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linneatanner · 5 months

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R.w. Meek Sabrine The Dream Collector Book 1 Sabrine & Sigmund Freud #LiteraryFiction #BlogTour #TheCoffeePotBookClub @cathiedunn

FEATURED AUTHOR: R.w. Meek Welcome R.w. Meek as the featured author in The Coffee Pot Book Club Blog Tour being held January 8th – 12th, 2024. He is the author of the Literary Historical Fiction, The Dream Collector (Book 1: Sabrine & Sigmund Freud), released by Historium Books on December 19th, 2023 (723 pages). Below are highlights of The Dream Collector (Book 1: Sabrine & Sigmund Freud), R.w. Meek’s author bio, and an excerpt from his book. Tour Schedule Page: https://thecoffeepotbookclub.blogspot.com/2023/12/blog-tour-the-dream-collector-by-rw-meek.html HIGHLIGHTS: THE DREAM COLLECTOR The Dream Collector (Book 1: Sabrine & Sigmund Freud) By R.w. Meek Blurb: The Dream Collector immerses the reader into the exciting milieu of late 19th Century Paris when art and medicine were in the throes of revolution, art turning to Impressionism, medicine turning to psychology. In 1885, Julie Forette, a self-educated woman from Marseilles, finds employment at the infamous Salpêtrière, hospital and asylum to over five thousand disabled, demented and abandoned women, a walled city ruled by the famed neurologist and arrogant director, Dr. Jean-Martin Charcot. Julie Forette forms a friendship with the young, visiting intern Sigmund Freud who introduces her to the altering-conscious power of cocaine. Together they pursue the hidden potential of hypnotism and dream interpretation. After Freud receives the baffling case of the star hysteric, Sabrine Weiss, he is encouraged by Julie to experiment with different modes of treatment, including “talking sessions.” Their urgent quest is to find a cure for Sabrine, Princess of the Hysterics, before Dr. Charcot resorts to the radical removal of her ovaries. In Paris, Julie finds a passion for the new art emerging, Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, and forms friendships with the major artists of the period, including Pissarro, Monet, and Degas. Julie becomes intimately involved with the reclusive Cezanne only to be seduced by the “Peruvian Savage” Paul Gauguin. Julie is the eponymous ‘Dream Collector’ collecting the one unforgettable, soul-defining dream of the major historical figures of the period. Praise for The Dream Collector: "Meek never fails to stun and impress with his evocation of scenes and events, of sights and dialogue, and of peoples' reactions to them." ~ HFC Reviews "Tribute must be paid to the obvious and clear literary skills of the author R.w. Meek and to his ability to invoke historic personages and the Belle Époque he so evidently adores."~ Julian de la Motte, award-winning author of Senlac Buy Link: Universal Link: https://books2read.com/u/4jE52j AUTHOR BIO: R.w. Meek R.w. Meek has a Master’s degree in Art History from the American University in Washington, D.C., his areas of expertise are Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, with a particular interest in Vincent van Gogh. He has interned and conducted tours at the National Museum of American and the National Gallery of Art. In 2022 and 2023 five of his chapter excerpts from his soon to be published novel, The Dream Collector, were either finalists or published in various literary journals. The author has also won the Palm Beach Book Festival Competition for “Best Writer in Palm Beach," his manuscript judged by a panel of NYT Best Selling authors. The Dream Collector also received gold and silver medals in the Historical Fiction Company literary contest and earned runner-up for the “Best Historical Fiction Novel’ of 2022. The author was born in Baltimore, adventured in Europe for many years, and recently moved from Delray Beach, Florida to Santa Clarita, California. His wife is a psychologist, sculptress, playwright, and stand-up storyteller. His daughter Nora is a storyboard artist in the animation world and resides in Hollywood, California. His favorite writers are Dostoevsky, John Fowles, and Antoine de Saint-Exupery. Author Links: Website: https://www.ronmeekauthor.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100010220437381 EXCERPT: THE DREAM COLLECTOR Book 1: Sabrine & Sigmund “Alone with Sabrine” “Do you have a special fear?” Sigmund decided to ask her. “I have no fears, so it’s my duty to take them away from others.” She stepped out of his rim of light, skipping away. He could not shake the thought that she was behaving like a mischievous schoolgirl. As best he could, he followed her with the one trembling, tallow candle. “I want to dance!” she announced loudly. And so she did, making gentle turns and playful leaps, delighting in being the center of attention. Sigmund had never found the temerity to engage in dancing, but he easily guessed its pleasure as he followed her with the candlelight. Keeping her mask in place, she performed pirouettes and self-assured spins before concluding with a charming bow. She dropped the mask—Sabrine and no other! The candle’s flame flickered in the green of her eyes. “On special occasions the young doctors allow us to have costumed balls,” she said. “The hypnotized are not supposed to remember them, but we do.” Pounding at the library door prompted her to quickly whisper: “Shall we meet again to share more secrets?” The commotion outside grew louder: “Someone has locked it from the inside! Find another key, another key!” As the door flew open, Sigmund eagerly conceded to her, “We can meet again, Mademoiselle, if you like.” Instagram Handle: @thecoffeepotbookclub Bluesky Handle: @cathiedunn.bsky.social Read the full article

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glacialtimeframe · 3 years

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(poorly formed musings on disagreeing with Scott Alexander more over time)

It's strange reading Scott Alexander's recent stuff on the culture wars. It's hard to pinpoint exactly, and maybe this was just my own projection I guess, but I feel like Scott used to have a lot more "mixed feelings" on leftist cultural politics. I used to read him as being broadly supportive but with some real concerns about echo chambers, cancel culture etc etc. It's strange reading him now where he has a much more "anti" leftist cultural politics persona.

And, you know, that's fine, I've probably always been a bit to the left than Scott on pretty much anything. But it feels like the difference has widened lately, and it's difficult to tell if that's me changing or Scott. I do think like he's felt a bit more comfortable being explicitly anti leftist since the whole NYT article - it wouldn't be surprising if he'd been holding back before then but now of course he has very little to lose.

It's just a bit weird, I guess. I'm used to broadly agreeing with Scott on who has power in society, and he ascribes a lot more power to leftists than I feel is accurate. I think a weakness in his recent stuff is the lack of engagement with recent politics in the US, with state Republicans throwing their weight around on voting rights, lgbtqia+ issues etc etc. To me it really calls into the question the extent to which leftist cultural politics has "won" in the way Scott seems to be assuming or coming from.

It's hard not to make the "get off the internet" critique too - as much as leftists have definitely been influential in the internet wars and in a way that has had an impact at major news organisations like the NYT, that is very different from broader power in the real world outside the internet.

It's just strange, I guess, watching someone who has been a huge intellectual influence on me have such a different view about leftist cultural politics. The funny thing is I don't think we necessarily would disagree on that much in the specific - it's the overall diagnosis of the situation and what the "real problems are" that we seem to have different views. Like, I do think cancel culture is a real problem in both leftist and public spaces, but it's also incredibly overblown and an explicit political weapon that has been massively exaggerated for political gain by both conservatives and centrists. And the people who usually end up the most hurt by it are usually leftists. But I don't see those caveats in Scott's writing, which is so weird to me!

Same with people like Jordan Peterson, who Scott seems to be substantially more favourable towards and I find that hard to reconcile with my mental model of Scott. Strange!

Part of it I think is the issue of bubbles - Scott almost certainly has more tolerance for right wing views on a daily basis than I do, for both cultural and economic content. I've just given up on the right as a potential source of truth and good ideas, especially the US right. Since Trump got in office and most of the right wing intellectuals did a complete 180, it seems like a waste of time consuming the thoughts of everyone who is more right wing than centrist now. I'm not sure if that means I'm exposed to more or less bias than Scott now - or just a different kind of bias.

It's always been weird being more left than Scott on Econ, as someone who has actually studied Econ at post-grad level. Now Scott is obviously pretty smart - definitely smarter than me! - but I do feel like he's a bit out of touch with the empirical literature on a number of Econ issues, and probably a bit too inclined to take the "intuitiveness" of free market logic at face value relative to the actual empirical evidence which is decidedly mixed. Particularly in the case of complex services like healthcare and education where a lot of the core market features which make the markets for simple goods work well don't apply. As I've learned more about econ and moved left, Scott hasn't moved with me, and that's been strange too.

#it is good i have written something

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waywardnerd67 · 3 years

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TFWB - Chap 24 The Winchester Chronicles

Summary: Jared has a special signing of Jensen’s NYT Bestselling book at his renown bookstore. Characters: Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Rachel Sanderson (OFC), Reader Pairing: Jared x Rachel (OFC) Warnings: Fluff/AU Word Count: 1197 Squared Filled: Bookstore AU A/N #1: This is for @spnfluffbingo card

Check out: The Family We Built Masterlist

Jensen looked at his calendar seeing he had an appointment with a new client scheduled by his assistant Kat. He called her into his office before she left for the day.

“Who is this new client? I’m taking a step back from the firm, remember?”

She narrowed her eyes at him, “I remember. Trust me, you will want to take this appointment. I wouldn’t have scheduled it if I didn’t think it would be a great fit for you. Now I’m going to leave because I have a hot date with a Winchester tonight. Have a great night Mr. Ackles.”

He laughed as she left his office leaving the door ajar. Most of his firm had read his debut novel, The Winchester Chronicles, by now. A few senior employees asked for him to sign it and a couple of braver interns had as well. He needed to check in with (Y/N) to see how it was selling around the country. He looked up when there was a knock on his door and saw Jared walking in.

“Hey, what’s with the monkey suit?” Jensen motioned to Jared’s nice charcoal suit and navy tie.

He sat down in front of his desk, “I’m your appointment Mr. Ackles.”

Jensen stared at his best friend for a moment surprised deciding to play along, “Oh, well okay then. What brings you in today, Mr. Padalecki?”

“I wanted to approach you about having a book event at my local bookstore. You see, your novel has just hit the New York Times Bestsellers list and I would love to have an event to celebrate that remarkable feat.” Jared held up his phone with the website pulled up and zoomed in on his novel.

He took the phone from him staring down at his name and novel title with the number ten by it, “Holy shit…” He looked up as his friend smiled widely at him then went back to his business face.

“Now, Turn the Page Books and More, I feel is the perfect fit for this event. We can have a limited book signing and reading. We would work with your agent for promotions and have your novel featured in our front window display.” Jared pulled out an official contract placing it on his desk, “Of course you’ll want your agent to read over that and once it’s signed we can begin preparations.”

He was impressed by all the work Jared put into this and reeling from the news of being on the bestsellers list, “I will have my agent read over this after myself and have it back to you by the end of the day tomorrow.”

Both men stood up, “I appreciate this opportunity Mr. Ackles and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed your novel. I look forward to hearing from you tomorrow.” Jensen stepped from behind his desk to shake Jared’s hand.

“Thank you.” He pulled Jared into a hug, “Now stop being such a damn good business owner and let’s gather everyone to celebrate.”

“Damn right because this is fucking awesome! Congratulations buddy.”

A month later, Jensen was standing in front of his mirror trying to decide on if wearing a tie was too much or not. It was his first event of any kind for his novel and his stomach was buzzing with nerves.

“Hey there handsome.”

He turned around to see (Y/N) standing in the doorway wearing a simple flowy white dress. She walked over standing in front him, slipping the tie from around his neck. It was the simplest thing but from her it made his heart race.

“You look beautiful, (Y/N).” He said softly as she smiled.

(Y/N) walked into his closet pulling out a more casual yellow and gray plaid button down, “The Oxford is a little too much for this event. You need to be approachable and not the CEO of an investment firm.”

Jensen unbuttoned his shirt, slipping it off and trading it for the one she was holding. He noticed her eyes traveling the length of his body as she sucked in a breath seeing him in only a plain under shirt. A smirk curled on his face as he put the other shirt on.

“Thanks.” He looked up to see her looking away walking towards the door. He took a deep breath remembering his promise to her.

Jared’s bookstore was located on 6th Street, which was a popular bar hopping, shopping part of downtown Austin. He first drove past the front of the store to see a line wrapping around the building of people holding copies of his book. He could not believe the amount of people there for his book and looked over to (Y/N) who was smiling from ear to ear.

“And you thought there would be no one here.” Her sing-song tone made him chuckle as he parked behind the bookstore.

Rachel was waiting outside for them pacing as she rubbed her swollen belly. Jensen said a silent prayer that she did not go into labor during this event. Not for his sake but for Jared’s since he knew his best friend had been freaking about this event all month.

“Finally! Jared is driving me crazy and I need you to calm his ass down before I kill him.” She ranted as Jensen leaned down kissing her cheek.

“You look gorgeous Momma now relax and I’ll handle the mad man.”

She sighed hugging him, “Bless you, you wonderful man.”

Before going inside Jensen looked back to see Rachel and (Y/N) having some kind of intense conversation. Curious, he made a mental note to ask her about it on his way to drop her off back home. He found Jared easily losing his mind trying to make everything perfect. After a few stern words and a smack on the face, Jensen finally got him to calm down.

The event went without a hitch. Meeting fans of his book was an experience he would never forget. Hearing how the Winchesters’ story helped them through some dark times and give them hope meant everything to him. A few young ladies flirted with him as well as a few older ones. He would smile politely, signing their books and then would scan the room for (Y/N). When his eyes would land on her everything in the world felt right again.

When it was time for the reading, Jared surprised him by reading one of his favorite parts in the book, “Chapter 22 - The Wayward Sons…”

***

Watching Jensen with his fans and hearing some of their stories was an amazing experience for her. (Y/N) remembered all the fangirls talking about how hot Jensen was and the jealousy raging through her body. Any time a girl would flirt with him, she had noticed his eyes scanning the room until they found her and then he would smile at her. That is when Rachel’s come to Jesus talk about her feelings for him would echo in her mind.

Make your move or you’re going to lose him to some other woman and I refuse to let that happen. You’re in love with him now tell him.

If you enjoyed this story then check out my Masterlist!

My Nerd Herd: @waywardbaby @ladywinchester1967 @akshi8278 @ericaprice2008 @deans-baby-momma @spnbaby-67 @dean-winchesters-bacon @carryonmywaywardcaptain @-lovepeacenhope- @destiel745 @carribear31 @srsllydunnodoncare @whimsicalrobots @thisismysecrethappyplace @starstruckzonkoperatorbat @adoptdontshoppets @mrswhozeewhatsis @bella-ca @drakelover78 @imascio08 @pisces-cutie @dwgrl1903-blog @mannls @the-salty-asian @winchesterprincessbride @xostephanie @superromijn @witch-of-letters @time-travel-bouqet @screechingartisancashbailiff @myinconnelly1 @sister-winchesters99 @thekatherinewinchester @maddiepants @tumbler-tidbits @sandlee44 @destielhoneybee @jerkbitchidjitassbutt @thefaithfulwriter @stoneyggirl @supernaturalginger @emoryhemsworth @wednesdayismyfunday @team-free-will-you-idjiot @atc74 @cosicas-cuquis @casseythebee

#spnfluffbingo #tfwb series #jensen ackles fanfiction #jensen ackles fanfic #jared padalecki fanfiction #jared padalecki fanfic #ofc #reader insert #fluff #au

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newstfionline · 3 years

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Monday, May 10, 2021

Higher Prices Leave Consumers Feeling the Pinch (WSJ) Americans accustomed to years of low inflation are beginning to pay sharply higher prices for goods and services as the economy strains to rev back up and the pandemic wanes. Price tags on consumer goods from processed meat to dishwashing products have risen by double-digit percentages from a year ago, according to NielsenIQ. Some consumers are feeling stretched. Costs are rising at every step in the production of many goods. Prices for oil, crops and other commodities have shot up this year. Trucking companies are paying scarce drivers more to take those materials to factories and construction sites. As a result, companies are charging more for foods and consumer products including foil wraps and disposable cups. And consumers are therefore paying more.

As US reopens, campuses tighten restrictions for virus (AP) About a year into mask mandates, nasal swabs and remote classes, the atmosphere turned tense at the University of Vermont as the school cracked down on rules for social distancing and face coverings amid a spike in student COVID-19 cases. Students were handed hundreds of citations for violations like standing in another student’s doorway or walking maskless to a hallway restroom, igniting a student-led petition that blasted “strict and inhumane living conditions.” “You start to feel suffocated like I’m afraid to leave my room,” freshman Patrick Welsh said in an interview on campus. Even as restrictions relax across much of the United States, colleges and universities have taken new steps to police campus life as the virus spreads through students who are among the last adults to get access to vaccines. Administrators say they’ve needed to act urgently to avoid risking an early end to the semester or sending infected students home and spreading COVID-19. In recent weeks, the University of Michigan punished hundreds of students for missing mandatory virus testing by deactivating their access cards to nonresidential buildings, and Cornell University announced that students would lose access to campus Wi-Fi, course materials and facilities for missing virus tests. The University of Chicago locked down residence halls for seven days and shifted classes online after finding more than 50 cases in a matter of days.

Pandemic gives boost as more states move to digital IDs (AP) The card that millions of people use to prove their identity to everyone from police officers to liquor store owners may soon be a thing of the past as a growing number of states develop digital driver’s licenses. With the advent of digital wallets and boarding passes, people are relying more on their phones to prove their identity. At least five states have implemented a mobile driver’s license program. Three others—Utah, Iowa and Florida—intend to launch programs by next year, with more expected to follow suit. Mobile licenses will give people more privacy by allowing them to decide what personal information they share, state officials say. The licenses offer privacy control options that allow people to verify their age when purchasing alcohol or renting a car, while hiding other personal information like their address. Having a mobile driver’s license will allow people to update their license information remotely without having to go to a state’s Department of Motor Vehicles or waiting for a new card in the mail, said Lee Howell, state relations manager at the American Automobile Association. Industry leaders say safeguards will prevent anyone’s information from being stolen, but some critics argue that having so much personal data on a phone is too risky.

Why an Estimated 100,000 Americans Abroad Face Passport Problems (NYT) About 9 million U.S. citizens currently live abroad, and as the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel finally appears, immigration lawyers estimate more than 100,000 can’t get travel documents to return to the United States. Despite the State Department making headway on a massive backlog of passport applications in the early months of the pandemic, many consulates and embassies abroad, plagued by COVID-19 restrictions and staffing reductions, remain closed for all but emergency services. Travel is restarting, but for American expats who had a baby abroad in the past year or saw their passport expire during the pandemic, elusive appointments for documents are keeping them grounded. “It’s a real mess,” said Jennifer Minear, an immigration attorney and the president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. “It’s a giant, multilayered onion of a problem and the reduction of staff as a result of COVID at the consular posts has really thrown the State Department for a loop.” Michael Wildes, the managing partner of the law firm Wildes & Weinberg, PC, which specializes in immigration law, estimates that the number of stranded Americans abroad is in the hundreds of thousands.

Scotland’s pro-independence leader promises another bid to break from U.K. after election boost (Washington Post) First Minister Nicola Sturgeon promised Saturday to push ahead with another Scotland independence referendum after her party gained a strong showing in Scottish Parliament elections, setting up a potential clash with Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Sturgeon said that an independence referendum was the “will of the country,,” with her Scottish National Party and pro-independence allies taking a majority of the 129 seats after all the votes were counted. That will probably boost calls to redo a 2014 independence referendum, which could lead to the crackup of the United Kingdom under the strains of Brexit and its deep divisions.

‘Freedom’ fiestas: Spaniards celebrate end of COVID curfew (Reuters) Exhilarated Spaniards danced in streets, chanted “freedom” and partied on beaches overnight as a COVID-19 curfew ended across most of the nation. In scenes akin to New Year’s Eve celebrations, hundreds of mainly young people gathered in Madrid’s Puerta del Sol square to applaud the clock striking midnight while in Barcelona revellers headed to the beach with drinks in hand. Police in Barcelona had the strange task of moving people on after the last curfew began at 10 p.m., only to let them back at midnight when it ended for good.

Putin reviews Russian military might as tensions with West soar (Reuters) President Vladimir Putin reviewed Russia’s traditional World War Two victory parade on Sunday, a patriotic display of raw military power that this year coincides with soaring tensions with the West. The parade on Moscow’s Red Square commemorating the 76th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two featured over 12,000 troops and more than 190 pieces of military hardware, including intercontinental ballistic missile launchers, and a fly-past by nearly 80 military aircraft under cloudy skies. This year’s parade precedes parliamentary elections in September and comes at a time when Moscow’s relations with the West are acutely strained over issues ranging from the conflict in Ukraine to the fate of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.

Death toll soars to 50 in school bombing in Afghan capital (AP) The death toll in a horrific bombing at a girls’ school in the Afghan capital has soared to 50, many of them pupils between 11 and 15 years old, the Interior Ministry said Sunday. The number of wounded in Saturday’s attack has also climbed to more than 100, said Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Arian. Three explosions outside the school entrance struck as students were leaving for the day, he said. The blasts occurred in a mostly Shiite neighborhood in the west of the capital.

China says most rocket debris burned up during reentry (AP) China’s space agency said a core segment of its biggest rocket reentered Earth’s atmosphere above the Maldives in the Indian Ocean and that most of it burned up early Sunday. Harvard astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell, who tracked the tumbling rocket part, said on Twitter, “An ocean reentry was always statistically the most likely. It appears China won its gamble.” People in Jordan, Oman and Saudi Arabia reported sightings of the Chinese rocket debris on social media, with scores of users posting footage of the debris piercing the early dawn skies over the Middle East.

Palestinians fear loss of family homes as evictions loom (AP) When Samira Dajani’s family moved into their first real home in 1956 after years as refugees, her father planted trees in the garden, naming them for each of his six children. Today, two towering pines named for Mousa and Daoud stand watch over the entrance to the garden where they all played as children. She and her husband, empty nesters with grown children of their own, may have to leave it all behind on Aug. 1. That’s when Israel is set to forcibly evict them following a decades-long legal battle waged by ideological Jewish settlers against them and their neighbors. The Dajanis are one of several Palestinian families facing imminent eviction in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of east Jerusalem. It also highlights an array of discriminatory polices that rights groups say are aimed at pushing Palestinians out of Jerusalem to preserve its Jewish majority. The Israeli rights group B’Tselem and the New York-based Human Rights Watch both pointed to such policies as an example of what they say has become an apartheid regime. Settler groups say the land was owned by Jews prior to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation. Israeli law allows Jews to reclaim such lands but bars Palestinians from recovering property they lost in the same war, even if they still reside in areas controlled by Israel. Israeli rights groups say other families are also vulnerable, estimating that more than 1,000 Palestinians are at risk of being evicted.

#headlines #news

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rachelkaser · 4 years

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Stay Golden Sunday: The Engagement

In my continuing efforts to find time to write about things outside of the bounds of my job, I’ve been thinking about some old friends. If I’m going to write about anything in the wreckage of 2020, I want it to be something very close to me, something I know that others remember with as much fondness as I do.

So yeah: Let’s talk about The Golden Girls.

youtube

Thank You For Being a Friend

Given everything that’s happened this year, both to the world and me, I’ve not really been so interested in watching new shows as re-watching some old favorites. And out of those, the closest to my heart is The Golden Girls. It’s the show I watched the most with my late mother -- she and I bonded from my pre-adolescence to my late twenties on this show.

I was at the perfect age to absorb this show’s lessons, even if some of the raunchier humor went over my head when I was a kid. This is the show that taught me about strong friendships, how to love well, tolerance, acceptance, grief, humility, integrity and good humor. There are so many parts of myself I can trace, in some way, to Dorothy, Sophia, Blanche, and Rose -- and through them, my mother.

And I’m far from the only one. According to a report from The New York Times, the show became incredibly popular with 18-to-34 year-olds after it began airing on Lifetime -- the article charmingly refers to us as “The Grandchildren of the Golden Girls.” As you might expect, that’s not the projected demographic for a show starring four women over the age of 50 (yes, Blanche, you really are old enough to have a 16-year-old grandson).

If I had to pick a reason, it’d be a combination of the motherly warmth of the four main characters and the novelty (and reassurance) of a show that tells you life does in fact go on when you’re no longer in the bloom of youth. The NYT article features an interview with a Lifetime exec who theorizes that it’s because the women act in a way we typically associate with youth: “They all dated, they all talked about sex, they didn't care about what people thought about them. Those are all values that younger people share.”

I agree with that sentiment, though I will add an addendum: They act the way younger people want to act. Younger people want to be carefree and fun-loving in the way that the Girls are. More often than not, young people are -- and I say this with all the fondness and self-effacement of someone about to exit their twenties -- comparative basketcases. It’s like Mark Twain said: “Life should begin with age and its privileges and accumulations, and end with youth and its capacity to splendidly enjoy such advantages.”

Of course, there’s an alternate explanation: Golden Girls is really goddamned funny.

So every Sunday, I’ll recap and review an episode from The Golden Girls. Barring extraordinary circumstances, I’ll review every episode in order. Then I’ll give some commentary on the story, highlight any of those devilish inconsistencies, and pick a favorite line. I hope some of my fellow Grandchildren of the Golden Girls enjoy some of my thoughts on the episodes.

Picture it...

With all that being said (and I promise no long intros after this point unless it’s very called for), let’s get started with the pilot episode, “The Engagement,” which originally aired in September 1985.

The show proper opens with Dorothy Zbornak and Rose Nylund asking roommate Blanche Hollingsworth about the man she’s been seeing. Blanche tells them the gallant beau in question, Harry, has proposed -- in spite of the fact that, as Rose points out, they’ve only known each other a week. And Harry wants an answer tonight.

Meanwhile, the doorbell rings, and Dorothy answers to see her mother Sophia Petrillo, who says that her nursing home burned down. As Blanche has to explain to Rose, Sophia’s cutting words are the result of her stroke destroying her inhibitions. Sophia does indeed have the subtlety and diplomacy of a Sherman tank, but she at least thinks gay cook Coco is alright.

Harry arrives and schmoozes all of the ladies, though Sophia is not impressed. After he leaves, Rose has a soliloquy about how glad she was to move in with the other ladies, as otherwise she’d be alone, with her children grown up and her husband dead, and she’s not sure what to do now with herself. Sophia’s suggestion? “Get a poodle.”

Rose and Dorothy are divided on whether or not Blanche will accept Harry’s proposal, with Rose adamant that Blanche can’t be without male attention. Blanche returns, and reveals -- after a brief argument about the movement speed of oysters -- she accepted Harry’s proposal and they’ll be married in a week. When Rose asks where she and Dorothy will live once Blanche, who owns the house, is married, Blanche responds that they can stay for as long as they like.

A week later, Blanche is preparing for her wedding. Rose pulls Dorothy aside and says there’s something about Harry that makes her suspicious, but she’s not sure what. She tries to tell Blanche to call off the wedding, but Dorothy resorts to physical restraint to stop her from ruining Blanche’s happy moment, up to and including throwing Rose into Blanche’s closet.

Harry is late to the wedding, much to the frustration of the minister -- “This is Miami. I’ve got funerals backed up.” When the doorbell rings, however, it’s a police officer (played by a pre-Designing Women Meshach Taylor), who tells Blanche that Harry has been arrested for bigamy. Harry leaves Blanche a note telling her she was special to him.

Three weeks later, Blanche is still upset and refusing to leave her room. Rose and Dorothy discuss what to do, and Sophia’s only input is to ask to be left on the curb next to the trash cans when she goes. Blanche arrives, smiling, and says the girls helped her pull through her grief. The girls all go out to celebrate with dinner, but Sophia declines as she and Coco are going to the dog track.

BLANCHE: Your mother bets?

DOROTHY: No, she rides. She’s a dog jockey.

“It’s Miami in June. Only cats are wearing fur.”

For a pilot, this episode establishes the characters, their biographies, and their dynamics with incredible economy. What you see here is what you’re going to see for the next seven seasons, at least with regards to the four women.

For example, we know the moment she opens her mouth that Dorothy is a teacher -- that teacher, specifically. She’s smart and tough enough to tell her rebellious students to leave. She also complains that “all the single men under 80 are cocaine smugglers,” establishing pretty much all you need to know about the women’s dating lives. We also known from the moment we see Rose that she’s bright, cheerful, and a grief counselor -- she probably couldn’t say a stern or unkind word if her life depended on it.

Blanche, on the other hand, has to bear the first heartbreak of the series -- meaning she’s the first who gets her negative character traits examined as well as her positives. She’s refined, graceful, and sexy on the positive side. Unfortunately, she’s also desperate for romantic affection, so much so that she accepts the proposal of a man she’s only known a week and suffers for it. I don’t think there’s an actress in the world who could have sold this as well as Rue McClanahan did.

That said, I think it’s Sophia that binds the whole episode together. Without her sass, I don’t know if the three women would have held together as well as they do. While the opening moments of the show do have some crackle to them, it’s only when Estelle Getty walks on screen that the show really comes to life. Not only does her sharp tongue pair well with Dorothy’s own witty banter, she’s a great counterpoint to Rose’s bubbleheaded buoyancy and Blanche’s genteel manners.

As is usual for pilots, not everything about this episode stayed for the rest of the show’s run. The biggest example of this is Coco, the gay cook who appears only in this episode, but there are others. For starters, Blanche’s room is in a completely different part of the house, and she’s referred to by the name “Blanche Hollingsworth.” Sophia’s smart mouth is blamed on her stroke, rather than being who she is. The entire house’s furniture, decorations, and color palette would eventually change.

Coco’s a bit of an unusual example, because it feels like even the people who made the show didn’t know what to do with him. He’s given next to nothing to do. He has no stand-out personality traits like the ladies. Even most of the shots are framed in such as way as to exclude him: For example, he’s “on-stage” for the whole kitchen scene at the beginning of the episode, but look how these shots are angled so as not to show him:

That’s bizarre because, according to Golden Girls Forever by Jim Colucci, the “gay houseboy” character was apparently pretty important in the early script treatments. All of the writers apparently wanted to see more gay characters on TV and they thought he would add variety to the cast. But even one of the people who auditioned for the role said he thought the character was cheap and drew attention away from the women. The character was eventually dropped because it didn’t make sense for the women to be living together out of financial necessity and have a live-in domestic.

I didn’t think I was going to see inconsistencies in the very first episode either, but there is at least one: Blanche tells Harry about Sophia’s home burning down, even though Blanche wasn’t in the room when Sophia told Dorothy that. These little continuity errors have become a kind of trivia for Golden Girls fans, as fondly remembered as anything in accepted canon.

Overall, I can see why this script attracted three well-known TV actresses, and why everyone at NBC fell in love with it. I’ll work out a grading system for episodes later, but for now I’ll just say I’m so, so, so pleased for myself and the world in general that they managed to capture this kind of lightning in a bottle.

Favorite part of the episode:

ROSE: I can’t eat anything that moves. DOROTHY: Like what, Rose? Horses? ROSE: Like oysters. COCO: Oysters don’t move. DOROTHY: Coco, they could dance! Who cares?!

#golden girls #stay golden #dorothy rose blanche sophia #dorothy zbornak #sophia petrillo #rose nylund #blanche devereaux #the engagement #stay golden sunday

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itwasanangryinch · 5 years

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JCM Projects -- 2019

My aim is to update this at least monthly, ideally weekly with all of the projects John Cameron Mitchell will be working on, debuting, or a part of in the upcoming year. If you know of a project not listed here, please message me thru inbox or IM. | | Updated June 19th

This Week (June 19th-23rd)

(DJing) Mattachine – Monthly queer dance party with Amber Martin and Ang DiCarlo at the Julius

The Origin of Love Tour (North American) (ongoing)

New York – June 27th, at The Town Hall (3 left!) New York – June 28th, at The Town Hall – sold out! New York – June 29th, at The Town Hall – sold out! New York – July 27th, two shows! at Fischer Theatre/Bard College (16 left!) Michigan – November 2nd, at the University of Michigan, (tix on sale in Aug.) Austin – February 7th, 2020, at University of Texas at Austin/Bass Concert Hall (tix on sale in August) San Fransciso – February 29th, 2020, at Berkley University. (tix on sale in Aug.) Salt Lake City – April 3rd, 2020, at Kingsbury Hall (tix on sale in July) Los Angeles – April 11th, 2020, at UCLA/The Theatre at Ace Hotel (tix on sale in July)

more dates to come!

MERCHANDISE: Junction City Mercantile (launched! all proceeds go to helping John’s mum)

Other Concerts

New York – June 22nd, John will be singing a selection of songs from Anthem as part of the first Topic Talks: Music concert. Tickets on sale now.

TV Shows

Shrill (series regular) – Hulu, first season available now! – RENEWED!!

The Good Fight (guest star) – CBS All Access Trailer | | Sneak Peak | | Episode

Movies

Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) – June 25th. Critereon Collection DVD/Blu-Ray release featuring a new 4K restoration of the film, a new chat with the original creatives behind the film, a talk between Stephen Trask and Rolling Stone writer David Fricke, and all of the features from the original DVD release. Critereon.com | | bbfc certification | | watch now

How to Talk to Girls at Parties (2017) – May 8th. Transmission Films. After almost a full year since JCM was there and told that there were no immediate plans for distribution, Australia is finally getting HtTtGaP on DVD and digital.

Podcasts

Anthem: Homunculus: A ten episode podcast series written by JCM and HtTtGaP collaborator Bryan Weller and featuring performers such as Glenn Close, Patti LuPone, Madeline Brewer, and Nakhane. All episodes available. Luminary Podcasts. Little Known Facts with Ilana Levine: Upcoming. John was interviewed on April 29th, episode presumably airs soon. iTunes | | Podbean | | Stitcher The Orbiting Human Circus (of the Air): New episodes dropping generally 2019. A fictional series set in the world of a radio show that broadcasts from the top of the Eiffel Tower. Season one, season one remaster featuring interviews with Julian Koster and JCM, and The Second Imaginary Symphony (does not feature JCM) available now. WNYC Studios.

Too Hot For Radio: 2019. John recorded a live reading of a short story for the NPR program. If it follows past airings, it will be included sometime when the new season starts streaming later this year.

Dreamboy: an ethereal monster movie told in podcast form. JCM guest starred in the finale, aired March 25th, and sang a song. NightValePresents Website.

More John podcasts

Albums

Anthem: Homunculus (Soundtrack) – Out now. Full soundtrack currently available as a digital download from Ghostlight Records. Featuring John, Glenn Close, Patti LuPone, Nakhane, and others, written by JCM and Bryan Weller. Ghostlight Records

T-Rex Tribute Album – John will be singing ‘Diamond Meadows’ as part of producer Hal Willner’s project. No release date yet. Variety, JCM ig

Interviews

For interviews that are not really part of a podcast or other thing.

Big Think: May 18th. Video. (Different from the 9th) [ YT, BT ]

Psychology Today: May 15th. Text interview with John about one of the key plot points in Anthem. More talking about the show than actual interview. There is a more spoilery interview linked off of it relating to ep 7, though the spoiler is something that’s been hinted at in past interviews. [ PT, C ]

Big Think: May 9th. Video [ YT ]

BuzzFeed AM to DM: Daily webshow. May 2nd. [ Periscope, Twitter, BFN ]

New York Live TV/The Hub Boston: TV interview. Same interview ran on both programs. About 5 minutes. May 1st [ YT ]

Time Out Mexico: Text interview. Translated into Spanish. April 29th [ TO ]

Backstage.com: John answered questions from the people at Backstage and fan questions left on their forum and social media. April 25th. [ FB ]

Broadway.com Live at Five: John was interviewed to talk about Anthem: Homunculus and Hedwig. April 24th. [ YouTube, text write up ]

Other Projects

Come Back Once More So I Can Say Goodbye – a theatre piece by Labyrinth Dance Theatre. About gay life in NYC 1965-1995. JCM is part of Julius' Honorary Host Committee for the show. $40 gen. admission. $25 student/senior/artist. June 14-17th.

Broadway: The Next Generation – documentary. No release date yet.

Time Warp: The Greatest Cult Films of All Time – documentary. No release date yet.

TV Series 1: John has talked about this in interviews. Something that he would be writting/showrunning as well as creating. (impending)

TV Series 2: Something that John would be creating, but not as involved in the day-to-day workings of. Has talked about in interviews. (impending)

Other Appearances

Mattachine, June 20th – a monthly queer dance party at Julius’ Bar in New York. Usually the 3rd Thursday of the month, but does vary. John usually shows up, but does not go to all Mattachines. @mattachineparty UPDATED!

Filmmaker on the Edge, June 15th – John is going to be honoured with the award, have a conversation with resident artist John Waters, and screen Hedwig. (press release)

ARCHIVED

After a certain amount of time, older information will drop here so that fans looking for recent, current, and upcoming projects will have an easier time. Things that have already been done will drop down here. And going into 2020, there will be a new list.

The Origin of Love Tour

February 8th -- Washington DC, National Theatre February 22nd -- Chicago, IL, Atheneum Theatre March 2nd -- Boston, MA, Schubert Theatre May 22nd -- Mexico City, MX, Auditorio BlackBerry June 8th -- Miami, FL, The Arsht Center/Knight Hall

Other Concerts

Drop down after performance unless there’s a stream or a downloadable thing for them.

TV Shows

Shows drop down here after three months for guest appearances and six months after the last episode airs for series regular status.

Movies

Movies drop down six months after last release.

Podcasts

Podcasts that John is in the regular cast for will drop here six months after the last episode. guest starring, three months. Interview, one month.

Regular Cast

Guest Starring

Interview

Adulting: an interview format podcast where JCM and another guest star were interviewed. Broadcast live April 12th as part of a celebration for the venue. Watch video on FB | | Periscope | | Youtube

Death, Sex Money: John is guest hosting and interviewing his friend Marilyn Maye while the regular host is on maternity leave. April 17th. WYNC Studios.

Katya and Craig/Whimsically Volatile: April 25th. Podcast hosted by drag star Katya Zamolodchikova and director Craig MacNeil. This week, Craig hosted the show and interviewed John without Katya. Soundcloud | | Libsyn | | iTunes | YouTube

Chapo Trap House: April 29th. Podcast where John talks about Anthem, Hedwig, Shortbus, “the end of sex.” Soundcloud

Laura Heywood Interviews: May 8. player.fm | | Libsyn

The Frame: May 9. John has a segment talking about Anthem. iTunes | | player.fm | | NPR

Studio 360: May 14th. John and Bryan talking about Anthem and performing a live version of ‘The End of Love.’ Slate | | iTunes

Albums

If John is guest appearing on the album, it will move after four months. If it’s his project, it will move after six.

Interviews

Drops down after one month for text interviews. Three for video.

Rolling Stone Mexico and GQ Mexico: John is interviewed in both for his performance in Mexico City

Mural: May 18th. Text interview in Spanish. [ M ]

Escandala: May 15th. Text interview with John. In Spanish [ E ] Open Revista: May 14th Text interview with John in Spanish. [ OR ]

TheatreMania: May 12. Text interview with John and Bryan Weller about Anthem. [ TM ]

Metro Source: May 10th. Text interview with John about Anthem. [ MS ]

Time Out: May 9th. Press release/info for Orbital DJing Event [ TO ]

Daily Beast: May 6th. Text interview. [ DB ]

Rolling Stone: Text interview with John and Glenn Close about Anthem. May 5th [ RS ]

Backstage.com: write up of the FB/IG live video that John did the previous week. May 1st [ Backstage ]

Forbes: Text interview about Anthem and transforming it from the Hedwig sequel. John also talks about his writing process, The Orbiting Human Circus, and which Broadway shows he’s excited by this season. April 26th [ Forbes ]

NewNowNext: Text interview. April 23rd. [ NNN ]

Observer: Text interview. April 23rd. [ Observer ]

Queerty: Text interview. April 20th. [ Queerty ]

New York Times: Text interview. April 19th. [ NYT ]

Other Projects

Unless John is featured heavily, these will drop down after a month or two. These projects might also be less available than some of the other programs.

Other Appearances

Too Hot For Radio – January 26th, as part of San Francisco SketchFest, John went out and read a story for NPR’s Selected Shorts radio program. Eventually it will air via streaming like iTunes, NPR’s website, SoundCloud....

JCM interviews Claywoman – March 17th, John participated in a performance art interview of a drag character reported to be the oldest being in the universe who has travelled to our planet from her own.

JCM screens Entertaining Mr. Sloane – March 19th, John screened one of his favourite movies, a British sex comedy called Entertaining Mr. Sloane as part of a Quad Cinema series.

Various Promotion – various times in January thru March, John was on location being interviewed to promote Shrill. These appearances include the Hulu winter TCAs, the New York Shrill premiere, and San Francisco SketchFest.

Jay Brannon, Joe’s Pub – April 9th, John announced attending concert. Presumably did not perform.

Club Cumming – April 15th, John made his first appearance at Club Cumming as part of a star studded benefit for New Alternatives, an LGBT Youth charity. Sold out!

SirusFM//Signal Boost Show – April 25th, interview about Anthem, Hedwig, Uber rides, and sex.

Tribeca Celebrates Pride – May 4th, John was interviewed his Shrill costar Patti Hardison about how his queer identity has affected his work.

Chocolate Babies screening – May 7th. John announced on ig that he was going to be attending a screening of Stephen Winter’s film.

Orbital – May 24th. John and Amber DJed at the Ortibal dance party in Mexico.

Tony Awards - June 9th. Guest.

Nahkane, The Illustrious Blacks - June 20th. John announced on ig he would be attended Nahkane’s performance before June’s Mattachine Party.

#john cameron mitchell #hedwig and the angry inch #hedwig #shrill #the good fight #anthem #hatai #mattachine #anthem homunculus #dreamboy #the origin of love #club cumming #orbiting human circus #the orbiting human circus #orbiting human circus (of the air)#wnyc #jcm

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staytheb · 5 years

Text

GRAND Masterlist

prompt list here! guideline post here! new guideline here! new ACTIVE masterlist here! new RESERVED masterlist here!

NEWER guideline here! NEW active ML here! NEW reserved ML here! NEW hiatus ML here! NEW inactive ML here! female artists ML here! soloists ML here!

NEWER GRAND MASTERLIST here!

updated 4.11.22

1TEAM

Immortal Soulmate

1THE9

Snowball Fight (YYH)

ATEEZ

Do You Ever... (SMG)

B.A.P

Bonds of Roses (CJH)

Chocolate Memory (KHC)

Handcrafted Card of Feelings (JDH)

Jars Filled A Second Time (YYJ)

The Balloons’ Representation (BYG)

Teddy Bear Confession (MJU)

Walk Away (YYJ)

BTOB

Tick... Tock... Is This For Real? (YSJ)

BTS

Interested (JJK&KTY)

CRAVITY

Clingy (PSR&KJM)

Distraction (PSR)

ENHYPEN

Delivery (JP)

For Now (JP)

I Know (JP&PSH)

Mine (PSH)

Morning (LHS)

Oops (JS)

Tattoo (JP)

ERIC NAM

Neighbor

EXO

Warzone (KJM&OSH)

GOT7

Babe, I’m Sorry (JW)

Babe, Wake Up (MT)

Cereal (MT)

Conversations

LA Confidential (MT) -> pt.1 of YLHT

Leap of Faith (MT)

Like Oh 2.0 series (MT&IJB)

Moonlight Melody series (PJY)

My Last (MT)

Official Anyways (MT)

Pay It Forward (MT)

The Next Part (PJY)

Truth or Dare (MT)

You Live Here, Too? (MT) -> pt.2 of LAC

IKON

My Favorite Kimbap (BK)

Will You Ride For Me? (KHB)

INFINITE

[As You Walk On By, Will You] Call My Name (KSG)

He Is (KSG)

JESSICA JUNG

Moonlight Melody

MONSTA X

A Jar of Love (SHW&LHS)

All In Fun and Games -> pt.2 of TA

Between Us

Closer (SHW&CHW)

Moving On

She Left? (LHS)

Sure (LHS)

The Aftermath -> pt.1 of AIFaG

Trip (SHW&CHW)

NCT

Because I Can (NYT)

Crazy (LJN)

Day Festival series

Deja Vu (LTY)

Dragon Bride (DSC)

Insufferable (JYO) -> pt.2 of PM

Morning Kisses (NJM)

Private Matter (JYO) -> pt.1 of I

Rooming (LTY)

Shampoo (WYH)

NU’EST

Soulmate Timer (KDH)

OMEGA X

Immortal Soulmate (Xen & Jehyun)

PENTAGON

Chances (YHS&AYT) -> pt.2 of SIY

Foundation (LHT)

Maybe, I Could Be (LHT&AYT) -> pt.1 of O

More Time (YCG&JWS) -> pt.2 of TNNOY

Obviously (LHT&AYT) -> pt.2 of MICB

Phone Call (LHT)

Really Hoping You Would (YCG&AYT) -> pt.2 of TM

Screams (YHS)

Skype (YCG)

So It’s You (YHS&AYT) -> pt.1 of C

The Night’s Not Over Yet (YCG&AYT) -> pt.1 of MT

Treat Me (YCG&AYT) -> pt.1 of RHYW

Witches (LHT&AYT)

RED VELVET

Moonlight Melody (BJH)

SF9

Acting Secretary (KYB) pt.2

Errands (KYB) pt.1

Fluffy (LJY)

Gotta Go (KYB) pt.3 (co-feature TBZ’s LSY)

Scenery (KYB) pt.4 (co-feature TBZ’s LSY)

Sunflower (YTY)

SEVENTEEN

Club Seventeen (JWW)

Last Kiss, First Kiss (JH)

Worry (YJH)

SHINee

Chasing You (KJH)

My Heart’s Been Knockin’ On Your Door (LJK)

Nothing Compares to You (KJH)

STRAY KIDS

Assume (LMH)

Confession (BC)

Dance Partner (HHJ)

Date (HHJ)

Eavesdrop (HJS)

Fine (BC&LF)

Formal (BC&HHJ)

Fun-Sized & etc series (BC)

He’s Cute (BC&LMH)

Hide ‘n Seek (BC)

I Like You (BC&HHJ)

iPad Mini (LMH)

Is This...? (BC&SCB)

Just For You (BC&LF)

Love and Affection (BC)

Love Warning (BC&HHJ)

Movies (BC)

My Style (BC)

Scavenger Hunt (BC)

Seriously (BC)

Stay

Tell Me (LMH, co-feature TBZ’s KM)

THE BOYZ

Got It (KM)

Gotta Go (LSY) pt.2 (co-feature SF9′s KYB)

Hot Chocolate (KSW)

I’m Fine (LSY) pt.3

Only One (HHJ)

Polaroids (KSW)

Report (LSY)

Scenery (LSY) pt.4 (co-feature TBZ’s LSY)

Tell Me (KM, co-feature SKZ’s LMH)

TXT

Elusive (CYJ)

Favorite (CSB)

VERIVERY

Double Date (LDH)

Kiwi (BHY)

WEi

Snowball Fight (YYH)

WORLD KLASS

Umbrella (LIM)

37 notes · View notes

monkeypretzel · 5 years

Text

NYT Article about Joel Hodgson’s Riffing Class, 2012

Don’t Like the Movie? Let’s Talk About It

Joel Hodgson on ‘Mystery Science Theater’ and Riffs

By Paul Brownfield June 1, 2012

IT takes a certain kind of fan to recognize Joel Hodgson, creator of the cult 1990s Comedy Central series “Mystery Science Theater 3000,” and Shawn Queeney is that kind of fan. In his media and society class at Bucks County Community College north of Philadelphia, Mr. Queeney, an associate professor of communications, discusses the place of the “Mystery Science Theater” in the underbelly of cinema, and he and his wife spent a December evening watching Mr. Hodgson and friends perform their idiosyncratic comedy as part of the live B-movie heckling tour “Cinematic Titanic.”

So when Mr. Queeney spotted Mr. Hodgson at a restaurant not long after, he asked Mr. Hodgson to speak at his college. Mr. Hodgson agreed but later came back with a suggestion more befitting his sensibilities. And so was hatched one of the odder master classes ever offered in formal higher education: a workshop on the art and science of “movie riffing.”

On “Mystery Science Theater,” which began in 1988 and was integral to the early growth of Comedy Central, Mr. Hodgson played a janitor at a byzantine research lab who is sent into space, where he is forced to watch B and C genre movies with two robot companions named Tom Servo and Crow. But that setup, laid out in the theme song, was only the bones of the show. The meat each week was in the riffing, as Joel and his bot-pals, silhouetted at the bottom of the screen, commented on everything from killer lizard films like The Giant Gila Monster to cheesy instructional shorts like “Hired!”

“Hey, isn’t that the John Belushi biography?” Mr. Hodgson’s character says when the title appears. (Riff spoiler alert: It’s a reference to the book “Wired.”)

If “Mystery Science Theater” was part insult comedy aimed at movies, there was also something congenial in the show’s tone. (Perhaps it was the puppet robots, or that it was all being produced in Minneapolis.)

Six writers had to deliver a 90-minute episode every week, Mr. Hodgson said, with 600 to 800 riffs per movie, “when all the pistons were firing.” In devising the lines, no reference (Bella Abzug, Roy Lichtenstein) was too outré or rejected initially, Mr. Hodgson said. As he tried to convey to the students at Bucks, it’s best to brainstorm nonjudgmentally first and figure out what’s funny later.

Mr. Hodgson, now 52, left “Mystery Science Theater” in 1993 after, he said, a dispute with the executive producer Jim Mallon over the direction of a feature film based on the series.

Moving to Los Angeles, Mr. Hodgson landed a series of movie and TV deals while also keeping creative in more inimical ways. One of them was an event called the Super Ball, an annual “one-night World’s Fair” that Mr. Hodgson dreamed up with his brother, Jim, combining their interest in comedy, science and art happenings.

Mr. Hodgson, in this way, has long approached comedy as a chemist in a lab does, noodling with a drug protocol to make it more effective. In Minneapolis in the late 1980s he briefly taught a workshop called Creative Stand-Up and Smartology that was based on communication paradigms he’d read about in college. This was after he had earned appearances on “Late Night With David Letterman” and “Saturday Night Live.”

Years later he tried to rejigger the sketch comedy series format at HBO, where he made a pilot called “The TV Wheel.” Mr. Hodgson’s idea was to shoot the show live, with a camera that was locked down in the middle of a set that rotated like a record on a turntable. “Your TV doesn’t move, so why should the camera?” Mr. Hodgson said, explaining the philosophy.

Finally, in 2007, Mr. Hodgson, still regretful about leaving “Mystery Science Theater,” returned to movie riffing, forming the tour “Cinematic Titanic” with the writer-performers Trace Beaulieu, J. Elvis Weinstein, Frank Conniff and Mary Jo Pehl.

In class Mr. Hodgson kept things loose but wasn’t just fooling around either. In his travels with “Cinematic Titanic,” Mr. Hodgson said, he often meets people movie riffing à la “Mystery Science Theater” but live. “I was always curious what it would be like to participate with these people who wanted to get into it.”

The class was made up mostly of theater, film and video majors, and a number of them were involved in improv comedy, including Kyle Reichert, 21. “Every class he would talk about something new,” Mr. Reichert recalled, “what he would go through on a daily basis making the show.”

Mr. Hodgson’s first lesson was simple: When riffing don’t be a jerk. (He used a different word.) The 25 students in Riff Camp 2012 were divided into groups. They had two and a half months to complete a film’s worth of riffs before performing at the college’s spring arts festival. They also had to dream up a back story and set it to a theme song. One group, the all-female New Valkyries of Valhalla are Valkyries by day, collecting Viking souls, and students in a women’s studies course at Valhalla Community College by night.

That explains why they would be watching “Consuming Women,” an oddly spooky short billed as a portrait of the female consumer circa 1967. The other films Mr. Hodgson assigned for other groups — from the public domain Web site archive.org, which houses the Prelinger Archives— included “Pennsylvania Fish Commission,” a riveting 1950s tour of trout farming narrated by the commission’s decidedly un-emotive executive director, and the delicious University of California romp “Health: Your Posture,” about a girl ostracized by her peers because of bad posture.

“It had nothing to do with posture,” said Stephanie Drejerwski, 20, one of the riffers.

Mr. Hodgson instructed students not to riff more than once every three seconds, so that the audience could absorb each joke. As on “Mystery Science Theater,” scripts were time- and color-coded to indicate when the film’s narrator was speaking (“You need a thorough checkup by your family doctor to discover the cause of your posture defects”) and when the riff was interjected (“Sir? We don’t have insurance?”).

Though the practical application of a course on movie riffing seems negligible, Mr. Hodgson has perhaps hit upon something in the age of social media. Facebook and Twitter, among others, are portals not dissimilar to the sad, empty cinema where Joel, Servo and Crow watched bad movies, their riffs providing a sense of community.

Maybe that’s why “Mystery Science Theater” keeps enjoying afterlives. Michael J. Nelson, who replaced Mr. Hodgson on the TV series until it ended in 1999, offers RiffTrax, audio riffs to play alongside DVD releases of current and older films. The comedian Doug Benson, host of the popular podcast “Doug Loves Movies,” organized a live screening series in Los Angeles, “The Doug Benson Movie Interruption,” in which he and friends (like Zach Galifianakis, Sarah Silverman and Ed Helms) riff on a movie for the audience. And Kevin Smith, the filmmaker and inveterate podcaster, is starting a show on Hulu this week called “Spoilers.”

Mr. Smith was quick to note that this was riffing not like “Mystery Science Theater” but in the tradition of his first film, “Clerks,” in which the characters spitball about a movie everyone’s already seen, “Star Wars.” In “Spoilers” Mr. Smith plans to screen a current release at Universal City Walk in Los Angeles then take the audience to a nearby studio for what he sees as a live version of a movie chat room.

“I don’t think a movie discussion ever dies anymore,” he said.

Meanwhile, as alumni from Riff Camp 2012 prepared to perform this weekend at the Colonial Theater in nearby Phoenixville (the same theater where scenes from the original “ Blob” were filmed), Mr. Hodgson and his fellow “Mystery Science Theater” alums were busy putting together a “Cinematic Titanic” show set for July in Ann Arbor, Mich. They will be riffing on two 1970s films — “Rattlers” (rattlesnakes and nerve gas!) and “The Doll Squad,” which, Mr. Hodgson said, is about “a seven-woman army that was supposedly the prototype for ‘Charlie’s Angels.’” Set riffing engines to full throttle.

#joel hodgson #mst3k #cinematic titanic #riffing

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xtruss · 3 years

Text

Can Biden Reverse Trump’s Damage to the State Department?

Reeling from the leadership of Rex Tillerson and Mike Pompeo, career officials wonder whether Secretary of State Antony Blinken can revitalize American diplomacy.

— By Ronan Farrow | June 17, 2021 | The New Yorker

Donald Trump whispers to Mike Pompeo in a Cabinet meeting. Mike Pompeo echoed many of Donald Trump’s hard-line foreign-policy views, and was adept at surviving under a mercurial President. Photograph by Tom Brenner / NYT / Redux

Last year, in the early hours of October 27th, Philip Walton, an American citizen living and working as a farmer in southern Niger, was kidnapped in front of his family by armed mercenaries. The militants demanded a million-dollar ransom from Walton’s family and threatened to sell the American to local extremist groups. As Walton’s captors smuggled him across the border into northern Nigeria, Navy seals planned a rescue operation. Several days later, as the seals stood ready to conduct the raid, then Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was on a government plane, flying back to the United States after travelling in Asia. A State Department staffer entered Pompeo’s cabin and updated the secretary on Walton’s case. The staffer outlined the steps that Pompeo would need to take to facilitate the exfiltration, including a call to the President of Niger.

To the surprise of his aides, Pompeo pushed back on the staffer’s requests. Pompeo grew visibly annoyed with the request that he make the phone calls, eventually replying, “When am I going to sleep?” The staffer told Pompeo that the American citizen being held was unlikely to be sleeping much. At the end of the discussion, Pompeo agreed to make the necessary calls. On the morning of October 31st, the seals parachuted from an Air Force Special Operations Command plane and rescued Walton, killing six of his kidnappers. Donald Trump and Pompeo later boasted about the operation on Twitter, where Pompeo called it “outstanding.” Staffers said the tweet was one of multiple instances when Pompeo appeared to use his position to boost his or Trump’s political fortunes.

Aides who worked under Pompeo said the exchange regarding the raid typified a leadership style that included brusque treatment of personnel and an intense focus on partisan politics that sometimes hampered the day-to-day business of the State Department. In interviews, dozens of other department employees alleged that Pompeo’s chaotic tenure, and that of his predecessor, Rex Tillerson, left deep institutional and cultural scars that continue to impede American diplomatic efforts around the world.

During the Trump Administration, a hiring freeze, radical proposals to cut the State Department’s budget, and an unprecedented number of vacancies in pivotal roles undercut the institution’s capacity to conduct diplomacy. In an interview before taking office as the current Secretary of State, Antony Blinken warned that the departure of so many career diplomats had deeply damaged the department. That “penalizes you in all sorts of ways that will go on for generations, not just for a bunch of years,” Blinken told me. Absent a more robust department, he said, “We’re going to get into all kinds of conflicts we might have avoided through development, through diplomacy.”

State Department officials told me that the Biden Administration is acting too slowly to reverse the effects of the purge. Some said that they feared that Blinken and other Administration officials, eager to distance themselves from the reckless decision-making of the Trump era, have been hesitant to make bold policy decisions. “Things aren’t moving forward,” one career diplomat, who works with Blinken and asked not to be named, told me. “There’s starting to be some chatter around the building about, you know, let’s do the hard work. And I’m not sure that these folks are prepared at this point to do that.”

The initial wave of Trump-era damage was wrought by Rex Tillerson, who championed budget cuts of proportions not seen since the first Clinton Administration, which advocated for a downsizing of the department in the name of a post-Cold War focus on domestic priorities. Pompeo, a Republican who had served as a congressman from Kansas and as Trump’s C.I.A. director, promised to restore the institution’s “swagger.” He had little by way of diplomatic experience, but was politically savvier than Tillerson—and, ultimately, more adept at surviving under a mercurial President. An evangelical Christian from Orange, California, Pompeo graduated first in his class at West Point and served in the U.S. Army’s 4th Infantry Division. After graduating from Harvard Law School, he moved to Kansas to start an aerospace business, with investment from the Kochs’ venture-capital fund. He successfully ran for Congress amid the Tea Party wave, in 2010, again with Koch backing. Pompeo’s tenure as C.I.A. director was brief, just fifteen months, but he gained a reputation for being sharp-elbowed there as well, discarding the standing precedent of serving as an apolitical director and instead cultivating unusually close ties to Trump, sometimes even accompanying the President to meetings that were unrelated to intelligence. Pompeo echoed some of Trump’s hard-line foreign-policy views. When the President issued pugnacious calls to dismantle the Iran nuclear deal, Pompeo did so, too. And he appeared to internalize some of the lessons cited by White House officials about playing to Trump’s ego. The President, Pompeo declared during his tenure as C.I.A. director, “asks good, hard questions.”

After arriving at the State Department, Pompeo lifted the hiring freeze enacted by Tillerson but then isolated himself from the staff, in what seemed to some officers to be a deliberate show of mistrust. “Tillerson’s problem was function, Pompeo’s was deliberate,” one Foreign Service officer who worked closely with Pompeo told me. “There was never really any input from the field. There was less input from the building.” The new Secretary of State, several staffers said, treated them harshly. “He did a lot of screaming in private,” the Foreign Service officer added. “Pompeo was a dick, that I would agree on,” another senior official who worked closely with Pompeo told me. At times, his outbursts were directed to foreign interlocutors, including one prominent European foreign minister.

By the end of the Trump Administration, morale in the department had collapsed. Pompeo had lost the confidence of his staff, some of whom believed that he was preoccupied with a potential Presidential run and was playing to his conservative political base. Several cited his repeated refusals to sign off on even perfunctory commitments to diversity, at a time when Black and Hispanic diplomats each comprised just eight per cent of Foreign Service officers. Allegations of corruption surrounded him as well. The House Foreign Affairs Committee moved to hold Pompeo in contempt for refusing to comply with multiple subpoenas. The State Department inspector general’s office disclosed the existence of five different investigations into State Department activities, including at least two that directly involved Pompeo.

One investigation focussed on his use of subordinates to run personal errands for him and his wife, such as picking up dry cleaning and walking their dog. After Steve Linick, the department’s inspector general, began examining the Secretary’s conduct, a Pompeo ally dismissed him. Linick, a career public servant, was abruptly placed on administrative leave and locked out of his office. He later told a congressional committee that he was given no explanation for the removal. (In April, the State Department’s Office of Inspector General concluded that Pompeo had violated the department’s ethics rules, but noted that he is no longer subject to penalties because he has left the government.)

After Trump’s loss, last November, staffers’ concerns about Pompeo’s political activities increased. As Trump rejected the election results, Pompeo’s State Department impeded the transition process. Messages from foreign leaders to President-elect Joe Biden piled up, as Pompeo declined to observe protocol and release them. In the department’s press briefing room, Pompeo told reporters, “There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump Administration.” No one was sure whether he was joking. Pompeo seemed irritated at follow-up questions, saying that “every legal vote” had to be counted, an adage used by Trump allies claiming, falsely, that the election results were fraudulent.

As Pompeo set out on a post-election international trip, last November, his refusal to acknowledge the balloting results cast a shadow over his diplomacy. E.U. officials declined to meet with him, prompting Pompeo to cancel some stops. As he visited Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Georgia, where the United States has encouraged electoral transparency, career Foreign Service officers wondered what moral authority their country still carried on the subject. After he learned that plans for a routine transition meeting with his successor, Blinken, had leaked to the press, Pompeo cancelled it. Although the meeting later took place, Foreign Service officers who worked with Pompeo were dismayed by the apparent prioritization of politics over an orderly transition. “He didn’t want to be seen as doing his job,” one told me.

During the same period, Pompeo was posting political messages on Twitter. The messages were reposted to an account in Pompeo’s name, with more than a hundred thousand followers, on Telegram, where a far-right audience, shunned by some mainstream platforms, had congregated. (A spokesperson for Pompeo said that Pompeo was unaware of the Telegram account.) His posts often focussed on domestic issues, including criticism of news outlets, and featured political slogans like “#AmericansFirst” and “#SoMuchWinning.” In one message, from January, Pompeo told his followers, “America is a land of many freedoms - it’s what makes us the best country in the world. Even after I leave office, I will continue to do all I can to secure those freedoms. Follow me @mikepompeo and join me.”

After Pompeo and Trump left office, the State Department was riddled with vacancies. More than a third of all Assistant Secretary or Under-Secretary positions—the organization’s top leadership—were empty or filled by temporary, “acting” officials. For more than half of the Trump years, the senior position responsible for nonproliferation and arms control, including confronting nuclear threats from North Korea, had been vacant or led by an acting appointee. Diversity among senior staff had dwindled, and the department’s workforce was overwhelmingly white, with just thirteen per cent of the senior executive service roles filled by individuals of color. Concerns about a lack of diversity in the department’s workforce predate the Trump Administration, but recent employee surveys showed growing frustration with the department’s failure to address the problem.

Today, the staffing challenges persist. Five months after taking office, the Biden Administration has filled numerous senior roles, but the State Department still employs slightly fewer Foreign Service officers than at the conclusion of the Trump Administration. And diversity has yet to improve, according to figures published in March.

The Trump Administration also left behind a culture of suspicion. “There’s this mistrust of career officers,” Blinken told me, of his predecessor’s era. A 2019 State Department inspector-general investigation found that Trump’s political appointees had retaliated against career employees who typically serve under Administrations of both parties. Those employees, who carry much of the department’s institutional memory, were pilloried as “disloyal” or “traitors,” part of a shadowy and allegedly liberal “deep state.” Pompeo defended Trump’s habit of praising authoritarian leaders—a practice that diplomats told me was generally not part of any wider diplomatic strategy. Trump extended White House invitations to the Egyptian autocrat Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, who was presiding over a brutal human-rights crackdown, and the President of the Philippines, Rodrigo Duterte, who has admitted to murdering opponents and had encouraged his troops to rape women. Echoing Trump, Pompeo praised Sisi’s approach to religious freedom and, according to a Philippine spokesperson, told Duterte that he was “just like our President.”

Numerous diplomats acknowledged what they described as unprecedented challenges ahead for the State Department. “There’s a real corrosion of the sense of American leadership in the world and the institutions that make that leadership real,” William Burns, President Biden’s current C.I.A. director and a former Deputy Secretary of State, told me before taking office. “Diplomacy really ought to be the tool of first resort internationally. It can sometimes achieve things at far less cost, both financially and in terms of American lives, than the use of the military can.” Several staffers praised Biden for pledging, on the campaign trail, to empower diplomats, and for embracing diversity initiatives that Pompeo had shunned. “They’re saying all the right things about diversity, they’re doing all the right things about affinity groups,” one official told me. But many diplomats said that there had been little visible progress on these issues. They wondered whether Biden, an establishment figure, was the right President to confront them at a time that they believe merits a radical course correction.

Biden ran on promises to reverse his predecessor’s embrace of dictators. “No more blank checks for Trump’s ‘favorite dictator,’ ” Biden tweeted during the 2020 campaign, referring to Sisi, in Egypt. But in his long career in Washington, Biden often championed such relationships. As chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he had presided over the rubber-stamping of unfettered military aid to the Egyptian strongman Hosni Mubarak. As Vice-President, he was one of Mubarak’s last supporters in Washington, saying, two weeks before Mubarak was unseated, in 2011, that he was not a dictator and didn’t need to leave office. Blinken told me that the subject had been a focus of fierce debate within the Obama Administration. “There were some folks who wanted us to much more forcefully defend Mubarak,” Blinken said. “And others suggested that, as one said, we needed to be on the right side of history.” The dispute had been “more generational than anything else,” he added, with a group of younger officials, including the current U.S.A.I.D. administrator, Samantha Power, arguing against “some of the older, more seasoned hands, who had, after all, been dealing with the relationship with Egypt for years,” including “[Robert] Gates, Hillary [Clinton], Biden,” who defended Mubarak. Blinken said that loyalty to Mubarak had been a mistake. “Yeah, maybe we were caught flat-footed in Egypt,” he told me.

Several diplomats said that the Biden Administration, in an effort to strike a different tone than that of Tillerson, Pompeo, and Trump, is being too cautious. “These new folks are doing their best to be not-the-last-folks,” the career diplomat who works with Blinken said. “That’s great in some ways, and, in some ways, it’s sort of keeping them from finding their groove. Sometimes there are tough decisions to make. And if the last folks made that decision, they’re trying not to do it.” As an example, the diplomat cited conversations about the extent of the United States’ ongoing presence in Iraq, which have, several staffers said, largely stalled since Biden took office. The diplomat added, “We can’t get a rhythm until we stop trying to be the anti-Trump, anti-Pompeo people.” (A State Department spokesperson told me, “We’re not going to make apologies for running a process that is inclusive and appropriately deliberative,” a reference to consultations with offices across the State Department and the wider government. “You can’t have an inclusive process and expect dramatic shifts, in every single realm, in a hundred and fifty days.”)

William Taylor, an Ambassador who testified during Trump’s first impeachment, said that rebuilding the Department’s battered workforce would be difficult. “They’ve seen things that have bothered them, that have disturbed them, that have shaken their faith in this institution they have been serving in. And a whole lot of people have left the Foreign Service,” Taylor told me. “It’s a real loss. They’ve left a hole, a vacuum.” But Taylor and other veterans of the State Department expressed optimism that American diplomacy could be revitalized. “Damage has been done. But there are smart people, good people,” Taylor said. “If we get good leadership and reëstablish trust and transparency, they’ll go back.”

— This piece was drawn from “War on Peace: Revised and Updated,” by Ronan Farrow, published by Norton.

— Ronan Farrow, a contributing writer to The New Yorker, is the author of “Catch and Kill” and “War on Peace.” His reporting for The New Yorker won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for public service.

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orbemnews · 3 years

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Sleepless in the Senate On Feb. 22-23, DealBook will bring together some of the sharpest minds in business and policy for our DealBook DC Policy Project. Join us from anywhere in the world, free of charge. Register today. Fifteen hours later … From around 2:30 p.m. yesterday to 5:30 a.m. today, senators engaged in a “vote-a-rama,” dealing with a flood of amendments to a budget resolution that would accelerate the passage of President Biden’s $1.9 trillion economic rescue plan, without any Republican votes if necessary. Indeed, after dealing with dozens of amendments, the Senate passed the bill along party lines, with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the deciding vote in the evenly split chamber. And so begins the “budget reconciliation” process. The arcane, filibuster-proof procedure — which was used to pass President Donald Trump’s tax cut in 2017 — features “baroque parliamentary tricks that few understand,” writes Times Opinion’s Ezra Klein. In short, after the House passes an identical resolution to the Senate’s, probably within a day or so, lawmakers will take a few weeks to work out the details of the stimulus bill, subject to some constraints under reconciliation. The final package won’t include everything Mr. Biden wants, most notably raising the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour, which will be delayed by an amendment that senators passed to put off any increase until after the pandemic. Senator Bernie Sanders, unfazed, said that his plan for the wage increase was to phase it in over five years, not impose it immediately. Senators also agreed to a motion to block tax increases on small businesses during the pandemic, backed a fund to provide grants to bars and restaurants hit by the coronavirus crisis, voted to overturn Mr. Biden’s halt on the Keystone XL pipeline, and forbade $1,400 stimulus checks from going to “upper-income taxpayers,” which will be defined when the bill-writing process begins. The upshot: Something resembling the $1.9 trillion package proposed by the White House will probably become law in the coming weeks. Later today, the monthly jobs report will provide an important gauge of the strength of the economic recovery, and could influence lawmakers as they haggle over the small print for a huge stimulus. HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING Johnson & Johnson applies for emergency approval of its Covid-19 vaccine. The drugmaker submitted paperwork for its single-shot treatment to the F.D.A. yesterday. Approval could come by late this month, clearing J.&J. to begin shipping it in early March. Senator Amy Klobuchar proposes sweeping changes to antitrust laws. The new Democratic head of the Senate antitrust subcommittee introduced legislation that would prohibit companies with dominant market positions from buying rivals unless they can prove such deals wouldn’t hinder competition. Expect skepticism from Republicans and the tech industry. The Bank of England paves the way for negative interest rates. The central bank told British banks yesterday that they should prepare for rates to go below zero, though policymakers have kept the benchmark rate at 0.1 percent. Still, the pound and bond yields rose in anticipation of a future rate cut. A short seller takes on Chamath Palihapitiya. Hindenburg Research, the research and investment firm, accused the health insurer Clover Health of misleading investors and failing to disclose an inquiry by the Justice Department. Hindenburg, which said it has no investment in Clover, questioned whether Mr. Palihapitiya was aware of those issues when one of his SPACs took the company public. Clover rebutted Hindenburg’s claims this morning, but acknowledged the S.E.C. has begun an investigation. Private equity might join the club of N.B.A. team owners. CVC Capital is reportedly in talks to buy a minority stake in the San Antonio Spurs at a $1.3 billion valuation, The Financial Times reports. A deal could open the door to investment firms buying pieces of other N.B.A. teams, as some minority owners demand more options for selling their stakes. Cashing in on meme-stock mania Here’s another winner in the meme-stock frenzy: the Koss family. The headphone maker that bears their name was swept up in the recent market mania, pushing the heavily shorted small-cap company’s share price up by nearly 2,000 percent in a matter of days. Koss insiders sold some $44 million in stock this week, an amount worth more than the company’s entire market cap before the crowds of retail traders sent its shares soaring. Michael J. Koss, the C.E.O. and son of the firm’s founder, sold shares worth more than $13 million, and was joined by other family members, executives and directors in paring their holdings. Can they do that? Although executives at other companies at the center of the frenzy, namely GameStop and AMC, haven’t sold shares during the rally, there is nothing untoward legally about the move, provided that the insiders did not have access to private information about the run-up in share price. There’s no reason to believe that they did, since it seems that the Reddit-fueled rally was largely conducted in the open, by investors cheering each other on via a public message board. “As the stock goes up in price, whether it makes sense or not, the people on the end of the short sale suffer,” said Craig Marcus, a partner at the law firm Ropes & Gray, “and people who hold the stock and have the opportunity to sell it and benefit from it, benefit from it.” Speaking of cashing in, Jaime Rogozinski, the founder of the WallStreetBets Reddit forum, where meme-stock traders gather, sold the rights to his life story to a production company. Other moderators at the forum, who pushed out Mr. Rogozinski last year, are now fighting for control of the group, which has 8.5 million members, amid accusations that they are trying to position themselves as key players in the saga in hopes of signing deals similar to Mr. Rogozinski’s. In other meme-stock news: GameStop crashed again yesterday, leaving it more than 80 percent lower than at the start of the week. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen held a meeting with fellow regulators to address market volatility, which concluded with statements promising further research but no immediate action. And Elon Musk, who had celebrated the meme-stock rally before saying he would take a break from Twitter, returned to tweet praise of the jokey cryptocurrency Dogecoin, which promptly surged in price. A big week for Big Media At CNN: The news network’s longtime leader, Jeff Zucker, announced that he would be stepping down at the end of the year. His exit from CNN raises questions about the network’s future — including speculation about whether he would try to buy out the channel from AT&T or seek to replace his boss, Jason Kilar of WarnerMedia. At Fox News: The election technology company Smartmatic has sued the network for more than $2.7 billion, accusing Rupert Murdoch’s broadcaster of peddling false conspiracy theories about its technology. It follows Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.3 billion lawsuit against Rudy Giuliani on similar grounds. In the papers Some of the academic research that caught our eye this week, summarized in one sentence: Speculative trading in volatile assets creates “pseudo-wealth,” which becomes “dangerously untethered from either market wealth or the real wealth of the economy.” (Joseph Stiglitz) Bankruptcy filings have fallen during the pandemic, but governments should prepare for a surge later this year. (Simeon Djankov and Eva Zhang) Covid-19 may accelerate the automation of jobs, which would affect women more than men. (Alex Chernoff and Casey Warman) How you’d fix the market In his column this week, Andrew suggested six ways to restore trust and fairness in the stock market. We asked what you would add to the list, and received a ton of thoughtful submissions. We read all of them, and here is a selection of common suggestions, edited and condensed for clarity: “Have a zero percent capital gains tax on securities held more than two years. This would encourage long-term investing at the expense of short-term speculative trading.”— Bob Knutson in St. Paul, Minn. “Limit how much of each new issue the big guys can grab and let the small fish get their nibbles first.”— Miriam Kelly in Baltimore “Restore the uptick rule.”— Andrew Oliver in Marblehead, Mass. “Buying back shares should not be allowed. It does nothing for the value of the company, nor does it lead to better investment performance.”— Joyce Hum in Ottawa “Limit the total percentage of float allowed to be sold short. Anything over 100 percent seems to be a recipe for a short squeeze.”— Dan Niemiec in Chicago “Have the exchanges process market orders in a manner that nullifies the machinery of high-frequency trading, like adding a random delay of between five and 15 seconds to any market order.”— Ronny Lempel in Redmond, Wash. “Go to T-0 equity settlement, which reduces the overall credit exposures from trading T+2. Before anyone objects to the technical challenge, China operates this way.”— Stephen Howard in Hong Kong THE SPEED READ Deals Exxon Mobil is reportedly considering adding Jeff Ubben, the environmentally minded activist investor, to its board amid pressure from hedge funds like D.E. Shaw. (Bloomberg) In I.P.O. news: Shares in Kuaishou, a Chinese rival to TikTok, more than doubled in their market debut in Hong Kong. And the yogurt company Chobani plans to go public later this year. (CNBC) A SPAC backed by Alex Rodriguez — yes, A-Rod — hopes to raise about $500 million. (Reuters) Politics and policy Millions of dollars in donations to key Senate races last year came from mysterious nonprofits and companies with little to no paper trail. (Axios) “Can the Man Who Saved the Euro Now Save Italy?” (NYT) Tech Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook unexpectedly made his debut on the social network Clubhouse last night, causing service outages on the platform. (Newsweek) Gov. Gina Raimondo of Rhode Island, President Biden’s pick for commerce secretary, said she saw “no reason” to lift U.S. national security restrictions on Chinese companies like Huawei and ZTE. (Bloomberg) Best of the rest The economist Nina Banks argues that community activism and other unpaid social labor by Black women is ignored by traditional economic data. (NYT) The number of Black executives who serve as chairs, C.E.O.s or C.F.O.s of Britain’s 100 biggest companies has fallen to zero, thanks to a “vanilla boys’ club.” (HR Magazine) Peloton is spending $100 million on air and ocean freight to shorten shipping delays of its exercise bikes and treadmills. (CNBC) We’d like your feedback! Please email thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. Source link Orbem News #Senate #Sleepless

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ecoamerica · 2 months

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Watch the 2024 American Climate Leadership Awards for High School Students now: https://youtu.be/5C-bb9PoRLc

The recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by student climate leaders! Join Aishah-Nyeta Brown & Jerome Foster II and be inspired by student climate leaders as we recognize the High School Student finalists. Watch now to find out which student received the $25,000 grand prize and top recognition!

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newstfionline · 4 years

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Wednesday, November 4, 2020

The coronavirus is surging, but Canada is keeping schools open (Washington Post) It’s been an uncertainty-ridden time for parents across Canada. As cases surge again, provinces are closing businesses, reimposing restrictions on public spaces and urging people to curb private gatherings. Still, as in European countries that are also tightening their rules, Canada is prioritizing keeping its schools open. All 13 provinces and territories are holding classes in person; in only some are hybrid or remote learning even options. In the United States, in contrast, nine states and territories have ordered some or all schools to hybrid or remote learning only, according to a tally kept by Education Week. Individual districts in other states are limiting or banning in-person classes. The incidence rate of covid-19 in people under 20 has increased since schools reopened, a trend the Public Health Agency of Canada says could be tied both to a growing number of school outbreaks and an increase in testing for that age group. Officials are responding by isolating sick pupils, quarantining classes hit by the virus and, in some cases, closing schools temporarily. But they’re resisting the blanket closures and wholesale shift to e-learning of the spring. “On balance, it’s been as expected,” said James Kellner, head of the pediatrics department at the University of Calgary. “And how that’s been has been concerning, but not terrible so far.”

Are ‘Kidfluencers’ Making Our Kids Fat? (NYT) Parents beware: Many YouTube channels that are wildly popular with young children are targeting them with thinly veiled ads for sugary beverages and junk food. That is the conclusion of a new study published on Monday in the journal Pediatrics. The authors of the study analyzed over 400 YouTube videos featuring so-called kid influencers—children with large social media followings who star in videos that show them excitedly reviewing toys, unwrapping presents and playing games. The study found that videos in this genre, which attract millions of young followers and rack up billions of views, were awash in endorsements and product placements for brands like McDonald’s, Carl’s Jr., Hershey’s, Chuck E. Cheese and Taco Bell. About 90 percent of the foods featured in the YouTube videos were unhealthy items like milkshakes, French fries, soft drinks and cheeseburgers emblazoned with fast food logos. The researchers said their findings were concerning because YouTube is a popular destination for toddlers and adolescents. Roughly 80 percent of parents with children 11 years old or younger say they let their children watch YouTube, and 35 percent say their children watch it regularly. Young children are particularly susceptible to marketing. Studies show that children are unable to distinguish between commercials and cartoons until they are 8 or 9 years old, and they are more likely to prefer unhealthy foods and beverages after seeing advertisements for them.

Turkeys (AP) A pertinent question coursing through the $4.3 billion turkey business is a basic one: how many turkeys are we gonna need for this Thanksgiving? It’s an incredibly complicated proposition. Grocery chain Kroger’s research found that 43 percent of shoppers plan to celebrate Thanksgiving with only their immediate family, which if true means that the birds people will want may be smaller, but they’re going to need way more of them as normally large gatherings (which would use a single large bird) temporarily splinter into smaller more intimate gatherings (necessitating multiple smaller birds). A lot is at stake, as in 2019 Americans spent $643 million on turkey in November. Walmart will carry 30 percent more turkey breasts in its stores for those who don’t want a full bird.

As the U.S. votes, the world watches with anxiety and hope (Washington Post) As Americans cast their votes in Tuesday’s presidential election, the world is watching closely, especially allies in Europe and rivals such as Russia, China and Iran, which could expect a very different U.S. foreign policy depending on the outcome. The choice of a U.S. president is always a matter of global importance—to allies, rivals, trading partners, and the web of treaties and institutions that bind countries together. This time, however, the stakes are exceedingly high. Analysts around the world expressed fears for America’s political system, speaking in terms often reserved for fragile democracies. Some commentators in China hope that a Joe Biden win could usher in a diplomatic respite, but fear that the deepened U.S.-China rivalry could persist, whoever wins. Pro-Kremlin media warn elections could lead to chaos and street fighting, predicting that President Trump will be forced to retreat to his White House bunker. Many European leaders fear Trump would weaken or destroy NATO if reelected. In Israel, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made much of his close ties with Trump, analysts wonder if a Democratic win might weaken the Israeli leader’s long hold on power.

Presidential race too early to call (AP) The Associated Press is not calling the presidential race yet because neither candidate has secured the 270 electoral college votes needed to claim victory. Republican Donald Trump said, “Frankly, we did win this election” over Democrat Joe Biden and said he would take the election to the Supreme Court. His assertion of victory does not match the results and information currently available to the AP. Trump or Biden would need 270 electoral votes to win. Several key states are too early to call, including Pennsylvania, Georgia and Michigan.

Hurricane Eta slams into Nicaragua as Category 4 storm (AP) The heart of powerful Hurricane Eta began moving ashore in Nicaragua Tuesday with devastating winds and rains that had already destroyed rooftops and caused rivers to overflow. The hurricane had sustained winds of 140 mph (220 kph), according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center, down from an overnight peak of 150 mph (240 kph). Landfall came hours after it had been expected. Eta’s eye had hovered just offshore through the night and Tuesday morning. The unceasing winds uprooted trees and ripped roofs apart, scattering corrugated metal through the streets of Bilwi, the main coastal city in the region. Nicaragua’s army moved red-helmeted troops specialized in search and rescue to Bilwi, the main coastal city in an otherwise remote and sparsely populated area.

France ponders new Paris curfew as lockdown rebels frustrate government (Reuters) France could reimpose a night curfew on Paris and possibly the surrounding region amid government frustration that too many people are ignoring lockdown rules as COVID-19 infections soar. France dramatically slowed the spread of the coronavirus in the spring with one of Europe’s strictest lockdowns. But 10 months into the epidemic and with winter drawing in, many are reluctant to endure another period of confinement. New COVID-19 lockdowns and curbs have stirred resistance across Europe even as countries including France and Spain deal with record daily infections and hospitals buckle under the strain.

Bad blood—why France-Turkey cartoon row could leave lasting impact (Reuters) Slights and barbs have marred relations between France’s Emmanuel Macron and Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan for years, but the row over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad has dragged them to a new low which could have more lasting consequences. If they cannot find a way to mend bridges, momentum is likely to build for a proposal, driven by France, for European Union sanctions on Turkey’s already-fragile economy, according to Turkish analyst Sinan Ulgen. “Neither Erdogan in Turkey nor Macron in France will step back,” said Ulgen, head of the Istanbul-based Centre for Economics and Foreign Policy Studies think tank. A French official familiar with policy towards Turkey said that in the light of the events of the past few weeks: “The question of sanctions is going to be raised.” EU leaders have already said that if Turkey fails to de-escalate tensions in the eastern Mediterranean by Dec. 10, sanctions would follow, though there is no draft proposal yet.

5 dead in Vienna attack (AP) Five people died, including an assailant, and 17 others were wounded in a shooting in the heart of Vienna hours before a coronavirus lockdown started, Austrian authorities said Tuesday. The dead attacker was a 20-year-old Austrian-North Macedonian dual national who had a previous terror conviction. Two men and two women died from their injuries in the attack Monday evening, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said. The suspected attacker was shot and killed by police. Vienna’s hospital service said seven people were in life-threatening condition Tuesday after the attack, the Austrian news agency APA reported. In total, 17 people were being treated in hospitals, with gunshot wounds but also cuts. “It is now confirmed that yesterday’s attack was clearly an Islamist terror attack,” Kurz said. Interior Minister Karl Nehammer later told APA that the dead assailant, who had roots in the Balkan nation of North Macedonia, had a previous conviction under a law that punishes membership in terrorist organizations. The attacker, named as Kujtim Fejzulai, was sentenced to 22 months in prison in April 2019 because he had tried to travel to Syria to join the Islamic State group. He was granted early release in December under juvenile law.

Ukraine close to catastrophe, minister says (Reuters) The situation with the coronavirus in Ukraine is close to catastrophic and the nation must prepare for the worst, health minister Maksym Stepanov said on Tuesday. Ukraine registered a record 8,899 new COVID-19 cases in the past 24 hours, the ministry said, up from the Oct. 30 high of 8,312. Total infections stood at 411,093 by Tuesday with 7,532 deaths. Ukraine imposed a strict lockdown in March but eased it in May. Stepanov said the government would consider how to preserve the economy and save people at the same time.

India, U.S., Japan and Australia kick off large naval drills (Reuters) India, the United States, Japan and Australia began their largest joint naval exercises in over a decade on Tuesday, Indian government sources said, seen as part of efforts to balance China’s vast military and economic power in the region. The annual “Malabar” wargames that India holds with the United States and Japan have been expanded to include Australia this year to cover all members of the Quad, an informal group of the four largest democracies in the Indo-Pacific. Five ships of the Indian Navy, including a submarine, were deployed in the exercise along with U.S. Navy’s John S McCain missile destroyer, Australia’s Ballarat frigate and a Japanese destroyer, the Indian ministry of defence said. Later this month, India and the United States will deploy aircraft carriers in the drills, a military source said.

Almost Like Clockwork, Talk of a Military Coup Follows Thai Protests (NYT) There are certain constants in Thailand: the drenching monsoons, the grand openings of new shopping malls and the rumors that the Royal Thai Armed Forces are plotting another coup. For weeks now, student-led protesters across Thailand have taken to the streets every few days, calling for a new constitution with authority over the monarchy, an end to the persecution of the political opposition and the resignation of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, the retired general who led the most recent military coup, in 2014. While the security forces have not cracked down violently on these peaceful rallies, it’s unclear how long such restraint will last. Nor is it certain how long the army is willing to stay in the barracks, plotting against Mr. Prayuth, who was once one of their own. Whenever the generals launch a coup, the refrain is the same: Thailand needs a return to order, without messy rallies or dissenting voices. “I see a coup as not a bad thing,” said Sondhi Limthongkul, a prominent royalist. As recently as last week, Mr. Sondhi publicly called for yet another military intervention to restore stability and protect the monarchy, urging the military to quickly hand over power after seizing it so the king could oversee the formation of a unity government.

Oman to bring in income taxes (Foreign Policy) Oman is planning to introduce an income tax on top earners, beginning in 2022, in what would be a first for Gulf nations. The move comes as Oman attempts to narrow its budget deficit from 19 percent of GDP today, to closer to 2 percent in four years’ time. Up until now, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, have been taxing their populations slowly, using a value-added tax on purchases rather than taxing income.

#headlines #news

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gadgetgirl71 · 4 years

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Top Ten Tuesday 15 September 2020

Welcome to this weeks Top Ten Tuesday. Originally created by The Broke & The Bookish, which is now hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. Each week it features a book or literary themed category. This weeks prompt is:

Cover Freebie:

(choose your own topic, centred on book covers or cover art)

So I have chosen to list my favourite MC (Motorcycle Club) Covers.

Baker (The Devil’s Disciples MC #1) by Scott Hildreth

ANDY: I got a job next door to a tattooed biker named Baker. He was an outlaw, a criminal, a biker, a bad boy, and a thief. I should have run as far and fast as I could. Instead, on the day we met, I let him have his way with me. I couldn’t help myself. His intensity and swagger lured me, but it was the crazy sex that kept me coming back, day after day.

His sordid ways scared me, but I simply couldn’t stay away…

BAKER: When she moved in next door, I knew I was in trouble. She was sexy. She was irresistible. She had spunk. She was also the manager of a bank my MC robbed six months prior. She didn’t recognize me, because we wore masks during the robbery. If she ever found out who I really was, there would be hell to pay.

It would be nothing like the hell I’d be living in if my MC found out I was fucking her.

We’d issued an order to kill her on sight. She was off-limits if anyone ever was.

So far, the men in the MC hadn’t seen her. But, I couldn’t keep her hidden forever.

Beyond Reckless (Lost kings MC #8) by Autumn Jones Lake

Marcel “Teller” Whelan, Treasurer of the Lost Kings MC, has always been two things—honest and responsible. At ten years old, he was already taking care of his baby sister. At eighteen, he patched into the Lost Kings MC and took a major role in shaping the club’s future. Three years ago, he thought he’d met the perfect woman, only to have her reject everything he is—a Lost King. One bullet is a lifetime supply. Now, after an accident that left a girl dead and Teller almost crippled, he’s struggling through the darkest time in his life. His niece, sister, and Lost Kings MC family are the only things holding him together, but his reckless actions are bound to drive everyone away. Then, in the most unlikely place, he crosses paths with her again. The woman he once thought might be his perfect match. Love soothes our inner demons. Sparks fly for both of them. She’s the ride-or-die woman he needs, able to calm his many demons and bring the light back into his life. But she has a secret—one that forces him to lie to his brothers. In chaos we trust. When Teller’s brothers find out who he’s falling in love with, it will create a storm of chaos for the Lost Kings MC. But if there’s one thing Teller’s turbulent life has taught him, it’s that sometimes love is worth the chaos. Beyond Reckless is the 8th book in the popular Lost Kings MC series, but can be read as a standalone.

Big (Satan’ Fury MC #6) by L Wilder

How much would you risk to save the one you love? From NYT and USA Today Bestselling Author L. Wilder comes book six in the Satan’s Fury Series, a standalone MC romance.

Big: I don’t use a knife or a gun to get the guy I’m after. I find that my weapon of choice has a much longer, more crippling effect. With just a few keystrokes, I can have him scrambling for his life. I’ll take everything he’s ever worked for, everything he’s ever loved, and I’ll destroy it. That’s what I do.

My brothers don’t ask questions. They don’t want to know what I do behind the closed door. They know I bring results, and that’s all that matters. It’s my job to protect the club, and nothing is going to stand in my way–not even Josie Carmichael.

The girl with the tantalizing curves and emerald green eyes is an unexpected threat, but a threat nonetheless. It’s my job to take her down, but there’s just one hitch. I can’t get the smart-mouthed beauty out of my head. She’s trouble. The kind of trouble that would turn my whole world upside down, but I don’t give a damn. I want her.

Josie Carmichael will be mine, even if that means I’ve got to break her first.

Big is book six of the Satan’s Fury MC series. This book is a full-length standalone novel that’s intended for mature audiences due to the explicit language and violence. Reader discretion is advised.

Bull (Kings of Mayhem MC #6) by Penny Dee

She could be the end of me BULL: I lost my wife on a rainy night almost two decades ago. Since then, my heart has been a barren wasteland. It only knows love for family and the club. And for revenge. Then I meet Taylor and I know I’m doomed. Because she’s everything I didn’t know I wanted. Everything I’ve denied myself for years. But my club is about to storm headfirst into a war and I can’t afford the distraction. Yet I can’t get her out of my head. We both say we’re not interested. But we are both liars. TAYLOR: For years we’ve been running from my past. My kid brother and me. Hiding in the shadows. Now we have a chance for a new life in a new town … far, far away from trouble. I crave freedom and a quiet, simple life for us both. The last thing I expect is to fall for the enigmatic biker king, Michael “Bull” Western. He is magnificent. White-hot and scorching. With the touch of an angel and eyes of the devil. He could be the love of my life. But I have a secret. A very big secret indeed … Bull is book six in the Kings of Mayhem MC series. For mature readers 18+.

Claiming Mine (Unforgiven Riders MC #1) by Amy Davies

Sex, secrets and motorbikes.

When Ana starts working in a small but quaint café, after running from her old life, she never expects to be surrounded by sexy as sin men… Little does she realise they belong to the local motorcycle club. She’s had more than enough of controlling alphas in her life, but can she keep away from them?

Ace is the Sergeant-at-Arms of the Unforgiven Riders and yet another controlling alpha. He sees Ana’s reluctance to him, but Ace always gets his own way, and he wants Ana. Will Ace be able to prove his feelings for her and break down the walls of protection Ana has built around her heart? Can she let him in?

When secrets of Ana’s past are revealed and her life is threatened, it’s Ace’s job to save her. But will he be too late? Will Ace still want her when he finds out about her past?

Compass (Valiant MC #1) by Mary B Moore

Piper: When Hunter left, he cut me out of his life with no explanation. I sent him letters, but each time they were returned back to me. I had no choice but to raise my son alone and move on with life. I love being a mother, but every day I miss the other half of my soul.

Hunter: Four years ago, I joined the Marines. What I did for my country changed me. I saw my buddies, men that I’d fought alongside return home and set up their lives. Seeing them settling down, I took a risk and returned home to the woman that I’d left behind.

War changes a man. A majority of our military come home scarred inside and struggle to return to the civilian world. Learning from my friends in Piersville, I’ve established an MC called Valiant. Our training and military contacts will help assist the government with tackling the ongoing issues of human, drug, and arms trafficking along North and South America. Those responsible are like the mythical Hydra – cut off one head and two replace it.

I’m willing to fight that war, but more importantly, I’m going to fight the battle to get Piper back and become a father to my son.

Link’d Up (Dead Presidents MC #1) by Harley Stone

President Tyler “Link” Lincoln of the Dead Presidents MC, runs a club dedicated to helping military vets readjust to society. When his sergeant at arms is arrested for the attempted murder of a prominent Seattle figure, Link’s search for a lawyer brave enough to fight for justice leads him to an alluring defence attorney with a bleeding heart and a steel backbone.

This isn’t the first time Emily Stafford’s commitment to defending the falsely accused has put her in harm’s way. Smart, cautious, and independent, she knows how to defend herself. At least, she did until she joined forces with one sexy, overbearing, tattooed MC president.

Flames run hot as Link and Emily seek shelter in the club’s converted fire station, working against the clock to uncover the truth and save a somewhat innocent man.

18+ for language and sexual situations…

Primal Howl (Primal Howlers MC #1) by Piper Davenport

Orion: I’m the oldest son of MC royalty. My father founded the Primal Howlers and he expects me to wear his patch one day. The problem is, I don’t know if that’s what I want. Lately, I couldn’t give two sh*ts about anything.

Until her.

Raquel: I moved to Monument, Colorado to write my thesis and get some much-needed distance from my overbearing family. What I didn’t expect was to find is myself hung up on a biker who appears to have nothing to lose.

I, however, have everything to lose and I’m worried Orion just might be my downfall.

Stitch (Satan’s Fury MC #2) by L Wilder

From New York Times and USA Today Best Selling author L Wilder

Stitch: As the club Enforcer, Stitch is the man chosen to protect the club. There are no limits to his brutality, no lines drawn in the sand. The club is his life, and he’ll do whatever it takes to keep his brothers safe.

He’s a man who keeps to himself, guarding the walls that he secured so long ago. Then, one moment, one chance meeting, changes everything.

Wren: Life for Wren and her son, Wyatt, isn’t exactly easy. Yet, Wren faces each day with determination and courage. Wyatt is her joy and motivation; for him, she will find a way to make their lives better, even when obstacles are continually thrown in her path. The last thing she needs is another complication, but what is life without complications?

Stitch appears when they need him the most, protecting them when no one else can. Wren can’t understand it. She should feel threatened by his bulging muscles and menacing tattoos, but she’s somehow able to see past the mysterious biker to the man inside. She is drawn to him for reasons she can’t even begin to comprehend. All she knows is that her body craves his touch.

Can Stitch let his guard down and allow these two strangers into his heart? Can Wren see beyond the scars of her past long enough to let him in, or will her fear drive him away?

** This book is intended for readers 18 years or older due to bad language, violence, and explicit sex scenes.

Stitch is a standalone romance, but you may also be interested in reading Maverick: Satan’s Fury MC #1.

The Diary of Bink Cummings Vol #2 by Bink Cummings

Note: Must Read The Diary of Bink Cummings Vol 1, previously.

When changing life’s course you never consider what twisted curve-ball fate might dump in your lap. Growing up in the MC, then gaining my own personal independence was not only a curse, it was a blessing. So when I decided to say fu*k my past and embraced my future, away from the only place I called home, I tried to re-invent myself, by becoming the woman I am today. Until one day, fate reared its ugly head, forcing me to return to the place I ran from. The place where I had no choice but to face HIM. And hide the biggest secret of my life as I wallowed in silent fear, of the insurmountable repercussions it would evoke when anyone found out the truth.

Steamy Adult romance Warning: Contains Mature scenarios, and mass quantities of profanity. For Ages 18+

-This is not a Standalone.

I’m sure that some of the men on these covers are the same person! What do you think?

*** This majority of these books are intended for readers 18 years or older due to bad language, violence, and explicit sex scenes. ***

Until next Tuesday

#BikerErotica, #BikerRomance, #Bikers, #JustForFun, #MC, #MC-Erotica, #MCRomance, #Top Ten Tuesday, #TopTenTuesday, #TTT

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artworldnews · 4 years

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Swipe Right to buy this Basquiat

NEW YORK (NYT NEWS SERVICE).- Testing the notion that blue-chip art can be sold with a swipe, former Christie’s executive Loic Gouzer on Monday will use his new app as the auction block for a large drawing by Jean-Michel Basquiat that is estimated to sell for $8 million to $9 million. The app, called Fair Warning, started as a lark, Gouzer said, a way to keep busy under lockdown and to see whether the art world could pivot to online sales in a meaningful way. (Auction houses have since held their first — successful — completely online sales.) The first piece he auctioned on the app, Steven Shearer’s 2018 portrait “Synthist,” sold to a private European collector for $437,000 — an auction high for the artist — on an estimate of $180,000 to $250,000. Gouzer said he has sold two works since then: a body print by David Hammons that sold for about $1.3 million (estimated at $500,000 to $700,000) and a piece by Steven Parrino that sold for $977,500 (estimated at $650,000 to $750,000). “It’s really an experiment,” said Gouzer, who while at Christie’s built a reputation as a bad-boy rainmaker for coming up with unorthodox sale ideas as well as procuring and positioning big-ticket artworks, most famously Leonardo da Vinci’s “Salvator Mundi” for $450.3 million in 2017. “The idea was to create a guerrilla type of auction system,” he said, “where you could start moving paintings by using the cloud rather than physical locations.” So far, the large auction houses seem unconcerned about Gouzer taking a significant piece of their business. “The availability of only a single lot is a construct easily replicated,” said Marc Porter, chairman of Christie’s Americas, who called the app “clever and inventive.”

“The key factor will be the breadth of audience,” Porter added. “In that, he must contend with the worldwide data that the large auction houses, art fairs and megadealers have been investing in for years.” Buyers must apply for admission to the app, where they are evaluated for the seriousness of their collecting. Gouzer is trying to keep out speculators who would flip the works for higher prices to make a quick profit. He had hoped to avoid guarantees — lining up a minimum bid in advance — which have become routine among auction houses. But he said sellers demand them these days. (The Basquiat is guaranteed for an undisclosed amount around the low estimate, Gouzer said.) The untitled Basquiat, an acrylic and oil stick on black paper that measures about 4 by 6 feet, features many of the qualities for which the artist was best known, such as “all the obsessive scribbling and those words that come all the time like ‘tar’ and ‘asbestos,’ ” Gouzer said. He transformed his garage in Montauk, New York, into a climate-controlled viewing room where interested buyers can view the Basquiat starting Thursday (he hired security to guard it). The piece will sell on July 30. At this point, Gouzer is planning to sell one piece a week — assuming inventory cooperates — with auctions taking place on the app at 5 p.m. sharp on Sundays. The sales are conducted live with the app registering bids. Gouzer takes a 15% flat commission. While Gouzer has already been deluged with prospective future lots, he said he is picking and choosing carefully; should he fail to find pieces that satisfy his standards, he will simply wait until he does. “I only put works that I would buy for my invisible collection. My taste is eclectic but very selective,” he said. “I don’t have pressure, because I don’t have investors. It’s an extension of the curation I did when I was at Christie’s, but with complete freedom.”

#Art #Auction #Christies #Online Art Sale #App

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eathealthylivefree · 4 years

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Secondhand Screen Time

As the parent of a one-year old, I sometimes feel like my husband and I find ourselves playing a game of “hide the smart phone” with our son. We try to keep our phones out of sight because the moment he sees one, he grabs for it and wants to play with it. I’m sure many parents of young children can relate!

Earlier this year, a colleague of mine sent me an article titled “Is Secondhand Screen Time the New Secondhand Smoking?” This article certainly has an eye-catching title that may seem extreme to some. While I think this article has some valid points, I want to acknowledge up front that screens are not inherently evil, and the author of this article is not saying that a parent’s use of a screen is the same as a parent’s choice to smoke. Unlike smoking, screens have many useful and necessary functions in our world today, and it would be unreasonable to stop using them altogether.

What is concerning about parents’ screen use is that – like smoking – screens can be addictive.

When parents “read the news, check email, text friends or scan social media parenting groups… kids, even babies, notice these habits. They see parents reach again and again for a seemingly magical object that glints and flashes, makes sounds and shows moving images. Who wouldn’t want such a wonderful plaything? Trouble is, if the desire for a phone builds in infancy, it can become second nature.”

As I watch my own son grow and develop, I am becoming ever more aware of how I am always on stage for him. He is constantly watching what I say and do and learning how to interact with the world through me. Consequently, I have become much more mindful about how, when and where I use my smart phone. I have made a conscious effort to refrain from checking email or social media at times when I could be interacting or engaging in unplugged playtime with him, as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics. This effort has necessitated a shift in my media use habits. I check apps less often and only during certain times of the day. To help lessen the temptation to pick up my phone while with my son, I also turned off all non-essential notifications such as those for email and social media. Currently, the only notifications I receive are for phone calls and text messages.

Still, there are times when my husband or I need to use a smart phone in the presence of our son. In these occasions, some experts suggest narrating your actions to your children, whether you are ordering diapers or checking the weather. When parents take time to explain how they use their screens, and when they mindfully consider their use of screens in the first place, they help children learn to interact with technology in a healthy way.

Written by: Jenny Lobb, Family and Consumer Sciences Educator, Ohio State University Extension Franklin County

Reviewed by: Donna Green, Retired Family and Consumer Sciences Educator, Ohio State University Extension Erie County

Sources:

American Academy of Pediatrics (2018). Children and Media Tips from the American Academy of Pediatrics. https://www.aap.org/en-us/about-the-aap/aap-press-room/news-features-and-safety-tips/Pages/Children-and-Media-Tips.aspx

Caron, C. (2019). Ask NYT Parenting: I use my phone for everything. Is that harming my kids? https://parenting.nytimes.com/culture/phones-parents

Powers-Barker, P. (2019). Congratulations! You are a role model. Live Smart Ohio. https://livesmartohio.osu.edu/family-and-relationships/powers-barker-1osu-edu/congratulations-you-are-a-role-model/ Renstrom, J. (2020).

Is secondhand screen time the new secondhand smoking? The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/is-secondhand-screen-time-the-new-secondhand-smoking-129500

from Live Healthy Live Well https://ift.tt/3fRiBtB

#Live Healthy Live Well

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