#interaction: nicholas russo

[hsmtmtsnet]

Disney Theatricals President Thomas Schumacher, Frozen star Caissie Levy, High School Musical :The Musical: The Series creator and show runner Tim Federle, The Lightning Thief composer Rob Rokicki, and more will appear at this year's Junior Theatre Festival in Atlanta, scheduled for January 17–19. Produced and hosted by iTheatrics, the weekend event brings youth groups from around the world together for a celebration of everything theatre.

Also on hand at JTF Atlanta will be Hamilton stars Nicholas Christopher and Jennifer Locke, High School Musical: The Musical: The Series stars Olivia Rodrigo and Joshua Bassett, School of Rock alums Luca Padovan and Isabella Russo, Newsies and Between the Lines director Jeff Calhoun, and Matilda alum Lotte Wakeham.

Soon to join the upcoming revival of Caroline, or Change, Levy will perform the festival's headlining concert.

The Junior Theater Festival celebrates musical theatre and musical theatre education with a weekend of events and performances that bring Broadway and West End professionals together with educators and young students. Youth theatre companies can bring 15-minute staged selections from titles in musical licensor Music Theatre International's Broadway Junior collection for adjudication, after which students attend interactive workshops. Students interested in technical theatre can participate in the tech track, which includes the opportunity to work alongside industry professionals backstage for the festival's mainstage events.

This year's New Works Showcase will feature selections from new musicals that will soon join Music Theatre International's Broadway Junior library, including Roald Dahl's Matilda JR., Elephant & Piggie's We Are in a Play JR., The Drowsy Chaperone JR., Newsies JR., and Moana JR.

Educators, whether bringing a group of students or attending individually, have access to professional development workshops. Educators traveling with groups have the chance of being selected for the Freddie G Fellowship. Named for MTI Co-Chairman Freddie Gershon, the fellowship is bestowed annually on eight exceptional educators and includes an all-expenses-paid trip to New York City for professional development with Broadway greats and a $5,000 grant for the educator's theatre program.

Playbill will be on hand at JTF in Atlanta to present The Playbill Community Service Award. All groups attending the Junior Theater Festivals are encouraged to submit videos documenting their organization's community service projects. Up to five finalists will be highlighted on Playbill, where the public can vote on their favorite beginning January 11. The winning organization will receive a $1,000 grant to support continued charitable efforts along with a free custom Playbill from PLAYBILLder.com, our online program creation tool that allows schools and community organizations to personalize and print an authentic Broadway-quality Playbill for their production or event.

The Atlanta festival, which was first held in 2003, will host more than 6,000 attendees from 129 groups in 2020, with 31 states, Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K. all represented. JTF West, now in its fourth year, expects 2,200 attendees from 48 groups in 2020, representing 17 states and South Korea, the U.K., New Zealand, and Australia.

“It is estimated that 36 million people attend a performance of a Broadway Junior show annually in the U.S. and Canada," shares festival founder Timothy Allen McDonald. "That’s three times the number of people who attend a Broadway show each year. Because of this, our Junior Theater Festival students have become the de facto tastemakers for all things musical theater. They embraced songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul five years before Hollywood honored them with an Academy Award, and the songwriting duo introduced Ben Platt to our JTF family a year before Dear Evan Hansen opened on Broadway and won Tony awards for the three JTF alums. Our JTF fans welcomed Zac Efron at one of our first festivals, they lined up for the launch of Tim Federle’s first New York Times best-selling book here, and this January they’ll greet the creator and executive producer and stars of the Disney+ show High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. Rob Rokicki may have opened The Lighting Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical on Broadway this year, but our audience has been singing songs from the show since he first started performing them at JTF three years ago. If you want to know what’s going to be hot in musical theater in the future, ask our JTF kids. All of this is a wonderful bonus to our core objective which is to celebrate young people and their teachers, who make the world a better place one musical at a time."

Title sponsors of both festivals are Music Theatre International, Disney Theatrical Group, and Playbill.

[parf-fan]

At longer last, the masterlist of 2018 gender-and-orientations headcanons that nobody asked for!

(The following headcanons are canon-compliant to the best of my knowledge and abilities. There may have been various moments across the season in which some of these headcanons would have been refuted by various lines or interactions, but as I could not witness every single character every second, I missed them. If you’d prefer a colour-coded chart, just scroll down.)

Lady Mayor :  neutrois – andromantic – androsexual

Anne de Montmorency :  cis man – gay – homoflexible gay

Claude :  femfluid – panromantic – pansexual

Rosie Smith :  trans woman – aromantic – lesbian

Hella Eutonia :  cis woman – straight – straight

Sonny Baritone :  trans man – gay – asexual

Triboulet / Puck :  agender – aromentic – asexual

Elias Tanner :  cis man – straight – asexual

Sabrina Brightwood :  intersex woman – grayromantic – demisexual

Annabelle Norton :  trans woman – panromantic – pansexual

Charles Brandon :  demiboy – gay – bisexual

Catherine :  cis woman – biromantic – bisexual

Jean Mouton :  mascfluid – biromantic – sex-positive asexual

Donald Knotts :  demiboy – aromantic – pansexual

Nicholas Carew :  cis man – straight – heteroflexible straight

Meera Lowe :  trans woman – lesbian – lesbian

Robyn Eutonia :  intersex intergender – aromantic – bisexual

Deputy Fonteyn :  cis woman – lesbian – graysexual lesbian

Nicodemus Stone :  trans man – aromantic – asexual

Capt. Beatrix :  genderqueer – panromantic – pansexual

Imogine Fury :  trans woman – aromantic  – bisexual

Sir Walter :  cis man – gay – gay

Jane Scott :  agender – pansexual – asexual

Fergus MacAllan :  apagender – biromantic – bisexual

Sorcha O'Conner :  cis woman – straight – heteroflexible straight

Murphy Eutonia :  egogender – panromantic – pansexual

Lady Gisborn :  demigirl – demiromantic lesbian – lesbian

Henry :  cis man – biromantic – bisexual

Robert Russo :  ambigender – quoiromantic – apathasexual

Francis :  demiboy – panromantic – pansexual

Bridget Moorhouse :  trans woman – biromantic – bisexual

Gwendolyn Pemburthy :  cis woman – aromantic – straight

Madam Josephine :  genderfluid – recipriomantic – bisexual

William Cornish :  trans man – aromantic – pansexual

Alexander Luthier :  cis man – straight – straight

Hamish MacGuffin :  intersex man – gay – gay

Sheriff Nellie Frost :  nonbinary – aromantic – asexual

Eileen Ripleigh :  cis woman – lesbian – homoflexible lesbian

Titania :  b e y o n d g e n d e r – panromantic – pansexual

Oberon :  b e y o n d g e n d e r – panromantic – pansexual

Colour-coded chart for your convenience.

I have reasoning for each and every one of these headcanons.  Some of this reasoning is derived from careful analysis of small interaction-details.  Some of this reasoning is “why not?”, and “as opposed to…?”.  I’ll have a post of all my reasonings at some point.  Probably more than a few days, especially because I still need to post last year’s reasonings.  For now, please enjoy these headcanons (which I of course am in no way pressuring you to accept), and don’t hesitate to ask me about anything!

[shortsrifle7-blog]

Weekend Reading, 8.12.18

This week has flown by, and as I watched it pass I definitely sensed that the slowness of summer was giving way to the busier energy of fall. We’re not there yet, I know. But it’s coming.

I got my first two DI rotation placements, which means that I now have a sense of my schedule through December. September and early October should feel pretty manageable, and late fall will be demanding. After an initial day or two of nerves and resistance, I’m feeling pretty solid: aware of the changes ahead of me, but basically ready for them.

I realize, too, that a considerable part of me is excited about the DI. I think I’ve tried not to be, because so much of my grad school experience has defied was I was hoping for. I’ve developed a strong capacity to greet new experiences with an open mind and as few expectations as possible. Still, it’s good that I’m excited; I haven’t been excited about my training in a while, and the sensation is welcome.

Part of what excites me is the fact of my nutrition education finally becoming more humanized. I began this process because I love working with people. I needed a lot more scientific understanding and clinical exposure than I had in order to continue doing it in the way I wanted, and I don’t regret going back to school to fill in the gaps. It’s been hard, though, to study nutrition so abstractly; at many points in the last year it was easy to forget what had driven me to do all of this in the first place.

When I got my first two placements, it occurred to me that, for the first time since being a hospital volunteer at Georgetown, I’ll be working with people: patients, preceptors, peers. I know it’ll be difficult at times. But after a few very solitary years, the idea of an interactive workday holds lots of appeal.

We’ll see how I feel once I get there, and I don’t doubt that my feelings about it will fluctuate, just as my enthusiasm and energy for writing and cooking tend to ebb and flow. For today, I’m acknowledging my own desire for a new beginning.

Speaking of new beginnings, happy Monday. Here are some reads and some plant-based goodness to feast your eyes on.

Recipes

Four simple, summery recipes today, followed by one stunning dessert. First up is Kathy’s yummy and easy summer tomato cheese toast. Grilled cheese & tomato was my favorite sandwich when I was a kid, and this looks to be a perfect, grown-up answer to it.

I love a good multi-bean salad, and right now Kristina’s Mexican-style three bean salad is calling my name.

Speaking of beans, a simple yet creative butter bean and sweet potato smash. Amy’s recipe would be great as a lunch bowl component or scooped over toast.

There’s nothing like a colorful bowl of sesame peanut noodles. Ali’s stellar recipe calls for Chinese egg noodles, but any vegan noodle option will work; Udon noodles are my favorite these days.

Finally, it’s hard for me to put into words just how badly I’d like to devour a thick slice of Alexandra’s vegan chocolate raspberry cake right now. Those frosting swirls! ❤️

Reads

1. A sweet and surprising look at the power of expressing gratitude. Amit Kumar at the University of Texas at Austin and Nicholas Epley at Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago recruited study participants and asked them to write a thank you email to someone who had touched their life in a meaningful way. The participants were asked to make predictions about how the recipients would feel about being thanked and acknowledged; meanwhile, the researchers reached out to the recipients and asked them about how they actually felt and thought. The results:

The senders of the thank-you letters consistently underestimated how positive the recipients felt about receiving the letters and how surprised they were by the content. The senders also overestimated how awkward the recipients felt; and they underestimated how warm, and especially how competent, the recipients perceived them to be. Age and gender made no difference to the pattern of findings.

Other experiments showed that these same misjudgments affect our willingness to write thank-you messages. For instance, participants who felt less competent about writing a message of gratitude were less willing to send one; and, logically enough, participants were least willing to send thank-you messages to recipients who they felt would benefit the least.

Kumar and Epley believe that this asymmetry between the perspective of the potential expresser of gratitude and the recipient means that we often refrain from a “powerful act of civility” that would benefit both parties.

This gives me a nudge to send thank you notes more often, and also to find more simple, everyday ways of expressing and acknowledging gratitude.

2. Knowable Magazine interviews Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, about how the medical community is learning to manage chronic and acute pain in a time of opioid abuse.

3. Reading this article has made me incredibly excited to try Good Catch tuna!

4. I’m touched by Maria Del Russo’s candid thoughts on traveling alone and what it taught her; they brought me back to my trip to Prague last year and how much I realized about myself while I was there.

One of those realizations was that I had become—or maybe always been—afraid of being alone with myself. It’s a state that I successfully avoided for years with workaholism, self-imposed busy-ness, and various forms of codependency. Del Russo describes something similar:

I have never admitted out loud this stemmed from a deep, dark fear of being by myself. It is not that I just fear being alone. I fear being with me, and that is something different.

When I left Prague, I felt that I’d managed to become better friends with myself. More than anything else—the food, the sightseeing, the music—that’s what I took home from the trip. I’ve been gently cultivating it ever since.

5. Brandom Keim’s meditations on animal labor, both domesticated and in the wild, gave me a lot to think about. Particularly this sentiment:

Clean air and clean water, carbon sequestration, and organic materials are not yielded by something so abstract and impersonal as “ecosystems.” They’re the products of vast and unceasing animal and organismal activity. Countless creatures preparing soil, dispersing seeds, distributing nutrients, regulating populations, performing the myriad and constant tasks necessary to support the nature we take for granted…

Maybe recognizing animal labor at a larger scale would help people appreciate that.

Keim is particularly interested in pesticide use and its impact on birds, but for me the invitation to extend my consciousness to the rights of wild animals, as opposed to farm animals, was provocative and important.

A simple, staple recipe for tempeh is coming your way later this week. Till soon,

xo

Source: https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-8-12-18/

[butaneplate02-blog]

Weekend Reading, 8.12.18

This week has flown by, and as I watched it pass I definitely sensed that the slowness of summer was giving way to the busier energy of fall. We’re not there yet, I know. But it’s coming.

I got my first two DI rotation placements, which means that I now have a sense of my schedule through December. September and early October should feel pretty manageable, and late fall will be demanding. After an initial day or two of nerves and resistance, I’m feeling pretty solid: aware of the changes ahead of me, but basically ready for them.

I realize, too, that a considerable part of me is excited about the DI. I think I’ve tried not to be, because so much of my grad school experience has defied was I was hoping for. I’ve developed a strong capacity to greet new experiences with an open mind and as few expectations as possible. Still, it’s good that I’m excited; I haven’t been excited about my training in a while, and the sensation is welcome.

Part of what excites me is the fact of my nutrition education finally becoming more humanized. I began this process because I love working with people. I needed a lot more scientific understanding and clinical exposure than I had in order to continue doing it in the way I wanted, and I don’t regret going back to school to fill in the gaps. It’s been hard, though, to study nutrition so abstractly; at many points in the last year it was easy to forget what had driven me to do all of this in the first place.

When I got my first two placements, it occurred to me that, for the first time since being a hospital volunteer at Georgetown, I’ll be working with people: patients, preceptors, peers. I know it’ll be difficult at times. But after a few very solitary years, the idea of an interactive workday holds lots of appeal.

We’ll see how I feel once I get there, and I don’t doubt that my feelings about it will fluctuate, just as my enthusiasm and energy for writing and cooking tend to ebb and flow. For today, I’m acknowledging my own desire for a new beginning.

Speaking of new beginnings, happy Monday. Here are some reads and some plant-based goodness to feast your eyes on.

Recipes

Four simple, summery recipes today, followed by one stunning dessert. First up is Kathy’s yummy and easy summer tomato cheese toast. Grilled cheese & tomato was my favorite sandwich when I was a kid, and this looks to be a perfect, grown-up answer to it.

I love a good multi-bean salad, and right now Kristina’s Mexican-style three bean salad is calling my name.

Speaking of beans, a simple yet creative butter bean and sweet potato smash. Amy’s recipe would be great as a lunch bowl component or scooped over toast.

There’s nothing like a colorful bowl of sesame peanut noodles. Ali’s stellar recipe calls for Chinese egg noodles, but any vegan noodle option will work; Udon noodles are my favorite these days.

Finally, it’s hard for me to put into words just how badly I’d like to devour a thick slice of Alexandra’s vegan chocolate raspberry cake right now. Those frosting swirls! ❤️

Reads

1. A sweet and surprising look at the power of expressing gratitude. Amit Kumar at the University of Texas at Austin and Nicholas Epley at Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago recruited study participants and asked them to write a thank you email to someone who had touched their life in a meaningful way. The participants were asked to make predictions about how the recipients would feel about being thanked and acknowledged; meanwhile, the researchers reached out to the recipients and asked them about how they actually felt and thought. The results:

The senders of the thank-you letters consistently underestimated how positive the recipients felt about receiving the letters and how surprised they were by the content. The senders also overestimated how awkward the recipients felt; and they underestimated how warm, and especially how competent, the recipients perceived them to be. Age and gender made no difference to the pattern of findings.

Other experiments showed that these same misjudgments affect our willingness to write thank-you messages. For instance, participants who felt less competent about writing a message of gratitude were less willing to send one; and, logically enough, participants were least willing to send thank-you messages to recipients who they felt would benefit the least.

Kumar and Epley believe that this asymmetry between the perspective of the potential expresser of gratitude and the recipient means that we often refrain from a “powerful act of civility” that would benefit both parties.

This gives me a nudge to send thank you notes more often, and also to find more simple, everyday ways of expressing and acknowledging gratitude.

2. Knowable Magazine interviews Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, about how the medical community is learning to manage chronic and acute pain in a time of opioid abuse.

3. Reading this article has made me incredibly excited to try Good Catch tuna!

4. I’m touched by Maria Del Russo’s candid thoughts on traveling alone and what it taught her; they brought me back to my trip to Prague last year and how much I realized about myself while I was there.

One of those realizations was that I had become—or maybe always been—afraid of being alone with myself. It’s a state that I successfully avoided for years with workaholism, self-imposed busy-ness, and various forms of codependency. Del Russo describes something similar:

I have never admitted out loud this stemmed from a deep, dark fear of being by myself. It is not that I just fear being alone. I fear being with me, and that is something different.

When I left Prague, I felt that I’d managed to become better friends with myself. More than anything else—the food, the sightseeing, the music—that’s what I took home from the trip. I’ve been gently cultivating it ever since.

5. Brandom Keim’s meditations on animal labor, both domesticated and in the wild, gave me a lot to think about. Particularly this sentiment:

Clean air and clean water, carbon sequestration, and organic materials are not yielded by something so abstract and impersonal as “ecosystems.” They’re the products of vast and unceasing animal and organismal activity. Countless creatures preparing soil, dispersing seeds, distributing nutrients, regulating populations, performing the myriad and constant tasks necessary to support the nature we take for granted…

Maybe recognizing animal labor at a larger scale would help people appreciate that.

Keim is particularly interested in pesticide use and its impact on birds, but for me the invitation to extend my consciousness to the rights of wild animals, as opposed to farm animals, was provocative and important.

A simple, staple recipe for tempeh is coming your way later this week. Till soon,

xo

Source: https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-8-12-18/

[ideahood58-blog]

Weekend Reading, 8.12.18

This week has flown by, and as I watched it pass I definitely sensed that the slowness of summer was giving way to the busier energy of fall. We’re not there yet, I know. But it’s coming.

I got my first two DI rotation placements, which means that I now have a sense of my schedule through December. September and early October should feel pretty manageable, and late fall will be demanding. After an initial day or two of nerves and resistance, I’m feeling pretty solid: aware of the changes ahead of me, but basically ready for them.

I realize, too, that a considerable part of me is excited about the DI. I think I’ve tried not to be, because so much of my grad school experience has defied was I was hoping for. I’ve developed a strong capacity to greet new experiences with an open mind and as few expectations as possible. Still, it’s good that I’m excited; I haven’t been excited about my training in a while, and the sensation is welcome.

Part of what excites me is the fact of my nutrition education finally becoming more humanized. I began this process because I love working with people. I needed a lot more scientific understanding and clinical exposure than I had in order to continue doing it in the way I wanted, and I don’t regret going back to school to fill in the gaps. It’s been hard, though, to study nutrition so abstractly; at many points in the last year it was easy to forget what had driven me to do all of this in the first place.

When I got my first two placements, it occurred to me that, for the first time since being a hospital volunteer at Georgetown, I’ll be working with people: patients, preceptors, peers. I know it’ll be difficult at times. But after a few very solitary years, the idea of an interactive workday holds lots of appeal.

We’ll see how I feel once I get there, and I don’t doubt that my feelings about it will fluctuate, just as my enthusiasm and energy for writing and cooking tend to ebb and flow. For today, I’m acknowledging my own desire for a new beginning.

Speaking of new beginnings, happy Monday. Here are some reads and some plant-based goodness to feast your eyes on.

Recipes

Four simple, summery recipes today, followed by one stunning dessert. First up is Kathy’s yummy and easy summer tomato cheese toast. Grilled cheese & tomato was my favorite sandwich when I was a kid, and this looks to be a perfect, grown-up answer to it.

I love a good multi-bean salad, and right now Kristina’s Mexican-style three bean salad is calling my name.

Speaking of beans, a simple yet creative butter bean and sweet potato smash. Amy’s recipe would be great as a lunch bowl component or scooped over toast.

There’s nothing like a colorful bowl of sesame peanut noodles. Ali’s stellar recipe calls for Chinese egg noodles, but any vegan noodle option will work; Udon noodles are my favorite these days.

Finally, it’s hard for me to put into words just how badly I’d like to devour a thick slice of Alexandra’s vegan chocolate raspberry cake right now. Those frosting swirls! ❤️

Reads

1. A sweet and surprising look at the power of expressing gratitude. Amit Kumar at the University of Texas at Austin and Nicholas Epley at Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago recruited study participants and asked them to write a thank you email to someone who had touched their life in a meaningful way. The participants were asked to make predictions about how the recipients would feel about being thanked and acknowledged; meanwhile, the researchers reached out to the recipients and asked them about how they actually felt and thought. The results:

The senders of the thank-you letters consistently underestimated how positive the recipients felt about receiving the letters and how surprised they were by the content. The senders also overestimated how awkward the recipients felt; and they underestimated how warm, and especially how competent, the recipients perceived them to be. Age and gender made no difference to the pattern of findings.

Other experiments showed that these same misjudgments affect our willingness to write thank-you messages. For instance, participants who felt less competent about writing a message of gratitude were less willing to send one; and, logically enough, participants were least willing to send thank-you messages to recipients who they felt would benefit the least.

Kumar and Epley believe that this asymmetry between the perspective of the potential expresser of gratitude and the recipient means that we often refrain from a “powerful act of civility” that would benefit both parties.

This gives me a nudge to send thank you notes more often, and also to find more simple, everyday ways of expressing and acknowledging gratitude.

2. Knowable Magazine interviews Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, about how the medical community is learning to manage chronic and acute pain in a time of opioid abuse.

3. Reading this article has made me incredibly excited to try Good Catch tuna!

4. I’m touched by Maria Del Russo’s candid thoughts on traveling alone and what it taught her; they brought me back to my trip to Prague last year and how much I realized about myself while I was there.

One of those realizations was that I had become—or maybe always been—afraid of being alone with myself. It’s a state that I successfully avoided for years with workaholism, self-imposed busy-ness, and various forms of codependency. Del Russo describes something similar:

I have never admitted out loud this stemmed from a deep, dark fear of being by myself. It is not that I just fear being alone. I fear being with me, and that is something different.

When I left Prague, I felt that I’d managed to become better friends with myself. More than anything else—the food, the sightseeing, the music—that’s what I took home from the trip. I’ve been gently cultivating it ever since.

5. Brandom Keim’s meditations on animal labor, both domesticated and in the wild, gave me a lot to think about. Particularly this sentiment:

Clean air and clean water, carbon sequestration, and organic materials are not yielded by something so abstract and impersonal as “ecosystems.” They’re the products of vast and unceasing animal and organismal activity. Countless creatures preparing soil, dispersing seeds, distributing nutrients, regulating populations, performing the myriad and constant tasks necessary to support the nature we take for granted…

Maybe recognizing animal labor at a larger scale would help people appreciate that.

Keim is particularly interested in pesticide use and its impact on birds, but for me the invitation to extend my consciousness to the rights of wild animals, as opposed to farm animals, was provocative and important.

A simple, staple recipe for tempeh is coming your way later this week. Till soon,

xo

Source: https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-8-12-18/

[gardencityvegans]

Weekend Reading, 8.12.18

https://www.thefullhelping.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/weekend_reading.jpg

This week has flown by, and as I watched it pass I definitely sensed that the slowness of summer was giving way to the busier energy of fall. We’re not there yet, I know. But it’s coming.

I got my first two DI rotation placements, which means that I now have a sense of my schedule through December. September and early October should feel pretty manageable, and late fall will be demanding. After an initial day or two of nerves and resistance, I’m feeling pretty solid: aware of the changes ahead of me, but basically ready for them.

I realize, too, that a considerable part of me is excited about the DI. I think I’ve tried not to be, because so much of my grad school experience has defied was I was hoping for. I’ve developed a strong capacity to greet new experiences with an open mind and as few expectations as possible. Still, it’s good that I’m excited; I haven’t been excited about my training in a while, and the sensation is welcome.

Part of what excites me is the fact of my nutrition education finally becoming more humanized. I began this process because I love working with people. I needed a lot more scientific understanding and clinical exposure than I had in order to continue doing it in the way I wanted, and I don’t regret going back to school to fill in the gaps. It’s been hard, though, to study nutrition so abstractly; at many points in the last year it was easy to forget what had driven me to do all of this in the first place.

When I got my first two placements, it occurred to me that, for the first time since being a hospital volunteer at Georgetown, I’ll be working with people: patients, preceptors, peers. I know it’ll be difficult at times. But after a few very solitary years, the idea of an interactive workday holds lots of appeal.

We’ll see how I feel once I get there, and I don’t doubt that my feelings about it will fluctuate, just as my enthusiasm and energy for writing and cooking tend to ebb and flow. For today, I’m acknowledging my own desire for a new beginning.

Speaking of new beginnings, happy Monday. Here are some reads and some plant-based goodness to feast your eyes on.

Recipes

Four simple, summery recipes today, followed by one stunning dessert. First up is Kathy’s yummy and easy summer tomato cheese toast. Grilled cheese & tomato was my favorite sandwich when I was a kid, and this looks to be a perfect, grown-up answer to it.

I love a good multi-bean salad, and right now Kristina’s Mexican-style three bean salad is calling my name.

Speaking of beans, a simple yet creative butter bean and sweet potato smash. Amy’s recipe would be great as a lunch bowl component or scooped over toast.

There’s nothing like a colorful bowl of sesame peanut noodles. Ali’s stellar recipe calls for Chinese egg noodles, but any vegan noodle option will work; Udon noodles are my favorite these days.

Finally, it’s hard for me to put into words just how badly I’d like to devour a thick slice of Alexandra’s vegan chocolate raspberry cake right now. Those frosting swirls!

Reads

1. A sweet and surprising look at the power of expressing gratitude. Amit Kumar at the University of Texas at Austin and Nicholas Epley at Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago recruited study participants and asked them to write a thank you email to someone who had touched their life in a meaningful way. The participants were asked to make predictions about how the recipients would feel about being thanked and acknowledged; meanwhile, the researchers reached out to the recipients and asked them about how they actually felt and thought. The results:

The senders of the thank-you letters consistently underestimated how positive the recipients felt about receiving the letters and how surprised they were by the content. The senders also overestimated how awkward the recipients felt; and they underestimated how warm, and especially how competent, the recipients perceived them to be. Age and gender made no difference to the pattern of findings.

Other experiments showed that these same misjudgments affect our willingness to write thank-you messages. For instance, participants who felt less competent about writing a message of gratitude were less willing to send one; and, logically enough, participants were least willing to send thank-you messages to recipients who they felt would benefit the least.

Kumar and Epley believe that this asymmetry between the perspective of the potential expresser of gratitude and the recipient means that we often refrain from a “powerful act of civility” that would benefit both parties.

This gives me a nudge to send thank you notes more often, and also to find more simple, everyday ways of expressing and acknowledging gratitude.

2. Knowable Magazine interviews Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, about how the medical community is learning to manage chronic and acute pain in a time of opioid abuse.

3. Reading this article has made me incredibly excited to try Good Catch tuna!

4. I’m touched by Maria Del Russo’s candid thoughts on traveling alone and what it taught her; they brought me back to my trip to Prague last year and how much I realized about myself while I was there.

One of those realizations was that I had become—or maybe always been—afraid of being alone with myself. It’s a state that I successfully avoided for years with workaholism, self-imposed busy-ness, and various forms of codependency. Del Russo describes something similar:

I have never admitted out loud this stemmed from a deep, dark fear of being by myself. It is not that I just fear being alone. I fear being with me, and that is something different.

When I left Prague, I felt that I’d managed to become better friends with myself. More than anything else—the food, the sightseeing, the music—that’s what I took home from the trip. I’ve been gently cultivating it ever since.

5. Brandom Keim’s meditations on animal labor, both domesticated and in the wild, gave me a lot to think about. Particularly this sentiment:

Clean air and clean water, carbon sequestration, and organic materials are not yielded by something so abstract and impersonal as “ecosystems.” They’re the products of vast and unceasing animal and organismal activity. Countless creatures preparing soil, dispersing seeds, distributing nutrients, regulating populations, performing the myriad and constant tasks necessary to support the nature we take for granted…

Maybe recognizing animal labor at a larger scale would help people appreciate that.

Keim is particularly interested in pesticide use and its impact on birds, but for me the invitation to extend my consciousness to the rights of wild animals, as opposed to farm animals, was provocative and important.

A simple, staple recipe for tempeh is coming your way later this week. Till soon,

xo

[Read More ...] https://www.thefullhelping.com/weekend-reading-8-12-18/

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  Japanese Battleship Mikasa sits in Mikasa Park, Yokosuka, Japan.

Japan and Russia are at war.  Russian incursions into Manchuria and Korea in search of natural resources and warm-water ports in the Pacific angered the Japanese Empire, who saw the attempts as Russia encroaching on their sphere of influence and disrespecting Japan’s place on the world stage.  In 1904, these tensions blew up and after negotiations failed, Japan declared war on Russia.   At first Russia didn’t take Japanese threats seriously, but the stunning failure of the Russian fleets in Port Arthur and Vladivostok to escape anchorage and break the Japanese blockade, taking heavy damage in the process, led the Tsar Nicholas II to send a large part of the Baltic fleet around Africa, across the Indian Ocean, and into the Sea of Japan to relieve the Pacific fleet.   It was a long, difficult trip, but these Japanese upstarts couldn’t possibly stand against a full Russian battleship fleet.  Right?

A statue of Admiral Togo, commander of the fleet at Tsushima Strait, stands tall in front of his flagship in the battle, Battleship Mikasa.

And so, early in the morning on May 27th, 1905, Admiral Togo, leading the Japanese fleet from his new flagship, the Battleship Mikasa, got his fleet underway in the early morning fog.  The Russian relief fleet was sighted overnight steaming toward Tsushima Strait.  They had hoped to slip through in the night and reach the remains of the Russian Pacific Fleet in Vladivostok, but intercepted Japanese wireless messages let them know that they had been found and had Japanese cruisers shadowing them.  Battle was inevitable.  By early afternoon, the two fleets were in sight of each other and Admiral Togo crossed the Russian “T”, bringing the full firepower of his five battleships and numerous cruisers to bear.  The Russians, while having more twice the number of battleships, were still greatly outnumbered and after such a long voyage around the horn of Africa, their ships were ill-supplied and in poor condition.  And after so much time at sea without any friendly ports, Russian morale was also in very poor condition.  By nightfall, Mikasa and her comrades sent four Russian battleships to the bottom with only light damage in return.  After nightfall, Japanese destroyers and torpedo boats moved in to finish the job.  By the morning of the morning of the 28th, all but a few Russian ships were either sunk or heavily damaged and surrounded while the Japanese had lost only three small torpedo boats.  They had no choice but to surrender.  Of the 38 Russian ships that started the battle, only two small destroyers and a large armed yacht arrived in Vladivostok.  The rest were either sunk or captured by the Japanese.  The Japanese Navy, with Mikasa in the lead, had almost completely destroyed the navy of one of the great Western powers.  The Russians were forced to concede defeat and end the war and Japan was left as the dominant power in the Far East.

The side of Mikasa, bristling with guns. Before HMS Dreadnought and the advent of the modern battleship, these old battlewagons were designed with as many guns as possible, all of varying calibers.

The battle of Tsushima isn’t that well known outside of Japan and Russia, but it is historically significant for a few reasons.  It was the first major battle between two modern steel hulled battleship fleets and the Russian Battleship Oslyabya was the first all-steel battleship to be sunk by naval gunfire.  It also further established and emboldened Japan’s colonial ambitions in Asia while showing the west that they weren’t the only ones playing the naval power game.  While most Japanese ships at the time were built and designed by the British, Japan’s victory in the Russo-Japanese war clearly showed that, given access modern technology and tactics, non-European nations could equal or defeat the western powers.  Today, most people would never question that fact – nor would I.  In 1904, however, it was a different world and the idea that non-Europeans (or the U.S.) could match the might of Europe was a scary thing.  And Battleship Mikasa was front and center in all of this.

  Mikasa

Battleship Mikasa stands proud in Mikasa Park, Yokosuka, Japan

Battleship Mikasa was ordered from the Vickers shipyard by the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1898 and was based on the Royal Navy Formidable class ship with two extra 6 inch guns crammed onto her decks.  These days, it is easy to think of emerging navies buying retired warships from other countries, but the Japanese in the late Meiji were buying brand new, bleeding edge ships and paying cash.  So Mikasa was almost brand new and top of the line when she went into battle that early May morning.  She didn’t say new and pristine for long though.  She only took minor damage in the Russo-Japanese war, but shortly after the war, while in port in Sasebo, a fire broke out and detonated one of her powder magazines.  The crippled ship settled onto the bottom of the harbor and 251 men were killed.  She was still the flagship and pride of the Japanese fleet, so she was quickly raised and while she was being repaired, she also had her guns upgraded.  She served the Japanese in WWI and supported Japan’s attempted intervention in the Russian Civil War, but these conflicts passed without incident for the grand warship.  Meanwhile, Britain had launched the HMS Dreadnaught and changed the face of battleships forever, leaving older style battleships like Mikasa far behind.  Following the restrictions placed on the naval powers by the Washington Naval Treaty in 1922, the young, but now obsolete, battleship was scheduled for the scrap yard.  But Japan’s memory is long, and the flagship of Tsushima was too important to throw away, so the Japanese petitioned the other treaty countries to allow the Japanese to preserve the ship as a museum.��  The other naval powers agreed, but only if Mikasa was permanently berthed with her hull encased in concrete, ensuring she could never sail again.  And so Mikasa still rests today, encased in concrete along the water’s edge on the Yokosuka waterfront.

A replica six inch gun on the deck of Battleship Mikasa. Following WWII, the ship was stripped of almost all structures above the deck and guns of this style and age are very rare, so replicas had to be made.  All of the guns on board, from the main armament and turrets to these smaller caliber guns had to be completely remade when the ship was restored.

Mikasa’s retirement hasn’t been kind to her though.  After WWII, all of her superstructure and guns were stripped away and scrapped, leaving only a bare hulk.  For a short time, a dance hall and a small aquarium were built on top of her main deck and she fell into disrepair.  Eventually, those businesses failed, and Mikasa was left abandoned.  Then, in the late 50s, the Japan Times with the support of American Admiral Chester Nimitz launched a successful campaign to see Mikasa restored as a proper museum ship, open to all.  In 1961, she reopened with much fanfare and a visit from Prince Masahito.  Today the ship is well maintained and open to the public, with much of her decks, guns, and rigging accurately reproduced from photos and schematics of her in her heyday.  The guns are, of course, non-functional replicas, and only one deck is open below the main weather deck.  Even so, she is the only battleship of her era left in existence, and that really is something.

One of the larger caliber broadside guns with hammocks strung next to it. There are several displays around the ship intent on showing what life on board was like in 1905.

The Mikasa’s museum is fairly good considering the limited area of the ship open to the public.  There are displays in the various spaces with mannequins showing activities such as firing the guns.  The Admiral’s quarters at the stern of the first deck are fully refurnished as they would have been and are open to walk through.  There are many signs in English and a lot of good information about the Battle of Tsushima Strait, including an interactive V/R experience.  There are a few claims made in the museum, though, that are a bit of a stretch.   The biggest claim is that the Japanese victory in the Russo-Japanese war directly led to freedom for all colored people and inspired non-whites to push for more freedom and equality –especially in Asia.  While the battle, and the war, had implications on the international stage, most people outside of Japan, Russia, and the European ruling classes really didn’t know much about it.  So, while I can’t say it had no bearing, the museum makes a pretty big claim with no real way to back it up.

The bridge of Battleship Mikasa, restored with fittings bought from other scrapped ships of the same era or recreated from old plans.

The second big claim the Mikasa museum makes is that Mikasa is one of the “Three World-Renowned Historic Memorial Warships”, alongside USS Constitution and HMS Victory.  They claim that these three ships are the most important preserved warships in the world as each helped establish and maintain their native countries.  The issue here is, how do you say there are only three great memorial warships?  Mikasa is definitely a good museum ship, and her historical significance is unquestionable.  But the same can be said about a dozen other museum ships around the world.  Once again, this is a pretty broad claim with no real way to objectively support it.

Looking back toward the gangway from the Admiral’s gallery.

All that aside, if you do find yourself in Yokosuka with an afternoon free, Mikasa is definitely worth the time and money needed to visit.  You can see most of the ship in a couple hours, and the 600 yen entrance fee is worth it considering that there are no other ships of her type in existence, and only two other ships from her era left in the world.  For that reason alone, she is worth the trip to pay her a visit.

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The side of Mikasa, bristling with guns. Before HMS Dreadnought and the advent of the modern battleship, these old battlewagons were designed with as many guns as possible, all of varying calibers.

The admiral’s saloon at the stern of the ship. Here, Admiral Togo would entertain officers and draw up battle plans.

looking down on the bow of Battleship Mikasa from the bridge wing.

A protected, armored secondary bridge for steering the ship when under fire. Many of these fittings were salvaged from scrapped South American ships of similar era and construction.

The port side of Battleship Mikasa facing the city of Yokosuka. Before HMS Dreadnought, battleships crammed as many guns as possible in sponsons along the side of the ship, giving the ships a powerful broadside, like the sailing ships of old.

Battleship Mikasa in Mikasa Park, Yokosuka, Japan

Battleship Mikasa – Hero of Tsushima Japan and Russia are at war.  Russian incursions into Manchuria and Korea in search of natural resources and warm-water ports in the Pacific angered the Japanese Empire, who saw the attempts as Russia encroaching on their sphere of influence and disrespecting Japan’s place on the world stage. 

[juliandmouton30]

Branch Studio uses rammed earth to build Melbourne house extension

This moody Melbourne house extension by local studio Branch Studio Architects features dark rammed-charcoal walls, window nooks and an outdoor bathtub.

Branch Studio Architects was asked to extend an existing house for a couple to create a master suite with a bedroom, an en-suite bathroom and extra storage space.

The 1990s house "posed little architectural significance and interacted poorly with its context", according to the architects, who decided to design the extension as a separate structure that links to the original structure via a corridor.

"The strategy for dealing with the existing building was for the additions to be 'semi-detached' from the existing residence, this creates a separation from the main house," explained the architects.

"It gives the pavilion its own identity amongst the landscape, while also providing the private spaces contained within 'room to breathe' and a sense of calm, intimacy away from the large open plan family home."

The 85-square-metre rectilinear volume has been positioned to slot between existing large trees on the site. The structure named A Pavilion in the Trees was then manipulated to make the most of the surroundings.

The glazed wall at the western end of the extension is angled to offer a view through a large clearing between the trees, while two extruded windows on the pavilion's northern and southern walls extend out towards the trees, providing window seats inside.

The dark material palette of charcoal, timber panelling and steel is intended to weather and patina over time so that the structure further blends in with its surroundings.

These materials are also left exposed inside the pavilion, where they are accompanied by bluestone tiles in the bathrooms, and concrete and steel joinery. The stripped-back palette is intended to help reflect the time of day.

"The discrete, earthly approach to the lighting also allows the tones and textures of the individual materials to reflect the ambience of the current external climate at any given time," said the architects.

"A moody grey day outside will impart those connotations over the internal spaces," they continued. "Alternatively, a bright, sunny day will cast dappled light across the spaces through the tree canopies above."

The spaces inside the extension are arranged in a linear plan, leading from the en-suite, through the dressing rooms, and ending with the master bedroom. Rather than walls, the architects used subtle variations in floor level to delineate the different areas.

A walkway leads from the main house to the new en-suite bathroom, which includes indoor and outdoor washing areas separated by large folding glass doors. The outdoor space is shielded by a half-height rammed-earth wall topped with a steel mesh screen to provide privacy, while still allowing views of the treetops and sky.

Behind the bathroom, a central wooden wardrobe divides the dressing room into his-and-hers spaces named Adrian's robe and Georgina's robe respectively.

Georgina's robe features built-in seating made out of silver birch. This wooden bench wraps the wall and also functions as a dressing area.

On the other side, in Adrian's Robe, daylight filters in through a narrow clerestory window that runs above the wardrobes to provide glimpses of the tree canopy.

The rear wall of the central wardrobe, described by the architects as a "joinery forest", forms the headboard for the master bed.

Built-in cabinets, including a day bed and bench seating wrap the bedroom and sliding glazed doors open up to the outdoor space.

"The connection to the trees from the bedroom is more about being amongst the branches than beneath them and this is most apparent when standing in the large suspended window box or sitting at the very point of the space," said the architects.

"Where the full height 'cut end' glazing slides open to the outdoors as you hang well above the ground and gaze towards the greenery beyond."

Other residential projects by Branch Studio include revamped 1960s house in suburban Melbourne and a lakeside cabin clad in corrugated iron.

Related story

Woven metal-mesh curtain wraps Melbourne house extension designed by Matt Gibson

Photography is by Peter Clarke.

Project credits:

Architect: Branch Studio Architects Project team: Nicholas Russo, Simon Dinh, Rowena Henry Builder: Martin Builders Structural engineer: WSP Consulting Engineers

The post Branch Studio uses rammed earth to build Melbourne house extension appeared first on Dezeen.

from ifttt-furniture https://www.dezeen.com/2017/08/07/branch-studio-rammed-earth-charcoal-walls-architecture-a-pavilion-in-the-trees-extension-melbourne-australia/