#me and my little article collecting against the world ive had this one on the backburner to transcribe for agesss

[tkachukisms]

rip? ripped off? right on the ice? well. no reason for all of that.

[ad1thi]

If your still doing fic recs, could u rec any soft stevetony ones?

absolutely!! this got pretty long so ive hidden most of it under a read-more so i don’t annoy people. a couple of authors feature more than once. ive tried to avoid that as much as possible, but if an author features more than once - take that as a sign that they have rly good stuff for soft stevetony

disclaimer: don’t forget to leave kudos and comments for every author!! (a disclaimer i regrettably forgot to add to previous fic rec lists but will be adding from now on)

soda pops: @starklysteve

If anybody asks, Steve would smile and say it was very romantic. Very Tony. Because if he went into any further detail, nobody would quite believe him.

Tony, on the other hand, would laugh and say that Steve’s in love with a man in a can. So, really, it wasn’t outside the natural progression of things.

me voy pa’l pueblo: @firebrands

two times steve walks away, and one time that tony walks with him.

/ or, my very fluffy take on my bingo card prompt "farewells." steve is on vacation when he meets tony.

fill for my stony bingo prompt: farewells; also for bookworminaslump on tumblr who asked for a tourist/knowledgeable local au!

Tumblr Ficlets:  @omg-just-peachy (this is 115 chapters of stevetony being soft!!)

A collection of enough tooth-rotting fluff to last a year, all in one place.

tender offerings: @omg-just-peachy

Five times Steve carried Tony to bed.

the best thing (is that it’s happening to you and me):  @captainstarkreportingforduty

Or, five times the team saw Steve Rogers and Tony Stark in love.

Sweet On You: @miniblackraven

It’s the 1940’s and Tony is working as a Donut Doll for the Red Cross. His job is to go around to various military bases and offer comfort food and conversation to homesick soldiers. He’s come to expect a lot of things in this job, but he doesn’t expect to fall in love with Captain America, the hottest most awkward soldier Tony has ever met.

Bespectacled Avengers Society (Membership of One):  @baffledkingcomposinghallelujah

Tony gets glasses. Glasses get a Tony. Steve loses his mind and walks into walls.

a flower crown for your love: @anthonyed

"There, there," Pepper cooed. "Tony likes flowers?" she said with a shred of doubt in her tone. But when Steve peered up, she's smiling her bright toothy smile. He squinted and she sighed, dropping her hand from his shoulder. "He does." she insisted. "Even more so than me."

if this was a movie: @omg-just-peachy

“One of our seniors is being generous with his time this year—by force of his own actions, but generous none the less—and he’d be happy to help you, I’m sure. Tony Stark? I’ll set something up for later this week. I think between the two of you you’ll be able to pull your average up enough to make it through to playoffs,” Coulson said, with that ever-hopeful lilt in his voice.

Or, Steve needs a calculus tutor, Tony is available, but how is Steve ever supposed to focus when he's been in love with Tony for ... his entire school life?

you take me higher than the rest (everybody else is second best): @firebrands

tumblr fill for adi & anthonydarling, who asked for "'Prank' war, but the kind to see who can make the other blush the most in public" from this prompt list

amore mio:  @brucewaynery

Tony has had it with Steve being dumb and reckless out in the field, he has a family to think about now, Steve promises him that he'll be with him, kingdom come.

(initially based on that one headcanon about Italian Tony yelling and gesticulating at Steve but Peter thinks he's doing some weird dance and tries to copy him, but it got very fluffy very quickly)

Lost My Mind in a Coffee Shop: @betheflame

“Boyo,” Bucky muttered to his best friend. “I swear to God that if you don’t ask that man for his number soon, I will create a Grindr profile for you and you will not like it.”

Steve rolled his eyes. “I am here to finish grading, not hit on men.”

“Can you not do both?” Natasha smirked. “Nearly tenured, historical genius, feels like something you should be able to multitask.”

&&&

In which Steve is a history professor and Tony's an engineering one and Bucky owns the joint where they have their meet cute.

AU-gust Chapter 7: @iam93percentstardust 

stevetony, childhood friends AU

Right Up The Road: @gottalovev

The day at the senate committee in Washington DC wasn't supposed to end with Tony and Steve transformed into animals by a baby witch. That said, the 350 miles trek back to the compound to get help promises to be quite an adventure too!

(or the adventures of Cat!Tony and Wolf!Steve - and how to readjust when you're back to human!)

i’ll take care of you: @elcorhamletlive

“Hi.”

Steve blinks. The sound of loud thunder roars outside, but he doesn’t jolt, too focused on the image in front of him to be startled by the noise.

He has no idea what to say, and he isn’t sure if the shock is because of Tony’s absolutely sodden state – his hair glued to his forehead, his clothes dripping with water, forming a small puddle in front of Steve’s door – or because he wasn’t expecting to see Tony for at least three more days.

“Hi?” he says, a little tentative, before his brain catches up to reality. In his defense, he was getting ready to sleep when Tony knocked. He looks at what Tony is holding – a wet mess that seems to have been a flower bouquet at some point. “What are you doing here?”

The Tally System:  @betheflame

Everyone on the team knew about the tally system.

Whenever Steve would save Tony - whether from a monster or from his own stupidity - he’d say, “tag”. Whenever Tony do the same, he’d say, “your turn”. Thor thought it was adorable, Clint thought it was ridiculous, Bruce refused to register an opinion.

Natasha thought it was something she could work with.

what’s mine is yours: @robertdowneyjjr

5 times Tony stole Steve’s clothes, and 1 time Steve returned the favor.

or

For a billionaire, Tony Stark really doesn't pay for a lot of what he wears.

I like Shiny Things But I’d Marry You With Paper Rings: @betheflame

Rhodey: I just confirmed with Sam that he’s going to make sure he cooks tonight and that his entire team is briefed. I’m heading over now to strategically arrange a fuck ton of ficus trees to block them from gen pop.

Pepper: They’re not getting engaged in a prison, Jimmy.

Rhodey: Tony Stark and Steve Rogers show up to Circe on a Saturday night in May and you watch every person in that restaurant turn into someone I’d rather arrest than eat with.

****

In which Tony and Steve get engaged, but they're kind of extra about it, because they are always themselves

the road to the stars: @shell-heads

Tony is seven years old when he sees the ballet for the first time and meets his future pas de deux partner.

His father is invited to sweet-talk politicians into a new weapons deal and explain his latest idea for their program, and his mom goes to catch up with old friends she hasn't seen in years, but Tony goes because his mom had smiled down at him and told him he would love it.

His mom's never wrong.

-

In which boy genius Tony Stark meets girl wonder Natasha Romanoff at the ballet, and they fit their broken little pieces together to make something beautiful on the dance floor.

Steve? He's just a dumb, awful, chaotic, extremely supportive older brother that really should just shut up and admit he likes Tony a lot more than he pretends, because Natasha only has five people in the world she likes; it only makes sense her two favorites would fall in love with one another.

They always were a little slow, though.

A Second Chance To Take it Slow: @omg-just-peachy

Tony loves his adopted son, Peter, but that doesn't stop him from wishing he had someone to do this whole parenting thing with. After a failed one night stand, Tony's parent-teacher conference with Mr. Rogers comes with quite the surprise.

Wake Up!: @randomstufffromotherblogs

Tony came home from a business trip and is woken up by his husband and their three-year old.

pull me closer to love:  @captainstakreportingforduty (part of a series)

“A Mother’s Day card? For... Tony?” Steve clarifies, and can’t help the smile on his face as six familiar little heads nod in response.

“But... guys, Tony’s not—“ he pauses and takes a breath, any explanation dying in his throat against the excited gleam in everyone’s eyes. “Why do you guys want to do that, hmm?"

compromises:  @robertpattisons (when i looked up OP on tumblr, this is the blog i was directed to - but i sincerely apologise if ive gotten it wrong)

Steve should have expected it, he really should have.

There were regulations that came with dating Tony Stark. Things that were clear and things that they needed to work through.

Things like how Steve always got strawberry ice cream, while Tony got rocky road. Or when Steve needed to get his homework done before he was down to make out - even though Tony always got his way.

Things like that were clear

all that you are is all that i’ll ever need: @natasharxmanov

Tony Stark and Steve Rogers announced their engagement on Good Morning America through Tony Stark’s previous secretary now CEO, Pepper Potts. And over this past weekend, I got the chance to sit down with them both, to visit their home and attend their gala, all to write this article about the most powerful couple in the world.

(Or, the fic in which Tony and Steve get married.)

(i won’t ever) trade my mistakes: @brucewaynery

Toddler Peter, painting a masterpiece with his dad.

aka: a dumb amount of family fluff to help you power through the week

[itsblosseybitch]

Griffin Dunne by Lynn Geller (INTERVIEW Magazine, May 1985)

At 29, Griffin Dunne has seen the movie business from many different perspectives. Born in New York City to Ellen Griffin Dunne and television producer-turned-writer Dominick Dunne, Griffin grew up in Los Angeles and is the nephew of Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne. Eleven years ago, he returned to Manhattan to pursue an acting career and, after roles in Off-Broadway plays, television, and “An American Werewolf in London,” teamed up with Amy Robinson and Mark Metcalf [misprinted with an e at the end] to produce the film “Chilly Scenes of Winter,” in which he had a small part. He and Amy went on to produce “Baby, It’s You” and, most recently, Martin Scorsese’s “After Hours,” starring producer Griffin Dunne in the male lead. As if this weren’t enough responsibility, the past year has also included acting roles in the films “Johnny Dangerously” and this spring’s “Almost You.” 

Looking remarkably fit for such a busy man, Griffin strode into the Lion’s Head in Manhattan only fifteen minutes late and carrying a briefcase full of future projects.

LYNN GELLER: You come from a literary family--your aunt, uncle and father are writers--were there any actors before your generation?

Griffin Dunne: Well, my mother was an actress until she had children, meaning me. I was the first. She was raised on a ranch in Nogales, Arizona, and my grandfather sent her to school in the East. My father was an actor then and he met her at a play. Actually, she hated being an actress.

LG: I didn’t know your father had been an actor.

GD: He wanted to be an actor before he became a producer. He was a stage manager and actor, studying with Stanford Meisner, who ran the Neighborhood Playhouse. Meisner told him he would never be a leading man because he was too short. When I say short, I mean my height, five-seven, five-eight. He left the profession because he wanted to be a leading man, not a character midget, or whatever he thought he would be. This was in the pre-Dustin Hoffman days. He became a stage manager for live TV, everything from Howdy Doody to Playhouse 90 in the ‘50s. When I was two, he got a job in L.A. and that’s where I was brought up. 

LG: Is that home?

GD: Well, yeah, home is where the mother is, but I’ve lived in New York for eleven years.

LG: Why did you move here--you went to school in the East?

GD: I went to boarding school in the East [more specifically, Fay School in Boston, Massachusetts, based on a New York Times article from the -late ‘90s and the Alumni page] , a pre-prep school that was very repressive. Coats and ties, whippings--if you ever saw the Lindsay Anderson movie If... you know what I’m talking about. You stay through eighth grade and then hopefully you graduate and go somewhere like Exeter and Andover. 

LG: Did you?

GD: My response was to get the hell away from the East Coast and go to a liberal arts school in Colorado called Fountain Valley.

LG: I know about that school. That was supposed to be a very wild place.

GD: Well, I was hoping it would be. It was wild in my wildest imagination. You could grow you hair as long as you wanted and you were allowed to smoke cigarettes. You could pretty much get away with anything, but I did manage to get myself kicked out.

LG: What did you do?

GD: I smoked dope and a teacher saw me through a window. The next night I was going to appear in Othello, and I never got to do the play. 

LG: So you were acting at an early age. Was that because of your parents?

GD: No. I was planning to be a writer. But a guy who taught acting talked me into auditioning for Zoo Story, the Edward Albee play. I got the part and that was the end of that.

LG: How old were you when you got kicked out?

GD: I was 17 and almost finished. They wouldn’t let me graduate, which was really depressing. It was more depressing that I didn’t get to play Iago. They felt that my performance would be tainted by the fact that I had been kicked out and I might be unduly rewarded by applause.

LG: What did you think you might do after that?

GD: Be an actor. I finally got some work. I was in a movie called The Other Side of the Mountain.

LG: Then you came to New York?

GD: No, then I got a job on a television series called Medical Story. I had about ten lines. I played a doctor, stuffing an IV in Linda Purl’s veins [misprinted as Linda Pearl] and answering Meredith Baxter Birney when she came in and said, “What’s the diagnosis, David?” I’d memorized the diagnosis, which was complicated medical jargon. 

LG: What did you use for inner motivation?

GD: My major motivation was to say the words correctly. I figured if I did it like a real scientist, I’d pull off a real character coup. Then right as we were about to roll, the medical adviser on the show came over and said that the diagnosis wasn’t accurate, we had to change the description. They changed the lines and every time we’d go for a take, I couldn’t remember the lines and I’d clam up. The director would go, “Cut. What’s your problem? What is your problem?” I said I needed five minutes, so he said, “Okay, five minutes, the kid’s got five minutes.” I went into a little room and I was so nervous about ruining my career that when I went to light a cigarette, I set my lip on fire. So when I went back to give the diagnosis I hadn’t memorized in the first place, I lisped. The director was furious. He said, “Cut. What’s the accent? Are you doing an accent on me?” Finally, the actress, Linda Purl, took out one of my pens in my top pocket and without me knowing it, she wrote out the diagnosis on her arm, where I was to insert the IV. So when they said, “Roll ‘em,” I had no idea at first what my line would be and then I looked down at her arm and there it was. It was very sweet of her.

[Based on the available information I have, the Medical Story episode that Griffin Dunne was on was titled “Up Against The World” or “Us Against The World” depending on what you check. The episode is said to have aired December 4th, 1975. All I could find on the show was a promo on YouTube.]

LG: You must have fallen in love.

GD: I did, but we never got to say goodbye. So I got the lines out, but what I realized from that experience was...nothing. Absolutely nothing, but to have a cigarette in your mouth when you go to light one. Shortly after that I moved to New York and signed up at the Neighborhood Playhouse.

LG: Because your father had gone there?

GD: I didn’t know he’d gone there until I was already in there and he told me the Stanford Meisner/leading man story.

LG: While you were studying acting, did you work as a waiter?

GD: Yes. At Beefsteak Charlie’s for a limited engagement. At Joe Allen once for two weeks. I lied and said I was experienced and I clearly wasn’t. That was enough to get me the job at Beefsteak’s. I hung in the longest there--they liked my work.

LG: Then you would go on auditions? Is that what you do when you’re a waiter/actor?

GD: When you’re a waiter/actor with no agent, you read Backstage and go out for plays that you never see in ads for openings. They never appear as productions. I went to an audition for an original play once, written and directed by a woman with a long Russian name. She thought I was perfect for the part. It was the first time a director said, “You are going to be great, you’re it.” She told all the other actors to go and took me out for coffee. I couldn’t believe my luck--I’d just arrived in New York. She took me out, we talked intensely, and at some point I realized she was stark raving mad. She had this long scarf that dragged behind her picking up dirt and pizza crust. I looked closely at her and realized she was a bag lady. I realized that anyone can hold an open casting call, a trick I haven’t really employed yet as a way to meet new and exciting people. 

LG: How much does it cost to take an ad out? As much as a bag lady collects in a day?

GD: No, these people weren’t quite bag. They have apartments and enough money to be able to decide, is it Safeway tonight or an ad in Backstage? At some point, they just cross that line. 

LG: How did you get involved in producing?

GD: Well, Amy Robinson, Mark Metcalf and I were unemployed actors hanging out together. We were working on the play Cowboy Mouth, which we were going to do for ourselves and hopefully get a production. That never happened, but the three of us had a lot of energy together. Eventually that translated into our trying to get a movie off the ground. Amy loved the book Chilly Scenes of Winter by Ann Beattie, and we agreed. That became our first project. We were all frustrated at being out-of-work actors. At the time I was working at Radio City Music Hall selling popcorn. I carried around a big set of keys as the manager of the popcorn concession. I wasn’t getting a lot of feedback on my work.  

LG: Had you ever thought of producing before?

GD: I never had dreams of producing, but I was with Amy and Mark and what we wanted to do was much closer to what I wanted to do than what I was doing. It felt as good as acting. 

LG: How did you end up doing Baby It’s You?

GD: I was in Poland acting in a TV movie called The Wall. Amy was talking about the idea for the film before I left. It was loosely based on her life, about a middle-class girl who gets involved with one of her classmates, a guy from the other side of the tracks. While I was away, she got John Sayles involved. We discussed it over the phone from Poland, the conversations closely monitored by the hotel staff. God knows what they made of it. But I didn’t have too much to do with development. 

LG: You mean in terms of the story?

GD: More in terms of getting the development deal at the studio. Amy and I have a very good relationship. We both rely on each other’s opinions and support. We were both line producers on the film. Our job was to keep things rolling and to make sure that John Sayles had everything he needed. 

LG: Are you good at that?

GD: Yes, to my surprise. I never considered myself much of an organizer, but it turns out I’m good with money and at getting along with people, making sure that everyone has what they need and keeping those needs within the budget. 

LG: Let’s talk about some of the films you’ve been acting in recently. Have you seen Almost You yet?

GD: Yes. I liked it. The characters were incredibly human and sympathetic. And screwed up. Not homicidal--but normal, confused human beings. My character in particular was a very confused fellow. 

LG: That was a movie where someone approached you with a script. What made you decide to take it on?

GD: Well, Adam Brooks, the director, had a script he’d been telling me about when he was a script supervisor on Baby It’s You. One day, when I was living in a beach house with Brooke Adams, he came up with the producer, Mark Lipson, and the script. We had a great day at the beach. Brooke cooked this great meal. After they left, we read the script and thought it was really charming, funny. Brooke and I wanted to work together and this seemed perfect. We said yes, thinking, this sweet little picture is never going to get made anyway, but, of course, we’ll do it if it does. Ha ha ha. All we did was say yes, and Mark and Adam took the ball and ran with it. The next thing I knew, we had a start date.

LG: What was the time lapse between those two events?

GD: Six months. It was shot in February. Very quick--I was pleasantly surprised. 

LG: But at this point you’re no longer living in that beach house? 

GD: Six months is also a very. very long time. A lot can happen in that time. Brooke and I aren’t living together anymore, nor were we when we did Almost You.

LG: Wasn’t that hard?

GD: It was interesting. We get along very well. We’re good friends, and we were very professional. I think we both dreaded the idea of letting the crew think there was something more to this than there was. 

LG: Do you think people see you as wearing two hats now, actor and producer?

GD: It’s hard to tell. I don’t really know. I have noticed that scripts that are submitted to Doubleplay Productions that have a character that is anywhere from 20 to 35, they say, “This would be a good part for you.” I don’t know if that’s supposed to be a lure. 

LG: Well, aren’t you looking for movies to produce that you can act in?

GD: Whatever movies Amy and I decide to do, it’s totally collaborative. I can see doing a movie that I would rather produce than act in, but it would have to be very special, like Chilly Scenes of Winter or Baby, It’s You. But doing After Hours revitalized my interest in acting, it really inspired me. So my dream is to be able to continue producing movies with Amy that I can act in.

[momtemplative]

Watching My Diet.

Of Words and Images, That Is.

As for a spoiled life, no life is spoiled but one whose growth is arrested.—Oscar Wilde, from The Picture of Dorian Gray.

1.

When I was pregnant, I was astounded by the amount of shit-advice people felt entitled to force upon me, thanks to the visual whistle-blower of my growing belly.

I kept the book, Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth, by Ina May Gaskin next to my bed like a sacred text. The second half of the book contains a collection of empowered women sharing inspiring stories of their natural birth experiences. I read at least one story every night to off-set the deflating stories that were pushed at me. (One, still clear as day in my mind over a decade later, came from a woman who had never had kids! She said, in low tones and with concern in her eyes, “It’s the most painful thing you will ever experience. You WILL NEED DRUGS.”) 

I would often fall asleep with Ina May’s book on my chest, thinking maybe the positive messages would cause seep into my being, like a topical treatment.

Now, during the era of COVID19, the news is an IV drip of mounting catastrophe into all of our collective veins. And the way we receive news during these current times is 24-7, on screens, visual, relentless and without limits. (PS: as said in Time, “media images can be so intense that they can cause symptoms of acute stress or even PTSD.”) 

Like many, I find myself falling into the habit of using my few-far-between windows of space to either read updates from the Post and the Times, or to check social media. While informative at best, these word-venues are, nutrient-wise, anemic crumbs not suitable for a bottom-feeder.

So why the impulse to keep going back?

According to Time Magazine, “The human brain is wired to pay attention to information that scares or unsettles us—a concept known as “negativity bias“. Meaning, our brains are predisposed to go negative, and the news we consume reflects this.”

On a personal level, my intake of news is rising by the day—sometimes seemingly out of my control. I’ll just be grabbing my phone to check the weather and suddenly I’m well into an article on the pandemic, as if in a trance. 

Without clear boundaries and a bit of mindfulness, the news and media we are ingesting can be far more toxic than beneficial. The effects of constant negative-news consumption are real and complex. 

And I feel the wear-and-tear in my mental state, to be sure. I’ve been taking in the news every night, just before bed, via my tiny phone screen as if that makes it less potent and more manageable. Not the case. I can easily slip into helplessness, along with tasting the vinegar of potent rage in the back of my throat, even as I’m trying to settle in for sleep. 

Anxiety and stress create cortisol, which can wreak havoc throughout the physical body and beyond. My neck and shoulders feel like they are clutching with white-knuckles for some unseen disaster, pretty much all the time. Yoga and breathing provides a world of help while doing it, but the muscle memory is so deep, that the bad patterns often return within moments of back-to-life.

This is not to say the solution is to bypass the news entirely. But if we are in this for the long haul, deliberate choices need to be made, for the stability of everyone.

2.

Last week, my dear friend, Steph, mailed a box of crafting goodies to my girls. An eclectic mix of junk-drawer extractions and art things—things that have the potential to clutter up a house. But, when assembled in a package with intention and love, feel like vintage treasures from another world. Girl scout patches, circa the early 1990’s, ribbon in original packaging from the Carter administration, an untethered bouquet of white plastic glitter flowers. And in the midst of this treasure chest: a hardcover copy of the Oscar Wilde book, The Picture of Dorian Gray.

It was a fancy, old-timey edition that I had read through and written-in during college, using the same red ink from the same red pen the whole way through. My handwriting is young—an un-mastered version of my current script. But my brain is searching and inquisitive. I’m not sure why Steph wound up with the book, but there was a time when I passed out Oscar Wilde books like a communist would pass out propaganda and I likely forced it upon her.

Back then—over twenty years ago, more than half my current age—Oscar Wilde spoke to me in a way I was not accustomed to being spoken to, and brought about feelings that literature rarely provided. I indulged in Him, collected photos, quotes, and bought multiple used copies of his books. He became an unwitting spiritual guide of sorts. I carried the story of his tragic incarceration and subsequent death with me the way a god-fearing man would hold the image of Jesus’ crucifixion close to his heart. If they sold Oscar Wilde on a necklace, I’d have bought one, for sure.

Placing my hands on the cover of that book—while my girls squealed and unpacked the rest of the boxed treasures—was not far from the feeling of placing my hands on a body to massage. Flesh—living, breathing flesh. Cracking open the book brought with it not only the slight sigh that takes place in the inner ear during a good stretch, but also a swell of emotions. I flipped through the pages, feeling saved.

The article, What You Read Matters More Than You Might Think, in Psychology Today discusses the difference between “deep and light reading.” Deep reading is defined as reading that is slow, immersive, rich in sensory detail and emotional and moral complexity. It is distinctive from light reading, which is little more than the decoding of words. The author continues by saying deep reading is great exercise for the brain and has been shown to increase empathy, as well as inspiring reflection, analysis, and personal subtext to what is being read. 

A passage from The Picture of Dorian Gray—”Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there is in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there anything so real as words?”

Another passage (how can I resist?): “In this country, it is enough for a man to have distinction and brains for every common tongue too wag against him. And what sort of lives do these people, who pose as being moral, lead themselves? My dear fellow, you forget that we are in the native land of the hypocrite.”

How I missed that man. And what a time for him to pay a visit.

3. 

Last weekend, I was feeling particularly ill-at-ease. My speech had edges like so many sharp river rocks. Tears and sadness rotated through in unpredictable gusts. 

On the particular day I refer to, a book called Ordinary Magic, Everyday Life As Spiritual Path all but did a swan dive from my bookshelf and landed at my feet. The cover-image was dated and sun-bleached. The font and spacing came directly from the early 90’s, which is when it was published. I have a vague memory of buying this book at Half-Priced Books in Columbus, just before I made my move out west, in 2002, eighteen years ago. It’s a collection of Buddhist essays that focus on sectioned-out, topics—creativity and community, for example. It did not take long to realize that the editor, John Welwood, steals the whole dang show. His intros to each chapter sparkle with the quiet wisdom of one who is not the headliner, but knows his own worthiness.

(As with Oscar Wilde, I could include countless quotable phrases, but a taste is all you need.) In his introduction to the creativity essays, Welwood said, “By being still and receptive, instead of busily trying to find solutions, we give our intelligence the time and space it needs to find an appropriate way to proceed.” I read that line and gently set the book on my lap to take pause and think to myself, Thank god.

Another account of being liberated by the right words.

The Unknowing. Yes, that is the landscape we all inhabit now. How do we work with such potent feelings of lack-of-control? A classic solution would be to distract the hell out of ourselves so the low hum of anxiety doesn’t seem as loud. Or, we could try to re-frame our reaction, teach the brain that there could be another approach. 

Our lives are, in many ways, on hold as we await a vaccine to protect our collective physical health. But our mental health is not on hold. Our intellect is under non-stop media siege and our sanity begs to be nourished and protected now more than ever. An essential piece of that puzzle (the puzzle of avoiding going clinical insane, that is)—more so than what’s contained in a bottle or that can be purchased online with a credit card—may very well already live on our bookshelf.

John Welwood also said, “What is fresh and alive comes only from the unknown.” I’m pretty sure I’m going to have that phrase tattooed on my forearm  in old-english script after this whole thing is over. 

May 17, 2020

[fandomsandfeminism]

Today we are going to look at an amusing historical fact: The time that beloved poets Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman met, got drunk, and slept together.

(Closed Captioning coming soon) 

Transcript Below:

Recently, I talked about JRR Tolkien’s long standing grudge against William Shakespeare and how it affected his books. Today I want to look at the relationship between two other literary figures, but we’re going to take a slightly...different approach. I want to talk about two very interesting authors and the time they (almost probably definitely) had sex. That’s right: Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman, literary giants, did the do.

This is where I throw in a quick ~Content Warning~ While this video will not contain any explicit sexual material, it is, ya know, a video talking about two people having sex. There won’t be descriptions of the act itself, but if you are in a situation where someone else in the room hearing the phrase “and then these two dudes probably had sex” emanating from your computer speakers would be... non-ideal, feel free to hold off on watching this until later.

Now, I first came across this story in a wonderful article on the Toast.net by the hilarious Malory Ortberg, and I’ll leave a link to it in the information below. Its very funny and charming, and I’ll do my best to relay the story here with all the flourish it deserves. -

Let’s start by talking about Oscar Wilde and his trip to America.

Oscar Wilde was an irish author, poet, playwright, and essayist. He was born on October 16 1854 and became one of the most popular playwrights in Britain by the 1890s. These days he is most well known for “The Picture of Dorian Grey”, “The importance of being Earnest” and being spectacularly posh and flamboyant. He was part of the literary  Aesthetic Movement, which values beauty over socio-political themes in art. He was interested in Art for Arts sake, as it were.

Now, There is some debate about whether Oscar Wilde would have identified more as bisexual or gay were he alive today. Discussing the sexuality of historical figures is often complicated that way, since modern day labels are, well, modern. So a grain of salt is always needed. He was married to Constance Lloyd and together they had 2 children. Whether or not Wilde was genuinely attracted to her, or if it was a marriage out of expectation and social pressure is unknown.

But Wilde was not shy at all about his affection for members of the same sex, and once this became a widely known fact, their marriage deteriorated. Wilde went on trial for sodomy and gross indecency in 1895, where he was accused of having affairs with male prostitutes. He was found guilty and spent 2 years in jail. His imprisonment had a deeply damaging effect on his health, and he died 3 years later when he was 46. It is, overall, a pretty sad end for such a beloved figure. -

Let’s jump back to 1882. Oscar Wilde was 26 and still unmarried. I joke that Wilde specifically wanted to go to America with the purpose of ~meeting~ Walt Whitman, but the truth is a little more complicated. Gilbert and Sullivan, two well known opera writers at the time, had recently written a piece mocking the Aesthetic Movement, and they wanted to bring it to America. The problem however, was that Americans were largely unaware of the Aesthetics and their “art for art’s sake” mentality, and thus were not likely to get the joke. It was arranged then, for Oscar Wilde (deemed a true aesthetic, who embodied this idea like no other) to go to America on a series of speaking events. This would introduce the American public to the idea of aestheticism, and Wilde was pleased for the opportunity to make a name, and some money, for himself so early in his career.

Once in America though, he made it VERY clear that he very much wanted to meet Walt Whitman.  When he was asked “What poet do you most admire in America?” by a reporter, he replied “I think Walt Whitman and Emerson have given the world more than anyone else...I do so hope to meet Mr. Whitman,” and “I admire him intensely... There is something so Greek and sane about [Whitman’s] poetry; it is so universal, so comprehensive.” -

So, who is this master poet that the young, dashing Oscar Wilde was so enamoured with?

Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist, and journalist. Born May 31st, 1819, he was a humanist, blending both realism and transcendentalist views in his works.  He worked as a nurse during the civil war and greatly admired Lincoln (he penned the poem O Captain, My Captain  in his honor after Lincoln was assassinated in 1865) He is best known for his poetry collection Leaves of Grass. He was pretty opposed to alcohol and supported prohibition. He was a deist, and generally skeptical of any organized religion.

Like Wilde, his sexuality is somewhat debated. He never married or had children (though there are some account he may have had some illegitimate children, these are unconfirmed), but he did have a strong, possibly romantic relationship with New York Actress, Ellen Grey, and kept a picture of her in a locket for many years.

But there is little doubt that Whitman’s most enduring relationships were with men. There are many men in Whitman’s life who are thought to have been involved with him, including Peter Doyle and Bill Duckett. His poems, too, are filled with homoerotic subtext, particularly “Calamus” At the time the poems were published, one reviewer, Rufus Wilmot Griswold suggested Whitman was guilty of "that horrible sin not to be mentioned among Christians."

So, it’s 1882, Oscar Wilde, the 26 year old, posh, flamboyant aesthetic has arrived for a speaking tour in America and loudly proclaimed to the newspapers that he very very much like to meet Walt Whitman, the 62 year old master poet, known for his ruggedness and homoerotic poetry.

And like clockwork, the answer came to Wilde’s hotel: Mr. Whitman will be in this afternoon, and would be happy to meet with Mr. Wilde.

What followed is a scene straight out of some steamy romance novel. The following quotes are pulled from Neil McKenna’ biography, The Secret Life of Oscar Wilde:

“Stoddart [Oscar’s friend who had accompanied him] tactfully left the two poets alone. ‘If you are willing – will excuse me – I will go off for an hour or so – come back again – leaving you together,’ he said. ‘We would be glad to have you stay,’ Whitman replied. ‘But do not feel to come back in an hour. Don’t come for two or three.’ Whitman opened a bottle of elderberry wine and he and Oscar drank it all before Whitman suggested they go upstairs to his ‘den’ on the third floor where, he told Oscar, ‘We could be on ‘thee and thou’ terms.’”

Ok, so, they go up to Whitman’s den and are getting thoroughly drunk of elderberry wine together on “thee and thou” terms. Later, Whitman was asked about the encounter. He responded:

One of the first things I said was that I should call him ‘Oscar.’ ‘I like that so much,’ he answered, laying his hand on my knee. He seemed to me like a great big, splendid boy. He is so frank, and outspoken, and manly.

Again, I need you to imagine this with me. Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman, drinking elderberry wine in Whitman’s small, cluttered third floor writing den. Oscar Wilde placing his hand on the man’s knee. So outspoken and manly indeed.

The Biography continues though:

Stoddart went on to say that ‘after embracing, greeting each other as Oscar and Walt, the two talked of nothing but pretty boys, of how insipid was the love of women, and of what other poets, Swinburne in particular, had to say about these tastes.’

This is just a beautiful thing to imagine. Walt “I hear America Singing” Whitman, chatting about pretty boys and the insipid love of women with Oscar “the love that shall not be named” Wilde over a bottle of elderberry wine.

But, you may cry, this is all so circumstantial. Just because you have two queer poets who greatly admired each other, getting drunk alone together on homemade elderberry wine, chatting about pretty boys, left alone to be on thee and thou terms for several hours, doesn’t mean they had sex!

And I know. But I need you to hang on for one more glorious excerpt. After this meeting, Wilde was asked by a friend, Ives, about it.

Oscar told Ives that there was ‘no doubt’ about Whitman’s sexual tastes. ‘I have the kiss of Walt Whitman still on my lips,’ he boasted.

The kiss of Walt Whitman still on his lips, folks. What else can I say, honestly?

So, yeah. Thanks for watching this video! This channel is still really new, so I always appreciate comments and likes. I’ll be sure to see yall down in the comments. And as always, if you enjoyed listening to this queer millennial feminist with a BA in English, feel free to subscribe.

[maximuswolf]

Departure into Emptiness: a Taoist approach to the climate crisis and other contemporary issues (sample) via /r/taoism

Departure into Emptiness: a Taoist approach to the climate crisis and other contemporary issues (sample)

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https://preview.redd.it/h4b8diucg5g51.jpg?width=472&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ddae1e29690086bf3d24677f6e39b4119b790e10

I.

Not as much! That is the imperative of our age: less plastic, less CO2, less consumption, less stress. That sounds like a renunciation: of meat, of flying, of driving cars.

But does this necessarily have to be a renunciation? It would be renunciation to deny yourself the fulfill­ment of a deep desire. Not doing something because there is a better choice: that is freedom.

There are good reasons to use that freedom: need­ing less can be full of its own pleasure. It means be­ing less dependent and - instead of constantly chas­ing after the satisfaction of needs - having more time for the really important things.

“Those who have lost by being moderate are rare.” (Confucius, Analects, IV.23)

II.

Doing and leaving are what shape our perception of the world. A woodcutter, a biologist and an in­vestor perceive the same forest in a completely dif­ferent way. Whoever is taking on a task must be careful not to be taken over by the task. The more the focus is on predetermined goals, the more the view of collateral damage is lost.

In a world of numbers and financial streams, every­thing becomes a means to an end. The earth be­comes a raw material warehouse and people become human capital. Everything becomes a utility. What is useless or not useful enough from an economic point of view is in danger. Primeval forests are being cut down; animal and plant species are becoming extinct; in the name of utility a huge destruction is underway.

It would often be better if less were done. But this is difficult to achieve, because many people despair when they have nothing to do. They cling to their occupations. Often work is the centre of their lives - and for many it is the source of their identity.

In our performance-oriented times, this can be seen with extreme clarity. That it is not a new phenome­non, however, is proven by a more than two thou­sand year old text from China:

“When the farmer has nothing more to do with grass and weeds, he has nothing more to hold on to; when the merchant has nothing more to do with alleys and markets, he has nothing more to hold on to. Only when the people of the crowd have their daily work, do they make an effort. The craftsmen depend on the skill and handling of their tools to feel themselves. If he can­not accumulate money and goods, the scrooge becomes sad. If power and influence do not expand steadily, the ambitious man becomes desolate.The slaves of power and wealth are only happy when in the process of change. If they find a time when they can act, they cannot stop acting. They all follow their path with the same regularity as the cycle of the year. They are caught up in the world of things and cannot change. So they run along, internally and externally trapped, sinking into the world of things and never coming back to themselves. Oh, how sad!” (Zhuangzi, XXIV.4)

So what can be done is done - and that is often much more than what needs to be done. We virtu­ally suffocate under the mass of products that our productivity produces.

III.

Idleness. A word that has fallen into disrepute. Idleness, as the proverb warns, is the root of all vice; and more than a few even see in it the worst of all vices: the refusal to perform in a performance-based society.

The calls for deceleration, which are becoming louder and louder, have rehabilitated idleness to a certain extent in recent years. In the wellness sector at least it has found a firm place - and in countless magazine articles when it has to do finding oneself or burnout syndrome.

Idleness requires free time. This is more than leisure time: it is a time free of constraints, empty time that can be filled with what the moment offers.

Caught in the daily hustle and bustle, it is difficult to develop new perspectives. One is so busy mop��ping up the water that one does not even think of turning off the tap.

In order to get a grip on things at any time, your hands should be free. Being idle means to have time to do the right thing at the right moment.

IV.

Inspiration. The Muses like idleness. To be kissed by the Muse is the pictorial description of what many artists experience: a higher power seems to guide the creative process. This process is more of a letting happen than a conscious creation. Not the conscious ego - it paints, it writes, it composes. This state is called Flow.

In this way, making art becomes a communication with something unknown. Are higher powers at work here? Or is it simply neurobiological processes? Either way, it seems like a miracle.

But the flow does not come on command. You can only create good conditions for it. There's an an­cient Chinese story about that.

“A wood carver carved a bell stand. When the bell stand was finished, all the people who saw it were amazed at its divine work. The Prince of Lu also looked at it and asked the Master, ‘What is your se­cret?’ The latter replied, ‘I am a craftsman and know no secrets, and yet there is one thing that matters. When I was about to make the bell stand, I was careful not to consume my life force in other thoughts. I fasted to bring my heart to rest. When I fasted for three days I no longer dared to think of reward and honour; after five days I no longer dared to think of praise and blame; after seven days I had forgotten my body and all my limbs. At that time I also no longer thought about the court of Your Highness. Thus I was collected in my art, and all infatuations of the outside world had dis­appeared. Afterwards I went into the forest and looked at the trees in their natural growth. When the right tree came before my eyes, the bell stand was ready in front of me, so that I only had to put my hand on it. If I had not found the tree, I would have given up. Be­cause I let my nature interact with the nature of the material, that's why people think it's a divine work.’" (Zhuangzi, XIX.10)

V.

Art is often the art of omission. Capturing the at­mosphere of a place with just a few strokes of the pen or grabbing the audience with a few notes is considered high art. It is often important not to do too much. If you try to speak a text in a particularly beautiful way, you will quickly appear artificial. If at a jam session all the participants constantly wanted to show all their skills, it would be very exhausting to listen to. Only when others hold themselves back can individuals come to the fore with their solos.

As much as through the emphasis of its tones a rhythm gets its special character through its pauses. A scale gets its special sound by omitting certain semitone steps.

The white area left blank on an old Chinese ink painting appears like the water of a river or like wafts of mist between the mountains. The emptiness here is an essential element of the composition.

In the early twentieth century, abstract painting de­veloped through an increasingly consistent omission of all references to objects from the outside world.

This led to an undreamt-of freedom in dealing with colours and forms. And since there is no predeter­mined meaning in abstract paintings, they are an in­vitation to the imagination to go walking.

VI.

Let it happen! Trust in the momentum of the cre­ative process! That was my basic attitude for decades when I was artistically active. For me, abstract paint­ing became a voyage of discovery. Painting always had a meditative aspect for me. When I painted, I let the spontaneous impulses of my body take their course; I let my hands do it, without a plan, without thinking. I tried to leave the door to chance as wide open as possible. What happened to me often went far beyond what I could have thought up by myself.

I playfully found my artistic way. Over the years I did a lot of different things: pictures made of ce­ramic tiles, lit objects, digital art, abstract anima­tions ...

It was not a planned development. One thing led to another, each connected to the other, appearing in retrospect to be logical. But for me, every new turn was a surprise. I saw my own artistic development in the way that train passengers sitting with their backs to the direction of travel see a landscape. I never saw what would come next.

I learned to have faith in the continuing process. And that I would discover more in my journey I’d ever dreamed of.

VII.

Cognitive methods. The modern sciences are atheistic in their methods, i.e. the recourse to reli­gious beliefs is taboo in the scientific framework for good reasons. This does not mean, however, that one needs an atheistic default position to do science. The atheism of science is purely methodical and not ideological. Even those who are scientifically active have questions that cannot be answered in this way. Then one can decide for or against believing some­thing specific. As long as the scientific activity remains unaffected by this, all is well.

Besides, the sciences cannot prove an atheistic world view because their method is atheistic. They cannot prove what they presuppose. That would be a circular argument.

Just like a methodical atheism there is also a me­thodical spirituality. As an artist, I become more open to inspiration when I feel that there is some­thing greater than my conscious self, and that I can open myself to this something in my creative process. I just need to have the capacity to be amazed. Miracles are more likely to happen when I beleave they are possible.

As little as scientific knowledge can support athe­ism, so can artistic experience serve as proof of a higher powers.

The word "inspire" comes from Latin and means "to breathe in". It raises the question: who is breath­ing in? But all answers to this question remain speculation.

It is possible, perhaps even reasonable, to talk about creative work with religious or esoteric vocabulary. Then one interprets experiences within a given pat­tern of explanation. This makes them easier to com­municate. This is legitimate, but it proves nothing with regard to the pattern of interpretation.

Beyond all doubt, the experience itself remains: In­tuition can flow more freely the less conscious con­trol you exercise. It is an experience that probably all people can have, no matter what they believe or don't believe.

VIII.

Success. Basically, it's quite banal: of course my art will be better if I'm painting, focused on what I'm doing, and not constantly thinking about what oth­ers will say or whether my work will yield enough money. The freer my head is, the more attentive I can work. With attention comes wonder and with wonder comes awe. With awe I have a good chance of succeeding in what I do.

In his book Effortless Mastery the New York jazz musician Kenny Werner makes the observation “(…) that there are good players who, for some reason, have little impact when they play. Everything works fine. They are ‘swinging’ and all that, but still, some­thing is not landing in the heart of the audience.” (p.10) He attributes this to the fact that they are caught up in their thoughts and are far too much guided by ideas about how right it should be. “One must practice surrendering control to a larger, or higher force. It’s scary at first, but eventually liberat­ing.” (ibid)

I very often experience my painting when others talk about their art, be it music, painting or litera­ture. Whoever wants to taste abundance must be­come empty.

IX.

Emptiness is of crucial importance in Daoist phi­losophy:

“How the nose breathes and the ear hears, is essentially emptiness. All things use what they don't have on the basis of what they have. If you don't believe this, just look at a flute or a pipe made of reeds.” (Huainanzi, XVI.6b)

This is not about an abstract or metaphysical idea of emptiness, it is about the very concrete emptiness between things or within things. It's about empti­ness interacting with what's there. An emptiness that can be experienced.

Emptiness means potential. An empty space can be filled, empty time can be used, an empty sheet can be written on.

Not burdening oneself with unnecessary things means freedom. To become empty in this sense is the best way to find oneself.

To be empty means to have room for abundance.

In "Huainanzi", a book written over 2000 years ago as a collection of knowledge for the Chinese em­peror, it reads like this:

“A restless spirit does not feel well even on a nicely pre­pared bed with soft mats. Nor does it appreciate a meal of wild rice and juicy beef. Even sounding strings and flute tones do not give him any pleasure.

Only when the anger dissolves and the restlessness dies down does the food taste good. The bed becomes com­fortable, the home safe and being on the road a plea­sure.

From this point of view: our nature is open to joy, but it is also open to sorrow. Whoever struggles with things that do not give pleasure to his own nature and hinders what gives pleasure to it, will certainly become a sor­rowful person, even if he possesses all the riches of the world and is revered as a son of heaven. In general, hu­man nature loves peace and silence and not discord and noise. It loves rest and quiet and not trouble and toil. If the mind is permanently free of desire, it means peace. If the body is permanently free of tasks, it means rest. The one who allows his spirit to wander in peace and quiet, who allows his body to indulge in idleness, who simply waits for what heaven gives him, will find joy in his inner being and will be free from worries from the outside. Nothing can change his insight, be it as great as the whole world. Even if the sun and moon darken, nothing can stop him from his path. Even when he is low, he feels blessed, even when he has little, he feels rich.” (Huainanzi, XIV.59)

X.

Desires tend to take over control. The ambitions of the ego endanger inner freedom. They lead to com­pulsive behavior and a limited view of things.

“Among the people of Chu was one who stole gold. Just when the market was at its busiest, he came, took it and left. When they detained him and asked, ‘How can you steal gold in the middle of the market?’ he only replied, ‘I have seen no one. I only saw the gold.’ When the mind deals with desires, it forgets what it is doing.” (Huainanzi, XIII.10)

XI.

Overcoming the ego. Many religions and spiritual teachings demand this. Overcoming it sounds like a hard struggle, a heavy effort, an act of will, in short, a strong ego to tackle this task. How could the ego be overcome in this way?

Asceticism can become a trap. The ego indulges it­self in the rigid self-control it can exercise. There must be other ways to deal with the ego. This was also thought about in ancient China:

“The scholars in these times of decay do not understand how to get to the origins of their spirit and return to their roots. Above all, they try to model and polish their nature, to refine or suppress their original reactions in order to meet the demands of their time. Therefore, when their eye desires something, they intervene with prohibitions; when their mind delights in something, they restrict it with rites. They run further and further in circles, prostrating themselves, while the meat goes bad and inedible and the wine sour and undrinkable. Outwardly they tame their bodies, inwardly they scourge their spirit. They destroy the harmony of Yin and Yang and inhibit the original way of their nature of responding appropriately to fate. This is why these people are full of worries throughout their lives. Those who follow the Dao are very different: they regulate the original responses of their nature, cultivate their consciousness, nourish it with harmony, and direct it appropriately. They enjoy the Dao and forget the low things; they rest in their potential and forget the trivial issues. Since their nature does not desire anything, they achieve whatever they desire. Since their mind does not seek pleasure, there is no pleasure they would not participate in. Those who stick to their natural answers preserve their potential. He who yields to his inner nature preserves his harmony. Physically relaxed and unrestricted in their attention: such standards and regulations can serve as a model for the whole world.” (Huainanzi, VII.14)

XII.

Regulation instead of blocking. Not asceticism but self-cultivation is the path that the Huainanzi describes. To rest in one's own potential means knowing one's abilities, but not having to prove them all the time. This makes it possible to react ap­propriately in ever changing situations.

“Planning things in advance is not better than learn­ing techniques. Acting is not better than having options for action. Intervening is not better than leaving things to the Dao. If you act on purpose, there are goals that you will not achieve. If you strive for things, there are things you don't attain. So human beings come to their limits while the Dao pervades everything.” (Huainanzi, XIV.24)

This kind of restriction does not mean renuncia­tion, but the greatest possible sovereignty. And on the way there, it is not the effort that counts, but finding balance and peace. The less willpower is needed for this, the better.

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Submitted August 10, 2020 at 04:17AM by JuppHartmann via reddit https://ift.tt/2PEuJ5Z

[meme-and-askbox]

Get To Know Me Uncomfortably Well

1. What is you middle name?     Rae, and I don't hate it as much as I did when I was younger.  In fact, if I ever get published, my pen name is going to be Rae (redacted).

2. How old are you?     43, physically.  Emotionally, 3 or 300, given any particular day 3. When is your birthday?     15 October. 4. What is your zodiac sign?     Libra, and boy, am I ever. 5. What is your favorite color?     Purple, black, fushchia, aqua. 6. What’s your lucky number?     Don't have one.  I don't have luck. 7. Do you have any pets?     I have two.  Fucko and Harpo.  Actually, they're cats, named Sam (Samhain Murray) and Maggie (after Maggie the Cat in Gargoyles) 8. Where are you from?     North Carolina.  Lil bit outside Charlotte. 9. How tall are you?     It says 5'7 on my license, but.  It's probably more like 5'5 10. What shoe size are you?      Ladies 11 wide, Men's 8-9 depending on the shoe. 11. How many pairs of shoes do you own?      5.  Two pairs of Sketchers, a black pair I keep for funerals, a pair of suede ankle boots, and a pair of Harley Davidson biker boots. 12. What was your last dream about?      Roxy the pink police poodle.  She's a recurring dream, and I'm working on turning her and her handler into a novel. 13. What talents do you have?     I don't suck at writing.  I have pretty phenomenal reading retention; I can't tell you page numbers or anything, but I can recall that I read article X, and in it, they said A, B, and C.  I'm good with most non-reptile animals. 14. Are you psychic in any way?     Occasionally I have dreams that come true later, and I get odd flashes of deja vu, in that I'm certain I've done this before but I don't quite remember when. 15. Favorite song?     At the moment, it's "Glitter and Gold" by Barns Courtney 16. Favorite movie?     Sleeping Beauty. I can watch it a million times. 17. Who would be your ideal partner?     oh, oi.  I have no idea, because I don't want a partner.  I guess my ideal would be someone who had the same interests as me, and who didn't mind being either fucked off and left alone, or attended to every whim as the need occurs.  I'd honestly like to have someone to talk TV/Movies/Books with, have a cuddle every now and again, then fuck off to your own thing. 18. Do you want children?     Fuck no.  But even if I did, I couldn't have 'em anymore.  All the lady parts got surgically removed in my 20s. 19. Do you want a church wedding?     Do you WANT me to combust on the spot? 20. Are you religious?     More than I'd admit to, but less than my fam would like me to be. 21. Have you ever been to the hospital?     For myself?  Yes.  For someone else?  Yes. 22. Have you ever got in trouble with the law?     Do speeding tickets count?  Cause I had a couple. 23. Have you ever met any celebrities?     I have!  I used to hit the Star Trek convention circuit pretty heavy and I met most of the TOS cast, and the TNG cast too.  My favorite is John deLancie. 24. Baths or showers?     Showers, please. 25. What color socks are you wearing?     White with purple toes and heels. 26. Have you ever been famous?     Christ I hope not. 27. Would you like to be a big celebrity?     I'd like to be a Stephen-King level celeb, but not much more. 28. What type of music do you like?     80s and 90s.  I tuned out of music around 2000. 29. Have you ever been skinny dipping?     Uh, yes. 30. How many pillows do you sleep with?     5.  Three for my head, one between my knees, one tucked under my hip. 31. What position do you usually sleep in?     On my side, but lately it's been 50%-50% side/belly. 32. How big is your house?     3br, 2ba modular home.  So maybe 2000-ish sq ft? 33. What do you typically have for breakfast?     I don't.  I hate breakfast.  But because I take insulin, I usually scarf down some yogurt or Lance crackers. 34. Have you ever fired a gun?     Yes.  I enjoy guns even though I don't really own any.  My uncles both have/had huge collections, and I got my love from them.  But I know myself well enough to know that with my temper and my past suicidal tendencies, having a gun in the house would not end well. 35. Have you ever tried archery?     Nope 36. Favorite clean word?       Fudgin'. 37. Favorite swear word?     Fuck.  It's so versatile. 38. What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without sleep?     48 hours. 39. Do you have any scars?     Quite a few. 40. Have you ever had a secret admirer?     Not a real one.  I thought I had one for awhile in high school, but it turned out to be a joke some of the guys on my bus route played on me. 41. Are you a good liar?     Depends on the subject.  In the small things, yes.  "Does this make my ass look big?"  "No, of course not."  But on the big stuff?  No.  I don't lie well. 42. Are you a good judge of character?     Nope.  I'd like to think I am, but I have a string of disastrous ex-friendships and relationships in my wake to prove that I am, in fact, a shitty judge of character. 43. Can you do any other accents other than your own?      Not convincingly. 44. Do you have a strong accent?     Some people say I do.  I don't hear it, but then, I'm surrounded by it. 45. What is your favorite accent?     British, Scots, Irish, Spanish, Greek, Italian.  In that order. 46. What is your personality type?      INFJ, if I remember right. 47. What is your most expensive piece of clothing?       My Harley boots. 48. Can you curl your tongue?      Nope. 49. Are you an innie or an outie?     Innie! 50. Left or right handed?     Right.  My dad was a leftie, though 51. Are you scared of spiders?      Nah, not really.  If I see one, I just burn the house down and go about my life.  Yes, I'm terrified of the little ELFs. 52. Favorite food?     Chicken and rice.  Cook the rice in chicken broth, simmer the chicken in with it, throw in a can of cream of chicken soup, stir, simmer until hot, and serve.  Best thing EVER. 53. Favorite foreign food?     Chinese.  Cashew Chicken, Orange Chicken, Sweet & Sour Pork 54. Are you a clean or messy person?     Messy.  Cluttery.  Two Steps Away From Hoarding.  Take your pick. 55. Most used phrased?     Some variation of "fuck."  Lately, "fuck me." 56. Most used word?      See above, re: fuck 57. How long does it take for you to get ready?     If I'm showering first, about twenty minutes.  If I'm just getting dressed, about ten. 58. Do you have much of an ego?     I'd like to say no, but yes, I do. 59. Do you suck or bite lollipops?     Suck, baby. 60. Do you talk to yourself?     Sometimes I'm the only one who listens to me. 61. Do you sing to yourself?     Constantly, especially in the shower or when I'm cleaning. 62. Are you a good singer?     Fuck no. 63. Biggest Fear?     Snakes. 64. Are you a gossip?     Sometimes, especially with my besties. 65. Best dramatic movie you’ve seen?     Backdraft.  "You go... we go!" 66. Do you like long or short hair?     Shooooooooort. 67. Can you name all 50 states of America?     At one time I could.  But thanks to Yakko Warner, I can name all the countries of the world. 68. Favorite school subject?     Creative writing and physics.  I failed physics at the time, but I can tell, now that I understand most of it (thank you, Mythbusters!) that I would have loved it. 69. Extrovert or Introvert?     An extroverted introvert.  I don't MIND being around people, but I really would be happier with my own company.  But, when I am with other people, I am gregarious to the point of obnoxious. 70. Have you ever been scuba diving?     Nope. 71. What makes you nervous?     Practically everything. 72. Are you scared of the dark?     Nope.  Not since I was like, seven. 73. Do you correct people when they make mistakes?     They don't call me Grammar Nazi for nothing... 74. Are you ticklish?      I refuse to answer on the grounds it might be used against me. 75. Have you ever started a rumor?      Nope, but I've certainly helped pass them along. 76. Have you ever been in a position of authority?       Yep, I used to be manager of my office.  Hated it. 77. Have you ever drank underage?       Yep. 78. Have you ever done drugs?       Nope.  I don't like needles, and I don't have the cash. 79. Who was your first real crush?        Wayne E.  He looked so handsome in his ROTC uniform, and he was always nice and friendly with me and my BFF JC.  We both had huge crushes on him, but he was a few grades ahead of us, so I don't think we registered except as friends.  But that was okay. 80. How many piercings do you have?    Four.  Two in each ear. 81. Can you roll your Rs?     Thanks to Sra. Iglacia, yes.  Took her two whole semesters, but she got the whole flaming lot of us Southern kids rolling our Rs. 82. How fast can you type?    80ish WPM, last time I took a test. 83. How fast can you run?     I think a snail outpaced me. 84. What color is your hair?     A nice chocolately brown, with highlights trending a little auburn. 85. What color is your eyes?     Cornflower-type hazel. 86. What are you allergic to?     Mobic, IV contrast dye, Ciprofloxacin, medical-grate latex, ragweed and oak pollens, dumbasses. 87. Do you keep a journal?     Not in a few years, no.  I stopped when my dad died, idk why. 88. What do your parents do?     My dad's passed away, but before he died he was disabled, and before THAT, he was a computer systems programmer and analyst for Piedmont Natural Gas and Bank of America.  Mom's retired and disabled now with back problems, but she was an LPN before that. 89. Do you like your age?     No.  I hate being a responsible grown-up.  I want to be ten or eleven again, old enough to know things, but young enough not to be responsible for anything other than basic chores, and I still got allowance. 90. What makes you angry?     Practically everything, at some point.  My family puts it as I have a wild hair across my ass and it'll go off anytime. 91. Do you like your own name?     It's not a bad little name, but I always liked Daphne better. 92. Have you already thought of baby names, and if so what are they?    Fuck no.  Ugh. 93. Do you want a boy a girl for a child?     NEITHER.  I want cats.  or dogs.  or fish.  or a bird, I think I could love a bird.  or a turtle. 94. What are you strengths?    I'm loyal to a fault; if you're my friend, I am always in your corner and I will 100% throw hands with the first motherfucker who looks at you wrong. 95. What are your weaknesses?    Impulsive, careless, stubborn 96. How did you get your name?     My Dad's uncle (Kelly) and my mother's father (Ray became Rae).  Can you tell they were expecting a boy and got me? 97. Were your ancestors royalty?     Christ, no.  They were poor Irish. 98. Do you have any scars?     ...didn't we just answer this?  Yes. 99. Color of your bedspread?     Flowered. 100. Color of your room?    White walls, burgundy carpet.

from @evilwriter37  and @marcymakemagic

[never-lock-the-door]

I realize I haven’t posted in a while so here’s my re-intro.

Quick intro- My name is Chika and “professionally speaking”: I’m a PhD student doing research in Japan on alternative food networks and gender but “greater: this is my dream”: I’m on the quest to design food (eco)systems that uphold the dignity and respect of all beings involved.

I spend a lot of time, a lot! identifying injustices and flaws in our current food system, but it’s also been fueling my imagination for what is possible when we think about building an alternative system. Recently, I read an article by a farmer who eloquently articulated the collective loss that farmers are burdened with when it comes to farmers’ markets. It reminded me about the summer I spent working 2 farmers’ markets where every weekend a group of 10 of us loaded, unloaded, and reloaded towers of white crates filled with stone fruit all over southern California. On the “front of house” end, we had a beautiful cornucopia of colors and a sweet aroma that filled the air as people flocked to eat the many samples we endlessly cut. Something I observed from the consumer end was that me saying “don’t panic, it’s organic!” was all they wanted to hear regarding the 10+ varieties of stone fruit we carried. It felt a little disappointing as I and others were open to sharing more knowledge about the fruit, who grew it, where it was grown, etc.

On the producer/vendor side, I had fun building friendships and bantering with the other farmers/vendors at the farmers markets. However, the teasing and laughs masked the exhaustion and almost hopeless feeling that this was the only way to make a viable livelihood outside of the more conventional system where farmers are bound by contracts with large scale chain grocery stores. Collectively speaking, it doesn’t make much sense for individual farmers to foot the expenses of driving, setting up, tearing down, selling, throwing away food loss and spending thousands of dollars each month to distribute their produce. It feeds into the individualistic notion that you are along in the fight to succeed because we believe its the only way to survive… it’s what keeps capitalism thriving.

But does that have to be the only existing reality? What if we expanded beyond the individual? What would it take to build a brick and mortar or a communal space founded by farmers and centered on the farmer?

Living in Japan has opened my eyes to different possibilities as many structures are already built with a collective mindset. In Japan, there’s regional investment towards infrastructure building with their roadside stations and direct markets. It takes the farmers market concept and eliminates the loss and burden that I previously mentioned by allowing any farmer, hobby farmer, kitchen gardener to come and unload their produce to be sold and bought by anyone. You lose the people connection that some people yearn for at the farmer’s markets, but it serves as a convenient access point for both consumers and producers. Instead, there are signs that depict the producer’s name and sometimes their picture is there as well! The women farmers I interviewed rely on graphic designs to boost their marketing to stand out at these direct markets. The Japan model seems like it would be the solution to the problem I stated above… so why doesn’t it exist everywhere?!

Well for one, understanding context is critical. Roadside stations and direct markets are typical to Japan’s rural areas where populations are shrinking and aging. As people age, they will eat less, consume less, and cook less. The role of the farmer as we currently see it will diminish and head towards extinction. In urban settings of Japan, the questions point to who is going to buy and cook with fresh fruits and vegetables? Many big box grocery stores have shrinking fresh produce sections and growing prepared food sections.

We all must eat and drink every day. But who has the time to buy, cook, and feed each other?

There’s studies that say that people in lower income brackets spend more money on food outside the home than inside. Working multiple jobs means you spend that much more time in transit from one place to another and by the time you get home and realize there are multiple hungry mouths to feed… it makes sense to order, stop by the drive thru, or eat out. Here, individual consumers are left to struggle on their own- their struggles are siloed similar to the farmers selling at farmers’ markets. In both situations, and within the greater capitalist system, food is treated as a commodity.

What is a commodity?: it’s a good or material that can be bought and sold freely as an article of commerce.

In the above examples, food- is a good or item we sell, buy, consume through an economic transaction. That transaction can hold a variety of both positive and negative externalities: food coming from industrialized agriculture is polluting environments and destroying rural livelihoods in places we’ve never been to. Positive externality could be the satisfaction and positive health benefits we have from interacting and socializing with the farmers/vendors at the farmers markets.

While the farmers markets serves as a tangible means to economically support the farmer, what if we didn’t treat food as just a commodity but saw it as the medium through which nourishment and joy could be abundantly shared.

Okay that sounds abstract, but our relationship to food is complicated. It holds so many meanings.

We use food for celebration and ceremonial traditions. People explore love and relationships over food. Food comforts us in times of pain, sickness, and struggle. Sometimes food is seen as just fuel/input to curb your hunger so you can keep working- although if this were really the case then why hasn’t the industry for liquid iv bags skyrocketed? This is why I think food rooted in joy and nourishment holds potential for the greatest number of beings and therefore there is room for vast transformations in designing or reclaiming practices where food can be the center of sustainable resource management.

This is just a hypothetical or a fun thought exercise I go through in imagining what that design could look like. As of Jan 10, 2020 (first full moon of Gregorian calendar and last one of the lunar calendar) these are some brainstormed ideas.

A community space that feels welcoming to anyone where interactions can be had with people who are passionate about what they are doing and eager to share their knowledge with you. I’m using Japan as an example but imagine the ease and convenience of conbini (convenience stores) (theres no air of exclusivity or bouginess because it is literally everyone’s giant refrigerator/pantry. So combine with the friendly conversations and insights you receive from your favorite wholefoods cheese monger~ this is the kind of ambiance I’m imagining. (side note: Recently in Japan, there’s a courageous Osaka 7-11 store manager who is fighting against the strict rules of the corporation as he makes humane adjustments (closing on Japan’s biggest holiday or not being open 24 hours). We need more people like him in this world.)

A space that offers infrastructure for small scale producers and sustainable ag practitioners to share their harvests and where various eateries/pop ups/restaurants/canteens can feed and heal you (the trend of markets with a wide variety of food stands is way more satisfying than the 50 pg cheesecake factory menu), and co-learning and teaching spaces.  I’m not sure that the concept of a full-time job makes sense for the future but perhaps automation can “hopefully” give people the inevitable push to find different passions and pursue side hustles- Maybe it could be the chance for a re-emergence of teachers and creators. The space should be functional: maybe its 10 people get together and meal-prep for their entire week; meal-prep where you don’t have to eat the same thing for the whole week!  Sustainable resource management has to be done on a larger scale than just individuals going zero waste. We need to be building infrastructure and setting up policy to support systems design. I want a space where food is the vessel that holds stories, memories, and joy. People who were blessed to grow up with kitchens where there was constant action and lively movements could relate to such feelings.

This sounds pretty idealistic and I’ve seen similar models but they are often only catered to mostly the “glamping class[1]”… But I believe that with the right team of people to reimagine something different, commitments from different stakeholders, and a huge influx of capital, it doesn’t seem like such a far-off dream.  What small thing can I start with that helps build towards such a greater vision?

Being a grad student provides the opportunity to trial and error and meet different people doing similar things. I’ve been hosting weekly dinners after our graduate seminars using produce from the farm I used to live at: it’s a fun way to bond and get to know one another but logistically speaking it’s not the most self-sustaining. For example, I’ve never been able to find a replacement when I’m too busy… is that poor leadership on my end? Maybe. but also it could mean that it’s not a shared priority per se even though every time I’ve hosted there are people who come and join.

Last week, I had the pleasure of visiting a group of alternative farmers, some of who were active in the student protest movement in the 1960s. Their activism catalyzed their decision to choose farming as a medium to “walk the walk”. In other words, organic farming was an evolvement of their freedom of expression since the student uprise of the 1960s served as a platform raise their voice and speak their minds. The connections and friendships that developed during that time were critical for the foundations of Japan’s alternative food movement known as teikei. It became a natural fit for woke producers and consumers to come together to support one another to share food that was grown with love, care, and strong values. While the teikei model continues to decline and face possible extinction, I continue to be amazed by the friendships and close connections people share and support systems that they are building with one another. Maybe that’s what’s missing nowadays- deep connection and friendship.

I know I have a lot of ideas all the time but nothing will come of it or last without love and friendship. I don’t know if I’m currently doing what I’m supposed to be doing- but I am grateful for the many different people I have come to meet along this journey. I hope to continue deepening my friendships and love with the people that care about where our food comes from and how we share it with one another.

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Location: Hino, Shiga Prefecture.

[1] Glamping: glamorous camping: often falls to millennials and gen x who are willing to pay a little less than luxury hotel prices for a comfortable outdoorsy experience. They are often looking to get away from the mundanity of urban life.

the foundation of the perfect food system needs love and friendship. いい食と農のシステムの基盤には愛と親密さが必要 I realize I haven't posted in a while so here's my re-intro. Quick intro- My name is Chika and “professionally speaking”: I’m a PhD student doing research in Japan on alternative food networks and gender but “greater: this is my dream”: I’m on the quest to design food (eco)systems that uphold the dignity and respect of all beings involved.

[toomanysinks]

Timing and why we’re all VCs

Timing is the single most valuable skill of the modern economy, but I would argue its’s the least understood and also the least practiced.

Capitalism is fundamentally about timing, since market competition is about finding opportunities before others. When should you start a company? What company should you start? When should a VC invest? When should you join a company? When should you switch industries? When should you back a candidate for public office?

Every single one of our professional decisions is about timing, and yet, we do so little to practice and perfect it. Most employees only make 3-4 major career decisions in their lifetimes — hardly enough feedback for this skill to mature. Anyone who has worked in a large company further knows that timing a product launch or a new marketing strategy has more to do with internal politics than reading market forces.

Most of us want to make more money and accelerate our careers, but the truth is that these opportunities are few and far between. Most jobs have limited growth potential. Most startups die. Most VCs don’t make money. Most political candidates fail to get elected. The difference between success and failure sometimes has to do with hard work and tenacity, but far more often with the strategy of timing.

It’s obvious that we can be too late to these decisions of course. We can miss the round of financing, we can start a company a year or two behind someone else and lose the first-mover advantage. But we can also be way too early, ahead of the market and losing out on alternative opportunities that might have been more valuable.

Now, some perceive that “timing” is synonymous with “luck.” There is some truth there, in the sense that life is random and sometimes — completely unintentionally — people stumble upon a treasure chest of gold.

Don’t be distracted by that, because there are also people who just seem to have timing nailed. There are engineers (I know because I have seen their recruiter profiles) who have joined three unicorns in a row in the first handful of employees. There are VCs who get a string of wins that is far from chance. There are CEOs that always seem to guide their companies to the right place at the right time and drive their stock valuations up.

We talked a lot about why we can’t build infrastructure in America yesterday. One of the challenges is simply timing: so many things have to happen at once for these projects to get off the ground, and most governors and mayors lack the timing skills required to get them over the finish line.

How can you practice timing? Start writing down predictions about people, companies, and markets. Check in with the companies you talked with a few years ago — how are they doing? Ditto people you met a while back. Start evaluating your predictions: were they correct? Were they too early or too late?

More importantly, start cultivating networks of friends who have a sense of pulse on the frontiers of the economy. That could mean someone at the edge of a new science (quantum computing or AI) or someone who gets marketing to new demographics, or someone who tracks new regulatory and legal changes. Find a peer group of people who get timing and practice it as a craft.

Between TechCrunch today and my former roles in venture capital, I’ve had the opportunity to practice timing a lot. I have a list of companies that I would have backed, and some have turned into unicorns while others have ended up on the ash heap of history. I’ve predicted some trends well, while flubbed others. I’ve been way too early (a huge bias for me), and sometimes stupidly late.

But all along, I am practicing that timing muscle. It’s the only way forward in capitalism, and it’s worth every investment you can make.

Mithril Capital, management fees, and VC strategic drift

Peter Kim via Getty Images

Theodore Schleifer at Recode reported a rare deep dive into the internal intrigue at a prominent VC firm, in this case Mithril Capital. From the article:

Mithril had its best moment yet last week when a portfolio company, Auris Health, sold to Johnson & Johnson for more than $3 billion — returning at least $500 million to the fund.

All appears well. But behind the scenes, a far different story has been unfolding.

The late-stage investment firm has been a slow-burning mess for the past several months, angering current and former employees, limited partners, and, crucially, [Peter] Thiel himself, sources say.

Among the issues is the firm’s huge management fee … and I guess lack of expenses?

The firm is likely collecting as much as $20 million a year in management fees, sources familiar with the figures say.

We don’t know exactly how much the firm spends, but people close to Mithril say they can’t imagine that the firm, given its staff size, is spending more than half of that on operational expenses. [Mithril Capital founder Ajay] Royan’s salary, like that of other venture capitalists, is not publicly disclosed.

One limited partner called the fees, given the size of Mithril’s staff, “outrageous.”

What? I don’t understand this line of reasoning at all. The firm negotiates a fairly standard agreement with its limited partners, and then the LPs are pissed because the firm isn’t spending the money on massive staff and large, expensive offices? The whole point of delegating investment decisions to a GP is to empower them to organize their firm to win deals and get stuff done. If — and it’s a big if of course — they can do that on the cheap, then why should an LP care at all? Burn the management fee in a fireplace if it makes the deals happen.

Ajay Royan told Bloomberg in 2017 that Mithril does not “charge excessive fees.” But he was not exactly known for being thrifty with management money. Former employees describe Friday catered lunches where costs could run over $100 per person, and Royan was known internally for a “book ordering problem” — a former employee said that “unbelievable amounts of books” would be delivered each week to the office by Amazon to maintain the firm’s extensive library.

Pro tip: take on the mantle of book editor for a major tech publication, and the publishers will mail you books for free. We get at least a dozen at the TC offices every week, which is why we write about books so often around here these days. Alas, no $100 catered lunches.

The wider story here though appears to be one of a firm completely strategically adrift. Mithril is struggling to compete against ferocious competition in the growth-stage equity market. The best deals are obvious to dozens of firms, and the ones that are less obvious have huge risks attached to them that make it hard to write the big checks required.

“[Royan] literally did not want to compete. If there was a process or bidding war or something resembling a competition, he would just walk,” the employee said. “And he would just say, ‘I don’t want to outbid.’”

Mithril is hardly the only VC firm that is strategically adrift. Every time I go back to SF, this seems to be the norm these days among venture capitalists. There is a huge amount of money sloshing around, and very few deals that are in that sweet spot between obvious and highly risky. Startups either get three dozen term sheets or none at all, since every firm is walking around with the same frameworks and metrics in their head.

It’s so rare to actually hear a VC strategy that isn’t generic capital, that has some differentiation on sourcing, and picking, and growing businesses beyond the “we invest in great companies.” VCs don’t like strategy because it means making choices, and making choices means saying no to certain things, and those things might be the next Facebook. So they do everything, all the time, which really means they do nothing. And so we get book ordering problems and expensive lunches and weirdly angry LPs. What a boring mess.

Quality tech news from around the web

Written by Arman Tabatabai

Carl Larson Photography via Getty Images

South California is also seeing declining seed investment

Today, the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation (LAEDC) published its updated economic forecast for LA and the Southern California region. One interesting note in the report is an observed slow down in early-stage venture investing. The report highlighted that while growth-stage investments in CA were hitting record highs, total deal count and seed investing — both in terms of total seed dollars and seed deal count — were at their lowest points since 2012.

The data points in LA, Southern CA, and the rest of the state seem to follow the trend of declining seed rounds seen in the rest of the country. While the topic is one we’ve previously discussed and one which has heated up in recent weeks with commentary from Marc Suster, Fred Wilson, and others, it’s interesting to see the trend occurring even in more nascent startup markets.

Will “Diet CA-HSR” even get done as feds look to pull back California funding

The federal government announced that it would be pulling back $1 billion in funding that was slated for the California high-speed rail project through 2022, while also pursuing legal action to help recoup the $2.5 billion it has already coughed up. The Federal Railroad Administration is arguing that the state’s updated plan — completing only a route from Bakersfield to Merced — is starkly different from the plan for which the funds were originally allocated. Ouch.

As stock exchanges compete to attract IPOs, unicorns and investors win?

It might be getting easier for companies to go public around the world. With ample late-stage capital keeping more companies staying private for longer, looser rules from the SEC and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange may be on the way to help entice more IPOs.

In the US, the SEC proposed allowing all companies to market themselves to investors before announcing IPOs versus just those that fall under the agency’s “emerging growth” definition. Across the Pacific, Bloomberg reported that Chinese tech companies have been lobbying the HK Exchange for a number of more favorable rules, including allowing companies to maintain extra voting rights and letting major shareholders buy extra stock in the process. With a serious number of Chinese companies opting to list on foreign exchanges last year, the HK Exchange might be feeling pressure to cough up concessions that could help them win local listings — especially if the US moves forward with friendlier rules.

How Japan lost half its citizens with poor data

The Japanese government failed to pay out billions of yen in government benefits for years due to faulty data. If that wasn’t bad enough, Nikkei Asian Review reported yesterday that the government is struggling to even locate roughly half of those who are owed since they don’t have their current addresses on file.

As simple as it may seem, tracking the indebted is actually a tall task since citizens have changed residences, changed names, and since the Japanese government has historically destroyed benefit applications (containing address info) after the period required to maintain them. At this point, it’s unclear whether everyone who is owed will even end up getting paid, with the Japanese government now offering a prime example of how poor data maintenance and not just poor data collection can make a situation go from bad to a whole lot worse.

Can the race to build roads in Southeast Asia avoid development gridlock?

As we harp on our “Why can’t we build anything?” obsession, infrastructure development in Southeast Asia is continuing to heat up and everyone seems to want a piece of the pie. Japan announced plans to further accelerate investment into infrastructure and urban development in the region — where China is also actively engaged — with initial expansion talks focused on Cambodia and the Philippines. At the same time, a newly unveiled government budget in Singapore and the ongoing election in Indonesia have brought infrastructure development strategies into the spotlight, with open debate on how these projects have been and should be funded.

Obsessions

More discussion of megaprojects, infrastructure, and “why can’t we build things”

We are going to be talking India here, focused around the book “Billonnaire Raj” by James Crabtree

We have a lot to catch up on in the China world when the EC launch craziness dies down. Plus, we are covering The Next Factory of the World by Irene Yuan Sun.

Societal resilience and geoengineering are still top-of-mind

Some more on metrics design and quantification

Thanks

To every member of Extra Crunch: thank you. You allow us to get off the ad-laden media churn conveyor belt and spend quality time on amazing ideas, people, and companies. If I can ever be of assistance, hit reply, or send an email to danny@techcrunch.com.

This newsletter is written with the assistance of Arman Tabatabai from New York

source https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/20/timing-and-why-were-all-vcs/

[ionecoffman]

Is Corn the Worst Food Allergy?

When Christine Robinson was first diagnosed with a corn allergy 17 years ago, she remembers thinking, “No more popcorn, no more tacos. I can do this.”

Then she tried to put salt on her tomatoes. (Table salt has dextrose, a sugar derived from corn.) She tried drinking bottled iced tea. (It contains citric acid, which often comes from mold grown in corn-derived sugar.) She tried bottle water. (Added minerals in some brands can be processed with a corn derivative.) She ultimately gave up on supermarket meat (sprayed with lactic acid from fermented corn sugars), bagged salads (citric acid, again), fish (dipped in cornstarch or syrup before freezing), grains (cross-contaminated in processing facilities), fruits like apples and citrus (waxed with corn-derived chemicals), tomatoes (ripened with ethylene gas from corn), milk (added vitamins processed with corn derivatives). And that’s not even getting to all the processed foods made with high fructose corn syrup, modified food starch, xanthan gum, artificial flavorings, corn alcohol, maltodextrin—all of which are or contain derivatives of corn.

“It’s such an useful plant,” Robinson says of corn. “It can be made into so very, very many things that are, from my perspective, trying to kill me.”

[ Read: Drowning in corn ]

Corn allergies are relatively rare, and ones as severe as Robinson’s are rarer still. (Many people unable to eat whole corn can still tolerate more processed corn derivatives.) But to live with a corn allergy is to understand very intimately how corn is everywhere. Most of the 14.6 billions bushels of corn grown in the U.S. are not destined to be eaten on the cob. Rather, as @SwiftOnSecurity observed in a viral corn thread, the plant is a raw source of useful starches that are ubiquitous in the supply chain.

It’s not just food. Robinson told me is she is currently hoarding her favorite olive oil soap, which she had been using for 17 years but recently went out of stock everywhere. (A number of soap ingredients like glycerin can come from corn.) She’s been reading up on DIY soapmaking. A year ago, the brand of dish soap she liked was reformulated to include citric acid, so she had to give up on that, too. And navigating the hospital with a corn allergy can be particularly harrowing. Corn can lurk in the hand sanitizer (made from corn ethanol), pills (made with corn starch as filler), and IV solutions (made with dextrose). A couple years ago, she went to see a specialist for a migraine, and her doctor insisted she get an IV that contained dextrose.

“And while in the midst of a migraine I had to argue with a doctor about the fact I really could not have a dextrose IV,” she says. In the moment, she realized how absurd it was for her to be telling a world-class specialist to change her treatment.

[ Read: The allergens in natural beauty products ]

Because corn allergies are rare, doctors are often not familiar with the potential scope. Robinson says she was the first case her original doctor had ever seen in 38 years, and he didn’t know to advise her against corn derivatives. Even official sources of medical information can be confusing, telling corn-allergy patients they do not need to avoid cornstarch and high-fructose corn syrup. Misinformation abounds in the other direction, too, as corn allergies can be easy to misdiagnosis and easy to self-diagnose incorrectly. All this means that corn allergy sufferers encounter a good deal of skepticism. But Robert Wood, president of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology and a pediatric allergist at Johns Hopkins, told me that derivatives like corn syrup can indeed cause problems for certain people.

People with corn allergies have naturally been finding each other on the Internet. A Facebook group called Corn Allergy & Intolerance (Maize, Zea Mays) now has over 8,500 members. Becca, a tech worker in Washington state, writes a fairly prominent blog called Corn Allergy Girl. (She asked I not use her last name because she is currently interviewing for new jobs and didn’t want her health status to come up with employers.) The blog collates years of Becca’s research into corn allergies as well as resources inherited from other, now-defunct corn allergy blogs.

Members of the Facebook group have also forged ties with individual farms. Once a year, says Robinson, a farmer in California sends members of the group a big box of avocados that have not been exposed to corn-derived ethylene gas or waxes. “It’s a great month when you’re trying to get through all of them,” she says. For the rest of the time, she gets most of her food from a CSA with a local farm in Pennsylvania.

Becca, who writes Corn Allergy Girl, also gets a lot of her produce from local farms. The rest she grows. She goes to a specific butcher and meat processor who will custom-process whole animals for her without using lactic acid or citric acid. She has two fridges and several freezers to store food for the winter, when fresh vegetables are less abundant. “I go all Little House on the Prairie on the weekend,” she says, “pickling things and shredding them and baking them.” She counts herself lucky to live in the Pacific Northwest, where there are many organic, local farms. It’s harder to find fresh food in many other parts of the country, and it’s much harder to do so on a budget. “Your dollars just don’t go as far as if you’re getting bunch of Chef Boyardee. It’s very cheap to eat canned, preserved food,” says Becca. She had to run GoFundMes, for example, for friends who can’t afford to buy chicken from a source they can tolerate.

The diet of someone with a severe corn allergy is in some ways the ideal diet of a certain type of foodie: fresh, local, free of preservatives and processed foods, the provenance of every ingredient intensely catalogued. It’s just not exactly by choice.

Knowing how to avoid foods with corn is one thing; knowing how to navigate social situations where danger lurks in every corner is another.

Robinson says she has two rules when eating out with friends now. First, eat beforehand. Second, order a San Pellegrino and an appetizer for the table to share, which deflects the inevitable concern from the waitstaff. “They're nice, but people really feel they can find something, and they try. You have to keep saying, ‘No, I can’t I can’t,’ and everybody feels bad.”

Cassandra Wiselka, whose five-year-old is allergic to corn, has written about the problem of Halloween. Virtually all mass-produced candy contains high-fructose corn syrup. Her son still goes trick-or-treating, but she switches out the candy he collects with corn-free alternatives: lollipops, gummy bears, and “fancy expensive chocolate that we don’t even buy for ourselves.” She makes and freezes big batches of corn-free cupcakes and pizza to bring to birthday parties. It’s hard, she says. “He still gets upset at birthday parties and things where he has to have his own special food.” They recently had to turn down a birthday party that was moved to a pizza place last minute because they didn’t have time to make safe pizza to bring.

Wiselka’s family moved from Germany to California when her son was 18 months old. He seemed to get worse after the move. It’s hard to say exactly why but Wiselka noticed that “in Germany, things are a lot less processed, foodwise. At least not processed as much with things like corn.”

The one thing Robinson told me she really misses is being able to travel without worry. She did make a trip to Hawaii recently, after much advanced planning. She picked Hawaii for the scuba diving. When she dives, she has to watch out for a few specific things—that her wetsuit had not been washed with a corn-containing detergent, that her dive partners have not been eating corn chips. But once she’s in the water, she’s calm. Sure, scuba diving can kill if you aren’t careful (100 people die while diving in North America every day), but she can be sure there is no corn in water.

“You don't realize you're carrying around this extreme sense of alertness,” she says. “That level of hypervigilance that you have for things that you could touch or breath in is gone. You're breathing air that you know is and you know the actual oxygen content of. It's just incredibly freeing.”

Article source here:The Atlantic

[brettseaton]

Are Teams Eating Real Estate?

[Editor’s note: Originally published on Medium]

Some Questions Industry Leaders Might Consider

In August, 2011, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen coined the phrase “software is eating the world” in an iconic article published in the Wall Street Journal. In it, he put out a theory that we were in the middle of a dramatic and broad technological and economic shift in which software companies were poised to take over large swathes of the economy.

Fast forward to November, 2018 when Alex Rampell, one of Andreessen’s partners at A16Z, gave a presentation entitled “When Software Eats the Real (Estate) World” in which he laid claim to the premise that larger companies who can truly leverage technology will have a significant value proposition over traditional agents.

One can make their own assessment of how accurate Andreessen was in his perspective about software companies generally or Rampell’s predictions for the real estate space.

While maybe not as sexy as venture-funded startups using technology to eat something, there is another significant trend in real estate happening right now that may have broader and more systemic long term implications on the industry.

The undeniable growth of agent teams.

Consider these stats courtesy of RealTrends. In 2011, the top 250 individual agents produced approximately 45,000 real estate transaction sides compared to approximately 61,000 for the top 250 agent teams. At that time, these top tier agent-led teams were responsible for about 1/3 more transactions than group of top individual agents.

By the end of 2017, the top individual agents had grown annual transaction count to approximately 51,000, an increase of about 13%. During that same seven-year period, however, the top agent-led teams increased aggregate transaction count to 133,000, an increase of approximately 115%, more than 9X the transaction count growth rate of the top individual agents.

And the production gap continues to widen. From 2016 to 2017, the top individual agents modestly grew transaction count from approximately 49,000 to 51,000 sides. Compare that to the double-digit growth of top teams which went from 118,000 sides in 2016 to 133,000 sides in just one year.

At last count, the top agent teams were now producing nearly 3X the number of transaction sides controlled by the top agents!

Are these just “top-producer” statistics (remember these numbers compared the top 250 nationally in each category), or is team production growing across the board? To help answer this, let’s look at the recent comprehensive Teams Survey published this past October by the NAR.

According to the survey, twenty-six percent of respondents self-identified as members of a real estate team. While that number may not catch your immediate attention, keep in mind that NAR membership today is about 1.3 million. Of that number, a significant number (some believe as many as 50%) are unproductive and do little, if any, business.

Teams are, by definition, made up of productive agents. While a group of non-producers could join in order to not produce together, seems an unlikely occurrence.

So, with some simple math, we might extrapolate that the 26% of NAR members who are part of a team are responsible for well more than a quarter of aggregate transaction sides today.

Another interesting note from the survey. Respondents indicated that the median year their real estate team was established was 2014, with most of the respondents having joined their current real estate team in 2016. So, it’s clear that team formation growth is a new phenomenon. And, while I have not seen national data on team formation growth rates, this survey data and my own anecdotal observations tells me that the rate of team formation is rising significantly.

Unfortunately, we don’t (yet) have definitive national statistics on the relative production of all teams vs. all individual agents. That said, it would be unwise to not acknowledge that teams are accounting for a significant amount of national transaction sides and that it may only be a matter of time (if we are not there already) when teams will be responsible for the majority of U.S. real estate transactions.

So what? Why does it matter that teams may be accounting for more and more of industry business?

Simply put, the impact of a new and powerful collective on the real estate ecosystem.

What I’ve learned in my 30 years working across various segments of this business is that the industry works through a (mostly) constructive tension among various historically defined groups. Whether in the form of market share, broker/agent splits, franchisor/broker relationships, ownership of data, REALTOR association governance and politics or MLS rules, the industry is a microcosm of “Push Me-Pull You” tug-a-wars which generally keeps it in balance allowing each group to have a voice and a place.

Today, teams and more importantly team leaders are not part of any defined industry “group.” They are too new and until very recently not recognized as being a significant voice in the market.

Let’s envision, however, a future where 60–75% of all transactions are performed by agents on a team run under the control of a team leader. Today, many of those team leaders are acting less as individual producers and more about managing a consumer sales/service organization. They do not fit nicely into the historical box of either brokerage firm or individual producing agent. If that future were to occur, it is quite possible that this new collective will want to assert power and influence to further their business interests in ways not previously seen.

To be clear, my intent here is not to make statements either in favor or against the growth of teams, whether the growth of teams is good or bad for the industry (or any particular group) or to suggest specific answers to questions that may be appropriate. My intent IS to get organizational leaders thinking about an industry dynamic that might be very different than the status quo and to consider various questions that might be discussed as organizations look toward the future.

While there are many industry groups that could be affected by an industry dominated by teams, I have focused on three; brokerage firms, REALTOR associations and Multiple Listing Services.

Brokerage Firms

The most direct impact on the industry would likely be the relationship between team leaders and their brokerage firm. As we know, top level gross commission rates are dropping and teams are gaining more market share which translates into more negotiating power with their brokerage on splits. That leaves the brokerage in a precarious economic position between consumers who are paying less and team leaders who want to make more. Despite the recent growth of teams, many brokerage firms today still view their primary customer as the individual agent and with the challenging economics, have not developed a robust value proposition for team leaders.

A few of the questions that brokerage firm leaders may want to ask themselves include:

· How do I create a sustainable economic model that caters to the needs of teams and their leaders and still allows the brokerage firm to operate profitably?

· What products and services might I deliver that are specifically targeted to teams?

· How can my brand and the team brand work synergistically?

· What space requirements do teams want and how does that match with my current footprint?

· Can I build an offering that is highly valued to teams while also being valuable to individual agents, or do I need to consider a teams-only model with a completely different economic structure?

REALTOR Associations

Not to be left out of discussion, the NAR and its network of state and local REALTOR associations may also be impacted by this team growth trend. For decades, there have been two defined and recognized “groups” in the REALTOR structure. Brokerage firm and agent. And each has the opportunity for voice and influence at all levels.

Today, to my knowledge, there is no specific acknowledgment of the role that team leaders play within the REALTOR world. As teams gain in national presence and collective strength, I suspect that team leaders will begin to ask “what about us?” The risk of ignoring them could result in the formation of a new association that specifically caters to team leaders, something that would be detrimental to the industry’s constructive tension described earlier.

A few questions that REALTOR association leaders may want to ask themselves include:

· What specific value proposition do we provide to team leaders, recognizing the different role they play vs. the traditional broker and individual agent?

· Do we need to create separate committees that provide team leaders with a collective voice (e.g. NAR has a committee for the top-75 U.S. brokerage firms)?

· Is the historical dues formula that ties individual member dues to a Designated REALTOR still appropriate or might that be modified to take into account the much higher degree of control and responsibility that team leaders have over the members of their team?

· What type of education programs do we provide that may not only support, but might even encourage, the formation of teams?

· Does the Code of Ethics need to be reviewed to take into account the role of the team leader relative to other REALTORS and the public?

· Does the association governance structure need to be analyzed to specifically provide a voice and place for team leaders?

· Should associations lobby federal and state government to create laws and regulations favorable for teams?

Multiple Listing Services

Historically, MLSs have recognized two distinct groups. Broker (the MLS “Participant”) and agent (the MLS “Subscriber” under the Participant). This hierarchical paradigm is based on the fact that the broker “owns” the listing relationship between the firm and consumer as well as the legal right to collect commissions and the individual agent operates only through that legal construct. Today, team leaders fit somewhere in between this historical Participant/Subscriber paradigm. While the broker still maintains the legal relationship, the practical control over listings is more and more the province of the team leader as is control and oversight of team members.

A few of the questions that MLS leaders may want to ask themselves include:

· Should the MLS deliver technology products and services targeted only at the unique wants/needs of team leaders?

· Should team leaders have their own relationship category with the MLS that acknowledges their role in leading a “micro-brokerage” organization?

· Should the MLS recognize the market power that teams wield vis a vis their brokerage firm and include them in the formal MLS governance structure?

· Should access to MLS data and IDX and VOW rules be modified to take into account the role of the team leader and her team?

· Should MLS rules and regulations be reviewed to better acknowledge the role of teams in the local market and provide greater responsibilities for team leader oversight?

Again, the answers to some or all of the above questions might well be “no”. Maybe the seismic growth in team formation and market share will suddenly stop and the industry can ignore these questions and address the myriad of other issues on its collective plate. Or just maybe, team growth will accelerate and brokerage firms, REALTOR associations and MLSs will be faced with an industry dominated by teams bringing with it a new base of power and influence.

Are teams eating real estate? Only time will tell but I hope industry leaders will recognize the importance of this trend and engage in proactive and open discussion about how it may impact their respective organizations.

The post Are Teams Eating Real Estate? appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

Are Teams Eating Real Estate? syndicated from https://oicrealestate.wordpress.com/

[pamphletstoinspire]

The Church's Year - INSTRUCTION ON THE FOURTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

At the Introit of the Mass excite in your heart an ardent desire for heaven, with these words:

INTROIT Behold, O God, our protector, and look on the face of thy Christ:, for better is one day, in thy courts above thousands. How lovely are thy taber­nacles, O Lord of hosts! My soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord. (Ps. LXXXIII.) Glory etc.

COLLECT Keep, We beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy Church with Thy perpetual favor; and because without Thee the weakness of man is ready to fall, may it be withheld by Thy aid from all. things hurtful, and devoted to all things profitable to salvation. Thro'.

EPISTLE (Gal. V. 16-24.) Brethren, Walk in the spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh: for the flesh lusteth against ,the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh: for these are contrary one to another: so that you do not the things that you would. But if you are led by the spirit, you are not under the law.. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are, fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunken­ness, revellings, and such like: of the which I foretell to you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, mild­ness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity. Against such there is no law. And they that are Christ's have crucified their flesh with the vices and concupiscences.

What is it to walk in the spirit?

It is to obey the inspirations of the Holy Ghost always, and in all things. He who does this, says St. Paul, will not do the evil works of the flesh, which are here enumerated, but he will rather suppress and mortify all sensual desires, in this manner crucify his flesh together with its vices and lusts, and make himself worthy of the fruits of the Holy Ghost, which are also mentioned; he will belong to Christ, and secure for himself eternal happiness. On the contrary, he who lives according to the flesh, that is, gives way to the desires of the flesh, has no hope of salvation.

Is it not strange, that all Christians wish to belong to Christ and become heirs of His kingdom, but are unwilling to crucify the flesh and its lusts, though Christ says to all; If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. (Matt XVI. 24.)

ASPIRATION Intercede for me, O St. Paul, that God may give me grace to crucify my flesh with its lusts, that I may have part with thee in Christ:

GOSPEL (Matt. VI. 24-33.) At that time, Jesus said to his disciples: No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will sustain the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon. Therefore I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the meat, and the body more than the raiment? Behold the birds of the air; for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns, and your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they? And which of you, by taking thought, can add to his stature one cubit? And for raiment, why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they labor not, neither do they spin; but I say to you, that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these. Now, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which is to-day, and to morrow is cast into the oven, how much more you, O ye of little faith? Be not solicitous, therefore, saying: What shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or wherewith shall we be clothed? For after all these things do the heathens seek. For your Father knoweth that .you have need of all these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God and his justice; and all these things shall be added unto you.

What is meant by serving God?

Doing the will of God, or performing faithfully and zealously all that God asks of us according to our age and condition, and for love of Him.

Who are the two masters whom we cannot serve alike?

God and Mammon or riches, whereby also, the other goods and pleasures of the world are understood. These we cannot serve at the same time, because they command things diametrically opposed to each other; for instance, God prohibits usury, theft, deceit, &c.; to which the desire for wealth impels us. God commands that we keep holy Sundays and holy days, and devote them to His service; the desire for riches tempts man to omit religious worship and to seek temporal gain; it disturbs him even in church, so that he is only present with his body, but absent in mind with his temporal goods and business.

To whom can riches be useful?

To those who, like the saints, perform works of mercy with them, and thus lay up treasures for themselves in heaven.

Why does Christ call our attention to the birds of the air and the lakes of the field?

To, excite in us confidence in the providence of God, which preserves even the birds and the flowers. Surely, if God feeds the young ravens which cry to Him; (Ps. CXLVI. 9.) if He nourishes the birds which neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns; if He vests the flowers of the field so beautifully, how much more will He care for man whom He has made to His own image and likeness, and adopted as His child, if he only acts as such, keeps His commandments, and always entertains a filial confidence in Him.

Should we, therefore, lay aside all care and never work?

This does not follow from what has been said. Christ condemns only the superfluous cares, which cause man to forget God and to neglect the salvation of his soul. Besides, God has Himself ordered (Gen. III. 17-19.) that man should obtain the fruits of the earth with much labor, that he should earn his bread by the sweat of his brow. St. Paul says: If any man will not work, neither let him eat. (II Thess. III. 10.)

What should preserve us from superfluous cares?

A firm and lively faith, that God can and will help us. That He can is evident, because He is almighty; that His will is certain, because He promises it in so many pas­sages of Holy Writ, and because He is infinitely faithful to all His promises. Christ encourages us to this lively confidence with these, words: All things whatsoever you ask when ye pray, believe that you shall receive and they shall come unto you. Mark XI. 24.) Therefore the apostle also commands us to throw all cares upon the Lord, who provides for us. (I Pet. V. 7.) And why should God not care for us, since He sent us His Son and with Him all; for which reason St. Augustine says: "How can you doubt that God will give you good things, since He vouchsafed to assume evil for you!"

PRAYER O Lord Jesus! give me a firm confidence in Thy Divine Providence, and daily increase it in me, that when in necessity I may confidently believe if I seek first the kingdom of God and His justice, the rest shall be added unto me.

CONSOLATION IN POVERTY

Be not solicitous for your life. (Matt. VI. 25.)

If you were born in poverty, or accidentally, or through your own fault have become poor, be consoled, because God has sent you this poverty for your own good; for good things and evil, life arid death, poverty and riches are, from God. (Ecclus. XI-14.). Therefore receive it from the hand of God without impatience or murmuring, as a means by which He wishes to keep you from forgetting Him, which would, perhaps, happen if He were to bless you with temporal prosperity. Riches are a source of destruction for many. If you have brought poverty upon yourself by a licentious and sinful life, receive it in a spirit of penance as a just and salutary chastisement, and thank God that He gives you an opportunity to do penance for your sins. But if you have become poor through no fault of your own, be consoled by the example of the saints, of whom St. Paul says: they bear the unjust taking away of their goods with joy, because they know that a better and an unchangeable treasure is in store for them in heaven. (Hebr, X. 34.) But you should particularly take courage from the example of Christ who, being rich, became poor for us, (II Cor. VIII. 9.) and had not a place whereon to lay His head. (Matt. VIII. 20.)

In your distress say with job: The Lord gave and the Lord bath taken away: as it pleased the Lord, so it is done: blessed be the name of the Lord. Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither. (Job. I. 21.) Fear not my son, says Tobias, we lead indeed a poor life, but we shall have many good things if we fear God, and depart from all sins, and do that which is good. (Tob. IV. 23.) To serve God and to be content with few things always brings rich reward, if not in this, at least in the next life. Therefore Christ promised the kingdom of heaven to the poor in spirit, that is, not only to the humble, busy also to the poor who imitate Christ in all patience and resignation. Follow, therefore, the poor Jesus, follow His poor mother, by imitating their example, and you will possess the kingdom of heaven.

INSTRUCTION CONCERNING USURY

You cannot serve God and Mammon. (Matt. VI. 24.)

Usury is to demand more than legal interest from our neighbor, to whom we have lent something, or who is otherwise indebted to us. Those are also commonly called usurers, who, in times of want, hoard up necessary food, such as grain, flour, &c., and only sell it at an exorbitant price; or who buy up all such articles to sell them to the needy for enormous prices. This is a grievous sin, and usurers are threatened with eternal death, for Christ ex­pressly prohibits lending with usury. (Luke VI. 34, 35.)

Usurers are the real leeches of the poor, whom they rob of their sweat and blood, and since they transgress the natural law, but still more the divine, which commands us to love our neighbor, and be merciful to the needy, they will surely not possess the kingdom of heaven. Would to God, the hard-hearted sinner might consider this, and take to heart the words of Christ: What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul (Matt. XVI. 26.)

[redherringquotes]

John Greaves Nall, Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft: A Handbook for Visitors, 1866

Page 13: Footnote: Thomas Nashe was a Lowestoft man, born in 1558, a B.A. of St. John’s College, Cambridge, and one of the ablest Euphuistic writers of the Elizabethan age. His very rare tract on Great Yarmouth, reprinted in the Harlan Miscellany, vol. II, is a characteristic and favorable specimen of the literary fustian of his day;— “Taffeta phrases, silken terms, precise, Three plied hyperboles, spruce affectation, Figures pedantical.’ It is entitled “Nashe’s Lenten Stuff concerning the description and first procreation and increase of the town of Great Yarmouth, in Norfolk, with a New Play never played before, of the Praise of the Red Herring. Fit of all Clerks of Noblemen’s kitchens to be read; and not unnecessary by all serving men who have short board-wages to be remembered.” The principal passages of this scarce and curious work are given in the Appendix. Page 273: Footnote: Formerly, in many parts of the kingdom, in the Shrove Tuesday procession, was a man called Lenton, to represent Lent, clad in white and red herring skins, and his horse had trappings of oyster shells. Page 341: Gillingwater relates that in 1776 a panic set in amongst the herring merchants of Lowestoft, an extinction of their fishery being apprehended from attempts at that time commenced by the merchants of Scotland, the Isle of Man, and Liverpool, to introduce at their respective stations the red herring cure. ‘Towers’ from Lowestoft and Yarmouth were engaged to teach the processes, and an endeavor was made to displace the English East Coast herrings in the markets of the Mediterranean, the larger coarser fish of the North being introduced at Leghorn, and in the Levant, at lower prices. After several years’ operations, the attempt was abandoned as a failure, the nature of the Scotch herring proving unsuitable, their fat and oily quality rendering the fish both difficult to smoke, and unpleasant to the taste, the season also at which they were caught — in the heat of summer — affecting the cure. Page 344: Foonote; The Yarmouth red herring exportation has almost rom the first labored under grievous disadvantages. The heavy freight incurred by the lengthy voyage to the ports of the Mediterranean is a great drawback to its profits. Add to this the onerous duties and local charges, and the result has been that with some countries it has been carried on under conditions almost prohibitory. In Spain and Portugal they are quite excluded. Page 346: This would however be a great underestimate, inasmuch as it is computing the entire catch, at the weight of full, fresh, or ‘wet’ fish of the largest size. The smoked red herring, the curing of which absorbs nearly half the Yarmouth catch, loses much of its weight in the process, and a barrel of 2 cwt. will contain 1,000 fish and upwards. A proportion (about a fifth,) of the catch are shotten herrings, and of these a last will be just half the weight of the full fish. A barrel of Yarmouth herrings, as regards its weight and contents, is anything but a fixed quantity, and if a dozen persons in the fish trade be asked to define it, the probability is that a different answer will be made by each, the most frequent reply would give 500 fish to the cwt.; the red herring forming the staple of the local trade. Page 353: “The puissant red herring, the golden Hesperides red herring, the Maeonian red herring, the red herring of Red Herrings Hall, every pregnant peculiar of whose resplendent laud and honor to delineate and adumbrate to the ample life, were a work that would drink dry fourscore and eighteen Castalian fountains of eloquence, consume another Athens of fecundity, and abate the haughtiest poetical fury betwixt this and the burning Zone, and the tropic of Cancer.’ “There are of you, it may be, that will account me a palterer for hanging out the sign of the Red Herring in my title page, and no such feast towards, for aught you can see. Soft and fair, my masters; you must walk and talk before dinner an hour or two, the better to whet your appetites to taste of such a dainty dish as the red herring.” — Nashe’s Lenten Stuff. Page 358: The proverbs of a people are its most genuine cardiphonia, the fireside communing of a nation, the deliverance of its collective wisdom on the subjects which most engross its thoughts. In Dutch proverbs the herring occupies the foremost place. The national importance of their fishery to the comfort and well-being of the country is illustrated in their, — ‘Herrings in the land, the doctor at a stand.’ Their ‘Don’t cry herrings till they are in the net’ is the expression of a caution conveyed in a hundred shapes in other languages. There is a curious disparagement of the larger fish conveyed in their — ‘Big fish spring out of the kettle’ — ‘Big fish devour the little ones’ — ‘Great fishes break the net’ — ‘Little fish are sweet.’ Our English — ‘It’s neither, fish, flesh, nor good red herring’ is complimentary to the latter. An obsolete English proverb is that of ‘Luck in a bag, and then you may wink and choose, for the devil a barrel the better herring amongst the lot.’ The Scotch proverb of, ‘Let ilk herring hing by its ain head,’ smacks more of the latitude of the Yarmouth curing houses, but their ‘Dinna gut your herrings till you get them’ is perfectly characteristic. ‘O’ a’ fish i’ the sea, herring is king,’ is an old Scotch saying, another is, ‘It’s but kindly that the pock savor of the herring,’ of which, ‘the cask still stairs o’ the herring’ is a variation. A rhyming saw is that of — If you would be a merchant fine, Beware of o’ auld horses, herring, and wine. The first will die, the second stink, and the third turn sour. The Danish proverb, ‘Better a salt herring on your own table than a fresh pike on another man’s,’ is a homily upon contentment which the world is more apt to preach than listen to, and but sorry comfort can be extracted from their ‘Of bad debtors you may take spoilt herrings.’ ‘As straight as the backbone of a herring,’ is one of the proverbial sentences collected by Ray. In the Isle of man the two Deemsters or Judges, when appointed, declare they will render justice between man and man, “As equally as the herring bone lies between the two sides,” and image which could not have occurred to any people unaccustomed to the herring fishery. ….. Footnote: Among the proverbial observations gathered by Ray, is an obscure one relating to its cookery — “Red herring ne’er spake but e’en (once), Broil my back, but not my weamb.” The bony strictures of the herring has supplied an appellation to herring bone masonry, courses of stone laid angularly, and to the herring bone cross-stitch in seams, used chiefly in woolen work. ….. The herring has furnished the theme for a variety of similes, which abound in the works of our dramatists and slang writers. ‘Dead as a herring; Packed as close as herrings in a barrel; Scragged, lagged or sent across the herring pond,’ the felon’s irreverent Old Bailey formula for the terrors of the law, may be instanced. The sporting freak of laying hounds on a red herring trail, on a blank or frosty day, has supplied that caveto to an enlightened public, which ‘decies repetita placebit’ — not to be put upon a false scent, and distracted from the game in view. ‘A shotten herring’ has passed into literature amongst the bye words of contumely. “If manhood, good manhood, be not forgot upon the face of the earth, then am I a shooter herring,” exclaims Falstaff. In Quevedo’s description of the ‘House of Famine,’ “the master was a skeleton — a mere shotten herring.” Page 361: Burton, in his ‘Anatomy of Melancholy,’ discussing diet, quotes in commendation of sea fish Gomesius, an authority in whom one’s faith later on gets terribly shaken, on finding him declaring that fishes ‘pine away for love and wax lean.’ Galen pronounces fish to be melancholy food, but seems to have been a dyspeptic critic somewhat hard to please, and condemning beef and mutton as open to the same objection. Besides he is flatly contradicted by Cicero, who affirms that for some distempers of the mind fish will be found a better prescription than philosophy. A writer of our day has ingeniously sought to prove that Shakespeare was profoundly versed in medicine. We have not seen his book, and therefore do not know what weight of authority he attaches to Falstaff’s declaration (2 Henry iv, Act. 4): “There’s never any of these demure boys come to any proof; for their drink doth so overcool their blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male-green sickness; and then, when they marry, they get wenches.” Sir Toby Belch was of Sir John’s way of thinking. ‘A plague o’ these pickle herrings!’ is his drunken apostrophe to the disguised Viola. Whilst some writers have dwelt on the ‘cold phlegm of a fish diet,’ others have criticized its heating tendencies. ‘To think on a red herring,’ exclaims Nashe in his ‘Lenten Stuff,’ ‘such a hot stirring meat it is, is enough to make the cravenest dastard proclaim fire and sword against Spain. The most itinerant virgin wax phisnomy that taints his throat with the least rib of it; it will imbrawn and iron-crust his flesh, and harden his soft bleeding veins as stiff and robustious as branches of coral.’ Page 366: Of all fish that swim the sea, none has been more bountifully and abundantly supplied by a wise Providence for the sustenance of man than the herring; and, considering its cheapness, its excellent flavor and wholesomeness, no article of diet has undergone so absurd a proscription from the tables of the wealthy and great. That vile purse pride of the vulgar rich, which would fain protest with Peter that it had ‘never eaten anything that is common,’ has in this instance but obeyed with a servile fidelity the culinary edict which has banished the beautiful but plebeian fish from the menu of fashionable society. This ostracism of the herring is a thing of modern date, for turning over the leaves of our old cookery books, the reader will be surprised at the important place the red herring formerly occupied in the household menage, and the multiplicity of ways in which it was brought to table — stewed, potted, baked, boiled, roasted, fried, made into pies, soups, ragouts, terrines, puddings, etc.; dressed with cabbage, pickled with mushrooms, boiled with carrots, dished the Italian way, the Spanish way, as Virginia trouts, cum multis alitis, quoe etc., the choice offered to the gourmand is quite bewildering, whilst the recipes given for a variety of epicurean banquets on fresh herring roes, by Carême, prince of modern cooks, and others, would rouse the palled appetite of a Lucullus. Page 367: It is to be regretted (fàcheux) he observes, that the red herring does not enjoy in general a reputation sufficiently exalted to gain it admission to the tables of the great, and that the ostentation of rich people has banished it to the cookery of the people. It wakes up the blaséd appetite, it rouses vigorously the relaxed nerves. Served up as a hors d’oeuvre (side-dish) it prompts one to do justice to the entrées; cut in small morsels and mixed with the salad it gives it piquancy. Moreover it has a variety of exceptional uses, and if taken with moderation ought never to be entirely banished the table. It has besides an excellent virtue, one, of which the wine imbiber gratefully admits the value — it excites thirst, and renders him indulgent as to the quality of the wine. From all this one may conclude that maugre its defects — the red herring, like many people of merit, is of a much greater value than its ordinary reputation. Page 388: A cheap family Scotch dish is that of several pickled herrings, washed and put in a stone pan, or close covered pot, filled up with peeled potatoes and a little water, and baked in the oven or boiled till done. The herrings should be placed uppermost. A red herring sandwich is one of the standing list of articles supplied at the new model dining rooms opened in Glasgow. Page 399: Footnote: The reader may consult for much curious heraldic lore, treated very attractively, Moule’s Heraldry of Fish, 8vo. 1842, to which we are indebted for part of the foregoing. Mat: Thy lineage, Monsieur Cob, what lineage? what lineage? Cob: Why, sir, an ancient lineage, and a princely. Mine ancestry came from a king’s belly, no worse man; and yet no man neither (by your worship’s leave, I did lie in that), but Herring the king of fish, (from his belly I proceed), one o’ the monarchs o’ the world, I assure you. The first red herring that was broiled in Adam and Eve’s kitchen, do I fetch my pedigree from, by the harrot’s book. His, Cob, was my great great-mighty-great-grandfather. Mat: Why mighty, why mighty? I pray thee. Cob: O, it was a mighty while ago, sir, and a mighty great Cob. Mat: How know’t thou that? Cob: How know I? why, I smell his ghost, ever and anon. Mat: Smell a ghost! O unsavory jest! and the ghost of a herring, Cob.”—Every Man in his Humor. Page 400: ‘Be of good cheer, my weary readers, for I have espied land,’ breaks out Nashe, towards the close of his mad rhapsodical fantasias on the praises of the red herring. ‘Fishermen, I hope will not find fault with me for fishing before the net, or making all fish that comes to the net, in this history,’ he adds, and we would crave the same indulgence for this discursive, gossiping narrative. Our space imperatively requires us to take leave of this fascinating theme which has encroached so largely upon its originally allotted limits. We quit it with the greater reluctance, at leaving our tale but half told. More than half our materials, — illustrating the history of the herring fishery in Scotland, Ireland, Holland, and the Baltic, — and tracing the origin and growth of that romance of natural history, the herring migration theory, are per force thrown over for some future opportunity. Page xxii: A Ramble Round Old Yarmouth: …. “To fetch the red herring in Trojan equipage, some of every of the Christ Cross alphabet of outlandish cosmopolite furrow up the rugged brine, and sweep through his tumultuous ooze. For our English Microcosmos or Phoenician Dido’s hide of ground, no shire, county, count palatine, or quarter of it, but rigs out some oaken squadron or other to waft him along Cleopatrean Olympickly, and not the least nook or crevice of them but is parturient of the like super-officiousness, arming forth, though it be but a catch or pink, no capabler than a rundlet or washing bowl to imp the wings of his convoy. Holy St. Taurbard, in what droves, the gouty bagged Londoners hurry down, and dye the watchet air of an iron russet hue with the dust that they raise in hot spurred rowelling it on to perform compliment unto him.”

[rocklandhistoryblog]

Weathervane c. 1784 HSRC 2007.6.1ab Gift from the Collection of James Smith Haring, IV

___________________________________________________________

The Flight of the Rooster 

by Firth Haring Fabend 

 The Flight of the Rooster 

1. This is the Church. This is the Steeple 

In 1788, the Tappan Reformed Church consistory acknowledged the need for a larger building to house its growing congregation. That year, the old building (Figure 1), which had served for almost a century, since the late 1690s, was radically reconstructed. Its two-foot thick sandstone walls were retained, but the building was lengthened from a square to a rectangle, and a gambrel or hipped roof was substituted for the original four-sided roof.1 (See Figure 2.) 

Figure 1

Figure 2

David Cole, a Reformed minister whose father, Isaac D. Cole, was the pastor of the Tappan Reformed Church from 1829 to 1864, described the new steeple of the 1788 church as "of open work, exposing to view the great wheel to which the bell was attached."2 He did not mention it, but on the steeple was mounted an iron weathervane in the shape of a rooster, forged no doubt in one of the smithies in the neighborhood. 

 Why a rooster? A rooster weathervane was common on European churches, both Catholic and Protestant, to remind the faithful of the cock that crowed each of the three times that Peter denied Christ on the eve of his Crucifixion. For more than half a century, Tappan's rooster weathercock wheeled freely in the wind over the little community, indicating the direction and velocity of every gale and zephyr--and flaunting his own familiar, impudent profile for miles around. 

 By 1835, it was evident that an even larger church structure was needed to accommodate the still-burgeoning congregation. Besides, the current building was "decayed beyond repair," in Cole's words. This time, the 1788 building and its original sandstone walls from the 1690s were completely demolished. It was not an easy task. "The hipped roof, though so hopelessly decayed," Cole wrote, "was a marvel of tenacity as to its old shingles, and the heavy wrought nails with which they were secured to the lathing. The shingles were not ripped up, according to our present way of removing a roof," he continued, "but the roof was cut into large sections and hurled in masses to the ground. The strong stone walls, not less than two feet in thickness, were pulled down with chains to which several yokes of oxen were attached."3 In the commotion of the demolition, the church's steeple toppled over, and the old rooster weathervane "flew off and was caught in a poplar tree," according to an account published in the Nyack Evening Journal forty-five years later in 1880.4 

Figure 3

The new building on the site (Figure 3) was designed with a fashionable four-pointed crown steeple that offered no convenient roost for anything so plebeian as a weathervane. Nevertheless, one sentimental onlooker at the scene of the demolition believed he could offer the bird a home. John Perry, a parishioner, retrieved the rooster from its unaccustomed perch in the poplar tree and took it to Nyack, where he placed it on his premises.5 Not long after this, the rooster came into the possession of Jacob Demarest, when he acquired Perry's premises in Nyack and built the St. Nicholas Hotel. And soon after this, Jacob Demarest sold the bird to one James S. Haring (1820-1878), a young man with a penchant for things historical.6 Subsequently, the rooster disappeared from sight and was believed--by anyone who ever gave the old weathercock a thought, and for many years some oldtimers in the Tappan Reformed Church did, judging by the interest in it in 1880--to have flown forever. 

 Recently, to great surprise, however, the rooster weathervane resurfaced. Since 1997, it has been in the possession of the Historical Society of Rockland County. 

 2. The Roost Covert 

Where was the bird roosting for those 162 years between 1835 and 1997, and how did it come to reappear at 20 Zukor Road in New City, the home of the Historical Society of Rockland County? 

In September 1991, I received a phone call from a man who identified himself as James Smith Haring IV, a resident of Philadelphia. I knew of Mr. Haring by reputation as an eccentric collector of art and historical artifacts who had a strong affection for Rockland County's history and for his family's role in its original settlement in the 1680s and its affairs thereafter. He was calling to ask me how he could get a copy of my recently published book, A Dutch Family in the Middle Colonies, 1660-1800 (Rutgers University Press, 1991), which documents the history of the Haring family over its first five generations, first in New Amsterdam and then in New York and New Jersey. Seizing the opportunity to meet him--and to see his collections--I offered to hand carry a copy of the book to him in Philadelphia. At first, he was adamantly opposed to this idea. He never, he said, allowed anyone into his house. Disappointed, I agreed to mail him a copy of the book. But an hour or so later, he telephoned again. He had had a change of heart and invited me to visit him the next day. He made sure I knew that it was a very special and a very unusual occurrence for him to open his house to anyone. 

 The next morning I was on his doorstep. He opened the door, pulled me inside, and, much to my consternation, double bolted the door behind me. He saw my uneasiness and asked if I was nervous. I admitted that I was and asked him to leave the door unlocked, but he refused, saying that we were "safer" with the door locked, as the neighborhood was no longer what it had been. 

 Neither, clearly, was his once very elegant townhouse. I glanced around me. From where I stood in the front hall, every room that I could see was piled high with things: paintings, furniture, bibelots, books, artifacts of every description and clearly, even at a distance, of both good and of bad quality. A dog breeder, Jim had seven greyhounds in the house at the time, all of whom were yelping wildly from their quarters in the basement. Although I was exceedingly uneasy, I accompanied him upstairs anyway, to the one cleared space in the house, where in the center of a room on the second floor he lived. In this space, there were two chairs, a table, and a radio--which he never turned off, night or day, he told me--and there we sat. 

 3. Jim 

 I presented my book to Jim, and he began to tell me about himself and his life: Born in 1919, he had graduated from Ridgewood High School and then from the University of Pennsylvania. During World War II, he was put in charge of developing the famed Canine Corps, and after the War, while working as a sales representative for Dow Chemical, he owned and managed Sundridge House in Harriman, N.Y., breeding and showing champion greyhounds and English setters under the Sundridge name. 

 Later, picking our way along narrow pathways through towering piles of furnishings and objects, he showed me around the house. Much of what I saw was of fine quality. But much was junk, especially in the hundreds of paintings of recent vintage that were stacked against every wall. In one room, however, I was astonished to notice paintings that seemed to be by John Singer Sargent. I asked him if they were copies. He said they were not. He explained to me that his grandfather, James Smith Haring, Jr. (1855-1925), had been one of the civil engineers hired by the tobacco mogul Pierre Lorillard IV to lay out Tuxedo Park in the 1880s, and many of the paintings and much of the beautiful, and ornate, furniture that Jim possessed had been acquired by his grandfather at estate sales at this enclave of the rich and famous. (See Figure 4, a family tree.) Also, his maternal grandfather had belonged to the English baronetcy, and some of the objects and furniture in the house had come to Jim from that side of his family. 

 What caught my eye especially, however, were the humbler artifacts that had come down to Jim from his ancestors in eighteenth-century Bergen and Rockland counties: hand-painted miniatures of his great-great grandparents, daguerreotypes, albums, side chairs, a small desk, tables, a Bible--and more, all stacked haphazardly on top of one another in one corner of the upstairs hallway. Prominently displayed in the hall was a rose famille porcelain bowl in excellent condition and in an adjacent bedroom a charming set of framed watercolors of Piermont, dated 1906, by a skilled artist whose work was unfamiliar to me and whose name was tantalizingly just out of my eyeshot. 

 Naturally, I began to wonder what was to become of all these treasures, as Jim at the time was 72 years old and was suffering, he told me, from congestive heart disease. I asked him if he had made a will. He said he had not, but that he wanted to leave everything to Ridgewood High School and to the Historical Society of Rockland County. Gently, I tried to explain to him that a public high school was not a logical repository for antiques and priceless paintings, and that the mission of the Historical Society of Rockland County was to preserve not elaborate furnishings and artifacts of English or Continental origin, but strictly items related to Rockland County's history. 

 At this point, a gleam came into Jim's eye, and he asked me if I wanted to see something very special that related very notably to Rockland County. Of course, I said Yes. After swearing me to secrecy, he leaped out of his chair and, in the same room where we sat, scrambled up the side of a stack of furnishings and objects to the very top of the pile, where from just under the ceiling he pulled out from beneath a welter of musty, dusty rags, rugs, and old newspapers an iron rooster. 

 I had heard of the long-missing rooster weathervane that had once topped the steeple of the 1788 Tappan Reformed Church. Local historian George Budke had written of it in his articles about the church on its 250th anniversary in 1944, and as noted above, even earlier the Nyack Evening Journal had described the rooster's disappearance in an 1880 article preserved in the archives of the Tappantown Historical Society. 

 Jim confirmed what I had instantly suspected: This was the very same rooster. It had been in his family for four generations, ever since his great-grandfather, whose namesake he was, bought it (for five dollars) in the late 1830s. I tried to persuade Jim to make a gift of the weathervane to the church, but he became very agitated at the thought of parting with the object and reminded me of my promise not to reveal its whereabouts. 

 4. Curiouser and Curiouser 

 At this point, the saga of the missing rooster becomes even stranger. I remained true to my promise to Jim not to reveal the weathervane's whereabouts, but my guilty knowledge of it, and my uncertainties as to its future, preyed on my mind. 

In May 1993, I wrote to Jim to tell him that the Tappan Reformed Church was planning to celebrate its Tercentennial in 1994 and that, in honor of the occasion, the congregation had raised the enormous sum of $56,000 to replace the now-dilapidated crown tower that since 1835 had been such a beloved landmark in the area. What an appropriate gesture, I suggested, if he were to present the rooster weathervane to the church at this time, as a memorial to his Haring ancestors, founding members of the church three hundred years before. 

 He did not answer this letter, and six months later I learned that James Smith Haring IV had died, on November 2, 1993. With his obituary to guide me, I tracked down a sister who lived in Ramsey, N.J., and asked her about the circumstances of his death. She told me that, four days before dying, Jim had made a will, instructing that his house and possessions be sold--with the proceeds to be divided between Ridgewood High School and the Historical Society of Rockland County. She also told me that he had instructed his power of attorney, a Cynthia Williams, to go to his house in Philadelphia and remove from it two items: a rose famille porcelain bowl that had belonged to his mother, and the rooster weathervane. 

 Was I only wishfully thinking when it struck me that, on his deathbed, Jim had decided to return the rooster to the Tappan Reformed Church, as I had twice urged him to do? We will never know. Ms. Williams did not respond to my letter of inquiry to her, and in time it became known to me that (with or without Jim's treasures and precious antiques is not known) she had dropped, like the rooster 160 years before, out of sight. 

5. What To Do? 

 After learning of the existence of Jim's will, I decided to telephone Scott Vanderhoff, then President of the Historical Society of Rockland County, to acquaint him with its existence, in case he should not have heard of it. He had not heard of it. I described in detail to him, both then and later in writing, the marvelous treasures I had seen in the house in Philadelphia. 

 With little delay, the Society engaged the law firm of Doig, Cornell & Mandel in New City to look into the matter. Unfortunately, it was learned arduously--after much correspondence with the executors of the will and other parties--that Jim's house was ransacked soon after, or perhaps even before his death, of all that was valuable in it. All that was left was worthless. 

 Miraculously, the rooster turned up. One of the executors revealed that he had been holding it for "safekeeping." He conveyed it to the Historical Society, where it is today. Of all the possessions, of even the funds from the sale of the house, almost nothing was turned over to the Society except for the rooster, the rose famille porcelain bowl, a Civil War uniform belong to Colonel James Smith Haring, and seven disappointingly unimportant documents. 

6. Chanticleer Himself 

The rooster himself measures 16 and a half inches in height from his crest to his belly and 20 inches across, from the tips of his four flamboyant tail plumes to his cocky, swelling breast. The pole on which he stands adds another 9 and a half inches to his height, and he still turns on his perch today as smoothly as the day he was fashioned. 

 He is in excellent condition, considering that he is 211 years old. Forged of iron, he was at one time, perhaps originally, gilded or painted gold. A layer of black paint was subsequently applied. Both coats are peeling, and the peeling, which mimics the mottled or speckled effect of a real bird, adds to his verisimilitude. 

Will the Tappan Reformed Church weathercock ever return to his original roost in Tappan? The good news is Yes, if . . . . Pastor James Johnson has requested of the Historical Society that the bird be loaned to the Church for display, and the Board of Trustees of the Society has agreed to lend the old weathervane to the Tappan Reformed Church for exhibition, provided the Church can ensure its safety and security. 

 The downside is, this may not be so easy, given the weathervane's value as an outstanding example of eighteenth-century American folk art. So the rooster found still presents a problem. But what a wonderful problem for the Tappan Reformed Church, perhaps pooling resources and ideas with the Tappantown Historical Society and with the community at large, to solve together! 

 Notes 1. David Cole, D.D., History of the Reformed Church of Tappan, N.Y. (New York, 1894), pp. 76-77. Cole believed the first church building dated from 1716, but local historian George Budke subsequently found information in the church records and elsewhere to suggest the earlier date. For this information, and Budke's reasoning, see "Introductory Sketch of the Tappan Church," Budke Collection #48, New City Free Library. 

2. Cole, History, p. 77. 

3. Cole, History, pp. 93 and 95. 

4. Account in the Nyack Evening Journal, January 3, 1880, Tappantown Historical Society Archives. 

 5. Ibid. 

 6. Ibid.

[vancegame027843-blog]

Nuts Butter Rice Crisp Cures-- Oh She Shines

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[kristen-versionofevents-blog]

Best Version of GTA

We did it with Halo, so let's do it with another on the planets biggest game series, Grand Theft Vehicle. And by "it", I want rank the activities from "best" to "underside of the number".

Let's say you're new to a series. Or are in a station in which you're recommending a… Look at more Why? You could be new to the progression. Or diving back into it. These games take a long time to get done, therefore a person should probably start with the good ones head. Before... you might just be arguing with colleagues. That's the beauty of these items. With a string like Great Theft Auto, every game holds its ups and downs, the experts and cons, and investigating just what ticks people's boxes can be a blast.

Just before we plunge in, some see: these aren't Kotaku's cuts for the pecking purchase of the GTA series. They're just mine. You'll no doubt get the colleagues chiming in below using two cents! Also note that, like with Halo, I've had to put about boundaries by what I'm including then what exactly I'm not.

It was a lot tougher to pull out a policy from the GTA series, since it spans so many systems (and stable decades), bar on the threat of offending purists I've decided to follow hardly the standalone titles. That agency no "Reports" or "Events" rights, because near bit a drawing they're sharing half the experience (getting them much more of a increase, in my view, even using own words), but I'll think about them as part of the main games they're based on.

1. Vice City

It may not be the perfect Grand Theft Auto game, but that the perfect Grand Theft Auto experience. Sure, on a superficial level that the car chases and gunplay that make a GTA game fun, but it's the strength of the world which aids put these activities apart from each other. And no world became greater realised than Rockstar's take on 1986 Miami. Once you run past pink neon lights while Jan Hammer plays for the radio, you'll feel, just for a minute, that you're quite literally again inside 1980s. It's a little bit terrifying. GTA 5 Online Cheats,

It also helps the game boasts perhaps the series' strongest range of individuals, commanded through Ray Liotta's Tommy Vercetti, who is nevertheless overtaken by Bill Fichtner's coke-addled lawyer turn.

2. Grand Theft Auto IV

Drab as it may be, Rockstar's most recent door in the collection built a new so sweet they can put three pieces in it and still be aspect of the road feel make new. While dialling formerly the turmoil of San Andreas upset about, for me it was a hail run, the included "realism" of 2008's Liberty City constructing a personal capital that times with breathes like no different to all of video games.

3. Grand Theft Auto III

The most revolutionary record in the collection, since the idea this gave the permit into the 3D world, I don't think GTAIII gets enough credit for the intensity regarding its place. While the legend with personalities remain so hot, Rockstar clearly finding their base here which regard, GTAIII's road is I think the best from the total series, since this small adequate, then every neighborhood is unique enough, that it doesn't work long to learn the whole thing away with heart, something that's practically impossible in later games.

4. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Why isn't that higher? I supposed San Andreas overreached. The RPG material they added to the game wasn't enriching, it was annoying. The size of the chart wasn't a good thing, this entirely wanted here were a lot of room you'd get stuck without a auto. Next I don't think the whole early-90s machine was executed as well as Rockstar's action in the mid-80s in Vice City.

But... good Lord, that a big entertainment. Plus a mad one. Rockstar given that earlier with GTAIV's Gay Tony (the benefit of parachutes, etc) because, while world-building can be important, sometimes you just want to escape a plane fighter in then parachute against the top of the car or hit it in place with the RPG.

5. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

It's not as quite as bigger games, or perhaps even as engaging, but it certainly is gaining, both for the focus on Chinese-American gangsters (something not really include in previous games) and its novel control systems, which got a unique GTA happening to program like the DS and mobile phone which previously (and yet should) endure poorly-implemented ports.

6. GTA London 1969

Why is this the best-ranked "original" GTA game? Because it remains the only GTA game set outside the United States, which in default also is that one of the most interesting.

7. GTA 2

I became certainly not the biggest supporter of the original 2D games, because viewpoint deny them in the sensation of situation and scale of which stay so crucial to the 3D games, but GTA 2 at least introduced several important elements found in later games, such as ability to but the ready with to perform different objective for another teams.

8. Grand Theft Auto

Not a bad activity before any means—it spawned that collection, with all!—it's really became small to recommend that over any of the games listed above unless you're entering a article about the heritage of the contract.