#that would basically prevent it from being used commercially

[thoughtportal]

Opinion Here’s how to get free Paxlovid as many times as you need it

When the public health emergency around covid-19 ended, vaccines and treatments became commercial products, meaning companies could charge for them as they do other pharmaceuticals. Paxlovid, the highly effective antiviral pill that can prevent covid from becoming severe, now has a list price of nearly $1,400 for a five-day treatment course.

Thanks to an innovative agreement between the Biden administration and the drug’s manufacturer, Pfizer, Americans can still access the medication free or at very low cost through a program called Paxcess. The problem is that too few people — including pharmacists — are aware of it.

I learned of Paxcess only after readers wrote that pharmacies were charging them hundreds of dollars — or even the full list price — to fill their Paxlovid prescription. This shouldn’t be happening. A representative from Pfizer, which runs the program, explained to me that patients on Medicare and Medicaid or who are uninsured should get free Paxlovid. They need to sign up by going to paxlovid.iassist.com or by calling 877-219-7225. “We wanted to make enrollment as easy and as quick as possible,” the representative said.

Indeed, the process is straightforward. I clicked through the web form myself, and there are only three sets of information required. Patients first enter their name, date of birth and address. They then input their prescriber’s name and address and select their insurance type.

All this should take less than five minutes and can be done at home or at the pharmacy. A physician or pharmacist can fill it out on behalf of the patient, too. Importantly, this form does not ask for medical history, proof of a positive coronavirus test, income verification, citizenship status or other potentially sensitive and time-consuming information.

But there is one key requirement people need to be aware of: Patients must have a prescription for Paxlovid to start the enrollment process. It is not possible to pre-enroll. (Though, in a sense, people on Medicare or Medicaid are already pre-enrolled.)

Once the questionnaire is complete, the website generates a voucher within seconds. People can print it or email it themselves, and then they can exchange it for a free course of Paxlovid at most pharmacies.

Pfizer’s representative tells me that more than 57,000 pharmacies are contracted to participate in this program, including major chain drugstores such as CVS and Walgreens and large retail chains such as Walmart, Kroger and Costco. For those unable to go in person, a mail-order option is available, too.

The program works a little differently for patients with commercial insurance. Some insurance plans already cover Paxlovid without a co-pay. Anyone who is told there will be a charge should sign up for Paxcess, which would further bring down their co-pay and might even cover the entire cost.

Several readers have attested that Paxcess’s process was fast and seamless. I was also glad to learn that there is basically no limit to the number of times someone could use it. A person who contracts the coronavirus three times in a year could access Paxlovid free or at low cost each time.

Unfortunately, readers informed me of one major glitch: Though the Paxcess voucher is honored when presented, some pharmacies are not offering the program proactively. As a result, many patients are still being charged high co-pays even if they could have gotten the medication at no cost.

This is incredibly frustrating. However, after interviewing multiple people involved in the process, including representatives of major pharmacy chains and Biden administration officials, I believe everyone is sincere in trying to make things right. As we saw in the early days of the coronavirus vaccine rollout, it’s hard to get a new program off the ground. Policies that look good on paper run into multiple barriers during implementation.

Those involved are actively identifying and addressing these problems. For instance, a Walgreens representative explained to me that in addition to educating pharmacists and pharmacy techs about the program, the company learned it also had to make system changes to account for a different workflow. Normally, when pharmacists process a prescription, they inform patients of the co-pay and dispense the medication. But with Paxlovid, the system needs to stop them if there is a co-pay, so they can prompt patients to sign up for Paxcess.

Here is where patients and consumers must take a proactive role. That might not feel fair; after all, if someone is ill, people expect that the system will work to help them. But that’s not our reality. While pharmacies work to fix their system glitches, patients need to be their own best advocates. That means signing up for Paxcess as soon as they receive a Paxlovid prescription and helping spread the word so that others can get the antiviral at little or no cost, too.

{source}

[sorcerersandskillusers]

I want to talk about one of the most terrifying and interesting bsd characters who almost no fan remembers.

This character nearly tore down the ADA without ever getting involved herself, yet the entire fandom has ignored her because of her terrible anime adaptation.

Who am I talking about?

Nobuko Sasaki

If you haven't read Dazai Osamu's Entrance Exam, then you probably don't even know who this character is, in the anime she is watered down to the lovesick girlfriend of an actual villain, and you probably dismissed her immediately. But in the light novel, we get to see how dangerous and cunning she really is, to the point she nearly gets the better of Dazai and almost causes the ADA to be shut down. (Fukuzawa says he would have closed the agency if they hadn't caught her)

In terms of intelligence I'd put her on the same level as Mori, just slightly below the super human genius characters i.e. Dazai, Fyodor and Ranpo

The Azure Apostle

For those who don't remember, Sasaki was the Azure Apostle, a mysterious figure who challenged the agency with several horrifying cases, which would all lead to mass casualties if the agency failed to stop them. These were; uncovering an underground organ smuggling operation (which the agency failed to stop and which massively hurt their reputation) stopping a bombing of Yokohama port which could have killed hundreds of people, and preventing a commercial aeroplane from crashing into the city (this was not included in the anime)

Each of the people, who committed these crimes, had no Idea they were being manipulated and thought it was their own idea the whole time. There was no evidence that anyone else had been involved at all, and the agency had no way to connect her to any of the crimes. And she even makes the genius move of framing Dazai, the mysterious new member with suspicious knowledge of the underworld and a hidden past, as the true culprit.

In fact, she only made one mistake, challenging Dazai. If Dazai had been basically anyone else, they would have been cornered and arrested, but since Dazai's mind works on a level even master strategists can't imagine, he was able to turn the tables on her.

But even after Dazai sees through her plans, the ADA still has to act exactly the way she wants them too and stop the plane crash. Even when they know they're being manipulated, they still have to do exactly what she wanted.

Finally, after Dazai and Kunikida confront her and get her to admit to being behind all those crimes, even then they are powerless to stop her.

Even after being involved with so many massive crimes, Sasaki herself hadn't done anything illegal, so within the law the ADA is completely powerless to stop her.

They can't arrest her, and if they try then the agency will be put in even more danger as will many innocent lives. She has completely trapped the ADA, and even Dazai in a choice to follow the law and let her go or take justice into their own hands and prove they will stoop as low as she did.

In the end, there she has them in a perfect deadlock, let her continue her mission, or kill her themselves. Both are bad outcomes for the ADA.

In the end, Dazai has her killed by using a third party (Rokuzo) to shoot her, so the agency can't be blamed for her murder, though this ends her plans it deeply scars Kunikida and shakes his resolve in his ideals.

The trauma from this event still haunts Kunikida to this day, we see that when he is affected by Q's curse, Sasaki is who he sees.

So thats the Azure Apostle, a terrifying master mind who nearly brought down the Armed Detective Agency, but now lets look at the other side of this character.

Nobuko Sasaki Herself

We know several things about Sasaki as a character and her history from the light novel. That she was a brilliant criminal psychologist and was internationally recognised despite being so young

,that she was the ex-lover of the Azure King and the real mastermind behind his plans, and that she had very little motivation of her own.

That's not meant to be an insult to the character, she says herself that she never really had much direction in life, even with her incredible intelligence she never really had anything she wanted to achieve.

But the Azure King was the opposite, he had powerful drive and strong ideals, he wanted to punish criminals who couldn't be touched by the law and when he failed to change the law as a bureaucrat, she offered him an alternative.

A very important thing here is that neither of them were manipulating or forcing the other into this path, as far as we see they genuinely loved each other, each providing something the other couldn't, Sasaki her mind and the Azure King his drive.

When the Azure king died, Sasaki had no path of her own to follow, so she simply kept following his, even though she doesn't seem to have really cared about his cause.

All of this creates a very unique character, you can't say she was driven by revenge, because she wasn't really driven at all. It's more like she was running on momentum, she had chosen a path to follow and could not stop even though there was nothing pushing her down it any more.

She's a perfect antithesis of Kunikida and was the best possible villain a light novel about him could have had.

A man who brings his ideals into reality with his own hands against a woman who uses others to enforce ideals that were never hers to begin with.

Anyway, I made this because Sasaki is criminally underrated in this fandom, If you haven't read "Dazai Osamu's Entrance Exam" I highly recommend it, I've only put a tiny fraction of the amazing story here.

[tanadrin]

IP law as it is currently framed seems to me to be about outputs: is the thing you made obviously a duplicate of a competing product? Is the thing you made taking important and original features that make it obviously a ripoff? Regardless of what the inputs are, if the thing you make or sell bears no resemblance to the original or isn’t even the same kind of thing, it’s not really a violation of IP rights. If I sell a table that consists of nothing but hashes of the individual sentences of Dune according to a proprietary algorithm that’s not (as far as I know) copyright violation. It’s not a competing product, it’s not even vaguely recognizably the same. It’s certainly not masquerading as a novel by Frank Herbert.

And this makes sense insofar as IP law is a fairly recent creation in historical terms designed to promote the arts and sciences. It’s a set of commercial incentives, basically. Reframing all of IP law around the idea of inputs would be a drastic renegotiation of what it is and what it is for and it would radically transform the jurisprudential philosophy behind it as a body of law: does this mean pastiche is now illegal? Is it illegal if your work is obviously inspired by Dune? Should it be? I could certainly see how big rightsholders might want to lobby to make even such inspiration illegal, since if you’re buying indie superhero comic books maybe you’re not buying Marvel or DC ones.

But IP law doesn’t exist to prevent alteration or remix or modification of art. It doesn’t exist to prevent training computer programs on the public internet. I think in order to use IP law as an instrument to do that, you would have to break it, to make it do something it was not fundamentally designed to do, and you would open it up to become a vehicle of a legal regime far worse than anything the CEO of Disney could imagine in his darkest dreams right now.

Also, you know, as someone who writes and draws, I think the idea is morally objectionable! If you want your writing and art to be immune from giving inspiration or being altered in any way or being part of the great conversation of human culture, do it in private and burn it afterward. But putting it online and then complaining that people look at it, download it, do stuff with it beyond passively look at it seems to me to miss the point of creativity.

[feminist-space]

"Long COVID has destroyed my life

I would love nothing more than to “finally ignore COVID,” as the headline to Dr. Ashish Jha’s July 31 op-ed reads (“With a few basic steps, most of us can finally ignore COVID”). As a healthy, vaccinated, and recently boosted 35-year-old, I did what he said: I ignored COVID-19 on a weekend trip with friends in September 2022. But the infection I got as a result has all but destroyed my life.

A week after my infection, I began to experience intense fatigue, overwhelming headaches, and cognitive challenges that continue to this day. These symptoms are debilitating: I can no longer work, socialize, or travel. My finances are dire. And if I am unable to avoid another infection, my condition may deteriorate even further.

Jha wrote of long COVID “treatments” being promising. Perhaps he could clarify what treatments he is referring to, because my doctors say that there are no approved treatments for long COVID.

A recent study funded by the NIH’s RECOVER initiative showed that 10 percent of adults infected with COVID still have symptoms six months later, even with vaccination. By downplaying the prevalence and debilitating outcomes of even moderate long COVID, Jha is signing thousands of people up to the misery and despair with which I live every day.

Ezra J. Spier

Oakland, Calif.

Another view from infectious disease doctors

As infectious disease doctors, we disagree with Dr. Jha’s contention that it is time to ignore COVID-19.

Yes, being vaccinated and taking Paxlovid thankfully decrease the risk of severe disease. But only 43 percent of people age 65 and over and only 17 percent of all Americans had received an updated COVID vaccination by May 2023, and access to Paxlovid treatment is inequitable by race and insurance status.

Long-term complications of COVID can be devastating, including after second infections.

More than half a million Americans have died since the summer of 2021, when sufficient vaccine doses were available: COVID death rates in the United States continue to be double those of Canada. Termination of free tests and “commercialization” of medications as implemented by the federal government will only widen our country’s grisly COVID-related health disparities.

Inevitably, ignoring COVID leads to ignoring the slow-motion epidemic of long COVID. Standing up against such neglect, leaders like Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and Governor Maura Healey can promote meaningful measures to protect our communities: air purification in all schools and public spaces; free COVID-preventive masks (KN95 or N95, not surgical masks); tests, vaccines, and Paxlovid for all who cannot afford to buy them; and concern for and support of long COVID victims.

Dr. Julia Koehler

Boston

Dr. Regina LaRocque

Wellesley

We remain vulnerable to long COVID

Ashish Jha’s position as former White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator is a conflict of interest masquerading as a qualification for his op-ed. Researchers who study long COVID stated in a recent paper in Nature Reviews Immunology that “the oncoming burden of long COVID faced by patients, health-care providers, governments and economies is so large as to be unfathomable.” Rapid tests, which are less accurate with recent strains while PCR tests are less available, and low death rates give a false sense of security.

I agree that despite progress, more buildings need the air filtration and ventilation that would make public life safer. But Jha omits our vulnerability to long COVID after even mild infections, its devastating effects, and higher death rates for hospital-acquired COVID-19, combined with a lack of collective protection in health care settings with unmasked, untested people who prefer to ignore COVID-19.

Aside from advocating vaccines, he describes an everyone-for-themselves approach, not mentioning responsibility to protect others or access to essentials.

Jha dines in a restaurant with his friends while patients even in leading cancer hospitals are forced into Russian roulette, thanks to this approach.

Kathryn Nichols

Cambridge

Vigilance is necessary to prevent long COVID

While I understand the desire to promote optimism amid the ongoing pandemic, I am deeply concerned about the potential consequences of downplaying the importance of COVID precautions and the significant risk of long COVID. As a person living with long COVID for the last 16 months despite being vaccinated and boosted, I have experienced post-exertional malaise, fatigue, headaches, joint and muscle pain, cognitive dysfunction, and more symptoms that have continued to today. I have tried numerous medicines, supplements, and even participated in a clinical trial, only to find limited relief from the persistent effects of this virus.

Such a stance overlooks the reality that millions more people could end up with long COVID if we fail to remain vigilant in our efforts to combat the virus. Long COVID is a devastating consequence of this virus, and we cannot rely solely on vaccinations to end the pandemic. Even with widespread vaccination, the risk of contracting long COVID remains high. A recent study funded by the NIH’s RECOVER initiative showed that 10 percent of adults infected with COVID still have symptoms six months later. Minimizing the significance of long COVID not only neglects the suffering of long-haulers but also risks undermining public health efforts to control the spread of the virus.

By raising awareness about the risk of long COVID, media outlets can play a pivotal role in educating the public and promoting continued vigilance. Responsible reporting on the enduring impact of long COVID can serve as a reminder that the pandemic is far from over and that we must remain committed to taking necessary precautions to protect ourselves and others. Highlighting the struggles of long COVID survivors and the lack of proven treatments can spur further research and medical advancements in addressing this condition. Empathy and support for those living with long COVID are essential in paving the way for better understanding, compassionate care, and better health outcomes for everyone as COVID rates increase again this summer.

Travis Hardy

Norwalk, Conn.

Link https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/08/05/opinion/cant-ignore-long-covid-jha/

[surrealisticduvet]

Album Review: Infinite Rider on the Big Dogma (1979)

What is it? 

Infinite Rider… on the Big… Dogma.

What?

With this album, I decided to go with the “write as you re-listen” method of reviewing, since I knew I had so much to say about many of the songs individually. I hope this is as half as enjoyable to read as it was to write. As always, please let me know if you have any comments or dissenting opinions, I would love to hear them!

Without further, or really any, ado, we have “Dance”, a frivolously thrilling and unusual new style from our Michael. I am always a little shocked by its usage here as an opener, so used to it being the outro to Elephant Parts, in which many Infinite Rider songs feature. The instrumentation is rich and complex, in stark contrast to the lyrics –  “All I wanna do is dance and have a good time”. In some ways it leaves you confused as to why this wasn’t a big radio hit - is it the way he sings it, almost ironic in its empty-headedness? Is it just his bad luck? The song is too short to let you ponder for long. 

Next, we have “Magic” – my main gripe with this song, unfortunately not a bug but a feature, is the kitschy way he sings some of the high notes (we know for a fact he can hit them without so much falsetto fanfare) but it does add to the subtle irony of the song. Hidden underneath that facade, buried in the full, sustained notes of the chorus, is his true capacity. This song has a bit of a festive undertone with the bells lightly jingling, adding to the feeling of, genuinely, magic. Once again, this song is expertly produced, musically (aside from the background vocals “do-do-dooing” which I think is sometimes overkill) - there are a lot of layers which prevent it from sounding like a cheap holiday commercial.

I completely stand by the belief that “Flying” is an Eagles parody. Listen to this, and then listen to something like “One of These Nights.” I maintain also that this song is at least a parody of something, with lyrics that are deceptively genuine at first before dipping into deep unseriousness, all sung as straight-faced as ever. The middle eight here is again just exquisite. I wish there was an instrumental of this track particularly, although his vocals are so good that I wouldn’t push too hard for it. This song sounds like it ought to be played to a packed arena, something almost on the same level, musically, as “Comfortably Numb.” As the song fades out, you get a bit of a better listen to the drum and rhythm section, which has a unique stylistic blend and flare that, once again, adds depth to what otherwise might be called a boring album. (Misguided Rateyourmusic users have called it his “most accessible” album [read: contemporary, standard-issue, basic! – more on this at the end] but I disagree, at the risk of sounding pretentious… Infinite Rider is a complex and borderline experimental album; it just so happened that he was experimenting with things that happened to be in popular music at the time.)

Much like taking songs from The Prison out of their context as a soundtrack in order to review them musically, it is critical to take “Tonite” out of the context of Elephant Parts, in which it is evergreen in its evocation of the special as a whole – they were literally made for each other. The lyrics are weird, for Michael - on a first listen, you’ll be a little put off by them, until you get to the bridge and chorus, which swings back to the sort of strangeness that you’re used to, and now the old Hollywood oddness from the beginning starts to make a little sense. Three for three, these songs have so much going on musically that you never have a chance to be bored or question his intentions. There’s expert use of a piano/synth solo here which in some ways really dates the album as being from the late 70s/early 80s but that’s what I like so no complaints here. As the song ramps up towards the end (nearly unrecognizable from the moderately paced introductory verse) Michael slips into a rougher tone and drives the whole thing home. Careful listeners will catch the “I’m still inside of a little glass tube - I’m still inside of this room” as it fades out; a tasteful callback to the final scene of Head (1968), or just a bit of before-its-time commentary on the effect of fame on an individual’s psyche? Infinite Rider gives you no time at all to chew and swallow thoughtfully - the next song is already upon us.

“Carioca” is the first and only real reprieve you’ll get on this album, and it is still a wonderful song. Much like “Rio,” this song is inspired by what we can assume to be Michael’s fond memories of seeing Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in Flying Down to Rio (1933). His ability to belt out a chorus shines here, supported by pleasant instrumentation. Take a breath while you can, because up next we have…

… “Cruisin’”. If you’ve heard any song from this album already, it’s probably this – and you’ve probably seen a little bit of the music video from Elephant Parts, too. The verses are low-key and casual, and the whole thing reeks of sun-tan oil and hot tarmac. Whether or not you consider this to be Michael’s coming-out party, it’s still a compelling song much in the style of something like the Traveling Wilbury’s “Tweeter and the Monkey Man.” On its own, the song is fairly middle-of-the-road; it’s the music video that really makes it pop, with visual cues lining up perfectly to the song and Michael’s own performance of it (in those sunglasses...) 

From “Cruisin’” we dive straight into “Factions,” perhaps more memorably titled in early versions as “The Daughter of Rock n' Roll.” He didn’t invent anything new with the song, but definitely proved that he could keep up with the times, musically. The things he does with his voice here are almost foreign, a tone and gravel that we’ve never heard from him before. The song itself is good, with clever lyrics and an interesting story, a classic Nesmithian take on the contemporary “rock ‘n’ roll song about rock ‘n’ roll.” It’s not at the top of the album for me, but any song that effectively uses and rhymes the word “Boogie” gets a free pass for me. 

Take another deep breath at the end of this one, because you’re about to experience what is possibly, maybe probably, my favorite song of his ever: “Light.” Immediately, he has dropped the ironic and performative vocal quirks, and is once again singing in his own sweet tenor, with just a few humorous dips to keep you guessing. This song effortlessly blends bleating saxophone solos with laid-back steely drum meanderings, quivering organ overtones, and a sturdy, pulsing bassline. The lyrics are simple, yet powerful – “but the light from the window is the brightest of all” among others. I find it interesting that the song is called not “lights” plural, but “Light,” singular, implying that these eclectic lights are all interconnected, blending together from and into one infinite form. Once you have seen the music video for this, you’ll never listen to the song without its dancer flashing and jumping through your mind, it’s truly mesmerizing and at times otherworldly – again, the visions of the dancer and Michael are melded together by the use of mirrors and cutaways to create a mind bending effect. “Light” clocks in at 3:21 and feels even shorter; it ends almost abruptly, with the sax trailing off. I usually have to listen to it at least a second time to really let it sink in. 

One Tumblr user has in the past posited that we should “kill Horserace and replace it with a second Light” (Surrealisticduvet, 2024), and I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment. Much like “The Other Room” is on From a Radio Engine to the Photon Wing, “Horserace”’s placement here is jarring, uncouth, and downright disrespectful to the rest of the album. Okay – now that I’ve gotten all that out of my system, let me explain why it just doesn’t work for me. While many songs on Infinite Rider have lyrics that are tongue-in-cheek, parodical, and dare I say intentionally silly, “Horserace” feels to me almost sloppy. Many words are rhymed with each other in such a way that it doesn’t feel intentional, meaning that by default it sounds amateurish. Michael here utilizes the same growl that he does on “Factions” and to some extent “Dance,” but it overpowers the track to the point where I had a hard time focusing on the music. (When I managed to, I confirmed to myself that it wasn’t as intricately crafted as any of the first 7 songs, and certainly not the last one we just listened to.) I’ve always said that even Michael’s worst songs are still worth listening to; such is not the case with “Horserace.” Listen to “Light” a second time and then hit that skip button.

“Capsule” is another one of those songs that Michael co-wrote with a few other people, and it is, dare I say, obvious. I like what he was trying to do, and the song sounds interesting, with a cool, jazzy swing. I don’t think it’s among his best work, either vocally or lyrically, and it’s a bit of a disappointing closer to an otherwise fast-paced and densely enjoyable album. 

I have to give a little shout out to the album’s outtakes, which I actually didn’t even know about until very recently. “Rollin’” is a real foot-tapper that takes his old song “Roll With the Flow” and revamps it in late-70’s radio-rock fashion with a “Mama Rocker”-style piano breakdown that sweeps up and down the keys. The whole song is pretty simple, but fun and effective, and I really like it. “Walkin’ in the Sand” is an interesting track, a true outtake in the sense that it breaks free from the one-word-title constraint he set for himself on this album. It’s like nothing I’ve ever heard from him, ramping up his affinity for minor-keys to a new level, with a glaring bass riff like something from the Arctic Monkeys (sorry, I can’t think of a more period-appropriate comparison). I’d be curious about what he could do in this style if given a whole album to play with – but if all we ever got was this one song, I’m still thrilled. 

Conclusion:

I think Infinite Rider, despite being perhaps more well-known during its time than his other albums, is largely misunderstood. (To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to enjoy his… oh, god, listen to me.) Some reviews call it his most accessible album, and laud his return into the sphere of pop music. I have a hard time explicitly agreeing with these assertions; I don’t think the album’s true intentions are as wholesome, simplistic, and popularity-seeking as some may claim. Much like The Prison was written as a soundtrack, Infinite Rider was written as a “video album” – to listen to “Magic” or “Cruisin’” on their own, without the music video, is to experience only half of the song. Even tracks which were not released with a visual component, I would argue, must still be considered within this context.

Critics also say that this album was overproduced and that there’s too much going on, instrumentally; this is just a difference of taste – I like an album you can listen to half a dozen times over and still hear something new. One amateur reviewer (my peer, I suppose) said that they appreciated the album since, despite its tongue-twisting title, it was easy to enjoy without having to crawl into Nesmith’s head to “get” it. Well, I guess I can’t argue with that – Infinite Rider’s appeal lies in the fact that to the casual listener, it is a good rock ‘n’ rollin’ time that ends after 38 minutes and 15 seconds; for anyone with enough time on their hands to dig a little deeper, rest assured that Michael will not disappoint.

[uboat53]

You know, there are times when Elon Musk's ignorance of a topic slides by because I don't know enough about the topic to contradict him, but there are definitely times when he says something so obviously stupid that it smacks me in the face.

On Twitter in the last day or so, he said the following: “Cybertruck is the worst possible choice for a car bomb, as its stainless steel armor will contain the blast better than any other commercial vehicle."

As an engineer, I've got to say, that's a wild claim. Let's pick it apart, shall we?

First of all, if you watched the video, what it did in this case was not containing the blast, it directed it. In other words, it was probably less dangerous to people walking along the sides of the vehicle, but it was probably way more dangerous to people behind the vehicle where the plating is much thinner and the explosion actually came out. Fortunately there was no one behind this particular vehicle when it exploded in Las Vegas but normally when you're just using a car there's other cars behind you or there's people in the parking lot or something. Now, we still don't know the cause of this particular explosion, but it's still possible that it was a design flaw that other cybertrucks would also have. I can tell you that I definitely feel a lot less safe driving behind a cybertruck than I did yesterday.

Secondly, when you talk about how the plating contains the explosion… think for a second about where it's being contained. We've already see how the "indestructible" nature of the cybertruck makes it a death trap when a shipping CEO's cybertruck became submerged in a pond and she drowned because no one could break her car open. The same thing is true here, you're "containing" the explosion to a place where the owners of the car are. In other words, your customers. You're containing an explosion where it will kill your customers. Again, we don't know whether this is a fault in the cybertruck itself, but Musk is now advertising that, if it is (and even if it isn't), it will definitely kill the people inside it! That does not make me want to get in one.

Thirdly, even if it was fully containing the blast, containing a blast isn't necessarily a good thing. Look, if you can prevent a blast from spreading out and injuring people, that's great, but if you can't… Every material eventually reaches it's breaking point and the more pressure builds up before that breaking point is reached, the more dangerous the resulting explosion will likely be. The same force of explosion released inside a sphere of plywood or inside of a stainless steel pressure cooker will cause very different amounts of damage if it's enough to shatter the stronger one. In the case of the plywood, you'll have the concussive effects of the blast, any incendiary effects, and you'll have plywood shrapnel being thrown out at high velocity, but in the case of the pressure cooker both the concussive and shrapnel effects will be even greater because the pressure built up even higher before being released. He's basically saying it's less deadly for light blasts and more deadly for heavy blasts.

So yeah, I've got enough education to know that Musk's reassurance/boasting isn't as reassuring as he seems to think it is. As always, he knows enough to sound knowledgeable to people who don't actually study what he's talking about, but as soon as he talks about something you do know about it becomes clear that he's not as smart as he likes to think he is.

[dangerphd]

This is a vest done in brioche stitch, out of some yarn I got through Shave ‘em to save ‘em. The yarn is gorgeous…but I don’t wear white or cream. I’m thinking about frogging this, dyeing the yarn, then re-knitting. I’ve never dyed yarn before. Any thoughts or advice?

all the Internet advice is probably good with regard to what kind of dyes you can use versus what kind of fibers, I assume if it's from shave to save them it's 100% wool? I am perfectly happy with food color and occasional natural dyes and alum and iron mordants, and can personally attest that wool dyed with Kool-Aid not only stands the test of time with regard to color retention, but kind of still smells grape-y sometimes, twenty years later.

after tinking back an entire knitted piece to reclaim, lots of people like to give the wool a steam bath to relax it before they dye, but I like to wet the wool before I slide it into the dyed bath anyway (evens out color distribution), so I usually skip the steam step…

With regard to fancy technique, you can mordant the wool before dying, in a separate bath… Meaning you could mordant half the yarn in iron and half in aluminum, and then slip them both into the same dye bath after the fact to see what kind of color changes you get; but it's also totally fine to just dump the mordant into the dye, stir the whole thing up then add the fiber and let it simmer… I personally enjoy stove top, because I like being able to see it, but I know a lot of people prefer the oven method… I think they work basically the same. along those lines, I notice no difference between using vinegar, or citric acid to reduce the pH of the bath, doesn't seem to matter. Be careful using too much acid if you want to dye purple though because it can break spectacularly. 

The most critical advice I would have, is to tie your skeins looser than you think. like barely even a loop around the skein even if the individual strands were spread completely out. The tiniest bit of compression will act as a resist and prevent the dye from getting in there… I have found this happens with professional/commercial dyers, Etsy Dyers, everyone… There will be just a pale spot in the skein and so then you have a pale spot every 61 inches or whatever, and I am the kind of person that that will make absolutely crazy if the rest of the dye is solid. and a super loose loop will be plenty for figuring out how to untangle the yarn soup when you're done. 

if you would like to dye the skein in a repeating colorway, my best advice is to lay it out on plastic wrap, add your dye just to areas you want to receive it, wrap the plastic wrap tightly around the now dyed skein such that all of the yarn is in contact with the dye (squish it together as you roll it up), then place your entire plastic wrapped tube into a baking pan and pour boiling hot kettle water over it, to steam set the dye. I probably have pictures of this process when I was space-dying so I could do the float pattern. 

finally, just a question, do you hate the vest? Cause it looks like it fits well, and you could just dye the vest… Not that you asked, but if I were going to dye the vest I would dunk the whole thing into a bath let it sit for a little while, then pull it out and hang it up to get a drip dry gradient vest… 

[paladin-of-nerd-fandom65]

Cool answers, happy super early valentine day lol ❤️ got some more for you! :D

1: are they fans of the Super Bowl/puppy bowl or just like to watch the new commercials?

2: in your universe, will zod ever be redeemed, like maybe teaming up with his son against a massive invasion from darkseid or mongul & maybe sacrifice his life for his son, or is zod just plain bad?

3: this maybe a little dark, but have the duo been in a terrifying scenario before, like a school pew-pewing?

4: what is one thing they would do for a million dollars?Like brush their teeth & then drink orange juice.

5: how would their lives be if they didn’t meet or at least not 1st best friends?

6: I think I ask this already but are much are they a hugger on a scale of 1-10?

As you can tell, my universe is ready for questioning if you want to ask me anything? Asks are open ;)

1) Oh easy….its about the ads especially for whatever new movies or video games are coming out that year the Duo focus on. Though every now and then it can be an ad not related to those things which also gets their attention. A prime example being that time Dr Evil took over General Motors.

2) Probably he can take a similar Omni Man direction in trying to find some redemption for the errors of his ways though even Zod might know deep down he might never truly receive that forgiveness from Chris for the years of harsh treatment dished out since basically the latter’s birth. Perhaps uneasy alliances against worse threats including Xa Du and Darkseid between Zod and his son’s adoptive family can occur to which Chris then earns Zod’s respect as a worthy soldier for his own cause (Truth & Justice) which can be a small step on the massive mountain climb that is full reconciliation.

(More below the cut as the answer for Question 3 might be heavy handed)

3) Oh My yes they have. Mainly for Jake, an incident like that at his school occurred during what was an average day. Suddenly during Pre Algebra, loud banging noises sounding like whip cracks were heard down Bludhaven Academy’s hallways so his teacher took the time trying to investigate but thankfully got out of the perpetrator’s way and had his class go into lockdown mode. The issue was that unfortunately, the perpetrator was a recent grad from this school who knew about said lockdown so they weren’t easily fooled, blasting through the door’s locks. The amount of shots fired and bullets spraying all over that classroom can only bang loudly in Jake’s ears as much as his eyes can see one by one some of his classmates try making a run for it either past the attacker or through the window, only to catch their aim and get mercilessly hit by said bullets. Finally, it took a clever distraction from Meredith who risked getting into the aiming sights did Jake finally act, using his acrobatics and a wooden measuring ruler found on the red crimson fluid soaked floors as an impromptu escrima stick to knock the weapon out of the attacker’s hand and knock them out cold, ending the rampage.

In all, 45 total lives, including about 2/3 of Jake’s algebra class, were lost to this incident, and out of those 45, 41 of them were all below the age of 18. Needless to say, Meredith and Jake had to ask extensive permission not to be counted as heroes in this case (in addition to Bruce and Dick lobbying hard with the news media not to reveal any details about the attacker and their background prior to this incident) as that would distract from the real tragedy and the actions needed to prevent such from ever happening again. The hashtag #BludhavenAcademyBrave or #BAB for short trending very quickly the very next day, complimented by Chris and Jake having a blue and white armband with that shortened hashtag as Nightwing and Skybird respectively.

4) Money isn’t always a factor of concern for them since not only are they happy with the lives they do have but there’s also the small elephant in the room that is Mr. Owner of the Third Largest Corporation in the DCU, Gotham’s Prince Playboy Bruce Wayne being their ally and a factor to it. But if they have to earn a million dollars, I can see Chris and Jake attempting a feat that breaks world records of a sort or participate in many Japanese game shows. A popular one in real life that was around in the 80s was called Za Gaman (‘Endurance’) where its contestants would endure some of the nastiest, most punishing and messed up types of challenges imaginable ranging from being tied to a paddle steamer’s engine, dunking back and forth into the water or eating ice cream while buried neck deep in the snow. That I can see the Duo doing for a Million US dollars.

5) Chris and Jake without ever meet each other would be frankly in much more sadder and less fulfilling lives as they would not have as strong of a drive for adventure beyond just doing so due to their respective families and in Jake’s case with other friend and his Big Sis’ friends doing so. It’s likely Jake might’ve quit the hero business altogether even after his powers came in some time later and trying living a normal civilian life while Chris only really goes into hero duties if he was accompanying Jon. So overall, a lot more would change in ways neither one want to really think about

6) Chris: 8 on good days and 9 on days he feels off and needs a hug for comfort. Though he’d only go for it if he’s given a form of permission

Jake: 10 easily. Both Mar’i and him frankly. It’s a family thing, coming from Kory of course XD

Thanks for these asks as always @pin-crusher2000

It’s very appreciative and yes you can be expecting questions for your universe in due time ;-)

[kris-and-the-pnictogens]

Studying Generalism

It's taken us altogether too long to realize that if we had a proper place or station in life, a profession or occupation, it's to be a generalist. Every time we thought that we'd found a career in the usual specific sense that's assumed by U.S. society, we got bounced out of it. As you might imagine that wasn't pleasant to experience. It's meant decades of frustration and anger and self-loathing, racking up a string of failed careers. But even a failed career means experience and it has been of great long-term advantage to us, it seems, to have acquired such a wide variety of experiences, even if they were short and shambolic ones.

But how does one become a generalist? Pursuing a specific career is far more straightforward and well-documented, but there's no discipline or body of wisdom corresponding to generalism, is there? Actually...there is, but the difficulty is that almost all of it is likely to be bogus. For there's one sort of human being most likely to assert that they're generalists, and that's the man of business, the "entrepreneur" or the "founder" or the "investor". Because they're merely interested in success in the conventional capitalist sense, the would-be "founders" of the world are aimless and capricious in their interests, but they're easily persuaded to think that this means they're universal geniuses, good at everything they dabble with. Thus I don't doubt that if I looked for books purporting to describe how to be a generalist, I'd find thousands—and they'd all be terrible.

If there's any truly helpful and salutary approach to generalism, I suspect, it's through spirituality and mysticism. I have encountered the idea that magic or "the occult" can be regarded as the art of arts, the human discipline that really and truly does touch upon everything else. I'm reminded of my one taste of the work of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, the famous polymath of the German Renaissance, and was struck to learn that it was very much like an outline of all known human knowledge. If you were a polymath in those days, like Agrippa or Avicebron or Paracelsus, very likely you gained a reputation as an occultist and practitioner of magic. The "Enlightenment" and the severities of the Christian Reformation and Counter-Reformation rather put an end to such notions, and studying the occult became very disreputable and unsafe. But I would like to reverse that trend! =D

We are having a very difficult time figuring out how to get started. It has been an uphill battle of years simply to impose even the most basic of disciplines upon ourselves and internalize them. To put it bluntly, authoritarian U.S. society does everything possible to prevent the establishment of personal disciplines: we're supposed to jump around when we're told and that means we're discouraged as much as possible from having any strongly developed personality or sense of values. Frauds and charlatans have captured this field, each selling their own canned (and poisonous) variation on how to have an identity or purpose, always pitched in commercial terms: this is how to be successful, how to make friends and influence people, and so forth. Another difficulty is that we were never properly taught how to study! U.S. schools give this practically no attention. It's a sink-or-swim thing: the child is expected to figure out how to study on their own. Hence we learned nothing but bad habits and terrible coping mechanisms for our various cognitive and neurological issues...we never learned how to do it correctly.

It really does feel like...Back to Zero, if I may say so (q.v. Fate/Zero.)

~Chara of Pnictogen

[perseidlion]

Welp. This is some bullshit.

I was on Etsy and this came up:

This "service" tries to get around its shittiness with disclaimers and things like this. This is still NOT okay, let's be clear, unless it's YOUR fic and you just want a copy for yourself. This is definitely not okay for anyone else's fic, whether you sell the book or not. Because this service is profiting from fanfic.

What's hilarious about the above disclaimer is that it's basically saying 'consider making your fanfic not fanfic so you can print it.'

What also gets me is that this isn't even a unique service. Anyone can print and ship a book using any number of services with the material they request for less than what they're charging - often a LOT less. So they're ripping you off on top of everything and possibly doing the equivalent of dropshipping. It's possible they have their own printing setup and are printing it themselves, but honestly that doesn't make a difference.

What also makes me suspicious is this shop also has bound fics by different authors, so I am pretty sure they're already binding and selling fic they didn't write. Even if the writer gave permission, that is also not allowed. Because repeat after me:

YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO MAKE MONEY OFF FANFIC, FULL STOP. NEVER. IT IS NOT YOUR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY AND TRYING TO DO SO ENDANGERS ALL FANFIC. THIS IS ESPECIALLY EGREGIOUS WHEN THESE PEOPLE TAKE FIC THEY DIDN'T WRITE WITHOUT THE PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR AND SELL IT.

Look, if you just want to put your own fics on your shelf, you can find printing services that will do that for you for a lot less than these people are charging. The printer is still technically profiting off of another IP, but at the prices other services charge, that is a relatively small amount of money. Also, there's a difference between those services existing and people knowingly doing something on the edge of fair use, versus a shop like this which is trying to encourage people to print fic.

If this was allowed, just about every fic writer would have a storefront where they offered print versions of their fic. But it's not allowed. So why would it be okay for this service to encourage people to print fics and profit off that printing?

Fic is not public domain work. It is not fair game for this sort of commercial activity. What's worse, these printers are making money off the back of a fic writer who can't monetize their own work.

I find it suspect that nowhere in their description does it say you need to either own the work or have explicit permission of the author to print it. They try to use the shield of 'personal use' and 'gifting' to cover their asses.

You can try and find this shop if you want but honestly I don't want to give them any attention. And I highly doubt there's anything to be done about taking the store down if your own fic wasn't being distributed.

Shit like this is why fic writers quit writing and delete all their works.

EDIT: I did some digging and discovered that this shop is set up by a print-on-demand company. These people absolutely know what they're doing.

I also found this "disclaimer."

All of this is semantics. None of this makes this okay. They're trying to encourage people to print books with them so they can profit, when the person who wrote it can't. There is no "might breach" here. Unless you are an officially licensed piece of writing, it's ALWAYS breaching copyright. And they're the ones commercializing other peoples' writing by encouraging people to give them money to print work they don't own.

Also, why does limiting a print run to only 25 prevent commercial distribution?

Sigh.

[ingek73]

Extremist or mainstream: how do Tim Walz’s policies match up globally?

Ed PilkingtonFri 16 Aug 2024 12.00 CEST

Within hours of Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, being chosen by Kamala Harris to be her Democratic presidential running mate, Donald Trump and team began attacking him as a “dangerously liberal extremist”.

Trump surrogates seized on Walz’s record of expanding voting rights for former felons, combatting the climate crisis, and other measures as proof that Harris-Walz would be the “most radical ticket in American history”.

If you step back from the melee, and look at his gubernatorial acts through a global lens, they appear anything but extreme. From the perspective of other industrialised nations, what Trump denounces as leftwing radicalism looks little more than basic public welfare provisions.

Far from being militant and revolutionary, initiatives such as paid family leave, free college tuition and rudimentary gun controls – all championed by Walz in Minnesota – have long been regarded as middle-of-the-road and unremarkable in large swathes of the world. Through this frame, it is not Walz who is the outlier, but his Republican critics.

Here are how some of Walz’s most impactful reforms compare with the rest of the world.

Free school lunches

View image in fullscreenTim Walz gets a huge hug from students at Webster Elementary in Minneapolis after he signed into law a bill that guarantees free school meals on 17 March 2023. Photograph: Star Tribune/Getty Images

‘On fire with excitement’: Tim Walz’s former students react to nominationRead more

Walz’s record: “What a monster! Kids are eating and having full bellies so they can go learn.” That was Walz’s sardonic reply to CNN when he was asked about having introduced free breakfast and lunch for all Minnesota schoolkids. The 2023 measure puts Minnesota among just eight US states that offer school meals at no cost to all children, no matter their family’s income.

Around the world: Several countries provide free lunches for their children nationwide. Sweden, Finland and the three Baltic nations all provide meals at no cost for all schoolchildren irrespective of income, and many more European countries provide targeted or subsidised meals. Even a developing country such as India ensures access to lunch for more than 100 million kids daily.

“The idea of offering free meals to all students during the school day is hardly new – many countries already do so,” said Alexis Bylander at the Food Research and Action Center, a US anti-hunger organisation. “Numerous studies show the benefits, including improving student attendance, behaviour and academic success.”

Combatting the climate crisis

View image in fullscreenPublic works employees run a water pump to prevent flood waters from coming up through the storm drains in Stillwater, Minnesota, in 2023. Photograph: Nicole Neri for The Washington Post via Getty Images

Walz’s record: In February 2023 Walz signed legislation committing Minnesota to having all its electricity produced by wind, solar and other clean energy sources by 2040 – an even more ambitious timeframe than adopted by California, America’s sustainable energy leader. The legislature also passed more than 40 climate initiatives, including expanding charging infrastructure for electric vehicles and introducing a new code for commercial buildings to cut energy use by 80% by 2036.

Around the world: By global standards, Minnesota’s ambitions do not stand out. Some 27 countries have written into law target dates by which they will become net zero – that is, stop loading additional greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. In the developed world, Finland is leading the way, pledging to be net zero by 2035, and to begin absorbing more carbon dioxide than it produces by 2040. In December, almost 200 countries at the Cop28 climate summit in Dubai agreed to call on all countries to transition away from fossil fuels and for global renewable energy to be tripled by 2030.

Child tax credit

View image in fullscreenTim Walz reads a story to a group of kindergarteners in St Paul on 17 January 2023. Photograph: Glen Stubbe/Star Tribune via Getty Images

Walz’s record: Last year the governor signed into law a child tax credit program for low-income Minnesota families. The measure sought to fill the hole left by a federal scheme that expired in 2021 after Congress failed to extend it. The Minnesota plan is the most generous of its type in the US, offering $1,750 per child and reaching more than 400,000 children.

Around the world: The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the forum of high-income democracies, reported in 2018 that 34 of the 35 countries with available information provided their people with some form of family benefit including tax credits. The OECD compared the value of family benefits for two-child families, measured as a percentage of average earnings, across 41 countries and found that the US came in at No 40, with only Turkey being less generous in its support.

Basic gun controls

View image in fullscreenTim Walz hands out pumpkin bars to a gun safety advocate before the first day of the legislative session in St Paul in 2023. Photograph: Abbie Parr/AP

Walz’s record: The governor identifies as a proud gun-owner and hunter, and he accepted Harris’s invitation to be her running mate wearing a camo hat. That didn’t stop him in May 2023 enacting a slew of gun safety measures, including requiring all private sales of handguns and semi-automatic rifles to go through an FBI background check that looks for evidence of criminal or mental health risks. The changes also introduced a “red flag law” that allows relatives and other interested parties to intervene when someone is in danger of injuring themselves or others with guns.

Around the world: International comparisons show that Americans own vastly more guns than civilians in other rich countries – 121 guns per 100 Americans, compared with five guns per 100 people in the United Kingdom. The number of gun killings per 100,000 people is also vastly higher: 4.12 in the US, 0.04 in the UK.

Other countries also have much tougher gun controls that make those introduced by Walz look weak by comparison. Canada requires gun buyers to wait 28 days before acquiring a firearm, and imposes mandatory safety training and a ban on military-style rifles that does not exist in the US. The UK also bans some semi-automatic rifles and most handguns. Japan tightly restricts gun ownership, banning most guns other than air guns and a few other special categories and even then requiring owners to submit to annual inspections.

Paid family and medical leave

Walz’s record: House File 2, enacted by the governor last year, gave Minnesotans access to up to 20 weeks in every year of partial wages to cover medical leave after a life-changing diagnosis, mental health leave, or time off to care for a new baby. “Paid family and medical leave is about investing in the people that made our state and economy strong in the first place,” Walz said as he signed the bill.

Around the world: The US is the only OECD member country without a national law giving all workers access to paid leave for new mothers. Thirty-seven out 38 OECD countries offer national paid maternity leave – the only exception being the US. France, which holds the top spot, allows mothers and fathers to take paid leave until their child is three years old.

The US is also one of only six countries with no form of national paid leave covering either family or medical leave in the case of a health concern.

Voting rights for former felons

Walz’s record: The governor signed a bill that restores the vote to more than 50,000 Minnesotans who have been convicted of a felony. The Trump campaign denounced the measure as evidence of Walz’s “dangerously liberal agenda”, which is ironic, given that Trump himself, as a convicted felon, will only be able to vote for himself in November thanks to a similar reform in New York.

Around the world: A report released by Human Rights Watch (HRW) in June concluded that the US was an “outlier nation in that it strips voting rights from millions of citizens solely on the basis of a criminal conviction”. In 2022, more than 4 million people in the US were disenfranchised on those grounds. By contrast, when HRW surveyed 136 countries around the world, it found that the majority never or rarely deny the vote because of a criminal record, while those with restrictions tend to be much less draconian in their approach than US states.

[dontforgetoctober3rd]

Spillways (Chapter 4) A Gilded Age fanfic

Faceclaims for George and Randolph Stewart

Contents: Prologue, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3

Word count: approx. 1600

Story Summary: All of New York society is in a tizzy over the news: The Earl of Galloway is in town with his son, the 30 year old (bachelor) Randolph.  Marriage-minded mamas are on the prowl but the Earl and his son eschew most of the lavish parties and teas they’re invited to...except to a certain tea with Agnes Van Rhijn and her niece, Marian.

Rating: Everyone (Ratings will be *by chapter*, so subsequent installments might differ in their rating).

Author's Notes: This is a canon-divergence story that takes place a few months from episode 5 of Season 2.

DISCLAIMER: I am not affiliated with The Gilded Age in any way beyond being a fan, I do not own the Gilded Age characters nor am I using them for any commercial purposes or making money from this, this is just basically word fanart of the show

Beautiful divider by @muchomago

Bertha Russell was beside herself with a mixture of fear…and excitement.  Fear for Miss Brook, as her reputation was currently being fileted to pieces in the papers.  Excitement because Bertha knew she had a solution.

Agnes Van Rhijn had just sent word that she would finally call upon her. This very day. The day of the famous tea all of New york was talking about. 

The note had reached Bertha by messenger at Bloomingdale’s.  Mrs. Van Rhijn wouldn’t say why, just that it was urgent.  The note had not been sealed and no doubt the messenger had read it and would sell his bit of gossip to the highest bidder after this was done. Bertha wagered the note had something to do with Mrs. Blane’s horrid antics.  However, this provided an amazing opportunity. 

A few days ago, Miss Brook and the young Randolph Stewart (he insisted upon dropping the formality of “lord”, as they were in America after all) had happened upon her and her daughter in the park.  The carriage Bertha and Gladys had been using had broken a wheel.  Miss Brook had recognized them and Randolph had kindly offered them use of his rented carriage.

What an interesting ride that had been.  Apparently Mrs. Van Rhijn had known Lord George Stewart previously, having come close to an engagement with him. Randolph was apprehensive about speaking of the matter so openly to a stranger at first, but Miss Brook had encouraged him that Bertha was a trusted friend. And so she and her daughter Gladys became privy to the saga of their neighbor having a strained history with a Scottish Lord. 

This was the chance of a lifetime, and Bertha knew it.  She knew what she must do: get Agnes Van Rhijn to mend fences with Lord Stewart.  Before the Earl called off his acceptance to their tea later that day, as he surely would, due to Mrs. Blane’s defamatory statements in the papers.  If that happened, it would be the death knell for Marian Brook’s place in society but Bertha had every intention of preventing that from occurring.

Many called Bertha a power-hungry social climber, but she didn’t care.  If she managed to pull off her plan, Marian Brook would come out on top and one day be a countess!  Was it so wrong to want the best for people around her?  

Miss Brook had shown Bertha goodwill from the start, despite Mrs. Van Rhijn's edict that Miss Brook shun her, as everyone else had in the beginning.  It was time to repay that kindness. 

Bertha would get those wretched gossip rags off her back if it was the last thing she did.  Miss Brook would no longer be labeled an adventuress and Susan Blane would rue the day she decided to blacken the name of anyone who was her friend.

Gladys was quite apprehensive about her mother inserting herself into the affairs of Mrs. Van Rhijn.

“Mother, I don’t think it wise to meddle with this. The papers are already tearing Marian Brook apart as it is.” Gladys worried, as they hustled into their carriage to hurry home.  “They only mentioned us in passing from that day in the park and painted us as desperate hangers on, even now that we have Mrs. Astor’s favor!  Don’t you think you will be doing Miss Brook more harm trying to play conciliator between her Aunt and that Lord?  We should just offer Miss Brook whatever support-”

“Gladys, my darling.  If a friend of yours was drowning, would you merely swim by her and hope she is able to latch on on her own?”

“Well, no, I’d grab her at once but-”

“Exactly.  You grab her yourself and drag her to safety.”

“But mother, how-”

“Don’t you worry, I have a plan.” Bertha, smiling as she hastily scribbled a note, handing it back to the messenger before their carriage took off.  Agnes Van Rhijn’s own note had asked Bertha to return to her own home at once and wait for her there while she made a few emergency calls.

Bertha had to act quickly but knew now how to get Lord George Stewart’s attention.  He was sure to accept her new invitation to her house right away.  All she had to do was drop Agnes Van Rhijn’s name.

George Stewart had been looking forward to finally seeing Agnes Van Rhijn once more, but he knew good etiquette demanded he reject the invitation to Miss Brook’s tea now.  He also knew that if he did reject it, Randolph would not only never forgive him but would go by himself anyway and he would be left with trying to find a way to meet with Agnes on his own. It was for the best, as George had not looked forward to that blasted tea at all.  Having to air out his business in front of an unknown girl and god knows whoever else she had probably invited?  No thank you. He should have never let Randolph persuade him to accept the invitation in the first place.

The boy was smitten with Miss Brook and had vehemently defended her when they both read the papers after breakfast early that morning. He was still defending her now, after they had drained both cups of coffee and were on their second.

“You’re really going to listen to the prattlings of a scorned widow? To my knowledge, this Mrs. Blane never even socialized with Marian except for attending a few of same tennis matches.  There must not be much going on in New York right now if ballroom gossip is what is making headlines. This is not who Marian is, I assure you.”

“Oh, it’s just ‘Marian’ now? No, ‘Marian Brook’, no ‘Miss Brook’? You have only known her a few days.” George said in exasperation. 

“Father, I’m serious.  You’re not actually considering it?  Rescinding your acceptance?” Randolph asked, coffee cup in one hand and folded newspaper in the other. “Why inconvenience yourself so?  You have to meet with her Aunt anyway. Save yourself the headache of coming up with another excuse to see Mrs. Van Rhijn.  Do not add fuel to the fire that this Susan Blane ignited against Marian.”

“Randolph, you know I must.  It is nothing against Miss Brook. I’ll send a note after my coffee, I need to think of what to say.”

“The rumors will worsen when you reject her invitation!”

“Oh? It’s my responsibility to guard the reputation of this girl?  I don’t even know her!” George said with a scoff.

Randolph tossed the newspaper to the side and put his cup down, standing up. George put his own newspaper down and sat straight in his chair. 

“Father, I’m disappointed in you. You don’t know her, but I do and she doesn’t deserve what would happen if you decide not to go.”

“Rather harsh to take up against your own father for a girl you barely know.”

“I know enough of her.  I know she is kind, empathetic, cares about her family and has unshakeable integrity.”

George raised an eyebrow. “That is enough to defend her from me, is it? Your own father?”

“Enough for more than that, I would say. She is different.  Marian talks to me like a person.  Not like the future Earl of Galloway. I love her and I intend to ask for her hand.”

“Good god, please tell me you didn’t say that to her! She is American!” George exclaimed. A knock came at their door, his valet answered it while father and son stared each other down. 

“I am not an idiot. She is a practical woman and it would have pushed her away telling her too soon.  Also, why balk at her being an American? Really? If memory serves, you were almost engaged to one yourself!” Randolph said. He crossed his arms and smiled.  “Do you know what I find very funny about this?  The fact that you are still bent on meeting up with Agnes Van Rhijn.  Father, what do you think is going to happen when it gets out you rejected Marian’s invitation? Mrs. Van Rhijn will no doubt do something about these ridiculous gossip articles herself and when she finds out that you-”

“Excuse me, my lord, but a note has arrived for you.” The valet interrupted. George held out his hand and the note was put in.  Randolph rolled his eyes and sat back down, waiting for his father to read it. 

“Oh..!” George looked at his son, shock on his face. “Inform her messenger I will leave straight away,” he ordered.

Randolph looked worried. “Father?”

George Stewart rapidly walked to the door while his valet put on his coat and his top hat. “Mrs. George Russell has sent an invitation again.  Accepting this one is to my benefit, I think.”

“Why is that?”

“Mrs. Russell says that Agnes is anxious to meet with me at her house, Mrs. Russell’s that is,  before the tea. I will see what she has to say before I make a decision.”

“Mrs. Van Rhijn is at her house? Marian never gave me the impression that the two were friends.” 

George adjusted his hat. “The Russell house is right across from Agnes’s. If I change my mind, then we can just walk, it will take no time at all.  Satisfied with that?” he asked, still attempting to placate his son.

“If you change your mind?” Randolph asked incredulously.  “Do you really believe Mrs. Van Rhijn will give you a choice?  This is her niece, after all. From what you’ve told me, she will defend her family from anyone.  Even the nobility. I think you will change your mind, but I shall wish you luck all the same.”

“We shall see about that.  I have my own matter to take up with her, as you well know.” George said grimly, putting on gloves as the footman finished brushing a bit of lint off the Earl’s back.

“Like I said, I wish you luck, father.”

Randolph watched on as his father briefly nodded then hurried away. 

[manicmillenial]

Bar stools and dining chairs

Bar stools are basically stools which are used in dining, kitchen and more often in a bar setup. The difference between a bar stool and an ordinary stool is that bar stools comes with foot rest and a taller than a standard stool. Bar stools are very common in bars where the design of the bar counter is such that a high sitting arrangement is necessary to drink from the counter. However modern kitchens and even homes are also getting fascinated with the idea of using these sitting options. The design of a bar stool is somewhat a show add for the average room; however you need to pick the right design and material for that. Bar stools are click here to learn more also used in a bar setup at home and thus they add to the glamour of the room. Bar stools can be further customized to be used not only in the pool sides but also in some in-house spectator sports like billiards and snookers. They are there customized for the audience to sit and enjoy the game.

They come in various shapes and sizes although the general design has to be a tall one which is so typical of a bar stool. However the material can be plastic, wooden or even metallic depending upon the general set up of the location and the surrounding where the stools will be placed. Bar stools come with a foot rest, usually they are without a backrest though some do come with a backrest as well. They are usually not floor mounted in a household setup but in the commercial setup it is common to have them floor mounted and fitted to it using screw or angle brackets. This prevents them to be stolen and also reduces the possibility of having them misplaced. They add that extra glamour to the traditional bars. Nowadays offbeat materials like bamboo are also being used to manufacture them. This can be a wonderful idea for a Polynesian style Tiki bar with all the usual masks and other objects to complete the theme.

There are certain aspects to look into while buying bar stools for your home. A standard bar stool is about 30” in sitting height. The standard height for a domestic kitchen counter bar stool is about 26”. However before buying a bar stool for your home ensure to measure the height of the counter and also the space that you have to place the stools. It is not uncommon to have them made to your custom measurements and designing requirements. If your seller is willing to do that for you at a nominal charge then take that option as it is always better to have a custom designed stool rather than something that will not go with the general design and layout of your kitchen.

Breakfast bar stools are shorter than the normal ones. A standard bar stool is about 30” in height, however a kitchen or breakfast bar stool can be about 26” or less depending upon the height or your kitchen and breakfast counter plus also depending upon the space you have. If your seller gives you the option to custom order them, take it as they would be the right size and greatly enhance the look and feel of your kitchen. They are made of a wide variety of materials depending upon your choice. The usual Aluminum stools are standard varieties but nowadays there are a wide lot of options including wooden stools which greatly increase the ambience of the room. Say if you have a kitchen with wooden décor then going for a wooden breakfast bar stool would be the right idea. There are other options like chrome which is highly glossy and its appearance greatly enhances the look and feel of your kitchen together you’re your counter.

Dining chairs comes in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, colors and materials to choose from. Starting from the original hand crafted wooden varieties to plastic and also with silver. Wooden chairs always present a grand traditional feeling when placed in the dining. Wooden chairs are handcrafted and as such can be customized to preference with special contours and designing of the arms and legs. They can be with traditional wooden finish or colored as per preference. Together with a neatly designed cushion they are traditional and add to décor of your dining room.

Plastic dining chairs are fast becoming popular as they are lightweight, very durable and also come in a large variety of colors and design to choose from. So you can pick one matching exactly the general color scheme of the dining room. Plastic dining chairs are tough and they can withstand a fair amount of abuse and still look brand new. Also they are cheaper compared to wooden or silver or chrome chairs and are thus a huge savings for you. So if you are looking for cheaper alternative then plastic chairs are absolutely right for you.

[nicklloydnow]

“Dearest Martha,

We knew each other a very long time. Exactly a century in fictional terms, several decades in reality.

From the first discussion I had with Dave Gibbons at, of all places, the San Diego Zoo, about the two of us working together, when I didn't even know your name, I knew that you were a noble, and quintessentially American, creature.

One thing I've always loved about my country is its indomitable spirit, and you were indomitable from the day you were born. The deck was stacked against you: you were Black, female, and impoverished, but nothing ever stopped you. To date, you are the most heroic creation I've ever had the honor to write.

Dave and I fell in love with you early and often. In fits and starts, we told your tale. We hit a crisis early on: puffed-up with self-importance after the success of The Dark Knight Returns, I mischronicled your first adventure as something too on-the-nose political, too self-consciously serious, and, in a word, dreary.

Dave quit. You were almost stillborn, baby.

It took Lynn Varley to straighten my brain out and advise me to reconfigure your story, to bring absurdity and sarcasm and adventure and boyish joy to it, and to win Dave back. Dave's instincts and Lynn's wisdom brought you back from the brink, Martha. It's hardly a coincidence that Lynn shares your birthday, in day and month, if not in year.

So, Martha, my sweetheart, you've been both daughter and mother to me. You've been noble in your every decision, your every aspect, and you've been, unfailingly, a writer's dream: a character who wrote herself.

From housing-project prisoner to drugged-out victim of an insanity ward, from soldier to explorer to savior of the world, to mother of a new generation worthy of your name, you always, relentlessly, wrote yourself.

As Dave does, I miss you, Martha. And I will always love you.

Frank Miller

New York City, 2008”

“Despite being an extremely successful commercial work, and arguably the series that really put Dark Horse on the map as a home for adventurous comics creators bored with the Big Two, the Martha Washington epic is curiously underrepresented in comics criticism, generally liked but not held in anywhere near as much esteem as the creators’ other contemporary works. The character of Martha Washington will occasionally pop up in lists about strong women characters, or POC representation, or bleak sci-fi, but it’s treated as almost a footnote in the careers of Miller and Gibbons. For Gibbons, it serves as a personal and ambitious attempt to stand outside the shadow of Watchmen before the artist shifted towards more commercially inclined series. For Miller, it’s the exact line of demarcation between his classic Formalist Auteur Era (Daredevil, Dark Knight Returns, Ronin) and his hyper masculine Abstraction Auteur Era (Sin City, 300, Holy Terror). Martha Washington is the most human character Frank Miller ever wrote and the last time you can see him caring about a character more than experimentation and style, and not coincidentally it’s one of the last times he would share basically equal creative autonomy with someone.

As Gibbons and Miller both explain in the introductory text in the complete Martha Washington collection, Miller convinced Gibbons to work with him on the series by pitching him the story of Martha “on a mission to prevent an evangelical Elvis clone [from] nuking the rest of the United States from deep in the Arizona desert.” For Gibbons, this offered a giddy respite from “our recently successful dark dissections of superheroes,” so he started working on designs and plans based on that treatment. But when Miller’s script finally arrived, Gibbons was horrified by how dark and gritty it had become, missing the surreal humor and absurdity that had first caught his eye. Miller admits that the project would have been “stillborn” if Lynn Varley hadn’t convinced him to take Gibbons’ concerns into consideration and rework the entire project. The work that Miller and Gibbons eventually created is an incredible hybrid of these two spheres, brutal and unflinching yet curiously warm and tender and goofy. Not unlike life itself, in other words.

What’s especially clear throughout the series that make up the Martha Washington epic is that Miller and Gibbons and their various colorist collaborators truly love Washington as a character. And it’s not hard to see why. Washington is an epic hero with all of the tragedy and none of the hubris. If she has a tragic flaw, it’s that she has hope for humanity, but that’s also the ingredient that makes her continue long past the point her many enemies expect her to fall. As Washington herself puts it in a survival mantra, “When things get bad like this, you just keep telling yourself ‘This won’t kill me, I won’t die here, this won’t kill me.”

(…)

This is why Washington is such a uniquely potent dystopic protagonist. Gibbons draws her not as a cold superhuman brute or insensitive sex warrior (and notably Washington encounters and defeats characters who represent both of these tropes) but as a bold and powerful black woman with a wide emotional range to reflect her equally wide array of physical talents. Many of the most memorable scenes in the series are simple one page depictions of Washington crying in solitary peace after making a difficult decision (like her first foray in the senseless Amazon War between PAX and the rogue Fat Boy Burger corporate state), or multi-panel sequences showing her reaction to a trauma shifting from shock to acceptance to strength (the killing of a basically nonverbal bully who had just slain her adolescent mentor). So many dystopic and post-apocalyptic works gives us protagonists who are blank slates or emotionally cold, indicating that survival is only possible if you shut down everything that makes you human. But with Washington, Miller and Gibbons reject this premise and provide an emotionally open yet brave and strong woman who survives because of how much she values that which makes her human.

As that anecdote about Martha Washington’s gestation shows, a huge amount of Martha Washington’s humanity is due to Gibbons’ vision for what would make this project work and ability to weave that into even the most ambitious of Miller’s ideas (as well as minimize the tone deafness of Miller’s worst concepts– the less said about the gay Nazi terrorist group, the better, though it’s hard not to think of them as predecessors to the dreaded Nu Fascist icon Milo Yiannopuolos). Gibbons rightfully continues to get acclaim for the patterns and precision focus he brought to Watchmen but while that series and Washington share dystopic themes, Washington also serves as a foil to the unfeeling, repetitive nature of that landmark work. Washington is still just as ambitious and epic but there’s a chaos and looseness to it that makes it far more exciting and filling. Miller’s script gives Gibbons ample opportunity to show off his range as an artist, with issues taking place in locations as diverse as the densely overcrowded urban centers of Chicago and New York, the equally claustrophobic but less populated world of the Amazon and the far more desolate realms of the southwest and outer space. But beyond that, it also pushes Gibbons’ talent for realistically rendering human expression to new extremes, with many of its climaxes getting delivered via small panel beats and compressed close-ups of reactions. It’s a detailed work that never feels overbearing, that demands innumerable rereads but never makes that feel like a chore.

(…)

The Washington series is at its best when it focuses on these personal, human tragedies and how they spark the larger, more apocalyptic events filling out the background of the series. Though every Martha Washington release is worth reading, there is a significant difference in mood, tone and aesthetic in the initial Give Me Liberty series and what followed in its wake. The clearest difference comes with the departure of masterful colorist Robin Smith, who was brought on to the series to give it a more “European” feel. Smith’s coloring recalls 2000 A.D. and Heavy Metal but it also fits perfectly alongside the adventurous work Gibbons and Miller’s peers were doing at DC in the same era, particularly Tim Truman’s Hawkworld and Howard Chaykin’s The Shadow: Blood and Judgment, both of which utilized their painterly textures to depict grimy urban decay and freakish figures in ways that felt raw rather than realistic.

(…)

Yet the conclusion of the series, Martha Washington Dies, brought Miller and Gibbons full circle, reuniting them with the fearless and eternally optimistic Washington on her final birthday. A century old and still stoic, Washington knows death is on the way and what surprises her most is that she isn’t alone but surrounded by people she cares about. She chooses to spend last day inspiring them, not holding back about how dire their situation might seem in yet another apocalyptic scenario but focusing on the human capacity to overcome hopelessness. And in her final moment, Washington transforms into a literal beacon of hope, dying and then immediately being reborn as a lightwave leading on the troops. It’s not exactly a happy ending but it’s a perfect ending for the type of warrior Martha Washington is, eternally focused on overcoming all challenges and abiding not by law but by what’s best for humanity. In times like these, that’s perhaps better than a happier story or an unrealistically revolutionary text.”

[seotechshore]

Fire and Safety Courses in Kerala: Building a Safer Tomorrow

In today's fast-paced industrial world, safety is no longer a choice,it is a must. With industrialization taking an accelerated pace in India, Kerala, in particular, being no less appreciated with the growth, has thus created an unprecedented demand for safety professionals who are skilled enough to serve its industry. Fire and safety courses in Kerala are the buttresses attempting to support the greater need by offering rich training to equip people with opportunities for worthy careers that serve society.

Need for Fire and Safety Education

Fire and safety education prepare a person to avert, take control of, and react in situations like fires, chemical spills, and other hazards in the workplace. Whether a construction site, manufacturing unit, oil refinery, or residential complex, safety professionals would ensure compliance with safety protocols to prevent accidents and save lives. 

An ideal fire and safety course will be structured to cover many topics of fire prevention techniques, risk assessments, occupational health and emergency response planning, and use of safety equipment. The aim is to impart not only theoretical knowledge but also practical skills that are narrowed down through hands-on training and real-life scenario simulations.

The Rising Need in Kerala

Kerala sees a higher demand for trained safety staff as its industrial centers and infrastructure projects grow. Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram, and Kozhikode host many sectors—construction, shipping, oil & gas, and manufacturing—that need strict safety rules.

This growth in the area has caused more schools to offer fire and safety classes in Kerala. These schools teach local students and also draw people from all over India and Gulf countries because they provide top-notch education and job chances.

What's in Fire and Safety Classes?

You can find fire and safety classes in Kerala at different levels—from quick certificates to full diplomas and degrees. Here's a look at what these classes cover:

1. Certificate Classes

These are short programs that last from a few weeks to a few months. They teach the basics in areas like simple fire safety first aid, and how to get out in an emergency.

2. Diploma Programs

Diploma courses often take 6 months to a year and cover topics such as:

Industrial safety

Building site safety

Fire avoidance and safeguarding methods

Safety for the surroundings

Health and cleanliness in the workplace

3. Advanced Diploma and Postgraduate Courses  

An advanced program is specifically developed for specialists seeking to develop further in their fields or to specialize in:  

Fire engineering  

Process safety management  

Safety auditing and risk assessment  

4. Practical Training Modules  

Practical training is emphasized by most reputable institutions through:  

Fire drills  

Rescue operations  

Simulation-based learning  

Use of firefighting equipment  

Career Opportunities After Completing Fire and Safety Courses

Areas of employment for the graduates of fire and safety courses in Kerala include:

- Oil and gas industries

- Chemical plants

- Construction companies

- Manufacturing units

- Airports and seaports

- Government emergency services

- Hospitals and large commercial establishments

The graduates can work in the following positions:

- Fire Safety Officer

- HSE (Health, Safety & Environment) Manager

- Risk Assessor

- Safety Auditor

- Industrial Hygienist

- Safety Supervisor

There are many positions with attractive pay scales abroad, especially in the Middle East because of their strict enforcement of safety standards.

Why is Fire and Safety Education in Kerala?

Among several reasons, several make Kerala the preferred location for fire and safety training:

A High Literacy Rate: Since the population in Kerala is highly educated, it is more open to technical education. 

Best Quality Institutions: Kerala consists of some of the best institutes in India with good training infrastructure and experienced faculty. 

Affordable Courses: Fees in Kerala are comparatively lower than any other state. 

Placement: Placement services are offered within campus by most institutes, and they have tie-ups with major industries in India and abroad. 

Best Practice in Fire and Safety Training programs

To meet this increasing need for safety and fire experts, a number of state institutions in Kerala now have begun providing special courses. However, the quality and reputation of programs are very different. Ideally, choosing a suitable training institute is critical for creating a rocky foundation to pursue a successful life.

1. Accreditation and Affiliations

Verify whether the institute is accredited by reputable accrediting bodies providing qualifications which are endorsed by body. International accreditation does not just add to your resume but is usually a functional requirement by international companies during hire.

2. Curriculum Relevance

Choose courses which provide all-inclusive training in areas such as fire prevention, risk management, emergencies, industrial safety and environmental health. Successful courses combine theoretical knowledge with practical skills.

3. Infrastructure and Facilities

College with sophisticated training grounds in the form of safety laboratories and facilities for mock emergency drills enable students to learn skills that will be applicable in real life emergencies. Make sure that the educational facility has practical training, incorporates such drills as emergency drills and makes safety gear available to students in the course of their studies.

4. Experienced Faculty

Professors with professional experience bring real advice and industry examples to the discussion in the classroom. Their mentorship covers practical things, thus giving the students a deeper understanding of what employers seek and how work teams are.

5. Placement Support

High emphasis on placement services with appropriate industry connections is a major strength. Study their history with alumni and if you can, talk to them directly to get firsthand experience.

In Kerala a number of institutions of education correspond with these standards and equipped these institutions with able graduates to enter professional lives in India and abroad. Research thoroughly, tour the campus if possible, and ask the faculty or students already a part of the institution to help you do your enrollment.

As these businesses and sectors grow, there is an even greater need for concrete workplace safety practices. Importance of the fire and safety education received in Kerala comes in the form of equally nurturing professionals who are apt to ensure the lives and properties are protected. Using their elaborate curricula, train-on-job and acquisition of international certifications, organizations like Techshore inspection services are playing a significant role in the promotion of safety and security in the working place.

If you have any ambition to set up a career of meaning and international significance, enrolment in fire and safety programs available in Kerala may enable to succeed on the personal level and on the global level in your field.

Conclusion

As businesses keep on growing and developing, the significance of workplace safety becomes even more essential. Kerala's fire and safety courses are taking center stage in creating professional experts who can protect lives and assets. With extensive curricula, hands-on training, and international certifications, organizations such as Techshore Inspection Services are setting the pace towards creating a safer and more secure world.If you’re considering a career that offers both personal satisfaction and global opportunities, enrolling in fire and safety courses in Kerala could be your first step toward a meaningful and impactful profession.

[stevishabitat]

RFK Jr.'s autism study to amass medical records of many Americans

The National Institutes of Health is amassing private medical records from a number of federal and commercial databases to give to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s new effort to study autism, the NIH's top official said Monday.

The new data will allow external researchers picked for Kennedy's autism studies to study "comprehensive" patient data with "broad coverage" of the U.S. population for the first time, NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya said.

"The idea of the platform is that the existing data resources are often fragmented and difficult to obtain. The NIH itself will often pay multiple times for the same data resource. Even data resources that are within the federal government are difficult to obtain," he said in a presentation to the agency's advisers.

Medication records from pharmacy chains, lab testing and genomics data from patients treated by the Department of Veterans Affairs and Indian Health Service, claims from private insurers and data from smartwatches and fitness trackers will all be linked together, he said.

The NIH is also now in talks with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to broaden agreements governing access to their data, Bhattacharya said.

In addition, a new disease registry is being launched to track Americans with autism, which will be integrated into the data. Advocacy groups and experts have called out Kennedy for describing autism as a "preventable disease," which they say is stigmatizing and unfounded.

Between 10 and 20 outside groups of researchers will be given grant funding and access to the records to produce Kennedy's autism studies. Bhattacharya did not give details on how they would be chosen, but said their selection would be "run through normal NIH processes."

Bhattacharya said the research they will back using the data will be "the highest quality proposals" that will range "from basic science to epidemiological approaches, to other more applied approaches" to treat and manage autism. He also acknowledged autism's wide variation in how it affects people.

"I recognize, of course, that autism, there's a range of manifestations ranging from highly functioning children to children that are quite severely disabled. And of course the research will account very carefully for that," he said.

While the selected researchers will be able to access and study the private medical data, Bhattacharya said they will not be able to download it. He promised "state of the art protections" to protect confidentiality.

By bringing the data into one place, he said it could give health agencies a window into "real-time health monitoring" on Americans for studying other health problems too.

"What we're proposing is a transformative real-world data initiative, which aims to provide a robust and secure computational data platform for chronic disease and autism research," he said.

They are planning a "rapid timeline" to launch the autism research using this data, he said, but did not give specifics on when it would start or how long the studies would take. Kennedy last week appeared to walk back his earlier prediction that they would have all the answers to autism's causes by September.

Speaking with reporters on Tuesday, Bhattacharya pushed back the timeline, saying that they now hope to have grants going out the door by September for the research.

"It's hard to guarantee when science will make an advance. It depends on, you know, nature has its say," Bhattacharya said.