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Ever find yourself fancying a new Blu-ray player or flat panel TV on Walmart's website, but wishing you could pay with cash instead of credit or debit?
Yeah, no, me either.
But if we had, we'd both be in luck: Walmart.com has introduced what is supposedly the world's first "pay with cash online" option available from any major retailer.
How it works is as follows:
- Customers go to Walmart.com from any Internet-connected device to select an item and place an order.
- During checkout, the customer selects the "Cash" option and their shipping preference. Customer immediately receives an order number on the order confirmation page and an email receipt with their order number. The item is reserved in the system.
- The customer has 48-hours to take the printed order form to any cash register of any Walmart store or Neighborhood Market.
- Once cash payment is completed in the store and received, shipping then occurs via Site to Store or to their preferred address.
I looked into this "cash" thing, and apparently it's a system sort of similar to debit, except instead of swiping your card and having money subtracted from your bank account, you have to keep track of these little green pieces of paper and multicolored metal discs, which serve the same purpose as money. Sounds like a hassle to me, but according to the press release, one out of four Americans uses the stuff almost exclusively, and as many as 81% of them have internet access.
Who knew?
You can read more about the new option at walmart.com/paywithcash.

subset: commoncrawl


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According the Hollywood Reporter Paul Rudd and Zach Galifianakis will star in the new Paramount movie "Will" written by comedian Demetri Martin ("Important Things with Demetri Martin") and directed by Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton. While this is Martin's first screenplay, while Faris and Dayton last brought us the indie hit "Little Miss Sunshine." The duo has yet to direct another movie, although they do have some in the works, including "The Abstinence Teacher" based on a novel of the same name by Tom Perrotta. "Will" sounds like more a comedic turn for the team with the plot as follows:
"...an ordinary guy (Rudd) who lives in a world where people's lives and destinies are being written by scribes in Heaven. The man wakes up one day to find that his heavenly writer (Galifianakis) has decided to no longer draft his life, and he must go about his day unscripted, ending up on a journey to fulfill his hidden potential."
This will be Rudd and Galifianakis' second go around as they are both to appear in "Dinner for Schmucks" which will be out later this year. Rudd has been making quite a name for himself in comedy over the last few years, but especially with his last starring role in "I Love You, Man" and Galifianakis broke out last summer in the hit movie "The Hangover." Both have shown they have great comedic timing and could be the perfect foils for one another. This might just be a movie to be excited for!


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Big changes could be coming to Spike TV, the home of TNA Impact Wrestling, due to slipping ratings and lower advertising revenue in 2012. Broadcasting & Cable has a new article online featuring quotes from Viacom's head of ad sales, Jeff Lucas, regarding a transition of the network.
"Spike is a network that is transitioning, a majority of it, to more of a general entertainment network," he says. "This year we're announcing to the marketplace that we're developing scripted programming for Spike."
It's also possible the network could get a new name.
While Impact was not brought up in the article, it was noted that Spike will continue to focus on male-oriented programming such as Bellator MMA.
Click here for coverage by Broadcasting & Cable.


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≡ Category: Anime Pulse, Ze Shows | Author: Ichigo | ≅ Leave a Comment
So we've been podcasting for 5 years. Hard to believe, right? I reminisce a bit about the past, and look to the future. Then I talk about the news. I decided instead of a preview episode to instead talk about the most epic shonen series of all time, Dragon Ball. So I recap Dragon Ball and then talk about Dragon Ball Kai (Z). Don't miss this one.


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Freaking News
Funny Pills Pictures
The pill.
Funny South Park in The Pill
Member reactions:
Good one. But would be better if the people were as sharp as the writing.
I like it. Just wish the main characters were of higher resolution
Funny The Pill War Movie
Member reactions:
Top 5 congrats, Luciano. I agree with NM, Super clean chop
Funny Viagra Pills For Parrots
Member reactions:
Oh...this is disturbing. Another fine Crapco product-eh..
Sildenafil citrate compositions specially made for Birds they will become active and powerful like the chop with the cigarette and the glasses
Congratulations Paul. Great Humor, as always.
Bwhahahaha I didn not mean it deserved a Woody literally hahahhaha. Than is weird. Congrats Doc
You called it, Tim. HA. Thanks. Thanks, G-Man.
They'll speak like... Polly wants a hooker. Congrats on the wood, Paul. Great stuff.
Thanks, UncleChamp. Thanks, Bob. Thanks, Newsy. .
Funny South Park in The Pill Movie
Member reactions:
Well done.... both are staring each other funny ...
yeh.. this is the idea behind Array obviously
Funny Sick Obama Surronded by Free Pills
Obama's Healthcare Conquest
Member reactions:
Like the concept of free healthcare and the chop of putting him inside the pills with bandages all over him were amazing
otzie congrats..... really great.... Band-Aid perfect fit
Funny The Pill
double joke
Member reactions:
OMG, what a clean work with beautiful concept
yes some relations were hard to sallow money cant buy everything
Funny Dr House Full of Pills
House series finale set for May 21 Depressing aint it
Member reactions:
Its a perfect work. great idea to rip off the head and the capsules falling all over
Thanks everyone. I really appreciate the compliments
Funny Real Pacman Eating Pills in City Street
Member reactions:
Funny Pills Running Away From Mouth
U.S. seeing run on iodine pills
Member reactions:
I've read this news too. challenging to depict this article but you did well.
For more funny photoshop pix visit
Freaking News front page


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CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) — Redshirt freshman Giovani Bernard scored three touchdowns and had his sixth 100-yard rushing performance to help North Carolina beat Wake Forest 49-24 on Saturday, making the Tar Heels bowl eligible for the fourth straight season.
Bernard ran for a pair of touchdowns and had a 7-yard scoring catch in the first quarter, while North Carolina (6-3, 2-3 Atlantic Coast Conference) took advantage of an uncharacteristic line of mistakes from the normally sure-handed Demon Deacons (5-3, 4-2). Wake Forest had five turnovers — three on interceptions thrown by Tanner Price — after committing just five all season coming into Saturday, and the Tar Heels converted four of those into touchdowns.
It all led to a huge day for the UNC offense, which had a season-high 562 total yards and its best scoring output in seven years. It was also North Carolina's most points in an ACC game in a decade.


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The battle between Tamra Barney and her ex-husband, Simon Barney over custody of their kids is heating up. Accusations are running rampant as Simon accuses Tamra from "Real Housewives of Orange County" of neglecting their young kids, but it seems that Simon's past holds a secret that he doesn't want exposed. According to Radar Online, Simon has a history of domestic violence.Tamra and her son Ryan Vieth aren't keeping quiet this time.
Almost ten years ago, in 1996, police arrested Simon when he brutally assaulted Tamra. He hit her so hard that she had two black eyes and a lip that was busted open.
Ryan, 27, relates the incidents on Facebook when his stepfather Simon attacked his mother not just once, but many times. He said that he he remembers Simon hitting his mother, the damage he inflicted on her face, the fact that he was arrested, and the many times he caused problems between his mother and himself.
A source told Radar Online that after law enforcement arrested Simon, Tamra refused to press charges. Then, in 2010, police arrested Simon again for domestic violence. Tamra called law enforcement when Simon left the house after he threw a plastic retractable leash at her. According to Jim Amormino, spokesman for the Orange County Sheriff's Department, Tamra claims the leash was aimed at her head, so she put her hands up to protect herself. The dog leash hit her on the wrist instead.
However, unlike the time when Tamra quietly let Simon have his way, she is fighting back. The lives and well-being of their three minor children are at stake. She is no longer a victim of domestic violence. She has remarried and found happiness with a man who does not hit her.


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In December of 2011 I contacted former WCW Heavyweight Champion Diamond Dallas Page through his Twitter account about the possibility of doing an interview about his new DDP YOGA program which was originally caller YRG (Yoga for Regular Guys) that helped save his wrestling career before it took off in the WCW. I wasn't really expecting any type of reply, but a few days later I received an e-mail from someone at DDP YOGA informing me that they were very interested in setting up an interview and that Dallas would be called me on New Year's Eve.
Well, on December 31, 2011 my phone rang just after 4pm and it was the Three-Time WCW Heavyweight Champion of the World on the other line. I had been a fan of DDP back when he was a "jobber" and now our paths are crossing thanks to Twitter. We spoke on the phone for a long time, as I found out, he handles his Twitter account and took a look at my profile page at my radio station's website, where I had listed ten goals I wanted to accomplish in 2012. He is a huge fan of writing down your goals which dramatically increases the success rate of achieving them. During our conversation I had told him that I had lost quit a bit of weight while training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, but I was looking to add something to my training, that I could do from home.
I started doing DDP YOGA in January of 2012 in addition to my Brazilian Jiu Jitsu training. After the first month, I went from 205 to 195. Before my first tournament of the year, which was in late February, I dropped down to 190 pounds and competed at Medium-Heavy division for the very first time. I continued to post recap videos of my workouts as well as status update photos where I was now approaching 185 pounds when I received a call from Dallas and his business partner Steve Yu. They wanted to know what I was doing. I thought I was in some serious trouble, but when I told them I was doing a DDP YOGA workout in the morning, BJJ at night followed by another DDP YOGA workout, they wanted to know if I wanted to come to Atlanta.
As it turns out, they were really impressed with my results after only three-months on the program. They knew that I was training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and was looking for something to help me break through and get under 200 pounds. They wanted me to share my story, being someone who was already in good shape, getting into even better shape by incorporating DDP YOGA into my lifestyle. We filmed a video that had me sharing how my BJJ game improved due to the dynamic resistance training found within DDP YOGA as well as my increased flexibility.
Diamond Dallas Page has helped inspire and improve the lives of so many people around the world, including two members of the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2014: Jake "The Snake" Roberts and Scott "Razor Ramon" Hall who have turned their lives around since entering "The Accountability Crib" where they not only worked out with DDP but also had their nutritional programs changed.
If you are training Mixed Martial Arts, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Tae Kwon Do, or are simply looking to a way to lose weight with zero impact on your body, you should look into DDP YOGA. See all of the lives it has improved through videos and photos shared by members of the TEAM DDP YOGA community.


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Jockey Martin breathing somewhat easier
Aug 2nd, 12
Martin went headfirst into Ruidoso Downs' dirt. The Hall of Fame jockey's neck broke in three places.
Paralyzed from his neck down, Martin received stabilizing treatments at several hospitals, including TIRR at Memorial Hermann. Since the Sept. 2 fall, he had been unable to breathe without mechanical assistance.
Most of the past year brought no major progress. As Tracey Martin described her husband's condition, "There has been nothing to make us even a little happy."
Until now.
A Tulsa hospital has gifted the Martins with an occasional smile. The facility specializes in freeing people from 24/7 ventilator life. It began treating Martin two months ago.
Now he breathes unassisted for six to seven hours a day.
"He had been on a ventilator constantly since three days after the accident," said Tracey Martin, who has been at her husband's side for 11 months. "We're hoping they can get him breathing on his own for eight hours a day."
Eight hours is the treatment goal. He might reach that landmark in late August and earn a discharge.
Tracey Martin was asked not to identify the treatment facility, though Tulsa's Kindred Hospital confirmed that Martin, 57, is a patient.
Martin fits at the top of any career quarter horse jockey list: almost 3,000 wins, nearly $46 million in purses and seven All-American Futurity championships. Those numbers hold in stone because he won't ride again.
But his lifestyle can get a lot better.
"He would use the ventilator at night," Tracey Martin said. "During the day, he would breathe without assistance for those eight hours. The machine keeps people alive, but they like to be away from it for a few hours every day."
She is uncertain how much other improvement awaits her husband.
"He's still paralyzed from the neck down, but he has felt some sensation on his left side," she said.
Martin competed at about 120 pounds. Immobile and confronting several post-spill problems, he dropped 25 pounds. Today he's pushing scales the other way. An improved appetite has bumped his weight from 95 pounds to 127. A 32-pound weight gain would shock most people. Tracey Martin rejoices in it.
The Martins had someone drive them from El Paso to Tulsa in a motor coach. In a few weeks, they'll return to El Paso for further treatment.
"We don't want to stay here too long," she said. "There are sick people in a hospital."
Previous Articles
Lynch Finding New Life in Maryland Ten countries represented in third annual World Jockey Challenge Jockey Ovie D. Scurlock, 97, Dies Joe Bravo Named Jockey of the Week Baze's Win Record: A Way of Life Beyond the Numbers College of Health Sciences, Jockeys' Guild Unveil Concussion Management Protocol Pilot Study Irad Ortiz, Jr. Named Jockey of the Week Gerard Melancon Reaches 4,500 Career Wins Belmont newcomer Geroux has eye on Saratoga
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Zhu Shu Ji Nian (Annals on Bamboo) is the history of the Wei State in the Warring
States Period (475-221BC). The book used to have no name. It was named later as
Ji Nian (Annals) because of its chronological style, and also named as
Zhu Shu (Book on Bamboo) because the origin one was written on bamboo,
normally, it was called Zhu Shu Ji Nian (Annals on Bamboo).
There are altogether 13
sections, narrating the history of the Xia Dynasty (21st
century - 17th century BC), the Shang Dynasty
(17th century - 11th century BC), the Western Zhou Dynasty
(11th century - 771BC), the Spring and Autumn Period (770-476BC)
and the Warring States Period, which were sequenced according to the order of
the year. Quite a lot of records in the book are different from traditional
ones, and are closer to the facts. Besides, some records conform to the records
on Jiaguwen (inscriptions on animal bones and tortoise shells) and
inscriptions on bronze. The book is of great reference value for the present
study of the pre-Qin history.


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Review By Camille Berry Domaine Romanée-Conti's wines are perhaps the most famous in the world, and amongst the most expensive. The highly allocated bottles are reasonably scarce and cause a craze among collectors, particularly when it comes to bottles of the wine made from the Romanée-Conti vineyard itself. It is hallowed ground for Burgundy lovers and oenophiles the world over. A stone cross - a relic from the vineyard's days in the hands of monks, marks the site - seems to watch over Romanée-Conti like a silent sentinel. Perhaps due to the vineyard's renown, it became the target of a... continue reading
I happened last week to be eating lunch at a small cafe that had a wine store and bar attached. The only available table for me to occupy while scarfing down my panini during a break from my fifth day in the jury box (long story, don't ask), happened to be in the wine store. And sitting on the table was a careworn copy of Alexis Lichine's Encyclopedia of Wine and Spirits, first published in 1967. I spent my lunchtime leafing through this early (and remarkably deep) attempt at a comprehensive description of the world of wine. In addition to... continue reading
Review By Stella Fong The Essential Scratch and Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert will, at first, appeal to the reader's inner child. With thick cardboard pages, great illustrations, and scratch and sniff scent disks, the book offers elementary tools that provide good introductory wine information sans the verbiage that fill other basic compendiums. The author, Richard Betts gets right to the point, confessing to hating wine speak. Even as one of the fewer than 200 Master Sommeliers worldwide he sheds all wine snobbery, stating what he finds obvious, "Wine is a grocery, not a luxury." With humor and... continue reading
What does the world look like to those in the midst of a quiet revolution? As with the frog in a pot of slowly heating water, sometimes change can be hard to see when it doesn't arrive with a clap of thunder, an overnight recession, or live narration from a serious-looking news reporter with a microphone. If you weren't paying particularly close attention, or your relationship to California wine consisted of what you might find on your supermarket shelves each week as you shopped for your dinner, things might not look all that different from a few years ago. But... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. If you find the subject of food and wine pairing confusing, intimidating or irritating, read Francois Chartier's Taste Buds and Molecules and then Tim Hanni's Why You Like the Wines You Like in quick succession, and wait for your head to explode. These two highly opinionated volumes have only one thing in common: they both argue that just about everything you ever thought about wine and food pairing (including, by implication, anything in the other book) is wrong. Beyond that, there is some overlap on topics, but precious little agreement about what you should put in... continue reading
Why would any wine lover want to know something about more than one thousand different grape varieties? For the same reason that wine lover would want to taste them. A certain class of wine enthusiast, whether or not they accept the moniker of "wine geek" will experience a small shiver of delight as they peruse the pages of the recently published tome Wine Grapes, provided they haven't gotten a hernia in the process of lifting the seven pound book onto the table in the first place. As its subtitle suggests, this book attempts to be "A Complete Guide to 1,368... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson Books and articles about bargain wines are a dime a dozen--check that, a nickel a dozen. And like many forms of wine recommendations, they tend to be frustrating, too, since the phenomenal global proliferation of wine labels means that laying your hands on any particular bottle can be more trouble than it's worth. Do you really want to spend half a day visiting wine shops and calling supermarkets in search of an $8 Rioja? And just when you and your guide are hitting your stride, all the vintages change, leaving you wondering if you should trust... continue reading
It's not entirely clear to me which is more remarkable: the fact that before this book was published there was no definitive guide to one of France's most unique and historical wine regions, or the fact that this gorgeously exhaustive guide was entirely self-published by a wine lover who decided to do something about that lack. Regardless, it can easily be said that the world of wine books is greatly enriched now that Harry Karis has published his opus, The Châteauneuf-du-Pape Wine Book. I feel something of a kinship with Karis, though I've yet to meet him, because he seems... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. A big part of wine's allure is that it is so many different things: a source of alcohol, a source of pleasure, a gateway for entry into the mystical, the erotic, the enlightened, the divine, the silly, and sometimes the idiotic. But for thousands of years, it has also been a commodity--and that's where this book comes in. Worrying about wine as a commodity seems uninspiring, even tawdry, compared, say, to worrying about the distinctive terroir of some patch of dirt in Alsace. But without the buying and selling, we'd all be home winemakers, wine production... continue reading
I'm tickled by the idea of wine featuring prominently in popular entertainment. I think a lot of wine lovers got a kick out of Sideways. Regardless of what they thought of the movie overall, there were enough inside wine jokes and archetypal wine conversations that anyone who loved wine was able to at least smile knowingly. I found it delightful to watch people geeking out about wine and extolling the virtues of Pinot Noir on the big screen. A similar small delight is to be found in the pages of the newly translated Drops of God, by Tadashi Agi and... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Alongside the profusion of wine bars and wine weeks focused on so-called "natural wines"--wines made with minimal winemaker intervention and chemical adulteration-- two new books try to explain the phenomenon and assess its significance for the future of wine. In Authentic Wine: Toward Natural and Sustainable Winemaking, British scientist / wine writer Jaime Goode and New Zealand-born consulting winemaker and Master of Wine Sam Harrop make a plea for maintaining and defending the diversity of wines and wine styles from around the world, concentrating on careful, in-depth analysis of the technical and philosophical issues involved. Alice... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson I am here to tell you about the only wine book you or I will ever need--at least until next year, when we'll all need the 2012 edition. Throw away all those critic's ratings and all those books about food and wine pairing; you won't even need to visit Vinography any more, except for the cool images. When Wine Tastes Best: A Biodynamic Calendar for Wine Drinkers 2011 is what happens when the most far-fetched aspects of biodynamic agriculture get transplanted from vineyard to glass. It turns out, the introduction explains, that the same astral forces... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson Unlike the fads and fancies and 15-minute trends that come with every new vintage, the history of wine tends to stay put: the wine gods from ancient Greece and Rome don't get dethroned retroactively, and the 1855 classification of properties in Bordeaux, for better or for worse, said what it said. So even though Thomas Pellechia's Wine has been around for a while, it hasn't gone out of date, and it still provides an excellent read for anyone curious about the complex interplay between this amazing beverage and the history of the world. As the subtitle... continue reading
Book review by Sarah Trubnick. Argentine wine is an interesting subject for a book at this point in time. The wine industry in Argentina is currently witnessing a renovation and redefinition, with many wineries focusing on the potential for exportation. This burgeoning fine wine industry has caught the eyes of many throughout the international world of wine, and the quality to price ratio of many wines is exceedingly attractive. These points, along with the coincidental fact that I am presently here in Mendoza, led me to a reading of Laura Catena's Vino Argentino in the hopes of gleaning a bit... continue reading
I've been asked more than once in the past few weeks about which wine books I like that might make good gifts for the holiday season. And so I've had to give a little thought to which books I feel every serious wine lover should have read. So without further ado, here's my list. I didn't set out to have only ten, but that's just what I ended up with trying to stick to the most important books, the books that I think every self respecting wine lover should definitely have read, and possibly own. I had to leave off... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Secrets of the Sommeliers, a collaboration between Rajat Parr, wine director for the Michael Mina group of restaurants in San Francisco, and wine writer Jordan Mackay, carries the sub-title, "How to think and drink like the world's top wine professionals." Enticing as that sounds, and interesting as the book is, by the end, I wasn't entirely sure I was up to either task. The world of the upscale restaurant sommelier is a rarified place, populated by razor-sharp palates honed through years of diligent practice, access to tasting an astonishing range of wines most of us never... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. In contrast to his string of useful and successful Making Sense volumes -- Making Sense of Wine, of Burgundy, of California Wine, etc. -- Matt Kramer On Wine is a collection of short articles, written over the years for Wine Spectator, Decanter, and other publications. Rather than offering a sustained treatment of a single region or subject, this volume showcases Kramer's three-decade mastery of the art of the truly interesting and intelligent wine column. For those who have kept up with Kramer, the book can be the occasion for re-immersion; for those who haven't, it's an... continue reading
I can honestly say that of all the people in the wine world that hadn't written books, the one I wished most to do so was Terry Theise. And now that he has? Well, let's hope he doesn't stop at one. Terry Theise is not a name that will ring a bell with the average wine drinker. But to many a serious wine lover, especially those acquainted with the wines of Germany, Austria, and the back roads of Champagne, Theise is a rock star of a wine importer. His portfolio of wines, focused exclusively on those three regions, is one... continue reading
I think the very nature of coffee table books encourage them to be over the top. What else do we want, lounging around in the living room, than to be transported to someplace wonderful? A good coffee table book is better than TV in my opinion, if only because you want to experience it multiple times, which is more than I can say for pretty much any given TV show episode. I've now leafed through both The Most Beautiful Wine Cellars in the World and Living With Wine several times, and probably will again. While it's somewhat crude to us... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Wine writers love Jake Lorenzo's stuff; many wish they could write like him, or more precisely, get away with writing like he does. It's not so much the sheer literary quality of Jake's "mostly true stories of the wine business," the book's subtitle; it's the vantage point and the audacity. Jake Lorenzo is the rare wine writer who views the wine world from inside the industry, not as an outside observer dispensing judgments and scores. Better yet, he freely admits that he and his friends love to get hammered--common enough among wine writers, but rarely the... continue reading
Review by Brooke Cheshier. When I first slipped into A Year of Wine: Perfect Pairings, Great Buys, and What to Sip for Each Season, I worried it would be too formulaic. I am drawn toward in-depth histories (anything by the Kladstrups), poetic memoirs (Dorothy Gaiter and John Brecher's Love by the Glass springs to mind), and basically any book that feeds me my wine knowledge indirectly, though story, instead of through instruction. Since I evidently don't like to know I'm receiving an education, I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about what was basically a one-year manual for... continue reading
Great travel writing should do more than simply paint a picture of distant locations and suggest how they may be experienced. At its best, the travelogue should transcend its itinerary and offer a deeper, more meaningful narrative than one might expect to experience themselves should they find themselves in the writer's footsteps one day. George Taber's new book, In Search of Bacchus: Wanderings in the Wonderful World of Wine Tourism, ultimately fails to satisfy. That the book should be so ordinary and uninspiring was a huge surprise given the tremendous enjoyment I got out of the author's previous two works,... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. This is a short booklet, no frills, on a very focused topic, and will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about the serious science behind the claims that resveratrol in red wine is a boon to your health. Definitely worth a read. This whole business started, of course, with the famous "60 Minutes" piece over a decade ago on the French Paradox, the mystery of how it could be that the folks who eat foie gras for snack food have fewer heart attacks than the rest of us who just eat McDonalds's grease on... continue reading
I've recently discovered someone that I think may be perhaps the greatest writer of tasting notes in the history of the English language. He's not a wine critic, and the notes aren't about wine. But Luca Turin can write about what he smells better than anyone I have ever seen. Luca Turin is many things, but perhaps most of all he is a scientist. But then again that may be too small a word for a man whose career has consisted of smashing down many of the walls that divide traditional scientific disciplines. Pioneer might better describe this man who... continue reading
Review by W. Blake Gray I hate this book. I hate this book primarily because its title is misleading. Though one of the authors was once a psychologist, there's very little psychology here. If it were titled, "Logorrheic Lit Major/Sommelier Muses On Wine And Literature," that would at least be truth in advertising. Psychology is a science; this book has no charts and graphs, but it does have 298 footnotes, most of them to books of fiction or literary analysis. Even if it were better titled, I would still hate this book, because I hate the writing style. The Australian... continue reading
Review by Alfonso Cevola. Twenty-five years ago, I got a call from a client of mine, originally from Bordeaux, who had a wine bar in Dallas, Texas. "My father is visiting from France and would like to go to Denison, Texas, and see where Mr. Munson lived and worked. Would you like to go with us?" My friend's father was Raymond Chandou, who studied and worked under Emile Peynaud, and who ran one of the largest and most successful wine cooperatives in France. "You bet," I said. I was definitely in on this trip. A few years before, while making... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. If you love to drink wine, and love a good read, you have to get ahold of this book. The dust jacket for this re-issue and annotation of English wineophile George Saintsbury's famous Notes on a Cellar-Book describes it--correctly--as "one of the greatest tributes to drink and drinking in the literature of wine." It's also the quirkiest, the most baffling and inscrutable, and the most flagrantly opinionated. Writing in the 1920s, Saintsbury (1845-1933) was more than an avid drinker and collector; he was a legendary professor of literature in the British Isles, the author of something... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Here we have that rarity of rarities: a wine blogger who knows how to write a footnote. Wine Politics dates from the days when Tyler Colman--known to the wine blogosphere as Dr. Vino--was an academic political scientist teaching at NYU, before he succumbed entirely to the wiles of wine. The book is an expansion and retrofit from his dissertation in political economy at Northwestern University, and so when you encounter, in the course of a discussion about supply and demand and wine quality, references to economists Joseph Stiglitz and John Maynard Keynes, you quickly realize this... continue reading
Review by Alfonso Cevola. It's not unusual to pick up a wine book that reads like a journal. But Neal Rosenthal's Reflections of a Wine Merchant reads like it could have been the personal journey of a score of young folks who entered the wine industry 30 years ago, me included. The confluence of experience was so uncanny at times that I started thinking this guy had climbed inside my head. He may be a celebrated and accomplished fellow in the world of wine importers now, but in the early days many of us traveled the same wine paths and... continue reading
There are two things I wish were more easily found in the world of wine: great bottles for under $5, and excellent introductory wine books for novice wine lovers. Although after reading his latest book Heard it Through The Grapevine: The Things You Should Know to Enjoy Wine, I'm tempted to suggest that the wine world also needs more people like Matt Skinner. Born in Melbourne, Australia, Skinner stumbled into the wine world almost by accident. As relayed in a 2005 profile in the UK's The Observer, his transformation from surf bum to celebrity sommelier sounds more like the plot... continue reading
Review by Arthur Przebinda. The Central Coast is a huge appellation. Compiling a comprehensive guide to its wineries is nearly a Herculean task. William A. Ausmus, a Cal Poly San Luis Obispo Communications professor, set out do that with his book: Wines & Wineries of California's Central Coast: A Complete Guide from Monterey to Santa Barbara. The book consists of a very good 30-page introduction and a main section with winery profiles. The latter is divided into three parts, each focusing on a separate county: Monterey, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara. Each of these contains its own detailed introduction,... continue reading
Review by W. Blake Gray Great books are often the result of obsession. They have to be, considering the hours put into work that may never be published. Tilar Mazzeo, an assistant professor at Colby College, spent years pursuing her obsession with the life of the Veuve ("widow") Clicquot for her book The Widow Cliquot: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It. The Widow built one of the leading Champagne houses in the early 19th century in an era when few women were internationally famous for anything other than marrying well or divorcing scandalously. Most... continue reading
Review by W. Blake Gray. Is wine food or alcohol? Most Americans would immediately choose "alcohol," perhaps laughing at the question. In Europe, though, that wasn't the case for centuries. Before water purification became widespread, wine was safer to drink than water. The idea that wine is primarily an intoxicant is relatively recent, and like so many influential memes in the world today, it comes from the United States. Paul Lukacs' book American Vintage: The Rise of American Wine was inspired by the author's realization at an Italian wine event that U.S. wine has become not only the best in... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. If you're getting your morning jollies reading about the amazing collapsing Ponzi schemes of investment wizard Bernie Madoff, you'll love The Billionaire's Vinegar: The Story of the World's Most Expensive Bottle of Wine. It's all there: fraud on a grand scale; apparently smart people who should have known better committing serial stupidities; rich people doing pratfalls in public. It's like a bottle full of schadenfreude; what more could you ask from a wine book? In this particular case, the super-rich and the official arbiters of vinous taste make fools of themselves over a stash of wines... continue reading
Review by Brooke Cheshier. I was going to read Alice Feiring's book and write my review and I swore I was not going to be influenced by the controversy that was thundering across the web-writing world. But then I thought, well, perhaps I'd just take a peek? One quick look? So I clicked onto the Cellar Rats forum, then the Wine Spectator Bulletin Board and suddenly found myself swept up in the tornadic, mostly negative conversations occurring on these sites. Heck, even Amazon.com reader critiques seemed uncensored. One Amazon review, titled Feir and Loathing on the Champagne Trail, basically dubbed... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. This is a very useful, though not very exciting book. No rhapsodies about mind-bending encounters with memorable wines, no personality portraits of wild and crazy winemakers, no dirt on the owners of winedom's most precious pieces of dirt. But dirt, yes--the kind geographers start from and worry over. Brian Sommers teaches geography at Central Connecticut State University, including a course on the geography of wine, a subject that turns out to include a vast range of vinous things. Early on, he explains to non-geographers--that would be nearly all of us--that the geography of wine is more... continue reading
Review by Alfonso Cevola. There are stories that are meant to be true and stories that are intended to stir one's enthusiasm. In reading Sergio Esposito's highly engaging Passion on the Vine: A Memoir of Food, Wine, and Family in the Heart of Italy, how can you not want to have your very own Neapolitan family? While some of the anecdotes may not be the gospel truth, the book follows in the tradition of the Neapolitan, who are known as the story tellers of Italy. An extra pinch of salt, one more clove of garlic, and what does it matter,... continue reading
There's only one thing, you might say, that stands between a thirsty wine lover and her wine. And luckily, that obstacle is usually easily overcome with one or more variations on a twist of a wrist. Corks, screwcaps, crowncaps, glass stoppers, plastic corks, synthetic corks, agglomerated corks, the list goes on and on. 20 billion of them are used each year, and these closures which seal our precious bottles of wine are given very little thought by most wine drinkers. Indeed, we only tend to notice them when they are unexpected -- a screwcap when we were thinking about cork,... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Biodynamic grapegrowing and winemaking have gotten a great deal of press in recent years, far out of proportion to the planted acreage involved. Much like the coverage for the adventures of Britney Spears--also wildly outstripping the extent of her creative resume--biodynamics write-ups have tended toward the sensational, even the salacious, emphasizing the ritual usage of cow dung and excursions into pop astrology. At the same time, there is no denying that the international Who's Who of biodynamic growers and winemakers turns out some mighty tasty wine--Chapoutier in the Rhone, Zind Humbrecht and Ostertag in Alsace, Domaine... continue reading
Review by Jessica Yadegaran Do readers really care about active yeasts and secondary fermentation? Or do they long to understand wine's seductions, and its otherworldly sense of place? Do they care about a region's production, or would they rather hear how a glass of juice resembles a curvy redhead, and why it makes them feel the way it does? You know, drunk. This is among Natalie MacLean's first points in Red, White, and Drunk All Over: A Wine-Soaked Journey from Grape to Glass. A descendent of Celtic alcohol-lovers and livers, MacLean, a sommelier, writes first and foremost from a sensual... continue reading
Review by W. Blake Gray. Carlo Rossi was a real person: a relative of Ernest and Julio Gallo. In the 1970s, the Gallos launched a new jug wine and decided "Carlo Rossi" (though he actually went by "Charlie.") had the right ring to it. Now he's famous and synonymous with cheap wine. This is not a bad thing: songs and even a band have been named after him. And people who buy Carlo Rossi wine do not turn up their noses at it -- it's bringing pleasure into their lives. It seems that Robert Mondavi may be headed down the... continue reading
Review by Christy McGill. Have you ever daydreamed about a different life? Perhaps one set in some sun-dappled, far-flung wine-making countryside where rows of grape vines bursting with perfect fruit are transformed with the help of your touch into magnificent wine? A better question might be—has anyone with even a cursory interest in wine actually not harbored this fantasy? Eric Arnold, a 20-something former joke and copywriter decided to chuck it all, leave New York and take his version of that daydream to the next level. What resulted is First Big Crush: The Down and Dirty on Making Great Wine... continue reading
As casual wine lovers, we live in the daily romance of wine. We thrive on the pleasures of a great glass with a wonderful meal, a fabulous bottle shared with a friend, or the exciting first taste of a new grape variety. But lurking just under the surface of this delightful, even magical world, lies a deeper more complex universe of wine made up of history, geography, geology, meteorology, organic chemistry, geopolitics, economics, philosophy, and more. Some are content to always experience wine in the most casual of ways, but nearly every wine lover I know has at some point... continue reading
Review by Jessica Yadegaran. Did you know that the world's oldest single vine is in the Slovenian city of Maribor? Or that the Italian Ministry of Justice supports a Roman jail's production of Novello wines to the tune of $600,000? And how about this: the world's largest wine list belongs to Bern's Steak House in Florida. The restaurant stocks half a million bottles and employs ten wine waiters. Gems like these make up Graham Harding's A Wine Miscellany: A Jaunt Through the Whimsical World of Wine. Harding, chairman of the Oxford Wine Club and director of a specialist wine importer,... continue reading
People fall in love with wine every day, and many never realize that it is happening. They just wake up one day and they can't imagine a life without it. Frankly, the same is true when we're talking about the people that we love -- unless there's a bolt from the blue, much of the time we never even realize just when, exactly, we started loving the person that we end up spending the rest of our lives with. The mysterious pull that wine and love have on our souls is similar enough that it comes as a surprise to... continue reading
They say those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it, but many of the events of the past were so dependent upon the knowledge of the times, that there is simply no way they could ever occur again. Indeed, those of us who are alive today take certain moments in history for granted, precisely because our modern experience blinds us to the extent of the crisis that these events most certainly represented at the time. Such is the case for the modern wine lover, who enjoys a bottle with the carefree ignorance that there was... continue reading
Review by Wanda Hennig "The story of how Beaujolais reached its present prominence is worth a look because it encapsulates so much not only about the wine itself but also about France and the French themselves: this quick, talented, nervous, occasionally maddening but altogether admirable people." So writes Rudolph Chelminski in the opening chapter of his book about Beaujolais: the wine (or more aptly, wines); "the" Beaujolais," as he reminds readers to call the region; and Georges Duboeuf—known as "Mr. Beaujolais" in the wine world. Duboeuf is the driven "French peasant" of the title, seemingly an intuitive marketing genius, who... continue reading
Review by Cole Danehower When I read James Laube advising in a recent Wine Spectator column that "Many Washington reds . . . make for good alternatives to their counterparts from California," I could almost feel the heat of Paul Gregutt's blood boiling. Gregutt is a well-known wine writer and authority in the Pacific Northwest and the author of the just published Washington Wines & Wineries: The Essential Guide. Gregutt is a partisan of Washington wine quality. I could easily imagine he might have claimed that many Washington reds would make good replacements for their California counterparts! Frankly, he'd... continue reading
Review by Jennie Schacht. In the world of wine, the sweet ones get short shrift. But veteran cookbook author James Peterson doesn't mind. His book, Sweet Wines: A Guide to the World's Best with Recipes, covers the territory that wine writers often leave behind. Peterson's discussion of the wines, accompanied by his own evocative photographs, covers this complex subject clearly and succinctly. After a context-setting introduction, he takes us on a geographic voyage through the thirteen most important countries producing sweet wines, describing major regions and the wines for which they are best known. Sidebars point to interesting details, top... continue reading
Review by Jessica Yadegaran. Millennials, there's much to celebrate. Not only did wine out sell beer last year, but you are officially the fastest growing segment of the wine consumer market. Good times, indeed. So if you're young and trendy " or both " and looking for a solid introduction to wine, you've found it in Courtney Cochran's Hip Tastes: The Fresh Guide to Wine. Cochran is the brains behind the uber-popular San Francisco-based Hip Tastes events, where 20-somethings relish PB & J and Tater Tot pairings for their wine against a techno beat. She's infused her first book with... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Oregon's Sokol Blosser Winery prides itself on a number of "firsts" it has scored over the years, for everything from its wine to its architecture. Now co-founder Susan Sokol Blosser has written the first account of the rise of Oregon wine by a pioneering industry insider, and it's a good one. When Susan and her husband, Bill (the whole scheme was his idea) planted their first vines in 1971, they had none of the relevant skills and experience—no background in growing grapes, making wine, or running a business. They, and a lot of other people in... continue reading
Review by Bill Rohwer. With dozens of wine regions, hundreds of grape varieties, and several overlapping classification systems, Italian wine is not a subject for the faint of heart. The authors of Vino Italiano certainly have the credentials to write an authoritative account. Joseph Bastianich co-owns (with Mario Batali, who lived and cooked in Italy for some years) five Italian restaurants and an Italian wine shop in New York City, as well as owning two Italian wineries, one in Toscana, another in Friuli; David Lynch is the wine director at one of these restaurants and a prolific wine writer.... continue reading
Review by Cole Danehower. If I were a grape, and someone wanted to write a book about me, I'd pray that someone was John Winthrop Haeger. Haeger's singular work, North American Pinot Noir, is a model of precise scholarship translated into cogent and flowing narrative. Thankfully devoid of the purple prose syndrome so prevalent in writing about Pinot noir (for example, Oz Clarke calls Pinot "seductive, sultry, steamy, sinful if possible," while Serena Sutcliffe says that "to unlock the flavors and smells of fine Burgundy is to attain a hedonist's nirvana."), the volume should serve as the prototype for sober,... continue reading
Review by Jennie Schacht. If you have ever anguished over what to serve with your perfectly poached salmon, or what to prepare for your dinner guests toting wines they brought back from South Africa, Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg have advice for you. 2007 International Association of Culinary Professionals "book of the year" winner What to Drink with What you Eat: The definitive guide to pairing food with wine, beer, spirits, coffee, tea—even water—based on expert advice from America's best sommeliers is the current sine qua non of wine and food pairing, with 230 pages listing over 1500 pairing suggestions... continue reading
Review by Derrick Schneider. Frank Prial's New York Times wine articles educated and entertained subscribers for more than 25 years. His small piece of the Dining section whisked readers into historic chateaux, through renowned vineyards, and into hearing range of the business's most interesting people. Food and wine lovers no doubt looked forward to his articles, but they were ephemeral works destined to be the next day's birdcage liner. Devotees can now trawl through the Times' online archives to find them, but they might prefer to pick up Decantations: Reflections on Wine by The New York Times Wine Critic which... continue reading
Review by Jessica Yadegaran. If wines were movies, what would be your Citizen Kane? After all, one man's genre-defining epic is another man's Roadhouse. That's the premise of Lettie Teague's Educating Peter: How I Taught a Famous Movie Critic the Difference Between Cabernet and Merlot or How Anybody Can Become an (Almost) Instant Wine Expert. Teague, an executive editor at Food & Wine magazine, spent a year weaning her dear friend Peter Travers off fatty Chardonnay and into the nuanced arms of Riesling and Pinot Noir. Entertaining and easy to read, it is an ideal ride for the budding wine... continue reading
Review by Tim Patterson. Jaime Goode is one of the best popular science writers in the English language, and fortunately for us, his subject is wine, not cosmology or tropical diseases. Trained in biology, a former scientific editor, his Wine Anorak website (and accompanying blog) is a major presence in internet wine and the original source for many of the ideas explored in this fascinating, mind-opening book. The Science of Wine isn't a textbook on grape growing or winemaking, though it covers a lot of that ground. Its chapters are focused on key concepts and controversies in the serious wine... continue reading
This page only has the last sixty entries in this category. If you're interested in digging farther into my archives, you'll want to use the complete list of archives to access my articles by month.
Book Review: Shadows in the Vineyard by Maximillian Potter Wine and Words in Three Volumes Book Review: The Essential Scratch and Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert California's Current Wine Revolution Book Review: The Latest in Wine and Food Pairing Book Review: Wine Grapes by Jancis Robinson, Julia Harding and José Vouillamoz Book Review: A Toast to Bargain Wines by George Taber Book Review: The Chateauneuf-du-Pape Wine Book by Harry Karis Book Review: Wine Wars by Mike Veseth Book Review: The Drops of God: Vol 1, by Tadashi Agi
Wine Will Never Smell the Same Again: Luca Turin and the Science of Scent Forlorn Hope: The Remarkable Wines of Matthew Rorick Debating Robert Parker At His Invitation Passopisciaro Winery, Etna, Sicily: Current Releases Should We Care What Winemakers Say? The Sweet Taste of Freedom: Austria's Ruster Ausbruch Wines 2009 Burgundy Vintage According to Domaine de la Romanée-Conti Charles Banks: The New Man Behind Mayacamas Wine from the Caldera: The Incredible Viticulture of Santorini Why Community Tasting Notes Sites Will Fail Chateau Rayas and the 2012 Vintage of Chateauneuf-du-Pape A Life Indomitable: The Wines of Casal Santa Maria, Portugal Bay Area Bordeaux: Tasting Santa Cruz Mountain Cabernets Forgotten Jewels: Reviving Chile's Old Vine Carignane The First-Timer's Guide to Les Trois Glorieuses of Hospices de Beaune


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CEE Morning Briefing: Hungary Parliament to Alter Constitution
- Local/GMT
- 0800/0700 Hungary January trade balance
- 0900/0800 Czech CPI in January, fourth-quarter GDP details and wages
- 0900/0800 Poland central bank releases inflation projection
- 1300/1200 Czech central bank comment on inflation
- N/A Hungary parliament votes on amendment to the Constitution
Efforts by the ruling Fidesz party to alter Hungary's constitution are likely to elicit concern from international bodies, while in the Czech Republic fresh data confirmed the country's economy remains in the doldrums.
Hungary's parliament is set to vote on constitutional amendments that could weaken judicial independence, but the Council of Europe, Europe's democracy and human rights watchdog, called upon Hungary to postpone amending its constitution, saying lawmakers are rushing the changes, which may undermine the rule of law.
Also in Budapest, the latest foreign trade data showed a surplus in January at 317.9 million euros ($413.3 million) versus €356.7 million a year earlier.
New investment in the country's automotive manufacturing sector is expected to gradually boost export performance, while imports are likely to stay depressed due to weak domestic demand.
In Prague, the local statistics office said Czech gross domestic product fell by 0.2% in the fourth quarter compared with the third quarter, or 1.7% on an annual basis. GDP fell by 1.2% annually in the full year 2012.
In Warsaw, Poland's central bank cut its inflation and growth forecasts for 2013 on continuing economic woes in the euro zone and lower-than-expected consumer CPI and gross domestic product in late 2012.
The central bank said it expects economic growth to slow to 1.3% in 2013, from 2.0% in 2012, with economic growth remaining below the long-term average in the following years, but accelerating to 2.6% in 2014 and 3.1% in 2015.
POLAND: Spain's Banco Santander and Belgium's KBC Group have hired a consortium of investment banks to advise them on the planned share offering on the Warsaw Stock Exchange of Bank Zachodni WBK, the Polish bank said Monday.
POLAND: Poland has to "significantly" reduce its debt levels before adopting the euro in order to have a cushion against external shocks and euro zone-related financial burdens, Polish Finance Minister Jan Vincent-Rostowski told reporters Friday.
Poland may have to pay even 8% of gross domestic product to the European Central Bank's stability mechanism when it adopts the euro, Mr. Rostowski noted.
Separately, Mr. Rostowski said Monday he hopes the country's central bank will continue lowering interest rates, after what he expects will be a brief pause in easing in April.
HUNGARY: Hungary's new central bank governor has changed the bank's rules of operation, which will take effect Monday, and has stripped the two vice governors, appointed under a previous government, of some of their former roles, but they remain members of the rate-setting Monetary Policy Council.
Gyorgy Matolcsy, the new central bank governor, also modified the Central Bank Act while he was economy minister to concentrate powers in the hands of the governor.
Veronika Gulyas in Budapest and Marynia Kruk in Warsaw contributed to this article.
Write to Sean Carney at firstname.lastname@example.com


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Fleeton Fields Bed and Breakfast
The Garden Suite
This romantic suite of total elegance also offers a private garden entrance. The oversized bedroom is furnished with a four-poster bed and period antiques. Enjoy water and garden views or just relax in the separate sitting room before a cozy fire. Private bath.
The Victorian Suite
An ornate antique walnut bedroom suite sets the mood in this lovely suite. The sitting area in the bedroom overlooks the inn's gardens and the Chesapeake Bay beyond. A small attached room (originally the old nursery) is furnished with a single bed - perfect for an extra family member or friend. Private bathroom.
The Tidal Pond Suite
This two-room suite includes a separate bedroom and sitting room with a private bathroom across the hall. Relax in your private sitting room, read or watch the news, or just lookout onto the inn's manicured gardens or the Chesapeake Bay beyond. A queensize sofa bed in the sitting room can accommodate additional family or friends.
Guest Information & Policies
- Beautiful suites with fresh flowers and charming antiques
- Each room offers a queen-size bed, a mini-refrigerator and soft bathrobes
- Guests enjoy unlimited phone, wireless internet, and DirecTV
- Cots are available
- Reduced rates December through March
- Each additional room guest is $20
- Confirmation requires a credit card number
- We welcome children and pets by special arrangements, while remaining mindful of our other guests
- For comfort and safety, no smoking, indoors
- Credit cards, cash and personal checks are accepted
- Gift certificates are available
- Check-in is between 3:00 and 6:00 p.m.
- Check-out is by 11:00 a.m. Other times by prior arrangement
Cancellation Policy
Cancellation within 10 days prior to check-in results in a charge for the entire reservation to the credit card on file


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Day 2 of the Sochi 2014 Paralympic Winter Games saw Team USA continue to obtain significant wins through medial awards and game playoffs. Two medals were won in the women's cross country and men's super G. Playoffs were won in sled hockey and curling.
Oksana Masters won silver in the women's 12km sitting cross-country. The win is a big break for Team USA, being the first Paralympic cross-country medal by an American female in 20 years. Masters came out the gates fast today and was at the top of the leaderboard throughout the duration of the event, eventually finishing with a time of 39:16.0 just behind Ukrainian Lyudmyla Pavlenko who claimed gold at 38:54.3. Masters is also a summer paralympian in rowing. At the 2012 London Paralympic Games, she won a bronze. Masters just started Noric skiing about a year ago, but has proven herself at this debut of the 2014 Paralympic Winter Games .
U.S. alpine skier Mark Bathum and guide Cade Yamamoto competed in the men's super-G visually impaired competition to achieve a silver medal. For events that include a guide, both athletes are awarded medals, but is only counted as one in the overall country total. This was Bathum's second Paralympic medal, having won alpine downhill silver at the Vancouver 2010 Paralympic Winter Games.
Team USA sled hockey played strong as their Olympic brothers, winning their first two games. The first game against Italy scored 5 – 1. Brody Roybal claimed 2 goals, followed by Declan Farmer, Josh Sweeney and Paul Schaus each contributing a goal. Amazingly Paul Schaus scored the 5th goal with just 5 seconds remaining in the game. Steve Cash and Jen Lee shared goal tending with Cash making nine saves in the first 40:18, and Lee halting 3 additional tries by Italy for the remainder of the game. The second game against South Korea grabbed a shutout win of 3 – 0. In just the first minute of play, Taylor Chace scored the first goal. Adam Page followed later making the two addition goals. Steve Cash maintained the shutout blocking 9 attempts by South Korea. The win puts Team USA in the medal round which will include a play against Russia.
Team USA wheelchair curling broke their losing streak by beating Norway 8-5. Patrick McDonald, and teammates David Palmer, Jimmy Joseph, Penny Greely, and alternate Meghan Lino propelled the win to position 1-2 in the round robin standings. McDonald proved to be the leader shooting 72 percent contributing key shots to score multiple points in three ends.


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Adopt, rescue or buy puppies, kittens and more in Redwood City!
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Abraham Bengal Cat
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Abraham (AB) is 6 yrs old. He is a loving cat, loves to sit and snuggle on laps. He seems to especia...
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All branches of Marin County Free Library will be closed on Monday, July 4 for Independence Day.
Did you know that March is the month of the Sock Monkey Madness Festival? Made out of Rockford Red Heel Work Socks, sock monkeys had their heyday in the 1950's. A copy of the sock monkey pattern was included with every pair of socks and, well as they say, the rest is history! This year's festival featured an Elvis sock monkey, a Jack Sparrow sock monkey, and many more. Of course your library has sock monkey books. Check these out:
And for a little more monkey madness:


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The film starts with Milkha Singh(Farhan Akhtar) racing in 1960 Olympics in Rome but when his coach said bhag milkha bhag ,he was taken back to memories of his childhood days which haunted him,resulted in him dropping to forth.India Pakistan friendly racing was going to take place in Pakistan but milkha rejected this proposal.Then the days of his childhood with his friends and family are shown.The partition causes chaos which resulted in war with the locals of Punjab in Pakistan ,killing his parents and he reaching Delhi and later on meets his sister there. Milkha soon makes friends and survived by stealing with friends.He falls in love with Nirmal Kaur(Sonam Kapoor) but she asks him to live life of honesty.Milkha finally finds himself in army where he gets noticed by hawaldar after he wins a race in which top 10 runners will get milk ,two eggs and excuse from exercise.He gets selected for service commission where he gets miffed and also got beaten up by senior players whom he had defeated earlier, on the day before selection of Indian team for olympics.Inspite of being injured he still participates in the race ,overcomes his pain and wins the race.His coach tells him that he has broken the national record. In Melbourne Olympics he gets attracted to the granddaughter of his Australian technical coach ,and after a night in a bar he sleeps with her.He loses the race ,beats himself up and and the way back to India asks his coach to tell him world record for 400m race.He trains hard with his coach with firm determination and this time even rejected the approach of fellow women swimmer ,saying this is the fight with himself.He wins in several places Paris,Tokyo,1958 Asian Games,1958 Cardiff Commonwealth Games.Then the film routes to the scene where everyone try to convince him to lead the Indian team to Pakistan for friendly races and is finally convinced by Pandit Nehru ji.In Pakistan he misses the press conference and goes to his village where in flash back it is shown how his parents were murdered and the last word of his father were "bhag mikha bhag".He started crying and is confronted by a boy who turns out to be his childhood friend's son.In the games pakistani favourite was winning ,when mikha singh came overtaking opponents one by one and finally taking on the lead and winnig the race winning the respect of both nation's people.The pakistan commander gives him the the title "The Flying Sikh".Watch Bhaag Milkha Bhaag Songs Download Bhaag Milkha Bhaag Torrent Hindi Movies Watch Bhaag Milkha Bhaag New Hindi Movies Trailers
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Toews, Cup take a ride (Courtesy Josh Landau)
Toews' first day with the Cup without question far exceeded his own expectations and dreams.
"You always envision it being such a big deal coming home, but you don't think people will take time and hours out of their lives to come out just to get an autograph or a picture with you," Chicago's captain told NHL.com shortly before he had a quiet family dinner at Earls Restaurant in South St. Vital, a section of Winnipeg. "To them it means the world. That's what makes the Stanley Cup such a special thing and that's what makes you want to win it so bad, so you can share it with other people.


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Maddox restaurant owner's family discusses his ALS battle, reliance on LDS faith
Jon Williams Photography
"You have 24 hours."
These daunting words precede what may seem a painful endeavor for social media users nominated to take the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, but for the Maddox family, ALS is more than a quick dip in ice water or a generous donation.
Steve Maddox, former owner of Maddox Ranch House in Perry, Utah, died as a result of ALS, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, last October after a painful and degenerative diagnosis the previous May.
In April 2013, Maddox was filling out his income tax returns when he noticed it was challenging for him to hold his pen tight enough to write his name.
On May 1, the bad news was delivered.
"I don't think we've gone through anything more difficult as a family," said Lisa Maddox Sedlak, Steve's daughter.
Sedlak, who lives in Illinois, was desperate to get to Utah to spend time with her father.
"Accepting that the disease was terminal wasn't so difficult for him, but as a family it was emotionally devastating," Sedlak said.
Most of the Maddox family hadn't previously heard of ALS, but Sedlak was introduced to it in her teens when she saw a man give a presentation with his wife about his experience with the illness.
"I'll never forget it because he was communicating slowly with his wife through eye blinks and lip-reading," Sedlak said. "It's been more than 20 years since I heard that presentation, and I had no idea it would be something that would happen to my own father."
Fifty percent of Americans didn't know what ALS was before the Ice Bucket Challenge, according to NBC News, but the Maddox family is very familiar with the disease.
Sedlak explained ALS as a condition in which the motor neuron cells start to die.
When those cells die, many muscles, including limbs and vocal chords, are no longer able to move.
Eventually, the person with ALS is unable to breathe.
"We kind of thought he'd lose his mobility, but we weren't expecting that it was going to be very physically painful," Sedlak said. "But in my dad's case, he did have some things happen to him that caused him quite a bit of physical pain, and it was really hard to watch him go through that."
As Maddox's disease progressed aggressively, he couldn't eat solid foods, which was one of the hardest parts of the illness for the former restaurant owner.
"For a family like ours that has grown up around food and served it to families, food is very important to us," Sedlak said. "I remember giving him some of the last food that he ate from his restaurant, and you could just see the longing in his eyes to chew a Maddox steak. I dipped a Maddox roll in the juices of the steak I was eating, and it was a bite of heaven for him."
Although they hired medical professionals to care for Maddox, his family rallied around him, and at least one family member was with him constantly during his last few months.
"If there was any kind of silver lining, it would be that it was bringing us closer together, and it was really good for my dad that he could see we loved him," Sedlak said.
Maddox, who was a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, relied on his faith throughout his illness.
Sedlak said he often talked about being sure he would leave this life for another life in heaven and that he'd be able to see his mother and father again.
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MYSC 2011 Coaches Clinic
August 28, 2011 4:00pm–6:00pm
MYSC Coaches, the club is sponsoring a coaching clinic on Sunday August 28th. The clinic will be from 4-6 PM held at the Kamiak practice field. The clinic will be focusing on three topics; footwork and technical ball skills, passing and receiving, and defense. I want to encourage you all to attend. No matter how much experience you have it is always great to continue to add to your coaching toolbox. As a club we are continually striving to improve and provide useful tools for our coaches and members. In this effort we have designed a program and curriculum for the season we feel compliments our team's individual sessions and. At the same time, is not too much of a time commitment. The coaching clinic is the beginning of a four session curriculum. The following three sessions are player clinics for our U8-U18 players. Each of the player clinics will focus on the 3 topics covered in the coach's clinic. The plan is to have the coaches attend the initial clinic and then support the training directors when the material is delivered to the players in their clinics. The goal is to provide you all with an educational session followed by practical application of the training exercises.
Kamiak Practice Field (Grass Field)
Kamiak High School
10801 Harbour Pointe Blvd
Mukilteo WA 98275
This is the fallback content for users who cannot see the Google Map.
All events on this calendar are indicated with the above linked dates. To view events by date, please use the calendar above. To view events by programs, please use the above side bar navigation.


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The Houston City Council meeting on Wednesday, April 16, included lengthy debates, but eventually all major agenda items passed with only minor changes.
The Council held three public hearings to allow for comment on Resolutions of No Objection, which will pave the way for tax credit applications for properties at 2010 North Main Street (Item 1), a scattered-site project in the Greater 5th Ward (Item 2) and a project at 5300 Coke Road. The developers were well known for positive contributions to development in their areas, and no one reserved time to oppose the projects.
The Council also confirmed appointment of three members of the Houston Public Library Foundation board of directors, including former Councilor Sue Lovell to Position 10, Ryman Leach to Position 11, and David Lopez to Position 18 (Item 4).
A $7 million contract for replacement parts for police vehicles with Tommie Vaughn Motors, Inc. caused several Council members to ask why so view vendors bid on the contract and whether future contacts could be subdivided into smaller components. Several qualifications for supply and service of police vehicles have stringent requirements, but some components of the contract for parts might be feasible for smaller minority vendors. (Item 15)
Three measures were essential steps for moving forward on the second downtown Convention Center, hotel and associated parking garage (items 21, 22, and 47). The first two passed without opposition, but the third was the subject of a lengthy discussion on the role of Houston First Corporation, City Council's oversight over the plans and procedures of the downtown development project, and related technical legal questions. The matter was resolved with a minor change in the deed of the tract of land for the parking garage, assuring that it could not be conveyed to a third party at a later time.
The Council also passed an ordinance dealing with hoarding and related behaviors. The ordinance clarifies language in existing law, and provides for police inspection of multifamily residential units where a hoarding might cause a health or safety hazard to other residents. Houston Police would be authorized to inspect, the areas when they receive complaints, and when appropriate, refer the occupants to mental health counseling services. (Item 46).


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Buffalo Bills coach Doug Marrone said to pinpoint one or two things he learned while working for the New Orleans Saints under Sean Payton, Mickey Loomis and Tom Benson wouldn't do justice to his nearly three seasons with the organization.
Marrone was one of Payton's first major hires when Payton accepted the head-coaching job in New Orleans in 2006. Payton hired Marrone as the team's offensive coordinator/offensive line coach, a position Marrone manned before leaving to become head coach at Syracuse, his alma mater.
Marrone is the second NFL head coach in Payton's coaching tree, with Dennis Allen taking the Raiders job in 2012. But it's the first time Payton will face one of his former assistants in a regular-season game.
"I was very fortunate to be around people that I felt that I could communicate with (in New Orleans)," Marrone said. "Sean and Mickey weren't only people that I worked for, but they were also good friends. A lot of who I am today is from that experience that I had down there -- with them, with the other coaches, with everyone."
Payton has mentioned many times how he has a special place in his heart for the coaches from the original staff in 2006 as the challenges of recovering from Hurricane Katrina lingered inside and outside the organization.
"The challenge at that time was we were shortly removed from Katrina, trying to find coaches with families to come into the region was sometimes difficult," Payton said. "Doug was someone who I'd met before, and he was still under contract with the Jets.
"He was finally able to get out of his contract and had a chance to interview him and felt really, really comfortable with his expertise and ability to teach and since then, that initial staff was pretty special, and he's someone I've stayed in close touch with when he went to Syracuse, and now with Buffalo, he's doing a good job with."
Marrone added: "I say this all the time, this is not the first time, having gone down there post-Katrina and having really been a part of something that special is always going to be a special part in my life and in my family's life.
"What everyone did and the resiliency of the people to build back a region, and I tell that to people all the time, was just an unbelievable incredible experience. I was fortunate enough to be there."
Offensive tackle Zach Strief and guard Jahri Evans both came into the league in 2006 where Marrone first sank his teeth into preparing them for the NFL. Both players made a point to reach out to congratulate and thank Marrone when the Bills hired him.
"He's a fantastic football coach," Strief said. "I think he was a grinder when he was here. We saw a lot of him very tired and very worn out. I think a lot of that was, this staff especially, when we got here those guys were working late, late hours a lot.
"And yet when he goes to Syracuse and he gets that job, you see that different personality and his character kind of come out. I think he really thrived in that role and it really worked (for) him. Honestly, it was probably a better fit for him than being a coordinator. I think he's a natural kind of leader. It's good to see him succeed."
Evans said Marrone continuously stressed technique when coaching the offensive line in New Orleans and that never left the perennial All-Pro guard's mindset.
"He got me in the right direction and got me going," Evans said. "He's a great coach and that's why he moved up so fast. ...
"Coming into the NFL from Division II (Bloomsburg), you don't really get to see the athletes that you see up here. He was very instrumental early on in my career."
Saints view QB Lewis as threat: Bills quarterback Thad Lewis is 1-1 as a starter after picking up a road win in Miami last Sunday. Lewis' numbers aren't eye-popping, but they aren't disastrous by any means as he's completing 62.5 percent of his passes with two touchdowns and one interception.
"What I see in (Lewis), he's very confident," Lofton said. "You would think that he's played in more games as this is only his third start. He goes through all of his reads, all of his checks. He looks good out there."
Lewis has been susceptible to sacks, though, with nine. Saints safety Malcolm Jenkins said Lewis has hung tough through the beatings.
"He's been getting hit a lot, but if you watch him on tape, he's very poised," Jenkins said. "They (defenders) don't bother him. We saw him get hit in the Miami game. His helmet came off and everything. But he stayed in the pocket, he took the hit and he moved on. It hasn't rattled him. This quarterback definitely has some poise. The team believes in him even though he doesn't have that much experience."
Marrone, newspaper man: Marrone has more ties to New Orleans than coaching for the Saints.
He played briefly for the Saints in 1989 as an offensive lineman for the final four games of the season. But Marrone's offseason job may have been most intriguing as he worked in circulation for The Times-Picayune.
"When they brought me back for the last four games of the year, when I was done I was going to stay down there," Marrone said. "Obviously you can only do football so much, so I wanted to make sure I worked. I wanted to work my way up; I wanted to be your boss. That's what I really wanted. I wanted to be the editor of the paper. You have to start somewhere, so I started in circulation ...
"When those things came off the press, I took them and they said, 'OK go to St. Bernard Parish and put about 50 bundles in the back.' There I was with 50 bundles in the back."
Marrone said he needed the offseason job because he wasn't one of those high-priced players.
"I just needed something to do, I actually liked it. It was great, I would get a couple papers and then right from the docks I would go in to practice to lift weights in the morning," Marrone said. "So I'd go in and coach (Jim) Mora would be waiting for me, and I'd bring him the paper. I'd drop it right at his door, I figured the more you can do. I was trying to make sure I'd get another year under my belt."
Larry Holder can be reached at email@example.com or 504.826.3405.NOLA.com Saints coverage on Facebook


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In a great book, The Age of the Crowd, the author, Serge Moscovici, writes on Gustave Le Bon.
EVERYONE KNOWS that Le Bon was the founder of crowd psychology. There is, however, a kind of Le Bon mystery. For the last fifty years, works in French have made no mention of his extraordinary influence on the social sciences, preferring to devote inordinate space to minor scholars and amorphously general schools of thought. Why should he receive such unfavourable treatment? How has it been possible to ignore one of the dozen or so most decisively influential thinkers in the field of the social sciences in the twentieth century? To be quite honest, no French thinker apart from Sorel and probably de Tocqueville has had an influence as great as Le Bon's. None of their books has caused anything like the same stir. For those reasons, we should first of all look at the man himself and his place in his time. This will help us to understand the circumstances in which the discipline came into being and why it did so specifically in France.
Le Bon was born in 1841 at Nogent-le-Rotrou in Normandy and died in Paris in 1931, and his life was remarkable from many points of view. He happened to be born in a period of incipient social progress, and his adult life spanned the Second Empire, a time of industrial revolution, military defeat and civil war. He also lived long enough to see the triumph of science, the crises of democracy and the spread of socialism and the popular forces whose rise he had anxiously observed and whose increasing power he had condemned.
He seems in his person to have continued the long line of amateur scholars and pamphleteers previously represented so illustriously by men like Mirabeau, Mesmer and Saint-Simon. He continued a tradition, but did so within an environment marked by rapid changes. This provincial physician, short in stature and fond of good food, had abandoned the practice of medicine to become a populariser of science. He was successful enough to be able to live from his writing, to mix freely with men of letters and to rub shoulders with the greatest of them. Why was he so eminently successful? Was it perhaps a case of an outstanding talent imposing itself on a milieu which had initially been unfavourable and even hostile? Should his writings be seen as incorporating both new and progressive scientific ideas and an older literary tradition? Or had he an outstanding flair for discovering and expressing currents of thought and a hidden sensibility in his age? No doubt there was something of all that in Le Bon, but his own particularly highly-developed gift was for synthesising and expressing in a direct and telling way ideas which were in the air but which others had either not had the courage to articulate or had only put forward unsystematically. An unusual combination of circumstances turned the studious doctor into the founder of a new; branch of science and the originator of a new kind of politics.
After the humiliating defeat of her army in 1870, France (and the French bourgeoisie in particular) discovered within the space of a few months just how fragile the latter was and how ill-prepared to govern the country and control the social forces operating in it. Under Napoleon III, it had applauded Offenbach's operettas and been charmed by their music without understanding their words. The country had unconsciously played the most spineless of roles and had not recognised the signs of the impending catastrophe or the lack of seriousness that was paving the way for it. Armand Lanoux made this point forcefully when he said that when nowadays we look at Offenbach in a historical perspective, we cannot help seeing his work as a kind of danse macabre leading to Sedan. And from Sedan to its logical consequence, the Commune. As always, the bourgeoisie saw the cause of the disaster in urban disorder, disobedient workers and undisciplined soldiers and the welter of social movements swarming towards Paris as the Huns had once swarmed over Europe. Sluggish governments and divided political factions were powerless to contain the insurrection.
Logically, the only answer was a strong government capable of re-establishing authority. The only reasonable thing, Flaubert wrote to George Sand on 29 April 1871, is a government of mandarins, as the people will remain minors all their lives. And all this at a time when the Paris Commune, with its insolent claim to be changing the world, was proclaiming a glorious future at the very moment when France was on her knees, the territory of France reduced in size and the army defeated. The Commune was in fact a fairly good manifestation of the link between defeat and popular uprising, between the collapse of state power and the rebellion of the citizens. The intellectuals shuddered with their mother, the bourgeoisie, at the spectacle of the humiliation of the nation, at the same time raising their voices against the hereditary enemy, Germany, the chief external danger, and the French Revolution, which had never been completed in the years since 1789, was seen as the chief internal one despite its perpetual defeats. As Francois Furet writes, The whole of French nineteenth-century history was that of a struggle between Revolution and Restoration, passing through 1815, 1830, 1848, 1851, 1870 and 16 May 1877 (Furet, 1978: 16).
We only need to read Taine or Renan to appreciate the strength of the disquiet brought into the open again by the last two of those dates and the response it evoked in the thought of the time, and its effect on society can be seen in the new interest in social movements and the popular classes. Zolas novels are as striking an indication of this as more purely historical studies. The whole of society saw the masses at work and judged their importance or the threat they posed in terms of individual political convictions. Rather than concern, it was fear that illicit and shifting populations and 'the anti-social scum, as they were described in expressions used at the time, caused in the hearts of the French citizenry.
If the threat was to be overcome, there had to be some explanation for what was happening. What was perhaps even more necessary was how to find the key to the modem world. The eyes of the whole of France were on the social order, and everyone was aware of the shaky foundations on which power was based. The attempts at returning to an earlier order and restoring the old regime with its monarchy and its Church had not had the hoped-for results. Views which condemned the modem world, the claims of science, universal suffrage and the overriding principle of equality and the like were very much in vogue. Those who supported progressive ideas were held up to public obloquy. None of this, however, stopped political parties from proliferating, the bourgeoisie from hanging on to its control of society, or revolutionary ideas from taking root. Some drastic remedy was needed, some bold, clear and simple idea that would purge minds, bring men to their senses and channel their energies. There had to be a convincing counter-blast to socialism, some proof that France could regain her strength and become mistress of her fate. It was clearly no easy undertaking, but everyone knew what was at stake and was aware of the need for a fresh solution.
At last, one is tempted to write, Le Bon's time had come. The scientist manque, the man of the people without a platform, had understood what was involved. He was completely obsessed with curing the ills of society, and once his medical studies were completed he associated with men concerned with the same problems, politicians, philosophers and many learned writers. He was anxious to make a career for himself, to become a member of the Academy or obtain a University post, and embarked on a whole range of research which included physics and anthropology, biology and psychology. This last was still in its infancy, and he was one of the first to see its future importance. Despite his many contacts and his enormous scientific industry, however, his deepest ambitions were never fulfilled. The doors of the University and even of the Academy of Sciences remained firmly closed to him.
It was thus as an outsider, excluded from official circles, that he worked so indefatigably, handling knowledge as a financier handles money, setting up intellectual project after intellectual project without ever achieving any remarkable discoveries. His dilettante research and his scientific popularisation did, however, give him considerable skill as a synthesiser and perfected his gift for presenting broad outlines and telling phrases. He acquired the journalist's sixth sense for the facts and ideas that will grip the mass of readers at a particular time. The academic resistance he encountered meant that increasingly he sought success in the political and social field. In dozens of works published over many years he perfected the same brew of biological, anthropological and psychological theories, suggesting the main lines of a psychology of peoples and races inspired by both Taine and Gobineau. Historians say that his contribution in that field was decisive enough to ensure him a place amongst the not very glorious list of the forerunners of racialism in Europe.
In his psychological studies, Le Bon was naturally struck by the phenomenon of crowds, and particularly that of popular movements and terrorism, which his contemporaries found so disturbing. Indeed, a number of books on this topic had recently been published, particularly in Italy, which stressed the fear caused by what some saw as a return to barbarism. Le Bon skilfully took up the theme, which had been discussed in general and purely legal terms, and erected around it a plausible if not entirely coherent body of doctrine.
He first gave his diagnosis of parliamentary democracy, its sickness and lack of resoluteness. The strength to govern, he maintained, led to social order, the lack of it to social disorder, the will to govern to political security and the lack of it to public danger and incitement to revolution. The ruling classes in such democracies, he maintained, had remained intelligent, which caused irresoluteness, but lost the will which is the source of all strength. They no longer had the necessary confidence in their mission, and this meant that political functions and institutions were foundering in a morass of indecision and irresponsibility. Such classes did not even have the virtue of honesty, for although in a democracy the majority vote, it is the minority who govern.
It is important to be clear here. Le Bon was not accusing the governing classes of dishonesty or a lack of principles, but of being unable to turn their backs on the past and of being ineffectual. In troubled and demoralised times, decisions lay with them. By choosing a democracy which combined Jacobin ideas and oligarchical practices and wrapped everything up in general and vague speeches, they had condemned themselves to impotence and the risk of being manipulated and outflanked, crushed by ambitious, intelligent and unscrupulous men supported by popular forces under their own control. If they were not to fail in their task of bringing civilisation and progress, they would have to recognise the facts of the situation and the real nature of the conflict which was tearing society apart. And Le Bon, of course, gave them the long-awaited answer: in that conflict, the masses played the major part, and they alone held the key to the situation in France and the modem world.
As a recent writer on the subject notes, Writing in a prophetic mood, Le Bon began by putting the masses right at the centre of any possible interpretation of the modem world (Giner, 1976: 58). Towards the masses, Le Bon certainly felt the traditional bourgeois contempt for the lower classes and the scorn of the socialist for the sub-proletariat. But the masses are a fact, and the scientist does not scorn facts but respects and tries to understand them. Le Bon, faced with this situation, did not hanker after the restoration of the monarchy or of an aristocratic regime. What he dreamed of was rather a patrician and individualist democracy in the English style.
From the Second to the Fifth Republic, and including both of them, English liberalism continued to have a considerable impact on French social thought, but never made a decisive intellectual breakthrough. Neither did the French financial and industrial upper middle classes have any definitive political impact on the French state, which was conceived by and for the middle reaches of a mercantile, administrative, peasant and even working-class bourgeoisie. France's distinctly uneasy and rather abstruse relationship with modernity, the fact that she was tom between the English model which was close in time and German power to which she was close in space, her loyalty to a kind of crusading nationalism based on an inner picture of a world distinctly French-looking, for which the eighteenth century provided the model and the sense of nostalgia, all went to explain these part-failures.
Le Bon was anxious about what was happening in France, and sought a cure for the disorders brought about by the masses. This he found not in history or economics, but in psychology, which showed him that there was a crowd soul consisting of basic impulses and shaped by strong beliefs and taking little account of experience or reason. Just as an individual soul responds to the suggestions of the hypnotist who has put someone to sleep, the crowd soul responds to those of the leader who has imposed his will on it. In such states of trance, everyone does what under normal circumstances individuals neither would nor could do. The leader, by conjuring up images which replace reality, takes possession of the group soul. The crowd, like the patient hypnotised by a doctor, is at his mercy.
So the basic idea was a simple one. All the catastrophes of the past and the difficulties of the present had been caused by the masses breaking in. The weakness of parliamentary democracy was accounted for by the fact that it went against the findings of psychology. The dominant classes had made mistakes and failed to recognise the cause of crowds and the laws that govern them. To cure the evil and return to a status quo that had long been compromised, all that was needed was a recognition of past errors and an awareness of those laws.
The expression of this idea in lively and straightforward language and supported by a quasi-scientific content explains why his books were so successful that he finished by gaining a reading public no other social thinker could rival (Nye, 1975: 3). Overnight, the scientific populariser became an intellectual mentor, a role which he was to play for the rest of his life. In the words of his only biographer (English, of course) For the rest of his life . . . Le Bon bent his efforts towards educating the elites to their growing military-political responsibilities (Nye, 1975: 78).
For thirty years, this work brought to his home, which he rarely left, a stream of major politicians, men of letters and scientists, amongst whom were the psychologists Ribot and Tarde, the philosopher Bergson, the mathematician Henri Poincare, that unclassifiable genius Paul Valery, and the princesses Marthe Bibesco and Marie Bonaparte, who both played a large part in spreading his ideas. Nor should one forget the politicians who knew and, as far as one can See, respected him, such as Raymond Poincare, Briand, Barthou and Theodore Roosevelt. It should also be mentioned that all these admirers were convinced of the importance of his view of human nature, although it was a difficult one to accept. In social and political matters, they took his imperative advice seriously. Indeed, his ideas were at the height of their influence in the nineteen-twenties, when the appeal of the new discipline was strongest for the democratic elites who saw it as a conceptual device that confirmed their deepest fears about the masses, but also gave them a body of rules for the manipulation and control of their violent potential (Nye, 1975: 161).


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24/12/2012 23:24Posted by FalereBaby Blizzard Bear or Murkimus the Gladiator, for examples, used to be given out to every character you ever made, whilst they were character bound.
The issue with that is that Heirlooms have to be bought, and you pay for one item, not one on all your characters. I believe.
It would seem... wrong to have Heirlooms mailed to your characters. I dunno. It irks me, that does, yet I can't find sufficient justification why.