#one of the things that fascinates me about this sport is its administration

[darthmelyanna]

And the WTC finally published the Help Desk document for the current code, 30 days before Worlds. Well done, very timely, ladies.

[lorem-text]

Fantastic Cryptids and Where to Find Them

 Maria and John called earlier today, waking me up an hour before my alarm was set to go off, to let me know that today is officially Self-Indulgence Friday. And at Night Owl, what that means is today we each make a post -be it a recording, a video, or, in my case, an article- related to something we like.

If you go to Maria’s blog, you’ll see a beautifully edited montage of her hiking to the locations for her photoshoots. Likewise, John has uploaded a recording of himself reading Hard in Hightown in his best Varric impression, which is honestly on point.

For my part, I decided to indulge in one of my oldest and most persistent interests: Cryptids.

Now, I know that most cryptids are no more than embellished myth spread by word of mouth and the chances of ‘known’ cryptids existing are infinitesimal, but I’ve always been fascinated by the stories people come up with for them and the environments that inspired them.

So, based on years of recreational research and an evening spent meticulously rating every cryptid I could find based on story, context, appearance, realism, and a number of other factors, I give you my top favourite cryptids, in no particular order.

The Bloop

The Bloop is a powerful, ultra-low-frequency underwater sound of uncertain origin detected by the NOAA (National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration) in 1997 in the South Pacific. Earlier speculations attribute the sound to a very large, still undiscovered, marine mammal. It was later noted, however, that not all animals make sounds proportionate to their size, like the pistol shrimp which is only a few centimeters long but can make sounds as loud as a jet engine.

Regardless of its actual appearance, that creature has been named ‘Bloop’ after the sound.

I said before that the chances of any of these cryptids existing are infinitesimal, but the Bloop is an interesting case, because its existence has not been disqualified by the scientific community.

Since the sound was first detected, many have tried to make sense of it and various theories have risen in the scientific community.

In 2012, the NOAA determined that the sound is “consistent” with noises generated via non-tectonic cryoseisms originating from glacial movements such as ice calving, or an icequake; seabed gouging by ice. However, confirmation of this theory was not possible.

Another suggested scenario, first suggested in 2014, is that the sound was caused by an erupting underwater volcano, but many have argued that a volcano is unlikely to have produced such an odd frequency.

Still, regardless of whether the Bloop is a living creature or ice breaking off of the Antarctic ice shelf, it’s spurred the imagination of many people and will likely continue to do so for many years to come.

Camazotz

With its first modern sighting in 2004 and the latest in 2009 in Mexico, the Camazotz is another curious case as there’s evidence supporting its existence all the way up to the Mayan era, where the firth myths of it originate.

Let me explain.

The “snatch bat” or “death bat” of Mayan legend. It was supposedly a giant bat which attacked human beings and other large animals, drinking the blood. it was also known as the “sudden bloodletter”. Fossils of Desmodus draculae, the giant vampire bat, support these legends. There have also been skeletons of Desmodus draculae found which were sub-fossil, of very recent age. These suggest that the bat was still common when the Mayans were around, and some believe a few specimens may still exist today, explaining the sightings.

But that’s just a theory; a cryptid theory.

Mothman

No cryptid list is complete without the iconic Mothman, who swooped in near West Virginia one cold autumn night in 1966.

On November 12, 1966, near Clendenin West Virginia, five men were in a cemetery preparing a grave for a burial when they saw something they couldn’t explain. Lifting off from the nearby trees was a brown winged creature, cloaked in shadows. When questioned about their experience, the men held to the fact that what lifted off beyond the trees was no bird it was humanoid.

The state of West Virginia has had its fair share of strange and inexplicable events throughout the years, such as the visitation of the Flatwoods Monster and the mysterious case of Indrid Cold, but none have marked it quite as much as the Mothman.

The Jersey Devil

Another classic, the Jersey Devil has been a hit in cryptid circles for actual centuries.

With its first reported sightings all the way back in the 1700s and continuing on until the past decade, the Jersey Devil is deeply rooted in folklore and legend in the area of Pine Barrens in New Jersey, and is still found in various media, from sports teams to video games.

What makes the Jersey Devil interesting is the variation in its sightings; by putting the Jersey Devil on this list I could essentially use it as an umbrella term for a variety of cryptids.

But, let me explain what I mean by that.

Originally, the Jersey Devil was originally described as having hooves, a snake’s tail, bat wings, and a head vaguely resembling a horse. Essentially, it was a chimera. However, the Jersey Devil of modern sightings is a bunch of different things. The name has been applied to cryptids that somewhat resemble the original Jersey Devil, but throughout the years it has also been applied to nearly every New Jersey cryptid imaginable, from hairy humanoids that resemble Bigfoot, to mystery birds, and even Eastern cougars. One popular modern interpretation of the Jersey Devil often seen in movies and video games, such as The Wolf Among Us, describes the creature as a hairy humanoid with black dur, a deer’s head, and glowing red eyes.

Unfortunately for anyone hoping to discover the truth behind the illustrious cryptid, a number of well-publicized -but not very convincing- hoaxes have managed to complicate the matter even more, scaring researchers away from the topic.

Loch Ness Monster, aka Nessie

Okay, I know I said this list had no particular order, but I couldn’t resist leaving my favourite for last.

The Loch Ness monster, also known by the nickname Nessie, is probably the creature that most often leaps to mind when people think about cryptids or cryptozoology. Nessie is virtually a symbol of cryptozoology. This creature has probably been the object of more sustained media attention than any other individual type of cryptid, with the possible exception of the Sasquatch and some less traditional cryptids such as the infamous Grey Aliens.

First sighted somewhere around 565 AD (yes, you read that right) with the first serious wave of modern sightings coming in the 1930s, Nessie has been a part of Scotland’s folklore for as long as the mythical water dragons and kelpies said to reside in Loch Ness.

Although older legends were much more variable in regards to Nessie’s appearance, modern accounts describe a creature with sleek, rubbery black-ish gray skin, approximately twenty feet long and a serpentine body with humps along its length, and one or more sets of paddles. Nessie’s head is typically described as either roughly horse-shaped or smaller and rounded like a turtles, with some witnesses reporting small horns or a crest and a straggly mane running down the creature’s neck.

Now, onto the theories!

Starting with the most bizarre, some more untraditional theories suggest Nessie comes from some type of space-time anomaly, causing a plesiosaur, bassilosaurus, or some even say sauropod to be transported to the modern day. Taking second place in the ‘bizarre theory’ list, some self-proclaimed cryptozoologists suggest genetic experiments and mutations.

However, any theories suggesting that Nessie is -or is related to- a plesiosaur or some other type of dinosaur were officially discredited last year, in September 2019, when a group of scientists tried to catalogue all living species in the loch by extracting DN from water samples.

Following analysis, the scientists have ruled out the presence of large fish, such as a sturgeon, or prehistoric reptiles. Suggestions that catfish or a wandering Greenland shark may be behind the sightings were also discounted.

They did however discover another type of DNA in the loch that may solve the mystery behind Nessie; eel DNA. Eels are very plentiful in Loch Ness, with eel DNA found in pretty much in every location sampled. According to Prof Neil Gemmell, a geneticist from the University of Otago who was involved in the study, the sheer quantity of the material suggests that what people see and believe to be the Loch Ness Monster might actually be a giant eel.

Even so, the most prevailing theories at the moment are that any sightings of the Loch Ness Monster are actually surfacing trees, mountainous reflections, the results of seismic activity, or even swimming elephants form travelling circuses which were popular in the 1930s, when most of the Nessie sightings were recorded.

Still, there are countless less popular theories surrounding the sightings to add to the more widespread ones. In the end, we may never truly know what Nessie really is, but it’s certainly fun to speculate.

Eliot Wilde, journalist and writer for Night Owl and host of Night Owl FM

[mylesudland]

Some thoughts on youth sports

Baxter Holmes at ESPN has a fascinating story out about the NBA’s concern over injuries in its young players. For anyone who has spent time training — at any level — the concerns outlined will be ones you’ve heard before: a lack of mobility in explosive athletes and a lack of flexibility in strong athletes create ticking time bombs that go off in the form of broken legs, broken ankles, and warped backs. 

The concerns voiced by executives and doctors at the NBA level are also familiar in the modern world of youth sports — by specializing in one sport at a young age, these athletes are set up for disappointment. They will be disappointed by their health and disappointed by their in-competition performance. In 2019, the issues surrounding the culture of youth sports are not new. The parents, the kids, the coaches, the administrators in every part of the country at every level in every sport have heard this story a thousand times. 

And the “answers” end up sounding a lot like what AAU board member Rod Seaford told ESPN. 

“The NCAA and the NBA loves to lay fault for their ills at the feet of youth sports or AAU,” Seaford told ESPN. “That's a pretty common thing. We've approached the NCAA and NBA with various proposals [only] to get lip service. We don't get much serious conversation. I don't doubt that it's a legitimate concern. But it's really easy to lay all those faults of the youth coach.”

The only answer is that there is no answer. Except that as I see it, the current youth-sports-industrial complex has a pretty straightforward incentive structure that perpetuates and accentuates that unathletic athletes that are filtering into the highest levels of American sports. It’s called the NCAA. 

---

For a brief time, I ran cross country in college. My results are not inspiring. But my path to college athletics began during a heated dinner conversation in the winter of 2006 when I told my parents I was going to give up baseball. It was a decision my father didn’t really understand: why did I need to run all year round? 

The previous fall I’d had a decent cross country season for a sophomore. Especially with the limited training I’d done the previous summer. After a string of races that showed promise, I ended up with a hairline fracture in my leg that resulted from running a race on an already stress-fractured leg. I ended up in a hard cast for a month. For me, the injury did not prompt questions about whether running was a viable long-term pursuit — was there, for instance, something anatomically that would disadvantage me as a long distance runner? — but instead convinced me that a tighter focus on running is what would stave off these injuries in the future. 

In the spring of 2006, the first during which I gave up baseball to pursue distance running as a singular pursuit, I ended up with a lingering shin injury and eventually my season ended with torn ankle ligaments after hitting a rock the wrong way on a run. For the second time in six months, I was in a hard cast. 

The next summer’s training led to a fall with a nagging hip injury. My results did not improve from the prior year. I survived the season, however, without a cast. Then the winter and spring of 2007 proved relatively injury free. And the results were just good enough that the opportunity to run in college was realistic. This, of course, had been the point all along. 

---

In March, the public was made aware of something we all sort of knew was happening, we just didn’t know how. Rich parents were buying their way into college. 

And while the FBI explicitly outlined that putting your name on a building and getting your descendants admission to an elite university as a result is not illegal, paying someone to take the SATs for your kid is. So is sending money to a fixer who sends some money to a college coach who then makes a spot for your kid on a team. Even if they’ve never played the sport. But the system that I think was laid most bare in Operation Varsity Blues is found in the name: it’s about the sports. 

If you watch any college sports, you’ve see a version of this commercial before: “There are over 400,000 NCAA student athletes,” we’re told, “and most of them will be going pro in something other than sports.

And so while the NBA is worried about the load borne by kids playing over 100 games a year between AAU and their school-sponsored team, for those kids the NCAA is the finish line. 

And as the FBI’s investigation into college admissions bribery outlined, one of the surest ways to overachieve your academic limitations is to be a good athlete. 

---

My modest success running long distances encouraged both of my brothers — always superior athletes to me — to pursue running both at a younger age and more seriously than myself. Both of them had considerable success. Both of them attended elite universities they would never have been accepted to based on their academic achievements as a result of this athletic success. The specialization that came to the Udland family ultimately worked out. 

Most weekends in the summer now we play golf together. None of us are particularly great. But the thing with golf is that everyone always thinks that if they could just spend more time practicing... So when we get together, the conversation sometimes leads to “what could have beens” about how things might be if we’d focused on, say, the three sports we all played as young kids (football, basketball, baseball) once we got to high school. Or what kind of golfers we could be if we’d played in high school, and so on. 

It’s the idle talk of former athletes re-living a not-lived version of their glory days. But what these conversations usually ignore is that the specialization we might now dream away was the right decision. It opened to each of us a college experience that would have otherwise been impossible. 

And so when we speak of the ills of youth sports, we must remember that the parents are not motivated because of professional sports, but about college sports. And while playing a sport in college is not realistic for most youth athletes, it is way more realistic than playing a professional sport. And the benefits — namely, an education at a university you might otherwise not be qualified to attend — are worth the risks of having more fun as a kid. Or, at least, that’s how many parents see it. 

---

When I sat down to write this piece, I don’t think I meant to apologize for youth sports culture. And I’m not sure I really did. But re-reading this piece it seems that I have a lot of sympathy for a culture that directs money away from families who don’t have a lot to spare and takes time away from kids who won’t ever get their youth back. 

The youth sports industry is fueled by bitter parents who think things should’ve gone a different way and put that anxiety on a child who is not equipped to know they’re but a pawn in an insecure adult’s do-over. Youth sports should be fun. And for many kids, they are not. 

But the incentives that underwrite the youth sports industry are also not hard to decipher. Athletic achievement for many kids unlocks academic — and in turn, professional — doors that otherwise don’t exist. You can be a national level concert pianist and make your pitch to Harvard on that basis, but if you’re a high school boy that breaks 9:00 for the 2 mile, you’re pretty much in. 

This argument is also the one used by NCAA executives who believe that paying college athletes is not justified. “They get an education,” you hear the amateurism defender saying. “That’s the payment.” And for an Olympic sport athlete, this may well be true. For the members of a major football program where television rights and ticket sales bring in tens of millions of dollars a year, this argument is obfuscating bullshit. 

This argument also leaves out the kids who end up at schools they aren’t really qualified to attend. But the lack of investment in public schools in America is beyond the scope of this post. (The demonization of public schools is one of our nation’s most shameful public policy stances.) 

Holmes’ article simply struck a chord for me because the NBA viewing itself as a relevant stakeholder in the culture of youth sports seems to me like an odd position for the league to take.

The league is defined by a dozen or so stars and their backgrounds are highly varied. LeBron James was The Chosen One at age 16 and has, improbably, exceeded that hype. Kevin Durant went to a major university to play college ball, was a star from the beginning of his freshman season, then entered the league and was one of its best players within three years. Kawhi Leonard and Paul George were overlooked high school players, mid-first round picks, and have grown into themselves. Giannis Antetokounmpo’s journey to the NBA from Greece earned the 60 Minutes treatment. 

All of which is to say that the NBA’s worry about youth sports matters little to the league’s players that actually define for the public what the sport really is about. Which is about stars. 

Certainly, some NBA general managers would like the deeper parts of the league’s pool to be more mobile and less injury prone. The freak leg fracture suffered by Julius Randle — a product of the AAU system and the University of Kentucky’s NBA farm system — was certainly a blow to Randle, his family, and the Los Angeles Lakers. 

But the lesser versions of Julius Randle, the kid from Dayton he played in a summer league tournament back in 2011 that ended up getting a scholarship to Kent State, probably doesn’t regret his choice to overextend himself during high school summers. Because while that kid might’ve had his eye on Ohio State, a scholarship came through. The gamble paid off. 

And when you’re at a desk making calls to sell P&C insurance in suburban Cleveland, you don’t worry about your chronically stiff ankle in the morning. 

Instead you wonder what could’ve been with your buddies, knowing it worked out just fine. 

[drtanstravels]

It’s been a while since I’ve checked in because we’ve had a relatively quiet two months, until now that is. We had been anticipating our first venture back to mainland USA since we left New York three years ago for quite a while, but for slightly different reasons than the usual excitement that comes with a big trip; the bulk of our stay was going to be in the state of Wyoming for another one of Anna’s conferences, this time the Midwest Ocular Angiography Conference being held in the small town of Jackson. We were going to be in a white, working class state that voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump and one where a licence isn’t required to carry a concealed weapon so we figured the two of us together might draw a bit of attention. Then there was the fact that Wyoming is the least populous state in the United States so when we were looking for information about where we’d be staying, among the endless memes such as these, we also found a lot of people, mostly ironically, even calling into question the state’s existence:

Our plan was to fly out on the night of Friday, July 5, taking a 15-hour direct flight to Los Angeles, California, but due to the time difference, landing around the same time we left. We would then stay a night in LA, fly out to Jackson, Wyoming where we would spend the following four nights before spending a similar amount of time traveling around both the Great Teton and Yellowstone National Parks. Let’s get this show on the road!

I think someone wanted to come with us

Friday, July 5, 2019 I had a lot of loose ends to tie up during the day, then Anna returned from work and we began to pack. This was no easy task as the temperature in Wyoming is a little scattered. With the exception of a couple of colder outliers that were in the mid-teens, most days were going to be between 27°C (80.6°F) and 31°C (87.8°F), however, the nights would be quite cool, every evening in single digits, sometimes dropping to 0°C (32°F). This meant we would have to pack for both summer and winter, especially due to the fact that Anna had also planned to spend two nights “glamping” in a tent. Anyway, we went through our boxes of winter clothes, got everything packed, dropped the dog off at Brownie Buddies, and made our way to the airport.

There’s been a recent trend of disasters occurring around the same time we are in, or not long after we leave, a country:

We were in Honolulu, Hawaii (I realise it’s not a county in itself, but part of the US) for an ophthalmology conference from April 29 – May 2, 2018. The Kilauea volcano erupted the day we left, followed by several earthquakes including one at a magnitude of 6.9, as well as multiple lava flows. 700 houses were destroyed.

We then stayed in Tokyo, Japan from May 2 – May 7 on the way back from the Hawaiian conference. Two months later Western Japan suffered its worst natural disaster since the 2011 earthquake and the worst weather-related disaster in 36 years with flooding and landslides killing around 200 people and two million more evacuated after July 5. Another two months after the typhoon, an earthquake with a magnitude of 6.7 occured in Hokkaido, killing at least 39.

We visited Chiang Mai, Thailand for another conference from June 27, 2018, I returned on June 30 and Anna on July 2. In what was only a relatively small story when it broke, 12 teenage soccer players and their coach became trapped in a cave in neighbouring Chiang Rai on June 23, not being rescued until 18 days later, one volunteer rescuer suffocating in the process.

We were in Hangzhou, China from September 12 – 15, 2018, with Anna arriving on the 13th from Hong Kong. The day I landed in Hangzhou, Hong Kong, also technically a “special administrative region of China”, was hit by Typhoon Mangkhut, leaving 400 seeking medical care and 1,500 taking refuge in temporary shelters.

Later in the month we had a holiday in Turkey from September 24 – 29 and they didn’t escape lightly, either. Not only was there a hurricane warning for Turkey on the day we left to return to Singapore, but Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul by his own government just two days later as well.

This year we spent February 1 – 5 in Sri Lanka, a mere two months before a series of bombings in churches and hotels in Colombo killed 257 people.

So, what does all of this have to do with our trip to Wyoming? Well, we had a one-day layover in Los Angeles and a 6.4 magnitude earthquake hit about 240 km (150 miles) north of LA just before we departed from Singapore, that’s all.

We caught our flight, landed, and it is alway amusing people-watching at Los Angeles International Airport, including the middle-aged woman we encountered resembling Lolo Ferrari who wouldn’t be able to sleep on her back for fear of being crushed under the weight of her own ridiculous breast implants. Once through immigration we caught a shuttle from our terminal to our hotel at the airport and an extremely strong female driver who appeared to have just returned from the manicurist picked up our exceptionally heavy suitcases like they were nothing and loaded them onto the shuttle. When we got to the hotel we grabbed our bags and I asked her how she managed to do that and keep a full set. She just gave me a cheeky smile, winked, and drove off. We checked into the hotel before making our way downstairs to a bar where we pulled up a seat for a few drinks, but the staff all seemed a little freaked out, talking about the earthquake. It seemed a little fresh in them all until I looked up at a screen showing CNN and the numbers didn’t quite add up. It turned out that another 7.1 magnitude quake with several aftershocks hit about an hour before we landed at LAX. They weren’t dwelling on the previous day’s occurrence, this stronger quake that everyone was nervous about had only just occurred. The staff just wanted to get out of there and check that their homes were still intact, plus we were pretty tired so we just had a couple of drinks and went back up to our room.

Saturday, July 6, 2019 You never get a great sleep when you make a flight as long as the one we had, constantly waking up during the night, struggling to get back to sleep, then waking up early again. This left us a fair bit of time to kill in LA before we had to fly out later that night so we decided to catch a cab to a nearby shopping mall, but first we grabbed some breakfast in the hotel cafe. One thing we were aware of, but to the degree of which we had completely forgotten, was the portion sizes in the US. Case in point, we got a breakfast burrito each and probably wouldn’t need anything else until dinner! Time to walk this one off in Westfield Culver City.

Add “NBA record most missed shots in NBA history” to that list

This mall had a ton of sporting goods stores selling NBA jerseys, caps, and other stuff, predominately Lakers gear. I’ve mentioned before that I loathe, hate, and despise the Lakers, think Kobe Bryant (left) is the most overrated player to ever lace them up, and believe that LeBron James’ spoilt, overprivileged attitude is ruining the league. This offseason the Lakers traded for Anthony Davis of the New Orleans Pelicans, a deal that could ruin the franchise for years to come if it doesn’t work out and left them wanting to sign another star player Their eyes were set firmly on free agent Kawhi Leonard, whom had just led the Toronto Raptors to the NBA championship. Instead, Leonard announced that very morning that he intended to sign with the Lakers’ crosstown rival L.A. Clippers, a team that also managed to trade for Oklahoma City Thunder star Paul George, and Lakers fans were PISSED! There was a guy who ran one of the stores, an overweight dude in a Kobe Bryant throwback jersey and all other Lakers attire who was close to tears. “If only we still had Kobe, man,” he said longingly of a player that retired three years ago. “He’d be 41, but we’d still have a chance, with Kobe you always had a chance.” He’s talking about a guy who couldn’t stay healthy toward the end of his career, playing a grand total of  107 of a possible 244 games over his final three seasons, the Lakers’ three worst regular seasons in franchise history for that matter, all while pulling in a cool US$78,953,000 in salary over that time. Yeah, he’d get it done today.

We spent the bulk of the afternoon wandering around Westfield, finding quirky objects such as Twix chocolate bar packets that claimed to contain four of only the left-side bars. We are attending Anna’s cousin’s wedding in Vancouver, Canada in September so I managed to pick up a three-piece Calvin Klein suit plus a shirt from JC Penney for a grand total of only US$355.88 (AU$506.49) plus tax, well under half-price and it actually fits. This isn’t boasting, but the price will make a bit of sense when I use it as a comparison later in this post. Anyway, take a look at some photos from our less than one day in Los Angeles:

The TV while we were in the bar on Friday night

Breakfast is served

These things were enormous

For those who believe the right Twix bar is unlucky and need twice as many in total

And vice versa

Anna had a weird craving for In-N-Out Burger, but we didn’t have time and before long we were back in the airport, ready to take a short flight from LA to Jackson, Wyoming. There is only one flight per day to Jackson and I was beginning to think there may be some truth to the conspiracy that Wyoming may not even exist when we boarded the plane and there were a grand total of 12 passengers onboard. Anyway, a bit of background information on our alleged destination:

Jackson is a small city in the Jackson Hole valley of Teton County, Wyoming, United States. The population was 9,577 at the 2010 census, up from 8,647 in 2000. It is the county seat of Teton County and is its largest town.

The town gained significant fame when a livestream of the town square went viral on YouTube in 2016, leading to much fascination with the town’s elk antler arch, its law enforcement, and its prevalence of red trucks.

As of the census of 2010, there were 9,577 people, 3,964 households, and 1,858 families residing in the town. The racial makeup of the town was 79.8% White, 0.4% African American, 0.8% Native American, 1.4% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 15.2% from other races, and 2.3% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 27.2% of the population.

Upon finding out those demographics, I immediately set myself the goal of getting a photo with one of those nine or 10 Pacific Islanders if Wyoming did indeed exist, especially if they drive a red truck. Failing that, a guy in a MAGA hat shouldn’t be too much of a stretch. I can honestly vouch for the existence of Wyoming as we landed in the Jackson Hole airport. No memories planted by the government, just real visions of a tiny airport decorated with discarded elk antlers. Anna had hired a car, but we wouldn’t be picking that up until the following day. Instead, we had a driver collecting us to take us to our motel about 10 minutes outside of town. When we arrived at the Flat Creek Inn at 8:30pm, sitting directly opposite the National Elk Refuge, the place had an appearance resembling kind of a much larger version of the motel where Earl and Randy lived in My Name Is Earl. In fact, if the motel were located in any major city in the US, it seemed almost inevitable that at least one hooker or backpacker would have been murdered there and stuffed into a wall cavity. Realistically though, it was a nice enough place and pretty much suited our needs. Our flight, the airport, and our home for the night:

Our packed flight

Flying over “Wyoming”

Anna out the front of the airport in Jackson Hole, Wyoming

Outside our room

The store where we’d be buying dinner

In our room

A little dingy, but it’ll be fine for the night

Anna sitting on the bed

Me trying to give the room a sexier vibe

After we had checked into our room it was time to try to find something to eat and that is where any semblance of normalcy ceased. This was truly an area where you couldn’t achieve anything without a car and, despite being only a 10-minute ride, a taxi into Jackson was US$40.00 (AU$57.00) each way so we were limited to the convenience store that was linked to our hotel, one that closed at midnight. Now, one thing that needs to be made clear here for anyone who hasn’t suffered from jet-lag before is that it is simply agony, especially when it is the result of an excruciatingly long flight from South-East Asia to North America. Traveling to the west coast of the US isn’t quite as bad as the east, but it’s still awful — You are unable to keep your eyes open at 4:00pm, it’s almost as if you suffer from narcolepsy and you have no problem falling asleep once you go to bed if you make it to what would be the time you would normally sleep back home, but then you find yourself wide awake a couple of hours later at 3:00am, unable to switch back off. The one upside of that late-afternoon and onward period where it’s tough to stay awake is that you are also a little delirious and anything can become absolutely hilarious. That is the position in which we found ourselves at this point. Anyway, we went down to the convenience store, but there wasn’t a lot of food options and no alcohol, however, there was a microwave and an electric coffee maker in our room so we bought two packets of instant noodles, a large frozen pizza, some jerky, and a small turkey pot pie, as well as some Tabasco sauce and two bottles of sparkling water. Dinner would soon be served. We took our instant foodstuffs back to the motel, I went to the bathroom while Anna heated some water in the coffee maker for our noodles and upon return was informed of some unpleasant news — Our room was devoid of all cutlery and crockery. Never mind, she came up with the brilliant idea of using two coffee stirrers for chopsticks. This method worked perfectly between her Kermit the Frog-like fingers, but wasn’t conducive to particularly successful eating in my massive mitts, although I eventually managed in the end, much to Anna’s amusement. But this was nothing, things were only getting started. It was time to prepare our second course, a large, frozen, pepperoni pizza. This one we did have the equipment for, or so we thought. Our pizza was vacuum-sealed so I had to tear the inner package open with my teeth. Once done I also discovered it was a little large for the microwave, but on the other hand the microwave had a button specifically for pizza. Our pizza spun and spun, smearing cheese and tomato paste all over the inside of the oven and then it occured to me; This was America and that button was for reheating cold pizza, not cooking a frozen one. This was not some dual convection oven, this was a basic microwave and if you’ve ever tried to cook an unbaked bread product in a microwave before, you’ll be more than aware that it essentially just steams it. Our microwave was getting cheesier and pastier as time went on so we had no choice but to remove the pizza and cut it in half, sans knife. Anna’s inner-MacGuyver kicked in and she thought cutting through our steamed pizza with the cardboard base upon which it had come would be the best approach. The only problem was that there were no plates to put the two halves on so Anna gnawed half of her portion of the floppy, steamed pizza from the cardboard, laughing to the point of crying at how ridiculous the situation was, while at the same time lamenting that her half wasn’t cooked properly and quitting halfway through. I started to eat my share of the pizza from the glass base of the microwave, but agreed that it needed further steaming. Nothing an extra minute of heating couldn’t fix, I even got the crust to rise a little. We gave up on the idea of even attempting to eat the pie so I cleaned the cheese and tomato paste from the inside of the microwave using makeup-removing wipes, followed by washing the microwave base in the bathroom sink, leaving an oily, red ring around the basin. What better way is there to follow a hilariously bad meal than with a hilariously bad film? RoboCop was on TV so it seemed that our night had just planned itself. Some of the offerings on hand that evening:

On the menu tonight

Easy for the daintier among us

Not so much for the larger of the species

We tried to make it fit

Pure ingenuity

Going…

Going…

Gone.

Nothing some medicated wipes couldn’t fix

My half turned out okay for a steamed pizza

Sunday, July 7, 2019 It was tough staying asleep again that night and we were awake early so we did a check of the room to make sure there were no lasting repercussions of the steamed pizza episode, checked out of the motel, and waited for our ride to take us into town to pick up our rental car, snapping a few pictures in the process. Anna had done a little research and found a cafe and bakery called Persephone so we drove down once we had our Toyota Carola and pulled up an outdoor seat for brunch. The cafe was run by hipsters so it would probably be one of the only places around to get a half-decent cup of coffee, plus we had learnt our lesson the previous day so we only ordered an appetiser each, instead of bloating ourselves on a enormous main meal when we don’t usually even eat breakfast.

Before long our brunch was finished, but it was too early to check into our new hotel so we decided to have a look around the shops. We had never been to this part of the US so I was expecting it to be a bit like Fargo, either the film or the series, but I was pleasantly surprised, however, one thing needs to be said — There is a ton of taxidermy around these parts! Go into almost any store and there is going to be anything from stuffed jackalope creations on a small table, to stuffed and mounted elk and bison heads on the wall, to full bearskin rugs with the head still attached. Add to that the wide variety of redneck t-shirts and and cowboy gear on offer, fossilised animals, and bear shit-shaped chocolates and we had an interesting afternoon ahead of us. Anna likes to find a ring for every place she visits and although there were mainly ones with ugly turquoise stones, she managed to find a unique, black gold ring in a jewellery store that has an ancient elk tooth that is actually a remnant of a tusk from when elk hadn’t fully evolved into the animal we have today. I picked up a Wyoming t-shirt with different regional animal turds on the back. Once done, before checking into our hotel, we went to a supermarket because we wanted to see what you would find in a small town US supermarket in a sparsely-populated state and we weren’t left disappointed; there was an entire bar of different flavoured fried chicken wings, you could get 80 fl.oz (2.36lt) jars of pickles, but I guess that’s because there isn’t a lot else to do in this town, especially in winter, but eat. We just bought a foam cooler for later in the trip, as well as some other supplies, but we were delayed on the way back to the car when a gust of wind came up and blew the lid off the cooler, hitting an older Mexican man in the head in the parking lot. He felt guilty for some reason and chased after it, returning the lid to us.

We then went back and checked into our home for the next three nights, the Four Seasons Resorts and Residence Jackson Hole. It was a really nice place, our room was massive, and there was food and drinks for Anna’s conference in one of the downstairs conference rooms, as well as outside by some fire pits, so we just spent the night snacking and drinking with old colleagues and some new friends. I didn’t get any pictures from the evening, but here’s the motel from the previous night, the vibe of some of the stores, and our new room:

Our motel from the previous night

The Elk Refuge across the road from the motel, sans elk

On the way into town

Hanging out with what was once a bison

This stuff was everywhere!

Anna was worried she wouldn’t see any bears on this trip so she wanted this taken

As soon as I saw this book my post had a title

One of the finer volumes ever published on the topic of wild faeces recognition

Seriously, almost all shops are like this inside

You could just settle for a fur

The perfect gift for your coprophiliac friends

Anna was a fan of this Dolly Parton picture

Fossils for sale

Some of the redneck attire available

Part of the wing bar inside the supermarket

More wings

I should’ve put something else with these pickles for perspective

Looking into a small portion of our bathroom at the Four Seasons

Part of the room

The view from the bed

Monday, July 8, 2019 Anna’s conference began early each morning and finished around 1:00pm, which wasn’t an issue for either of us because of the jet-lag and even if we did manage to nod off again after waking up in the wee hours, we’d be wide awake again about 7:00am, just in time for the conference. Anna would go about her business in the morning and we had a Nespresso machine in our room so I would drink coffee and watch the NBA Summer League until she returned, but today didn’t look like it was officially the third week of summer, it was one of those outliers I mentioned at the beginning of this post; cold outside, about 13°C (55.4°F), and pouring rain. When Anna returned the rain had stopped, but it was still cold. We went and had lunch in neighbouring Teton Village and then took the arial tram up the mountain into the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort:

The Jackson Hole Mountain Resort (JHMR) is a ski resort in the western United States, at Teton Village, Wyoming. In the Teton Range of the Rocky Mountains, it is located in Teton County, 12 miles (20 km) northwest of Jackson and due south of Grand Teton National Park. It is named after the historically significant Jackson Hole valley and is known for its steep terrain and a large continuous vertical drop of 4,139 ft (1,262 m).

Jackson Hole’s original aerial tram was closed to the public in the fall of 2006 and replaced with a new tram that opened in 2008. The tram’s vertical rise is 4,139 feet (1,262 m) to an elevation of 10,450 feet (3,185 m) above sea level.

That explains a whole lot, because the previous day we had both felt a bit out of breath at times, but we didn’t realise that we were at that elevation. Denver, Colorado is known as the “Mile High City” due to its elevation and I experienced a little bit of breathlessness when I was there, but nothing like this. However, it turns out that at 5280 feet (1609.3 meters) above sea level, Denver is barely half the elevation of the Mountain Resort and only about three quarters the average elevation of the entire Jackson Hole valley, something we definitely weren’t prepared for.

Once we were at the summit it became abundantly clear that I was glad we had come in summer. People were saying that it had been snowing as recently as a week prior and before we arrived the previous day there had been a storm of enormous hailstones out of a clear sky! There was still a bit of snow on the ground and a fair bit on the peaks so we went inside the cabin there to have a cup of awful coffee and then started to explore around the area. People around here are completely oblivious to the cold, as was proven to us time and time again on this journey, the first evidence of this was locals walking around near the snow in shorts and t-shirts! We were only out a short while when an announcement came over stating that everybody needed to get back on the tram or be stranded in the cabin for an unknown period of time, because there was a thunderstorm coming and if lightning struck the metal platform for the tram, everyone standing on it would be fried. Instead of packing onto the tram, we sat in the cabin, drank more shitty coffee, walked around and got a bit wet outside, and waited for the next opportunity to leave, embracing the lack of children in the cabin and the space in the tram, all the while the operator played classic rock on our descent and we spotted foxes and marmots on the mountain. Our day up until that point:

A little grim outside our hotel window that morning

A challange in the restaurant in our hotel. That’s almost a 1kg burger and a litre of beer

Heading into Teton Village

“Hey, let’s go up there!”

Beginning our ascent

A panoramic view of the summit

Anna was complaining that the wind was making her teeth hurt

These people are fearless

Coming over a bit bleak

Making the most of everyone else fleeing

It’s nicer up here alone

A fox running around

Now beginning our descent

Another fox in the snow

About halfway down

Most shops and restaurants in and around Jackson close at 10:00pm so we decided to take the opportunity to drive into town and get our outfits for the Western-themed dinner the following night. It was also essential that we remembered to refer to the clothing as our “outfits” and not “costumes,” because this is how a large portion of the local population actually dress every day, including some of those in attendance.

We found several stores selling what we needed and it soon became abundantly clear why cowboys used to rob banks and shoot people back in the day — It was so they could steal money to buy their clothes! The reason I mentioned the Calvin Klein suit that I had purchased in Los Angeles a couple of days earlier for US$355.00 was for a comparison. For my “outfit” for the dinner I figured I’d get a Western shirt, some boots maybe with a fringe running up the side, a hat, possibly some chaps, but those dreams were all shattered when I saw the prices. A shirt was at least US$100.00, most pushing US$200.00. It was impossible to get a pair of boots my sizes for much less than US$500.00. I even found the sweater The Dude wears in the film The Big Lobowski, marketed as such and it was US$239.00! For a zip-up woollen sweater! Fortunately, I was able to snag a shirt for US$59.00 on a post-fourth of July sale rack and when you see it you’ll realise why, plus a cheap hat for another US$39.00 (all plus tax, of course).

We looked around a few of the areas of town that we didn’t explore the previous day and soon it was time for dinner. We’re not used to this cooler weather, plus we both love cheese, so what better option could there possibly be than fondue? We found a place called Alpenhof Lodge that had fondue back in Teton village near our hotel, then settled into a bar claiming to be “World famous” called the Mangy Moose Steakhouse and Saloon for a few beers and some live country music, or “Farm Emo” as I like to call it, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last time we’d be listening to it on this journey. A pattern we would discover while in this part of the country was that bars close at 11:00pm no matter what day it is, but we still managed to have a good time that night before walking back to our place to try to get some much needed sleep. How the rest of the day looked:

In another arch made from discarded elk antlers. There are a few of these around

I see what they did there….

The main street of Jackson

I love ‘The Big Lobowski’, but I’m not paying that much

$567.00 is the sale price for a very small pair of boots

That’s the original!

All the cars here are enormous!

Someone’s excited for fondue

There was a ‘Galaga’ machine where we had dinner, too

Settling into the Mangy Moose

Our entertainment for the night

They inexplicably have an original 1950s Las Vegas showgirl costume framed on the wall near the toilets there…

…as well as what looks like the evolution of bear traps

Tuesday, July 9, 2019 It was our last full day in Jackson prior to moving on to the holiday leg of our stay and the weather was nice so we had to make the most of it before I made a complete fool of myself in front of a bunch of strangers that night. I did my usual routine — a coffee and NBA Summer League — before Anna returned home, we had a bite for lunch, and then she confirmed what she had been considering the previous day as a way to fill in today; we were going to go whitewater rafting on Snake River:

The Snake River is a major river of the greater Pacific Northwest region in the United States. At 1,078 miles (1,735 km) long, it is the largest tributary of the Columbia River, in turn the largest North American river that empties into the Pacific Ocean.

Formed by the confluence of three tiny streams on the southwest flank of Two Oceans Plateau in Yellowstone National Park, western Wyoming, the Snake starts out flowing west and south into Jackson Lake. Its first 50 miles (80 km) run through Jackson Hole, a wide valley between the Teton Range and the Gros Ventre Range. Below the tourist town of Jackson, the river turns west and flows through Snake River Canyon, cutting through the Snake River Range and into eastern Idaho.

When Anna gets her mind set on something her intent is always to do it properly, however, I didn’t have to worry about her inadvertently signing up to do the full length of the river, just a stretch of about eight miles (12.8km) through Snake River Canyon, an area known to have some of the best whitewater rafting in the US. There were several options regarding the size of rafts and the amounts of people thereon, but we wanted to keep it intimate so we opted for one with room for eight people plus our guide. Our journey down the river was going to consist of Anna and myself, as well as Adrian, one of Anna’s colleagues that works in Sydney, Australia, and Nicole, an ophthalmologist we had met at the conference that we got on well with from Chicago. The other four spots would be taken up by some randoms that wanted to join us, which ended up being a family of four from Oregon. We took a shuttle bus for about an hour to the point in the river where our journey would begin. For a few dollars extra you could rent a wetsuit, but it was a nice, warm day so everyone besides Adrian and Nicole decided they didn’t need one, a decision we would all regret in hindsight. We all put on some sunscreen, the combination with Adrian’s black wetsuit making him look a pale shade of blue, as if he had a vitamin-D deficiency or maybe it was just his first ever time in actual sunlight, but he would have the last laugh. Once we had donned our lifejackets we pushed the raft out into a calm part of the river, boarded, and Hunter, our guide who was also clearly a massive stoner that had his own radio show with his friend, gave us our instructions as we floated downstream, informing us on how to react to each command, what to do if we have an “out of boat experience,” that type of thing. You could tell from a million miles away that this dude spent the nine months of the year that weren’t summer completely baked in neighbouring Colorado, just punching decriminalised cones and snowboarding. One thing that he said, however, had me a little worried; he told me I was going to freeze in my cotton t-shirt. Should’ve opted for the wetsuit. After receiving our advice and instructions we started to hit some small rapids, but it was when the first wave sprayed over our boat that we truly realised that this river was formed from glacial runoff and was absolutely freezing. The four of us were seated in the back two rows of the boat, the family in the front two with the father and the teenaged son having volunteered to be at the very front of the boat. Every time we hit a rough patch that sent water over us the teenaged kid seemed to cop it the worst and from the very first time you could just see him perpetually shivering and his teeth audibly chattering the entire ride. It was a really great time, the scenery was stunning, and it was hilarious when we would see a capsized boat or people doing something stupid and a possibly still-stoned Hunter would make chicken noises and yell either “Utah” or “Florida” at them, the latter an obvious reference to the less than stunning track record people from that state have in the common sense department. Not all of the people in the water were in there accidentally, though. Some of them were swimming! I mentioned earlier about how these people are impervious to cold and some thought a dip in the frigid waters was rather refreshing, one group even turning their inflatable boat upside-down and used it as a slip-n-slide. Me? I was soaked in my t-shirt, probably shouldn’t have worn socks either, my hands and feet were wrinkled and completely devoid of any colour whatsoever. In my own defence, it wasn’t the kind of boat I was expecting and I didn’t think I would get quite so wet, but we had an absolute blast and I’m just thankful I didn’t have an “out of boat experience.” Here’s a few shots from inside the boat, some of our group, and a couple more of our beautiful surroundings:

Heading down to the water behind the family that would be joining us

Yup, we’ll be on a small one of those

All aboard!

And we’re off

Going to have to put the camera away and paddle soon

Adrian, Anna, Hunter, Nicole, and my saturated self

The upside-down boat is the slip-n-slide

It doesn’t look that rough, but it certainly was

Another area of the river

Looking back on from where we had come

We got back in the shuttle bus and made the one hour trip back to the hotel, trying to get the feeling back in our lower extremities the entire way, as the moment we had spent a large portion of the previous day shopping for was almost upon us; when we arrived back at the hotel it would be time for us to start getting ready for the Western-themed dinner. I was a little nervous about the dinner for the sole reason that when I purchased my cowboy shirt, it was one of those seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time moments. You see, as I mentioned, the shirt was on a discount rack for fourth of July stock that the store now needed to get rid of, but this wasn’t just any old shirt — It was an extremely ugly shirt with a design based on the good ol’ stars ‘n’ bars. Yes, my shirt was a particularly patriotic-looking one that resembled the American flag and I was worried the irony would be lost on some at the event. Admittedly, it really was the cheapest shirt I could find, but my concern was that some people wouldn’t find it anywhere near as funny as we initially did. At least there would be others that would look just as stupid as I would, as Adrian had just ordered a generic cowboy costume online and this was his first time even trying it on, although we had to remind him to refrain from calling it a “costume,” because it closely resembled the wardrobes of some in attendance.

When we arrived there was a live country band churning out some more Farm Emo so Anna started to do the rounds, chatting to colleagues, friends, and acquaintances and I hit the bar, which had some really good local microbrews available. Soon it was time to sit down for dinner, but not long after we were seated some of the organisers wanted to get everybody up again to do line-dancing and they were relentless! They just wouldn’t take a “no” for an answer, but fortunately they also weren’t going to get a “yes” out of myself. It was a good thing too, because the end result wasn’t pretty:

As you can clearly see some people got a little more into the line dancing than others, possibly even enjoying themselves, as is also evident here:

The food started to come out and the line-dancing devolved into just regular dancing to country music for those that refused to give up the dance floor. Dinner was good, but there weren’t a whole lot of options and there was one woman on our table who had allergies to seafood and nuts, as well as being lactose intolerant, ruling out the bulk of what was served to her. The night continued on, but one thing that occurs when drinking at high altitudes is it takes you nowhere near as much to get drunk so the crowd started to peter out a little as people began to realise they were getting sleepy and went back to their rooms. As for Anna, Nicole, and myself, we decided to hit up the Mangy Moose again, joined by a cool pharmaceutical representative from Chicago we had met, Tony. We hung around in the Mangy Moose until they were going to close, the girls getting served special, albeit exceptionally strong, house Slurpee cocktails. When the Moose closed, we headed back to our rooms, myself content in the knowledge that I would never need to wear that shirt ever again. Or so I thought; one of our plans for this trip was to attend a rodeo and Anna was insistent that I wear it, fully aware that it could possibly get me killed. Anyway, here’s how the dinner and drinks looked:

This is what I’d be rocking

More Farm Emo

On the menu tonight

Some really got into the line-dancing

The table centrepiece

It was a fun night, but I couldn’t dress like this all the time

Back at the Mangy Moose

The next day we had lunch with Tony and then drove out to Grand Teton National Park to begin the holiday leg of our journey.

Stay tuned for the conclusion to this story to see us exploring the US Pacific Northwest and “glamping” in Grand Teton National Park, as well as staying in the world famous Yellowstone National Park, encountering more than our share of geysers and wildlife along the way. If that doesn’t interest you, at least check to see if I have my Borat moment at a rodeo:

via GIPHY

Hanging out in Wyoming, an American state that some don't even believe exists It's been a while since I've checked in because we've had a relatively quiet two months, until now that is.

[bountyofbeads]

https://trump-russia.com/2019/08/18/the-ceo-of-overstock-has-more-to-say-about-maria-butina-the-fbi-and-don-jr/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock $OSTK, has More to Say about Maria Butina, the FBI ... and Don Jr and it's a FASCINATING READ 📖. Somehow I missed this story, by Seth Hettena, with everything else going on in Trump-Insane-World this week, but this is worth the 📖 time.

The CEO of Overstock Has More to Say about Maria Butina, the FBI … and Don Jr

By Seth Hettena | Published August 18, 2019 | Trump-Russia.com | Posted August 22, 2019 6:59 PM ET |

Editor’s note: After I published my Q&A with Overstock CEO Patrick Byrneabout his relationship with Maria Butina and the FBI, I sent him a link. He responded with additional comments to expand upon and clarify some of the things he said, so I am reposting the entire Q&A with Byrne’s additional comments indicated in bold.

Not long ago, I had an email exchange with Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com, about his relationship with Maria Butina, the Russian gun-rights activist who was sentenced to prison after she tried to set up an back-channel between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

Byrne told me three high-ranking officials (whom he calls “X,Y, and Z”) in the Obama administration directed him to “resume a romantic relationship” with Butina. He says the Russia investigation started when he contacted the FBI (which he refers to as the “Men in Black”) about Butina in July 2015. Byrne says he has a “non-standard relationship” with the FBI.

I have concerns about Byrne’s credibility, as I noted in a previous post, and I’ve tried, with limited success, to verify his claims. What I’ve been able to confirm is that Byrne and Butina did meet in July 2015, they had a brief romance and they kept in touch until Butina’s arrest three years later.

I spoke to Butina’s attorney, Robert Driscoll, on Sunday, by phone from Tallahassee, Florida, where he was visiting his client in prison. Driscoll has long suspected Byrne was a government informant, but it wasn’t a major focus of his efforts. In a letter last month to the Justice Department, Driscoll noted the government had “flatly denied” his speculation that Byrne was a government informant. He now says believes that Byrne was passing information about his client to the government.

The Justice Department declined my request for comment, although, interestingly, my email was routed to Peter Carr, former spokesman for Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office. Carr is now with the Office of Professional Responsibility, which will be handling any investigation into Byrne’s claims.

So there things stood until this week, when Byrne’s story took on a life of its own. Overstock issued a press releasein which Byrne announced, “I am the notorious ‘missing Chapter 1’ of the Russian investigation.” (The company’s stock fell more than 30 percent on the news.) On Thursday, The New York Times followed up with a story on Byrne’s claims.

I believe people need to hear what Byrne told me — this guy is the CEO of a publicly-traded company, after all — so here goes:

Q. You met Maria Butina at Freedom Fest in July 2015.

A. Correct.

Q. You began dating shortly thereafter.

A. No. We had an intellectual discussion for 90 minutes. She knew all about me already.

She told me there was a circle in Russia of about 150 liberals, from across the Russian power structure, including the oligarchs. They watched my videos on liberalism. They know about my relationship with Milton Friedman. They discuss things I say and write.

I should make clear that Maria is an unusually impressive young woman. Chosen for a school for which 30 brainiac children from across Russian get selected each year. Graduated No. 2 in her class. Super-conversant on the history of liberalism, from the Greeks to Locke and Jefferson. Knows U.S. history and the Constitution better than about 99 percent of millennials. Also, the Greater Moscow Power Lifting Champion (or something like that).  I have taught at the university level (teaching fellow at Stanford, visiting prof at Dartmouth), known a lot of smart young people, and she is pretty remarkable. She came across as far more adult and capable than a typical 26-year-old should.

She also told me that General Mikhail Kalashnikov had started a gun rights group in Russia [Право на Оружие — Right to Bear Arms]. But the main function of the group was really to be a club for liberals. “Believe it or not, Dr. Byrne, General Kalashnikov was a liberal, too!” Maria told me.

And he had selected he had selected her to lead it.

“Do you know what this means in our culture, Dr. Byrne, that a man like General Kalishnikov would select a 23-year-old female, to lead such a group?” Maria asked me.

She mentioned that there are 50 oligarchs who run Russia, but seven who really run Russia, and that she, Maria, was well known to four of them. She mentioned that she might end up president of Russia someday. Or that at least there were people grooming her for that.

She took care to explain that they were loyal Russian people, “President Putin is our president, no one is talking about anything inappropriate,” she said.

But they wanted to discuss liberalism, and what a post-Putin age might look like in terms of U.S.-Russian relations.

I’m sensing that this may seem odd to you. It’s no so odd for me. Especially since I started being called this kind of stuff. But even before blockchain. But I already sense that you are one of those guys who rolls his eyes a lot, so I’ll stop there.

They had sent her with a message for me to come to Moscow to speak on Bitcoin, then go to the Altai Mountains to a resort that would be shut down for three days so I could meet with 40-45 people from across the Russian power structure — government, oligarchs — to discuss liberalism, John Stuart Mill, Hayek, and global relations, and what a post-Putin age might look like.

We parted after meeting that day in Vegas, her stipulating that we would text to make future arrangements and that she would be texting me under the guise of us having a romantic relationship.

I reported that night to my clearance authority (where I once kept a low level clearance due to some minor advisory work I do in foreign policy).

I gave a description of the situation and wanted to know:

May I introduce her to some senior thinkers in the foreign policy establishment (My hope was to Yenta her in to talking to some senior thinkers in the foreign policy establishment whom I know through the Council on Foreign Relations. I thought she would be interesting for someone to spend an afternoon talking to, and perhaps her dreams of a back channel for peace might ring a bell with someone.)

Is it OK if I travel to Russia on her invitation?

Or should I cut her out of my life as being a security risk?

I learned later that my report “sent up a flare over Washington” that very night. July 2015: That is when the Russian investigation started, not July 2016. That is the big coverup.

I got contacted by Men In Black (I do not like using the acronym “FBI”). They were unclear, but seemed to suggest that I should learn more then they would decide, but were not sure. It went back and forth for two months.

Meanwhile, Maria was writing me, asking me to Moscow, then Montenegro, then Rome, Paris, etc. Watching my YouTube videos on liberalism. Pretending to be fall in love.

Finally, in September, I sent word to the U.S. government that I was not going to meet Maria again (lest I get in some hassle with the U.S. government) unless I was given the word “Greenlight.” They sent: “Greenlight.”

So I went to meet her for the second time in September 2015 at hotel room in New York City with the idea that we would spend a few days talking, getting to know each other, a possible trip to Russia and the purposes thereof. It was a two-bedroom suite. She arrived first. When I arrived, she made clear immediately (as in, less than three seconds) that she had not been pretending and wanted to make it romantic. I was putty in her hands.

Q. You had done some work for the FBI in the past?

A. I helped the Men in Black twice before.

[Note: Byrne forwarded two links to me. One is a Sports Illustrated storythat discusses Byrne’s friendship with ex-NBA player Bison Dele, who disappeared while sailing in the South Pacific in 2002. The other is a link to his talk about naked short selling and corruption on Wall Street,  Deepcapturethemovie.com]

I have also had the honor of playing a tiny, tiny role in three peace events in my life. So again, while Maria’s story may seem odd to you, I know that are times where tiny events lead to something good happening. Like peace. I’ve seen it. I know there are a lot of deep thinkers who argue that Maria had to be a Red Sparrow because they have seen the movie. You make your own call.

Q. What happened next with you and Butina?

A. I saw her sporadically (every 4-6 weeks?) from September 2015 through March 2016. Initially my estimation was:

66% chance this is an opportunity of some kind. Maybe just getting a chance to preach the gospel of Liberalism and freedom in Russia. Maybe some good contacts. Maybe push the peace ball a couple of yards down the field.

33% chance this is a risk

The Men In Black’s lack of responsiveness or concern was odd.

As the September 2015-March 2016 wore on, my estimation changed. Maria was spending less time talking about John Locke and John Stuart Mill, more time talking about the political circles in which she was swanking around.

She let me know [Alexander] Torshin, had told her to focus on Hillary, Rubio, Cruz, and Trump. Whichever of the four won, she was to have a contact in their administration.

[Note: Torshin was the deputy governor of the Central Bank of Russia who prosecutors say was directing Butina’s activities in the United States]

This kind of talk was especially concerning. So the Men in Black’s lack of apparent interest or concern was frustrating to me.

Around February, she asked me to fly to Russia, give a talk in St. Petersburg on Liberalism and Bitcoin, then spend an hour with Putin (who would be in town). The Men in Black studied, came back, said it was too dangerous, don’t go, break up with Maria. So I did. (I was also stage four of two things at once at the time, and they were on the brink of starting to yank out organs, so I was not going to argue.)

The Men in Black then had me get involved with a corruption case involving a federal official. That ran a couple of months. Something deeply unusual and troubling came out of that experience that led me to wonder if I was involved in law enforcement or political espionage.

On July 1, 2016, they came back and said, “What a mistake we made. Russia, Russia, Russia. We want you to know that the U.S. government neverasks something like this but we are here to ask you to rekindle a romantic relationship with Maria. The orders are coming from X, Y, and Z.”

[Byrne declined to name these officials.]

“The USA never, ever does this, but these circumstances are so extraordinary, that you are being asked to do this. We want to remind you that you can refuse.”

And the agents were clearly extremely discomfited and unhappy about the whole thing. But the request came from X, Y, and Z.

The Men in Black are extremely honorable, straightforward men (and women), and there was no leering and rubbing of hands with excitement. They were clearly extremely discomfited. They reminded me several times that I could refuse the request (I suspect they were secretly wishing I would refuse it, in fact).  No one would think less of me if I refused it, etc. All that kind of stuff. They were quite uncomfortable about it all. But…. X, Y, and Z were sending the request, and it was their job to communicate it. That is the reason I do not like using the initial “FBI” when explaining this. It seems unfair to them. As far as I could tell, they were hijacked from the top.

I decided that I had gotten sucked into what was starting to seem a lot more like political espionage than law enforcement. I knew this was all going to end up in front of a jury, or in television, or in the history books, and I did not want to disgrace our country or Maria by carrying out those orders. I would have if I had thought them legitimate. I’ve done lots of stranger things for our country, related to tracking down Brian William’s  murderous brother in Mexico, for example but this smelled like skunk, so I decided to do two things instead:

Lie to the feds. I would wine and dine and romance Maria, and give the public perception that we were once again romantically involved. I would blow her away with being this unbelievably romantic gentleman to her. I would report that I was back in the saddle, but all the while 100% NEVER TOUCH HER. I knew I had to be 100% pure on that bright line, so when the day came that it was all unearthed (which I knew would happen), the record would show that actually I had not laid a finger on her. (I understand that she and her lawyer have confirmed to other journalists that I was a total, perfect gentleman to her during that second phase we spent time together).

Set up X,Y, Z for felony charges down the road

Q. You conveyed all of this to the Justice Department, including the name of the three higher-ups in the Obama administration in April 2019?

A. Yes on April 30 I told them all of this, including that the U.S. government had know all about Maria in July 2015 from me, and had known about each of her subsequent meetings (e.g. Don Jr.) before she had them, and had let them all occur.

Q. On May 20, 2016, Butina and Torshin attended the National Rifle Association convention in Louisville, Kentucky and shared a table with Donald Trump Jr. at a private dinner. Is that what you’re talking about?

Editor’s note: In earlier version, Byrne suggested that Butina had made him aware of a possible second meeting between Butina and Don Trump Jr. Butina’s attorney, Robert Driscoll denied that such a meeting took place and, after some back and forth discussions, I gave Byrne an opportunity to revise his answer.

The truth is I am not completely sure, but the answer is, “Most likely.” I will distinguish what I surmise from what I know. And when telling you what I know, I will distinguish between what I know with total confidence, and when I am unusually vague. Please remember that I am somewhat foggy on things come the latter part of March, 2016 and into Spring.  Rough time medically.  

At some point in the first three months of 2016 Maria spoke of some meeting being arranged/to be arranged with Don Jr. via some of the Republican Party bigwigs with whom she had been schmoozing. In her description, it was to occur in a clandestine manner, it was to occur at a convention of conservatives of some kind, and was to occur somewhere in the South (I vaguely but not confidently remember “Tennessee”). It was not clear how stable or firm a plan it was, but it was clear that she had her Republican big shots working it.

Something I do remember with total clarity, however, is that the Men In Black were completely disinterested and indifferent. I was perplexed: I offered to whisk her off to somewhere exotic instead just to block such a meeting. They consulted then returned with this answer: We’re just going to let it play out. That is when they told me a fib to keep me in check, along the lines of Sometimes when spies come to the U.S. we might just follow them and see where they go, who they meet…. But I knew there is no way they would do that, certainly not meeting the son of the likely presidential nominee. Not in this case. That, coupled with the fact (not yet explained) that I, around about the same time, had been involved in a corruption matter, and it also played out in a way that seemed fishy, made me think…. they were leaving something out.

Since this all blew up, it may surprise you to know,  I have often tried to follow news about this as little as possible, so as to keep my own memory fresh for the day the right people asked me for the truth. Eventually that  became impossible, but I tried. So it was only more recently that learned  from a news broadcast about Maria (which I have generally avoided, frankly) that among the people she met  while here was Don Jr. I could not have told you where until today, when I learned it from your question, that she met Don Jr. in a private dinner in May, 2016, with Torshin.  (However, that is not completely true: when I saw Maria some year or more later, I believe she confirmed to me she had met Don Jr. I am not sure, and I never asked the circumstances.)

Was that private meeting she was discussing with me in the first three months of 2016, the one that I remembered being a clandestine meeting at a convention of conservatives somewhere in the South, maybe Tennessee, the private dinner that happened in May at an NRA convention in Kentucky?  I can’t be sure, but I would think so. The details match up pretty well. Especially if Driscoll has confirmed she only meeting with Don Jr.

Also…. Did I make clear, Maria and I stopped speaking in early April? I was asked to break it off, I was super-sick, and I did. It was only around July 1 (+/- 7 days?) that the request came to revive things.  So we were not in contact while the dinner played out.

However, if it was May, then it happened well after they had made me feel batshit crazy for thinking there might be anything unusual about this Russian grad student, very bright and admirable, but connected to Russian senators and oligarchs, swanking around with big shots who were getting her in touch with the son of the possible next president.  Boy, did they gaslight me on that one. They made me feel like some kind of conspiracy nutjob to think that there might be anything problematic about that. Guess the joke was on me.

Anyway, it was shortly after that — the period I was telling them of talk of arrangements being made for her to meet Don Jr., and they were brushing them off as silly to worry about — that she asked me to Russia to speak and meet Putin, and they came back and told me to break it off and get her out of my life. And as I said, I was right in that window that any recrudescence of disease would have led to organs getting pulled out as a next step. So I folded and disappeared from the scene. Probably first or second week of April 2016. I did not see her again until October 2016, I believe.

Q. What happened after you spoke to the Justice Department?

A. I learned that Maria was transferred 9 days later from a SHU unit [solitary confinement] in a prison in Virginia to the nicest women’s camp in the federal system. So I give great compliments to the DOJ. Nothing happens in 9 days normally. But I think they heard my story, checked out some of the basic claims, and moved her out of isolation by the end of the following week (May 9). The following Wednesday they announced John Durham.

[Note: John H. Durham, the U.S. attorney for the District of Connecticut, is investigating the origins of the special counsel’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election. News broke about his investigation on May 13. The Washington Post reported that the investigation had begun “in recent weeks.”]

I should make clear that I have no idea what connection there is, if any, between my coming forward and any subsequent events, including Durham’s appointment. I make no claims in that regard. I know only that I spoke twice to the DOJ, on April 5 and 30. I am under the impression that there are numerous other whistle-blowers coming forward, with tales that amount to political espionage conducted not just against Republicans, but against Hillary Clinton, by certain high-level actors (X, Y, and Z).  Mine may well be (and probably is) a footnote to a footnote to the whole story. I hope so.

Q. It’s a fascinating story, but I need to report it out. Is there someone who can corroborate this?

Sara Carter has had some recent confirmation from the Department of Justice. I don’t know what your connections are like there, but that’s why you get paid the big bucks! I’m not in the convincing business. I am simply in the business or letting the world know what happened. My rabbi told me “You let feds do fed jobs, you do your job. You are a citizen. Your country is ripping itself in two. Your job is to come forward to the public.” So I have.

[Note: Byrne’s “rabbi” is Warren Buffett. Byrne’s father, John, was the CEO GEICO, one of Buffett’s companies, and Patrick has known Buffett for years.]

I watched this unfold for the last year knowing I had a lot of the answers, and in late June decided (and was advised by my rabbi) that I had a moral duty to come forward. So I have. It is proving interesting to see how long it takes the world to get it.

Ok, Seth, I have qualms. From what you have written so far, I fear that when you learn the full truth you will seek to distort it because it conflicts with some things you have written so far. On the other hand, I have it on good authority that you are a legitimate, honest reporter. I have given you a ton. I have a mountain more. Let us see how you represent what I have told you before going any further.

OK, signing off for now. Busy week ahead.

[macgyvermedical]

“Let’s Get to it, Nature Boy” a “Lidar+Rogues+Duty” Medical Review

A lot of times I sit down to write these reviews and think something like “wow, there’s a lot to unpack here.” Fortunately for this review, the only thing I thought was that somewhere an NSA agent is definitely going to have to read this because of all the alarming keywords. Hope they like clavicles.

Let’s get to it. Spoilers ahead.

The main story centers around Mac and Desi going on a mission to recover the body of LCDR Robert Reese, an old friend of Mac’s who was presumed dead when his plane crashed in an unauthorized part of Azerbaijan. While there they find that Reese is still alive, though injured, and that a group of American CIA operatives has found a cache of white phosphorus-based chemical weapons which they intend to sell on the black market. Mac and Desi manage to subdue the operatives using homemade tranq darts, prevent the white phosphorus from ending up in the wrong hands, and get Reese back home safely.

The main medical situations in the episode include Mac’s diagnosis and field treatment for Reese’s fractured clavicle, the potential use of white phosphorus as a chemical weapon, and the morphine darts.

A little spoiler for you, the morphine darts are what I’m mad about this week.

The Clavicle:

But let’s start with that clavicle break. The clavicle is the thin bone that makes up the front part of the shoulder, attaching at the shoulder joint and sternum. A broken clavicle is a pretty common sports injury and occurs when the patient falls either directly on the outside of the shoulder, or falls on their hand or forearm and the force travels upward. Due to how close the bone is to the surface, if the bone segments are displaced, deformity from the break is often visible or palpable (feel-able). 

^^The bump is where one of the ends of the bone segments pushed over the other. Euagh.

It’s entirely possible that Reese fell onto his shoulder or forearm when he detached his seat from the parachute, so this (or anything consistent with a fall) is a pretty expected injury. While most remote first aid guides would tell you to sling the arm or wrist (slinging the wrist only takes pressure off the shoulder and reduces pain), the splint Mac makes for it- a version of a “figure eight” splint- is also a real way of splinting a clavicle fracture. The figure eight splint would work much the same way it does in the episode, pulling the outer (distal) part of the clavicle up and back and putting/keeping it in a reasonable place to heal. It would also have the advantage over a simple sling of leaving the affected arm free and somewhat usable (though still not weight-bearing)- something that would be important in a remote and hostile environment.

The thing I’ll nitpick about this scene is the fact that Mac seems to know immediately without looking that Reese has a clavicle fracture, where the break is, and the best way to treat it. Reese was holding his arm awkwardly, looked like he was in pain, reported that he was banged up, and Mac knew that he’d recently fallen out of a tree. Together those would still only point to a shoulder injury, without specifics. Mac would still have to look at it (like, skin level look at it) and probably touch it to know it was a clavicle fracture (and not, say, a dislocation or other fracture) before splinting it.

I understand a lack of assessment was a decision likely made for time’s sake, but assessment is a really, really important part of the process- and it would have made a significant difference in treatment. A figure-eight splint is only helpful when the break is in the middle or closer (proximal) third of the bone, because the strap has to go somewhere that’s not directly over the break. A day after the injury, where they would have been in the episode, there might have been significant swelling and bruising which might make it difficult to know where the break is, and if that figure eight splint would be appropriate.

I probably would have gone with the sling either way, but I see why they did the figure eight (both from a cool TV thing(TM) standpoint and for mobility). Its the lack of assessment that’s the problem, not the intervention for once.

White Phosphorus:

I’m sure you all know the feel when your primary (academic) fascinations in life are toxicology and chemical weapons, so you’re constantly paranoid that you’re one google search or tumblr post away from a SWAT team showing up at your apartment.

About 3 years ago I did a lot of internet research on white phosphorus in order to write a Criminal Minds tag that followed up an episode where a character was tortured with white phosphorus salve (please excuse the minor errors in hospital realism, I had not yet graduated nursing school when I wrote it), and I was really excited that this episode might give me reason to talk about what I learned.

I guess it didn’t exactly, but I’m going to talk about it anyway.

White Phosphorus (known from here on out at WP) is a waxy, yellowish substance useful as a chemical weapon because of its versatility and plethora of uses other than terrorism. It doesn’t occur naturally, but is created and used extensively in industry as a necessary component in the production of fertilizer, cleaning chemicals, munitions, (illegal) fireworks, older rat and cockroach poisons, and certain food additives. Most common exposures are due to industrial spills, not terrorism.

WP can contaminate food, water, and soil as particles, or air as smoke. Eating or drinking contaminated food or water can cause severe gastrointestinal distress and fatal damage to the kidneys, liver, and heart in doses of about 50-100mg. Breathing the smoke can cause airway irritation and coughing, but is rarely if ever fatal at typical concentrations. Exposure to intact skin is also usually not thought to cause lasting damage, though as you’ll see in the next paragraph, that doesn’t happen often.

Another way WP can enter the body, and probably more relevant in the context of its use as a chemical weapon, is through burn wounds. WP tends to burn or explode on contact with any air above 86F (30C), and can cause extensive partial and full-thickness burns. The burns may have a characteristic yellow wound bed, and can pose a hazard to both the patient and rescuers due to the fact that unspent WP particles in the wounds can spontaneously re-ignite. Wounds must be kept damp until the patient is decontaminated to avoid re-ignition of the particles, and the careful use of copper sulfate or silver nitrate as an antidote can make the decontamination process a lot safer and easier.

Note that I don’t recommend googling this unless you have an exceptionally high tolerance for human suffering.

Instead, enjoy these curated pictures:

Picture “A” is of the yellow wound beds, and “B” is all the unspent WP glowing under a UV light. 

The WP passes readily through the burn-damaged tissue, and if the patient survives the burns themselves, can still cause fatal damage to the kidneys, liver, and heart.

Before we move on, I would like to point out one last particularly horrifying aspect of WP poisoning: It does not kill quickly. Initial symptoms of severe gastrointestinal distress may last up to 8 hours, after which a latent period similar to the kind seen in radiation poisoning lasts for about 3 days. Organ failure then develops, which if severe, usually results in death unless dialysis and a liver transplant can happen fast enough.

Tying this back in, you can see why the team didn’t want this getting into the wrong hands.

Morphine Darts

So now we’re finally here at the fun part. And by fun I mean... well, poorly portrayed?

Because honestly? Morphine could take these guys out, or at least make it difficult for them to fight, which would accomplish the goal of leveling the field a little. The problems in this scene lie, as they usually do in TV, in:

The route of administration-

Repeat after me, kids: If you are chucking a needle at someone, you’re hoping against hope to hit a muscle. Did I say “neck needle” anywhere in that sentence? Good. You should know how I feel about them by now.

I know they were going for the needle to have hit the exterior jugular, delivering the dose of morphine IV and therefore making it reasonable that the person could be quickly subdued afterwards without alerting his friends to the guy running around chucking needles at people. To give you an indication of how difficult it would be to do this, however, placing a 18g IV catheter into the exterior jugular (placing an “EJ”) is something RNs are not allowed to do in hospitals because there’s too much room for error. No one, not even MacGyver, could reliably throw something 20 ft and hit the EJ perfectly.

Plus, there’s a lot of really important things in your neck that you don’t want to just forcefully stick needles in randomly. While insulin needles are very small, it would still be safer and more effective and reliable to stick them in large muscles like the thigh or butt, which can also take considerably higher volumes of medication without injury.

The dose-

The validity of the needle chucking contraption notwithstanding, the needles they use in the scene are U100 insulin needles (not exclusive to insulin, that’s just what they’re called), meaning if you filled the entire syringe, the total volume would be only 1ml. Morphine comes in IV concentrations up to 15mg/ml. The most filled syringe I saw in this whole scene was to about the 0.15ml mark, so even assuming they used the frankly ridiculously high concentration of 15mg/ml, that would only be about 2.25mg/dose.

I say “only” because the starting dose of morphine for acute pain clocks in at around 4mg for otherwise healthy people. How much of an impact morphine has has a lot to do with size and tolerance, too. Some of the antagonists in this scene were big enough they probably wouldn’t have been knocked off balance by (or possibly even felt) 2.25mg, let alone felt “10 shots of vodka” as the scene suggests. At the peak of effectiveness, it might have given Desi a slight advantage in a fight, but wouldn’t have taken anyone down.

The time to onset/peak-

The last thing about these I’ll say before I step off (never!) is about the onset time. The “onset” is the length of time it takes, on average, for a drug to begin working, and the “peak” is when it is most effective. This is different between drugs and routes. Morphine’s IV onset is rapid (and at the speed this would have been pushed, probably would have made the person briefly dizzy and nauseated), but it still takes about 20mins to “peak”, so assuming Mac *did* impossibly manage to sink an EJ from 20 feet away and there was a high enough dose to do something, anyone in this scene would still have had plenty of time to alert others or fight before they were incapacitated. The best thing throwing a needle at someone in this scene would do is provide some distraction while Desi takes them out manually.

More realistically, morphine injected into the muscle takes at least 10 minutes for onset and up to an hour to peak and doesn’t have as rough of side effects, meaning overall that no matter the dose, morphine is a really poor choice for a tranq dart (but admittedly, if its what you’ve got, its what you’ve got. Also who decided just leaving it lying out in a supply closet was a good idea? The fact that it hadn’t been stolen yet is a miracle in itself.).

R E F E R E N C E S

So there you have it. If you liked this and want to take a look at other MacGyver reviews I’ve done, you can find them here: Awl - X-Ray + Penny - Duct Tape + Jack - CD + Hoagie Foil - Guts + Fuel + Hope - Wilderness + Training + Survival - Father + Bride + Betrayal

[Patreon] [Ko-Fi]

[kazlifeadventures]

Chernobyl!!

23 May

Those of us who signed up for the full day trip to inside Chernobyl’s exclusion zone were up early in our long pants,sleeves,with enclosed shoes with our passports ready for the security checks to go into the zone. We signed our lives away on a safety waiver, and check in sheets that go to the highly controlled checkpoints located at the different zone crossings. Visits to the area are highly controlled with only a few tour companies given permission to enter, they are required to wear a tracker at all times so they are monitored to ensure they are not going into areas where they are not permitted. We were all required to wear dosimeters so that our radiation exposure could be checked at the end of the day. Our guide, Alexi, gave us some amazing insights he has learned from years of research, insights into not only the events that lead up to what occurred in the early hours of 26th April 1986, but also the time line of sorts of what was done afterwards. A lot of the ‘truths’ surrounding the reactor explosion were lost when witnesses died, or were buried by the propaganda and coverups of the Soviets at the time. Don’t forget it took for America to call them out with the incontrovertible satellite photos of the blast for the Soviets to admit anything had happened, let alone take steps to contain the ongoing radiation leakage and further risks of explosions. When it comes to information surrounding Chernobyl it’s difficult to find a complete story, let alone be able to fact check anything. Alexi gave us the name of a you tube documentary that he advised shows the true side of what happened in reactor 4 on 26 April 1986. The " Battle of Chernobyl" if you want to look it up!

First up was a stop in Zalesye, an abandoned village within the exclusion zone. It was surreal, to step off the bus, knowing that we were walking down a main street, but seeing nothing but vegetation. Then through avenues in the trees we came across the remains of the houses, we then entered into the old town hall building with its rotting floors, and decaying walls. There were still old signs on the walls. I managed to get myself what I like to call a ‘shin - obyl’ bruise on my way in, as only I can - stacked it climbing up onto the entry. Luckily one of my bus mates helped me up as we were told not to touch walls, or ground...or anything really ... so that would be why we had to wear long pants (for when idiots like me fall over!)

The next stop was the reason the power stations were built, the Duga radar. Holy huge metal antenna array... when you know that the huge, costly, power hungry radar actually wasn’t that good at its job makes the events of the reactor explosion seem even more of an avoidable incident. Incredibly, you would have no idea that it was there until you walk into the forest of vegetation, then it’s an ‘oh my’ moment at it’s sheer size and the wonder of the precision of the components. It is slowly rusting, and someone died climbing it a few years ago, so we were not allowed to climb it.

We then headed to Chernobyl and the Reactor canteen for lunch. Yes, complete canteen lunch on a tray... Soup, mains, desert, replete with unsmiling Ukrainian canteen ladies serving it to us. With the extra bread we’d grabbed at lunch we then fed fish from the railway bridge near the reactors. Then it was up close to reactor 4 and the monument for it. I couldn’t believe we were able to get to within about 200m of it. Although there are strict rules on photos in this area - can only shoot in one direction, and there are guards and cameras everywhere.

Chernobyl town was the administrative centre for the district and until its evacuation on the 30th April 1986, housed about 14000 people It was not as close to the site as our next stop.

Alexi gave us an interesting parallel: apparently ‘Chernobyl’ means wormwood in Russian. In Chernobyl town, 164 died as part of the first responders to the explosion, and there is a memorial that has been erected in the central square depicting an Angel blowing a trumpet. The 8th book of revelations talks of a cataclysmic event : “And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter.” Revelation 8:10-11. Draw from that whatever conclusions you will, interesting nonetheless...

Pripyat was designed to be new age city of sorts, with its amusement park, cafes, art installations, hotels, apartments it was coming into itself with 50000 residents, housing workers at the power plant. It was finally evacuated in the afternoon of the 27th April 1986, with residents being told they would be gone for a couple of days and to just grab a few things and leave their pets. They were never allowed to return. We climbed through the maternity hospital, where the abortions were performed, with some of its records and equipment still intact. We were warned not to touch anything that still remained as it would still be highly radioactive. Trekking through the vegetation we came across what once was a beautiful cafe on the banks of the river that was due to open on the day the city was evacuated. The stained glass art that had adorned its window depicting the four seasons, some still intact, the rest of it lying shattered on the ground. From there we headed to the sports stadium, through what we later realised was the soccer field (no sign that it was there!) To me it was incredible to see sparks of beauty still there, the glass work in the cafe, the tile art adorning the external sides of two of the buildings we saw. We ventured into the pool area of the sports complex, it’s dive platform still intact, tiles, ladders, everything still there, just decaying, old, or vandalised by some who have snuck into the area over the years. It was then time for the iconic amusement park. Again something that was only just opening when the incident occurred. It stands as a rusting memory of time gone by, bumper cars, Ferris wheel, all the fun of the fair, with that eerie overtone of nothingness or is it hopelessness, I’m not sure.

We then took off to see the last Lenin statue in Ukraine, all others have been removed. It is still located outside of the Communist party building where the ‘fake’ trial took place of a power plant director and 2 engineers, where they were found guilty of negligence and the the blame placed on them for the incident. Nothing of course said about the safety measures that were supposed to have been installed in the reactor, or the fact that they failed, or they fact that the staff were following orders as required under Soviet rule. The Chernobyl town is home to what are known as the ‘self settlers’. Previous residents who have returned of their own volition to continue living in their property.

Our last stop was in the Red forest area, northern part of the exclusion zone. It apparently received the worst of the radiation. We entered the kindergarten where to my dismay we learned that kids continued to be sent to for at least a week after the reactor explosion. Testing after the incident proved that everything including the toys they had played with were riddled with extremely high levels of radioactivity. It was poignant and incredibly sad to see the remains of the toys, the cribs/beds knowing that these children had been exposed to such toxic levels of radiation due to the inaction of the Soviet authorities.

On our way out of the zone we stopped briefly at ‘The men who saved the world’. An un-offical memorial to the first attendees, doctors, firefighters etc, who all died in hospital number six in Russia and were then buried in lead coffins somewhere in Russia. Their families were not allowed to even see them or be at the burial.

On our way out of two checkpoints we had to submit to a full body radiation scan at each in order to check for any contamination. Luckily none of us had to be decontaminated (ie hosed down!). We were then given strict instruction to shower thoroughly and ensure our clothes were either washed or kept in an area safely before we washed them... On a side note the radiation we experienced for the day was somewhere around a 5 or 6 hour transatlantic flight so I pretty much got more radiation flying over to Europe than I did wandering around all day - good to know though!

It was an amazing day. A long one, we're all tired. But wow. How lucky am I that I got to do this. Mother nature has given the human race and it's nuclear power a big fuck you. And I love it! It's surreal to walk down what was once a street realising that on both sides of you hidden by nature's growth stands the time capsule of the crumbling remnants of the buildings of whole towns. Nature has rebounded here in spades, the birds chirping constantly, the land brimming with growth, the fish teeming - and no, none of them have 2 heads or mutations anymore. Apparently nature very quickly removes such mutations when they serve no purpose. The amusement park, a ghost town of rusting steel and decaying wood. The beautiful art works of tile and glass slowly deteriorating. It's eerie, and incredibly fascinating. My emotions are everywhere. Our guide is so passionate about what happened here and what the Soviets did to cover up their mistakes and the impact this had on the people who are still affected to this day, with no accurate records of how many have died from exposure in the years since the explosion. I was astounded how close we were able to get to reactor four. Incredibly saddened at how little care was taken of the people here. This Chernobyl adventure will stay with me forever, and has left an indelible mark on my psyche. If you don’t know much about this story, read more, find as much of the truth as you can, and most important of all - never forget.

[fiothelemon]

december 15, 2018 takenobu mitsuyoshi 光吉 猛修

If you’ve ever played a 90′s era SEGA game, then you may recognize the work of Takenobu Mitsuyoshi. Takenobu has produced music on games such as Daytona USA, Virtua Racing, and even Shenmue. Whatever game he takes part in, it always gives me both a smile on my face, and makes me enjoy the game waaay more. Today on the first issue of FBoGCaTW, we look at my all time favorite video game composer: Takenobu Mitsuyoshi!

history

Takenobu Mitsuyoshi was born on Christmas of 1967 in the Fukuoka prefecture of Japan. Because of his father’s work, he moved around the country until they finally settled in Chiba, and then later in Sendai when he was in his second year of high school.

When Takenobu was in his elementary and middle school days, he despised music, music class, and anything relating to music theory. Despite the dislike of music, he did enjoy singing and singing popular anime theme songs from back then (that isn’t too different nowadays for him). One other thing he liked during elementary school was baseball, ending it while he was wrapping up his middle school days. Why he left is because when Takenobu began high school he started attending his school’s science club in search for something other than sports. In that science club, there were NEC PC-8001s in the class that could play music and this impressed takenobu, along with screwing with synthesizers. Of course, the science club did not 100% spark Takenobu’s musical interest. the band “Yellow Magic Orchestra” was a huge influence on him and also helped him build his fascination of music.

When Takenobu went out to college, he majored in economics, out of all things. He was considering a teaching job, but then he got a real taste of what being a teacher was like when he attended classes. But college is where he both joined several bands, and discovered SEGA, and thus aspired to work there when a friend showed him Galaxy Force. In an interview with Game Music Core, Takenobu said:

“Actually, I also attended a Sega job fair meeting, though it was for their business and administration positions, not games development. At the meeting, I was surprised when someone else raised their hand and asked “I want to do sound at Sega, how can I apply for that? [...] ”I remember they replied, “Just send in your demo tape.” -Takenobu Mitsuyoshi

Keep in mind that Takenobu was there for things such as business, and if it weren’t for that one guy... then we wouldn’t have his classic music now. And taking what that guy said in mind, Takenobu took work on producing a demo tape to show to SEGA, and produced 2 instrumental songs. All played by hand and using a multitrack recorder with sequenced drums. Takenobu had always had an interest in game music, so he also applied to other game companies such as Namco, Taito, Konami, and SNK. (Huh, the Daytona USA guy coulda done the music for Metal Slug!!) During the application for the other companies, Takenobu received an “unofficial offer” by SEGA, and the story of when he was tested on his skills deserves a paragraph to its own.

“Their entrance test was insane, too! They had an electric piano setup in the interview room, and they said, ‘Please listen to this melody. You will have 5 minutes to come up with an arrangement.’ [...] After that, I had to meet with the business managers, but my head was all muddled and I blurted out that I’d received an unofficial offer from SEGA.” -Takenobu Mitsuyoshi

In retrospect, he said how he should have backpedaled and was teetering on accepting the offer or not. Instead, he said to the interviewers how he “Just wanted to learn more about your company.” Even though this left them baffled, Takenobu was hired and for almost 30 years (since 1990), he has taken part in games such as Daytona USA, which he has particular fond memories of. The Virtua Fighter series (including the anime, oddly enough), Yakuza, and plenty more that I don’t have much time to mention here.

takenobu, seen on the right, in his early days of joining sega

music showcase

The first track of Takenobu’s I wanna show y’all that I think describes his style beautifully is an exclusive to an album he put out in 2003 called “From Loud 2 Low: Takenobu Mitsuyoshi Works.” It features mostly famous songs he made for famous SEGA games, but an extra 2 songs of the album are an exception, though. They were made only for the album, and weren’t featured in any SEGA game. One is called “Night In H.A.P.” and the other is “I Feel So Good…”

“I Feel So Good…”

“I Feel So Good…” shows a good example of what I like to call “Mitsuyoshi-ism.” I define it as cheery music based on jazz fusion, that also feature upbeat, optimistic vocals. A few other notable songs by Mitsuyoshi that display mitsuyoshi-ism well are some of his songs in Daytona USA such as “Sky High” or the famous “Let’s Go Away.” In case you enjoy this track, a lot like me, this and the album it was originally from are available on Apple Music and Spotify!

Speaking of Daytona USA…

This is “Sky High” from Daytona USA, released in 1993 for the SEGA Model 2 arcade board. Since it’s an arcade game from the time, that would explain the choppy vocals and sampled instruments. Nevertheless, Takenobu shines bright in this song with his signature singing and flexes his composing muscles. If this version of the song isn’t doing it for you, I don’t blame you. There was a SEGA Saturn version of the game released a year after the original, and it improves aaaaalllmost everything about the game, including music. Here is the cover made for the Saturn.

“Course Select”

When he first joined SEGA in 1990, one of the first games Takenobu was tasked with scoring for was Virtua Racing. It was made by the same development team as Daytona, AM2, and Takenobu is involved with the music, so think of it as sort of a precursor to Daytona, but the music won’t say so. Comparing Virtua Racing’s soundtrack to Daytona’s, VR has a more rock-ish feel to it than Daytona’s Pop-ey, Jazz-ish aesthetic. While it *may* not live up to the beast of a soundtrack that is Daytona, Virtua Racing *does* have some catchy tunes up its sleeve.

“Passing Breeze ~Arrange”

Takenobu was so good at making music for SEGA games, that he was promoted into the S.S.T. Band. S.S.T. stood for “SEGA Sound Team,” and as you could imagine, it was a band consisting of composers from SEGA games. Here is a cover by them of “Passing Breeze” from OutRun, composed by Hiroshi Kawaguchi. In this arrangement, Takenobu is playing keyboard, in which he is also playing the melody of the song. Very relaxing cover, I prefer this one over the original arcade rendition!

a picture of takenobu with the S.S.T. band, circa 1991

“Burning Rangers”

When you’re talkin’ Takenobu, you CAN’T forget about his kickass vocals! This song from Burning Rangers called, um, Burning Rangers, is a great example of Takenobu’s vocal beauty. While this track wasn’t composed by him, and the original game is more obscure due to the game being released on the Saturn, and pretty much SEGA just shooting themselves in the foot during this time, thus you may not recognize this one. Despite the obscurity, this is a great recommendation! PLUS: shoutout to Dino Gavoni, who did the AMAZING sax solo around the 3 minute mark! (That alone is worth a listen, too!)

“Shenmue - Main Theme”

You may notice a pattern here, all of the songs before this one are all upbeat and high-energy. The main theme to shenmue takes a completely different turn to Takenobu’s style of composition, in that there are no vocals, no high tempo or energy, and only the energy of the orchestra. And this alone displays Takenobu’s flexibility of music, the last music he helped make before this was from Daytona USA 2, with music such as this ( youtube.com/watch?v=kbgD7VTM-MY ), and coming off from that to a huge, and I mean HUGE game like shenmue, also with a huge production team of composers behind it (10 composers!!) was daunting and impressive to say the least. Basically, the song and the soundtrack in general are amazing. So is the game. Have I mentioned how great shenmue is? It’s great. Play it. Now.

sources (in order of appearance)

Please look through some of these yourself, these interviews/articles are all way more informative than this blog!

seganerds.com/2014/05/23/takenobu-mitsuyoshi/

segaretro.org/Takenobu_Mitsuyoshi

shmuplations.com/sst/

www.ne.jp/asahi/v/hara/ga_core/ga_core1_1.html

tssznews.com/2013/03/28/interview-takenobu-mitsuyoshi/

segaretro.org/From_Loud_2_Low:_Takenobu_Mitsuyoshi_Works

segaretro.org/Burning_Rangers#Japanese_version

www.shenmuedojo.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=42297

[back-and-totheleft]

Stone, cold sober

Re-telling the story of September 11 with a measured hand and lightness of touch hithertoo unhinted at, director Oliver Stone proves a more serious thinker than his paranoia-soaked canon would suggest. Here, he explains how his experiences as a soldier in Vietnam framed his outlook on life and art.

The introductory handshake comes with an additional squeeze of the wrist and a roguish smile.

“You’re Irish. I can tell.”

No. Your correspondent hasn’t been transported back to a disco in the 1970s. Instead, she’s in New York’s Regency Hotel meeting Oliver Stone. That twinkling opening gambit has brought about a Proustian rush of wayward tabloid headlines. I remember that idiotic book on the making of Natural Born Killers, with its scurrilous tales of loose ladies, psilocybin mushrooms and cocaine abuse. I recall that story about the director commandeering the Warners corporate jet to do peyote in the Mexican desert while making The Doors. I remember too how the set of Alexander reputedly became an extravagant saturnalia. Sure enough, I can effortlessly picture this man partying down with Colin Farrell, a duel study in swaggering Dionysian charm.

Though Stone insists his appetite for debauchery has been greatly exaggerated, he’s always owned up to unruly habits. Yes, he does have a fondness for marijuana dating back to time spent on the frontline in Vietnam. He has also ‘expanded his consciousness’ with the occasional psychedelic. But driving offences from last year and 1999 have, he claims, more to do with pre-diabetic medication unwisely knocked back with alcohol than exotic marching powders.

Still, it’s an impressively scandalous record for a man of his years. Stone is 60 now, though you’d say he were a decade younger if you suddenly spied him on the street. In person he’s imperturbably casual, far more relaxed than the ‘madman’ headlines might lead one to suppose. His glowing tan is offset by a bright yellow polo shirt and he sits way, way back in his chair holding your gaze all the while.

Accommodating and easy in his manner, you’d be hard-pressed to identify this individual as Oliver Stone – Controversial Filmmaker. That is, nevertheless, to whom we speak. Stone boasts a fearsomely uncompromising reputation as a screenwriter and director. Throughout the ‘80s when the post-classical frisson of counter-cultural Hollywood had fizzled and poachers died off or turned gamekeeper, only Stone kept the faith, authoring politically conscious cinema at a time when the Academy was honouring Driving Miss Daisy.

His screenplay for rapper’s favourite Scarface set the frenzied pace and ultra-violent tone that would later characterise his visual style. But Stone was too engaged with the world to become the new Brian De Palma. Salvador, his first major film as director, probed the gulf between the ideals of American foreign policy and realpolitik. Platoon, Wall Street, JFK and Nixon would further confirm his interest in micro and macro conspiracies and establish him as an outlaw auteur.

Though he’s now rueful about being stereotyped or “pinned like a butterfly”, he was a good sport about it, appearing as a conspiracy nut in Dave and Wild Palms.

“You know, I’ve never really regarded myself as a political filmmaker”, he tells me. “I consider myself a dramatist. I always get involved with people more than the politics. With the movie JFK, for example, the book by Jim Garrison had a lot of theory. I was more interested in making him part of that story. And Oswald fascinated me. If you watch that film it is really a trail of people played by great actors. Nixon, despite the whiff of conspiracy, is truly a psychological portrait of a man. Many people in the right wing thought it would be a hatchet job but I really made him apathetic. I refuse to be pigeon holed. I am not a political guy. I don’t go to rallies. I am not an activist. I don’t have the time because I’m busy being a writer.”

He may deny the role of agitator, but his opinions, both off and onscreen suggest otherwise. His most recent work in the documentary sector includes Persona Non Grata, an examination of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and two features about Cuban president Fidel Castro, Comandante and Looking for Fidel. (Stone has described himself as a friend and an admirer.)

He has, before now, referred to the events of September 11th as a ‘revolt’ and expressed an interest in the work of Richard Clarke, the former White House counter-terrorism advisor whose book Against All Enemies accuses the Bush administration of ignoring the al-Qaeda threat, then linking the group to Iraq, contrary to all evidence.

“We Vietnam vets, in particular, found it very difficult”, says Stone. “We had the backing of the world in Afghanistan. We were rounding up the main suspects. Then we go into Iraq with no support. Militarily, it was stupid. It was overreaching. And any American who travels can tell you how the rest of the world is resentful. What the hell are we doing in Iraq when the enemy was 4000 al-Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan?”

When it was announced last summer that Stone would direct World Trade Centre, a film focusing on ‘first response’ police officers trapped by the Twin Towers collapse, many eyebrows were raised. “To allow this poisoned and deranged mind… (to recreate 9/11) in the likeness of his vile fantasies is beyond obscene,” raged one conservative commentator. But World Trade Center, it transpires, is Stone’s least obvious work even by his own consistently innovative standards. The towers do not fall back and to the left. There is no grand plot or secret ruling elite. “This is not a political film in any sense”, insists Stone. “It harks back to Platoon in that respect. In Vietnam, we didn’t sit around talking about LBJ. And the truth is, I don’t think we can say for sure what happened during 9/11. We spent more investigating Bill Clinton’s blowjobs than the destruction of the World Trade Centre. Whatever was going on in the background, if you look at the forest through the trees, it seems to me that what has happened since is far worse than what happened that day. So the politics and conspiracies behind that day, whatever they may be, are not as relevant as where we are now.” Completely eschewing polemic, the movie instead offers a heartfelt portrait of ordinary fellows on the front line. Stone’s traditional constituency are, needless to say, horrified, and assorted doublespeak statements have been issued attacking World Trade Center as “non-conspiratorial lies.”

John Conner, a leading voice in the Christian branch of the 9/11 Truth Movement, went so far as to ask the following– “Was Stone used by the Illuminati as an unknowing pawn to whitewash the 9/11 conspiracy theories to the masses? Was he approached with the project and coerced into a commitment to occupy his time in attempts to thwart any other 9/11 angle from being used? Is Stone a pawn in the game? Perhaps Stone didn’t know at the time, and found out too late.”

Oddly, however, like Paul Greengrass’ United 93, Stone’s film has found champions from either end of America’s bipolar political spectrum, often the same folks who had previously dismissed him as a pinko malcontent. L. Brent Bozell III, the president of the conservative Media Research Center and founder of the Parents Television Council — a latter day Mary Whitehouse in trousers — called it “a masterpiece” and sent an e-mail message to 400,000 people saying, “Go see this film.” Cal Thomas, the right-wing syndicated columnist and contributor to The Last Word, wrote that it was “one of the greatest pro-American, pro-family, pro-faith, pro-male, flag-waving, God Bless America films you will ever see.”

“I just felt this was a great story dying to be told,” explains Stone. “It may not be like anything I have done before, but Heaven And Earth wasn’t like anything I had done before. Nor was U Turn or Natural Born Killers. I do jump around and each film is a different style. This isn’t like United 93 which was a brilliant piece of vérité. This is more like a classic John Ford, William Wyler or even Frank Capra film. Against tremendous odds this rescue takes place. This has the traditional Hollywood tropes of emotional connection to four main characters from the working class.

"I would love to bring Hollywood back to that, making films where people actually work for a living, not sit around making things happen with a remote control like that Adam Sandler film. Born On The Fourth Of July was blue-collar. So was Any Given Sunday. Although it’s about elite athletes, it was about work. They had to punish their bodies for their lifestyle.”

A marriage of disaster movie and combat zone drama, World Trade Centre follows Port Authority officers Sergeant John Mc Loughlin (Nicolas Cage) and Will Jimeno (Michael Pena) on a doomed rescue mission into the Twin Towers. On September 12th, they were among the last survivors to be pulled from the rubble. Though the original script by newcomer Andrea Berloff read like a relocation of Beckett’s Endgame, Stone has widened the remit to include the rescuers and the anxious wives at home. As a director noted for working within a decidedly masculine milieu, was it a challenge to represent domesticity, I wonder.

“Oh yes,” he admits. “That was a big challenge. On the surface this is a very simple story of catastrophe and rescue and heroism. But if you go beyond the cliché it is very fresh. Everything the rescuers did was dangerous. We assume rescues just happen, but it is hard work. These men really crawled into places where they thought they would die. It took hours to get them out. I tried to show some of that digging. But an even bigger cliché in these circumstances is the waiting housewife. Actually, it goes further than that. Each of these women died that day. They sit there as the hours pass and the only news is no survivors. You knew no one would come out of there. The buildings were so pancaked. So it was like death for them. I wanted to portray that. I wanted them smelling the sheets from the previous night where they had slept. Again it’s a cliché but the idea was to take the cliché and make it fresh.”

Another subplot concentrates on Staff Sergeant Dave Karnes (Michael Shannon) a Christian marine in Wilton, Connecticut, who watches events on TV and tells his colleagues that America is now at war. Once he decides that God wants him to go to New York he heads to Ground Zero with a flashlight and eventually hears the two cops in the debris. A postscript before the final credits informs us that Kearns has since served two tours of duty in Iraq.

“It’s a remarkable and weird story,” Stone admits. “But that’s how it happened. I also think Kearns represents a significant sector of the American population when he says, ‘We’re going to need some good men to avenge this’. For many people, revenge was their first thought.”

And there you have it. For all the pigeonholing as a conspiracy theorist, facts are of paramount importance to Stone. He spent two-and-a-half years researching JFK. He spent three years immersed in Persian history for the much-maligned Alexander. It was a labour of love and the ill-tempered critical reception seems to have cut to the quick.

“I’m a historical dramatist,” he explains. “I wasn’t a Kennedy assassination junkie at the time, nor was I a 9/11 junkie. But I love the past. It hurts when I read someone claiming that I’ve fabricated something. But then you make a film like Alexander and scholars say you have it right, but critics say it’s all wrong.”

Similarly, while Stone has been at pains to represent those involved in the World Trade Centre disaster as faithfully as possible, he has not been able to quell dissent completely. The widow of Dominick Pezzulo – a cop portrayed in the film - has accused Jimeno and McLoughlin of cashing in on the tragedy by selling their story to Paramount. There have also been mutterings about the film being too soon.

“I know,” nods Stone. “But I honestly think it is the right time. The Killing Fields was made five years after those events in Cambodia. During World War II, Hollywood made propaganda films. Casablanca, made in 1941, takes a very anti Nazi position even before we declared war. The Vietnam movies took longer to make, but life goes faster now. I would say to you the consequences of 9/11 are so bad that we better look back now and understand what happened on that day. When you leave it too long, events become mythologized. Watching Pearl Harbor, you’d think we won that battle. This is the epicentre of 9/11, but there are many stories that still need to be told.”

Though personal and more modest in scope than the $63 million budget might suggest, the director does hope that his intense focus on McLoughlin and Jimeno has a wider relevance.

“They did not have a clue as to what was happening,” he says. “They knew it was a terrorist attack but there was no discussion of politics. They’re cops. They are far more likely to talk about pop culture, whether it is Starsky And Hutch or GI Jane. It wasn’t Bergman down in that hole.

So I am not claiming this movie will answer all the questions. But let’s say you go to a psychiatrist and all your life you have been repressed because you were raped when you where 14. Perhaps the psychiatrist says, ‘Let’s go back to that day’. They make you remember that day and it changes all the defences you had built up. So perhaps by undoing the screw, the secret at the beginning, you can take some of the armour off.”

The events of 9/11 may be difficult to disentangle, but no more so than the filmmaker himself. Born in New York City to a Jewish father and Catholic mother, William Oliver Stone was raised Episcopalian by way of compromise. His parents divorced after his father, a conservative Republican, conducted various extra-marital affairs with family friends. Young Oliver spent much of his subsequent childhood in splendid isolation between private schools and five star hotels - ‘a cartoonish Little Lord Fauntleroy’ by his own account.

Still, Stone needs neither bullfighting nor marlin fishing to confirm his Hemingwayesque credentials as an artist. He attended Yale and dropped out twice before enlisting to fight as an Infantryman in Vietnam. Mixing with the lower orders and smoking pot soon transformed the spoiled youngster into a military hero. He was wounded twice in action and received the Bronze Star with ”V” device signifying valor for “extraordinary acts of courage under fire,” and the Purple Heart with one Oak Leaf Cluster.

Soon after the war, he was arrested at the US-Mexico border for possession of marijuana. His father bailed him out but the experience served to radicalise him. Later, meeting understandably embittered veterans such as Ron Kovic pushed Stone further to the left.

He has, however, wooed Hollywood despite the often overtly political nature of his films. He won his first Academy Award as the screenwriter of Midnight Express and has been further honoured for directing Platoon and Born On The Fourth Of July.

Now, after World Trade Centre, has attention and lavish praise from the likes of Bill O’Reilly turned his head? Not bloody likely.

“People are people,” he tells me. “I think people have to take care of themselves and their families first. But there are bigger questions now. The ecological movement want us to clean up, but how can that work when there is always the issue of jobs? It’s a very selfish world and avarice triumphs over the green imperative. After Katrina, there was a tremendous outpouring of help. That was also true when the tsunami hit Indonesia. People are very generous in America and there are some very fine Americans. Unfortunately, a lot of them don’t have passports. Most of them don’t know where Iraq is. And a lot think al Qaeda and Iraq are the same thing. There’s a problem with the education levels. American television keeps people trapped. The news is very superficial and mostly filled with advertisements and rapes and murders. If you travel in the country and you stay in the smaller places you find very limited resources. If America spent the same amount of money as we spend on embassies and CIA stations around the world on our major cities with the goal of helping bring those cities to a way of life that was democratic and economically viable, we would have a tremendous success in this country. Instead, we have an international presence and I don’t know if it is worth it. All we are doing is promoting a system which is now suspect all over the world. We have broken our constitution repeatedly since 2001.”

He smiles cynically.

“I don’t think pictures of soldiers pointing their naked dicks in Abu Ghraib has helped us at a local level either.”

He’s still got it.

-Tara Brady, “Stone cold sober,” HotPress, Sept 19 2006 [x]

[dailydaveeddiggs]

DAVEED DIGGS TAKES HIS TALENTS TO ESPN FOR MUSICAL PARTNERSHIP

Daveed Diggs is taking his talents from Broadway to ESPN. In a new partnership, the multifaceted actor, rapper and singer  — as seen in the Broadway-turned-global hip-hop musical phenomenon Hamilton and on the ABC hit series blackish as Rainbow Johnson’s brother, Johan — will write and perform six pieces pegged to timely cultural sports moments.

For his first act, the Oakland native will dedicate a monologue to his hometown team, the Golden State Warriors, as they defend their NBA championship title this season. Stay tuned for the first piece set to debut around the start of the Warriors season this month on all ESPN platforms, and get more familiar with Diggs’ inner sports geek and future plans with ESPN below. Diggs also shares his love note to the Bay Area in the form of a West Coast-themed playlist.

How has the partnership with ESPN pushed you creatively versus other projects?

Well, it’s interesting because it’s so specific. We’re really trying to make these pieces for specific events. So this first one being the first Warriors game of the season is just everybody working towards this one goal of creating this thing that is fun and that can have a life outside of this but it’s also really tailored to these specific moments in sports over the course of the year. I think that the challenge and fun of it is the specificity and trying to make something feel like something for everybody.

What was your fondest sports memory growing up?

Before I could remember, the [San Francisco] 49ers won a Super Bowl as I was being born against the [Cincinnati] Bengals in ‘82. That became kind of legendary in my house growing up. So I sort of grew up in Oakland being a Raiders fan and a Niners fan, but that was a good time to be a Niners fan because of Joe Montana, Jerry Rice, Ronnie Lott, all those guys. I have this vague memory, like at seven years old, [when] I went to the day lounge football camp where a bunch of those guys were there. That was crazy. Then, many years later in 2012, I was with Freestyle Love Supreme at the Super Bowl in New Orleans. I met Jerry Rice again, but really for the first time there, and I kind of had this flashback of shaking his hand when I was seven years old.

How do you plan to incorporate music in your original pieces for ESPN as a way to depict notable sports moments?

Well, it’s all music. We’re not doing anything that’s not musical but the music comes first, so we’re really focused on getting the song right then we try to create a visual piece that really complements the song.

What were some recent sports stories that you felt impacted today’s culture or resonated with you?

I think the rise of [Golden State Warrior] Steph Curry as such a major star in basketball is a big thing because, for where we are now, he’s such an atypical player. He wasn’t huge. To be a superstar like that, to be so consistent from the three-point line, it’s added to this idea that sort of you can figure out your own way to be amazing at something. You don’t have to do it the way everybody else does it.

Marshawn [Lynch’s] return to the Raiders has been big for me this season thus far. And the real story about Marshawn — and I hope we get to do a piece on this at some point — is really sort of the anti-gentrification work he’s been doing in Oakland while being back playing for the Raiders. He’s always been in the community, he’s always been around, but his production company is shooting films in Oakland. And I just finished shooting a film in Oakland as well. There’s definitely push for people who are really from Oakland [and] our gaining of some sort of visibility to try and keep some of the things in tact that we loved about that place growing up. [With] his clothing store downtown, Marshawn is really all over the place there, and he’s such a great ambassador of the city both in terms of what he’s doing to actually help people but also his being unafraid to stand up for the thing he believes in. He’s always sort of worn his politics on his sleeve. My favorite thing during the whole “Take a Knee” discussion was when Marshawn finally commented on it, and he was like, ‘I haven’t stood for the National Anthem since I was 17 years old, like, I’ve never done that.’

And then, of course, the Take a Knee [protest] has been huge. I have always been very proud of [former Niners quarterback and current free agent] Colin Kaepernick, despite everything that it’s caused him. I think in the recent debate, it’s gotten so muddy, which is what this administration does really well: muddy up the actual issue of the thing when it comes right down to players, organizations or sports taking a moment to demonstrate that the way that the country’s being run is detrimental to people of color. People who are making up a large part of the folks we have playing these sports are important. I think that, as that debate and that protest continues to morph and take shape, that’s gonna be an interesting one to watch.

It’s sort of fascinating how [President Donald] Trump’s comments about players who take a knee are the kind of things slave owners say about property. That’s what it is when it comes right down to it. And so we’re treating athletes as property, that’s what [Trump] is suggesting. He is suggesting harsher punishments on players who disrespect the country in this way, and the country under his control doesn’t necessarily deserve their respect in the same way and really has nothing to do with the military or any of that. This is about holding a country accountable for the way they treat its citizens.

[thirdgradewritingsamples397]

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The Great Divide: And Other Reasons No One Is Playing Any More

As of late, I had espresso with an individual from the governing body of a significant garments retailer. He had some extremely fascinating perceptions about the manner in which our customer society is evolving. He said an exceptionally clear line isolating society into two separate age bunches is rising; and each age bunch shops uniquely in contrast to the next. How about we consider it The Great Divide. Those more than 50 years of age despite everything shop a similar way they generally have - they go to a blocks and mortar store. These "overs" look, contact and give things a shot before they purchase; and they typically return home with an astonishment or two, things they had not proposed to buy. Shopping in the conventional sense is extremely mind boggling, tedious and a purchaser be careful experience, however the blocks and mortar world is the universe of the more than 50 group  188xoso On the opposite side of the Great Divide are the under 50 individuals who once in a while go to a store. Rather the "unders" shop on the web and just for precisely what they need right now. As a matter of fact, my espresso accomplice said they shop utilizing a cell phone. Continuously moving and performing various tasks, they shop, tune in to music, watch sports, talk and bet any place they are and paying little mind to what else they are doing. The main explanation "unders" go to a store is to get a buy and still, after all that they regularly have the buy conveyed and maintain a strategic distance from the store visit. Theirs is a fulfillment ensured understanding. Whatever they purchase, on the off chance that they don't care for it they send it back and anticipate full credit. Despite the fact that, the chain offers motivations to tempt them to visit the blocks and mortar areas, they once in a while do. The internet is their space. He said there is just a single special case; it appears that when a lady purchases a dress she goes to the store to see, contact and give it a shot before she purchases.

The Great Divide is going to influence business betting similarly as it does retail. Changes in conduct and tastes are not new. Both in betting and shopping, the development from the one conduct to different has been occurring for a considerable length of time. Be that as it may, we despite everything have a foot in each camp in a manner of speaking - not exactly on the web and not exactly in blocks and mortar. That will change as the more than 50 foot, the one in the blocks and mortar world gets too old to even think about standing anyplace.

Betting has been continually developing in the United States for the only remaining century and a half. The sorts of games we play and where we play them has consistently been a moving objective. In the 21st century the absolute most well known rounds of the twentieth century are vanishing into annihilation. Keno, horse hustling, bingo, roulette and craps are on the rundown of jeopardized betting species. Those games are passing on in light of the fact that they are moderate, exhausting and do not pull in anymore, engage or hold players. In the gambling club condition, exhausting isn't worthy and it isn't gainful; yet those games were not continually exhausting.

Take keno for instance. In 1969, I came back to Nevada from 10 years in length excursion. I returned home with nine dollars in my pocket, no attractive aptitudes and no arrangement for what's to come. My cousin was a teacher and had a subsequent activity composing keno in a neighborhood club. He charitably took me to meet his chief and I was recruited on the spot; I worked 30 days without a day away from work. I had seen nothing to contrast and the air, energy and sheer mass of humankind that filled the gambling club each night - particularly on a Saturday night.

On Saturdays there were 25 or so keno journalists on my work day. Every author would compose almost a thousand tickets in an eight-hour move. The normal ticket cost in those days was around a dollar, so every author created roughly $1000 in net income on a bustling night. The thousand dollars would give the gambling club net income of $250; short the departmental costs, the club would have gotten $200 out of each thousand dollars. That $5000 in net benefit for one move on a Saturday in 1969 was extremely huge to the club proprietors.

At the point when Warren Nelson and his kindred keno essayists came to Nevada in the late 1930's to carry out their specialty they remained at the head of the stack. Tired of battling neighborhood law requirement in Montana, Warren just moved to Nevada where betting was lawful and taking care of the sheriff was a bit much. He and others like him and their keno games included a lot of energy just as a great deal of money to gambling clubs around the state. In 1962, the normal keno game income spoke to 25-30% of a normal gambling club's absolute gaming income. Indeed, even as late as 1980, keno statewide despite everything contributed 10-15% of absolute gaming incomes. Today, keno speaks to under 5% of complete incomes and is proceeding to decay.

Keno was brought into club gaming during the Great Depression as an adjustment of the Chinese lottery. The Chinese lottery was played all around the west coast - wherever where Chinese workers had settled in the nineteenth century. The American rendition was quicker; during those years keno was played 4 to multiple times an hour while the Chinese game was played week after week, every day or at most two times per day. The American form offered prizes that were extremely huge for the time - by the 1970s, the top prize was $50,000. Indeed, even in the downturn the top prize was over a thousand dollars. The chance of hitting a "first-class" was essential to the accomplishment of keno; the success could give the fortunate card shark enough cash to take care of the entirety of his money related issues and completely change him.

No other gambling club game offered a similar chance; the main other club games were gaming machines and table games. Gaming machines had a limit of 8000 scientific prospects and along these lines would never offer genuinely enormous prizes - for the most part not more than $50 dollars. Gaming machines were mechanical, slow and were intended to hold 15-25%. Table games were quicker than keno, yet in addition came up short on the "large big stake" that keno could offer.

Keno was essentially more energizing than those gaming machines or table games. Keno was sensational venue with its own exceptional language, masterfully composed tickets, testing scientific issues, and high dramatization over the "calling" of the game and paying of winning tickets. Early keno players were only men who were all the time jobless, or, best case scenario, under-utilized. Keno gave a spot to meet, talk with other men and expectation; it offered a guarantee of winning something, and any success was critical.

Each type of amusement was distinctive in those occasions. All of society moved at an increasingly slow loosened up pace; book clubs offered another book once every month once per week one could see another film or cheer on the host group playing baseball or football. Sports and sports betting have consistently been a significant piece of the American culture, yet in the pre-digital TV, pre-Internet period games and betting open doors were inconsistent. In that universe of a wager or two per week, keno was energizing and relentless.

At the point when keno was famous, there was no desire for speed or of an interminable number of decisions as a fundamental component of energy. Men invested a lot of their amusement energy with other men in a bar or bar or gambling club; the little club turned into a characteristic expansion of that culture. In its time, keno was a get-together that gave energizing diversion. Presently, be that as it may, keno is a backwater occasion, best case scenario.

The finish of keno started with the coming of stepper spaces with a lot bigger big stakes and lower opening holds. Gaming machines have assumed control over the gambling club floor driving all the less productive games into corners or out the entryway. Keno is basically no opposition; a cutting edge gaming machine can offer prizes in the a large number of dollars, taking care of to the player as much as 97 or 98 percent of all out bet keno despite everything takes care of just 75 percent of the bet. A gambling machine presently can offer upwards of 20 choices every moment, while keno battles to convey 6 choices 60 minutes. For a considerable length of time, keno the board has looked without progress for an enchantment equation to bring the game back. They are not the only one; pit administrators have for some time been doing likewise with craps and roulette. It is a numb-skull's mission - an excessive amount of has changed in the public eye for those games to until the end of time discover a group of people.

In the 21st century we have the web, advanced mobile phones, 500-station TV and a whole world all connected together and changing by the occasion. Trusting that something will download onto a PC is viewed as unsuitable. Today, in the event that you put down your wagers on the web, you can bet on a game, a battle or a race some spot on the planet at any hour of the day and you can watch the game as it is played - live. What a world!

The destiny of keno is only one model, I may have utilized pony hustling, craps, roulette, bingo or faro - you recollect faro isn't that right? Pony dashing has discovered a touch of relief by utilizing gaming machines to sponsor the hustling. In any case, a pony track without gaming machines is as jeopardized as a keno or bingo game. Shouldn't something be said about bingo, the staple of houses of worship and social clubs? Bingo resembles keno it has definitely no future. Bingo just works where there is no elective old people homes and church storm cellars. In some other spot bingo is confronted with better decisions for the player. The are lotteries in 44 states, gambling clubs in 37 states, in addition to poker rooms, race tracks and social clubs, bars and truck stops with gaming machines and obviously, a web association in almost every house or on each cell phone - everybody has an option in contrast to bingo. Also, in that lies the issue for the individuals who might ensure or revive the dinosaurs and dodos that keno and bingo have become; everybody has a decision and it is quicker and offers greater prizes.

There is no motivation to assume that all betting, regardless of whether in a club, at a race track, a bingo parlor or the state lottery, isn't confronting that equivalent generational separation and along these lines an emotional move in betting conduct. More youthful Americans are surging all around with a cell phone in their grasp. They expect and trust the gadget to furnish them with all that they need. Those more youthful individuals don't have the persistence to play customary games or to go to conventional p

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Island Rasdhoo

Rasdhoo is the only island I’ve visited 10 (!) times in the last 5 years. The first visit was back in 2015, when a budget holiday was just started in the Maldives.

At that time there was very little information about local islands, but because of that island, I created a blog about local islands and later founded a travel agency to the Maldives.

Where is Rasdoo located?

The island is located in the North Ari Atoll, 60 km west of Male. The size of Island is approximately 500×600 m. Almost the entire territory of the island is built up. The population is about 1200 people. You would think like so many people can live on such a small piece of land, but in reality, you won’t even notice it.

Rasdhoo beach and house reef

At the moment, the beach on the island is not very large, about 100 m in length, which is not so much compared to Ukulhas or Thoddoo. However, during the season it’s packed by people. There are sun loungers for common use on the beach , which is very convenient. Entrance to the water can be inconvenient, especially during low tide, because in some places there is a lot of dead coral. Therefore, in order to avoid injuries, I advise you to wear special shoes (I personally do not do this because I have already walked in such places many times). If you don’t have shoes, it is best to swim right away.

Soon, hopefully, it will change because a joint project with the Indians involves cleaning the coastal area of debris and expanding the beach. Due to the coronavirus, all work is postponed, so if everything goes well, then by the 2020/2021 season the project will be completed. Let’s hope for the best.

The length of the house reef is about 1 km. In this case, you will see all the most interesting stuff on its outer side. The current is constantly changing: today it may not be, tomorrow you can only swim with flippers. If you are a beginner, then you have to snorkel only with a buddy for your own safety.

What you can see on the outer reef? Depending on the current and time of the year, on the reef you can see huge schools of reef fish, batfish, tuna, parrot fish; there are Napoleon fish and schools of barracudas. Rasdhoo is famous for its habitats of black and white tip reef sharks. And for good reason – in one place you can see up to 3-5 sharks, is this not breathtaking? These sharks are absolutely safe for humans and they scare you more than you do them. So when you see them, you can just freeze and watch them.

The most awesome experience while snorkelling was when I met a school of batfish. They were so friendly and close to me, that I could even touch them! Without any reason, they followed me around 100 m. ! I don’t know why they liked me, but it was extremely unusual and breathtaking!

Tip: if you want the fish / rays / sharks to come towards you, then do not make sudden movements do not try to catch them (anyway they are faster than you). Best of all is just to stop and wait.

Several turtles live on the reef and you can see eagle rays almost every day!

If all this staff can be seen on a house reef, then why you should take a snorkelling safari tour? It is a good question that you asked. That is why I advise you to take this tour.

Firstly, you will be taken to places where the water is more transparent, more live corals, more fish.

Secondly, there are places, for example, next to Veligandu resort, where you can see up to 7 (!) turtles and even manta rays! Mantas do not swim ashore because they prefer deep water.

Thirdly, with a high chance you will want to try scuba diving to see more. Perhaps this is a so-so reason for some, but diving opens you a truly new underwater world compared to snorkelling because corals and fish will be much closer and you can make out them in detail.

What else to do on Rasdhoo?

Perhaps the most breathtaking and amazing place I visited in the Maldives is the nearby chain of uninhabited islands and sandbanks. Every time I visit Rasdhoo, I definitely visit these places.

What is so unique about it? First of all, there is lagoon, where you can see a real 50 shades of blue with a beautiful reef in the center. A lot of fish live on the reef, which themselves swim up to you because they expect something delicious from you. They are already taught this. Therefore, if you still decide to feed them, then take a bit of bread in a plastic bottle and mix with water. But be careful, there can be a lot of them.

The second thing is ability to walk by water between these islands and sandbanks. There is some magic in the sandbanks because you are on a piece of land without any plants or palms in the middle of the ocean! Isn’t that fascinating?

The outer reef of the lagoon is rich in its wildlife and you can see sharks, stingrays and turtles. But there is always a current between Rasdhoo and lagoon, so I strongly do not recommend swimming alone there!

Dolphin safari

Between Rasdhoo and Thoddoo there is a place where a group of dolphins gathers in the evenings. They are very friendly and follow the boat. Sometimes they swim so close that you can even touch them (but you shouldn’t do that). But officially you can’t swim with them. You can try, who knows, maybe you are lucky and they will come to you.

Night / Morning Fishing

Usually, it’s still evening activity. No need to be a professional fisherman to catch a fish in Maldives. It is enough to have only reels and fishing lines. You can ask to cook caught fish at your hotel (in most cases this is free of charge, but depends on the hotel). Personally, I’m not a good fisherman, so I tried only once and caught a small snapper.

Romantic dinner

It can be arranged either on the beach or on a sandbank. Based on my experience, the beach is not very suitable for that, because there is almost always someone nearby.

For this reason, a sandbank will be the best solution. After all, there will be no one else except you. The maximum level of privacy is guaranteed!

Suba Diving

Rasdhoo is truly famous for its diving. It’s said, this area is one of the best in the Maldives. Seven (!) diving centres (nowhere else in the Maldives you can find so many centres on one island) offer to take a short training course and dive with an instructor. A great advantage of Rasdhoo is easy to access dive spots even for beginners. Even diving in 8 m depth will open you a new underwater world!

I made my first dive in 2015 near Kuramathi Resort. At that time I was wearing glasses but has dived with contact lenses. After that, I decided that if I return to the Maldives, I will do a LASIK correction and take the course. Just next year it happened. Now I have Rescue Scuba Diver certification, just only one step for a divemaster!

For certified divers, 17 spots are available. The most popular among them:

Madivaru Corner, one of the most famous dive spot in Maldives due to its excellent reef, a large number of fish (barracuda, batfish, Napoleon, etc.), sharks and stingrays. Every time you can see something new.

Caves. The farthest point from Rasdhoo. Drift dive with many caves at different depths. It features a wide variety of soft and hard corals. You can see a lot of lobsters!

Hammerhead point. One of the few places in the Maldives where you can see hammerhead sharks. Morning dive that starts at 6:00. Chance to see sharks 50/50. I tried several times – not lucky.

Manta point. Manta ray cleaning station. You can see up to 5 rays in one place. You can also snorkel at this point, but diving is much better.

Shark Point. Many reef, whitetip and blacktip sharks.

The perfect solution would be to take a package of 8-10 dives and dive into the most popular places. Up to 4 dives can be completed per day.

Therefore, I recommend everyone to try diving, after which your ideas about the underwater world will change dramatically!

For water sports lovers, a centre is open on Rasdhoo where you can rent a jet ski, wake / flyboard, kite surfing and more.

Rasdhoo Infrastructure

Rasdhoo is the administrative center of the North Ari Atoll. This means that the island has everything you need for life:

– groceries and hardware stores. There you can buy fruit and drinks, and also beach staff. It’s very convenient for those who left something at home. – gift shops. There are 6 gift shops on the island. There are lots of various souvenirs, everyone can find something to his liking. – several cafes. There are 4 local cafes (two more are coming) on the island, and what’s more, most of them are intended for tourists. – dive centres. There are 7 dive centres on the island. And one water sport centre – a bank;

– ATM (your can withdraw rufies only, the service fee is 100 ryfiyaas, and it doesn’t matter how much money you’re going to take out); – a branch office of the mobile network operator. – a hospital. They can help you in a case if you have got a minor illness. Otherwise, they’ll transfer you to Male by speedboat. – a post office; – a police station.

Where to stay?

There are a lot of places to stay, already about 30. The cost varies from $ 40 to $ 110 per night.

I always stay only at Shallow Lagoon Rasdhoo. And that’s why:

Firstly, this is one of the first hotels I’m working with since 2017. During this time, I organized holidays for clients from 40 countries to that hotel, and there were no concerns during that time. I also brought my friends here several times while I was living in the Maldives in 2016-2017. Everyone was satisfied.

Secondly, they are very responsible and easily go to meet customers (which is not so common in the Maldives), therefore they are always ready to satisfy any of your wishes. The staff is always nearby, so there is no need to look for anyone if you need anything. In this hotel you will feel like at home!

Thirdly, Shallow Lagoon Rasdhoo is almost the only example of a hotel that is developing and expanding. I work with 20+ hotels on local islands, so I can see the changes. For example, in three years they expanded their area by 3 times and now they have the largest garden on Rasdhoo!. They have their own free snorkeling kits, including life jackets. Free unlimited tea, coffee, water.

Fourth, they have a separate block, which is located on the beach, with an ocean view. No other hotel on the island can offer an experience like that. Soon they will finish another block near the main hotel. Thus, the total number of rooms will increase to 17.

Fifthly, they recently equipped a new kitchen and hired a chef from Sri Lanka, who used to work at Adaaran Rannalhi Resort (the vast majority of hotels can only afford Bangladeshi or local). Therefore, high-quality food is guaranteed!

Sixth, I have an exclusive partnership with them. This means that I can offer you the most attractive prices for accommodation, meals, excursions.

This hotel is above average price range and they used to work with agents directly (not through booking or agoda). But this cost is fully justified by the quality of service they provide.

Transfer to Rasdhoo

Public ferry

Rasdhoo to Male at 11:00 Every : Sunday , Wednesday

Male to Rasdhoo at 9:00 Every: Monday, Thursday

From Rasdhoo you can also take a ferry to the neighbouring Thoddoo or Ukulhas.

Scheduled speedboat

Runs daily, duration is 1 hour 20 minutes, price is $35 per person.

Male-Rasdhoo at 10:30 and 15.30 – 16.00, on Friday at 9:30 and 15:00

Rasdhoo – Male at 7:30 and 13:30.

Private speed boat

The traveling time is about 1 hour 20 minutes, the cost is $550-650.

Seaplane

The traveling time is about 15 minutes, the return ticket is $375.