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Orange County tea house part of 'new economy' vision
Standing in a field in Orange County planted with rows of grape vines, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, camellia plants, and elderberry, Tim Toben described a vision for a community-focused "new economy" in which friends and family supply loans and energy, and food and medicines are produced locally.
Toben is an entrepreneur and former Chapel Hill developer who lost acres of his own land and $5.2 million in investment money in a mixed-use development project called Greenbridge.
The approximately $62 million green project was designed to be a model for energy efficiency. But Toben said the bank wouldn't lend any more money in 2010 to cover an approximately $1.6 million construction cost overrun, which he said is "pretty typical" amount for a project of that size. The contractor placed construction liens on the property, which halted the sales of condos. Bank of America started the foreclosure process and then sold the remaining project debt. The building is now under new ownership, and sales of the Greenbridge condos resumed.
As told by him in Lyle Estill's book "Small Stories, Big Changes: Agents of Change on the Frontlines of Sustainability," Toben saw about $10 million in profits from a $175 million sale of a database company he'd started earlier. He had invested in about 500 acres of land in western Orange County, but in paying off the Greenbridge debt, he lost all but 38.
He and his wife, Megan Toben, moved their home and a nonprofit educational farm operated by Megan, the Pickards Mountain Eco-Institute, to that land they still owned.
The farm is now equipped with solar panels for electricity and gardens for their own food. Seventy percent of their food comes from the property, Toben said.
"We get closer and closer each year," Toben said, to their vision of sustainability and self-sufficiency.
To add to the list of what they can produce, Toben and his wife are now launching a plan to create a "nexus" for alternative medicine. They're looking to open what they're calling The Honeysuckle Tea House, where they will sell tea, herbs, smoothies and other items made from plants grown on the land.
The Tobens contributed land, and a Chinese-owned limited liability company contributed capital so they could launch an herb and berry garden. They agreed to dedicate the 16.5 acres for growing medicinal herbs, mushrooms and berries, with 10 percent of any profits going to the institute.
The rows of fruits and plants are already planted. Slated to open in March, the tea house is now under construction. It's being built from trees that came from the field when it was cleared, old telephone poles that previously ran through the property, and recycled shipping containers. The project architect was Giles Blunden, who also designed progressive co-housing communities in Chapel Hill and Carrboro.
"So my approach to the design is to use everything that's here," Blunden said of the construction materials, as he stood in front of the partially completed building. The shipping containers came from Norfolk, Va., but were at the end of their natural lives in the shipping world.
They make up the building's foundation, he said, and are going to be used for drying the tea leaves.
The structure will have space for outdoor seating and will have an overhanging roof. Rainwater will be collected in a retention pond near the building, Toben said, and they're planning to fill it with water lilies and fish.
Toben said they envision the tea house as a place where people can buy tea, smoothies and other products, where children can play in surrounding natural play-areas, and where adults can meet with staff herbalists in consultants and workshops to learn about herbs and other alternative medicines.
Two herbalists, Frances O'Halloran and Dana Simerly, have already been hired to prepare salves, teas and tinctures. Last week, they were working to prepare a salve for rashes or dry skin that was made using wild as well as some cultivated plants.
"It really is a dream come true to share our passion," O'Halloran said, also arguing that plants, used in their entirety to treat ailments, can lead to fewer negative side effects in the body.
To pay for the tea house, about 80 percent of the total cost, or $80,000, has come from loans through the Slow Money NC movement, Toben said. The organizers are hoping to raise an additional $20,000 in a crowdfunding campaign through the website Kickstarter for the rest of the construction cost. So far, Toben said all of the cost of building the house has been community-financed, and he wants to see that continue.
"We have always kind of resisted this idea of globalization -- that the big companies have the answers," Toben said, explaining that as part of their beliefs in a new economy, they don't want to be dependent on transportation systems, energy utilities, pharmaceutical companies, and food businesses.
Toben likened the Honeysuckle Tea House to "small roots and shoots" growing up through the pavement after the financial loss of Greenbridge. A friendship developed with one of the bidders in the bank's fire sale of Greenbridge, who is now one of the partners in the project. That bidder also is with the Chinese company that contributed capital for the herb gardens and medicine fields with Toben's new endeavor.
"The eventual buyer of Greenbridge did indeed foreclose, so that was a total financial loss for us, but sometimes small roots and shoots grow up through the pavement," Toben said in an email. "Such is the case with the Honeysuckle Tea House."


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Some of us who attend public schools are not Christians. The Messiah is a great piece of music that transcends whatever dogmatic religious message you wish to attach to it (which is why it is regularly performed in the public schools), but manger scenes and Christmas trees speak a different language, altogether. Christmas, as a holiday, is such a bastardized bit of idolatry (now pumped up through over-commercialization) as to be a joke to any true Christians that might still be out there: the merging of pagan solstice celebrations with the near mythical death of a Turkish saint (crafted into iconic splendor by the Coca Cola Corporation in the 1930s) with enough tinsel, bows, and golden calf trinkets to sink a ship ought to be enough for some upstanding Christian to rise up and say "ENOUGH"! Where is the outrage from the Believers whose holy day has been sold to the highest bidders?
Meanwhile, the rest of us hunker down with our families, celebrate simply and discretely, and wait for the Christians wearing their faith on their sleeves to go away.
trex ... since you posted this message two times, you must feel it is fairly insightful and pithy. You might recall that the 3.5% tax cut passed in 2001 is still a "temporary" holiday ... one that most benefited the wealthiest of Americans (my "cut" of it amounts to less than $700 a year) ... and is coming up (once again) for reauthorization next year. How many jobs have been created since 2001 because of those tax cuts given to the so-called "job creators"? Most real job creators will tell you that the reason they are not investing in job creation is either (1) consumption is way down and there is no demand ... in large part because of ongoing 8%+ unemployment, or (2) the jobs have all been created overseas (contributing to the 8%+ unemployment).
we should continue a "temporary" tax holiday for people that already have jobs and tax job-creators more so that we can continue to have 8-9%+ unemployment. Nice call, Pat.
So why, then, do the Tea Party extremists in the GOP Caucus favor allowing tax cuts for working people to lapse?
elmexijedi ... I am neither ignorant nor illiterate. I know that private companies (at least at this precise moment in time) provide electricity and water and charge rates for incremental use (again, the model at use at the moment) ... but I also know that they are licensed, monitored and regulated by government because the services they provide are deemed "universal needs". Additionally, government approves and "permits" plans so that development does not take place randomly, or at the whim of those in power or those with the means to influence the nature and scope of development. In better times they were once identified for what they really were (and perhaps, once again, will be in the near future) ... common, or community needs, that rightfully belong to the Commons and not to private individuals. Moreover, other community services ARE still in the public domain ... mail (universal and still inexpensive), police, fire, air traffic (not to mention traffic, in general), schools, waste disposal, public health, and the like. In many instances, the infrastructure supporting all of these services was at least paid for by government, if not directly under its control (the internet was developed by government as a means for internal communication; the transcontinental rail and highway system was planned and built by government and/or funded by it; the electrical grid and a great part of the generation infrastructure was built by government and still is operated by it in many parts of the country). Keep in mind that UPS and FedEx are your messengers ... you may pay for their private service, but the service they provide is only possible because of government. The more that you use ALL of these resources, the more you benefit from the functioning of government and the greater should be your contribution to its continuance.
Of course, we could return to the apparent feudal system that you seem to be indirectly championing ... powerful overlords provide us with the basic services we need without oversight by a government funded with taxpayer money and responsive to the electoral whims of the citizenry, and they do so at their own whim and fancy; you, as a citizen, can choose to use those services only to the extent that you can afford them, meaning (as I originally stated) the more you benefit from the system the more of its resources you use.
Be thankful that you do not have to be given free food, health care, or housing as a result of your poverty. Also be thankful that we have a safety net to care for the dispossessed, the unfortunate, and yes, the shiftless ... otherwise they might be surrounding your domain with torches and pitchforks, forcing you to pay for the opening of debtor prisons and hard-labor camps (sounds more and more Dickensesque all the time). Does each individual on welfare take more in a year than you make? I doubt it. But even so, why don't you tell us all what you would do for the growing number of destitute people besides "let them eat cake".
It would be foolish to assume the Chinese did not employ engineers to study and design plans before it built bridges, tunnels, high speed rail lines, dams, massive solar-powered electrical generating facilities, and the like. But you can bet your bottom dollar that it was the government that hired and paid all the engineers and workers needed to build those structures, purchased the necessary materials and got them to the site on time ... either that or it offered a contract to a private firm, on its terms, to do the actual work. If private business was involved, you can also be fairly confident that the contracted company does not employ an army of six-, seven-, eight-, and more-digit salaried executives who are seeking to "maximize profit" for their shareholders. Nor does that company employ an army of lobbyists or consultants to make sure that government steers contracts or enacts legislation that favors its interests. This is not to say that there is no cronyism, corruption, or influence-peddling in China (didn't the Chinese invent the concept?) ... in fact, the more power and control that government has, the more likely it is that those in elite governmental positions take advantage of their power to extract benefits from those with whom they do business (be it simple rent collection or massive construction projects). Still, if the Chinese layered in a "maximize the profit" motive at every level of transaction, the cost of that bridge would easily have tripled or quadrupled.
So this proposal should appeal to all who think a flat tax is the most fair and least complicated of all possible tax proposals on the table ... create a system wherein for every additional $100K you earn in a year (and that is ALL income ... investments, capital gains, dividends, inheritances, etc) you pay 2% more in income tax (or some negotiable percentage). Eliminate ALL deductions, credits, and other scams for avoiding paying taxes except credits for the individual deduction, deductions for children, and the home mortgage interest.
championlode ... the only problem with your flat tax is that most Americans (including me) spend most of our income (i.e., 75-90%) on necessities, so will be taxed just to get the things we need. The very very rich spend only a small percentage of their income on goods that are taxed. This means that they are taxed at the same rate as me on the things they buy, but they set aside so very very much more than I (probably more than I earn in a decade or so) that there is no way that any reasonable person can call that "fair" (unless, of course, they do it for some self-serving purpose).
elmexijedi ... because I am not sure how you earn the income that makes you a high income earner, I cannot itemize. Do you own a manufacturing plant? I'll bet you use more electricity and water than a poor person. I'll bet you you make use of the nation's transportation systems more than does a poor person. Do telephone and/or internet communication factor into your business? I'll bet you use both more than does the average poor person. Maybe you don't produce anything useful as you earn all your money. Maybe you gamble it on speculative ventures (the most common way for people to amass fortunes in the good old USA today). Somehow, I suspect that however you put your money up for the big risk, you have to use the public infrastructure ... and much more frequently and in much greater volume than even the most tech-savvy poor person. But I may be howling at the moon and barking at the wind. Tell me how you have amassed your fortune and then I can be more specific.
Better yet, tell me how the health and welfare of the average poor person does not affect you in some way, and why you do not have a social obligation to support even the lowest of the low. Then I will know exactly which Dickens novel to assign to you as homework.
merwinwfinzork has raised an interesting point ... but only scratches the surface of the politico-industrial-complex. Besides the marketing and public relations industries, we also must consider those industries that sell time and space to the advertisers and promoters. Permanent electioneering provides massive income to the media, mainstream and supposedly independent ... and the more "controversy" or "fear" that is involved (whether genuine or manipulated), the more intense the interest and the longer the "story" can be drug out. The travel and tourism industries also do very well, thank you, thanks to conferences and conventions and the never-ending debate season. There is nothing standing in the way of having a single, nation-wide primary on a given day in the summer of 2012 (culminating a four-week window of campaigning) from which the top 2-4 candidates for all offices ... national and local ... can be selected (regardless of party affiliation), and then have a run-off general election in the Fall. If we simply required all private media to cover this election as a public service for the privilege of being given a license to broadcast on the publicly owned airwaves, we would instantly reduce the price of running for office. Of course, we should take all money out of elections, as flaque suggested, as well as prohibiting ANY form of conflict of interest for prospective candidates.
To find people who will listen to the "average American citizen", we need more average American citizens to not only run for office, but to win. How about those who do the complaining be the first to step up? What is it that stops you from putting your money where your mouth is?
I do not mean this as an insulting challenge, nor as a means of prying into your personal lives (we all have really good reasons why we do not seek public office ... or public service). But the question is an important one. What is it in our current system that prevents average citizens from seeking office or, if they are seeking office, from actually winning elections? And if we were to not only find the answer to that question, but also took appropriate steps to remediate it, would these "average citizens" then automatically "listen to the practical problems" of other average citizens?
The progressive (not "progressive" in the sense of political ideology, but in the sense of developing or increasing in relation to a changing variable), graduated (as in delineated) income tax has been recognized as the most egalitarian form of taxation for more than a century ... especially in a democratic society where voting citizens ultimately control the expenditure of revenues arising from that tax (whether they exercise that control is a separate subject). Those who most benefit from services provided by governmental action pay more (and have more left over after paying) than those who are less fortunate ... regardless of cause. More specifically for the U.S., it is one of the possibly three most important factors involved in growing a strong and large middle class, inarguably the most important development in the social growth of this country and a thing that distinguishes us from most other pretenders (or has distinguished us, since the middle class is currently shrinking after three decades of virtual warfare against it). At few times since its inception has the income tax been lower than it is today. So what, exactly, is it that has changed in our perception? When this country was booming and growing to become the largest and most humanitarian lender in the world, respected globally for our good intentions, high ideals, and willingness to take action, we were paying taxes at rates ranging between 50 and 92%. Now that we appear to be in decline across the board (at least in many respects), have become the world's largest borrower with the biggest gulag system known to man, the wealthiest amongst us have taken to whining and snivveling that their taxes are "too high"?
In passing, I should mention that the sales tax ... a form of flat tax ... is considered by almost every economist and political scientist as a regressive tax because it takes proportionately a greater amount of the lesser income brought home by low-income earners. Yes, 20% charged to everyone is 20% of whatever it is that they have, and to the mathematically challenged that seems "fair". But 20% of a $20K annual income leaves its earner with $16,000, while 20% of a $2,000,000 income leaves its earner with $1,600,000 ... which doesn't do much to lift the low-income earner up to the middle class and leaves the rich guy with an awful lot of loose change (that he or she does NOT invest in job creating opportunities, by the way). The only way that a "flat tax" would be fair would be to impose limits on the amount of governmental services that a person can expect to use ... everyone puts the same amount in and gets the same amount out.
Continued ... According, again, to Ron Paul, here is a list of the financial institutions receiving the most money from the Fed (found on page 131 of the GAO report):
Citigroup: $2.5 trillion ($2,500,000,000,000)
Morgan Stanley: $2.04 trillion ($2,040,000,000,000)
Merrill Lynch: $1.949 trillion ($1,949,000,000,000)
Bank of America: $1.344 trillion ($1,344,000,000,000)
Barclays PLC (United Kingdom): $868 billion ($868,000,000,000)
Bear Sterns: $853 billion ($853,000,000,000)
Goldman Sachs: $814 billion ($814,000,000,000)
Royal Bank of Scotland (UK): $541 billion ($541,000,000,000)
JP Morgan Chase: $391 billion ($391,000,000,000)
Deutsche Bank (Germany): $354 billion ($354,000,000,000)
UBS (Switzerland): $287 billion ($287,000,000,000)
Credit Suisse (Switzerland): $262 billion ($262,000,000,000)
Lehman Brothers: $183 billion ($183,000,000,000)
Bank of Scotland (United Kingdom): $181 billion ($181,000,000,000)
BNP Paribas (France): $175 billion ($175,000,000,000)
and many many more including banks in Belgium of all places
I am not sure where the $7 trillion giveaway program of the Fed comes from (unless it is just a part of the bigger picture), but we have known ... well, apparently only some of us have known ... since the end of July that the figure actually is SIXTEEN TRILLION! That is when the Executive Summary of the first ever independent audit of the Federal Reserve was released. The actual report was released on November 21 of this year. The audit was conducted by the Government Accounting Office (GAO) as stipulated in a hotly contested amendment attached to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Financial Reform Act. Oddly enough, the amendment directing the GAO to audit the Fed was introduced by Ron Paul and Alan Grayson in the House, and Jim DeMint and Bernie Sanders in the Senate (for those not keeping score ... a Libertarian, a Tea Partier, a Liberal-Progressive, and a Socialist).
SIXTEEN TRILLION! As Ron Paul points out on his website (http://www.dailypaul.com/188540/audit-teh-federal-reserve-reveals-16-trillion-in-secret-bailouts), the entire GDP of the US is only a little over $14 trillion; the national debt, incurred since the time of Washington, is abour $14.5 trillion; the budget that has so paralyzed Congress is a trifling $3.5 trillion; and the deficit that has hypocritically opened the eyes of the right is only $1.5 trillion. SIXTEEN TRILLION. Due to space limitations, I'll post a listing of who got what in the next message.
uglyone ... one sets academic "standards" to define what is important to know, but there are countless ways to get there. Standardizing the process to guarantee a standardized product at the end works well on assembly lines, but amounts to not much more than "training" when it comes to learning.
bailie ... a skilled teacher can take almost any student question and turn it towards a larger goal or objective, whether that goal is teacher-generated or generated by groups of "experts" who more likely than not are far-removed from actual classroom reality. I am sure you would agree that most people -- adults and children -- learn better and deeper when they are interested in what it is they are learning, or when what they learn has meaning or importance to them. Meanwhile, the skills needed to learn and/or communicate about learning can be taught in isolation (often leading the learner to question why she needs to learn this stuff), or they can be taught in the context of actually learning something of interest or value, as they are needed (thus directly illustrating why "this stuff" is important). To describe the process as "children guiding the curriculum" is therefore misleading; using a student-centered approach to instruction (whenever possible and/or appropriate) merely provides the doorway or path for the skilled teacher to open or follow. The teacher must still connect student experiences and learning to the mandated curriculum.
We need more teachers who can do this, not less. We need more teachers like Mr. Koshewa.
Taxed ... There many ways to assess what students are learning that can be tied into true accountability measures that would satisfy your supposed interest in how our kids are doing in school. Everybody wants accountability, but they want to do it on the cheap (not that contracts with major publishing firms tare inexpensive). A single, standardized test that measures student performance on mandated factoids and skills is a one-shot effort that provides a numbered score with statistical meaning, but has no other useful purpose. It doesn't provide information about areas where students might be having troubles, since the publishers (for security reasons) do not allow students ... or teachers ... to know which questions the kids missed. Because the tests cannot be "too easy", there must be questions that no child can answer correctly, and a significant number that a lot of kids cannot answer; can you just imagine the outcry that would erupt if every kid in a classroom or school got all of the questions correct, even if in doing so it actually meant everyone had learned what was expected? Finally, standardized tests are not designed to measure the performance of a school or especially a teacher ... to do so, according to the publishers, is a grave misuse of the test results and a grave disservice to all involved. They are designed to report the relative performance (especially growth) of individual students, compared to themselves from year to year.
Teaching to those kinds of tests, as Mr Koshewa points out, is largely a waste of everyone's time. But don't believe me ... simply look at the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP, the so-called national report card), which clearly shows that since the inception of NCLB and its rigid testing regimen, growth in student performance at all levels has stagnated, whereas before the testing regimen began, growth was constant and improving.
Taxed ... There are plenty of ways to assess what students are learning that can be tied into true accountability measures that would satisfy your supposed interest in how our kids are doing in school. Everybody wants accountability, but they want to do it on the cheap (not that contracts with major publishing firms that provide the tests are inexpensive). A single test that supposedly measures student performance on mandated factoids and skills is a one-shot effort that provides a numbered score with statistical meaning, but has no other useful purpose, whatsoever. It provides no information about areas where students might be having troubles, since the publishers (for security reasons) do not even allow students ... or teachers ... to know which questions the kids missed. Because the tests cannot be "too easy", there must be questions that no child can answer correctly, and a significant number that a lot of kids cannot answer ... can you just imagine the outcry that would erupt if every kid in a school (let alone an entire district) got all of the questions correct, even if in doing so it actually meant everyone had learned what was expected? Finally, even according to the publishers of standardized tests, they are not designed to measure the performance of a school or especially a teacher ... to do so, again according to the publishers, is a grave misuse of the test results and a grave disservice to all involved. They are designed to report the relative performance (especially growth) of individual students, compared to themselves from year to year.
Teaching to those kinds of tests, as Mr Koshewa points out, is largely a waste of everyone's time. But don't believe me ... simply look at the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP, the so-called national report card), which clearly shows that since the inception of NCLB and its rigid testing regimen, growth in student performance at all levels has stagnated, whereas before the testing regimen began, growth was constant and improving.
It would seem that a true conservative would be looking to preserve and sustain that which brought greatness and strength to this country (and possibly personal fortune ... or at least comfort ... for themselves). As you point out, "strong trade policies" protected American workers from the threat of foreign labor markets (wealthy people do not need or seek out cheaply made foreign goods), and "strong union representation in the commercial market" kept profit-sharing at reasonably sustainable levels. I would add that a strong, publicly funded school system provided a necessary vehicle for social advancement, and an employer-funded health care system operated by not-for profit and state licensed providers (in lieu of the single-system approach we contemplated building in the late 1940s) enabled most Americans to enjoy some security in their lives. One would think that a true conservative would seek (disregarding changes to social mores that came with them) to re-establish those elements of our society that made us strong, respected, and the number one creditor nation in the world. Instead, it seems that those calling themselves conservative, today, would prefer the Gilded Age and the Age of the Robber Barons. It makes no sense.
Someone once said to me that those who most profit from a strong economy and strong government (encapsulated as a strong domestic police force and a stronger foreign military capability) are the ones who ought to be the most willing to keep paying for it. When no one else can contribute (after reducing their wages to Third World levels; after sucking out all of their savings through the legalized investment of their retirement funds and privatized pension plans; after privatizing their Social Security and Medicare protections; and after eliminating as many elements of the social safety net as conceivable), at that point they will either have to pony up the entire cost or they will stand to lose all to which they thought they were entitled.
I am not a player in this game of local power-politics, but here is what I see. On one side, I see a bunch of good old boys ... land-owners, developers, investors, and the politicians whose bread is buttered by an infinite growth model ... who equate progress with growth driven by outside investment and a franchised service economy, and who are in a position to profit handsomely from it. On the other, I see a relatively new breed who seem to favor growth of a different model: a smaller but self-serving economy based on local production and distribution that is more sustainable while building stronger local bonds and sense of community. Having grown up in southern California during the 1950s, I know which model I favor (and it is not the one leading to Californication). The problem is we all share this space, and all of our voices must be heard. Certainly losing a couple of rounds is not grounds for recall (sour grapes, I call it); instead, buckle-up and bring your best shot to the next set of decisions that will have to be made. As long as the discussions and decision-making are transparent, resign yourself to the fact that you win some and you lose some.

subset: commoncrawl


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The second beta version of Little Fighter Naruto!You can find Naruto, Kakashi, Sasuke, Sakura and more Naruto characters in this version.
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As African football has improved in depth, Nigeria found qualifying for both the continental and global stage more difficult. They failed to reach the finals of the 2012 CAF Africa Cup of Nations, a rarity, as well as the 2006 FIFA World Cup™ after three consecutive finals appearances. Success in the 2013 AFCON finals, where they won their last four contests after two opening draws, saw the Super Eagles qualify for their first-ever FIFA Confederations Cup proper.
The current crop
Former Super Eagles captain turned coach Stephen Keshi did not shy away from dropping several big-name stars and introducing domestic-based players in pursuit of a first African title since 1994. In the AFCON finals in South Africa one of these players, Sunday Mba, proved all naysayers wrong by scoring the side's match-winner against both the pre-tournament favourites Côte d'Ivoire in the quarter-finals, as well as against Burkina Faso in the final. The breakthrough seemed to ring the bell for a young generation of talent bursting through the ranks, but there is also a fair bit of established international-calibre talent for Nigeria to call on. However, for a team notorious for dramatics, team spirit was very high after the victory in Johannesburg, so a delicate balance is surely needed.
The key players
Remarkably, the Super Eagles had just two outfield-players older than 25 in their 2013 AFCON squad. One of those only 25 at the time, John Obi Mikel established himself as the most influential player in the side despite many up and down years with the national team. The Chelsea midfielder has grown into the leadership role that has seen him become an integral member of the team, along with his club-mate Victor Moses, who is a flamboyant menace on the wings. Other rising figures include striker Emmanuel Emenike, joint top-scorer at the AFCON, and Celtic defender Efe Ambrose.
Coach: Stephen Keshi
Best performances in a FIFA competition: FIFA U-17 World Cup China 1985 (Winners), FIFA U-17 World Cup Japan 1993 (Winners), FIFA U-17 World Cup Korea Republic 2007 (Winners), Men's Olympic Football Tournament Atlanta 1996 (Winners)
Former stars: Mudashiru Lawal, Jay-Jay Okocha, Nwankwo Kanu, Finidi George, Rashidi Yekini, Stephen Keshi, Daniel Amokachi.


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The Triple S Planning Commission has a brief agenda for their meeting Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. at the Stratton Center, 215 Washington St. in Shelbyville.
The commission will hear a preliminary plat for a subdivision of Rut 'N' Strut Distillery on Gordon Lane.
The plat proposes two tracts and the extension of Gordon Lane, which is currently a gravel strip of road.
The property is a total of 128 acres, but is to be divided into two tracts, both larger than 60 acres, said Joyce Nethery, who owns the property along with her husband Bruce Nethery.
A storm that produced hail in the northern portion of the county last week didn't cause much damage overall in Shelby, but farming business suffered heavy losses.
Amanda Gadzik, co-owner of Mulberry Orchard near Bagdad, said that about 98 percent of the apple crop – about 200 bushels – was damaged to the extent they couldn't be sold as whole fruit.
Walgreens personnel gave out almost 75 free flu shots Wednesday in Shelbyville at the Church of the Annunciation's Community Hall to those served by Centro Latino.
Morgan Justice, pharmacy manager at Walgreens, said the store looks for charities to help with out free flu shots.
She said that Walgreens routinely goes onsite to give flu shots, although not all are free.
"This is free for them," she said, glancing around the room. "This is the first charity I've done, we hooked up with Sister Pat [Reno] to do this."
Members of the Shelby County Chamber of Commerce will soon be required to adhere to a new structure of payment.
At the beginning of the year, the Chamber will be changing their payment and enrollment structure. Existing clients will soon be converted into a new type of membership, not one that pertains to the type of business, but rather the services desired.
While lawmakers in Washington push for a ban from children working in tobacco fields, local farmers aren't quite sure that's the right move.
Current U.S. agriculture labor laws allow children 12 and older, with their parent's permission, to be hired for unlimited hours outside of school hours on a farm of any size. Also, youths of any age may work at any time in any job on a farm owned or operated by their parents.
But that could change, as 35 House Democrats made a plea to U.S. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez last week to stop that practice.
Edwards Moving and Rigging has long been known for transporting extremely large items all over the country, and now they're adding another dimension at their location on Everett Hall Road in Shelbyville.
Gathered in front of a newly established railroad spur, Edward's representatives, local officials and other industry leaders held up a blue ribbon while company owner Mark Edwards ceremoniously snipped it to open the company's new set of tracks.
With a trailer behind his Ford truck, Moises Tejeda is chasing the American dream.
For 18 years, he's been working in construction, moving houses, but he's ready for a change.
"I'm getting old, I gotta start doing something else. [Construction] is hard on the body," he said with a smile.
So, Tejeda decided to lean over a hot grill, opening Taqueria la Nayarita, a Mexican food trailer, this summer. But it was the year before that his cooking flame was sparked.
A downtown cafénearing one year in business is gaining popularity for trying to help and work with its customers.
Harvest Coffee & Café, at 524 Main St., inside Masterpieces for your Home, has instituted a Pay-What-You-Can program once a week.
"My husband, Ben, and I began Harvest with a dream to do something different in our hometown. We've been thrilled with how that dream has evolved," co-owner Melinda Hardin said.
"It's settling in nicely," said Steve Ladden of his post as head of security at the Outlet Shoppes of the Bluegrass in Simpsonville.
Ladden, 54, a Colorado native who has lived in Shelbyville for 12 years, was a police officer in Colorado Springs as well as head of security at the Citadel Mall there, so with 20 plus years of experience in the law enforcement field, he feels right at home in his new position.
Despite a wet, soggy harvesting season, the tobacco crop is doing fairly well, according to area farmers.
"It's a good crop, even a big crop, but it's wet," said Paul Hornback, state senator and co-chair of the state Agriculture Committee who also owns a farm in the Bagdad area.
Hornback said that wet conditions are making it difficult for farmers to dry and cure their tobacco.
"It's been very trying," he said. "There have been some challenges."
Copyright © 2015
The Sentinel-News is your source for local news, sports, events and information in Shelby County and Shelbyville, KY, and the surrounding area.


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Turn on WBOI, 89.1-FM on a Sunday afternoon at 3 p.m. and you will hear something completely different – a Burmese-language show.
The half-hour broadcast, the brain child of Thiha Kyi and Thin Koko, gives listeners in the Fort Wayne Burmese community and Burmese across the country their own voice.
Thin Koko said they reach out to Burmese across the United States for debate and discussions on politics, both here and in Burma, as well as social, and health issues. They also have music, education and lifestyle features.
So far they have talked to Burmese in the Carolinas; Buffalo N.Y.; Indiana; and California – basically anywhere Burmese have resettled in the United States.
The show is recorded both on location and in their studio in Fairfax, Va., where Thin KoKo said they can record five people at one time from outside the studio.
The first show aired July 1, and Thin Koko said the response has been excellent. They have listeners from across the country as well as in Singapore and Japan.
The program is modeled after the Golden Moon cable TV program that began on Fort Wayne's public access channel two years ago. Last winter the producers realized if they started a radio program they could reach a lot more people then the TV show could. Thin Koko said radio show reaches people all over the world. It was then that they began looking around for a station to broadcast from and called Will Murphy, General Manager of Northeast Indiana Public Radio.
Murphy said the Burmese producers put the show together and then send it into the station, ready for broadcast.
Currently they are working to get the show broadcast in Burma.
"We are just waiting to get the green light," Thin Koko said.
A few years ago Thin Koko said this would not even have been a possibility but now that the Burmese government is beginning to ease its hard-line isolationist policies, Thin Koko said it could happen.
"We have to try, for the people," Thin Koko said.
So far they have been funding the program out of their own pockets and using their own time to put it together. Once a month Thin Koko travels to Indiana to touch base with the Burmese community there. He said they do the show because they know their people need it.


text: http://stackoverflow.com – On android IAB v3, I am able to nearly consistently get my purchasing into a state where I receive a dialog of "YOU ALREADY OWN THIS ITEM" even though getPurchases says I do not, and I am unable to consume the item (because the item isn't actually owned). This can be reproduced by turning on airplane mode halfway though a purchase (while its loading). I've tracked this down to being a problem with the caching of purchases in the Play Store app. If I get myself in such a state, the only way to fix it is to clear the cache in the Play Store app. After which, my application's purchase states wi (HowTos)


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Topher is, well, bossy, and I knew Jayce could be submissive from the Serviced video we did. So to kick the video off, I just told Topher to tell Jayce what to do. Make him do whatever he wanted. Topher took his time getting around to fucking him. Delisciously making him take his clothes off, toying with his hard cock, spreading his cheeks and butthole, and forcing his cock down his throat while holding him down. And Jayce seemd to really get in to it. I keep thinking of guys to fuck his amazing ass, and I know he wants to top, so I'm gonna try to mix it up for him. But it's gonna hard, because he such a great bottom. rnThe cumshot seems a bit abrubt, but I just had to find something to cut out to keep the video under 25 minutes. And Jayce totally got off to Topher busting all over his face. Thank goodness I have other cameras rolling as the two basically nut at the same time. This is one hot video with two really hot guys. It's totally worth the download, so get to it!
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Posted: June 27, 2014
The Voice season three winner Cassadee Pope took time out of her summer tour with Tim McGraw to perform "I Wish I Could Break Your Heart" for "Fox & Friends" summer concert series.
In the clip below, Pope is accompanied by guitarist Jim McGorman, who is rocking his new Gretsch Center-Block Double Cut White Falcon.
Tags: Cassadee Pope, I Wish I Could Break Your Heart, Jim McGorman
Posted In: Artists Blogs | Leave a comment
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From the staggering statistic released by the Republican National Committee that found women have lost 92.3 percent of all jobs lost since Obama took office, to yesterday's scathing story on the gender pay gap in the Obama White House by the Washington Free Beacon, the GOP has started throwing the "war on women" rhetoric back into the faces of the Democrats who coined it.
And that was before the Hilary Rosen controversy erupted last night. Rosen has since apologized, and her statement appears to be more of a plea for a truce than a mea culpa:
"Let's put the faux 'war against stay at home moms' to rest once and for all. As a mom I know that raising children is the hardest job there is. As a pundit, I know my words on CNN last night were poorly chosen. In response to Mitt Romney on the campaign trail referring to his wife as a better person to answer questions about women than he is, I was discussing his poor record on the plight of women's financial struggles. Here is my more fulsome view of the issues. As a partner in a firm full of women who work outside of the home as well as stay at home mothers, all with plenty of children, gender equality is not a talking point for me. It is an issue I live every day. I apologize to Ann Romney and anyone else who was offended. Let's declare peace in this phony war and go back to focus on the substance."
Many have noticed that Rosen is apologizing to anyone she offended as opposed to apologizing for the substance of her comments. They're right about that, although I'm willing to give Rosen the benefit of the doubt. But Rosen's choice of words at the end is interesting – she calls the controversy a "phony war," which is basically what Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus was attacked for saying about the "war on women" last week. Any of the high-profile Democrats who have expressed outrage at Rosen's initial comments – Debbie Wasserman Schultz and First Lady Michelle Obama to name just two – want to come out and take another swing at her for "belittling" legitimate concerns of stay-at-home moms?
This won't be the last we'll hear about the "war on women," but it sounds like Democrats are at least ready to retrench for awhile after a rough week. As Priebus has indicated, the GOP also seems ready to put this narrative to rest.


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They don't make 'em like this anymore. God Bless Mr. Sullivan.
Is there ANYTHING this misguided individual will not do for attention? May i suggest a dunking booth.
nolascience, is there a reason you might think it was median, and not mean? I saw the word "average" in the article, so that's the only reason I'm curious.
I don't have a strong stats background, so I'm unsure why any survey of this nature would use median, particularly when STP has 8 values and the EBR system in question only has 1 value. Just wondering if I've been misreading articles like these when I see the word "average" and connote it as "mean." Thanks :-)
Mobile crime station? The 1st District NOPD station is physically in the next block of Basin Street. You could huck a rock from the Municipal Auditorium and hit the First District station. There would be a significant security presence, if only there were employees and/or events at a re-opened Auditorium.
i agree with this. It is an embarrassment that this facility is still shuttered. The ticket office isn't even shuttered, it's just open to the elements. If the City is determined to let it crumble through inaction, at least make an effort to secure the property.
Clementine Hunter worked at Melrose Plantation. It served as an artists' colony. In 1939, one of the artists left some paints and brushes behind. Clementine Hunter used these paints and brushes to teach herself how to paint.
Thompson Road is not east of Slidell. Thompson Road is west of Slidell. It seems like i've posted this on Times-Picayune before. Please spread the word at Times-Picayune. Thanks
Good work little angel! congratulations!
For future reference, Thompson Road is just WEST of Slidell... not east of Slidell. It's the westernmost end of Hwy 433, meeting Hwy 190W between Slidell and Lacombe. thanks
Anyone remotely familiar with what you describe as "that deserted, blighted, empty part of town" would presume the driver was on his way to the interstate on-ramp, which is a few hundred feet to the north of where the described incident occurred. Especially as it's stated that driver didn't realize his passenger was shot, until he exited at Downman, which (you'd presumably know since you're so familiar with the area) is the next eastbound exit. Elysian Fields or Franklin at I-10 are also pretty empty at 3:30 A.M. - but until cars can fly, that's how you get to the highway.
i have this album and i really like it. Good work Troy, and everyone else who makes "Backatown" so good.
Thanks Mike; you're right, it's more based on the graphic novel anyway (in which Thomas Hardy's story is barely recognizable). i love Stephen Frears; thanks for telling us this one is arriving here.
it's "Far From the Madding Crowd".... fwiw
For once, C. Ray and i agree on something. Yes, please, Mr. Meffert, we hope you tell it all.
Excellent follow-up work, NOPD. Thank you and keep it up
Controlled risk is the only way trustees can hope to increase a retirement system's value for those retirees whose living-costs go up each year just like the rest of ours. Particularly when each fiscal year, the mayor's office puts up a fight about whether retirement funding is a required budget item per the voter-approved city charter (IT IS).i wonder what sort of "safe" investment the financial wunderkind above would consider to be a "necessary" risk, while still earning enough for the system to sustain itself. Perhaps you'd like to divide your time between commenting on weak 5-paragraph barely-summaries, and taking on the considerable responsibility of the UNPAID POSITION of New Orleans city retirement fund trustee.
Way to post an abstract after reading a portion of the article, "Times-Picayune Staff". Please at least get the man's name correct. While you're at it, maybe you could make some mention about how Mr. Davis criticizes JPMorgan, instead of running a one-line preliminary quote.
i agree with hopexchange that these females, for whatever reason, are largely coerced into this lifestyle. i'm glad i live in a town where this gets the police's attention. When i lived in the city, someone was shot right outside my bedroom window and it never even made the news.To the poster who wishes SPD would turn their efforts towards the "larger problems" on the North Shore ... if you know something about these larger problems, why don't you call the SPD/STPSO/State Police/Feds yourself, and point them in the right direction.
This poor man. How sad. Doesn't he have family or friends who noted that he's gone missing. i hope someone claims him soon.


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Giant Bombcast 07/28/2015
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This re-release seems unnecessary at first glance, but the conclusion of Kratos' journey serves up a level of spectacle that remains impressive in 2015.
Her Story is a bold and largely successful experiment in interactive crime fiction.
Rocksteady's gorgeous-looking third Arkham game refines its open-world format a bit and lets you drive a whole hell of a lot of Batmobile.
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Digital Distribution is the concept of purchasing digital media via the internet and having it sent to the user directly via the internet. No physical representation of this content is given but the content resides on the users hard drive and is legally owned by them.
Sure, these days have almost every game sporting the newfangled 3D, but way back when, everyone had to live with plain old 2D. 2D, or two dimensions, limit the game to scrolling backgrounds, but some games even now make use of this basic concept.
Sometimes designers add old-school things on purpose to enhance game design.
The fifth annual PAX East took place April 11-13, 2014 at the Boston Exhibition & Convention Center in Boston, Massachusetts.
The tenth annual PAX Prime took place August 30-September 2, 2013 at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle, Washington. It was the first 4-day PAX.
The main line of distinction between victory or failure in video games, death is the process of a biological being ceasing to be alive.
Steam is a digital distribution service owned by Valve. Originally created to distribute its own games, Steam has since expanded to become the de facto standard for digital distribution of PC games, and supports community features, downloadable content and achievements. Starting 2010, Steam now offers Mac games as well.
Not all games are made by dev teams with massive budgets. In fact, some games were made in Adobe Flash before becoming a commercial product.
Also known as a triangle jump, this is the ability to hit a wall and propel yourself off of it like you were some kind of crazy ninja or parkour fiend.
Games whose main character is so egotistical that the whole game just HAS to be named after them.
It's arguably the one move that symbolizes the medium to those outside it. The ability to jump, be it onto building, onto platforms, or onto skulls, is one of the all time most important abilities ever put in a video game.
Collectibles are items such as coins, rings, gems, packages etc. that can be gathered, usually for some kind of reward, or sometimes to simply beat a level. Often (almost too often) the source of earning achievements and trophies on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
If the protagonist is standing on an unstable platform for a certain amount of time, it will eventually drop. Usually there is a pit below, or some other hazardous danger.
Games that have had an Original Soundtrack album released.
Industry jargon used to describe a troubled development cycle that results in long delays, extended periods without new info, and often radical changes to the game.
Xbox 360 games that have been approved to run on the Xbox One's backwards compatibility feature.
A level that is focused entirely on a boss encounter.
Some games just won't settle for laughs. Some games make you want to cringe as you're busting a gut.
The eleventh PAX Prime took place August 29-September 1, 2014 at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle, Washington.
Used in Super Mario Bros. via the pipe system. Warp Zones became popularized on the NES/SNES.
Games that involve characters racing on foot. This could be a portion of the game or could be the game's main focus.
The ability to move from one area to another instantaneously - typically through some sort of special power or device.
Computer games that recommend players use a controller, rather than a keyboard and mouse. These are most often side-scrolling platformers and action games.
Steam Trading Cards is a built in feature in the Steam client. It lets users collect cards from certain games and trade them and receive rewards for complete sets.
A visual motif consisting of a series of 1s and 0s, often used when depicting in-game computer systems and electronics.
The player is respawned (or has the option to respawn) immediately following death, and with minimal lost progress and little to no break in the action. This concept is often seen used in difficult or fast-paced games where frequent player death is treated as a learning experience.
A game mechanic that lets players pause and rewind the action in order to correct a mistake or change a path.
Games that feature stages in which the player is forced to continually progress, chased by a relentless and lethal threat that covers the entire height/width of the screen.
Games featuring guests introduce playable, established characters from outside of a franchise. Primarily but not exclusively seen in fighting games.
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Margo doesn't believe Maddie made up the fact that she was raped. Louis is getting very nervous, and Henry is beginning to see the truth. Will wants to go home to Gwen. Paul gives Emily a lecture about taking care of their baby. Holden and Luke talk to Lily at her bedside.
Dr. Hughes tells Meg how lucky Lucy is that Meg was there after the explosion. He invites Meg to come back to work at the hospital, they are short handed, she starts immediately. Her first patient is Emily, who shows up in pain, won't let Meg attend to her. Emily tells Meg to call Paul. Meg admits Emily to the hospital. They argue about Paul. Emily tells Meg she's insecure because she refused to call Paul, Meg calls him. He shows up at the hospital very upset, worried about Emily, but happy to see that Meg got her job back. She tells him Emily and the baby are fine, she had a pre-ecliptic episode. Meg tells him she really tried not to upset Emily. Stress is what triggers the attacks. Paul says they are all in trouble if Emily's mental state is the issue. Meg says maybe he can calm Emily down and he agrees, but when Meg pulls the curtain back, Paul starts shouting at Emily that he thought he could trust her. They argue fiercely, Paul demanding that everything she does should be about the baby. She tells him that if she can count on him, she can stay calm.
Will and Jade are having a nice dinner at the Lakeview. Paul comes in and asks where Gwen is. Jade goes to the restroom, runs into Luke and Holden having dinner, she asks to hold the baby. Paul sits down and talks to Will about Gwen while Jade is away from the table, tries to give him advice. Will doesn't want his advice. Paul says he needs to spend some time with his little brother, that his life is messed up right now. Jade holds the baby before Luke and Holden have to leave. Paul gets up and leaves when Jade returns to Will's table. When they get back to the motel room, Jade tries to make out with Will. He doesn't want to, he says he's going home. She starts saying she's scared again.
In Lily's room at the hospital, Luke tells her he needs her to wake up. He apologizes, he understands everything now. Meg's mom makes Holden and Luke both feel better, telling them what she think Lily would want.
Margo asks Maddie who attacked her as Dallas, Eve, Henry, but especially Louis wait to hear her answer. Maddie says maybe it didn't happen at all. They don't believe her, but she says she made it all up, that she lied about being raped. She says that her imagination runs away with her. Margo thinks there are too many people in the room, stressing her out. Maddie is in serious trouble, Margo says, and she needs to leave there with some straight answers. Maddie agrees to talk to Margo alone. Louis is having a fit. Margo and Henry talk in the hall, she says she suspects Maddie is protecting someone she knows. Henry walks in and hears Louis tell Maddie ...I knew I could trust you.... Louis tries to twist around what he said, but Henry isn't buying it. Louis leaves. Henry asks Maddie if there is anything she wants to tell him, that he will never let anything happen to her because she tells the truth. Finally, Margo and Maddie are alone. Margo says the bottom line is that Maddie is the prime suspect in a murder, and that her lying about being raped is a criminal offense, asks her why she thinks she needed to lie. Maddie says there was no party. She sees Louis' face clearly in her flashback as the rapist, but says she can't talk about it. Margo won't accept that. She says this is not going to be over until you tell someone the truth.
Louis and Eve talk in the bar while Margo is talking to Maddie alone. Louis says that Maddie's always had something wrong with her, they need to get Maddie the help she needs. He says there's no telling what she will say next. Eve goes upstairs to the room, Maddie cries in her arms, then cries alone after Eve leaves. In the bar, Henry starts remembering the way Maddie acted when she first saw Louis. He tells Louis he's looking at the piece of dirt who raped his sister.
Next on ATWT:
Jack tries to make up with Carly.


text:
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Your interests in paranormal activity has peaked to the point that you have decided you want to join the search for answers. Whether you are searching for concrete evidence to prove to others or just verifying your own beliefs you will find suggestions here for starting a successful paranormal investigation team.
It Starts With You
Since this is going to be your paranormal team, by default you are the leader. So the first thing to decide is what your reasons are for starting this team? Is it to get a TV show, make money or become famous? Is it to better understand the energy of spirits and record their presence? Is it perhaps to validate a personal paranormal experience? Other than the first reason, which at its very best is a long shot; these are very valid reasons and now you have one more item to clarify.
What are you going to be able to do for this team? Are you willing to keep expanding your knowledge about ghosts, learn photographing methods and how to collect EVP's, develop procedures, expand on techniques and especially train new members? As a leader of the team you have to be knowledgeable in a lot of areas but knowing the boundaries of what you are willing to commit to will help you find team members to fill in the missing pieces and form a strong base to grow off of.
Finding Paranormal Team Members
NOTE: Remember to always be aware and cautious. For the first meeting with perspective members, always meet in a public place and never go alone.
When looking for new members create an announcement (nothing flashy) stating that you are looking for new people to bring on board and for them to email you if they are interested. It is easy to find people interested in the paranormal but its hard finding people who are dedicated in this area.
You find that many groups fizzle out after becoming discouraged and not finding evidence especially within their first few investigations. With that in mind, try not to get discourage with a high membership turnover in the beginning. With that in mind we suggest keeping your initial team members to about 4-6 people. Establish a solid team core before trying to expand membership, you may find that those 4-6 people are all you ever needed.
Since you will be spending a lot of time together during investigations and examining evidence, it is important that you take the time and build your team on people that will get along together. Interview the people who want to become members of the team. You will be able to weed out people with only a casual interest and can narrow the search to the ones that seem dedicated. The mix of members is up to you and Anna at the S.I.T.E. group has graciously allowed us to print her questionnaire she uses for this purpose:
This article was written in part by Anna Gass, Founder & Lead Investigator for The S.I.T.E. Group. In no way could it have been done without her insight and knowledge.
In Starting a Paranormal Investigation Team – Part 2 we will discuss promoting your team, team image, going about an investigation and whether to charge for your services.


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Norman Rockwell
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moreNorman Rockwell's tremendously successful, prolific career as a painter and illustrator has rendered him a twentieth-century American icon. However, the very popularity and accessibility of his idealized, nostalgic depictions of middleclass life have caused him to be considered not a serious artist but a "mere illustrator"–a disparagement only reinforced by the hundreds of memorable covers he drew for The Sunday Evening Post.
Symptomatic of critics' neglect is the fact that Rockwell has never before been the subject of a serious critical biography. Based on private family archives and interviews and publishes to coincide with a major two-year travelling retrospective of his work, this book reveals for the first time the driven workaholic who had three complicated marriages and was a distant father —so different from the loving, all-American-dad image widely held to this day. Critically acclaimed author Laura Claridge also breaks new ground with her reappraisal of Rockwell's art, arguing that despite his popular sentimental style, his artistry was masterful, complex, and far more manipulative than people realize. less
Random House Publishing Group; December 2001
600 pages; ISBN 9781588360649
Download in secure PDF format
Title: Norman Rockwell
Author: Laura Claridge
600 pages; ISBN 9781588360649
Download in secure PDF format
Title: Norman Rockwell
Author: Laura Claridge
Buy, download and read Norman Rockwell (eBook) by Laura Claridge today!
moreChapter 1
Narrative Connections, the Heart of an Illustrator
We tell ourselves stories in order to live.
-Joan Didion, The White Album
Norman Rockwell was not sadistic. He was, however, expert at creating desire, both in his public and in his private life. His family, who too often felt themselves to be "living out the cover of a Saturday Evening Post," as his oldest son, Jarvis, once expressed it, were routinely seduced by his invitations of intimacy, though the artist established a subtle but impermeable distance when they tried to respond. His real sensitivity was reserved for his art, his empathy lavished on his easel, day after day, for over six decades. As do many artists, he tended to exorcise his internal tensions in his paintings, so that the energy that might have been expended on the work of rearing three sons born within six years of each other exploded into the narrative stories on his canvas instead. In the summer of 1954, for instance, at the height of his powers, Rockwell undertook a Saturday Evening Post cover of an aspiring artist studying master works in a museum, The Art Critic, published on April 16, 1955. The cover shows a young man scrutinizing a woman's décolletage in the head-and-shoulders portrait in front of him, while on the adjacent wall, prosperous Dutch burghers in an Old Master painting appear to start with indignation and amusement as they watch the impudent student. The model for the student was Rockwell's son Jarvis (named after the illustrator's father); for the portrait the young critic studies so assiduously, Rockwell used his wife (and Jarvis's mother), Mary.
The timing of this particular painting, in terms of familial harmony, was way off. Mary had been struggling valiantly against alcoholism and depression-possibly a bipolar illness-for at least five years. The family had been racked by the demise of their formerly predictable upper-middle-class home, as the mother, previously the anchor of their household, suddenly needed all the tending. Boarding school plans had been upended in an attempt to rally round her, trips were rescheduled, tremendous amounts of money were poured into treatments, and finally, a permanent move was undertaken from Arlington, Vermont, where the family had lived since 1939, to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, when it became clear that Mary's treatments at the Austen Riggs Center would be long-term. Unknown to the family, as they struggled to adjust to Mary's illness Rockwell suffered a simultaneous spate of suicidal thoughts.
Jarvis, however, could give both his parents a run for their money, and in terms of expensive sessions with mental healthcare specialists, he did exactly that. From his earliest years, he was a particularly complicated member of the family: "I never caught on to what you're supposed to do in school," he remembers. "So it kind of never made sense to me, from the beginning." Born in 1932, by 1938 Jarvis had been displaced by two younger brothers, and as he approached first grade, his parents were contemplating yet another major dislocation in his young life. The next year, they would decide to leave the sophisticated enclave of New Rochelle, New York, to make their home in Arlington, Vermont. A greater contrast is hard to imagine, at least on the face of it. New Rochelle fed on the overspill from Manhattan, seeing itself as a haven for worldly artists, entertainers, and intellectuals who wanted to be within commuting distance of the city, while enjoying the yacht club environment of what many treated as a wealthy distant suburb of the city. Even at his young age, Jarvis would feel the shock of adjusting to a bucolic life after the faster pace of his earlier years.
Between the move at age nine and posing for The Art Critic immediately prior to his twenty-third birthday, Rockwell's eldest son re-trod many of his father's steps, though too often, to Jarvis, they seemed to be missteps. He, too, had dropped out of high school; he, too, attended not only art school but his father's own, the Art Students League in New York City. And though "Pop," the name the boys conferred on their father when they became adolescents, ostensibly encouraged Jarvis's efforts, praising lavishly to others his son's work, the young artist grew up feeling distant from the father whose somewhat vague friendliness left his son desperate for a closer connection.
By 1954, Jarvis had been in and out of art schools, the Air Force, and psychiatric treatment. He was, in the lingo of a later age, trying to find himself. And he was trying hard to understand how to position himself as an aspiring artist in an art world that rejected as inconsequential the achievements of his father, whose technique Jarvis at least deeply appreciated, but whose storytelling in oils found expression, after all, only on mass-reproduced magazine covers. As soon as he was finished posing for Pop this time, Jarvis planned to head off for the Boston Museum of Art School, a more competitive program than any his father had attended.
No account exists of Rockwell's inspiration for The Art Critic. Preparing even more feverishly than he did for most of his covers, however, he went through dozens of charcoal sketches, color renderings, and redirection of the mise-en-scène. The flirtatious, attractive woman for whom Mary Rockwell posed took the form of at least ten variations alone, from an early frowning hausfrau to the beautiful damsel that preceded the final image. More impressive still was the illustrator's long indecision over what to place in the frame on the museum's right wall. He completed two detailed paintings in contrasting Dutch styles; in addition to the group portrait of the men, he executed fully a landscape genre scene.
Until the last moment, Rockwell alternated between the two pieces, unsure which effect he preferred. In the charcoal on board that he drew immediately prior to his oil sketch, the painting to the right of the student critic is the Dutch landscape, with windmill, elaborate forestry, and tiny figures in the background. But in the end, he chose the parody of a Dutch group scene, which historically implied the weight of patriarchal authority. Vacillating between a genre that suggested a domestic tranquillity and one that invoked the power of his fathers, Rockwell went with the idea of ancestral censure and brought down the full force of his family and aesthetic pedigree on the poor befuddled art student, hapless in the ways of the world and of art.
The student himself metamorphosed from an initially disheveled outsider into a more suave Easterner: "Finally, my father changed my face so much it hardly looks like me," the model remembers. In one of Rockwell's earliest pen-and-charcoal sketches, first renderings, Jarvis is given long uncombed hair, a soft, almost nonexistent jawline, and made to appear nearly myopic, his glasses sliding down his nose, as he stands within an inch of a startled-looking housewife in order to study her portrait. He is, in other words, presented as a sloppy, unkempt beatnik, an identity he had in fact been fostering.
The finished painting consists instead of a slender, well-groomed slightly droopy-lidded young man, painterly accoutrements of his trade under his arm, standing in front of a portrait in the Netherlandish section of a museum. This eager neophyte, seen only in profile-in contrast to the frontal views of the Dutch group portrait-exhibits a supercilious facial expression and an aristocratic sharp chin, accentuated by his proprietary leaning in toward the woman's portrait. The ersatz sophistication is offset by the childlike way that he nearly squeezes his legs together, his feet perfectly aligned on the tile floor, their toes almost pushed upward by their owner's rigid lower body. Rockwell's frequent device of exaggerating the subject's derriere is employed here to undercut any authority the young art critic might have claimed otherwise; instead, the viewer of the cover is invited to assume the superior, knowing position: benign, wise interpreter of the scene.
The finished painting positions the oddly disruptive parody of the Dutch Masters group scene to the right of the voyeuristic student, in the pictorial plane of his palette and easel, perpendicular to his open art history book with its reproduction of the woman's portrait. Rockwell's deliberately formulaic Old Master painting, its antecedents the famous group portraits by both Frans Hals and Rembrandt, revisited his own earlier family romance. His admiration for seventeenth-century Netherlandish painters was one of the few passions he shared with his parents, with whom he continued to live for several years while he went to art school. His father's own not inconsequential sketches clearly were modeled on studies of the Dutch and English countryside; and the domestic painting that lost out to the group portrait in The Art Critic was strikingly similar to the older man's homey sketches.
Father-son issues not resolved in their own time passed down to Jarvis and Norman Rockwell. What part mockery versus a more gentle condescension plays in the psychodrama of The Art Critic remains incalculable to its principal model. It was not entirely clear to Rockwell's oldest son how much his father really respected his progeny's work. Rockwell could slide from speaking of "Jerry's" terrific modern art one minute to referring to his son's local installation piece as the "string mess up on the hill" the next. Probably both attitudes were real, given Rockwell's lifelong ambivalence toward abstraction. And Jerry, since late adolescence, had begun to deprecate his father's painting, his newfound superiority hard to hide from Pop. The son's claim to know, his right even to judge his father, takes shape in The Art Critic in the proprietary posture of the student, bending over the detail of the portrait with his magnifying glass in one hand, his easel, palette, and reproduction of the painting in the other. A slightly weary expression, sandwiched between smugness and an unguarded absorption, captures the poseur's incoherence, the lack of an authentic center. His innocence is further compromised by the hint of pursed lips, as if ready to kiss the painting. Worse still, the young artist is magnifying the brooch perilously close to the woman's décolletage; the smirk she has assumed seems a cross between an admonishment and a come-on.
Jarvis Rockwell does not like to talk about this painting. "It was very unpleasant for me," he says. "It's true that my mother and I never posed together for this piece. But that's why I realized that there was all this stuff going on, and that my father, on some level, was too polite or too timid to force our faces in it literally. As usual, we were living on the cover of a magazine." Jarvis was embarrassed to contribute to the painting's ribald implications, since his mother's bosom was the object of his gaze. "My father made it very plain that the sexual joke was important to the painting," he remembers. What Mary Rockwell thought of the whole thing goes unnoted; loyal wife of a prominent artist, she buried any conflicts she had at the time with alcohol and pills. The millions of readers who welcomed that April 16, 1955, Saturday Evening Post cover into their homes didn't realize the family drama writ large that the cover shared with them, Rockwell's other-and at least equally important-family. Questions of influence, of talent, of generation, of authority, and of the vexed center of family love all reverberate as one painting within the painting relates to the other, and the parodies and substitutions and historical references feast on one another.
What tale would Rockwell have claimed to be telling in The Art Critic? Norman Rockwell told stories. That was his job as an illustrator, and over the decades he stressed that, for him, the hardest part of his work always was coming up with ideas to narrate in the absence of a text written by others. And Post covers, as he said on more than one occasion, had to be read within a few seconds, the manifest meaning laid out through the artful accretion of details. Given those thematic elements of the painting that remained unchanged from his earliest pencil sketch, The Art Critic asks to be understood as, at the least, a young, earnest, overconfident art student yielding up his professionalism to female pulchritude. In the process, his artistic and historical elders gently show their superiority, through their mock outrage and hints of laughter that acknowledge this normal misguided stage of youth. Themes of looking, illicit views and presumptuous vantage points among them, knit together the young art critic, daring to judge, and the Dutch ancestors-woman and man, the old and the young, the new and the dated. Final authority is granted to the viewer-the wise spectator looking in on the picture who is expected, surely, to smile at the too-earnest artist who is still miles, decades, ages away from the achievements of his father(s).
Did Rockwell actually reflect upon the template of family desire and ambition embedded in this painting too fraught for his sons to enjoy? Of course not. But we know that by 1954, Norman Rockwell had been put through the wringer in terms of delving into his own psyche. At least as important, he had always developed his narrative line through accretive yokings, visual puns, and meaning that begot meaning, an almost classical, psychoanalytically oriented process of free association.
In the late 1940s, for instance, he explained for the benefit of the students he was then teaching that "in a picture which tells a story, the idea itself probably is the most important element of the entire illustration." For an instructor who insisted on the primary importance of technique, of mastering the principles of traditional draftsmanship and color, this was an illuminating statement. And it is a position that he reiterated over the decades, usually adding wryly, as he did here, that he had always found this the hardest part of his profession-coming up with a good idea. After all, he expounded, it wasn't enough to come up with something that the artist alone found meaningful; for an illustrator, a narrative idea had to possess near instant recognition for the audience. "Usually I get my best ideas as I shave in the morning," Rockwell repeated throughout the years. "I draw them on three-by-five squares of paper, then discard them until I get one I think I can go with."
That crucial next stage-developing a nugget into a narrative gold mine-involved a long associative habit of thinking, free ranging and unlimited in the directions in which it took the artist. He shared with the students enrolled at the Famous Artists' School an example of this process, in which to begin the sequence he sketched a lamppost, "which always gets me started," although "where I will end I never know." Rockwell travels through ten more vignettes before that end point arrives, and, along the way, he plays with a drunken soldier, who morphs into a dutiful one sewing his pants, to a picture of the sailor's mother mending them instead-with the family dog at hand; to the sailor transformed into a boy who tends to his sick dog, to a vet and dog, to doctors braving blizzards, to a sick girl missing out on a dance, to a square dance, to a cobbler fixing shoes, to a lone cowboy-"shoes recall cowhide, cowhide recalls cows, cows recall cowboys. Still no idea so I must keep going until I finally do get one." At this point, he stops, assuming that the students get the point.
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Airbus believes re-engining the A320 will keep potential competitors in check by maintaining a cutting edge while allowing the airframer to pour saved development capital into differentiating technology instead.
Speaking during an event in Toulouse this week, Airbus executive vice-president of strategy and future programmes Christian Scherer said the decision to develop the A320neo - and Boeing's opting for the 737 Max - was "driven somewhat" by the emergence of the Comac C919 and Irkut MS-21.
Scherer says these programmes are wholly funded by "very deep pockets indeed", but points out that they are effectively A320 imitators and claims: "None of these new players is bringing anything new to the party."
He says that, with the A320neo, Airbus has "put the established aircraft at the highest technological standard" and says that, for the next 10-15 years, "we know there will be no new players in this industry, because everybody's declared themselves".
Instead of spending a large sum to develop an entirely new narrowbodies, he says, both Airbus and Boeing have saved billions of dollars that "can pay for innovation that will set us apart afterwards" - innovation, he adds, which will emerge before the new rivals have matured.
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