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One of the advantages of industry standard and ISV benchmarks is that they have run rules, are audited, and for the most part are "fair."
I was going to talk today about IBM's newest outstanding SAP SD 2-tier benchmark results on the IBM System x3650 and the IBM AMD Opteron LS41 for IBM BladeCenter. The IBM x3650 replaces the HP Proliant BL460c as the top quad-core result (1) and the LS41 outperforms the HP ProLiant BL685c result as the top 8-core Opteron result (2).
But thinking about SAP benchmarks got me to thinking about Oracle's recent claims against SAP on violations of the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and California Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, Unfair Competition, Intentional and Negligent Interference with Prospective Economic Advantage and Civil Conspiracy. The suit charges that employees at an SAP subsidiary in Texas posed as Oracle customers and logged into an Oracle website, repeatedly taking software and confidential information. In its investigation, Oracle traced the computer downloading the files to an Internet protocol address at SAP and, later, to an SAP employee who used to work for PeopleSoft.
Who needs John Le Carre or last night's episode of "24" when real life is this exciting ?
(1) IBM SAP SD 2-tier result of 1850 SD Users (1.96 avg. response time, cert #2007019) on the IBM System x3650 with 8 cores, 8 threads, 2 quad-core Xeon X5355 2.66 GHz processor chips (4 MB L2 cache per 2 cores) and 32 GB main memory running Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition, DB2 9 and SAP Version 6.0 vs. the HP SAP SD 2-tier result of 1841 SD Users (1.97 avg. response time) on the HP ProLiant BL460c (2 processors/8 cores/8 threads), two Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® Processors X5355 (2.66GHz, 4MB L2 cache per 2 cores, 1333MHz Front-Side Bus), 32GB of memory, running Microsoft SQL Server 2005, Microsoft Windows® Server 2003 Enterprise Edition, and mySAP ERP 2005,Certification #2007002.
(2) IBM SAP SD 2-tier result of 2020 SD Users (1.98 avg. response time, cert #2007018) on the IBM AMD Opteron LS41 for IBM BladeCenter with 8 cores, 8 threads, 4 dual-core Opteron 8220SE 2.8 GHz processor chips (1 MB L2 cache per core) and 32 GB main memory running Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition, DB2 9, and SAP Version 6.0 vs. the HP SAP SD 2-tier result of 1987 SD Users (1.98 avg. response time) on the HP ProLiant BL685c (4 processors/8 cores/8 threads), dual-core AMD Opteron Model 8220 processors at 2.8GHz with 1MB L2 cache per core, 32GB of memory, running Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Enterprise x64 Edition, Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Enterprise x64 Edition, and mySAP ERP 2005, Certification #2007007.
Source: http://www.sap.com/solutions/benchmark/. Results as of 3/26/07.
The postings on this site solely reflect the personal views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views, positions, strategies or opinions of IBM or IBM management.
IBM, System x, System Storage, DB2 and Xcelerated Memory Technology are trademarks or registeredtrademarks of International Business Machines Corporation.
AMD and Opteron are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/orother countries.
SAP, mySAP and other SAP product and service names mentioned herein as well as their respectivelogos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and in several other countries allover the world.
technorati tags: IBM, systems, performance, SAP,Oracle, HP, benchmarking
Benchmarking and systems performance - hosted by Elisabeth Stahl
Blog Authors: ELISABETH STAHL 0600029JQ8 is Chief Technical Strategist and Executive IT Specialist, IBM Systems and Technology Group, and has been working in systems performance for over 25 years.
The Spy Who Came in from the Code
estahl 0600029JQ8 Tags:  sap oracle benchmarking hp 3,964 Views


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Fresh Malware Assault Pretends to be Death News of Fidel Castro
According to researchers from Sophos the security company, one fresh malware assault, which camouflages as current hot reports about Fidel Castro the ex-dictator of Cuba as allegedly dead, is presently circulating online.
It maybe recalled that Fidel Castro, who's a politician and revolutionary of Cuba has been both a President and Prime Minister of the country.
Meanwhile, Sophos warns that Internet-users are likely to get a spam mail apparently from the "24 Horas" news site from Chile declaring the hypothetical demise.
Also as per the company, the e-mails bear one header of "Murio Fidel Castro," with a message body asserting that Castro the tyrant who ruled for long on Cuba met his heavenly abode during the day, while in his house. As per officials, he'd been ailing since some days having experienced an unexpected heart attack, the message states.
Thereafter, it (e-mail) tells recipients for following a given web-link to view a latest movie on Fidel Castro's death, Sophos outlines.
Remarking about this latest incident, Senior Technology Consultant Graham Cluley at Sophos states that certainly if Castro had truly died then it'd have made the breaking news on CNN and BBC. However, he hasn't observed those news agencies giving any such reports. So, people should be careful about clicking web-links inside the e-mail since it can result in a Trojan virus on their Windows PCs, which subsequently pulls down more malware. Sophos has identified the Trojan as Troj/DwnLdr-JGW and the malware as Troj/Agent-SYF, Cluley adds. Nakedsecurity.sophos.com published this on August 7, 2011.
Worryingly, it's because of the above kinds of terrible and malevolent assaults that have prompted Sophos to highlight within the 2011 Mid-Year Security Threat Report it recently issued from the company that a mean of 150,000 malicious programs was detected daily during H1-2011. This is equivalent of a distinctive malicious program getting designed every half-second, accounting for a 60% rise from 2010.
Eventually, death rumors like that of Fidel Castro by cyber-criminals over the Internet isn't something new. In two other instances, popular TV and film actor, Charlie Sheen and well-know rapper Kanye West were also targeted with a similar scam.
Related article: Fark.com Files Suit against Suspected Hacker from Fox13
» SPAMfighter News - 16-08-2011
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Stiga Competition Compact Table Tennis Table
Stiga Competition Compact Table Tennis Table
- For national and international indoor tournaments
- For individual training in the play-back position
- Balance of different standing positions
The Stiga Competition Compact Table Tennis Table is for use in national and international indoor tournaments. Also perfect for individual training in the play-back position.
- Tabletop: 3* 25mm chipboard, coated several times with special varnish. High stability through metal frame.
- Undercarriage: Rectangular tube profile, 40 x 40mm, sqaure profile 40 x 10/20 x 10mm. Powder coated great aluminium.
- Net Set: Primus II En Stationary Compact.
- Locking System: Handle system. Metal handle underneath the tabletop unlocks both of the safety devices simultaneously. Simple and automatic click-mechanism in storage and playing position of the table.
- Wheels: 4 wheels, 100mm diameter with rubber tread, all wheels are manoeuvrable, 2 of them are lockable.
- Special Features: Balance of different standing positions and unevenness up to 25mm through height adjusters on the outer legs.
- ITTF Approved.
Additional Information
Dimensions in Storage Position:
Length = 152.5cm x Width = 69.5cm x Height = 155cm.
Dimensions in Playing Postition:
Length = 274cm x Width = 152.5cm x Height = 76cm.
All dimensions are in accordance with international dimensions.
Customer Reviews for Stiga Competition Compact Table Tennis Table
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text: Special attention has been paid to the materials and construction of the earmuffs which make them easily adjustable and exceptionally comfortable. The HD681 features 50mm dome type neodymium drivers, a 10 Hz – 30 kHz frequency range and total harmonic distortion of less than 0.25%. They deliver a rich balanced sound with high resolution, wide dynamic range and excellent stereo imaging.


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Activation of the Emergency Siren Alert System implies that the Randolph College campus community is experiencing an "Immediate Catastrophic Event." Examples of these events may include hostile intruders, terrorist incident, mass violence and severe weather warnings (tornado). Such an event also implies that personal injury, loss of life and/or catastrophic property damage is imminent.
This emergency also activates the Critical Incident Management Plan. Other notification methods such as mass campus email alerts, e2Campus text and email alerts and campus telephone voicemail alerts may be activated in advance of the emergency alert siren sounding.
When activated, the siren will sound steadily for about three (3) minutes (LISTEN: Emergency Siren Sample - mp3). Should you hear the emergency alert siren at anytime, (unless you have been informed of siren testing) you should take the following action:
This communication does not include campus emergency procedures in its entirety, but should serve as an information resource regarding what to do if the emergency alert siren sounds. Portions of the College's Emergency Procedures and Safety Information are linked to the Campus Safety and Security web page, which may be found at http://web.randolphcollege.edu/security/.
Further information and training concerning emergency preparedness is forthcoming. Please do not hesitate to contact me with your questions or concerns about campus safety and security at Randolph College.
- Kris L. Irwin
Director of Safety and Security


text:
Welcome to WebmasterWorld Guest from 220.127.116.11
Forum Moderators: not2easy
I've got an issue with a drop down menu appearing behind a flash movie on the homepage (every browser) and the same menu appearing behind the content on every page (IE only).
The menu usually responds to the z-index property but i can't seem to influence this behavior at all on this website.
Can anyone have a look at the page for me? I can send you a link to the site under development.
Thank you advance for your help!
I have fixed the menu from appearing behind all content in IE by removing 'position:relative' from the container holding the menu.
I have also fixed the menu from appearing behind the flash in every browser except IE by adding wmode="transparent" to the <embed> tag for the flash.
The only remaining problem is with IE not listening to transparent property of the embed tag... Any ideas?
The script that was placing the flash into my page had a separate case for IE browsers using the newer <object> and <param> tags - i added a <param name="wmode" value="transparent" /> and IE now responds like the other browsers letting the menu overlap the flash.


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Have you watched Resident Evil: Red Falls yet? This trailer has a link to the 50 minute film.
Stephen King once said, "I'll try to terrify you first, and if that doesn't work, I'll try to horrify you, and if I can't make it there, I'll try to gross you out." And who knows how to make horror work better than Stephen King? I don't think anybody in the entertainment industry—writers, filmmakers (other than James Wan), or video game developers—has King's horror-credibility, and yet CAPCOM hasn't used this very simple, very effective method in the lattermost Resident Evil titles. Of course there's a host of reasons, and I'll get to that in a little bit.
Without getting into a history lesson here, the first several RE games (including RE4) used this scare method tactfully. And I know a lot of the purists say RE4 was "bad" or "wasn't Resident Evil" based on the superficial reason that there were no flesh eating zombies (but rather the traditional mind-controlled, pre-Romero zombies). However, it was still a survival horror game. Heck, if pushing a shelf in front of a door because there's a village full of crazy people with pitchforks and one guy with a bag over his head wielding a chainsaw trying to get inside isn't absolutely terrifying, then I don't know what is. To say the least, that opening sequence in Resident Evil 4 is the apotheosis of Survival Horror...
...and yet RE5 used the secure-the-room-so-the-things-can't-get-inside method only once: at the beginning of the game with the executioner; and RE6 didn't use this horror technique at all. In fact, RE6 didn't even bother trying to scare us. Yeah, yeah, yeah, there were some pretty gross monsters—and for the most part, I loved the creature designs; although, it was pretty dang convenient that the C-Virus could literally create every kind of monster imaginable—zombies, J'avo (essentially Majini with a different name), skyscraper-sized monsters, a tyrannosaurus, a monster with a biological chainsaw for a hand, a huge snake that could turn invisible, and the list goes on. At least the monsters derived from the T-Virus, G-Virus, T-Veronica Virus, and the Plagas all made sense in their own ways (other than most of the mutations from RE5—I think Jun Takeuchi just took unused Lost Planet creature designs and hoped nobody would notice; and am I the only person who thought that Ricardo Irving transforming into a sea monster just because he was on a boat was a little bit too convenient?—and don't you dare try to justify that transformation with any kind of science).
Anyway, I think we all know the issues with RE6 (and 5; but mostly 6): it tried to be too many things for too many people instead of being one particular thing for one particular group of people: Survival Horror for fans who like Survival Horror. And I think that's what happened with Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2; it forgot its own core audience by trying to make it into a bigger, uglier, unfocused concoction for the sake of it appearing like a grander, more entertaining game. What CAPCOM doesn't understand—along with MercurySteam (Castlevania: Lords of Shadow), since I mentioned it—is the fact that people are always going to buy sport video games and war shooters regardless of reviews, regardless of quality; but for games like Resident Evil (and Castlevania), however, people are going to wait for the reviews. It's kind of like, "Fool me once [RE5], shame on you; fool me twice [RE6], shame on me." And I personally know at least four hardcore Resident Evil fans that just didn't want to be disappointed so they didn't even play RE6: they're not waiting for it to go down in price, they just don't want to play it. It's not about money; it's about an ideal. Would you want to see your grandmother drunk at a bar flirting with old hairy men just because it's twenty dollars? No. I don't blame them. The fans have learned to dip their toe into the water first before jumping in (and then there are people like me who just jump in to tell everyone else not to jump in because it's too cold). In fact, making Resident Evil more "mainstream" in theory just doesn't make sense. Resident Evil isn't a franchise for casual gamers, nor is it a franchise for those who buy flavor-of-the-month games (GTA, COD, BF); the franchise for those who want a challenge, who want to piss their pants while playing with the lights off, who want to work for their satisfaction, who don't mind restarting the game because they accidentally used up all their ammo too early on and can't find any more or have multiple saved points just in case an earlier decision turns out to be a dead end. That sounds like Dark Souls...
...okay, maybe we're onto something. Dark Souls proves that players still like to be challenged (even pissed off occasionally), and The Last of Us (hands down on par with any Resident Evil game in terms of Survival Horror) proves that Survival Horror is still relevant—as long as the story is good, the characters are likeable, and the horror is effective.
(While on the topic of The Last of Us, the game had only four types of monsters; Resident Evil 6 had roughly thirty different monsters ... and yet a Clicker from TLOU created more fear in the player than any of the monsters in RE6. I think this alone speaks volumes on the subject of horror and how to achieve it.)
In terms of story and characters, I partially blame the cultural barrier—CAPCOM, a Japanese-based developer, are trying to create this American atmosphere with American characters, but they don't feel American. I think I'm a decent writer, but I would never attempt to write Japanese characters set in Japan; the results would be goofy because I don't know what they act like. But other than cultural barriers, it comes down to the art of storytelling and writing effective dialogue—all the characters being a slave to the plot worked in the first several RE games, but with realistic graphics means that we as gamers expect realistic characters and dialogue. In RE6 plot-driven dialogue was kind of like the elephant in the room; none of it seemed natural. Absolutely NONE of it. Ninety percent of the dialogue in The Last of Us had nothing to do with the plot, but all of it created the story.
As a writer (oh yeah ... I wrote the screenplay for the zero-budget fan film called Resident Evil: Red Falls) and a fan, I have written this wish list for CAPCOM to apply to Resident Evil 7. I don't think I'm unreasonable.
1 ) Remember what Resident Evil is about. Evil residents (Umbrella, Illuminados, Tricell); some kind of biohazard—hence, the Japanese title for the series; and Survival Horror. In other words: horror in which you force the player to endure and survive.
2 ) Simplify! An overcomplicated, discombobulated plot is common for a lot of amateur writers and especially fan fiction (speaking of which, doesn't the entire premise in RE6 feel like it was adapted from someone's overly passionate fan fiction on one of the Resident Evil fan sites?); in RE6 I literally—not figuratively—laughed out loud when Leon and Helena just happened to bump into Jake and Ashley after their plane crashed—and the fact that they actually survived the plane crash was ironic enough. An overcomplicated plot full of lucky coincidences actually breaks the fourth wall by reminding the audience that it's written—and poorly so; on that note, The Last of Us was so masterfully written that it makes you forget that it's even written at all.
3 ) Listen to some fans, ignore the trolls. All the fans that wanted to go back to Raccoon City after Resident Evil 5 got what they asked for ... three more times. Umbrella Chronicles, Darkside Chronicles, and Operation Raccoon City. (And yet some people wonder why I set Red Falls after Raccoon City and the fall of Umbrella; the answer: because we're not just tired of Raccoon City—we're sick of it.) On that note, please don't go back to Raccoon City. And please don't bring back zombies because of stubborn individuals that don't actually understand the essence of Survival Horror, unless zombies make sense in the story.
4 ) Modernize the typewriter, don't throw it away. The typewriters from previous games worked. They're essentially what bonfires are in Dark Souls. Although they can—and should—be updated into laptops (or some kind of tablet). Instead of an ink ribbon, players should find flash drives to save their game until the flash drive is full. This would add a level of strategy and depth to their survival. I loved Resident Evil 4 for its gameplay ideas, but it held my hand too much.
5 ) Bring back the merchant. Why? Because it makes sense to have a person to sell stuff to and to buy stuff. A menu after chapters (RE5, RE6) where you can magically buy, sell, and upgrade your stuff doesn't make sense at all in a storytelling sense. And if you don't bring back the merchant, then why not have random BSAA operatives throughout the city where you can sell your stuff? At least in a storytelling standpoint, that is a tangible concept.
6 ) Melee. In RE6 I kept on trying to shoot the zombies down to their knees until I realized that the game completely scrapped that feature. Yeah, I could still shoot them in the head or arm and make them disoriented for a little bit—but there's nothing so satisfying about dropping them down to their knees for a devastating melee attack. All in all, RE6's melee system was a lot worse than RE5's. The fact that you gave the player a melee button made it too easy and hence less rewarding.
7 ) Fix the inventory; don't tamper with it. An egg is not the size of an AK-47; and RE6's inventory ... don't get me started on that. It was a headache and a half. Trying to fumble to grenades and health was a task within itself. Either go back to RE4 (in which you actually have to pause the game: and I really, really don't mind doing this even if it's an archaic gaming device), or make the weapons accessible during gameplay as they are in The Last of Us
8 ) Bring back the documents. Make them necessary. In RE5 you couldn't keep the documents; in RE6 you couldn't even read them in the game—and it seemed as though a five-year-old had written them anyway. At least in the earlier games intellect was attempted. I honestly hope there's a novel's worth of documents in the game ... as long as a writer is hired to write them and not some intern.
9 ) Challenge me, reward me! But don't baby me. Unless it's an infected soldier, it shouldn't be dropping ammunition when I kill it; running away from monsters should be smart from time to time (replaying RE2, I did that a lot); make me use my knife; make me not want to waste ammunition; make melee harder to do, but rewarding when done successfully (The Last of Us is a perfect example). And enemies should be able to break down any door, unless I reinforce it by putting a shelf in front of it or kill them beforehand; the game must reward smart tactics—and a loading screen shouldn't be able to stop creatures from entering through a door. Bring back the "Crimson Head" strategy in which we must burn the bodies once we immobilize them (and for Pete's sake, no more dissolving: let them stay where they fall—we're in the PS4 and Xbox1 era).
10 ) Be inventive (and hire a good writer)! Resident Evil doesn't even need to be about zombies. Heck, I wouldn't even mind if they took a more realistic approach and made it about an advanced strand of Ebola in which you're dealing with sick people instead of soulless zombies. Don't worry about having Chris, Leon, Claire, Jake, Jill, Billy, Rebecca, Sheva, or Helena in the game (RE6 made us sick of most of them anyway—and it breaks my heart to say that). But, at the same time, don't pretend that they don't exist. Jill's absence—and lack of even mentioning her—in RE6 felt like bad writing than anything else. At least Christopher Nolan had a reason for not mentioning the Joker in The Dark Knight Rises; RE6 really had no excuse for not mentioning characters that would be logical to mention: Jill and Claire, for example. What I absolutely LOVED about RE4 was that the game mentioned Umbrella, Raccoon City, and Wesker in almost nonchalant ways—in fact, that's a cool storytelling device (Stephen King uses this method often in his books which all connect to The Dark Tower). My idea: create a new character in which we—as the audience—gradually (and subtly) read up on Chris and the others via news, social media, etc. I think it would be pretty interesting if this was "peace times" and their was a film (or a video game) based off from the events from the previous games in RE7—what if we could actually play this game as our character? RE-inception, mind blown. Maybe our character is a teenage girl or boy who is a huge fan of Chris Redfield and an outbreak happens in her or his town. The possibilities are endless ... but I think we as fans are sick of the straight up third person shooter. Give us something else to do other than to shoot things! And it would be pretty awesome to witness an outbreak from the very beginning.
11 ) Be smart (and hire a good writer)! Dark Souls + The Last of Us = Resident Evil 7's potential formula of success. Challenging, dark, depressing (but with hope at the end of the long, bleak tunnel). Choose a couple great locations rather than hundreds of mundane ones, and make them layered. The player will have to go back to certain locations once they obtain particular knowledge or items to unlock certain secret areas. Have exploration be necessary but optional at the same time. It's rewarding in any game when you find something that you assume other people would overlook. But in Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 6 I quickly learned that exploring was meaningless—of course I might find a random chicken egg here and there, or a medallion that really doesn't do much: who wants to waste their time on that?
12 ) Be scary (and hire a bloody good writer)! Of course horror comes in many forms. No matter the story in RE7, use the Stephen King method: first terrify, then horrify, then gross us out if all else fails. We'll respect the effort. And mix it up. Thrills are shameless, yes, but when done properly they could be pretty clever. And then there's paranoia type horror too, like in John Carpenter's The Thing. I would love to be in a situation in which there's a group of people that seem normal, but one of them might be infected (not necessarily with the T-Virus). Here's another pretty interesting idea: you're stuck in a room with a group of survivors and you only have three guns—one of the survivors is an ex-con, one's a half-blind war veteran, then you've got a young mother with a baby, and throw in a physically-handicapped person—maybe a dwarf, or someone in a wheelchair, or someone who's a deaf-mute. Do you risk handing out weapons to survive the horrors outside? Who do you hand out the weapons to? It's a risk assessment with many different outcomes in which the right thing isn't the obvious thing. Also, cut scenes shouldn't kill off survivors—your decisions and your skills should determine who lives and who dies. That's why the invisible snake scenario in Resident Evil 6 ultimately felt unsatisfying. I couldn't have saved my team anyway, so who cares?
13 ) Story matters. It really, really does. I'd much rather play a Christopher Nolan-esque Resident Evil game than a Michael Bay-esque game (which was what RE6 was in many ways).
14 ) I don't know if I mentioned this, but CAPCOM needs to hire a writer. I know I sound like a broken record, but it's important. Actor Christopher Plummer says he'll never work with Terrence Malick (The New World, The Tree of Life) again based on the fact that he gets in these creative ruts and he's allegedly too stubborn to hire a writer, and he insists on doing it himself. CAPCOM is a lot like Terrence Malick in this sense; and I'm a lot like Christopher Plummer as a fan. The ideas—at least at a corporate level—aren't flowing anymore, and the people hired to helm the last two Resident Evil entries didn't hit the mark. I think it would be smart to take up on Cliff Bleszinksi on his offer; I think it would be interesting to even see about collaborating with James Wan (Saw, Insidious, The Conjuring) or another horror genius; or literally hire a writer. Hugh Howey would be a unique choice.
One) Don't bring back partners for the sake of co-op; I just want to be alone in a dark room and crap my pants. Besides, partners are either annoying, stupid, or make the game less scary. Ashley Graham wasn't too bad because her addition actually added some horror. And it made sense with the story. Sheva Alomar, however, was a little too forced. Dead Space 3 is case in point that partners in horror don't work unless it's for a moment of relief.
Two) Don't try to make casual/social gamers come to you; make a terrifying game with a good story and make them come to you. If you build it, they will com; it worked with RE4 and it worked with The Last of Us.
Three) Don't allow the player to choose what chapters to play once they beat the game. It'll be too easy to play one particular level too many times and get sick of it. Instead, force the player to start over. When reading a book, do you skip chapters? No. I hated that about RE5 and RE6.
One) Have clever unlockables in RE7. Perhaps you could unlock HD versions of RE2 and RE3 (and EVERYONE wants to see those games remade anyway); you might as well do this and that'll be a huge incentive to buy RE7. Also, I LOVED Mercenaries in RE4 and RE5, but RE6 really lost sight on why it used to be so addictive. I spent just as many hours playing Mercenaries than I did in the actual campaigns for RE4 and RE5 because they were fun to compete with friends and siblings. It's almost like a very sophisticated version of PACMAN.
Two) I'm not saying this because I wrote the script, but I think it would be awesome in the POV of a fan if RE7 referenced Resident Evil: Red Falls in some way, shape, or form.
Three) Take what worked in the previous games and built onto it; if it isn't broke, don't fix it, just make it better.
Four) Focus on making great moments that always use Survival Horror is some form.
Five) Bring back the creepy music and the comfort of Safe Rooms.
What do you guys think? I know I'm pretty bold with my opinions, but I think we Survival Horror fans need to step up and hold CAPCOM accountable for their mistakes and the direction of Resident Evil's future. But ultimately it's because we want them to succeed. If I didn't care—and if I didn't plan on giving RE7 a chance—then I wouldn't be writing this.
Follow me on Twitter at @WorkElf. If you like my rants, follow my blog: jcstreetsoldier.blogspot.com (I'd write more blogs if more people followed.)
Check out Strike to Burn Productions' original fan film Resident Evil: Red Falls! Directed by Travis Hayward and written by Jordan Page, Red Falls is meant to be canon with the Resident Evil video game franchise, taking place between RE5 and RE6. It was filmed and edited over the course of a year on less than a $2,000 budget directly from Jordan and Travis's pockets. With over sixty cast and crew members involved, the movie finds a balance between action and horror; there are genuinely creepy moments, excellent hand-to-hand combat choreography, and a multitude of T-Plagas inflected zombies. Resident Evil: Red Falls also includes a Children of Men-esque gunfight tracking shot, humanoid B.O.W.'s (like Nemesis), character development, and a tentacle?!
Fans disappointed in the film franchise might find new hope in Red Falls, as it's all about cinematic balance and an understanding of what elements from the games translate to film.
The official Resident Evil Facebook page has posted and bookmarked this passionate fan film, saying, "We love seeing all sorts of Resident Evil creations which our fans make, this 50 minute fan film is one of the most impressive!"
Follow the director Travis Hayward (@StrikeToBurn) and writer Jordan Page (@WorkElf) on twitter!
What do you think of Resident Evil: Red Falls? Tell us in the comments below!
Where has the American horror film of epic proportions gone? That's the question. But, in order to cure, you must first understand. There were once great horror films that had people lining up in the streets to watch them (Jaws, Alien, The Exorcist); or to cause people not to take showers because a killer might open the curtain; or not go swimming in the ocean because a shark might attack you a couple feet in the water—that was a true fear . . . all because of a simple movie. The twenties invented and popularized the genre with The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) and Nosferatu (1922—based on Bram Stoker's Dracula). Then in the thirties, there was Frankenstein and King Kong. But let's skip a few generations to get to the truly important, modern cinema sculpting films—Night of the Living Dead (1968), The Wicker Man (1973), and Halloween and Dawn of the Dead both came out in 1978—can you say horrorgasm?, then Alien (1979—which extended the horrorgasm), The Shining (1980—which really has more to do with King's influence in the horror genre, but I get into more detail later on) and The Thing (1982). In the nineties, the horror genre took a break . . . or failed without an end (literally, on imdb.com's top rated "Horror" titles, you won't find any film in the nineties, and only a few from the last decade—most of them being comedy-hybrids. Also, back to the "understanding" part, you must also understand the history of horror in literature, as well as how videogames have helped/hurt the genre.
The last and greatest horror film that most of us agree on—unless you consider No Country for Old Men a horror film, which I particularly do in some aspects—is Zach Snyder's remake of George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead. A few of us horror connoisseurs may have condemned it for being an unnecessary remake; the other half of us are just glad that finally there was a movie that could scare us and feel big on an epic scale at the same time (BIG is the keyword). If you look on imdb.com's Top Rated "Horror" titles—a website which a lot of average Joes go to get their movie info—most of the horror titles in the year beginning with a "2" and followed by a "0" have, for the most part, horror as a subgenre. There's Shaun of the Dead (2004—a black comedy), Grindhouse (2007—a black comedy), I Saw The Devil (2010—but it's Korean, so my mom won't watch it), Zombieland (2009—a black comedy), and Saw (2004—good, but with all its ridiculous sequels, it's safe to say that the original lost its potency; remember The Matrix?). And of course there's been other horror films since the turn of the century that have been "sort of" good, but the only movie I can think of—aside from Zach Snyder's Dawn of the Dead—is Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later (2002). And why? Because 28 Days Later took itself seriously; it may not have had a Hollywood budget, but it made up for its financial constriction by its vibe/tone (which is hard to define and harder still for a filmmaker to create; a lot of what vibe is is existential and subjective, and therefore nearly impossible to pinpoint while filming because it's not an exact science—in other words, 50% of the film's horror was by pure chance) and the film's horrific, nightmarish visuals and scenery.
Let's just say that other countries are stepping ahead of the Old U.S. of the A. in their horror genre because they have a little bit more to prove than us; they have to be more original than us (and they know that if they are, some billionaire American producer will buy the rights to their original script).
I'm not saying that the horror genre is dead (well, sort of); however, I'll compare it to a class of students in which over years there are only one or two with all A's per graduation. But you would never know they were there because they hide in the far backs of the rooms, and in the corners, and they never raise their hands, they never even say anything at all. All they want to do is exist privately with very few close friends (cult/foreign horror films). These "students" settle with being smart (scary), but they don't have a drive to "show off" (to be blockbuster hits). This analogy is more or less aimed at foreign filmmakers today. Part of it is their fault for not marketing their films well enough; the other part of it is the American film-goers who will rather see average (to downright terrible) horror films, because they don't want to read subtitles—and this could also kindle an essay on young American's illiteracy, too, but I'll regress on that epidemic because it digresses away from the topic being discussed.
Of course English speaking filmmakers who see these movies (because filmmakers watch movies the same way writers read books and musicians listen to music) think, "Wow, I really think that people need to go out and see this foreign film." Sometimes these filmmakers actually do promote these films. Tarantino is good at giving shout outs (I think), but I couldn't really give a specific example. An even better example is when George A. Romero (the inventor of the flesh eating zombie) promoted Shaun of the Dead (2004—a non-American film)—and people actually listened to George's advice on that matter, and why wouldn't they?
However, the other half of the time, instead of promoting these films, filmmakers will actually remake them. And I'm not talking about a necessary/debatably necessary remake of a movie fifty or sixty years ago; I'm talking about a remake of a foreign film only a couple years old. The Ring (2002) was based on a 1998 Japanese film called Ringu; The Grudge (2004) was a remake of the Japanese film Ju-On—also, drum roll please, released in 2004 (but, oddly enough, the same director directed both of these films—I'll give him some credit for that); Dark Water (2005), the same title 2002; Pulse (2006) was a remake of Kairo—a Japanese film from 2001; Quarantine (2009), a remake of Rec. (2007); then there were Shutter, One Missed Call, The Eye, and The Uninvited—each one of these movies were within a decade of their progenitors. The most recent foreign sleeper hit to American blockbuster was Let the Right One In (2008—based on the novel of the same name), which was remade only two years later by Cloverfield director, and it was called Let Me In (hey, at least they changed the title). What is disturbing about this is that Let the Right One In was a semi-successful film, and was on imdb.com's top 250 films of all time for a while, with an 8/10 out of 90,000 votes; whereas its American counterpart has a 7.2/10 with a little less than 35,000 votes . . . and do I have to say which film made more money? I'm afraid I do. The American remake; and this is true with all the films (or at least most) that I've mentioned.
So how could there ever be a debate between a writer trying to save the horror genre and a producer of trash that makes money from it? The answer is darkly rhetorical but entirely relevant in this age of cinema (and art, and entertainment, and literature). Sometimes there can be great and necessary foreign remakes, such as Martin Scorsese's The Departed (2006—a remake of Infernal Affairs, 2002, starring Tony Leung Chiu Wai); but, I wouldn't include David Fincher's Girl with the Dragon Tattoo remake as great, and definitely not necessary for the Swedish version or for Fincher—that remake, despite Rooney Mara's Oscar nomination, gets thrown into the fire of "unnecessary remakes," because, well . . . it was. Some foreign films need help, like Infernal Affairs—because no amount of promoting from Brad Pitt (who produced The Departed and started the process of remaking I.A.) was going to make average American people go out and seek Infernal Affairs. In fact, I had to find the film via Netflix—there was no way in Heaven you could find Infernal Affairs at your local movie rental store, or even at electronic retail stores such as Best Buy. No, The Departed was its producers' way of saying, "Internal Affairs is a great film; so great that the only way for you 'film-goers' to know about it, is for us to remake it and throw Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Wahlberg, and Alec Baldwin in the movie." For films like Let Me In and Fincher's Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, there's really no excuse for the remakes except for the middle finger and thumb rubbing methodically in circles, whispering with each rub: "money, money, money." And those two films didn't need a remake to expose them to film-goers, because people found Let the Right One In and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (original) at their movie rental stores and at every retail store that sells movies. Ergo, greed is the only reason . . . not only is that bad enough, it also contributes to young Americans inability to read subtitles, which, in small capacities, contributes to them not reading at all. And it's a terrifying thought. I have room to speak: I'm a recovering illiterate.
And, aside from the bad habits these "unnecessary remakes" have on its viewers, it also promotes unoriginality in American filmmakers in general (and I would not include British or any other English speaking country, because they seem, for a lack of a better word, more original—maybe more inspired, too—than their American counterparts). It promotes the studios taking the easy route—deciding to do another remake instead of giving an original script a chance. District 9—though not a horror film (but containing horror elements)—is an excellent example of when a big studio allowed a nobody-director with an original script to go ahead and film a movie that originally was going to be a Halo adaptation. Of course, they didn't give too much financial assistance to the film . . . but just enough for it to be completed. And what happened? It became the first alien-genre film since E.T. to get a Best Picture Academy Award nomination (unless you consider Avatar, which was also nominated with District 9, an alien film too—but I consider it a Pocahontas remake, as does anyone who watches the film with a clear mind, mixed in with FernGully elements). See—great things can come out of sheer originality and passion towards the craft at hand, but it seems as though all horror can do is make money . . . instead being original and great at the same time. And this is the viewers' faults as much as it is the producers' and the directors' who make the financially successful horror-remake-garbage. It's like politics. All you have to do is say 'NO!' and stand outside the studios with pickets in our hands, raving for the next epic, original horror film to come and demand an end to unnecessary remakes and sequels . . . but who's going to do that? Really . . . it's more likely you'll buy the ticket to Resident Evil: Retribution or, if you're reading this in 2014, then I'm sure Resident Evil: Beginnings (because prequels have a bang to their buck, too) will be in theaters and you'll buy that ticket and just settle for the same old Hollywood comfort food.
But not to worry horror connoisseurs, whereas the epic, critically acclaimed, financially successful horror film had been dwindling away, the video game developers had begun to pick up the slack—and the genre was called Survival Horror (a blend of John Carpenter's The Thing-esque paranoia and George A. Romero's Dead series' survivalism). Resident Evil (1996) invented the genre, so to speak (and there are some that would argue Alone in the Dark was the granddaddy: in some ways it was—but nowhere near as successful or revolutionary). Resident Evil changed video games and cinema from that point on—and since, it had produced financially and critically successful sequels: Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, Resident Evil: Code Veronica (arguably the weak link in the series), Resident Evil Remake, Resident Evil Zero—oh, and all of those titles, excluding Code Veronica, took place in the infamous Raccoon City: this actually explains a sort of "insecurity for taking risks" in the horror genre, and I'll explain in full detail about this theory in due time. Along with Resident Evil, there was Silent Hill: Resident Evil's ghostly, pale cousin (pale in comparison). Silent Hill is also important to mention because, unlike Resident Evil, it never left its roots entirely, nor changed things up a bit—and for that, it failed. Also there was the cult hit System Shock 2 (which spawned Bioshock), and sort of piggybacked off from Resident Evil's survival horror (with an emphasis on survival actually causing the horror). Doom, Fear (and its sequels—but the third sort of pulled an RE5 and focused on action), and the early Turok games also attempted to in horror into their action-oriented gameplay . . . to some success, you could say.
What video games were capable of doing—that Hollywood film productions weren't—were to take absurd, risky premises, and develop them at the same cost as it would for a less ambitious storyline. Such successful horror-based video game premises could be summed up in five words or less: Fear—Ghostbusters with guns; Resident Evil—zombies plus other monsters; Bioshock—big dudes in scuba-gear that have drills for hands and protect little girls who abstract a type of energy from dead people; Silent Hill—there's a vengeful spirit-demon thing with a HUGE pyramid for a head and a battle-axe (okay, those two latter examples have more than five words, but you get the point: they're CRAZY ideas, but why not take a risk if the cost of production will be the same regardless the story?).
The selling points in those horror-based games, if taken to a film studio, would have been laughed at . . . there's just too much risk, you see. But the studios are glad to adapt them into movies if the game succeeds. But never would they attempt to film such a risky storyline, even if these premises were adapted into good scripts (prior to being a successful game franchise); it would require a psychotic director, like Terry Gilliam—but then who would trust Gilliam to direct a 400 million dollar budget horror film? Horror films, even though they're box-office gold, sell about the same whether they're high budget or low budget. As true as this is, it isn't a proper treatment of the genre—because, quite frankly, there are really great low-budget horror films (28 Days Later) and some pretty terrible high-budget horror films (George A. Romero's Land of the Dead); and the reasons why Land of the Dead was less successful as 28 Days Later was because it was a worse movie . . . not because there's a magical formula that horror film can't have a high budget. In fact, it's hard to look up high-budget horror films . . . because you literally can't. Google seems not to know how to put "high-budget" and "horror" in the same search. It just doesn't make sense, like peanut butter and cheese sandwiches.
Therefore, video games were (and sometimes, still are) a haven for horror, because budget doesn't matter as much as it does for film. That's how Resident Evil could attempt to breathe life into the zombie/horror genre. Funnily, George A. Romero directed a commercial for Resident Evil 2 (and before that, he wanted to direct Resident Evil, but he was turned down; and why turn down the Godfather of the Zombie genre?—well, two reasons: first reason, the script was terrible [but forgive Mr. Romero, he tried]; second reason, to direct Resident Evil, Mr. Romero would need more money . . . and the studio shook its head, saying, No, no, no—it's too expensive, Mr. Romero).
Would George A. Romero's Resident Evil have been that bad? Nobody really can say for sure.
Then something happened—but I won't tell you what it is just yet because writers never tell their reader what they want to hear until the time is right; but they vaguely hint about it just to get their attention. Do I have your attention Reader? What happened was that the video game survival horror genre reached its peak of greatness, but it was also a bittersweet double-edged sword (okay, I sort of ambiguously hinted at the mysterious event, so don't hate me too much).
But let's go back to the horror genre's INSECURITIES FOR TAKING RISKS theory, because, as the scientist in 28 Days Later said, "To cure you must first understand!" This statement is true; 28 Days Later unintentionally prophesied the horror genre's cure: first to understand, then to prevent, but ultimately to improve the formula. The horror genre's belief, in order to be successful, was to stick with what works: campiness (Evil Dead 2), the same setting (Raccoon City, for instance; or the lake from Friday the 13th), cheap gimmicks (the home video approach: made famous by The Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield, and then recently overused by Paranormal Activity), lots of cussing (because good ol' Christian folk won't wanna see horror films anyway, right? RIGHT!?—not necessarily true), nudity (Eli Roth; enough said), and comfort (for the filmmaker/game developer, not the audience). Resident Evil: Code Veronica is a very important element in this theory; it says that CAPCOM took a risk by changing the location, and by giving fans what they've been wanting and waiting for (Chris finding Claire and Wesker finding Chris) and a few surprises along the way (Wesker's super strength; but at this point, he wasn't an Agent Smith clone)—and after all that, the game was a failure . . . so they started blaming the content of the game and the risk that they took (the camera movement was a noticeable change for fans) instead of looking at the awkwardness of the video game consoles at the time. I didn't even play CV until it was released for the GameCube (and for me that was like finding GOLD), because nobody really bought the Dreamcast—and its extinction is evidence. So, CAPCOM went back to their comfort zone, they made Resident Evil Remake and Zero; both were successful hits and terrifying—but the odd, un-Resident Evil-esque AI co-op in Zero didn't settle with most fans, so yet again this built up their insecurity for taking risks, until, of course, Resident Evil 4, which changed the horror genre once again—but I'm not taking you there quite yet, you must stop at yet another pit stop. I'm sorry.
Okay—you're terrified of spiders—there's a man chasing you down a hallway with a machete; maybe he's Jason Vores or maybe he's just a hobo with a machete or maybe he's Danny Trejo himself—and there's only one way out: a room full of creepy, crawly, quick-moving, big and bulky, scary, nasty SPIDERS. Here comes the machete-wielding maniac, he's about to chop your head off, but you face your fears and you run through the room full of spiders and maybe you have to jump out of the window of an unknown distance (and yes, you're afraid of heights too). But, give yourself an axe. What does that do? It gives you hope—but not so much that it dwindles the horror; in fact, it might cause more tension because it's a viable option to stop and fight off the machete-wielding maniac. Decisions, decisions, and indecisions, and horror, and lions, tigers and bears, oh my! A little hope can be effective in horror because if there's no hope, the audience gives up; why read? Why watch? Why play?
Okay—same scene takes place with a small variation—spiders—machete-wielding maniac—and you have a flamethrower, baby! What happens is this: it kills the horror and creates fun—Deadrising and its sequel; case and point. Freddy vs. Jason, too—the film was not scary at all because you knew Freddy (or Jason) were on your side, and they were the flamethrowers; you didn't have to worry, and you knew that they would faceoff at some point and all the tension would be relieved because you hoped they would just both kill each other so you didn't have to cower behind your hands anymore (which, while watching this film, you probably never did because you had no reason to). End of story, no more horror. Now you can go home and get a good rest. I remember watching The Ring—it terrified me; there were many sleepless nights that I imagined if I opened my eyes I would see an upside-down face looking at me with pale skin and long, black wet hair. How I coped with it was by imagining that the little ghost girl was actually a species of vampire and that Blade (Wesley Snipes) would be able to watch the video and then take care of her; it's because I had faith in Blade and I didn't want to be scared anymore. This is another way of looking at it: there's such thing as comedic-relief and there's such thing as action-relief—guns a-blazing. Is that good for horror? Only for momentary relief—too much of it can make the film/video game/novel too fun and not scary at all.
Okay. Need to time recover? I'm sorry, no break. Horror's all about pacing, pacing, pacing, faux moments of relaxation, then BOOM!—your Grandma knocks on the door with cookies. Anyway, time for a very important parable to understand the extinction of the horror genre in video games (and in some ways movies, too), it involves music . . .
(Yeah, yeah, yeah, what does music have to do with horror anyway, Mr. Writer? That's so stupid! Well, Impatient Reader, it comes back down to understanding the problem and it always does—sometimes you have to show a non-related example that fits the problem and helps the Learner to understand from an example that most of the concerning generation can relate to; and to help answer the question: what the H-E-Double Hockey-Sticks happened to the horror genre, so shush 'n listen child . . .)
. . . Linkin Park. In the early 2000's, people loved their debut album, Hybrid Theory; everyone and their moms could sing "In The End"—and during this time there was Limp Bizkit, Korn, Disturbed, Crazy Town, Disturbed, System of a Down—all, at the time, considered Nu Metal for the most part. And what was similar between all these Nu Metal songs? a similar formula—intense to melodic, intense to melodic, intense to more intense to melodic again—you get the point. At the time that was a very successful formula; even some pop musicians dabbled with the genre . . . with mixed results. Then something happened: the epitome, the perfection, the "Plateau," the whatever-it-is-you-want-to-call-it. It was the album that put all others to shame, the album that had a benchmark so high, how could anyone else reach it?—unless of course they copied the formula (therefore causing unoriginality—and that doesn't insure their success), or change their genre? Linkin Park's Meteora was that album; it was the best Nu Metal album ever, but it also caused the genre's extinction (and they survived the cataclysmic event with by building a fallout shelter called Minutes to Midnight, but barely).
(Okay, okay, okay, what is the point Mr. Writer? We all remember this period in music! And I hate the new Linkin Park! So what's the point? Well, Blind Reader, that is the point; and it explains perfectly what happened to the horror genre in a way you can understand, because you lived through it and may now apply that same idea to the dwindling horror genre.)
If Meteora was Nu Metal's plateau, then Resident Evil 4 was survival horror's savior and its extinction-catalyst; it saved the Resident Evil franchise (and the horror genre in general, movies and books included) by taking the proper risks: no more zombies, and only some mentions of Raccoon City, Umbrella, and Wesker. Where some fans were utterly devastated by the lack of zombies and the addition of Ganados (which is another double-edged sword because they were great in RE4, but they spawned the terrible, ridiculous Majini in RE5), there were others that thought it was refreshing and still terrifying. In the game, there was a sense of "are they good or bad—so should I shoot them at a distance, or walk up and talk to them?" sort of horror—that goes back to John Carpenter's The Thing, because the Ganados farmed, they fed their animals, they did chores, etc.. There was also the usual Resident Evil-esque monster-enemies later on in the game that satisfied the fans endlessly. By all means, there's a reason why Resident Evil 4 is considered one of the greatest games of all time: because it is. But, like Meteora, it also spawned a flood of descendants of action/horror hybrids—some were successful (Bioshock and Gears of War), some were descent (Deadspace and F.E.A.R.) and some . . . not so good . . . Resident Evil 5 was one of those "not so good" games, alas. Even the game reviewers X-Play (part of G4TV), who deemed RE4 the greatest horror game of all time and one of the greatest games ever, gave Resident Evil 5 a meager 3/5 score. At first, I, being a fan of both X-Play and Resident Evil 4, was in upheaval about this tragically low game score, and then . . . it made sense. Once playing the game (the game with so much promise; the game that I hoped would be The Dark Knight of all games—I mean, come on, Chris Redfield has a machete and he's buff, and Leon only had a knife and he's skinny—so it must be a great game, right—RIGHT!?). But it wasn't. They—CAPCOM—saw Resident Evil 4 succeed, and they made a pale clone that had more Gears of War elements than it did Resident Evil elements; the game was a financial success, sure, but a failure to the horror genre. Instead of trying to excel, it settled for the same old comforts. Resident Evil 5 marked another dark moment for horror because of its utter lack of it.
But, perhaps we have to dig deeper still to understand the dying of the dark. Novels are the third—and the most important—piece to the mediocrity of horror in modern times. Horror perhaps began with The Bible's Lucifer/Satan/Devil—whether it's something you believe in or not (and the what-if is what makes the Devil so terrifying; remember The Exorcist?—an Oscar nominated horror film, oh snap!). Then centuries later, Edgar Allen Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker, Ambrose Bierce, Algernon Blackwood, M.R. James, and Robert Bloch wrote novels and short stories that really inspired and sculpted horror in cinema today: Shelley's manmade monster, Stoker's bloodsucking vampire, Lovecraft's Cthulhu, Bloch's serial killer, M.R. James' ghost story, etc. . . . Then later there were Ray Bradbury (Fahrenheit 451), Richard Matheson (I Am Legend—which also inspired George A Romero's Dawn of the Dead), Shirley Jackson (We've Always Lived in the Castle), Ramsey Campbell (you wouldn't know his stories, so I won't list any)—and then, later still, Stephen King, Robert McCammon (utterly underrated) and Clive Barker—oh and I heard that one Dean Koontz fella—that has a new book on the shelf every other month—writes horror, too.
Stephen King revamped modern horror and he invented the blending of genres with horror (like Puff Daddy invented the remix . . . wait, wasn't it Linkin Park?)—The Dark Tower series is the best example of what sort of wonders can come out of genre-blending—western, science fiction, fantasy, action, and horror. Stephen King also has the Guinness Record for most film adaptations based on one author's bibliography; and the film adaptation that's most successful is Shawshank Redemption; it isn't even horror. McCammon and Barker are also equally important cases to point out, and they helped shape modern horror, too (Barker more so than McCammon—but I bet you'll never find another book on Amazon.com that has a higher score per vote than McCammon's Boy's Life). Stephen King hailed Clive Barker as "The future of horror," and The Hellbound Heart (which spawned the Hellraiser film series), has been the most terrifying, tension-filled read of my life . . . but something happened to Barker (which also happened to McCammon): he stopped writing horror (for the most part). Barker went on to write young adult (The Thief of Always, Abarat) and a bit of fantasy (Weaveworld, Imajica); McCammon—although he was the founder of the Bram Stoker Awards (which gives recognition to horror writers)—went on to write (after a ten year break, I might add) period-piece crime mysteries (Speaks the Nightbird, the Queen of Bedlam). And even Stephen King has ventured far from his straight-up horror genre. Why are they running away? Maybe it's the same thing Linkin Park had done with Minutes to Midnight and CAPCOM with Resident Evil 4: it's the idea that you should STOP while you're ahead. McCammon and Barker doesn't write horror anymore; Linkin Park doesn't make Nu Metal music anymore; CAPCOM stayed away from survival horror.
Maybe they sensed the extinction of the genre and got out while they had the chance (the same way Minutes to Midnight saved Linkin Park); kind of like Noah building the arc. Of course, King still writes his occasional horror novel—but the horror is usually a sub-genre, like with Under the Dome. And that's perfectly alright for the reading horror fan; it's better to read a semi-horror novel that's good, than a pure-horror novel that's bad. Some of us horror connoisseurs are shameless and will gobble down anything that squirms and that has blood in it; no shame in that, but . . . it's contributing to the commonplace horror novel out there on the shelf of the new releases. In fact, you won't find many horror novels in the new releases at all anymore, unless it's Koontz—who pushes out more novels than devote Catholic women with active sexual lives (and healthy, fertile wombs) push out babies. And Koontz—he may be casting shadows over up-and-coming horror authors . . . or maybe he's just the only "financially successful" author of horror (other than King, Straub, and Simmons—and the latter two are hit or miss authors in terms of financial and critical success) still writing books. But isn't the formula getting old? Are the dinosaurs of horror getting closer and closer to their extinction and new creatures of horror are to take their mantle? Likely—but considering who's out there—I hope not.
New authors are coming along . . . but they're infected with something terrible and disgusting; worse than rotten zombies with disfigured features, missing limbs, and a cesspool of morbidity and filth—what they're infected with, is what I—as a younger aspiring writer myself—call the Post-Video Game Writing Syndrome. How I define it is this: young writers who try to write based off from their favorite movies and video games instead of actually reading books (and lots of them); these types of young writers will write their favorite movies or video games into a book format, but they will change character names and settings so the book is "original" (I suffered from this when I wrote my first 180,000 word novel; then, I actually began to read books); I call what these P.V.W.S. writers write as "original fan fiction"—sadly some of it gets published (how many Harry Potter rip-offs have been publish?—lots). And, most important to point out, these P.V.W.S. writers only write sallow, anemic versions of what inspired them to write in the first place. Unoriginality plagues their plot-driven stories—and since they don't read that much, they don't really know how to write (seriously, try reading Scott Sigler . . . sorry, Scott)—and this is another reason why you don't see many new horror authors out there. Most new horror writers that find some success get lucky on Amazon.com; Scott Sigler is perhaps the most critically acclaimed P.V.W.S. author out there.
It's time for the young aspiring filmmaker/video game developer/writer to start being informed on the origins of horror, because there are a lot of filmmakers/video game developers/writers out there, making money, that are completely misunderstanding what it is that makes the horror genre so special. And there's no way to change the future of horror unless you understand the cancer that's eating away at it presently—and understanding it is only half the solution. You must actually make a stand and fight for a non-gimmicky, epic horror film of Oscar-worthiness, that will still make the green stuff. Every single Resident Evil movie—all of them are terrible compared to the games, aside from the upcoming non-profit, independent film Resident Evil: Red Falls—is number one at the box-office for at least a few weeks; so why spend money on these sorts of hogwash films (which only encourages more hogwash from the studios)? Instead, let's expect a horror film of epic proportions, whether it's about zombies, vampires, ghosts, werewolves, aliens, diseases, monsters, psychos, or politics. If we don't buy tickets for crap, they'll sooner or later stop making us smell it.
How can there be another George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead (which, in my book, is the only Epic—with a capital E—horror film ever)—which was made four decades ago—when the studios are too afraid to take risks, and filmmakers are too high on Cloverfield-cam gimmicks, too infected by mediocrity, and too stubborn to actually sit down and read the greatest horror novels and play the greatest horror games ever, and ultimately UNDERSTAND why they work and HOW they began to fail and die off? Food for thought.
How can there be another Stephen King or Clive Barker, when young potential authors nowadays will sit down for hours in front of a TV, wasting away, playing games, watching Family Guy, doing nothing productive, when they could be reading and writing and sharpening their craft?—it's fine playing games and watching movies for the right amount of inspiration; it's another thing just copying those things and writing a book that reads more like a video game, with equally bad dialogue, than it does an actual book. In other words, it's being complacent with the same old-same old; reading bad authors and liking them because the books are just like your favorite videogames—so you rate the book on Amazon.com a 5/5—is only contributing to the disease. You go, young potential writer! Maybe you'll sink the genre into a deeper, more desperate state than it's already in—or: take charge, stop settling for ordinary, and write something epic like Stephen King's The Stand and his first four Dark Tower novels, which are the epitome of what epic-horror in literature can be.
As for the horror in video games, thank goodness Naughty Dog's The Last of Us finally got it right.
And if you, Patient Reader, care at all for the horror genre, then you must fight for it; because it's not fighting for you . . . and that's a scary thought.
The apotheosis of all theses pertaining to horror was stated in Danny Boyle's sort-of-zombie-epic 28 Days Later, in which the scientist at the very beginning of the film says, "In order to cure, you must first understand."
With that being said, I've composed a list of everything that CAPCOM should avoid in Resident Evil 7, and what they should bring into the mix.
There's a reason why Dead Space 3 wasn't as good as the first two; it wasn't necessarily story or gameplay—it was having a partner to dull the scares. When you step into a survival horror game, you don't want a partner because it makes things too easy; unless the partner, of course, isn't armed, isn't strong, and is important to keep alive—such as Ashley from Resident Evil 4—or are capable of dying, like in Deadrising, and NOT from dying via cut scenes, but rather dying because of your own in-game decisions. That would be the only scenario that having a partner—whether armed or not—would be a good idea.
Hasn't CAPCOM learned from Resident Evil Zero that we don't want an AI partner that will make the game easier to play, along with less scary?
Resident Evil 7 needs to put an end to the partner system, plain and simple. Have Mercenaries be for co-op or multiplayer, because co-op has no place in a Resident Evil campaign.
When you think Resident Evil and Zero, you think of a mansion; Raccoon City's streets and police department is what you think about for Resident Evil 2 and 3: Nemesis; a village, castle, and industrial facility for Resident Evil 4; a boat in Revelations. And then it takes a dive. In RE5, nothing was really distinguishable; I certainly can't name my favorite location. Perhaps the swamps. But when you think of RE5, you don't think swamps—you think of the shantytown that is . . . uh, what's the name of the city again? Kijuju? Something like that. (And yes, I'm deliberately playing dumb because I can easily Google the name, but that's not the point.) And in RE6, get out a notepad and make a list of all the locations—you'll need a couple pages. Then how many of those locations were significant to the actual story? How many of those locations were interesting? Only a handful. And even if a location was interesting, that doesn't mean that the gameplay elements were.
Part of the reason why RE5 and RE6 had the weakest locations (and location designs, mind you), is because it's pointless to backtrack in either game, pointless to explore. Even though RE4 was a straightforward game (it wasn't as if you were stuck in the village for the entire game), there was still need (and rewards) for exploring every nook and cranny. Backtracking is good for survival horror. And it creates incentive for the game developers to put more detail and passion in the actual locations.
For Resident Evil 7 to be effective, it needs to pick a location and then make it interesting. CAPCOM needs to add some RPG elements to make it necessary to backtrack and find things they couldn't have otherwise; for instance, if at the beginning of the game there is a crumbly wall and then later on you find grenades and realize that you could blow that wall up, then that is smart game design. That's also why The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask were so good, and why Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword weren't as good—because the latter two games had less emphasis on exploration. In Resident Evil 7, I want to find secret weapons, treasures, etc. . . . by exploring rather than following a cookie crumb trail to the next objective in the game.
What the first several games of the franchise had—and you can't dispute this—was a moody atmosphere. The atmosphere alone (contributed by a creepy score, of course) made those games terrifying as they were. And then add sound design, creature design, pacing, etc. . . . and, well, you needed to bring along an extra pair of underwear.
This is where some fans might disagree on. Resident Evil 4. Okay, so the game might not have had a dark, sinister atmosphere as the first several games had, but it did have an atmosphere of its own. And it worked. Perhaps the first few games were the equivalent to hot sauce, and Resident Evil 4 was rich, almost-spicy cinnamon. It was Resident Evil even though it was different; it might have had a different taste, but it had a similar tang nevertheless.
And then Resident Evil 5 had no atmosphere, and Resident Evil 6 had inconsistent atmosphere in all the campaigns.
What Resident Evil 7 needs to do is create an atmosphere that creates a mood. The early trailers for Resident Evil 6 hinted at such a mood, whereas the actual game didn't deliver. And RE7 needs to deliver—whether its taste is different than the other games, it needs to have a tang of horror, mystery, depression, hopelessness.
I won't spend much time on this category, but it needs to be addressed. Resident Evil 5 had decent controls (upgraded from Resident Evil 4); Resident Evil 6 had terrible controls. Reason for which: the loose camera that follows the character. It's sad that I prefer the fixed camera behind the character over the incoherent one from RE6. If I want to see my character's face, I'll wait for a cut scene.
(On this point, The Last of Us has a "similar" camera as RE6, but it's a lot smoother and it works in telling its own story.)
All the best quick time events come from RE4—cutting the rope after the fight with the giant salamander, Jack Krauser's fight, dodging the lasers, avoiding certain enemy attacks, etc. . . . In RE5 and RE6, the quick time events are . . . sad to say . . . gimmicks. RE5's quick time events are better than RE6's.
Resident Evil 7 needs to take a step back and think before doing. It would be awesome to see Chris Redfield having a hand-to-hand fight with a group of enemies and using a QTE to fight through them. But, the quick time events can't be cut scenes anymore. The Last of Us is what Resident Evil 7's QTEs need to look like. They need to be intergraded into the gameplay.
Imagine this (in cinematography terms): During gameplay (not a cut scene) you see (character) getting surrounded by the enemy (whether zombie, human, ganados, majini, whatever). You're prompted to press "X"—you miss your chance. An enemy damages you. "Y"—you press it and punch an enemy; "B"—you press it and counter an enemy attack and manage to get the enemy in a headlock. 'Hold "A"'—you hold it, and your character is trying to break the enemy's arm or neck and the enemy is struggling. Meanwhile another enemy attacks. While holding "A," you're prompted to press "RT" (if you succeed, you block the enemies attack and finish breaking the current enemy's neck; if you fail, you lose your headlock and that enemy is free. Essentially you can choose this method of fighting a lot of enemies, or you can choose to blast them away. It's an option. There's pros and cons to going hand-to-hand, pros and cons to using a gun. This sort of QTE would be an optional risk assessment. Do you want to take a group of enemies hand-to-hand (which would save ammo but you're more likely to get injured)? Or do you just want to start shooting? And even if you want to shoot, you can still apply some hand-to-hand.
That sort of innovative gameplay is what Resident Evil 7 needs to have. And it serves survival horror. It's not just mindless QTE that was in RE6.
A) limited enemies (that don't drop ammo, that don't respawn); limited ammo; innovative weapons (not to the extent of Deadrising, but if I don't have ammo and I see a board of wood, I'll want to use it).
B) No more "end of chapters," instead bring back the typewriter. Or, hey, if typewriters are outdated, then why not send an email on a computer or laptop and that's how you save the progress? That's a good modernly relevant solution, isn't it?
C) Bring back the "safe room."
D) Enemies should be able to break down doors (aside from safe rooms).
E) The inventory needs to be fixed. As with all the games up until 5, bigger items took up more room; you had to be smart about what items you wanted to bring along.
The Uroboros from RE5 was way too simple and not scary enough; and, in terms of the Plagas, it never really made sense how Ricardo magically turned into a sea monster because he injected himself with the Plagas on a boat; the C-Virus from RE6 could just do waaaaaay too many things, the mutations were too numerous and inconsistent—even an enemy with a biological chainsaw for a hand. It didn't make sense how the C-Virus could create zombies, monsters, the Ustanak, and J'avos (which were the same thing as Majini but only looked different). If they really did want a virus that could do all those things, they needed to have had A LOT more in-game documents to read. In fact, RE6 didn't have any in-game documents. That was a disappointment.
I think Resident Evil 7 needs to have a novel's worth of documentation within the game for whatever their "virus" is going to be. Because it needs to make sense in order for suspension of reality to happen for the player. And sure, it doesn't have to be journals or pieces of paper, but cell phone text messages too. RE7 needs to be modern.
(Also, I know this is an outdated interest: but I actually really enjoy reading in-game documents.)
Bring back the merchant. Enough said.
Examples of simple Resident Evil plots:
1) Leon's sent to a European village to investigate leads on the kidnapping of the president's daughter; once he finds her, he needs to save her. (RE4)
2) You're trying to survive and you discover the story/plot as you play (RE1, 2, 3, ZERO, Revelations)—and most of the "plot" in those games is actually more or less the backstory.
Here's an example of a plot that doesn't make sense (or gets too discombobulated): For some reason the president of the United States is at a university in Tall Oaks and Leon shoots him and he is with a girl who he doesn't know and Hunnigan somehow knows her and meanwhile there're zombies everywhere in Tall Oaks; meanwhile, in Russia, Sherry Birkin magically finds Jake Mueller and discovers instantly that his blood is special and that a cure can be made by using it and, uh, somewhere else Chris is a captain of a BSAA team and
(where's Jill?)
he . . . I have no idea what his objective is, other than killing B.O.W.s—and that's the problem with RE6. The plot was WAY too overcomplicated. (And I still have no idea why Simons' wife wanted to clone herself into Ada Wong and I have no idea why Simons' wife wanted to kill Simons' and!—brain!—hurts!
Resident Evil 7 really needs to tone it down and find a simple story.
My example of a simple plot:
In a city a bioterrorist organization holds a group of people hostage and for every day that they don't get what they want, they'll kill a hostage and release a new B.O.W. into the city. And your character is trying to fight his way through a city to save the hostages. This type of story allows wiggle room for RPG elements: that's essential for survival horror by allowing the player to play through the horror in ways that they find most effective.
On a side note. Resident Evil: Red Falls (previously known as Resident Evil: No Hope Left) is being released on YouTube in October. So, that's something to look forward to. I've seen the rough cut, and the fan film is a BEAST. Lots of zombies (check); awesome cinematography (check); references to Chris and Wesker without actually having an actor playing them terribly (check); original story which takes place between RE5 and RE6 (check); humanoid B.O.W. (check); and . . . a tentacle (check).


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Nevins, Kafalas Earn BIG EAST Weekly Honors
By USF
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TAMPA- University of South Florida softball players Sara Nevins and Gina Kafalas were honored by the BIG EAST Conference Monday for their performances against Connecticut over the weekend.
Nevins was named the BIG EAST Pitcher of the Week for the second time this season, her third appearance in the weekly awards, and Kafalas was named to the Weekly Honor Roll marking the 10th time this season a Bull has appeared in the weekly awards.
Nevins went 2-0 over the weekend in a series sweep of Connecticut to help the Bulls move to 12-1 in league play. The freshman also earned a save in the third game, her eighth of the year, tops in the nation and a program-record for saves in a season at USF.
In her past five starts, Nevins has pitched a complete game shutout. She is now 14-5 on the season with 8 saves and an ERA of 1.71, and has not allowed a run in the past 41.1 innings dating back to April 3. Over the weekend, the freshman allowed 0 runs on just seven hits in 11.1 innings with an opponent batting average over .176.
Kafalas led the way offensively for the Bulls in the weekend sweep of Connecticut. The junior batted an unreal .625 in the three games with six runs scored. She drove in one, walked twice and was a perfect 4-for-4 in stolen base attempts. Kafalas slugged .625 and had an on-base percentage of .700, while scoring two runs in each of the three games and had two multi-hit performances.
Nevins, Kafalas and the rest of the Bulls will square off against No. 23 Notre Dame on Wednesday at 11 a.m. looking to stay atop the BIG EAST standings. Both games of the double-header can be seen on Brighthouse Sports Network.


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Access & Events Affected By President's Visit To Campus
Nov. 1, 2012
President Barack Obama will make a campaign appearance at Fifth Third Arena on Sunday, Nov. 4. Because the event is open to the public, it is expected that traffic will be heavy and affect access to the campus and to campus facilities from early afternoon through late Sunday evening. Please take this information into account as you plan travel to and from campus on Sunday.
UC parking garages will be operational at normal rates and normal access throughout Sunday. There is no shuttle bus service on Sunday, as is the normal schedule.
Doors to the Fifth Third Arena, 2700 Varsity Way, will open at 4:00 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 4. The event is free, but tickets are needed to get inside the facility. General seating tickets for the event Sunday are being handled by the Obama campaign. For access to tickets, see http://ofa.bo/Cinci. Tickets can also be picked up at the East Concourse of Fifth Third Arena, beginning at 5:00 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 1. A limited number of tickets will be reserved for UC students.
Two Athletics events will be relocated to accommodate this event:


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Agrium's profit falls 16 percent on weak fertilizer prices
(Reuters) - Canadian fertilizer maker Agrium Inc (AGU.TO: Quote) (AGU.N: Quote) on Wednesday reported a 16 percent fall in quarterly profit due to weak fertilizer prices.
The company's net earnings fell to $564 million, or $4.08 per share, in the second quarter, from $674 million, or $4.71 per share, a year earlier.
(Reporting by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)
© Thomson Reuters 2017 All rights reserved.


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Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: St. Louis
Posts: 297
My Ride: '09 Audi A4
Bimmian experiences
Has anyone had trouble buying parts with Bimmian?
Somehow I've drawn the short straw in this. I bought an HID upgrade kit, and a Raptor CWP kit from Bimmian in January. The Raptor kit took about a month to show up. The HID kit took about 2 weeks.
The HID kit was missing some parts and didnt have enough plugs to wire up everything that needed to be wired.. There was no place to wire up power. That's pretty important. And yes, I did it right. 3 plugs from the bulbs, and 3 available ports on the ballast. Plug them all in, and that leave you with zero ports to plug in the power connector from the car. Not like the power connector on the car would fit the plugs on the ballast.
So I return the kit in February via USPS. Bimmian says they never received it, but my tracking and customs stuff from the USPS says it was delivered. So there goes $300.
The raptor cwp kit came as a box of some parts, no instructions, or inventory list. I started to assemble the kit in May when the weather was nicer here, and what do you know. According to the instructions from e46fanatics, and google that I found, I'm missing parts. My harness didnt have enough plugs to connect up anything other than the ballasts from the light rings. There was no extra plugs to hook up the heater inverters, and the heater inverters weren't included either. And i was missing connector plugs so i had to buy some from radio shack.
I get in touch with Bimmian about the missing parts and they tell me they'll ship them out.
Now pausing, I was only able to reach Bimmian on the phone once, because they never answered the phones. Almost all of this was done via e-mail.
A month later a box shows up at my house, with 1 heater inverter. Great. What do i plug it into? My power harness has no plugs for it. And having one side heated is rather worthless too. I email them again, and they tell me theyll fix it and get me the correct harness, and ballasts. Then a few days later I get an email stating itll be shipped out that day. Nothings here 5-6 weeks later.
Supposedly a service manager looked into my return and said it never showed up.
So here I am 8 months later, out almost $600, and sitting around with probably $100 in parts.
What can I do to resolve this?
Nothing good can come from staying with normal cars.
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When you stay at Baden Powell Hotel, you'll be just a 5-minute drive from Melbourne Cricket Ground and Melbourne Museum. You can relax with a drink at the bar/lounge, and the restaurant is the perfect spot to grab a bite to eat. There's also a terrace, and rooms offer flat-screen TVs and refrigerators.


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|2,400 sq. ft.
|Property type
|Minimum Stay
|5 - 31 nights
This is one of the last few REAL Laguna Beach oceanfront Estates! Family owned for over 50 years. Private Home behind Security Gate. 125 feet of Private Oceanfront. Private steps to an intimate beach. Pool and pool house. Private cliff deck looking over spectacular whitewater coastal views.
Words cannot describe the views. Not one of our guests have ever said that 'this is what I expected'.
After 60+ years of of our Family residing on this most spectacular property, we have decided to share its treasures with a select clientele. Pictures and descriptions can never do this property justice! We have had much enjoyment with the appreciation of our past guests. Many new friends we have made and many fond memories we have been able to provide to our guests.
One of the last very few Original Laguna Estate properties. On nearly an acre of private behind private gate oceanfront. This property boasts 120+ feet of private coastline. Views and seclusion that very few properties can offer.
We took our family to Laguna for Christmas last year and stayed in this wonderful home for the holidays. it did not disappoint! Great location, we never had to rent a car. Walk able to all shops or a short Uber ride. The views were stunning! I am happy to say, we will for sure go back! A welcome home and fabulous host! Thanks for the memories!
This home and location was absolutely perfect. There are dramatic ocean views from every room and you are just steps away from the beach. We sat almost every night on the deck watching the sunset and listening to the ocean. We traveled with our 2 boys and our dog. It was really a great trip. If you are familiar with Laguna Beach, you will appreciate how close it is to the center of town, restaurants and beaches, but be completely private in your home. We can't wait to return.
The views were spectacular and it is located just far enough from all of the traffic of PCH but walking distance to all of the shops! JJ and his family were very courteous and were always a text away from anything we needed.
For the second year in a row, this home provided the perfect location for old and new friends to get together for time away. This year it was the background for two friends since childhood and former college roommates to get back together after twenty years. The security provided by the gates gives immediate feelings of safety which is key when traveling. The access to a private cove was used several times by our group. We loved the seclusion and privacy it provided. Some of the best times of the trip were the evenings sitting around the kitchen table talking and laughing after having an incredible meal prepared by the group. Ocean waves provided all the background noise needed for four girls from the Midwest. One of the girls pup loves the house also and she made herself right at home. She remembered where everything was from the year before. The huge master upstairs with the windows overlooking the ocean was a perfect hangout spot for chats after breakfast and making plans for the day. Thank you again to JJ for making the stay an easy and relaxing one. It was like coming home.
My husband and I stayed in this remarkable property for a week in Sept 2014. We found Casa Maxine to be exactly as described and more beautiful than expected. Truly the most amazing views I have ever experienced. The location cannot be beat. Minutes to the best Laguna has to offer. Walk to fantastic yoga studio and secluded and gorgeous beaches. We spent every evening on the lookout deck watching the waves crash and the stars sparkle.
Close by are Ritual Yoga, Sapphire, La Sirena, and Casa de Camino restaurants all which we highly recommend.
Thanks to JJ, Susie and Alex for being such gracious and kind hosts!
We look forward to the next time we come to Laguna and a stay at Casa Maxine!
Let me start by saying that JJ/Susie were the best ever. I hadn't met JJ until flying across the country to stay at his property...let me say that he made me feel welcome from the first moment we spoke.
I had done my research on Laguna and I had been there a few times prior to this trip. Let me save time for anyone looking for the PERFECT Laguna vacation, stop looking and book this home! Seriously stop and contact JJ/Susie right now.
The location ...amazing, the house...mind blowing, the views...unbelievable, JJ/Susie...great people, the vacation my kids experienced...priceless!
I have traveled just about everywhere you could imagine and this house, location and the reception by the homeowners go beyond what I can say.
JJ thank you once again for all that you did for the five of us I am truly in debt to you for all of the memories that you two have helped me provide for my family. I can't wait to see you next time, maybe we could go for a ride on the Vespa's!
The only regret I have about staying at the Casa Maxine is that I had to finally leave and come home. JJ/Susie thanks for sharing your home with us and I look forward to the next time we meet. THANK YOU BOTH!!!
Located just a few minutes south of downtown Laguna Beach just far enough to enjoy privacy and seclusion, but close enough to enjoy all the attractions and art galleries and finest dining within a few minutes. A block away from a 'trolley stop'. Ride the Free open air trolley's that run from the end of June to the beginning of September. They are a stress free way to get around town during the summer rush. No need to worry about driving and parking. Don't miss the Pageant of the Masters and the Sawdust Festival, Laguna is famous for!
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Summer High Season
Apr 21 2017 - Dec 31 2017
5 night minimum stay
My Standard Rate
31 night minimum stay
|Refundable damage deposit
|Cleaning Fee
Rates are subject to change prior to booking.
* Approximate monthly rate. Actual rate will depend on the days of the month you stay.


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Jon Bon Jovi is officially the nicest guy, like, ever!
For some brides-to-be, the big day plans include the flowers, the venue, the dress and the honeymoon. For THIS AUSSIE BRIDE, IT WAS WHO WOULD WALK HER DOWN THE AISLE
However, if you are NOT stopping with getting someone famous to "give you away", how's about THESE OVER-THE-TOP/MIND-BLOWING WAYS TO MAKE YOUR WEDDING/RECEPTION HAVE GUESTS TWEETING/IG'ING OR POSSIBLY BREAK THE BANK


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Is My Hair Ruined?!
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Join Date: Mar 2011
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Monday, April 4, 2011 at 02:06AM
thank you for your replies! I had become discouraged.. live and learn I guess. the funny thing is I used the treatment to prevent split ends and breakages and it had the exact opposite effect. I am definitely avoiding all protein at the moment. doing my research, I've found that a lot of the products I use have protein in them and I had no idea!
I purchased the shea moisture dc and conditioner.
(buy one get one free at walgreens)
thanks for the tips I will cut back on the shampooing and add the other steps to my regimen.


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Stockholm, Sweden, Oct 8, 2012 / 05:28 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Moral theologian Father Thomas Berg is praising the work of Shinya Yamanaka, the winner of this year's Nobel Prize in medicine, for helping to "put human embryonic stem cell research largely out of business."Yamanaka and John B. Gurdon, researchers in cell biology, were awarded the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries about the generation of stem cells."Yamanaka will be remembered … [Read more...]
Archives for October 8, 2012
Nobel-winning stem cell work helps curtail embryonic research
Moroccan navy prevents Dutch abortion ship from entering waters
Rabat, Morocco, Oct 8, 2012 / 04:06 pm (CNA).- Moroccan officials ordered a Dutch ship that provides abortions to leave its territorial waters after the vessel attempted to approach the country's port of Smir. According to Dutch radio, the group Women on Waves had announced that the ship would dock in Smir on Oct.4, but Moroccan warships blocked its entrance. The organization later said it had secretly sent a small yacht to Smir several days earlier in apparent anticipation of a … [Read more...]
Pope promotes rediscovering Rosary during Year of Faith
Vatican City, Oct 8, 2012 / 03:45 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict XVI is suggesting that families and parishes rediscover the prayer of the Rosary in the Year of Faith, which begins later this week."With the Rosary, we allow ourselves to be guided by Mary, model of faith, in meditating on the mysteries of Christ, and day after day we are helped to assimilate the Gospel, so that it shapes all our lives," the Pope said Oct. 7 in his Sunday Angelus comments.The Rosary, which … [Read more...]
Indiana priest found after scare in Greece
Indianapolis, Ind., Oct 8, 2012 / 03:26 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- A Catholic priest from Indiana who disappeared in Greece after telling his family he believed he was in danger has been located and is trying to return to the U.S. The family of Fr. Christiaan Kappes of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis said he made contact with them in the early morning of Oct. 8. He said he and his translator safely left the country, Indiana's Fox 59 News reports. The archdiocese said it is … [Read more...]
Vatican's prosecutor appointed as bishop for Malta
Vatican City, Oct 8, 2012 / 01:58 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict named Monsignor Charles J. Scicluna, the Vatican official in charge of prosecuting clergy abuse cases, as an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Malta on Oct. 6."I'm eager to be with my people and be a bishop for them – which means giving your life for them," the bishop-designate told Malta's Sunday Times.He will be ordained a bishop on Nov. 24, and will assist Archbishop Paul Cremona as a … [Read more...]
Italy's oldest Capuchin friar reflects on following St. Francis
Rome, Italy, Oct 8, 2012 / 12:09 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- As Catholics around the world celebrated the feast of St. Francis of Assisi on Oct.4, the oldest Capuchin friar in Italy said his life as a follower of the 13th century saint "has been a blessing." Father Giulio Criminesi, 74, entered the minor seminary at the age of 12. In 1957 he began his novitiate at the very first monastery of the Capuchin order in the town of Camerino, and was later ordained a priest in Loreto. In an … [Read more...]
Evangelization synod aims to reverse 'tsunami of secularism'
Vatican City, Oct 8, 2012 / 10:42 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The 2012 Synod of Bishops on evangelization began its second day with a call for the Catholic Church to roll back the "tsunami of secularism" that has swept over modern society in recent decades."It is almost as if this tsunami, this wave has washed across everything we lived by and simply took most of it away," Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C. told CNA on Oct 8."We have experienced, I believe, in … [Read more...]


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Chanel Black Caviar Trifold Wallet Pre Owned
This item is no longer available
This authentic pre owned Chanel Caviar Black Trifold Wallet is the most stylish way to arrange your money, cards and change. It features long lasting black caviar leather with a CC logo on the front flap. Compact, functional yet extremely chic, it has all the necessary pockets and compartments to organize currency in style. Snap closures with credit card slots and a bill compartment in the left. A coin purse resides on the rear. Such a timeless piece will be useful forever!
- Exterior: Very Good
- Interior: Very Good
- Description of Interior: Leather Lined
- Interior Pockets: Multifunction Pockets
- Color: Black
- Hardware Description: Gold Hardware
- Material: Caviar
- Width: 4 in.
- Length: 0.5 in.
- Height: 7 in.
Authenticity code: Chanel
Authentic: Pre Owned
Product Code: 2853002
All photos are of actual item being sold. This Chanel® item is guaranteed to be authentic. Chanel is a registered trademark of Chanel. LuxeDH is not affiliated with or represents Chanel in any way or form.


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