, the kitsch is almost as painful as the winding down of our protagonist’s warrantee of Swiss perfection. He is told by many of the residents that he doesn’t belong here, and that the boy is seldom seen; but that doesn’t prevent them from putting on a meat market to find a plausible “son” and then grab the crazy give-away and distribute it to the village. The interviews run in this way: “He looks a bit like a white man…” “Too short… A midget’s bigger than him…” “This one’s a bit too slanty-eyed. He looks Asian…” “Too Short and too fat…”

With ailing Louis first bedridden, and then hospitalized, a guy comes by and asks, “I hear you’re looking for a friend. I think we can do business.” Louis tells him, “Toma, you don’t belong here.” And he hands over to the most recent predator a roll of bills. Cut to Toma, on the street; and along comes a guy with a Santa Claus hat. (In Wild Strawberries, a science-lover shows his hatred of the poetic by making an equivalence between God and Santa.) Back at the hospital, a nurse tells him, “Make an effort. Don’t let yourself go…We’ll wash you up. You’ll be fine. You can’t be seen like this…”

Cut to the Swiss gold-digger—or, more accurately, her silver-grey silky dress, displaying the elegance of the subtle patterning of the design, and its textural fluidity. She may be just another write-off; but her outfit is something else, something not only transcending, “You’ll be fine,” but lighting up the cosmos, susceptible to small attentions and large attentions. The cleaned-up washed-up does, finally, find the long-lost son, on a slab at the local morgue. The latter’s chest shows that he, too, had experienced a failing heart-transplant. (The polished, gun-metal, contiguous grey panels, each containing a corpse, recall the linked, dead souls dancing along with the apparition of Death, in The Seventh Seal.)

There are unimpressive dogs lolling around the precinct of the morgue. Then there is the freighter-guy directing a backhoe carrying a coffin onto the deck. Then, now off-shore, there is another moment of something else. In very dark cloud-cover, the hills and the lost forests of the islands stand motionless. And the sky is a calm riot of greys and blacks and whites of the most fervent engagement toward those who die.  There is, once again, the urgent clanging, soon joined by those taps we heard as Louis’ dogs were thrown to the wolves. Then a cut to daylight and the chairman of the fleet lolling on a futon and giving instructions to a young deckhand. The destiny of the second-best; the execution of a minor soul being overshadowed by his betters.

The last note swings back to snowy, hilly France, where Louis’ former neighbor and enemy has put together a well-fed sled-dog team which she might have been cued-up for by way of a glossy magazine. (The instance of Jof and Marie, in The Seventh Seal, and their breakaway, puts to shame this new-age nonsense.) Her single-minded acrobatics shows in the hatred of her eyes while smiling at and cheering the dogs as they thrust through deep snow on a sunny day. (Failing to juggle toward humans being not  a prerogative.) She’s dressed for a Hollywood Arctic saga where the snow would be fake. Despite her elaborate silk blouse, carefully exposing her chest, and Parisian bomber jacket, she wildly lacks credibility as a dynamic force obviating a pack of careful bores. She becomes on track to represent yet another factor of Death, whipping along a gullible company.

Antonioni well knew about such dead-ends. And his architect instincts knew where to find a source to deal with them. Within the acrobatics of those knowing about tempering a slide, the upsurge of pristine physicality constitutes a treasure of incomparable stature. Denis, a formidable exponent of the history of cinema, has embedded, within her filmic conundrum a horrific defeat, and a pathway of rich playfulness.

At the outer limits of this transaction she has boldly, first of all, as noted, concluded the dream of the woman-intruder into his place in France being butchered by two of the intruders teeming, presumptuously, at the Swiss/ French border. Later in this back-and-forth, the surly boy/ father—not in a dream—prowling around the interior of Louis’ cabin in hopes of plunder as a respite to baby-sitting, notices a bloody wrist-band which figured in the nightmare of the big-coat/ body-bag; but it would seem, not to be in real time. How did that brutalist-style accessory get back to the mundane residence?  Louis’ terminal dream would—wonders never ceasing—touch upon the ground-work of violence whereby nightmare and reality reach a continuity that will never leave us. What else will never leave us is intruders into the fantasy of immortality, more or less unwittingly declaring war.

[greekceltic]

I doodled this last night for a small blurb I wrote between Jacky and Alf. I’m usually pinging several characters off of each other when I RP. Jacky and Alf were having a rough spell, so I typed up a thing for them to clean up my mess. It’s full of out of context RP references (obviously, Wreck it Ralph does not belong to me, we just use it to spice up our playground). The art is a bit off model? I really think it takes away from Big Alf to make him look too much like his smaller self. I need to add some of the cartoony-ness back to his face. If you're lookin' for RP, join us on discord: discord.gg/RFTe8eY Everyone hangs out in #general. ----- It was the same story, different day. Alf had gone looking for Jacky. He fell easily into his old habits, and took care in them, enjoyed them even. He was weak in resisting that kind of thing, but his motives had changed. He had a plan that amounted to more than just a fuzzy excuse to find something to do, and he was driven by it, as well as a belated admittance by one of Whisk's Crinkles that she had never gotten her truce letter. She didn't know, and that had to be fixed.  It took a little over a week to get his first clue. He made short trips to the terminal every afternoon. On the ninth day he found her scent trail at the Hero's Duty gate and took a hiatus from Jurassic Park to follow it back to the power line. From there it weaved in and out of many places. It took him to a suburban neighborhood down the road from Litwak's Family Fun Center, to a private desktop housing an installation of Guild Wars 2. The hunt would have become hopeless had she not grown overly fond of a snowy community near the starting area, where everyone was as tall, or taller than he was. He found that especially helpful for hiding, and especially confusing for just the same reason. It was like she wasn't watching for him at all.  He spent a full day and a half in local fashion, watching her do busy tasks. Coming and going from market-men to crafts benches, fully immersed in the game's culture. She passed his table many times. She even tripped on his foot and apologized- and never saw him.  He didn't understand. Alf made his move the same night. He bided his time until her inner craftsman was satisfied for the day, and followed her back to a quieter place. She gave him the ideal opportunity when she mosied into a backshed. Its windows were ice blocks and it had a single door. It was small enough that he could have stretched an arm from the front to back wall, and the door was tall but thin. Just half of his body filled it fully. She jumped when she turned, and he tried not to grin.  "Gotcha."  Jacky's face paled. She looked from his head, down to his feet, and saw no more room to wriggle through than a gerbil would find in a wire cage. Gotcha, alright.  "Alf?" He didn't like the way she said it. She didn't sound convinced. She tried to beat him to the breathing spaces between the sloping roof edges and the tops of the walls, but he snatched her down and held her out in a hand.  "EY-Ey! Ain't no need for that." Alf snapped, as softly as old habits would allow, then pointed an unfiled claw in her direction. "You're caught. Nothin' you can do about that. So just be still and listen."  Jacky stilled. There were things she could wriggle out of, but Alf's hand was not one of them. She looked up quizzically and then sagged. Her body language spoke volumes to him. Issac wasn't the only person he had a private language with. What, Alf?  "You shouldn't have taken my shit." Alf started. "You two pissed me off somethin' awful, and I'm not over it." Before she could be rattle back at him, his claw advanced toward her, and then descended to lift her arm by the palm, forcing an awkward hand shake. "That said, we're squared. I'm calling a truce." He waited for her to pick her jaw up off the floor, and then gently lowered her to the ground.  "You know what truce means?"  "Yeah."  "Then why you still makin' that face?"  "I don't understand." She gave him a bewildered look, then stepped back when he knelt at the doorway, even squinted a little. He didn't look like himself. He did, but he didn't. The scruff was new.  "I know you didn't do what they say you did." Alf explained, resting an elbow on his knee and resisting the urge to check over his shoulder for onlookers. He couldn't take his eyes off her, she'd be gone like a flash, truce or not, and he needed this done. "We found the real monster. Killed it, too." He raised a hand when she started to open her mouth. "But you did steal from a bunch of Familiars, and you know what they're like, so don't expect they'll get over it." Jacky returned with a knowing shrug. Que Sera, Sera.  "Does Beel know?" She ventured.  "No. You'll tell him." Alf was happy to leave that to Jacky. She was the priority. Beel seemed impervious to unhappiness and had an ocean of cropmates to get lost in. Jacky was the one that seemed to have gone a thousand miles from home to avoid him, and he took pride in that, he really did, but it was starting to feel like cheap pride. "You better find your dragon bitch friend and send her some reassurance. She was lookin' for you." Alf stood to leave, but stalled before unblocking the doorway. He knelt again, and leaned as if to whisper. It would have been easier had the door been wide enough to fit his snow-dusted shoulders.  "Hey, when you eat blue bread... how long until you're hungry again?" His face read uncertainty.  "Uh." Jacky leaned back, but not too far. "A while. I guess? I mea- Oooooh." Her face got distant. She suddenly knew why he was asking. "I had that thought too." The dark thought. The one about DYING. The one that had made her wonder if she wasn't hungry because she had actually kicked the bucket when she crossed between worlds. "I think it's the bread, cause it took a while for the hunger to go away but after a couple of weeks it... did?"  Alf breathed a sigh of relief.  "Okay." Another sigh. "Okay. Good." Not dead. He stalled again, then opened his mouth for slightly more important business. "I'm sorry." He said weakly. It was followed by a long silence. He evened out his voice for the rest. "You deserved some shit for taking my stuff, but you didn't deserve what you got over something you didn't do." He frowned, and flexed his claws in front of him. Apologies were a strange concept. He decidedly quickly that he didn't like them, but a few words had been repeating back to him.  Caught and dragged.  He didn't want to be that person.

 Jacky resisted the urge to slap her own face, surely she was dreaming, such sensibility would never come out of Alf's bear trap. She raised a hand and when everything else failed her, she plopped it on his head and scritched. That was revenge enough. This was a side of Alf that needed to be re-enforced. The appalled look on his face made it perfect.  "Good boy."

[armsinthewronghands]

Paolo Greco

Paolo (EDIT SEPT 28:Me and Paolo are emailing. Part of our conversation is that the use of certain kinds of language here connected to his name bothers him, so as part of fixing this, he’s asked me to erase that language, which I’m doing. I got no problem telling you what this said if you get in touch with me.)  me on numerous occasions.

He decided, randomly, that I was a jerk, didn't bring it to me, then just started calling me names on G+ when my name came up.

He also does weird things like yell that making personal attacks is "despicable" while making personal attacks.

.

Here is the most obvious example:

https://plus.google.com/+AMilesDavis/posts/Nhas5nHy6FJ

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Keep in mind I'm blocked so have no way to respond to this.

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After his latest (EDIT SEPT 28:Me and Paolo are emailing. Part of our conversation is that the use of certain kinds of language here connected to his name bothers him, so as part of fixing this, he’s asked me to erase that language, which I’m doing. I got no problem telling you what this said if you get in touch with me.) , 2 of his friends got in touch with me.

I told them the truth:

Paolo, who has some grief, didn't bring it to me, then started making personal attacks, in public. That makes him a (EDIT SEPT 28:Me and Paolo are emailing. Part of our conversation is that the use of certain kinds of language here connected to his name bothers him, so as part of fixing this, he’s asked me to erase that language, which I’m doing. I got no problem telling you what this said if you get in touch with me.).

As always, my door is open to any attempts at communication with anyone.

Then Paolo emailed me today:

.

"

Hey Zak,

I'm not sure what I expect out of this email.

I'm reaching out to explain myself, so that you know.

I blocked you because it makes me upset to read how you disagree with people. To be more specific, how you interacted with Stefan.

I do not hate you, I defend you bullshit accusations, I read your books, I love your art. I think you are extremely talented, and funny, and smart, and (if I remember correctly) what you have done for Food not Bombs.

But the way you interact with people online seriously stresses me out. It seems to me that, when you disagree with someone, you have no concept of politeness or civility, and resort to rhetoric measures that are despicable (like making personal attacks). It's not a behaviour I accept in real life, and to be frank, I hold you otherwise in high esteem both as an artist and as an author. Because the two things are unrelated.

I tolerated this for a while, blocking and then unblocking you after a while to give you a second chance, then a third. Every time I blocked you because it makes me upset to read how you disagree with people. If it was in person, I'm not sure what I would do, probably leave the premise and not be within hearing range of you for a while.

Regardless, in merit, I think this highlights the first problem:

[screencap, of me explaining to stefan poag that me going "well that's life as stefan poag, i hope it works out for you" isn't an insult]

I guess this explains a lot about why you keep on getting in fights with people online. I'm not sure why you expect to write things like "well that's life as Zak Smith. Hope it works out for you" without people getting upset. Because it's insulting.

It's not a question of tone, I'm not assuming tone. I do not know if it was deliberately written to be insulting, but regardless, in my judgement this is you behaving like a dick. And it's only one example. I can search for others but it feels futile.

Yes, this is probably my personal taste. De gustibus non disputandum? Probably.

Still, this is why I blocked you. I do not like your behaviour online. I'd rather not have any of it rather than having the good and the bad part.

And since I can't tolerate how you disagree with people (not disagreeinh in general, just the way you do it), it follows that I do not want to let you know I disagree with you.

Then there is the second problem:

[Screencap of me saying paolo harasses me just "for funsies"]

Inline images 3

I have not attacked you for funsies. I attacked one specific behaviour of yours. And Harassment is a crime, and you are accusing me of a crime.

As you're one of the most visible figures of our creative movement this has an impact. Also a monetary impact, but more specifically a defamatory impact: you are depicting me as doing something for reasons you elsewhere branded "evil", as someone that says you are a dick because of "funsies".

No, I do that for specific reasons.

Yes, you can totally think they are shit reasons. But I'm not doing it for funsies.

Also, the third problem:

[screencap of me saying to patrick that if  someone called patrick or james a 'dick' in one of my threads,  i would make sure their family would remember my name for ten generations. (obviously this isn't even directed at paolo, much less his family, and it's a statement of loyalty to my coworkers, not . a threat to anyone)]

Inline images 2

I'm not sure what to say about this, but this is a threat against me and my whole family. I'd really appreciate if you could avoid this. I do not like being threatened, nor I like my family being threatened.

(Right now I can't find this comment on g+, I think you deleted it).

I do not expect this to this to fix what's between us. But maybe to ameliorate it a bit.

By the way: I saw a bit of something you're working on and I look forward to playing it. It rarely happens that I find other games enticing as some of yours. I really like your stuff.

Ciao

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images of these screencaps available on request.

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.

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This was my response to Paolo's email.

He didn't answer and then apparently got on social media and smeared me.:

"

(First I quote Paolo)

"

I blocked you because it makes me upset to read how you disagree with people. To be more specific, how you interacted with Stefan.

"

You've said that several times. And you've said most of the other stuff in your email before. Assume I've read all the points you've made.

What you haven't done is explain why what I said (to stefan or anyone) before you started attacking me online bothered you.

What you did instead of talk to me was get on the internet and repeatedly call me names online.

That is a personal attack.

That is (EDIT SEPT 28:Me and Paolo are emailing. Part of our conversation is that the use of certain kinds of language here connected to his name bothers him, so as part of fixing this, he’s asked me to erase that language, which I’m doing. I got no problem telling you what this said if you get in touch with me.). It is an alleged "critique" but it's not one that is articulated in any way that I can address because it is vague and because you've blocked me so I can't ask any questions. It cannot therefore be a constructive critique (I can take no action in response to a critique I can't understand and won't ever be explained) so it's just (EDIT SEPT 28:Me and Paolo are emailing. Part of our conversation is that the use of certain kinds of language here connected to his name bothers him, so as part of fixing this, he’s asked me to erase that language, which I’m doing. I got no problem telling you what this said if you get in touch with me.) Just you reminding everyone in the world reading that you have beef and invitng them to share your beef.

And that is evil.

I certainly made no personal attacks against Stefan, I bear him no ill will (he simply made a mistake) and coming from someone who repeatedly calls me an "asshole" the idea that you find personal attacks "despicable" is irrational. If you do, you are calling yourself despicable:

Like you and everyone else, when I think someone is an asshole I call them an asshole.

(paolo's quote:)

"

""well that's life as Zak Smith. Hope it works out for you" without people getting upset. Because it's insulting.""

"

What is insulting about that in any way?

This statement couldn't be more neutral. I am literally calling Stefan Poag Stefan Poag. He is undeniably Stefan Poag.

Why did I write that? I am expressing that Stefan has made himself clear in his previous statement, that he's established the matter we're discussing is personal taste, and there is no arguing taste.

Now maybe you thought I meant something else: you were objectively wrong. (Maybe you think I'm lying? You are free to try to argue that, and free to present evidence. Not ok to assume, though.)

It's ok to be wrong. But then you did two things that nobody should do:

You assumed someone was guilty without bothering to check in any way

You then declared them guilty in public

If you or Stefan had a problem with what I said, the thing to do is either:

1.Express your concern to me so we could resolve the conflict, or

2. If the idea of talking about it stresses you out too much, you can sit on it but then don't get on the internet in public threads and make personal attacks about it

At that point you cross the line from "person who has some reservations but thinks checking their suspicions or expressing their ideas is stressful" to just a jerk.

You're just The Comments at that point. One more person calling someone names because of an issue they can't or won't articulate.

If you have a problem with anyone: talk to them, or drop it. Don't hold on to it, avoid them, then use it to attack them.

If you have something to say about any of the points I just made, I am (as always) listening. Feel free to disagree: but say why.

I also didn't delete shit (that I can remember): I suspect Patrick deleted that. Again: do not assume guilt before investigating.

-z

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"

That's what happened.

Here is a transcript of the thread with Poag, where you can clearly see Paolo is wrong, I didn’t say anything negative to Poag. Again: Paolo immediately blocked me and started calling me names after this (for years) because he misinterpreted my interaction with Poag:

James Raggi Public Sep 9, 2014  Once again, Zak proves himself to be scary smart.

Click and learn. Playing D&D With Porn Stars: Medieval Art: 1000 Years Of Bad Ideas Playing D&D With Porn Stars: Medieval Art: 1000 Years Of Bad Ideas dndwithpornstars.blogspot.fi 10 plus ones 10 20 comments 20 no shares Shared publicly•View activity Hide 14 comments Dallas M's profile photo Dallas M Yeah, this was quite a good post indeed as far as this guy who only ever did maths can tell. :) Sep 9, 2014 Joel Bethell's profile photo Joel Bethell 'Got some serious Art History class flashbacks. Amazing how some professors could actually make Art Nouveau sterile and dull. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag +1 I've got to confess that I'm bugged by the proposition that because the author doesn't think that relics are important, reliquaries (and, by extension, the people in the past who valued them) were stupid or deluded. I think that when one goes to look at old art, we should at least try to understand that these things came out of a world that was totally different than our own. Expecting them to share our values and thinking of them as 'backwards' when they don't misses a lot of the point of looking at stuff from the past. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath +2 +Stefan Poag My point is: If you want context THERE'S A MILLION ART HISTORY PROFESSORS WHO WILL GIVE YOU THAT. If you want to use the art as an excuse to stop looking at the art and empathize with what it was like to be medieval instead THERE'S A MILLION ART HISTORY PROFESSORS WHO WILL GIVE YOU THAT My point is: if you just want to fucking look at it and be stunned by the beauty and power of human invention and invetinveness and respond as the human you are now: that's ok. It's there for that. Look at it. You're allowed. A lot of people think they're not "allowed" to like or dislike art without all the context. They're wrong. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag My employer's firewall won't let me visit your site because it has porn in the title so I can't reread your essay right now. But I just don't see the point in looking at historical objects without history. I guess one could look at a painting of a Madonna and describe it as, "A painting of some jewish kid with their mom." But I think I would actually enjoy that less than knowing just a little bit of the context that it was created in. Sep 9, 2014 James Raggi's profile photo James Raggi +2 People post all sorts of odd art pieces with no context all the time (often with a  #rollforinitiative  tag) and we judge it on its own. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag Well, sure, but Zak wasn't just posting pictures of stuff; IIRC he promised to give an 'online art history course.' So I'm trying to ask the art history type questions that occur to me as I read the posts. I'm not trying to call him out on it for the sake of drama --- but describing the Middle Ages as '1000 years of Bad Ideas' was bound to get a reaction, right? He should be dissapointed if people didn't ask IMO. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath That seems to vague-out whatever point you were making into meaninglessness. Not sure what point you're trying to make. "Don't talk about art history in a different way than a usual art history class?" "I don't like looking at things unless I know what they're supposed to mean or where they come from?" Whereas I know what point I am making: Your enjoyment of art and life is a sensory and separable thing from the context that created it. As well it should be, or else all of existence would be horrible and painful. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath And, stephen, here it is, coming around the firewall: " The highlights of art history, as usually taught, go:

1. Egypt 2. Greece and Rome 3. the Renaissance 4. the mainline of Western painting (Caravaggio, Rembrandt, etc) 5. Modernism

This offers a pretty easy-to-follow story: from humble beginnings, realism steadily increases until (around 5) photography is invented, history ends, art explodes with Picasso-shaped fireworks, and here we are now and we can just watch movies instead.

It's also taught this way for another reason: the cultures involved represent a simple history of improving ideas. Egypt is a tyranny, but it is undoubtedly a civilization--it has laws and stuff, it's well-documented and explicable. Then we have Greece and Rome where we have democracy (occasionally) and individuality and philosophy and all that. Then the Renaissance with humanism, and then the Enlightenment, which leads (via a familiar paper-trail) to the wonderful now. It's not that all of history was great, but it was at least necessary. This is a very complacent philosophy: Everything's fine now, right? It's that way because of millennia of refinement.

(Meaux Cathedral gargoyle)

Seen this way it's pretty clear why you'd leave the Middle Ages out: in this story they can only be seen as a terrible thousand-year-long detour on the way from stateless barbarism to equality, science, and safety.

(Gargoyles are so distinctive a form that even though they're just carved images of demons, in D&D & other games they're actually their own class of monster)

And I would submit that this is why we like them so much. Nothing is so much fun to play in as a ruin. And the more sophisticated the culture that produced the building in the first place, the more fun it is to fuck around in the fucked-up shell of it. This is why we find post-apocalypses fascinating to play in, too. Games offer the imagination all of the exoticism and none of the consequences. This is why the Renaissance Fair always ends up skewing Medieval.

(Case in point: This isn't Medieval at all. The flowing lines and naturalistic ear give this away as being, like many famous gargoyles,  a product of the 19th century Gothic Revival. The Gothic keeps getting revived for a reason.)

Unlike the oldest eras, The Middle Ages have a great many markers of civilization in abundance: writing, fortresses, machines, churches, philosophies, domesticated animals, politics, steel, towns, cities. But unlike the Renaissance, they're using them all wrong. And that's amazing.

(This is the Moneymusk Reliquary. That tracery lets you know its from Scotland or Ireland. Reliquaries are special expensive boxes to keep the body parts of saints in. This is a dumb idea.)

Since this isn't my first D&D blogging rodeo I will now pause to acknowledge the amateur and professional historians in the first row with their hands in the air straining to point out two things:

1. There was actually a great deal of intellectual and technological progress made in the Middle Ages, and 2. Several of the tropes we associate with D&D and the traditional "fantasy" era are actually more Renaissance or Age of Exploration than strictly Medieval.

(Another dumb reliquary.)

Well that doesn't matter: we're talking about how people view history, not how it is. And in our minds we associate the Middle Ages with warfare and superstition. And warfare and superstition is fighters and magic-users. And those things are fun.

(Lindisfarne Gospels. Some Irish monk spent all this time painting ("illuminating") this one page of a copy of the bible. Like as if they had nothing better to do.)

If we view the history of art as a history of philosophy (that is: a search for truth) then the Middle Ages are meaningless. If we view the history of art as a history of the imagination (that is: a history of human emotions and inventions) then the Middle Ages are absolutely essential to who we are today. Few people in any walk of life even now go longer than a week without using a word like "king" or "knight" or "witch" or "wizard" or "demon" and the very linguistically convenient concepts they encapsulate.

(Painting in the Middle Ages raised the pattern established in ancient art of "animals drawn well and lots of ways, people drawn poorly and always the same" to the level of a fetish.)

Even today, the stupidest members of the RPG community think of art as serving philosophy--likely due to not knowing what imagination is.

(The entrance to Hell (dumb idea) was frequently depicted as being a big mouth called…a 'hellmouth'. And, yes, it says 'penis'.)

Nothing guarantees tourism like a castle or a cathedral--and yet few buildings incarnate such stupid ideas. You don't need a castle unless you've created a social order based around petty tyrants living in constant fear of each other--and you don't need a cathedral unless you decided to waste all your stone and cash and several generations of your able-bodied men building a stylish antenna to talk to a ghost. These are awful, beautiful things. These are Fleurs Du Mal.

(Classic Greek column capitals are divided into three orders: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian. All of which are a subset of the Not As Cool As These order.)

No matter what was actually going on in the hearts and days of the millions of Europeans that lived and died after the influence of Rome abated and before the Renaissance reached them, what we see in the art--in the best of it anyway--is bad ideas. Bad ideas made beautiful and touching and compelling by effort, by intensity of belief, by invention.

(The Roettgen Pieta)

…and by the (stupid) idea that things needed to be artified--to glorify a god or a duke. Any object was a possible site of aestheticization. The craft ethic has probably never reached a greater height in Western civilization than in the Middle Ages--not only because it was the last time there wasn't much division between high art and useful craft, but also because being crafty was one of the few ways to avoid dying face down in a pig ditch before you lost all your baby teeth.

(Ivory chess pieces from different sets.)

And--by no coincidence at all--the category of "the fantastic" is about bad ideas. Otherwise the ideas wouldn't be called "fantastic" they'd be called "true". Fantasy is literally all about received ideas that we, by definition, no longer believe and threw out. There is no magic, there is nothing special about kings or clerics, the world isn't made of four elements, people aren't made of four humours, there's no such thing as a whole race being evil, Jews don't have horns. Signing up for the "the fantastic" is putting a sign on the door saying "Everything you're about to hear is bullshit". So policing the implications of fantasy is stupid: every idea in fantasy is awful.  Anyone mistaking any of it for philosophy is in desperate need of a parent or a psychiatrist.

(I've told this story on the blog before: The first time I saw this in the Met it was labeled "St George Chesspiece". I asked, in an essay, "if St George is your knight, what the hell does the rest of the chess set look like? Is it all saints? Is your king Jesus? It's either not St George or not a chess piece." My teacher worked in the Met. The next time I saw it, it was re-labeled.)

Here's an interesting thing about Medieval art and our modern concept of The Fantastic:

We know for a fact that, for example, Dante Alighieri was genuinely a religious man. He would likely feel really bad--blasphemous, in fact--if he got the details of what Hell was like wrong. And Jesus fuck he had a lotta details.

(Again: Monsters done well. People done poorly.)

So what did he go on? Research? So far as we know: not really. He was something of a numerologist, but basically there are details of stuff in there that are obviously original to Dante. So was he like "Fuck it, I'll make something up, God won't notice. It's not like he sees all and knows all, right?"?

(This is Scandinavian knotwork on this staff-end, it's chunkier than Celtic tracery)

(Viking chest)

No: here's what he and thousands of Medieval Christian artists probably thought "If I'm having this idea, it's probably because God gave it to me". Which is marvellous, as terrible ideas go: If you get an art idea, it's because you should get it.

(Hey guys, lets make folding Marys! God tell you to do that? Yup. Alright. On it.)

This is the world your players' D&D characters live in--even moreso than genuine Medieval people because your party has daily reminders of divine power in the form of the party cleric.

Everything, even a new thing, belongs. Something higher has ordained it. Mallory, Wagner and Tolkien mined the echoes of this idea very hard: everything, even the pettiest handicraft, even the pies and mutton, is mythic. Everything is, was and always will be basically this way. The only "future" (conceived as a time when things in general look different than they do now) is apocalyptic.

This is a strange psychoaesthetic trick: portraying the Middle Ages--which is actually a very distinct moment in the development of politics and technology on a very specific continent--as a sort of platonic eternal. It seems very natural to us, but it takes a certain kind of sleight of hand to look at something as complex and specific and historical as, say, a crossbow, and read it as a weapon in a mythic conflict. You couldn't imagine a fairy tale with an arquebus in it.

(We don't know whether people back then thought this guy looked funny. But they might've: Chess is less important than God, so the chess piece carvers had a freer hand. )

If the Lord meant for me to not Hobo and thence to Murder why would he put the idea in my head?

(More Irish graphomania-- The Book of Kells)

(Hey let's keep water in a lion! Alright.)

(These shaped jugs are called "aquamaniles")

Often these unimportant domestic objects are the most interesting. Art historians hate that.

(The Tara Brooch. More insane Irish intricacy. This was before whiskey had come to the Isles.)

(Perrecy-Les-Forges)

(Bishop's grave) Sep 9, 2014 Paolo Greco's profile photo Paolo Greco +1 in unrelated news, he's also very wrong about Dante's theology. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag My only important point: I think my enjoyment is not increased if you describe a medieval reliquary as an object made by stupid people that should be appreciated on its aesthetic merits alone. That is my opinion. I have others.

Further thoughts: There are weapons in my local DIA that are simultaneously tools of war and nice shaped bits of metal. I find them interesting even though, in their original employment, they were objects used in acts that were no doubt horrible and painful to the people who were on the business end of them. To admire one of these weapons as a purely sensory object seems artificial and unrealistic to me. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath "My only important point: I think my enjoyment is not increased if you describe a medieval reliquary as an object made by stupid people that should be appreciated on its aesthetic merits alone. " "To admire one of these weapons as a purely sensory object seems artificial and unrealistic to me." Well that's life as Stefan Poag. Hope it works out for you. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag I don't get it, Zak. Someimes you post like you want a discussion and then when you get one you seem to get mad. "You hope it works out for me?" When did this conversation become about me instead of how to look at medieval art? Just forget I ever bothered, OK, man? Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath I don't get it, Stefan. We had the discussion. The discussion ended. Why are you slinging weird rhetoric about it? As for "mad"--you are assuming. Never assume. Why would I be mad?  I explained my position (which is based on my personal taste), you explained yours (which is based on your personal taste), there's no more to it. When did it become about you? When you explicitly said your point was only about you: "My only important point: I think my enjoyment…" So, ok, we're talking about your taste. Which it would be pointless to try to argue you away from. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag +1 You wrote, "Well that's life as Stefan Poag. Hope it works out for you," which is a pretty dickish thing to say. I don't think that's me 'slinging weird rhetoric.' That's me saying, "Don't be a dick to me. I don't like it, and, goddamn it, I don't deserve it." Sep 9, 2014 Nate Lumpkin's profile photo Nate Lumpkin +Paolo Greco How is he wrong about Dante's theology? I don't know much about Dante. ("he" meaning Zak the author, right?) Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath +Stefan Poag ""Well that's life as Stefan Poag. Hope it works out for you," "which is a pretty dickish thing to say." You've inserted an assumption about tone there that wasn't there. I meant that purely in a literal sense: you made a statement indicating that your point descended entirely from your personal taste. Thus ending the conversation because that's unarguable. My statement acknowledges it and says absolutely nothing insulting about you. So relax. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath I don't know what point Paolo is trying to make +Nate Lumpkin but if he's trying to say what someone in the comments said (that every detail in the descriptions of heaven and hell is sourced) he's utterly wrong. Dante very clearly inserts political figures that post-date any sources he had access to into hell, along with new specific punishments. Sep 9, 2014 Stefan Poag's profile photo Stefan Poag +1 I think I'm not going to try talking to you anymore, Zak. I don't think you understand me and I don't think I understand you. Sep 9, 2014 Zak Sabbath's profile photo Zak Sabbath You could just ask.

[footballleague0]

Ed Oliver Houston Cougars superstar representing city

Sep 13, 2017

Joel AndersonESPN

HOUSTON — Hurricane Harvey sent the University of Houston’s football team rushing off to Austin for sanctuary under the same roof as the coach who left the program just 10 months earlier.

It could have been — and maybe even should have been — an uncomfortable reunion with Tom Herman, the ex who spurned the Cougars for the state’s flagship program after two seasons, 22 wins and many promises he wouldn’t leave. That potential for discomfort wasn’t lost on those who coordinated their plans to seek shelter from the storm, choosing the University of Texas from among at least four other in-state options.

“That was a little bit in the back of my mind,” Houston athletic director Hunter Yurachek said. “There were some hurt feelings when Tom left. But I think everyone handled it very well.”

At least in their public comments, players and representatives of Houston have attempted to avoid lamenting the loss of Herman since his departure. But one of the few who went off-script was Ed Oliver, the homegrown star defensive tackle, who tweeted — and then immediately deleted — “Why you lie to us, coach?” shortly after word emerged that Herman had accepted the Longhorns job in December. He followed up with a less-than-subliminal shot in March, telling the Houston Chronicle that practices now had “a lot less yelling, and a lot more coaching.”

The University of Houston football team visited Austin, Texas, to pick up donations from volunteers around the Lone Star State to return home for victims of Hurricane Harvey.

Texas football put aside its rivalries as six programs from the Lone Star State loaned their equipment trucks to the Houston Cougars for a donation drive. We were there as the trucks rolled in and the Cougars’ players and staff unloaded the supplies.

1 Related

If Oliver took Herman’s absence more personally than most, it’s because he’ll be among those held most responsible for keeping Houston’s fans on the bandwagon. Only a 19-year-old sophomore, Oliver is already the anchor of a rebuilding program in a rebuilding city.

His family counts itself among the fortunate ones in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey: Its only real challenge, his mother said, was when the power went out for a couple days, leaving her and their stepfather alone in the house with their 4-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter.

���But they kept checking on me,” Dana Baker said of her older sons, Ed and 21-year-old Marcus. “They were never too far from home.”

Only minutes away, dozens of residents had their homes and lives ruined by floodwater and wind damage, like tens of thousands of others across the Houston area. The difference between a blessing and bad luck was often only a few blocks.

“It was tough to see my city like that,” Oliver told reporters while unloading trucks as part of a collection drive in Houston a couple of weeks ago.

“But we respond. … I do it for Houston, and I’ve always done it for Houston.”

Houston was gradually springing to life again when Major Applewhite took his seat at a makeshift radio booth at the far end of the Ragin’ Cajun, one of the city’s most popular and enduring restaurants.

The murky floodwaters that turned the city into a fetid lake were all but gone, dump trucks were clearing away thousands of tons of debris per day and many businesses started welcoming back weary customers who needed everything from bread to beer to retail therapy. Like many businesses, the Ragin’ Cajun sought to broadcast its hope — and reopening — to the public: “#HoustonStrong” read its billboard for passing motorists.

The “Major Applewhite Radio Show” made its debut at 1 p.m. last Wednesday before about 30 fans. Behind Applewhite and his broadcasting partner was a large screen draped in a red cover bearing the words “H-Town Takeover,” the moniker Herman gave for his dramatic makeover of a program that trails far behind the monstrous fan bases of Texas and Texas A&M in its own city.

Drumming up interest in Houston football will be among Applewhite’s chief challenges in this, his first head-coaching job. That was something that came easily to Herman, who is as gifted at salesmanship as he is at playcalling. Applewhite will almost certainly never be the coach to don a diamond-studded grille gifted to him by local rappers, as Herman did.

Applewhite’s first question from the audience came from longtime superfan and UH alum John Lofaro, known locally as “Johnny Cougar.”

In Houston’s first game of 2017, Ed Oliver swallowed up Arizona to the tune of 11 tackles, a forced fumble and a blocked field goal. Casey Sapio/USA TODAY Sports

“I am here to assure you that, in the very few times, the rare occasions that we might lose a game,” he said, “I can assure you that we will not throw debris at you” — a reference to the reception Texas fans gave Herman following a season-opening loss to Maryland days earlier.

“Appreciate it,” Applewhite said, smothering the attempt at a joke.

Lofaro pressed on, following up with a question. “Can Ed Oliver get any better?”

“He can,” Applewhite said. “And he better.”

In the Cougars’ season-opening win at Arizona on Saturday, Oliver responded to Applewhite’s challenge with a performance — 11 tackles, a forced fumble and a blocked field goal — that left little room for criticism. Oliver’s improvement was evident, another confirmation of the hype that has long preceded him.

“That’s exactly what I envisioned,” Applewhite said of Oliver. “He doesn’t need to do anything different.”

At Houston, the 6-foot-3 (his listed height, which is probably an inch or two generous), 290-pound Oliver has been everything that he was projected to be — and then some — as a five-star recruit at local powerhouse Westfield High School. The only surprise to many is that Oliver is doing it in his hometown at all, given that he could’ve signed with virtually any major program in the nation. Put another way: Oliver’s improbable choice of Houston made him the first recruit of his caliber in the ESPN 300 era to sign with a school outside of a Power 5 conference.

It all makes more sense when you meet his family.

His mother, Dana, raised Ed and his older brother, Marcus, in an idyllic north Houston neighborhood, only blocks away from her mother, sister and aunt — “we like each other a little bit,” she cracked — and just a few minutes from her alma mater, Westfield High. In their neighborhood of two-story brick homes and soaring pine trees, little Ed was always hot on the heels of his older brother.

“Ed followed Marcus around like a little puppy,” Baker said.

“Basically I would feel everything out before he did it,” Marcus added

So when Marcus joined the local little league football team at the age of 7, Ed followed along and played on the sidelines and adjacent fields during his brother’s practices.

This happened almost every day until Ed was old enough to join the team two years later. And when Marcus aged out of the league, Ed gave up little league football two years early to spend more time with his brother and ride horses on the weekend with his father, Ed Oliver Sr.

“Horses were my first love,” Ed said. “I played football because Marcus played football. But as I kept playing, I found love for it.”

Once they were at Westfield, Marcus became one of the Houston area’s top offensive linemen and Ed’s rapid growth turned him into a burgeoning force. In fact, in the spring semester of his ninth-grade year, Westfield’s coaches came up with the Ed Oliver rule: Whatever drill they were doing, Ed could play at full speed for the first half and then the offense could run through its playbook with no resistance for the second half.

“I’ve never coached anyone that was as disruptive as him at that age,” said Corby Meekins, then Westfield’s head coach and now one of Herman’s assistants at Texas. “He was pretty much unblockable.”

A five-star recruit and high school All-American, Ed Oliver stunned the football world by picking hometown Houston over his pick of blue-chip programs. Miller Safrit/ESPN

Marcus left Westfield as an accomplished player in his own right, choosing Houston over Colorado and a handful of other FBS programs. There was never any doubt that he was staying close to home — he didn’t want to force his family to travel to see him play and he wanted to see Ed’s final two years of football at Westfield — even as friends and classmates wondered if he wasn’t making a mistake.

“They’d always go, ‘Why Houston?'” Marcus said. “I got tired of it. I told them, ‘I see something you don’t see.'”

And even with Marcus off at college, albeit only about 40 minutes away, he kept his brother close by inviting him over to his dorm room, giving him tickets to the games, and getting him familiar with his teammates and the program’s facilities.

“He’d be up there with me all the time,” Marcus said. He saw what the others didn’t see, indeed. “He grew a brotherhood with everyone else, too.”

One afternoon in May 2015, the brothers were helping themselves to the buffet at Cici’s Pizza near their north Houston home when Ed surprised Marcus by asking him to call their old high school coach Corby Meekins, who’d recently joined Herman’s then-new coaching staff at Houston.

With no hint or warning, Ed orally committed to Houston on his brother’s phone over plates of $5.99 buffet pizza.

“I was like, ‘Is this real?'” Marcus said. “I was shocked.”

He wasn’t the only one: When the brothers went home later that evening to watch an NBA playoff game, the news of Ed’s commitment kept scrolling across the bottom of the TV. “That’s when I realized he might be a big deal,” his mother said.

Over the years, Houston has enjoyed its most success by developing lightly regarded recruits (Andre Ware was recruited as a running quarterback and left in 1989 as a record-breaking passer and Heisman winner) and turning over its program to innovators ranging from Bill Yeoman to Art Briles. But over the past quarter century, that formula hasn’t meant sustained success: The Cougars have won nine or more games only five times during that stretch.

The arrival of Herman, who worked at five other programs in Texas, portended a new connection between Houston and a school once mockingly known as “Cougar High” for its commuter school reputation. Herman took his cues from the rise of the University of Miami as a national power in the 1980s, telling Sports Illustrated, “We said, ‘If they can do it at a private school in Miami, why can’t we do it in a football-rich city like Houston?'”

And Oliver gave Herman’s “H-Town Takeover” some credibility and more national attention. Oliver’s commitment “opened some doors that we may not have had opened,” Yurachek said. However, the notion that Oliver chose Houston solely because of Herman remains an obvious source of agitation for him and his family.

They point out that his brother was already there. So was Meekins, his old high school coach. Staying home meant he could continue riding his horses (Caledonia, Oreo, Coffee and Sugar) with his father. He could continue checking in on his mother at least once a week, which often turns into an impromptu nap in one of her guest bedrooms. “I think he likes to stay home for peace,” she said. Everything a homebody could ever want was already in place.

“They know if Marcus wasn’t here, I wouldn’t be here,” Ed said. “They know when they got him, they got his little brother, too.”

“Are people too damn stupid to understand why he stayed there to fight with his brother?” Ed Oliver Sr. asked. “I wasn’t going to let EJ separate that. I told him, ‘While your brother is at U of H, you’re gonna have your ass there.'”

Baker said, in slightly more gentle terms: “Why leave Mayberry? It just felt right. It felt like home to Ed.”

A week after Harvey, the former “Cougar High” was alive with activity befitting its status as the state’s third-largest university. The floodwaters had caused only negligible damage to its facilities. Professors and students had largely returned to class. Most of the chairs were filled at the campus student center.

Ed Oliver, a Houston native and one of the stars of the Cougars, passes cases of water to a teammate at St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church. Michael Starghill, Jr. for ESPN

In her office suite atop the school’s art-deco-style headquarters, Houston president Renu Khator was balancing her relief at the school’s nearly painless recovery with her plans for dispatching students into affected neighborhoods near the school.

“If the city and community is to come back to normalcy,” Khator said, “we have to play our role.”

Khator, who doubles as the chancellor of the University of Houston system, has been waiting for the day the city embraces its asset in the university. She arrived in 2008 and immediately launched a plan to build a nationally competitive university out of an urban commuter school.

Those plans included a first-rate athletic program, which meant building the $128 million, 40,000-seat, on-campus TDECU Stadium, which opened in 2014. The school is also building a $20 million, 80,000-square-foot indoor practice facility adjacent to the stadium, an item that Herman added into his contract as a condition of his buyout.

Instead, Applewhite, who served as Herman’s offensive coordinator for two years, will inherit the indoor facility and Khator’s rising expectations.

In December, days after Applewhite was hired as Herman’s successor, Khator told faculty and staff at the annual holiday party at her home that “winning is defined at University of Houston as 10-2. We’ll fire coaches at 8-4.”

Months later, she hasn’t backed off that charge. “I like to have a winning team,” she said last week. “I expect the same thing all across the campus, from every department. Let’s push our talent.”

Applewhite demurred when asked about Khator’s comments. “I don’t pay much attention to things that are said,” he said.

Coming off an All-American debut as a freshman, Ed Oliver is the sort of game-changing player who could keep his new head coach in the good graces of the school president and a reeling fan base.

Oliver had seven tackles and two sacks in his swashbuckling college debut in 2016, an upset win over then-No. 3 Oklahoma. “There’s some guys that just stick out, like when we looked at Adrian Peterson,” said then-Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops. “It’s like, ‘Yeah. That’s what you need.'”

He finished the year with 23 tackles for loss, which ranked second nationally. And as an interior lineman, Oliver finished with impressive totals of 66 tackles and nine pass breakups — he was essentially just as good moving backward and laterally as he was forward.

“He’s a first-rounder,” Arizona coach Rich Rodriguez said of Oliver, before his team played against him Saturday.

Of course, that’s at least 18 months away. There’s more than enough time for Oliver to cement his status as one of the most important players in the history of the Houston program.

“He’s the best player we’ve ever had, and that includes Andre Ware,” said Lofaro aka “Johnny Cougar'” and season-ticket holder for 40 years.

And as he grows into his fame, Oliver seems well-positioned to replace Herman as the face of the program.

And, most important to a group of fans accustomed to being abandoned soon after good times, Oliver has assured them he’s not looking to go anywhere else. The #H-TownTakeover can endure for at least a little longer.

“I love Houston,” he said. “This is my hometown, this is my city.”

The post Ed Oliver Houston Cougars superstar representing city appeared first on Daily Star Sports.

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[giantsfootball0]

Ed Oliver Houston Cougars superstar representing city

Sep 13, 2017

Joel AndersonESPN

HOUSTON — Hurricane Harvey sent the University of Houston’s football team rushing off to Austin for sanctuary under the same roof as the coach who left the program just 10 months earlier.

It could have been — and maybe even should have been — an uncomfortable reunion with Tom Herman, the ex who spurned the Cougars for the state’s flagship program after two seasons, 22 wins and many promises he wouldn’t leave. That potential for discomfort wasn’t lost on those who coordinated their plans to seek shelter from the storm, choosing the University of Texas from among at least four other in-state options.

“That was a little bit in the back of my mind,” Houston athletic director Hunter Yurachek said. “There were some hurt feelings when Tom left. But I think everyone handled it very well.”

At least in their public comments, players and representatives of Houston have attempted to avoid lamenting the loss of Herman since his departure. But one of the few who went off-script was Ed Oliver, the homegrown star defensive tackle, who tweeted — and then immediately deleted — “Why you lie to us, coach?” shortly after word emerged that Herman had accepted the Longhorns job in December. He followed up with a less-than-subliminal shot in March, telling the Houston Chronicle that practices now had “a lot less yelling, and a lot more coaching.”

The University of Houston football team visited Austin, Texas, to pick up donations from volunteers around the Lone Star State to return home for victims of Hurricane Harvey.

Texas football put aside its rivalries as six programs from the Lone Star State loaned their equipment trucks to the Houston Cougars for a donation drive. We were there as the trucks rolled in and the Cougars’ players and staff unloaded the supplies.

1 Related

If Oliver took Herman’s absence more personally than most, it’s because he’ll be among those held most responsible for keeping Houston’s fans on the bandwagon. Only a 19-year-old sophomore, Oliver is already the anchor of a rebuilding program in a rebuilding city.

His family counts itself among the fortunate ones in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey: Its only real challenge, his mother said, was when the power went out for a couple days, leaving her and their stepfather alone in the house with their 4-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter.

“But they kept checking on me,” Dana Baker said of her older sons, Ed and 21-year-old Marcus. “They were never too far from home.”

Only minutes away, dozens of residents had their homes and lives ruined by floodwater and wind damage, like tens of thousands of others across the Houston area. The difference between a blessing and bad luck was often only a few blocks.

“It was tough to see my city like that,” Oliver told reporters while unloading trucks as part of a collection drive in Houston a couple of weeks ago.

“But we respond. … I do it for Houston, and I’ve always done it for Houston.”

Houston was gradually springing to life again when Major Applewhite took his seat at a makeshift radio booth at the far end of the Ragin’ Cajun, one of the city’s most popular and enduring restaurants.

The murky floodwaters that turned the city into a fetid lake were all but gone, dump trucks were clearing away thousands of tons of debris per day and many businesses started welcoming back weary customers who needed everything from bread to beer to retail therapy. Like many businesses, the Ragin’ Cajun sought to broadcast its hope — and reopening — to the public: “#HoustonStrong” read its billboard for passing motorists.

The “Major Applewhite Radio Show” made its debut at 1 p.m. last Wednesday before about 30 fans. Behind Applewhite and his broadcasting partner was a large screen draped in a red cover bearing the words “H-Town Takeover,” the moniker Herman gave for his dramatic makeover of a program that trails far behind the monstrous fan bases of Texas and Texas A&M in its own city.

Drumming up interest in Houston football will be among Applewhite’s chief challenges in this, his first head-coaching job. That was something that came easily to Herman, who is as gifted at salesmanship as he is at playcalling. Applewhite will almost certainly never be the coach to don a diamond-studded grille gifted to him by local rappers, as Herman did.

Applewhite’s first question from the audience came from longtime superfan and UH alum John Lofaro, known locally as “Johnny Cougar.”

In Houston’s first game of 2017, Ed Oliver swallowed up Arizona to the tune of 11 tackles, a forced fumble and a blocked field goal. Casey Sapio/USA TODAY Sports

“I am here to assure you that, in the very few times, the rare occasions that we might lose a game,” he said, “I can assure you that we will not throw debris at you” — a reference to the reception Texas fans gave Herman following a season-opening loss to Maryland days earlier.

“Appreciate it,” Applewhite said, smothering the attempt at a joke.

Lofaro pressed on, following up with a question. “Can Ed Oliver get any better?”

“He can,” Applewhite said. “And he better.”

In the Cougars’ season-opening win at Arizona on Saturday, Oliver responded to Applewhite’s challenge with a performance — 11 tackles, a forced fumble and a blocked field goal — that left little room for criticism. Oliver’s improvement was evident, another confirmation of the hype that has long preceded him.

“That’s exactly what I envisioned,” Applewhite said of Oliver. “He doesn’t need to do anything different.”

At Houston, the 6-foot-3 (his listed height, which is probably an inch or two generous), 290-pound Oliver has been everything that he was projected to be — and then some — as a five-star recruit at local powerhouse Westfield High School. The only surprise to many is that Oliver is doing it in his hometown at all, given that he could’ve signed with virtually any major program in the nation. Put another way: Oliver’s improbable choice of Houston made him the first recruit of his caliber in the ESPN 300 era to sign with a school outside of a Power 5 conference.

It all makes more sense when you meet his family.

His mother, Dana, raised Ed and his older brother, Marcus, in an idyllic north Houston neighborhood, only blocks away from her mother, sister and aunt — “we like each other a little bit,” she cracked — and just a few minutes from her alma mater, Westfield High. In their neighborhood of two-story brick homes and soaring pine trees, little Ed was always hot on the heels of his older brother.

“Ed followed Marcus around like a little puppy,” Baker said.

“Basically I would feel everything out before he did it,” Marcus added

So when Marcus joined the local little league football team at the age of 7, Ed followed along and played on the sidelines and adjacent fields during his brother’s practices.

This happened almost every day until Ed was old enough to join the team two years later. And when Marcus aged out of the league, Ed gave up little league football two years early to spend more time with his brother and ride horses on the weekend with his father, Ed Oliver Sr.

“Horses were my first love,” Ed said. “I played football because Marcus played football. But as I kept playing, I found love for it.”

Once they were at Westfield, Marcus became one of the Houston area’s top offensive linemen and Ed’s rapid growth turned him into a burgeoning force. In fact, in the spring semester of his ninth-grade year, Westfield’s coaches came up with the Ed Oliver rule: Whatever drill they were doing, Ed could play at full speed for the first half and then the offense could run through its playbook with no resistance for the second half.

“I’ve never coached anyone that was as disruptive as him at that age,” said Corby Meekins, then Westfield’s head coach and now one of Herman’s assistants at Texas. “He was pretty much unblockable.”

A five-star recruit and high school All-American, Ed Oliver stunned the football world by picking hometown Houston over his pick of blue-chip programs. Miller Safrit/ESPN

Marcus left Westfield as an accomplished player in his own right, choosing Houston over Colorado and a handful of other FBS programs. There was never any doubt that he was staying close to home — he didn’t want to force his family to travel to see him play and he wanted to see Ed’s final two years of football at Westfield — even as friends and classmates wondered if he wasn’t making a mistake.

“They’d always go, ‘Why Houston?‘” Marcus said. “I got tired of it. I told them, ‘I see something you don’t see.'”

And even with Marcus off at college, albeit only about 40 minutes away, he kept his brother close by inviting him over to his dorm room, giving him tickets to the games, and getting him familiar with his teammates and the program’s facilities.

“He’d be up there with me all the time,” Marcus said. He saw what the others didn’t see, indeed. “He grew a brotherhood with everyone else, too.”

One afternoon in May 2015, the brothers were helping themselves to the buffet at Cici’s Pizza near their north Houston home when Ed surprised Marcus by asking him to call their old high school coach Corby Meekins, who’d recently joined Herman’s then-new coaching staff at Houston.

With no hint or warning, Ed orally committed to Houston on his brother’s phone over plates of $5.99 buffet pizza.

“I was like, ‘Is this real?'” Marcus said. “I was shocked.”

He wasn’t the only one: When the brothers went home later that evening to watch an NBA playoff game, the news of Ed’s commitment kept scrolling across the bottom of the TV. “That’s when I realized he might be a big deal,” his mother said.

Over the years, Houston has enjoyed its most success by developing lightly regarded recruits (Andre Ware was recruited as a running quarterback and left in 1989 as a record-breaking passer and Heisman winner) and turning over its program to innovators ranging from Bill Yeoman to Art Briles. But over the past quarter century, that formula hasn’t meant sustained success: The Cougars have won nine or more games only five times during that stretch.

The arrival of Herman, who worked at five other programs in Texas, portended a new connection between Houston and a school once mockingly known as “Cougar High” for its commuter school reputation. Herman took his cues from the rise of the University of Miami as a national power in the 1980s, telling Sports Illustrated, “We said, ‘If they can do it at a private school in Miami, why can’t we do it in a football-rich city like Houston?'”

And Oliver gave Herman’s “H-Town Takeover” some credibility and more national attention. Oliver’s commitment “opened some doors that we may not have had opened,” Yurachek said. However, the notion that Oliver chose Houston solely because of Herman remains an obvious source of agitation for him and his family.

They point out that his brother was already there. So was Meekins, his old high school coach. Staying home meant he could continue riding his horses (Caledonia, Oreo, Coffee and Sugar) with his father. He could continue checking in on his mother at least once a week, which often turns into an impromptu nap in one of her guest bedrooms. “I think he likes to stay home for peace,” she said. Everything a homebody could ever want was already in place.

“They know if Marcus wasn’t here, I wouldn’t be here,” Ed said. “They know when they got him, they got his little brother, too.”

“Are people too damn stupid to understand why he stayed there to fight with his brother?” Ed Oliver Sr. asked. “I wasn’t going to let EJ separate that. I told him, ‘While your brother is at U of H, you’re gonna have your ass there.'”

Baker said, in slightly more gentle terms: “Why leave Mayberry? It just felt right. It felt like home to Ed.”

A week after Harvey, the former “Cougar High” was alive with activity befitting its status as the state’s third-largest university. The floodwaters had caused only negligible damage to its facilities. Professors and students had largely returned to class. Most of the chairs were filled at the campus student center.

Ed Oliver, a Houston native and one of the stars of the Cougars, passes cases of water to a teammate at St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Church. Michael Starghill, Jr. for ESPN

In her office suite atop the school’s art-deco-style headquarters, Houston president Renu Khator was balancing her relief at the school’s nearly painless recovery with her plans for dispatching students into affected neighborhoods near the school.

“If the city and community is to come back to normalcy,” Khator said, “we have to play our role.”

Khator, who doubles as the chancellor of the University of Houston system, has been waiting for the day the city embraces its asset in the university. She arrived in 2008 and immediately launched a plan to build a nationally competitive university out of an urban commuter school.

Those plans included a first-rate athletic program, which meant building the $128 million, 40,000-seat, on-campus TDECU Stadium, which opened in 2014. The school is also building a $20 million, 80,000-square-foot indoor practice facility adjacent to the stadium, an item that Herman added into his contract as a condition of his buyout.

Instead, Applewhite, who served as Herman’s offensive coordinator for two years, will inherit the indoor facility and Khator’s rising expectations.

In December, days after Applewhite was hired as Herman’s successor, Khator told faculty and staff at the annual holiday party at her home that “winning is defined at University of Houston as 10-2. We’ll fire coaches at 8-4.”

Months later, she hasn’t backed off that charge. “I like to have a winning team,” she said last week. “I expect the same thing all across the campus, from every department. Let’s push our talent.”

Applewhite demurred when asked about Khator’s comments. “I don’t pay much attention to things that are said,” he said.

Coming off an All-American debut as a freshman, Ed Oliver is the sort of game-changing player who could keep his new head coach in the good graces of the school president and a reeling fan base.

Oliver had seven tackles and two sacks in his swashbuckling college debut in 2016, an upset win over then-No. 3 Oklahoma. “There’s some guys that just stick out, like when we looked at Adrian Peterson,” said then-Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops. “It’s like, ‘Yeah. That’s what you need.'”

He finished the year with 23 tackles for loss, which ranked second nationally. And as an interior lineman, Oliver finished with impressive totals of 66 tackles and nine pass breakups — he was essentially just as good moving backward and laterally as he was forward.

“He’s a first-rounder,” Arizona coach Rich Rodriguez said of Oliver, before his team played against him Saturday.

Of course, that’s at least 18 months away. There’s more than enough time for Oliver to cement his status as one of the most important players in the history of the Houston program.

“He’s the best player we’ve ever had, and that includes Andre Ware,” said Lofaro aka “Johnny Cougar'” and season-ticket holder for 40 years.

And as he grows into his fame, Oliver seems well-positioned to replace Herman as the face of the program.

And, most important to a group of fans accustomed to being abandoned soon after good times, Oliver has assured them he’s not looking to go anywhere else. The #H-TownTakeover can endure for at least a little longer.

“I love Houston,” he said. “This is my hometown, this is my city.”

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