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Since Trump got in we've been barraged with such blatant lies and utter nonsense from the media that most 'normal' people throw up their hands and ask themselves and their friends "how can these bozos get away with this crap?", while the other half of the only acceptable political party in America have been relentless in opposing The Donald, instructing their stalwart sympathizers to resist the new administration to the point of open and armed rebellion. Never have we seen a larger, more organized gang of cry babies and hand wringing whiners than we are witnessing now in America. George Carlin was right when he said: "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups."
It's gotten so ridiculous that not just the folks who supported Trump, but even those who didn't, are now almost daily hoping that the shooting starts soon such that Darwin can rid us of all these Snowflake, liberal, Millennial, democrat, safe-zone requiring nitwits before they breed any further.
Yes, where we once had 'principles' there are none now. Where once our schools and parents taught 'values' today there are none. And, where we once had a proud Republic it's now mere legend. All that's here now are 'sides'; you need to take one or you'll be labeled some misbegotten misanthrope whom eventually someone or other will devise a final solution for.
I, for one, am quite tired of the absurdity of it all. Certainly tired of the 'sides', tired of the endless argument, tired of the same old claim of victimhood by one side or the other and tired of the make believe theater that most of the boobs around me seem to buy into. None of it passes any scrutiny for any thinking human who actually looks into any of the positions. For me, hanging on to my belief system, still futilely loyal to the old (dead) republic, I've decided that the most liberal thing I can do is to reciprocate, in kind. I've decided that I hate everyone.
I hate the retarded liberals, the right wingers and the Trumpites too. I hate those goofy MAGA hats since, for the record, America hasn't been 'great' since they shot Kennedy. I hate the gays, I hate the straights and anyone else finding it more important to talk about sexual proclivities than to just have fun and keep it to themselves. I hate transgenders and transracialists. I hate the muslims because they're freaking whacked, I hate the christians because they're pussies and hate the jews because they clearly hate everyone who's not a jew. I hate white racists as readily as I hate the blacks who think 'black lives matter' über alles or insist I call them "African-Americans" even though they have no more in common with Africa than I do with eastern Prussia. I hate dreadlocks because one can't help but wonder 'if' the Rastafarian wannabe wearing them even bathes regularly. I hate people who even mention pet and smoke free homes. I hate feminists wearing pussy hats. I hate any dingbat who wears their baseball caps backwards. I hate the 'press' and the media who's mission is supposed to be to inform the public but either spins events solely for the benefit of the financial benefactors or makes shit up out of whole cloth just to ruin the CIA's enemies. I hate the analysts and writers who pontificate endlessly trying to fathom what it all means when 'it' doesn't really 'mean' shit beyond what's obvious, in fact, "it" might not have even happened. Hell, I even hate NASA who, in their endless quest to mislead those who's taxes pay their salary, continue, in the 21st century, to pawn off black and white imagery without any kind of reference scale in a photo seemingly forgetting (or expecting we'll forget) that mankind has had color photography since before Hitler was Chancellor of Germany.
So, right, left, middle of the road, I hate them all. Every one of those ditzes who allege I must care what they think even though they don't, or I must give them a voice, even though they have nothing of any value to say or allow them to breath my air when they are complicit in the total retardation of American intellectual progress and, to coin a globalist phrase, are: "useless eaters". I hate any who attempt to manipulate and I especially hate those too stupid to see they're being manipulated which probably means I hate you too.
The entire political 'theater' in this country is prevarication and its people, apparently, quite willing to carry on a meaningless debate on gender equality or about the color of the curtains inside a burning building rather than live within reality. Nothing's getting better and nothing 'will' get better. The us/them paradigm coupled with the sky is falling is nothing more than the bleating of sheep, ruled by people who don't give a shit about the sheep's bleating. It all rather reminds me of an Atlantean, eleven thousand years ago, watching the spectacle of lava and ash rain down, as their continent explodes and sinks below the waves, arguing with their neighbors over who's job it was to build the dykes higher and insure the roads had a firmer foundation.
Perhaps you'll surmise that I'm overreacting, that I'm a nut. Then again, maybe you too are standing slack-jaw. troubled by his or her country's decent into the abyss regardless of which 'side' is running things. Let's face it, if we weren't significantly fucked up in this country then answer me why we put Braille on the drive-through bank machines? Tolerance of utter nonsense should not be acceptable. When confronted with these mindless, valueless, principle-less, lying meat-sacks who bleat endlessly of their 'needs' or even those who claim their 'side' will restore our Rights and/or our Republic in spite of their side's 'actions' being virtually identical to those of the neo-cons whom they replaced and/or ran against. (I'm sure it's all part of the secret plan to 'fool' the deep state which is little more than a variant of the quip "god moves in mysterious ways" we've all heard before.) Please!
Total derision is the LEAST they should expect from anyone with a brain since, sadly, we can only fantasize about clubbing them like baby seals while hysterically screaming "whack-a-mole!, whack-a-mole!".


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When I was young, I watched my own single mom juggle work and school and mothering and fathering. I watched her pinch pennies and suffer through week-long migraines and figure out how to fix stuff around the house and worry, always worry, about her kids. She struggled with insomnia and was beat back by disrespectful coworkers and missed every PTO meeting and she even sometimes cried. I watched her sacrifice peace, health, and her own personal goals so I could have a good life. I noticed and I appreciated and I was loved...at great expense to my mama.
Right around the time I realized babies were made mostly by choice, I promised myself if I ever had kids, I would make sure I was in a perfectly unbreakable, good, stable situation. Good, stable financial condition. Good, stable housing. Good, stable relationship. If I couldn't make those things happen, then no kids for me.
I was a silly little thing, wasn't I?
Once upon a time, Jen met a man, had kids, and planned a life for herself and her little family. About a decade later, that same Jen had to make a choice. She had to choose between self-respect and stability. Honesty and falsity. Divorce, and all the terrifying, expensive, messy things that come with it, or marriage to a man that made her feel trapped by her own needs. Jen, as we all know, chose self-respect, honesty, and divorce.
And I'm struggling. I'm struggling because a large piece of me wants to slam the door on that part of my life forever and run in the opposite direction for miles and miles until the ground under my feet is so unfamiliar I can no longer feel the sting of my own stupidity. Another part of me cries for familiarity, for something, anything, to resemble calm and contained and careful. Everything is so messy. I don't trust myself to make the right choices. I second guess everything. I struggle to trust those around me. Everything is new, or needs to be adjusted....my dreams and my goals are no different.
And I cannot run. I have these two beautiful dancing babies who need me now more than ever. Their relationship with me has become so critically and understandably needy. I can't slack. I can't disappear into the bottom of a beer can. I can't shout at and hit the man who disgraced me. I need to be on point 99.9% of the time, even when they are not around, because I'm the parent who puts them first. The pressure and isolation is suffocating....especially when combined with a distrust toward my own inclinations. Am I doing this right? Am I messing them up even more? Every time I give to one place, I take from another. Am I balanced? Is this ok?
And the rage. I have so much of it. It hits me out of nowhere, it seems...like when I drop a grocery bag on the ground and that jar of sauce I really needed breaks and my mind flashes to the memory of him carrying the grocery bags five at a time with no problem. Or when I feel my baby's forehead and it's so, so hot and I'm out of medicine, again, and I don't want to drag sick and sleeping babies out to the cold truck for a late-night trip to Walgreens. Or when my daughter tells me she is scared and I don't know what to tell her and I wish like hell there was another adult, someone who shared my love for this child, to help me come up with a solution for her pain. I curse him for making me choose between self-respect and stability, for putting me in this position, for his lies and false vows, for the loss of so many dreams, for the introduction of so many insecurities, for rejecting me in the most hurtful and harmful way a person can be rejected. I curse him for making me scared for my children. I curse him, but I still love him. I still appreciate him. I still hope he has a good day and that he one day wakes up and finds the strength to be the man I still somehow believe he can one day be.
Between curses and tears, surges of strength and pride in myself for making this work, and sheer exhaustion, I realized I needed to take steps to secure my future, however compromised and imperfect and uncertain that future may be.
But every time I give to one area of my life, I take from another.
I am both blessed and pained to say I started a new job this month. It's a corporate position, in a corporate office, surrounded by corporate coworkers and ruled over by corporate leaders. I make money for people. I make money doing things that do not, in my mind, positively affect the big picture of peace and prosperity for all. The job does not fit into the goals I had for my life. It does not align with my morals, my personal needs, my sense of satisfaction and pride. It is a paycheck. It challenges my mind and business skills. It challenges my ability to prioritize, and when I leave the house each morning and make the choice to put money ahead of time with my kids, it breaks my freaking heart. Why is this the only option? Why is this my only option? There's that rage again.
I'd swapped all my business casual clothes for flannel, you know. I'd purged my closet with so much hope and joy, knowing with certainty I would never need to dress to impress anyone other than myself ever again. Then last month, a week before my start date, I hauled over $100 in office wear from Goodwill into the house, plopped it all down on my bed, and sighed. Back here? I'm back here now, hm? How long are you going to do this, Jen? What happens if this becomes your new normal? What if you never achieve those dreams...or worse, what if you work this job so long you forget about your dreams entirely? What if this changes you into a different person, one who doesn't value the important things anymore?
So much fear. So much uncertainty. So much negative thinking.
I know this job is an opportunity....and I know this opportunity is something to be extremely grateful for. Most single moms don't get a fancy corporate job that financially allows for an in-home nanny and comes with the word "manager" attached to it. Many single moms are stuck taking whatever jobs they can get, sometimes multiple jobs, sometimes without benefits, or with horrific hours, or under horrific working conditions. I know this happens because my own mama worked one or two of those jobs. I am extremely blessed - the actions and work I'd done five years ago paved the way for where I am now. I proved my worth back when I was a younger corporate slave and consequently, I've been given a huge financial lead over most single working moms.
But that doesn't take away the sting in my eyes when I drive away from the two most important things in my life each morning. It doesn't keep my heart from racing with anger when my ex complains about how tired he is. It doesn't negate the pain I feel when I miss yet another one of my daughters' milestones. It doesn't soothe my doubts. It doesn't comfort me when someone I love dearly passes away and I remember that life is short, so, so short, and I am wasting it by sitting in this car, driving 90 minutes one way. For what? I scream it to myself, in my head, multiple times a day. For what, Jen? My rational side answers. You're in this position now, like it or not, so what are you going to do about it?
I'm gonna keep truckin'. I'm going to try and keep the faith that all of this, all of it, in its ugly, disgusting unfairness, is leading to something. I don't know what it is, and I don't even particularly believe it is a future set in stone, but I know it's coming. I know what I am doing now is preparing me for that future. And I know every day I spend allowing the rage to take over is another day wasted, another day I could be seeking the good, and the light, the calm. I am wasting my days by hating my days. And breaking that bad habit seems impossible. But I'm not giving up. Today I sang one of my favorite songs of all time on my way into work. Tomorrow I get to wear my new-to-me blue work dress. Thursday I get to work from a local coffee shop instead of driving into the office. My children love me. I have a beautiful dog. I found a great nanny. My friends are amazing. My ex-husband's been cool lately. My family, both biological and from my previous marriage, is rooting for me. I have this really incredible bearded man who's been talking to me for some time now....he reminds me of the big picture. He reminds me of my dreams. He makes me smile. What an incredibly lucky woman I am.
I had grand plans this month of sharing something homestead-ish and special with you, my treasured readers. Those plans will need to wait a little longer. I am keeping my head above water, but just barely, and my writing sits on a low rung now. I couldn't stay away tonight, though. I am sleepy and missing time with my kids as I type this, but I just had to. Words have been slithering around my head for weeks. It feels good to get them down...even though my kids will be getting to bed late. Every time I give to one area, I take from another.
My mama had to give to her career, and her chores, and the millions of other areas within her life. The funny part? I had no idea. She smiled brightly when she picked me up. She celebrated every holiday with joy. She danced and sang with me. I never wanted for anything. I had no idea that for my mama, to give to one area of her life, she had to take from another. I had no idea. No clue whatsoever. There's a lesson to be learned there, I'm sure of it. Maybe by the time I complete this season of my life, the season in which I am a working single mom, I'll have it figured out.

subset: commoncrawl


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Nancy Shurtz
Nancy Shurtz joined the law school faculty from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. Her interests include individual and business tax law, tax policy, environmental policy, and women and the law. She is editor for the Media/book Products Committee of the American Bar Association's Real Property, Probate, and Trust Section. Shurtz has been a literature reviewer and columnist for Estate Planning magazine since 1990. Recently, she consulted with Mills College (California) about the formation of an all women's law school after her article on the subject came out in 2005 in The Hastings Women's Law Review.


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FRONTLINE reports from Iraq on the miscalculations and mistakes behind the brutal rise of ISIS.
ISIS' growing foothold in Afghanistan is captured on film.
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When did you first fall in love with music?
1981, '82. Born and raised in the Bronx, New York. Hip-hop was starting. I'd say that was when I first started going out, going to block parties, seeing Afrika Bambaataa, the original DJ's, Full Force, and Cold Crush Brothers. I was in the streets when it was swelling. Before it became what it is now, a worldwide phenomenon, I was in the Bronx when it was all swelling. So my love for the music started then. So it just has grown.
What did it mean to you?
It was something different. It was ours too. I can understand how my mother and them felt when rock 'n' roll was around. It was something that their parents didn't get, and it was theirs. This is something that was ours. People didn't get it. It wasn't mainstream yet. It was exciting. There was energy there. It was fresh. It was just a real fresh feeling.
Is that the nature of what music is? You just said it's like a kind of soundtrack for your particular generation.
It is. I think that music is each generation identifying what makes it their own and grabbing ahold of it. And I think that some of what the problem is today is that it hasn't changed enough lately for the next generation to come up and identify it as its own. So they're having to jump on what was the generation before, or the generation before there, skip past those and like older music or whatever. I don't think that anything fresh has been given, in the last 10 years, to really give the next generation their own flavor. …
Michael "Blue" Williams is the manager of OutKast. Here, he recounts the steps he and the band took that led to their enormous success. He also describes the explosive growth of rap and hip-hop during the 1990s and how that drove the industry to the point that "… everyone was just trying to throw out so much quantity and no one was putting out quality." Williams tells FRONTLINE, "I think that if the labels adjusted the game again, started putting out good records, quality records, the public will buy." This interview was conducted on Feb. 11, 2004.
So how do you find yourself connected to OutKast? When and how has that happened?
1996, yeah, 1995-96, I just started working for Queen Latifah and Flavor Unit Management. Shakim, who is Latifah's manager and my boss, we took a trip to Atlanta. We were going after an artist called Monica. While we were down there, L.A. Reid called Shakim and says he has this group called OutKast starting to blow up, would you take a meeting with them? Shakim and I took a meeting with them, liked them, and we started managing them. And they were my responsibility on a day-to-day basis.
And that was '96, this is 2004, we've been together eight years. Around '98, I left Flavor Unit to start my own company, and they left with me because I'd been doing everything with them day to day. It's just been me and them since then continuing to grow, dropping records, sticking with our plan, and building a loyal fan base, touring, just rolling them on out. The guys make the records; I make sure we sell them. …
So you walk into this room and here's these two guys. How long does it take you to know they're hot stuff?
It probably took me about a month or two to really get what they were and to see the glimmer, the potential to really be as big as they have become. Because coming from New York, they were from Atlanta, they had a different type of music. It was a different type of hip-hop than I was used to. It had a Southern feel to it, there was more funk to it. New York radio wasn't playing it, so I had to spend time with them and get familiar with the music first. And then I had to go on the road and see the reactions they were getting, get the vibe for them, realize that these guys really had some good talent. We needed to work in the same direction, to get the label and everybody on the same page, and it could really be something big.
Had they cut a record yet, by then?
Yeah by the time we met them their first album had already been dropped. So they were in the middle of working their first record.
And how were they doing?
They were going well. They were already gold, they were on their way to platinum. We stepped in to help get it, like, right to platinum. And then we went in and started on the second album.
… What do you do to get them to the next step? What can you do for them?
It starts with a plan. You really have to assess what you have here. I try and tell our people that ask me, "What's the secret to good management?" And I tell them that you've got to know your personnel. You have to know your artists and what they're capable of, what they will and won't do. You have to know what the label is willing and not willing to do. And you have to have a good assessment of where the music industry is and things like that.
So I had to put a plan together. We sold a million records on the first album. So we had a base. LaFace Records wasn't really known for rap, so they sort of stumbled onto that platinum record. So we had it going with a plan to get everyone at LaFace onboard. Then we had to figure out how to get them from being just an Atlanta and a Southern-based group, up into the Northeast, break into New York and those areas, and out West, and start getting more areas to understand what OutKast was.
Then we had to build them as a touring band. We had to get them on the road so they could make money, and not only make money from the label. While the guys were working on music, I was working on the plan to figure out how do you do those things. Which magazine covers do you need? What TV do we need to get onto? Where would a good tour be? What size tour? Some of the visuals, things like that, that we needed to do to get people to take them seriously.
I'm a music director at a New York radio station, or Chicago, or Denver. How do you pitch OutKast to me in those days?
I try to sell on the excitement of what they're bringing. A new sound. Something that's not coming from the East, something not coming from the West. Because at the time, East had had a great run, and the West Coast was coming up, you had Death Row, you had Dre, Snoop, all of that. But here was something different. This was a new sound. Like, "I'm trying to get you take a chance on this, take a listen to it." Because you may not normally take a listen, you're like, "It's not New York or L.A., mmm, it's not important." So I'm trying to get you to take a chance on it, take a listen to these guys. …
And as those chances started to come in, the guys always provided the quality music. Nothing that I set up, nothing that I thought of, works without quality music. It's always about the music.
And how are they to work with? Do they give it over to you? Are they the kind of guys that say, "You go do that, we'll take care of business with the music."
On the first album it was a lot of, "How come we don't get these opportunities that these rappers get up North?" Or, "How come we don't get the opportunities that they get?" And the reality was because we were there to break down doors for Southern artists. So it was a lot of fighting to get things done, and a lot of me trying to get them to understand that we're going to get there, we're going to get there, just give us a minute. We're working on that, we're working on the doors.
So for them it was like, your job is to just keep rocking shows, keep making good music, and I'll get this door down, this is my next pitch. Alright we're going to get a cover of a Source Magazine, because that's important. Hip-hop needs to embrace you. We're going to get you on Hot 97. As I was able to get those things done, along with the label, their confidence grew in trusting me and in trusting that, "Hey, we are making good music, let's just keep going with what we do."
And I think over the next two or three albums that's how our relationship became. It became: They made really good music, and they really were great performers, and I really made sure that the world knew that they made great music and great performances.
Let me ask you a question, were you guys making money in those first two or three records? Or was their recoupment not?
Actually it was funny because we've always made money, but we always had our eyes on the bigger money. Like we always made money. We were able to get the things that at 23, 24 you want. You got a new car, you can get your mother a house, you know, you always have money in your pocket to eat. Uncle Sam wasn't kicking your door taking everything back. We were okay right there, but, you know, we wanted rock star money.
We wanted to see the real money. You always had somebody like, your Suge [Knight]s, and your Puffys, and the big guys, that always had the newest car, the newest this. So, we were striving to get to that level. But financially, naw, we weren't starving. But we weren't rolling in bed naked with our money. We were good.
And you had a goal for how much? What's good money?
I don't know, it changed. The '90s was like the golden era where everybody was just making -- you had your first $20 million movie guy and you had your first $100 million record deal. So the bar kept going up. I think that's what happened. You know we used to want a million-dollar deal. Then you got a million-dollar deal and you heard somebody got a $10 million deal. So you tried to figure out, well, what do you got to do to get that $10 million dollar deal?
Then you see the cover of Forbes and you see Master P, the $30 million man. So now you're trying to figure out, well, alright what's that $30 million do? Then you look up and you see Russell [Simmons] had Phat Farm, and Def Jam, and all this, and he was the $100 million man. So I think for me the bar kept raising to keep trying to get the guys to keep them in that stratosphere, in that level of playing field.
So the deals were always pushing the envelope. The guys own a studio in Atlanta. They own their own record label, started their own clothing line. Anything that could create wealth for them, we tried to find a way to do. So I don't know if there's a "Once we get $20 million in the bank we'll be happy" type of number like that. It's just that, you know, there's always more we can push the envelope to.
And then I'm always comparing OutKast to like U2 and the Rolling Stones, stuff like that. My goal has always been for OutKast to be the biggest rap bands of all time and eventually one of the all-time great rock bands. Because there's a difference between a rap band and a rock band, and I think at the phase that we are right now, we've become a rock band. And that's where I wanted us to go.
When you're a rock band, your numbers are different. When you're a rock band you can make a million dollars a night, to do a show. When you're a rap band, you can make $100,000 a night. That might be the top you'll make. And so that's the difference.
Because what, you'll fill auditoriums, arenas, speedways, whatever it is?
You can get stadiums, you can fill multiple nights in arenas. Mainstream has embraced you. You can get sponsorships. It's just a bigger pot.
When did you know that it was monster time for these guys?
I think "Ms. Jackson." The guys' fourth album, called Stankonia, they had a song on there called "Ms. Jackson" and it went to radio, and it just [grew] so fast. It was everywhere, on every chart, just, spins were crazy, the audience grew so quickly, and it was just, wham. Like, we're here. This is mainstream. Everyone knows who we are now, the guys are recognized. …
Step out of OutKast for a minute, or least look at the business. … Give me a sense of the business when you started, and where the business is now.
I think when I started, R&B and hip-hop was just starting to cross over to mainstream. Everything started to have a hip-hop beat under it. So we had attracted the mainstream crowds, and the mainstream audience. [M.C.] Hammer opened up the door. When Hammer sells 15-20 million records, people are paying attention to you. So the hip-hop numbers changed. Artists used to make five, $10,000 a night in the rap game. We're now making $50, $70, $100,000 a night.
In the grander scheme, everyone started trying to find their hip-hop and their R&B and their urban divisions. Every label had to have one. So every label had to have a rapper, or they had to have a rap group. They had to have a female rapper, they had to have an R&B boy band.
So these urban divisions in each label grew and they started to swell. Well when they grew, they also started spending more. Because it became, who could make the better video? Who could look flyer in their video? Who's going to spend $500,000? Who's going to spend a million dollars?
Urban music is driven by the producers just as much, or if not more than rock bands. So you had to pay this producer $40,000 for a track, $50,000, $100,000 dollars. "Well I want his best track, I'll give $250,000." It became this numbers game, and because everyone was selling, and everyone was wanting double and triple platinum, like that. In the '90s, it was like the golden era. It was like money was an object. Everyone could make money. As Puff would say, "Money ain't a thing." Money was just flowing through. The numbers became ridiculous. Budgets weren't making sense. You were selling three, four million records and weren't making any money.
So that's when the game changed, because everyone was just trying to throw out so much quantity and no one was putting out quality. Because everybody was hoping that, well if I can throw out two, three, four, five, a quarter, and one hits each quarter that sells me four million, it will justify everything else.
But in the meantime, the public is buying all this. They're buying all five each quarter. And they're liking one. Now that's in '94, '95. By '98 the public's buying 25-30 records a year and liking maybe two complete projects. They're really just getting one single off each of those. So they're starting to feel jaded and tricked. Why are they spending all this money and then not getting the record they want?
So around '98, '99, start getting things like Napster. Start getting ways for people just to get music, one single at a time, just what they want, and not be bothered with the rest of the CD. And the game starts to change. And people start to say, "Hey, we're losing money. People are just buying one single; they're not buying the albums. Our sales are going down."
In the grander scheme of things, I think what happened was the '90s was a high, like on a graph, and I think that where we are now is we're leveling back down. I think that if you realistically take a look at the music industry before say '92, '93, you'll probably find the album sales now are probably back where they were before then.
People say the music industry's down, it's coming to an end and everything, but we're coming off a high. … So the numbers are going to go back down to a leveled out thing, but everyone at the same time is seeing the result of downloading, and everyone's blaming it on downloading. In my opinion it's not downloading that's killing us, it's [that] we stopped putting out quality music. We stopped giving the public something to believe in. We started just giving them, "Here take this, take this, take this." And the public caught up to us and was like, "Hey, we don't want to take it no more, and we get it someplace else."
I think that if labels adjusted the game again, started putting out good records, quality records, the public will buy. Our OutKast is at eight million records right now. Eminem just sold eight million. 50 Cent sold six. Norah Jones sold six. The public will buy good music when you give them good music to buy. And that's what it should be about. We should get back to putting out good music.
So tell me why good music isn't being made. Or enough good music anyway.
I think one problem was the invention of the CD. With the CD, from vinyl to the CD, all of a sudden you had 80 minutes of space on a disk. Artistic people, if you give them 80 minutes of space, they going to try and fill 80 minutes of music. You can't always make 80 good minutes of music. Sometimes you're going to make 45 minutes of good music. "But now I got 80 minutes, I need to do interludes, I need to do another track, or I need to do outtakes, or I need to do skits." People just start filling up CDs just to fill them up. And A&Rs weren't strong enough to say, "Mmm, I only want these 10 songs for your records. Do whatever you want for the other ones." …
So I think that, along with computers, and people's attention spans and everything getting shorter, along with us making longer music, you found a perfect storm.
I tell people now all the time, young kids, when I was 15-16, if you gave me a $100, I would go buy a bunch of music, some comic books, maybe something to eat, and stretch out. I'd be okay. I might even be able to get some jeans and stuff. If you give the kids $100, he can buy one pair of jeans, maybe an outfit, or he can pay his two-way, or his cellphone or his pager bill that his parents gave him, or he can buy a video game, or he can do something.
But the last thing he thinks about with the $100 right away is buy music. That's the last thing that he thinks about. It used to be that was the first thing we thought about. We have to get that kid back into thinking, "I got some money, I should go purchase a CD." We got to start making it quality. …
Can the accountants and the lawyers and whoever runs these companies, actually recognize good music when they hear it? Especially hip-hop, or understand anything about it?
No. We're run by corporations now. We have accountants running two of the four majors right now and they don't get it. It's a numbers game. And music has always been a feelings game. And I think until they get back to a place where they're like, "Yeah I'll run it on the feelings again, but don't go over the top, keep the numbers under control," it's going to be hard.
You can't tell an accountant that, "This record feels good to me. I need to stay after it for a minute until it breaks." He doesn't get it. Because he's looking, "Well the charts say, or the numbers say it just doesn't make any sense. We're going to lose money. It's going to be diminished returns." And he definitely doesn't get it when you go, "You know what, we didn't get it on this record, but it feels good, I need another $600,000 to go make another one. Because I'm telling you I think we're going to have it on the next one."
There's so many bands that have become successful in their second, third or fourth project that would never get to that point. And that's the problem we're having right now, is that labels are being run in such an accounting firm way, there's going to be a lot of bands that never get to the opportunity to have a second, or to get on the road, or to shoot a video, get a visual, get that one crack that they need at it. And, it's not, it's not good for the game. So I'm happy that a company like we are right now has, has somebody like an Edgar Bronfman running it, who's a music person at heart, who's going to allow the company to take some swings. …
I think another problem was, everyone's looking at the numbers going down in the income on the labels, but the catalog business that carried the music industry for so long, it was a very finite business. Eventually everyone was going to have everything they wanted. You reach the point. There's only so many times you can re-package, re-master, digitally re-do, the Beatles. You brought it out, every year you put out a Beatles package. Eventually everyone's going to have that copy of the Beatles package or people are going to realize, "I just bought the same CD again," and they're going to stop buying it. So that year you're not going to have that extra two, $300 million off the Beatles, because people stop buying it. I think people didn't anticipate that. …
But how bad are things [in the music industry]? Really bad?
It is the perfect storm out there. But I think we're starting to get past the perfect storm. I think that these changes are going to lead us through it. I think that the public doesn't care about anybody right now, any of the artists right now. I think we've all become, like, the artist of the moment. I think the public is ready to move on to the next hot thing as soon it happens.
Even your guys?
I think especially my guys, in the sense of, I watched No Doubt. They matter still, but unless they have a hot record out, unless you have something the public wants, sort of slide over to the side, and then the next hot thing comes on. I don't think it's a bad thing. I don't think you can be hot all the time, otherwise it makes your fall so much harder, and it's hard, it's grabbing your artist. So I think it's good, but at the same time we need to get this next generation of kids to care about the artists. We got to get some artists that these kids want to grow up with, and that they care about and they care what their story is.
And you know, I think there's too much access to us now. I think reality TV and things of those shows, "American Idol", I think it's taking away the luster and the mystery and the excitement of the music industry. I just sat around with my cousin, who works in a paint factory, and he can tell me about the music industry because he saw it on TV. He heard this or he read this somewhere. There's nothing mysterious about it anymore, everyone thinks they know what it takes. …
What happened to radio? … Can groups break in now? It's like three kinds of radio stations everywhere in America.
Radio is so horrible right now. I don't even understand what the FCC was trying to accomplish. I just am like, what was the goal of this again? I thought you were supposed to be creating opportunity. You gave monopolies. You basically created monopolies. The richest and the strongest took over.
It's such a complicated game that it's hard to maneuver. If you've got a record that's working and you're on there, you love the system. If you have a song like a "Hey Ya" that all thousand Clear Channel stations are playing, you're in heaven.
But if you have a record that none of the Clear Channel stations are playing, you're out. What do I do? Like, who do I have to pay? It's not good. There's no competition, there's no originality, the playlists don't entertain new artists. There's no new energy. …
What does OutKast represent? … Is it that they had a chance to develop? Are they one of the few great positive stories of the business? And can another group ever possibly be like them?
I think that OutKast is a unique mixture of talent and intelligence coming together, and having vision. … OutKast has found a way to become a rap band, a pop band, and a rock band. And exist in all three realms, and be respected by their peers in all three realms.
I think that musically it would take a lot for another band to do that, because you need the personalities as well. 'Dre's a rock star, all day everyday, like there's no if ands or buts about it. But Big Boi's the personality that keeps it in the streets for them. And that balance is what worked. And I think, you know, that combination, with the sensibilities of L.A. [Reid], with me managing, I think all those things together have allowed us to create what we have now. I think you'd have to find another combination similar to that. Really talented group, with management that guide it, with a label that believed in them, and get to that area that you're in. …
One of the people we're following on this show is a young singer. How does she do it, how does she break in, what's the formula? What's it going to take to get new artists? Because there's not a lot of new artists poking through out there.
There's not a lot of new artists. I think that you can either go the big label route, which is find a hit record and get on the radio, and then hope your press and everything you do connects the public to you, and you break out that way. Or you don't have the big label, you don't have the money behind your project, you got to go the rock 'n' roll route. You either get back out on the road, and do performances, and do morning shows, and do everything that nobody else wants to do, and build a groundswell, build a reputation that people like you, and do that. That takes more time, but at the same time I think it's more rewarding when you win.
So as a new artist that's what I would do, is ground up. You can't get a superstar artist to do a morning show for radio. You can't get a superstar artist to do morning show TV. You can't get a superstar artist to do small publications. New artists should be flooding those. And that should be where the public knows that they can go to, to find new artists. And I think that that will start to nurture. Before you know it those artists will become afternoon artists because they'll be bigger and they'll want to do the afternoon show. …
But you're talking about people making decisions like that in record companies that are accountants and lawyers, not music people right?
They got to get more music people back in. They got to get more music people back in, they got to get better A&Rs back in, and people have to stop being scared.
What's it going to take for that to happen?
… I think these labels have an opportunity right now to clear out some of the blood that got tainted, and get some new fresh blood in there, some fresh energy.
And everyone became a follower, also. Everyone got into, " OutKast is working, we need an OutKast." Or "Evanesence is working, we need an Evanesence."
Where's the new Norah Jones?
You can't do that. If you find it, perfect, cool. But find something original. Or find something that isn't out there, do something.
You've got to have skill to do that.
You've got to find people that have hunger. The skill you can teach somebody. You can teach somebody how to make a record and how to do that stuff. You can't teach someone to have an ear. So I'm running a label, I'm going to hire somebody with an ear. I can teach them everything else.
But if you're running a label you're running it from Germany or a bank or someplace, right?
You know, they send the money from over there, but we still run the labels from here. You got to do it creatively. …
Some of the models and some of the ways that we've done things have to change. If they don't, the storm's going to continue, we're going to be stuck in there. Music's not going anyplace. Even if you download it for free, same things you going to need. You always going to need new music, public's always going to need to hear it somehow. You're going to need artists, you're not going to be able to get artists to do it for free.
It's always the artist that hasn't broken, that is just out there trying to get a deal, that says, "I'll do it for free." As soon as they taste some money, they're going stop wanting to do it for free. There's going to be changes. I think that this is a good time for music, because the changes are starting to take place.
One of the bands we're following is a new band called Velvet Revolver that's being made out of the old Guns N' Roses and Stone Temple Pilots guys who are saying, it's time for a revolution. Rock is back, we're going to blast through hip-hop and we're going to be back… Could rock really come back, or did rock already have its day and it's time for something else?
Comes back to the music. If you put out some music that people can feel, they can run through. Hip-hop's stale right now. What makes OutKast look so good is that hip-hop is also so stale. If people don't jump on the OutKast bandwagon, and see this as an opportunity to push the envelope, people just go back into their regular routine. Hip-hop's stale, if rock came through with some new energy or something, yeah.
It's going to be up and down. The question's going to be, who jumps back on that pop wave first, around 2006, 2007? To me whoever finds that next boy band first, that next Britney first, that next wave of artists first. That's when the labels are going to see the money they're looking for again.
But until then, I think we just keep putting out good records, we're steady as a ship, we'll be good. But yeah, rock can make a comeback. It's got to be good, it's got to be real good. It's got to be really good.
And who's the audience? Are they going after their fans from before, or are they going after new kids? I mean you talk about those two groups, what, who are they trying to get? You've got to figure that out. The problem with hip-hop is at 35 in hip-hop you're over, you're old. Hip-hop's a completely young type of genre. You've got to be young and fresh. Rock you can be older. You can be the Eagles going out now, and still have your fans.
But what they're talking about doing is something new. So are they going after their old fans or are they trying to get 13, 14, 15-year-old kids to like them? That's what they got to figure out, how you going to market it? …
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Florida Attorney General Says Student Loan Firm Bilked Consumers
(CN) – The Florida Attorney General's office sued a student loan debt relief firm it claims was nothing more than the front for a scam that bilked consumers out of millions of dollars.
As described in a May 23 complaint filed in Palm Beach County, Florida, Strategic Student Solutions and several related companies falsely promised to reduce or eliminate student loan debt in exchange for upfront fees ranging from $166 to $233, and monthly payments.
Also offered to borrowers as part of the alleged scam were bogus credit repair services.
"Strategic represents to consumers that upon receipt of their third payment, their current student loan monthly payment will be reduced; that the new set amount will be automatically withdrawn from consumers' bank accounts; and that the new, lower monthly payments will go towards satisfying consumers' student loan balances," the attorney general's office said in a statement.
None of this proved to be true, it says.
The state also says some students were told that after paying the fees and commencing to make additional monthly payments, they qualified for " "Obama's Student Loan Forgiveness Plan," and that their loans would be forgiven in full.
This also proved not to be true, the attorney general's office says.
According to the complaint, Strategic failed to make payments to the lenders as promised, and when consumers contacted their lenders they found out that Strategic didn't have a business relationship with them.
The attorney general's office says its investigation revealed that the student loan services allegedly provided by Strategic were actually offered free of charge by the federal government
"Consumers reported that Strategic did not provide the promised student debt relief services; that Strategic failed to provide sufficient consumer support; and that consumers were unable to cancel defendants' student loan debt services even after following the proper cancellation procedures," the complaint says.
The attorney general is seeking injunctive relief on claims of violation of the Florida's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.
A representative of Strategic Student Solutions could not be reached for comment on the lawsuit.


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[R493R, Whistler Blackcomb] ran its first test of the new Peak 2 Peak lift with its first gondola Sky Cabin making the crossing shortly after announcing its target opening date for the lift.
The first 12 Sky Cabins made their way across the 4.4-kilometer (2.73-mile) span from Blackcomb Mountain towards Whistler Sept. 19. Tradition dictates that the first passenger is a Doppelmayr engineer, riding atop the gondola's carriage. Mathias Zundrell rode Sky Cabin Number Five across the expanse strapped in with a harness and wearing a hardhat as he hung 436 meters or 1,427 feet off the valley floor.
The gondola stopped at each lift tower for Zundrell to check the mechanisms. The remainder of the 12 Sky Cabins followed across the expanse, gliding into Whistler's terminal. Peak 2 Peak will have a total of 28 Sky Cabins, including two with glass floors.
Construction is still underway on both terminal buildings. Load testing will take place during October and November, as well as operator training and evacuation simulation and training.
The resort announced the gondola's official opening for Dec. 12. "We know that on December 12, the way our guests use Whistler Blackcomb will be changed forever," says Dave Brownlie, President and Chief Operating Officer of Whistler Blackcomb.


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Time for the next entry covering Shawn Riley's list of 101 Tips to Make your EMR and EHR More Useful. I can't believe that this is the last post in the series. I think it's been a good series chalk full of good tips for those looking at implementing an EHR in their office. I'd love to hear what people thought and if they'd like me to do more series like this one. Now for the final 5 EMR tips.
5. Automatic trending helps all over the place – A picture is worth a thousand words and this is never more true than when we're talking about trending. Make sure your EHR software can quickly take a set of results and/or data points and graph them over time.
4. Keep training over and over – Are you ever done learning software? The answer for those using an EMR is no. Part of this has to do with the vast volume of options that are available in EMR software. However, the training doesn't necessarily have to come from formal training sessions. Much of the training can also come by facilitating interaction and discussion about how your users use the software. By talking to each other, they can often learn from their peers better ways to use the software.
3. Infrastructure is key to performance – I love when people say "My EMR is Slow" cause it's such a general statement that could have so many possible meanings. Regardless of the cause of slowness, the EMR is going to get the blame. For those wanting to dig in to the EMR slowness issue, you can read my pretty comprehensive post about causes of EMR slowness. I think you'll also enjoy some of the responses to that EMR slowness post.
Infrastructure really matters when someone is using an EMR all day every day. There's no better way to kill someone's desire to use an EMR than to have it be slow (regardless of who's responsible).
2. Quit pulling charts as soon as possible – I think this tip should be done with some caution. In certain specialties the past chart history matters much more than in others. Although, it's worth carefully considering how often you really look through the past paper chart in a visit. You might be surprised how rare it is that you really need the past paper chart. If that's the case, consider only pulling the chart when it's needed. If you only find yourself looking through the past paper chart for 2 or 3 key items, then just have someone get those 2 or 3 items put into the EMR ahead of time. Then, it will save you having to switch back and forth. Plus, then it's there for the next time the patient visits.
1. Crap process + Technology = Fast Crap – Perfect way to end 101 EMR and EHR Tips! I like to describe technology as the great magnifier. The challenge is that it will magnify both the good and bad elements of your processes. Fix the process before you apply the technology.
If you want to see my analysis of the other 101 EMR and EHR tips, you can find them all at the following link: 101 EMR and EHR tips analysis.


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Gone But Not Forgotten
Wednesday, April 01, 2015
My photos this week are from one of the oldest (maybe the oldest) major cemetery in the city. It's a couple of blocks of headstones and dead people just a little east of downtown (you can see the Tower of the Americas and bits of downtown hotels in the background of some pictures.) I took the pictures several years ago.
My anthology for the week is
New European Poets
published in 2008 by Graywolf Press. It is a very large collection of nearly 400 pages with, by rough count, about that many poets from 44 countries. (I didn't know there were so many.)
Plus me and poets from my library as usual.
dear diary
Bernardo Atxaga
Chus Pato
[and now the panopticon is a ruin]
ah, Clint, what are you doing there?
Gary Snyder
One Day in Late Summer
Spilling the Wind
breakfast by the river
Piotr Sommer
Don't Sleep, Take Notes
concrete gardens
Michael Blumenthal
Existential Couplets
music doth soothe
Ronalds Briedis
Before Addressing the People
the best I can do today
Jannette Lozano
Place of a dream with Gesualdo
Cold Flame
extra innings
Senadin Musabegovic
Dawn at Auschwitz
Jim Carroll
lost and found
Haris Vlavianos
De Imagine Mundi
John Phillip Santos
Oxford Punk
looking for a poem not about me
Anka Zagar
the future former you and me
After five years, a revelation and I suddenly understand what I've been doing.
dear diary
it lately occurred to me,
after five years of writing a poem every day,
that these are not just a collection
of fair to terrible poems,
but a daily journal of my life,
stories of me and what I care about,
truth, sometimes, but more often the comfortable lies
I have chosen to make it all and especially me
a little more
even as I do
that the greatest truths are often found in the lies
we tell about ourselves...
I do not edit my poems
nor do I ever throw one away
for to edit a poem
is to edit
(and who would dare do that,
consequence of each edit
and to throw a poem away
is to throw away the day
it represented
days are too short in number
to ever throw one
so I'll keep doing this.
writing these things, some better than this one,
many worse and I'll keep calling them poems .
despite all those who object,,
when you get right down to it,
it seems a humbler thing to call them
than autobiography, something best left to generals
and presidents and other persons of more import
than me...
I begin with two poets from this week's anthology. The country Spain, but the poems are translated from two different languages.
The first of the two poets is
Bernardo Atxaga
whose poem is translated from it's original Basque by
Amaia Gabantxo
. Born in 1951 in the Basque Autonomous Community, "Atxaga" is the pseudonym of
Joseba Irazu Garmendia
. He studied economics and philosophy at the Universities of Bilbao and Barcelona and worked at a variety of jobs before dedicating himself to writing in 1980, publishing several books since then of poetry that have been translated into more than seventy languages.
Life knows only
thorny extremes.
When not jungle
It dreams no more.
And so, this September of
Red Ferns
wants only
and Wolf;
aims at being bare,
frozen Immensity.
And Sun dreams
of Light pure and sharp,
blinding memory
of Bees.
While Night
remembers fondly
that first moment
of only night.
And so
Never, Never,
Always, Always,
loudly beats my Heart.
against those two words, unfortunately,
all desires.
The second poet from Spain is by
Chus Pato
, again a pseudonym for
Maria Xesus Pato Diaz
. Born in 1955 in Ourense, Galicia, she is a well-known writer and political activist.
Her poem is translated from Galician by
Erin Moure
[and now the panopticon is a ruin]
and now the panopticon is a ruin
never mind for i can imagine the landscape however i want
if a desert, it'll be a tell
if rich with vegetation, wisteria will grow over the building
if in Antarctica, it'll be a phantasmagoria of ice
some folks (working women, crazies,schoolchildren, poets)
still live there, they don't realize no one guards them
for in times of plenitude, systems of domination don't pay
attention anymore to populations, they don't have to feed
just as you were saying "capital is illiterate"
i have to get out
exit biology, remain in my body
Some of my more leftward flailing friends will never go to another Clint Eastwood film after his appearance at the Republican convention in 2012. Though not intense as they, I was disappointed, and expressed it here. Wasn't really that surprised though. Not much appreciation among the lefties of my acquaintance for a true individualist and denier of whatever kind of kool-aide they're swimming in at any given time, and Clint surely is one of those.
ah, Clint, what are you doing there
ah, Clint,
you're my hero,
a freedom-kind-of-guy,
a defender-of-the-truth-kind-of-guy,
a friend-of-the-abused-and-friendless-kind-of-guy
a no-bullshit-kind-of-guy
so what were you doing there?
to these anti-freedom clowns,
these congenital liars,
these abusers of the poor and unprotected,
these low-life bullshit masters
I'm very disappointed
with you,
but you're still my hero
cause I'm almost
as old as you
and my hero-supply is running kinda low
and I don't think I should toss
any of the remaining few
under the train...
you should know
it's a pretty close call
First from my library this week, two pieces by
Gary Snyder
, taken from his book
Danger on Peaks
. The book, a 2004 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist, was published (my paperback edition) by Shoemaker Hoard in 2005.
One Day in Late Summer
One day in late summer in the early nineties I had lunch with my
old friend Jack Hogan, ex-longshore union worker and activist of
San Francisco, at a restaurant in my small Sierra town. The owner
had recently bought and torn down the adjoining brick building
which had been a second-hand bookstore, "3Rs," run by
a puckish ex-professor. Our lunch table in the patio was right where
his counter had been. Jack was married to my sister once. We all
hung out in North Beach back in the fifties, but now he lives in
This present moment
that lives on
to become
long ago
Spilling the Wind
The faraway line of the freeway faint murmur of motors, the slow
steady semis and darting little cars; two thin steel towers with faint
lights high up blinking; and we turn on a raised dirt road between
two flooded fallow rice fields - wind brings more roar of cars
hundreds of whit-fronted geese
from nowhere
spill the wind from their wings
wobbling and slideslipping down
(Last Slough, Cosumnes, February 2002
A pleasant start to a pleasant day that, but for this daily writing exercise, might be lost forever in some short time.
breakfast by the river
breakfast by the river
with a friend
early on a schizoid morning
to the south
a bright blue sky
with puffy white clouds
softly cruising
to the north the black swirling clouds
of the night of heavy rain
just past...
a duck
with one blazing blue
feather half-hidden under a dun-colored wing
calmly tours with a jerky-duck stride
between the tables
of other diners, walks around us twice,
then settles in beside me...
I don't know what she wants
or what I'm supposed
to do about
so we just look at each
other in mutual
another day beginning
in an addled state of
confusion,familiar to me
for the past couple of weeks, stymied this day
by a duck with a single
blue feather
Next from this week's anthology, Polish poet
Piotr Sommer
with two poems. Born in 1948 in Walbrzych, Poland, Sommer is a poet and translator of contemporary English-language poetry.
The first poem was translated from Polish by
Halina Janod
Ed Adams
, and
Edward Carey
(after Wang Wei)
We live secluded under the smoke of steelworks.
The area to the east and south is Warsaw.
the sun is burning out and shining through the dust.
The river is invisible, our house was built by little ants.
It's freezing and almost dark, white figures return to their homes.
The buses can hardly move -
at home dogs have had a hard day.
Today, just as before, there are redundant people.
Yet each of them can do a lot and each can bear a lot.
The second poem was translated from Polish by
Halina Janod
D. J. Enright
Don't Sleep, Take Notes
At four this morning
the milkwoman was knocking
in plain clothes, threatening
she wouldn't leave us anything,
at most remove the empties,
if I didn't produce the receipt.
It was somewhere in my jacket,
but in any case I knew
what the outcome would be:
she'd take away yesterday's curds,
she'd take away the cheese and eggs,
she'd take our flat away,
she'd take away the child.
If I don't produce the receipt,
if I don't find the receipt,
the milkwoman will cut our throats.
Here's a poem from 2013 that goes well with this week's photos. In fact it may have been written the week I took the pictures.
concrete gardens
with age,
we come to accept
the limited future of our own
corporal self
to accept, no matter how long our life,
that all the works
of our kind
are equally limited
to their own moments in time,
longer moments than our own, but still
all passing fancies, like us, that begin and end
on a schedule unknown to us,
inevitabilities unknown to us until their moment
of denouement,
the whens and whys,
the mystery lying before us, clues aplenty
all around us, the how-we-will-end
surely a final play like those of all who ended before us,
most all, some version
of suicide, a product of an aggressive, explosive nature
or just the weariness of existence overtaking the will to continue,
unrecognized until the final of the kind lifted its head
and realized it was the last and that no more
would follow...
it might be there are no examples
for us to study,
maybe all kinds find their own way
to kill themselves,
all inevitable ends reflecting the truth
that we are all part of a universe of both birth and death,
both equal and appropriate
to the machinery
that keeps all the universal wheels
Next from my library, a poem by
Michael Blumenthal
. The poem is taken from his book,
No Hurry, Poems 2000-2012
, published by Etruscan Press at Wilkes University in 2012.
Existential Couplets
1. Rhetorical Question
If love were human nature not a curse
Why, then would have it fathered so much verse?
2. Posthumous Thoughts of a Mole Beheaded by a Root-Tiller
I followed my nose, but it didn't seem to know
The places noses aren't supposed to go
3. A Brief History of the Life of Hemingway
He was such a high-romantic figure
Until, at last, he found the trigger
4. Hope in Mid-Age
An aging man's hope is that desire
will fizzle out, and not expire
5. The Deaths of Others
The best thing about it, to be blunt,
Is it's not ourselves who bear the brunt
Of trying to breathe from underground
And finding there is no air around
6. On the Relationship between Having Sex Outdoors at Twenty Eight and Mowing the Lawn at Sixty
The grass was green on both occasions
That's all that links the generations
7. Wisdom at Sixty
It took so long to get, and now it's worth so little
from the darkened vantage off the declining middle
8. Senescence
In youth you heard your elders' counsel, but didn't heed it
Now you see the writing on the wall, and cannot read it
9. "The fact is..."
Said by those who seldom knows the facts
The mouth asserting what the spirit lacks
10. Satyr
He didn't know a thing, in fact, about the mission
But merely loved its antiquated old position
11. Poets
By the hundreds, by the thousands, night and day
The hunger for the sacred. So it runs away.
12. A Brief History of Sexual Life
The war between domestic life and sex
Goes back to old Tyrannosaurus Rex
I have friends who are excellent, sometimes inspired, musicians. I enjoy nothing more than to sit beside them and listen while they create. I had to do a little re-write on this piece because the first readers of the poem didn't get that meaning, thinking instead that I was talking about the pleasure of sitting with someone listening to someone else's music. That's kind the opposite the point of the the wonder of sitting beside an otherwise regular person as they make amazing music.
music doth sooth
music doth sooth the savage breast,
they say...
at least,
pretty much any kind,
from grand opera to grand ol'opree, country gospel, western swing,
cowboy tunes, rock and roll, hard rock, squishy rock, squooozy rock, metal, punk,
reggae,ska, funk, bop, bebop, Dixie, smooth and hard and all the other
modes in the bag Louis found in a New Orleans brothel
that someone decided to call jazz, and all the other rocks,
indie rock, Hindi rock and Hindi classical, singer/songwriters
from Wimberly, Texas or anywhere else where a fella or a gal
with a guitar and a wholesome homey voice can bring a catch to your throat,
and the unfamiliar harmonies of Japanese music and Chinese music and that lonesome
wailing music of the Bedouin in the desert and the call from the world's minarets
for the faithful to come to prayer and the fiddle and accordion and clarinet
of a klesmer band and the conjunto and reancheras from closer
to my part of the world, and the rumba and samba and conga and
bossa nova and all and everything else I can't think of now...
but best of all is the music I hear sitting close to someone I know...
not a science, not an art, but the miracle of a regular person known to me,
known to be regular, known to have all the regular attributes of normal regularity,
such a person, with their talent transcendent, finding a place beside the angels...
more than a gift, this wonderful expression of soul
through music, a blessing instead, one I never had but can
only appreciate, like watching a miracle unfold,
like watching the creation of a new and familiar element
under the sun...
if I could sing, I would never stop and don't understand those
who do, like putting a cap on a night of stars
and storing them in a black bottle in the back of the furthermost shelf
of never-going-there-again
such a dark night they make for themselves who do...
Next from the anthology I have two short poems by
Ronalds Briedis
, a Latvian poet born in 1980. There is a poor translation on Wikipedia which mostly confused me.
Both poems were translated by Latvian by
Margrita Galilitis
J. C. Todd.
Like the one before the world was created
Fog slides over the river
Tangles in brushes on shore
Dew trembles on a branch
A bud bursts open
A fledgling moves in a nest
Like the one before the first word was spoken
Church bells lick their lips
Before addressing the people
Before addressing the people
The prophet on return from the desert
Bends over the well
To quench his thirst
But freezes
When he sees his reflection -
His open mouth a zero
Here's something from 2014, a kind of desperate shot, it seems to me, at a poem for the day.
the best I can do today
damp wind
blows dreary -
fever clouds cover the sun
dog wants to walk
I want to sleep -
agree to let the dog walk in my sleep
protein -
body craves the solid comfort of protein -
rib-eye, driving to the supermarket
haiku masters,
Issa, Buson, Basho relieved to be dead
as I mangle their art form
The next short poems from my library are by
Jannette Lozano
, from her book,
The Movements of Water/Los momentos del agua
. The book, published in 2006 by Ediciones Poligafa of Barcelona, is beautifully illustrated abstract paintings suggesting moving water by Mexican artist Victor Ramirez. It is a bilingual book, including both the original Spanish and English translation by
Ron Hudson
Lozano is a Mexican poet and translator who has spent many years teaching and writing about the ancient philosophy and religion of Pre-Hispanic cultures, focusing particularly on myth. Her work has been translated into English, French, Italian, and Romanian.
Place of a dream with Gesualdo
The depth of night was shining,
the initial horizon
in a attempt to scatter the chants.
I was searching for the hill,
the house, the traces of fog
in the sharp leaves of the cypress.
I saw a bridge sink, the whiteness,
the voice
of the tree I heard.
What little Spanish I have is not usually good enough to enjoy the untranslated poem, but this one falls off the tongue beautifully
Despues de un sueno con Gesualdo
Brillaba el fondo de la noche
el horizone inicial
en un intento de esparcir los cantos
Yo buscaba la colina,
la casa, los trazos de la nieba
en las cortantes hojas del cipres.
Vi un puente hundise, la espuma,
la voz
del arbol escuche
Cold Flame
As if it would beat out a silence
the gold of the fireflies between spruce
was impassioned.
The light was falling on the water ad you were moving away
like one who exits a scene
without one's body.
Fire amidst the water,
was tracing a wake without knowing
that the sun was looking at you
for the first time
This, from a morning last week thinking about the time I've had that others have not.
extra innings
this morning
of my father, as I often do...
dead 35 years ago
just weeks after turning 65,
and, at the same time,
thinking of myself, now
just a few weeks past my own
71st birthday
of the 6 years I've had
that was denied to him,
and what I've done with those years
that he would have thought
worth doing
and, beyond that,
what he would have done
had he had those extra years
for himself...
and I have a hard time
with both those questions,
first because, after all the years
that have passes, it is hard to think of him,
not as a shadow man old beyond his years,
but at the tall young father
who would chase me down the street
after a hard day's work, squirt gun in hand,
running like the boy who was still a part of him,
not the serious working man in middle age,
not the pale figure in his bed
nearer each day to a premature death...
it occurs to me he never had a chance
in his life to seriously consider those extra years,
knowing well before they were lost that they would never
be his...
as for what I have done with the extra years,
I can't help thinking
he would have thought
he could have done
Next from the anthology, here is
Senadin Musabegovic
from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Born in 1970 in Sarajevo, he graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy in Sarajevo, from the University of Siena in Italy in Political Philosophy, and earned a Ph.D. at the European Institute in Florence. He has lectured at universities in Europe and the United States.
His poem was translated from the Bosnian by
Ulvija Tanovic
Dawn at Auschwitz
This morning
things have finally,
through the shriek of the officer's whistle
which penetrates the cracked barracks boards,
whispered their names to us.
As I open my eyes
two mice scurry into their hole;
frightened by the pasted faces
they twitch their legs and huddle together,
in the warmth of their bodies
on our smells to feed.
Images that slip by through the morning haze
the gray dog's paws whose tracks in the snow
resemble the dark eye sockets with their gaze turned up to the sky,
in which white infinity freezes;
and the electrified barbed wire which stirred my movements
touches the lines of the sky and the snow,
in the sounds of the doomsday harp;
and the officer's shining badge from which
the eagle with spread-out wings
plucks out pieces of my flesh
enter me
like darkness enters
a child's eyes.
The crematorium smoke softens the harshness of the landscape,
creating in it the contours of a female body
which speaks to me alluringly of the gentleness of the heavens.
Here death has no spasm,
no twitch.
Everything is the same.
The sunrise and the sunset are the same,
like the line of the horizon
streaked with rays on the snow
in which I will be laid by my mother's hands that used to touch me
in my dream.
Only order and firmness exist.
I wrote this in 2007. I'm thinking maybe I should send it to all the Republican wannabe-presidents.
I made
an excellent fire
I had charcoal
& lighter fluid
reminding me
the secret
of making an excellent life
in the wherewithal
to start it
From my library, here is
Jim Carroll
, from his book
Void of Course, Poems 1994-1997
, published by Penguin Books in 1998.
Born in 1949, Carroll died in 2009. Most widely known for his 1978 autobiographical book,
The Basketball Diaries
, later turned into a film by the same name starring Leonardo DiCaprio, he was also an author, poet and punk musician.
Soluble in the snow
I wait for you outside
The red building filled with sparrow-hawks
& female dust
Black canopies one goes up one goes down
I go still stand wavering head down
Snow sharp
Like raw rice in my face in the wind
The neck of my guitar warped snaking
Like a dry river bed in the neon ruins
Soon I watch the women drift
In and out
Scented like a frozen stream,
Obvious, oblivious, thin
I don't want sex
I just want to give you
Your cello lesson
Except for a couple of days of intermittent, dribbly rain, we've had the kind beautiful days that cause people to move to San Antonio before anyone tells them about August.
lost and found
lost in yesterday's
gloom and rain
I almost missed spring's bright
old Broadway,
shining in the morning sun
like a new polished
silver spoon,
a festival of sunlight
having chased away
the rain
Greek poet
Haris Vlavianos
is my next poet from this week's anthology. Born in 1957, the poet is professor of history at the American College of Greece.
His poem was translated from Greek by
David Connolly
De Imagine Mundi
For John Ashbery
"How beautiful, how unexpectedly sweet life would be
if we were not obliged to live it..."
Yet once things were different.
The messages brought by the seasons
were part of an absolute truth;
the looks, the gestures, the trivial talk
meant something,
the chance indications
these two with their secret conceit confirm
that love is something more
than a game of longing.
A clear sky
or a handsome man
poring over a manuscript
(metaphors concocted to contain us)
can't preserve you face in my memory
can't color the charred area
with the precision this recollection's shadow
I ask for more
much more.
A living context that's able to accept me,
a density of light that can reveal
imagination's true possibilities
a specific language whose subtlety's
can give to that dazzle the depth of your
What power can check the gallop
of the disfigured dream vanishing beyond the horizon
what desire can interpret this decisive
that nothing can interpret?
The day comes to its end.
We have to remain here.
In this silvery haze
the soul embeds itself.
From 2008, meeting someone who reminds me of a first love.
Actually from about the age of this picture.
her name is
but she's black,
not white,
and at least
40 years
too young
to be
who lived
down the road
past the irrigation
canal, my first
if I had stopped
in front of her
and knocked
on her door,
but I don't care,
black or white
old or young,
her name is Sheila,
the magic
the exact
same name as my
and that's
for me
I would
I love her
but she'd
Last this week from my library, I have this poem by
John Phillip Santos
. The poem is taken from his book,
Songs Older Than Any Known Singer
, published by Wings Press in 2007.
Born in 1957, Santos is a freelance filmmaker, producer, journalist, author, poet, and in 1979 became the first Mexican-American Rhodes Scholar. Born and raised in San Antonio, in 1997 he joined the Ford Foundation as an officer in the Media, Arts, and Culture Program. After living in New York City for twenty years, he moved back to San Antonio in 2005.
Oxford Punk
We ate biryanis de camaron and borrego
spiced anise and rock salt like fistfuls of posies
sluicing it southward with silky porter
boasting hopeful new tattoos under x-rays
until they glowed ad gradually faded
amidst gorging ourselves wondrous
in and ancient Sunday vindaloo parlor
on the Hindu furlong of old Crowley Road
in our penny-wise broke-down city of learning
another frittering dusk in a darkening yuga.
One name had gone off to Brighton, she wrote
"to mediate on a being in my belly,"
one stepped barefoot on a fishhook
one had hit the road with a blighter
she said was once back-up bassist
from the original Teardrop Explodes.
We, the inscribed, we who were left behind
had since forgotten the original question.
First came the lightning of the pleroma?
First fierce winds across mute earth?
Or was it always the word, the word, the word?
One by one, holding breath, each of the forsook
dove for scarce gold coins in the river of Beaujolais.
Hey, somebody start a fight now, he said
no easy task in a warren of wet, empty streets
fling a bicycle as far into the night as you can.
Over the wall, into a garden full of topiary sky
or better through a living room window
where the last progeny of empire
would be sleeping through reruns of Benny Hill.
One of my previous week's misery day poems.
looking for a poem not about me
trying very hard
to find a poem that isn't
about me,
but it seems for the past several weeks
most everything is about me,
the rest of the world and all around me
just a sideshow of shadows
and pain
that won't, unlike my brighter visions,
desert me...
through a dismal swamp,
that's my day...
so sorry I couldn't paint
for you. maybe
tomorrow, it's what I've
been counting on, tomorrows,
but stuck in yesterdays
(this is where I would insert
a clever close
if I had one)
Croatian poet
Anka Zagar
is the last this week from the
New European Poets
anthology. Born in 1954, Zagar is a librarian and, one of the most acclaimed Croatian poets, has published six collections of poetry and a number of limited editions illustrated with original etchings by famous Croatian graphic artists.
Her poem was translated from Croatian by
Tomislav Kuzmanovic
just as we pass we pass
and if we meet we meet
in the morning I milk the cows ans spill the milk into the sun
god, that's why the eclipse passed across my face
like a pencil like a birch like a blind man's cane
and I don't speak with my mouth because all of me speaks, just like when
the sea cuts into itself, it hurts in your mirror, giorgione, when all
all art moves south, a plain glade will stay behind like
a blueprint of eternity, because I build my voice from snow, don't let
the earth see you there, I will, for sure art equals
solitude, go ahead, take a bath in your eyes, though what will I then
glance at the bottom like through clear water, and then you play
a little like because the water runs HERE COMES THE NIGHT, LET'S
I'd like to take one innocent sip of that darkness
your snail coils into home verse and carries me, but
the wind unwinds that picture again, like in the spring when
I start learning foreign languages so that I don't go out, so what if
I walked to humiliate myself under the white skin of the wall, what drives
on saliva, dark happiness itself, when the sun splashes you in the morning
and you wake up: make a note of that window and close it shut, not that one,
that's my poem, a dog barked, goggled its eye, you
can leave you can leave, as the stainless steel NN hails
the roses on the state lawn, make them wake up everyone
just make them once come down after they've slept enough, but I enter my hand
like the plane, and see words are fireflies that
glowingly fly and if they pause, they just go out
I finish the post with a new poem from last week, especially appropriate for this week's photos.
the future former you and me
some say
I'm obsessed with death
because I write about it, but
what more fascinating subject
can there be but the end, writing
about one of the two enduring mysteries
of life, birth and death, the beginning and
the end...
and how, both, but especially death, can be done by
everyone, no special intelligence or training required,
and we all do it equally, at least in term of outcome, equally
well - Socrates did it, Aristotle and Karl Marx did it, along with
all the other Marx brothers, Harpo, silently and with a smile, Groucho
wise-cracking all the way, each proving at the end that they could do it just
as well as the rest...
and famous people do it and get their names in the paper for one last time,
and people no one never heard of do it, getting their names in the paper
for the very first time, good people and bad people too, some doing it
together, Bonnie and Clyde, Butch and Sundance, and all the long-
suffering heroes at Gettysburg, Guadalcanal, and Verdune
and Gallipoli and the Alamo and, like Liberty Valance
and the man who shot him, some who deserve it
and some who don't - except like Clint said,
"deserves got nothing to do with it" -
cause deserve it or not,we all get
it and I"m talking you and me
now and it that don't make
it and interesting thing to
think about it cause
what else could
there be more
than the
As usual, everything belongs to who made it. You're welcome to use my stuff, just, if you do, give appropriate credit to "Here and Now" and to me.
As always,
I am Allen Itz owner and producer of this blog, and diligent seller of books, specifically these and specifically here:
Amazon, Barnes and Noble, iBookstore, Sony eBookstore, Copia, Garner's, Baker & Taylor, eSentral, Scribd, Oyster, Flipkart, Ciando and Kobo (and, through Kobo, brick and mortar retail booksellers all across America and abroad)
New Days & New Ways
Places and Spaces
Always to the Light
Goes Around Comes Around
Pushing Clouds Against the Wind
And, for those print-bent, available at Amazon and select coffeehouses in San Antonio
Seven Beats a Second
Short Stories
Sonyador - The Dreamer
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text:
One of the most Terrifying Movies to Come out This Fall
As many of us know, box-office records were being broken all over this summer, thanks to a couple of good stories about saviors in tights. But now that summer is over, our cinematic superheroes are hanging up their costumes until the next sequel, and moviegoers are now finding themselves in a new fall season. Though a few Oscar contenders will be coming out this fall, this is definently the time of year when horror movies rule. With the frightening film "The Possession" making a killing at the box-office, and other upcoming horror films being released soon, such as: "Last House on the Left", "V/H/S", "Silent Hill: Revelations 3D", and "Paranormal Activity 4", it is clear that superheroes and action-adventures are out, and villains and terrifying suspense are in.
Even some animated kids films that are coming out this fall will be playing along a little bit with the scary movie genre, just expect then to bring more laughs than screams with films like "ParaNorman", "Hotel Transylvania", and "Frankenweenie". However, there is one kiddy flick that has already come out with a concept so scary that almost no parent dared to take his or her child to see it, and that movie was "The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure" (the horror!). In fact, this film frightened parents so much, that it only made $448,131 its opening weekend, which makes it the worst box-office opening EVER!!!
How bad is $448,131, really?
"The Oogieloves", which officially has been recognized as the worst box-office bomb of all time for a movie with a wide release (over 2,000 theaters), had a budget of about 20 million dollars and about another 40 million dollars was spent on marketing alone (this was money that was clearly well spent). To breakdown what a horrible performance this really is here is a fun facts from boxofficemojo.com; "the film had such a low showing that it had a per-theater average that went as low as $47, this means over the full 3-day weekend, the total gross for the film averaged about only $207 dollars per theater". To make your jaw drop even farther, the site claims, "if each location played "Oogieloves" five times a day on one screen at an average ticket price of $7, that would translate to fewer than two people per showing." This means that it is quite possible that many of these showings had only one kid and one very loving parent.
Marketing Geniuses?
"The Oogieloves" was marketed to children and their parents as a dance-along, sing-along, and interactive-family adventure. Dancing, Singing, and being interactive while watching a movie, unless it is The Rocky Horror Picture Show, I don't think that many people, are going to want to participate. It is hard to believe that no one working or marketing the film (though,keep in mind they were the 'creative' geniuses behind Teletubbies),had the common sense to realize that not many parents will be willing to take their child to a movie that is supposed to replicate going to a loud and obnoxious concert (let the Wiggles and Barney worry about that Hollywood). A good movie experience is supposed to be enjoyable, relaxing, and most importantly QUIET!! In fact, I cannot understand why a parent would pay to take their child to a movie where their kids, and other rugrats are encouraged to sing-along (IE: scream) and dance-along (IE: run around), to these three bigheaded hybrids of Barney and H.R Pufnstuf without puffing any stuff.
To the Very Loving but Crazy Parents
It is clear from the box-office numbers that not many parents wanted to waste their money, time, and sanity by taking their children to this cutesy calamity of a film. However, having said that, the film did make some money, which mean some parents did take their kids to see the awful "Oogieloves", even though they might have been the only ones in the theater (not quite concert experience). So, I say that the bravest moviegoers over the past long weekend were not the thousands who went to see "The Possession", but were the very few parents who sat through this sing and dance along nightmare.


text:
No naughty nurse, no sexy police woman, no slutty witch.
When Mindy and basketball lawyer Josh go to a Halloween party in this Tuesday's The Mindy Project (Fox, 9:30/8:30c), the OB-GYN leaves her fishnets at home.
"A Halloween costume is stressing my character out a lot," says the show's creator, writer and star, Mindy Kaling, who wears five or six different disguises during the episode. "There's some pretty awful and pretty – I think – hilarious costumes that you get to see during the show. I look crazy in a lot of them too, by the way," she says with a laugh. "They're not sexy, hot girl costumes."
RELATED | The Mindy Project Scoop: The Newsroom's Kelen Coleman Drops By for a Mini Office Reunion
Kaling goes on to tease the re-appearance of some familiar faces, give the odds on whether other Dunder Mifflinites will show up on her sitcom and compare her bubbly doctor character to the World's Best Boss. Read on for highlights from the conference call.
HER MILKSHAKE BRINGS ALL THE BOYS TO THE YARD | Saturday Night Live's Bill Hader and The Office's Ed Helms, both of whom appeared in the pilot, are set to show up again this season; Hader in the aforementioned Halloween episode, Helms a bit later.
TO SIR, WITH LOVE | Kaling says that Dr. Lahiri could probably learn a thing or two from a very unlikely source: Dunder Mifflin's former regional manager. "I always think that a good series, or a good hero or heroine in a show will change and evolve. And my character isn't 19," she says, noting the fictional Mindy's tendency to turn every moment into a Bridget Jonesian scene. "I think she should learn and grow. And a little bit [like] how Michael Scott in The Office was very different when he left at the end of his time… than he was in the beginning, part of loving romantic comedies is a little bit childish, you know?" Should Kaling's show run for a while, "I would love to see her shed some of that adoration for romantic comedies and try to embrace her life a little," she adds.
RELATED | Fox Picks Up The Mindy Project for a Full Season
BETTER ON TAPE | She says much prefers the comfort of an edited television show to the adrenaline rush of live theater. "I have a little stage fright. When I did plays, I was always scared, every single night. I don't miss that." Kaling adds that she marvels at her good friend (and Office love-hate-makeout interest) B.J. Novak's stand-up comedy abilities. "It seems like every week, he goes to a college and does an hour of stand-up. To me, that seems incredibly daunting."
GOOD PEOPLE, GOOD VEGGIES | The secret to Kaling's success? Hiring an amazing staff ("I trust them a lot so I can delegate things") and quaffing a daily smoothie. Seriously. Every morning, the multi-hyphenate drinks "this blend of vegetables and fruits that's this disgusting green potion that I believe keeps me alive. That's my secret trick."Follow @kimroots


text:
According to a recent Blizzard security update, now might be a good time cook up a new password.
Blizzard's security team found that its internal network has been illegally accessed, and answers to personal security questions, authenticator data and cryptographically scrambled Battle.net passwords have found their way into the perpetrator's hands. The team is confident, however, that the compromised data isn't enough to give the attacker access to user accounts, and says that there is no evidence to suggest financial data (credit cards, billing addresses and customer names) were accessed.
Blizzard President Mike Morhaine recommends that users update their passwords all the same, and we couldn't agree more. Check out his official statement at the source link below and get that Diablo III account locked down.


text:
Day 8 – Thursday, Nov. 8 Write about how you choose to write about others in your blog. (Friends, family, Doctor, etc) National Health Blog Post Month #NHBPM
Joan Winifred: What-cha doing about Dr.Bob's Elective Couch Potato Therapy Bill? Chato Stewart: Blog about Him?!?
Caption: The Internet – The Great Leveling Field
In 1986 I had a problem with a Boston restaurant… The Problem? Well to save you from being too grossed out, I will just tell you it involved a cockroach. YUCK! back then all I could do was complain to the restaurant owner who assured me "they have never had a problem with cockroaches before." Every restaurant, I'll repeat that, every restaurant in the Boston area has at one time or another had an issue with cockroaches. That's why the restaurants spray frequently for bugs. I worked at a few restaurants in Boston and I would not even eat at their site knowing what was going on behind in the kitchen. It's like the show Restaurant Impossible. If you ever watch it, you see almost every restaurant deals with or has some type of bug issue.
Now back then like I said before, all I could do was complain to one person, who didn't even offer to take care my bill or make any attempt to reassure me this problem would NOT happen again. I would never know if it happened again because I never went back! I told a few of my friends about this issue and they didn't frequent the restaurant again either. In total maybe five people found out about this gross incident and that was the end of the story.
Today with the INTERNET, there are sites to go to and review restaurants, or professionals like therapists and psychologists and not just one person finds out, but thousands could be privy to important information. It's manic word-of-mouth. Remember to wield the power of the Internet with caution because it is a two-edge sword.
Now about Dr. Bob's couch potato therapy…I love it! I just can't afford it.
Friend me on Facebook @chato B Stewart.
—————-View previous Newsletters.
Originally Posted on https://blogs.psychcentral.com/humor YOU need permission use ©2011
Family Stew: National Health Blog Post Month Cartoons
Mental Health Humor Cartoons


text:
Lytinio švietimo grėsmės paauglių lytiškumo ugdymuisi bendrojo lavinimo mokykloje
Obelenienė, Birutė
Pukelis, Kęstutis
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In solving questions of risky adolescent sexual behaviour prevention, it is common in both state prevention and health promotion programmes and educational means to see two essentially different processes equated: sexual education and sex education. The inability to properly identify these processes not only causes serious confusion in the use of these concepts but also serves as a precondition in choosing educational content, tools and methods incompatible with education and family preparation of the young generation when applying preventional measures against risky adolescent sexual behaviour in schools. The article addresses the problem of sex education integrated in school curriculum provoking incorrect sexual identity processes in adolescents. The article presents the results of a qualitative study of adolescent focus groups, which was aimed at determining the possible influence of the presence of elements of sex education in the school curriculum. Results reveal that such elements cause irresponsible sexual behaviour and the development of disrespect between persons of different gender.
- Straipsniai / Articles [5273]


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Datum: WGS84 [ Help ]
Latitude: 33° 40.307' S
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Easy next to road
DistanceTake a car
WalkInstant access (< 5min)
Easy to find?Easy to find
Public access?Public access
Special accessDon't know
Wave qualityNormal
ExperienceAll surfers
DirectionRight and left
Normal lengthShort (< 50m)
Good day lengthShort (< 50m)
Good swell directionNorthWest, SouthEast
Good wind direction
Swell sizeStarts working at 1.0m-1.5m / 3ft-5ft and holds up to 2m+ / 6ft+
Best tide positionMid and high tide
Best tide movementRising and falling tides
Week crowdEmpty
Week-end crowdCrowded
Author: Anonymous Contributors (1) They surfed this spot ! (20)
11th ave
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By danni , 04-02-2005
brent rudolph - trying to locate my old friend, he used to live around that area..
By email@example.com , 23-04-2004
melkbos - does anyone know where matt thomas is now?he used to surf melkbos then he moved to england (where i met him) and now he's back in SA. just wondered if anyone knew where i could get hold of him?if you do e-mail me.
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