Work to install a body scanner in Terminal 3 is underway, a year after they were first trialled at the airport. The scanners allow security staff to see through clothing.
Since the launch of the new scanners, around 400,000 people have used the technology. Results of passenger surveys since the airport began a voluntary trial in Terminal 2 in October 2009 reveals that over 95 per cent of travellers rated the body scanner process to be a significant improvement on the traditional airport security 'pat down'.
The airport also said the new technology had cut queue times from an average of two minutes to about 25 seconds.
"We began trialling a body scanner in 2009 because one of the most regular complaints from our passengers was about being patted down at security", said Andrew Harrison, Manchester Airport's managing director.
"Body scanners could solve this but we also knew that the technology was controversial which is why we embarked on a trial.
"We fully respect that a small number of people have reservations about body scanners on privacy or medical grounds but we have gone to great lengths to ensure the highest levels of privacy protection and expert studies have shown that the technology is safe.
When the body scanner trial began in 2009, under 18s were exempt from the process in accordance with specialist advice at the time. Passenger feedback was 75 per cent positive, according to the survey.
But a week after an alleged terrorist incident on a US flight into Detroit was foiled last December, passenger acceptance levels at Manchester Airport increased to over 95 per cent.
In February, the government instructed Heathrow and Manchester to make the technology compulsory.
The latest decision to by airport bosses makes Manchester the first UK airport to deploy body scanners across all of its passenger terminals.
So what is the option for those who do not wish to have naked photos taken of them? Surely the right to privacy should be taken into account?
I won't be flying from Manchester airport again if I have no opt out of these machines.
That is your only option, fly from another airport if you don't like it. An anonymous scan is a small price to pay for your security is it not? Surely the right to not be subjected to a terrorist attack should be taken into account?
I really don't see how these scanners breach privacy. There is no contact between the scanee and the person viewing the scan, the image are deleted immediately, and they aren't naked images anyway as they scan through to below the first layer of skin. I got to see a presentation on them a while back, as part of a group of people who did have legitimate concerns, some for reasons to do with the fact they were trans and had implants, and others from a religious perspective. Everyone at the end was both impressed and also reassured.
You have to put up with a lot of things when travelling, this makes the process easier, quicker and less invasive than traditional security.
We could just use racia/religiousl profiling as an alternative? no think the scanners are a good idea , dont you?
I fly a lot through Manchester Airport and to be honest the security checks are a joke in general, what's to stop anyone pulling the emergency door at 35k feet and de pressurising the aircraft most probably causing loss of life and a crash, there are also a host of objects that can be used as weapons that you can legally take and buy on board.


What if Talos, the mythical metal giant of Crete and archetype automaton, awakens in the modern era to fight injustice and protect the innocent? This is the narrative of Automaton's second full length release, a carefully crafted concept album spanning 48 minutes in which Talos spreads pure catastrophe. Dark and dangerous, with a cinematic quality that rises throughout their relentless groove and into the fabric of their cold, ever-expanding universe, "Talos" offers some outstanding doom/drone thrills, exploring at the same time the boundaries of the genre: heavy guitars, psychedelic black metal, sludge and drone elements merge seamlessly, while a very special guest, the legend of traditional Cretan music Psarantonis, sings and plays the lyra on the key track Talos Awakens. If Automaton's debut album "Echoes of Mount Ida" provided the setting, now "Talos" is where the real action is!
HOWLING GIANT - Howling Giant 10"


text:
namespace XenAdmin.Controls.CustomDataGraph
{
    partial class DataKey
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Required designer variable.
        /// </summary>
        private System.ComponentModel.IContainer components = null;

        /// <summary>
        /// Clean up any resources being used.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="disposing">true if managed resources should be disposed; otherwise, false.</param>
        protected override void Dispose(bool disposing)
        {
            if (disposing && (components != null))
            {
                components.Dispose();
            }
            base.Dispose(disposing);
        }

        #region Component Designer generated code

        /// <summary>
        /// Required method for Designer support - do not modify
        /// the contents of this method with the code editor.
        /// </summary>
        private void InitializeComponent()
        {
            this.SuspendLayout();
            //
            // DataKey
            //
            this.HorizontalScrollbar = true;
            this.ItemHeight = 17;
            this.MouseDoubleClick += new System.Windows.Forms.MouseEventHandler(this.DataKey_MouseDoubleClick);
            this.SelectedIndexChanged += new System.EventHandler(this.DataKey_SelectedIndexChanged);
            this.ResumeLayout(false);

        }

        #endregion
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series Preview: Las Vegas
September 22nd, 2020 by Chris Leone
With just two rounds remaining in the eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series regular season, tonight's tilt at Las Vegas Motor Speedway will be crucial for drivers looking to crack into the top eight spots in points in time for the playoffs. Even still, they'll have an uphill battle to get there—and their most frustrating opponents may be one another.
Brad Davies, Corey Vincent, Graham Bowlin, and Jimmy Mullis enter Las Vegas separated by just seven points for ninth place in the championship, putting all four on roughly equal footing coming into the night. But Davies, the leader of the pack, is still 20 points behind eighth place driver Ray Alfalla, the four-time series champion who has long since put the frustrations of his 2019 campaign behind him. Seventh place Logan Clampitt is the only other driver within a race's worth of points of Davies, but he's still another 14 points ahead of Alfalla.
With that in mind, while the full playoff grid isn't officially locked in yet, it'll take some major mistakes from either Clampitt or Alfalla to yield a spot. The top six of Bobby Zalenski, Keegan Leahy, Garrett Lowe, Michael Conti, Ryan Luza, and Nick Ottinger all have enough breathing room not to worry about being on the bubble unless they make uncharacteristic mistakes and have the cards fall just right for two events in a row.
Even in Las Vegas, it'd take quite a bit of rotten luck for anyone to make that bet. While stranger things have happened, almost all of the current playoff drivers were strong in the back-to-back 1.5-mile races at Charlotte and Atlanta in May. Lowe, Luza, and Leahy took top-fives in the 300-miler from Charlotte, while Alfalla made his long-awaited return to the winner's circle over Lowe in Atlanta, with Leahy again in the top five.
So as Davies and company hope to pressure Clampitt or Alfalla and throw them off of their game, the rest of the field looks to keep their focus on maintaining, or earning, a spot in the top 20 of the standings. For the second year in a row, the defending eNASCAR champion is hovering around the bubble; last year, it was Alfalla, but this year, Zack Novak has just a one-point edge on John Gorlinsky and two on Michael Guest for the final spot to retain their license. With a talented group of Road to Pro drivers preparing for a faceoff for the next 20 licenses this winter, the path back into the series for 2021 will be as difficult as ever.
eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series action from Las Vegas Motor Speedway kicks off tonight at 9PM ET on eNASCAR.com/live and the iRacing Facebook, Twitch, and YouTube pages. NBC Sports NASCAR analysts Steve Letarte and Parker Kligerman will join tonight's broadcast. For more information on iRacing and for special offers, visit www.iracing.com.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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With an impressive 6-fight win streak, many believed that Demian Maia would be up for the next welterweight title shot after Tyron Woodley and Stephen Thompson fought at UFC 205. Ultimately however, after Woodley retained his belt following a majority draw, the UFC opted to book a rematch between the two men for UFC 209, which takes place this Saturday.
Demian Maia was left without a title fight, and was subsequently booked for a fight with Jorge Masvidal, which rubbed many fans the wrong way.
While Maia's win streak is certainly an impressive one, many feel the top ranked contender doesn't get the attention he deserves due to the fact that fans prefer to see knockouts rather than Maia's JiuJitsu.


text:
Your password needs to be at least 6 characters. (ex: OZoFh!ISzfq,)
Your password needs to be at least 6 characters. (ex: aMlDX1$,LiAh)
32 People Describe What It's Like Living With Both Anxiety and Depression
While anxiety and depression seem to exist on opposite ends of the emotion spectrum, more often than you might think, they co-exist in the same mind. Out of those diagnosed with depression, 85 percent also have generalized anxiety disorder. So in some ways, talking about one without the other is only acknowledging half of an individual's mental health experience.
To find out what it's like to live with both anxiety and depression, we asked people in our mental health community to describe what it's like living with both.
1. "For me, it's a vicious cycle where. During the day, I'm completely exhausted and can't seem to get anything done, and then I lie awake all night worrying about all the things I didn't do…" — Karen R.B.
2. "It's two voices inside of you, both with totally different opinions. It's anxiety screaming you have to get up and do stuff or you'll fail in life, and then depression on the other side telling you it all doesn't matter anyway and you should stay in bed all day. It's being super stressed out about everything all the time but also not really caring about anything at all. It's two totally opposites pulling your mind apart, and that's really exhausting." — Amy H.
3. "Depression is not caring about anything at all, and anxiety is caring too much. And having both, ironically, is a nightmare. You want to leave everything behind and sleep, yet you overthink anxiously about everything you didn't or have to do." — Ismail T.
4. "For me, my mind is split into two halves. The anxiety half worries constantly about every aspect of my life (from health, image, to relationships) where the other half is too exhausted and worn down to do much about it." — Dominick L.
5. "It's like researching new tires and weather patterns for hours, going for a drive and getting stuck in the mud or getting hydroplaned off the road. Then silently hating all of the choices that led you to this car on this road. Then repeat, daily." — Lori S.
6. "Breathing through a coffee stirrer. A daily battle against yourself… a desire to live yet at the same time the desire to stop." — Tara K.
7. "Constantly being held back from things you really do want to do. Depression says 'don't go, you don't have enough energy and don't feel like socializing' and anxiety says 'what if you don't go and people get upset, or if you do go what if something sends you into panic mode?'" — Lindsey W.
8. "It's no motivation to do anything, followed by the fear of failure because you aren't doing anything. It's both not caring at all and caring all too much. It's a vicious cycle of hell." — Desi H.
9. "It's like having two devils on your shoulders. One tells you that you don't care or feel anything. The other tells you to overthink and worry about absolutely everything." — Carleen W.
10. "For me it's like a roller coaster ride. The anxiety is the ride up the hill, the constant wondering what's on the other side. Will my seatbelt hold me? Will the tracks fail? Why is it creaking and shifting and the screams of everyone? It's all rushing, and panic is starting to come over me. Then the free fall of depression; it dips so fast. The fall is so hard. I'm going down faster and then I'm ripped side to side and upside down. I'm crying in fear of continuing on like this. It all happens so fast. I see everyone around me. They are walking and talking and carrying on normally and I want to reach them, but I can't. It doesn't stop. It just keeps going. Around and around and around." — Chip M.
11. "To me, it's like covering your face with some kind of invisible mask. I have to show other people that I'm fine, completely functional and capable of finishing all the tasks, while the reality is I'm completely a vulnerable person who sometimes has to lock himself in a [bathroom] just to make sure the mask he wears doesn't break loose and expose his true self." — Andre D.
12. "Either I'm wandering in a fog where time is meaningless and emotions are abbreviated, or I'm thrown into an unpredictable, terrifying instant where I'm drawn and quartered by the most inane indecisions." — Lisa L.
13. "Not only am I fighting with mental illness, but my mental illnesses are fighting with each other. My %%4GwSE2Imo1%% and depression fight over who gets to control me, so I have to battle two armies that are battling each other." — Hannah L.
14. "It's a tug of war. One minute, your anxiety skyrockets, and the next, depression hits you in the face. I feel glued, stuck, ripped in two. It's an exhausting cycle, especially when I crash into an episode. All the crying, overthinking, the feeling of being sucked into an abyss I can't escape from, the constant mood swings, the panic attacks, the suicidal thoughts — it's a draining feeling that makes me wonder if this life is worth living at all." — Noelle M.
15. "It is two forces in 'coopetition' with each other… they both remind me at times I can't do anything right, I am faking my way through (and failing mightily at times), and then they will turn on each other over some minute details. They're frenemies with me stuck in the middle." — Annette M.
16. "It's like you're a living paradox; you feel both too much and nothing, you're exhausted and high strung, you are lonely but afraid of people, you are being torn apart between the fear, despair, pain, emptiness and soul-rending apathy all at once. And the worst part is both sides tell you no one else cares or needs to know." — Opal S.
17. "Some days are tolerable. Other days, I can't function. Both of them are always there… but, it depends on the way the wind blows, which direction the sun sets, the temperature of the day, is it raining or sunny?" — Hanni W.
18. "It's a never-ending rollercoaster. You feel exhausted all day, you can't concentrate or have enough energy to do anything. You worry all the time, the voices in your head never stop screaming at you. You stress over every single detail every single minute of your day and yet you sometimes can't even care. It drains life out of you." — Mariví R.T.
19. "Anxiety — it's like being on a rocking chair that's tipping back, that feeling of dread that it's going to fall back, but it doesn't. It's worrying and overthinking simple things. Sometimes it comes out of nowhere, even when my whole day has been positive and I have nothing to worry about, I start to worry about nothing. Depression — it's having this negative voice telling you to not do anything. It makes me question every single thing I know, and just feel constantly lost and without hope." — Ashley M.
20. "It's like having two different people inside of your head. You have the anxiety that makes you panic about the smallest things — like the house being dirty or being late — and it makes you hate yourself. But you also have depression that tells you there's no point doing anything because it's all worthless anyway, so you stay in bed. But while staying in bed you're also freaking out about everything else going on, you just don't have the energy to sort it out." — Alexandra J.
21. "Your mind playing tug of war with your body. You constantly question your abilities, you are stuck in a fog of negative numbing thoughts, but on the other hand the anxiety makes you always on your toes. You feel like a victim on puppet strings being pulled from one end of the scale of feeling dull and low to the other end when your heart is sprinting 100 miles an hour in panic just because somebody looked at you." — Vanessa W.
22. "It's like sitting in the middle of a motorway with an articulated lorry ploughing straight towards me. My mind tells me the vehicle's breaks will fail, that the driver isn't paying enough attention to notice me and that I'm going I'm going to die. I panic, my throat closing and my chest unable to expand for fear of the impact, the pain, a potentially agonizing death as my broken body fails. Yet at the same time, another part of my mind whispers no one would miss me anyway, In fact, they'd welcome my demise. The thought drains me of the strength and motivation to stand, never mind run. And so I sit there, anxious and resigned all at the same time." — Angela M.
23. "It's sort of like one side of your brain begging you not to get out of bed with chains, meanwhile the other part of you barks like a military sergeant for not getting out of bed, as well as other people in the world and guilt-tripping you, destroying your confidence." — Joy L.
24. "To me it's like being a runner whose legs are broken. You want so badly to do what you love, it's all you think about, but you just can't. You're broken and all you're left with is memories of how you used to be able to run, but now it seems like you never will again." — Kimberly S.
25. "It's the feeling of wanting to be alone but feeling lonely at the same time. The anxiety causes my heartbeat to echo in my ears, and my depression takes my brain to a dark place where all I can do is either put myself to bed or cry on the floor with my dog." — Renee M.
26. "No matter what I accomplish, it will never be good enough for my inner critic. I slowly dissolve as my feelings of worthlessness and failure envelop me. I pull away and isolate myself from everyone. There is just emptiness." — Brett L.
27. "I see it as my younger self playing hide and seek with imaginary friends. No one else sees it, but I know they are there. And it's an absolute vicious cycle of wanting to change the %%rssc22YZDp%%, but depression taking over and [stopping you], causinanxietyanxiety… you feel frozen, watching your life pass you by as you envy everyone around you. Just wishing you could be 'normal' again." — Cassandra B.
28. "%%WTpXD0d1Yk%% and depression makes me feel as though I'm stuck in tar and can't get out, even though my heart has so many dreams and aspirations." — Samantha M.
29. "The overwhelming dread and anxiousness of everyday tasks, but also the apathy to not complete any of them. So basically you lay in bed with no motivation or energy to move, but internally agonizing about everything you're not doing and hating yourself for not being able to do anything." — Alex U.
30. "The inability to make a decision because you feel completely numb, but if you're capable of choosing you are overwhelmed with guilt and anguish that you made the wrong choice. The feeling of vibrating at a high frequency then going completely numb." — Ashley B.
31. "Feeling like I can't move fast enough and my brain is zipping along at 100 mph but also that there is a rope around my middle that is being pulled from behind, stopping me from moving." — Anna M.
32. "Exhausting but liberating. I find that everyday life with depression is a day I fight. If I don't fight it will overtake me. I'm not allowing this to take my dreams away from me! It gives me strength and motivation to work harder. There are times where I feel so debilitated and there are times where I feel so strengthened by it. We walk hand-in-hand every day, we are partners but we are not one." — Vicky B.
If you or someone you know needs help, visit our suicide prevention resources page.


Braves starter Kevin Gausman will pitch in a minor league game Tuesday and remains on track to pitch in the first week of the regular season.
Gausman has been plagued by shoulder soreness in the past few weeks. He's pitched in just two games in spring training, exited his last start having pitched less than an inning.
Still, the Braves maintain Gausman will be good to go for his first turn in the rotation. He's set to throw five inning Tuesday.
Acquired from Baltimore last July, Gausman posted a 2.87 ERA in 10 starts.


We are a friendly, inclusive and vibrant primary school at the heart of our local community on the edge of Otley in West Yorkshire. We are single form entry and benefit from fantastic and extensive school grounds in a semi rural setting. Our aim at school is to encourage children's love of learning and to set learning in purposeful contexts which develop enquiring minds and independence. We carefully plan a curriculum that engages children's curiosity in the world around them and regularly uses the outdoor environment to drive learning experiences.
We hope that you gain a flavour of the ethos of our school and find all the information you need through your visit to our website.


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fog lamps 1960 | Austin-Healey Club of America, Inc.
The correct answer is none. The factory did not install fog lamps on finished models. The Donald Healey Company may have installed fog lamps on cars modified or delivered to their firm. The common available fog lamps of the period would be LUCAS SFT576 fog lamps, 5 3/4" round lamps available either in amber or clear lens. The other period lamp would be LUCAS SFT700 fog lamps, 7" round lamps available either in amber or clear lens. Other LUCAS lamps would be the "Fog Ranger" series normally found on Jaguar Mk2 sedans, and FT7 amber fog lamps found on other cars. A French made lamp by Marchal 570/680 series lamps, 5 3/4" round lamps normally in amber lenses. LUCAS made a toggle switch and mounting plates as an aftermarket product. The switch is in common with other British cars while the mounting plates could be had with holes for one, two, or three switches made from white plastic and black facing. Most Big Healeys with fog /driving lamps are usually mounted on badge bars (again, an aftermarket product available from Moss Motors and Victoria British). Right now, you can get new LUCAS SFT576 lamps from Moss Motors or Victoria British.
You are wealth of great information, thank you. My goal is to as period as correct as possible. Also, like the looks of the fog lamps. I have a mounting bar for the front and see the fog lamps that Moss has. again, appreciate the knowledge share.


Blog Focus - Hey...What's the BIG idea?
Most all blog hosting sites will explain to you that a blog which sets focus on a particular topic has the best chance of capturing a wide audience. I agree. And, if that is what you want then it's probably the best way to go.
If the topics to choose from were like a basket of fruit (or a box of chocolates in F. Gump terms) then this blog writes about the basket of fruit as well as the surface that the basket rests on and the room that it's in. You might not know what you get.
Pinning myself down to particular subject to gain a particular audience is not my reasoning nor incentive to building a blog. There are other activities that I have which already have sharp focus.
Hence, based on common logic, its unlikely that this blog will ever achieve mainstream success.
What is the Incentive? What is its Value?
This blog relates to self-reflection first. A semi public diary or notebook which consolidates a part of who I am. It deals with topics that regard things that people were afraid to ask me or forgot to ask me or just on my mind.
Within these posts, pages and articles you will find that many of the topics and subject manner cross into one another. I find that the more I understand various subjects the more I find myself consolidating them as being about the same.


text:
Q: Pass an object as data of Autocomplete in React-js I am using the autocomplete of React-md. Actually I want to pass an array of objects in the Autocomplete and I have tried the following code.
<Autocomplete
    id="Autocomplete"
    placeholder="I want ..."
    className="md-cell md-cell--4"
    data={services_data[name]}
    filter={Autocomplete.caseInsensitiveFilter}
    inputStyle={style.inputstyle}
    style={style.rootstyle}
    listStyle={style.liststyle}
    onAutocomplete={this.handleChange.bind(this.value)}
/>

I have the service_data of the format:
0: {fee: 100, name:"abc"}
1: {fee: 240, name="xyz"}
.
.
.
.

Now I want to pass an array of this object in Autocomplete data and want the suggestions to be listed down by the name. I have already shown what I have tried and I am getting an error for the same as soon as I type something in the field.
What I want is that After a user selects a value the complete objects of that name should be passed in the function handleChange.
Thanks in advance.

A: Your service_data seems to be an object. Autocomplete expects an array, with a key dataLabel.
let transformedData = Object.values(service_data).map((item)=>{
  item.dataLabel = item.name; return item;
})

onAutoComplete is called with the suggestion, suggestionIndex, dataLabel of the item the user clicks. Your handleChange can access the complete object as shown below.
handleChange(suggestion, index, dataLabel){
  let completeObject  = service_data.find((item)=>(item.name==dataLabel))
  ...
}

Also your handleChange should be bound to this not this.value
<Autocomplete
  data={transformedData}
  onAutoComplete={this.handleChange.bind(this)}
  ...
/>

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
VII: Advent Children
VII: Crisis Core
VII: Dirge of Cerberus
VII: Last Order
XIII-2
FF Tactics
FF Tactics Advance
FF Tactics Advance 2
Theatrhythm
FF: Crystal Chronicles
FF: Dissidia
FF: Dissidia 012
FF: The Spirits Within
Threads of Fate
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Incoming - Official
Night Fury
It hasn't even been that long since Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 was released, and it comes as no surprise to anyone that Square Enix are going to continue to cash in on this popular franchise by given the second game in the series a HD makeover too. Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 will feature Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix, Birth by Sleep Final Mix, and some pretty snazzy remastered HD cinematics from Re:coded apparently.
I can't help but feel a little skeptical of all these HD remakes myself, especially when Square Enix have already teased us with Kingdom Hearts III, isn't that something they should be focusing on more? It seems like giving previous games a HD touch up is all the rage at the moment, and of course the fans seem to lap it up as they usually come with special bits of merchandise too.
This particular HD game has been given a release date of 2014 - so nothing too concrete just yet. Also, like it's predecessor, Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 will be an exclusive title for the PS3, with no mention of a PS4 release just yet.
Still, this will tide over all the Kingdom Hearts fanatics for a while until Square Enix spill a few more beans on Kingdom Hearts III...
This article was originally published in forum thread: Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Incoming - Official started by Locky View original post
Square-Enix,
Kingdom Hearts,
Kingdom Hearts II,
Tags: kingdom hearts, square enix
Aulayna - 10-14-2013, 01:28 PM
HD BBS on my big TV. Yes. Please.
Depression Moon - 10-14-2013, 01:52 PM
trout, Finally a chance for me to play BBS without having to buy a PSP.
Hollycat - 10-14-2013, 02:16 PM
I don't know why they are bothering to add Re:coded. All it did was set up a single line from a single character so far.
Still, I'm happy to get to play KH2 and BBS again.
Shauna - 10-14-2013, 02:48 PM
Cool. Maybe I will have played 1.5 by that point. loljk.
Fynn - 10-14-2013, 03:07 PM
What about 3D?
Originally Posted by The White Wizard of Fynn
What if they got it to do 3d on the playstation?
That'd be great.
kotora - 10-14-2013, 04:34 PM
Donald and Goofy don't seem to happy about getting re-released like a million times
Freya - 10-14-2013, 06:52 PM
No dream drop? Just saw the trailer while at work. Good job on catching it for an article
SirPrizes - 10-14-2013, 08:13 PM
Excited for this, never got a chance to play BBS
Mirage - 10-14-2013, 11:11 PM
Originally Posted by Locky
I can't help but feel a little skeptical of all these HD remakes myself, especially when Square Enix have already teased us with Kingdom Hearts III, is that something they should be focusing on more? It seems like giving previous games a HD touch up is all the rage at the moment, and of course the fans seem to lap it up as they usually come with special bits of merchandise too.
That's probably of very little consequence. You don't need a lot of manpower to make a HD port. It's something that they could easily do while also developing KH3. It's not like throwing all your resources at a single game necessarily makes it a better game, after all .
The reason they are releasing the HD remasters is because this series is getting older. When kingdom hearts 3 comes out, how will new fans know wtf any of the story is! By releasing these all in one remasters they are able to have the old stories hit new fans. So when 3 hits stores it will already have all the new fans lined up with the old. It's smart for how little it costs to make like mirage said.
Jiro - 10-15-2013, 02:06 AM
Originally Posted by Mirage
Except they "lost" the first Kingdom Hearts game.
So we should be expecting a 2015 release for Kingdom Hearts III, which puts it at 10 years since it was teased at the end of KHII. That seems like a pretty smurfing long development cycle. Some older fans (hello) are already getting jaded and just want the smurfing game.
Aulayna - 10-15-2013, 02:48 AM
Either way it still requires far less developmental resources to make a HD re-master and that's even assuming that the same team making this port is the same team responsible for KH3. Even if it is the same team it's likely only a very small portion of that team that's working on 2.5. Considering 2.5 ReMIX was hinted at in the special ending of the Japanese 1.5 ReMIX, they were very likely working on this as work was wrapping up on 1.5 - hence it's relatively quick turn around considering 1.5 only came out on Western shores last month.
Besides SE have already come out and said that there are developmental difficulties considering Nomura is involved in both XV and KH3 so in all honesty it's very likely we'll see XV way before KH3. Sure the waiting time for KH3 has been immense but a small team working on 2.5 is hardly going to shave years off of the development of KH3 if they were moved over to KH3 instead. Judging by Nomura's interviews at E3 they were still hammering out the basics of the engine and tools to make KH3 so some of the team is likely just working on 2.5 due to it's relatively easy turnaround and once that's done, and the base engine and tools are available, they will transition onto KH3 once development is in full swing.
Prior to even releasing 1.5, there was an interview in which someone from SE said "it'd be pointless to make 1.5 and not 2.5" so it's not as if this wasn't expected, but I thought there might be a quicker turnaround than this. I just... we used to have dev cycles of a few years and now we're getting a decade long wait? Seems a bit off to me.
I want to make a joke about the original fans dying after this long a wait but it might be in poor taste.
Night Fury - 10-15-2013, 08:09 AM
Well I was a young teen when KH1 came out...
Maybe I'll be a grandma in time for KH3.
As for my comment about them making HD releases, I still think it's all a bit pointless really, I wish they'd tell us more about KH3 than giving us news of another HD game that we were expecting anyway, and it's really just a way for them to cash in.
Fynn - 10-15-2013, 08:35 AM
How do people keep forgetting there were so many games released in the meantime. And I mean real sequels, not just some silly spin-offs, but things that really influence the overarching storyline.
That being said, I'm surprised they're bundling this with coded instead of 3D. Mainly because coded really is just a silly side game with very little consequence in the grand scheme of things, but Dream Drop Distance was pretty damn important. They could have at least included the cutscenes, since there are some pretty crucial plot twists in there. They really do change a whole lot of what we know about the KH universe.
Still, it appears that owning a PS4 and a 3DS will be enough to enjoy the whole series thus far now. That's a nice step forward, since it's no longer five systems
Jiro - 10-15-2013, 12:00 PM
I'm not forgetting, but I didn't own every console and handheld made in the last decade, so I couldn't play them all.
I bought all the consoles just to play them! I'm a KH addict I guess.
Originally Posted by Hypoallergenic Chie
Same here :P
DMKA - 10-17-2013, 05:34 AM
I never played the DS titles, but thanks to these HD collections I guess I don't have to.
Looks like I'll still be forced to get a 3DS for 3D though.
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Cheddar Senior Reporter Alex Heath sat down with Spotify Chief Content Officer Dawn Ostroff, Gimlet Media Managing Director & Co-Founder Matt Lieber, and Anchor Co-founder/CEO Michael Mignano for a SXSW Keynote Conversation to discuss the future of the rapidly developing podcasting industry.
The recent acquisition of Lieber's Gimlet and Mignano's Anchor by Spotify, which signaled a big push from the digital media platform into the podcasting industry, served as the starting point for the conversation. While Gimlet and Anchor function within the podcasting ecosystem in different ways – with Gimlet being a premiere production house for premium podcasting content and Anchor being an app that streamlines the logistical side of podcast production for users to lower the barrier of entry – they both have been highly successful and have driven increased interest in developing the booming storytelling medium.
Much of the conversation centers on how these companies will function under the ownership of Spotify, as Heath keenly acknowledges concerns from the podcasting community through his questioning. Ostroff is reassuring that Spotify does not intend to "rock the boat" with businesses that have already proven themselves to be very successful, but is intent on leveraging the newly conglomerated businesses to grow both the audience and the range of content offered across all platforms.
Watch the full Convergence Keynote, The Second Golden Age of Audio: Podcasting, to hear about how the podcasting industry has developed in recent years, and to learn about future plans from some of the main players in the industry as they discuss their perspectives and opportunities to collaborate.
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Paul Shepherd is a Writer in Residence and former Kingsbury Fellow at Florida State University, where he earned a Ph.D. with distinction. He attended the University of Virginia, UNC-Chapel Hill and UNC-Greensboro. His work has appeared in Crazyhorse, Fiction, Omni, Prairie Schooner, William and Mary Review, Folio, Pacific Review, U.S. Catholic, St. Anthony Messenger, Portland Review, the Quarterly, Beloit Fiction, Maryland Review and elsewhere. He has served as Senior Editor of International Quarterly, and as faculty adviser to award-winning college newspapers and literary magazines.
Paul has taught college classes in creative writing, magazine and newspaper writing and modern literature.
More Like Not Running Away was the winner of the 2004 Mary McCarthy Prize in Fiction, and was a finalist for the Associated Writing Programs Award in the Novel, the Bakeless Prize and twice for the James Jones prize.
His book of poetry, Reasons Like Birds, is currently in submission to publishers. A second novel, as yet untitled, is scheduled for completion early in the coming year.
He lives in Tallahassee, where he works part time with family ministries at St. Stephen Lutheran Church, and with Rainbow Rehab, a nonprofit construction company that renovates homes for low-income home-owners.
We met with Shepherd at his home in Tallahassee in late January, and had this conversation at the kitchen table, a pot of coffee at the ready.
HOMILETICS: We're down here in Tallahassee to talk to you because we think that if Homiletics subscribers read this book they will get a ton of sermon fodder or material in terms of the themes of this book, the events described in the book and its characters. So let's summarize the plot without giving too much away.
Let's see if I got this right. This is a story told from the viewpoint of a teenager in a family with a father who has a past, a dad who always thinks things are going to turn out better the next time, and whose disastrous mistakes cause the family to run from one situation to another, until the family can't survive. What would you add to that summary?
SHEPHERD: The boy suspects early on that the father has a secret, and that it has to do with his violent behavior. The father has a tendency toward violence, although he's never laid a hand on anyone in the family. But the boy has actually witnessed some things that have been very disturbing to him. And the kid is struggling pretty hard. In the first chapter, he's been hearing voices that he thinks are from God and these voices become a lot more troubling to him as the book unfolds.
HOMILETICS: The reviewers have said various things. Some say that the book is about "blood ties" that bind fathers and sons, or it's a book about voices and how we hear the voice of God, or it's a book about a search for self, or it's a book about work. What is the book about?
SHEPHERD: [Laughs] That's a good question. Like many novels, that question can be answered in different ways. The father and son — there's a lot going on in their lives. Probably everything you've mentioned could be identified as a theme. If I had to say what I think it's about, I would say it's about a boy growing up and finding his way in a world that he doesn't understand.
HOMILETICS: Some reviewers mentioned Salinger's Catcher in the Rye and Holden Caulfield. Is Levi, the kid, a Holden Caulfield with a dad?
SHEPHERD: I think it's a fair comparison to Holden Caulfield in some ways. The kid is certainly alienated. One of the things by design in the book that was a risk is that we don't see him interacting much with other people outside his family. He doesn't have a best friend. Increasingly throughout the book he becomes more alienated and isolated. The family moves all the time and they keep moving farther out from other people.
HOMILETICS: Because Everest, the dad, hates people.
SHEPHERD: Right. He increasingly is unable to get along with people.
HOMILETICS: So this is also a book about alienation, isolation, aloneness and separation.
That's God acknowledging forsaking us!
In the first page or two, the boy is remembering the first time he goes to church and he hears Christ on the cross saying, "Why have you forsaken me?" You have things from early childhood that sort of reverberate and that line has always reverberated in me.
HOMILETICS: I'll tell you what, when I picked up this book, I read the first line, the first sentence of the novel, I was hooked. "The first time I heard someone preaching, when I was six, the words stuck in me like nails." I thought, "Wow! I gotta keep reading this." I don't know how writers work, but was this book a conscious attempt to suggest that the human predicament is often about alienation and feeling forsaken?
SHEPHERD: Yes and no. Yes, that's certainly what I found I was dealing with in the book. But, no, I didn't set out to make that point. And I think that can be a problem for fiction writers. A lot of fiction writers consciously avoid that kind of agenda.
Instead, what I set out to do was to try to listen to this kid's voice and the father's voice and get into that situation and be as truthful as I could to that situation.
It was halfway through writing the novel that I started picking up on the themes myself, forsaken being a big one.
HOMILETICS: Nevertheless, you read this novel and it raises the question of the human condition and whether it is often characterized by a sense of alienation, feeling forsaken and aloneness, and Levi the kid as an example of how this works. And not just the kid, I guess.
HOMILETICS: He doesn't want the church bus pulling up in front of the house to pick up the kid for Sunday school.
SHEPHERD: Right. He can't handle that. The boy is struggling with that. His childlike faith seems to be going away. And the father feels forsaken by the mother who leaves. This is the crowning blow for him; everyone is running away from him. The boy feels forsaken by the father and mother at times.
HOMILETICS: Could we talk about their names for a minute? I'm curious how this happens. As I was reading More Like Not Running Away, I thought of Updike — for a couple of reasons. For one, I read carefully because you both have such phenomenal powers of description and metaphor, but also because Updike's characters have interesting names. For example in his Rabbit books, Harry Angstrom, a form of angst, and if anyone knows anything about angst, it's Harry Angstrom. And when I got to know Nora, the mother, and as I became familiar with her circumstances, Ibsen's Nora, from The Doll House, came to my mind. Was that a conscious decision? How did these names emerge?
SHEPHERD: I struggle with names. I always have. And titles.
HOMILETICS: So a writer doesn't always try to choose names that might be suggestive of a theme, or that might layer another meaning that the careful reader might explore. If it were me, I'd open the phone book, and point. [Laughter].
SHEPHERD: I did not intentionally choose names that way. I wanted names that were interesting and real.
HOMILETICS: Levi — so Jewish. I wondered whether there was something in that name.
SHEPHERD: For example, that name, the name of the kid was a problem. I had the novel just about finished, and I wasn't happy with my choices. And the same with Everest. Nora I had, and Carson, Levi's sister — the daughter of Nora and Everest. But Levi and Everest — I went through all sorts of names when I was drafting the novel. I have a nephew named Levi. I said, "That's the name I want." I asked my brother, "Can I name my character after your kid?" There's no connection there, but I liked the name. And it was helpful that there was some depth to the character, and to the name. If you're going to have a name that's symbolic, that's a lot of baggage. That's really difficult.
I just read a student's story, and the main character's name is Job, and the character is suffering all the time, and that's just a little direct. [Laughter]. You don't want to hit your reader over the head.
SHEPHERD: And the danger. One of the things that is attractive about Everest [the mountain] is that, while it is not the most difficult climb technically, it certainly is one of the most dangerous climbs. It throws weather and altitude at people and even great climbers get caught on it.
HOMILETICS: I love Levi's thoughts about "falling up." Here's a kid who likes to crawl out on the roof and stand on the roofline or climb high into trees and preach his sermons about the love of God and how Christ died for our sins. And he's not worried about falling, because his "feet had never made a mistake." But when he's out on the roof, he tells his mother not to worry, because he'll just "fall up." What a great concept.
HOMILETICS: See, now I didn't know that. So any person who's grown up in construction and works on roofs — they know about falling up?
SHEPHERD: Pretty much. I was taught that by my father when I started walking roofs. He always gave me "the lecture" when I got up on the roof. He said, "You have to think about if you fall how you're going to fall. If you fall down the roof, you'll be a tangled mess and your fall will be uncontrolled. If you fall up the roof, you may be able to stop your fall, but even if you come down the roof, you're feet first. You're in a much better position.
We're going to fall. That's one of the things Levi learns in the first chapter. People fall off roofs. It's not uncommon, unfortunately.
"Oh, yeah, yeah, I was just getting down!" [Laughter].
HOMILETICS: So he had already in his own mind created a redemptive experience out of this! [Laughter].
SHEPHERD: Immediately! The guy was a terrific liar.
HOMILETICS: Yet if we are going to fall, we want to fall in a way so that redemption is possible. In the end, Levi does — we understand — that Levi has been able to fall up. Everest, we're not so sure. Everest seems to be one who falls down, and does so rather spectacularly.
SHEPHERD: Levi wants to believe. The redemptive aspect of this is something that a lot of readers have picked up on. And they have also had an interesting reaction to Everest, the father, who although he struggles with such violent impulses and is in many ways a hard character, yet readers have found redemptive qualities in him. His care for the family is genuine, deep and abiding. And what he's trying to give his son is really everything he has.
HOMILETICS: This is one reason I enjoyed the book so much. It's such a great study in human nature, human natures. I was thinking about what Everest says to his son after he'd hired a drunk to do some construction work. In the end, he tells Levi, people just have to do what they have to do.
SHEPHERD: Some people are skid row alcoholics. You get a sense of destiny just grinding away at persons.
Working in homeless shelters, you see how much it takes to rescue some people — it's very, very difficult to look at them and think that they're going to change the path their lives are on, or that there is much at all that can change the path they're on.
HOMILETICS: So when you work with them, you're not necessarily trying to change the path they're on, but instead to give them the basic things they need.
SHEPHERD: It's interesting that right here in Tallahassee, we have a homeless shelter. It's basically, "Come as you are." Come in, lie down — you're taken care of. They offer social services, food and so on.
There's a new shelter that's open now, and its purpose is to help them get back on their feet. But there was this discussion here in our town. Some people wondered why we needed two shelters. But this second shelter is different from the other one.
SHEPHERD: In a sense. If people want to get themselves out on a new path, there's a chance for them to do that, but a lot aren't ready. It's not where they're at.
HOMILETICS: What writer or writers have influenced you? Or what writer or writers do you admire?
SHEPHERD: Okay. Hands down the writer who has had the greatest influence on me in fiction is Dostoevsky. I read Dostoevsky at a critical time in my life when I was going through a lot of things Levi is going through. He opened my eyes to the human condition and the potential for people to steer through that. So Dostoevsky, particularly Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov.
I also read when I was young Catcher in the Rye. And my heart soared when one of the reviewers of More Like Not Running Away compared it to Catcher. Caulfield is a character that a lot of young people identify with. It's interesting to come back to that book as an older reader. It holds up well.
And then there's a book I am trying to get everyone to read [laughs heartily] and it's Bulgakov's Master and Margarita. It's a tremendous story written mid-20th century of a writer in Stalinist Russia who travels back in time to the court of Pontius Pilate. The devil has come to Moscow to try to recruit this writer. It's a compelling story. It's also a book that made me think a lot — as much as any book I've read — ever. The book was never published in his lifetime.
HOMILETICS: Is it his only book?
SHEPHERD: It's his only good book! [Laughs] He wrote one good sci-fi piece, but he was mainly a playwright. He wrote a scathing letter to Stalin which ended his career, but he was never put in prison. He was sent away to some remote post.
HOMILETICS: You have a book of poetry, also?
SHEPHERD: It's being prepared for a publisher now with the working title, Reasons Like Birds.
HOMILETICS: I'd like to ask you about writing. Pastors do a lot of writing. Many of them take pride in their writing and storytelling. We do a lot of writing with our weekly sermon preparation and other projects. I have always been interested in the craft itself. Stories about Graham Greene, for example, tell us that he went out on his patio in the morning with a pad of paper and couple of sharpened pencils, wrote 500 words, put down his pencil and spent the day fishing or walking or something. But he did that every day and in 10 days he's got 5,000 words. How do you write?
SHEPHERD: I love the question! One reason I like the question is because I think — at least for me as a writer — why I'm interested in that is because I am always hoping that there's an approach that's easier or better than the way I'm doing it! [Laughs].
So I say to people, "Do you have the answer?" because I've heard about 17 different ways to write, but there must be one more that will work for me!
One answer that does work for me is Ron Carlson's approach. He's a terrific writer. He says that a writer is the person "who stays in the room." He sits down to write and when it's going very well, his first inclination is to get up and get a cup of coffee because it's going so well.
I'm a terrible person about getting up about every 15 minutes. And I have written in about every possible way.
Part of this book was written on a motorcycle while I was commuting to school two hours away.
HOMILETICS: How do you write a book on a motorcycle?
SHEPHERD: I used one of those [points to the micro-recorder on the table]. The first time I did that, I affixed it to the handlebars and I talked into it for two hours and when I went to play it back all I heard was "Whoooosssssssh!" [Laughs and laughs]. So I had to hold it closer to my mouth and I would have to take a hand off the handlebars because I had to have the recorder right to my mouth.
SHEPHERD: I don't have a secret! [Laughter all around]. No secret. Except that I try to write whenever I can, and when I'm not writing, I resort to what I call my Daily Writing Option. I write every day, but I don't have a minimum, like Greene's 500 words. If I realize that it's been a month and I haven't written, then I know something's wrong, and I say, "I'm going back to the Daily Writing Option." Anything that's writing; e-mail doesn't count. And it usually ends up being a couple of hours.
One thing writers take comfort in is to hear writers talk about writing. Some writers love to write. I don't. I hate to write. It's very painful. I find it boring. For your readers who don't like writing, who sometimes feel it is a burden — there are a few of us writers out there with whom to join forces.
HOMILETICS: Why would you do something you hate to do? Here is someone who hates to do writing who's just published a marvelous novel, and then there are others of us who love to write who can't get a manuscript over the transom door. What motivates you to write a story like this?
SHEPHERD: It has to come out. It's trapped inside. It's a great discomfort to have the story and not have it out there.
HOMILETICS: Is there is something about this particular book that at some level is autobiographical and that in some way exorcised your own demons?
SHEPHERD: It did not exorcise my demons. There's a lot autobiographical. It's more autobiographical than A Million Little Pieces [laughter all around. This is a reference to James Frey's best-selling book that purported to be an autobiographical account of a 23-year-old alcoholic and drug abuser and how he copes with rehabilitation. In fact, the book, published by Random House and an Oprah's Book Club selection, contained considerable fictive material, outright fabrications. The controversy was reported widely in the press.]. What it did do was help me understand things that had happened to me and decisions I'd made. To put a narrative together, things have to make sense.
It's one of the things you teach students with plot. Things don't just happen. A plot is cause and effect. What happened on page one has to affect what happens on page three.
We often think of life as not having a plot. When you're forced to take some of the material in your life and work it into a narrative, you begin to see why something happened three years later. You can connect that to an earlier event.
HOMILETICS: There's a chapter that has a title something like that, in which Everest is going to explain "why things are the way things are." I wasn't sure he ever did that. I think he got started, but perhaps I read that too quickly. For Everest, the dad, why were things the way they were? Because he had made one big mistake?
SHEPHERD: That's what he thought.
HOMILETICS: That's what he thought. So he is explaining to Levi, his son, that for his own life this is why things were the way they were, but it also meant that this mistake is why things were the way they were for Levi?
SHEPHERD: Everest was burdened with this secret, and had to tell his son at some point that he had killed this man, and that it hadn't let him go.
HOMILETICS: Is it important to look at our lives to attempt to uncover some pivotal event that is the cause of "why things are the way they are"? Can we all look back and say, "That changed the course of my life"?
This is something I talk a lot about with my students. We have 800 creative writing majors at Florida State University. I've been going around the country to colleges talking to creative writing majors all over. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds over the last year. Of those, a handful or less will publish a book. Most of them will go into other fields.
The question is: What are we teaching them? What are they here to learn? And in my mind, what they can get is a sense of how to think creatively about where they are, and where they're going, to see their lives as unfolding.
It's surprising how seldom we do this. For example. My students always have new cars, cars that are very nice. They have car payments to go with those cars. They dream of being a dive instructor on a ship in the Bahamas. Maybe they do some diving. It would take a couple thousand dollars to get that instructor certification. They could do it for a couple of summers. They can't see how to get there from where they are. They don't see the car as what's stopping them.
My wife is a law professor. We see this with lawyers. Lawyers make good money. It's hard when you're making $200,000 a year to say, "But I want to be a high-school history teacher. But I can't do that. I've got this house", and so on. But there are high-school history teachers living full, meaningful lives, on their salary. They're not living like lawyers, but to move from being a lawyer to being a high-school history teacher takes someone seeing his own life as a story he's writing instead of one that's being written for him.
SHEPHERD: We want to superimpose the Bible story on our lives. We want someone else's story to be our story.
HOMILETICS: Or, to tell us what our story should be.
SHEPHERD: Yes. And that's easier. We're really looking for that all the time. I guess it's understandable.
HOMILETICS: Do you like listening to sermons?
SHEPHERD: I like listening to good sermons! [Laughter all around].
SHEPHERD: One of the most important pastors in my life would not be surprised to read in Homiletics that I said he was not real gifted when it came to sermons. His ministry was in other areas. I was talking with a homiletics professor at Wartburg Seminary about this. About how a good sermon and a good story share the same characteristics.
Stories have a form, a very simple form, and a very human form. That doesn't mean it's an easy form to pull off. But they work in a lot of the same ways. It's that upside-down check mark of rising action, conflict, turning point or crisis and falling action. Good sermons certainly follow pretty much that same shape.
One of the things that people find difficult in a sermon is not knowing where they are in that shape. I've heard a good many sermons where it's like waves, and we're coming to the rising action and the crisis and we're coming down and then we're coming to another rising action! [laughs].
HOMILETICS: And the message in the bottle never seems to get to shore!
HOMILETICS: On page 221 of your book, you have a little excursus where it's written: "I heard God and when God went away, I heard everything." Can you talk a little bit more about that?
SHEPHERD: The moments when we feel forsaken by God have an important role in our faith formation. Sometimes we look at those moments when we lose our faith, or we struggle, as bad things. When we don't hear God and want to doesn't necessarily mean that's it a wrong or bad thing, but it might mean that our faith is deepening. We can be overinvolved in our own vision of what God is saying to us, but there is a role for the silences in our lives, and the questions.
We certainly see around us some negative effects of a single-minded belief that what I have is the unfettered word of God direct into my heart. There's a tube. There's no need for questioning or evaluating that.
HOMILETICS: I was thinking of other works that have the "running away" theme, but I didn't come up with much. There's the movie, Forrest Gump. "Run, Forrest, run!" [Laughter all round]. Or The Fugitive, the falsely accused man running from the law. But we understand the concept of "running away" and that running away may not always be a good idea. But can running away be the right choice? Nora, the mother, runs away, and it is probably the right thing to do. In your book, the only character who doesn't run away is Frankie, who is this really wonderful character who loves life, accepts life as it comes along, loves the Mariners, a little earthy. But everyone else is running away.
SHEPHERD: And Carson, the sister. There's a book I'm working on now that comes before More Like Not Running Away, that deals with the father's childhood. The father is not the main character, but it takes place when the father is a child. And there's a book I'm going to write in my mid-50s that will pick up with some of these characters a number of years later.
But Carson and Frankie are two characters — for the book to have the shape I thought was best — they didn't quite have the room I'd like for them to have at some point. So I'm hoping that in this next book Carson and Frankie are two people we get to know even more.
In this family of four — Nora the mother, Everest the father, and Levi the son — Carson is the only one who in a lot of ways seems connected to the "real" world and who understands what is going on in the family.
HOMILETICS: Frankie seems "normal," and Nora likewise, although Nora is in a situation that's become untenable, and therefore she has to make some decisions that Frankie doesn't have to make. But it seems like Frankie has a colorful past, too. But maybe she doesn't; I don't know [Laughter].
SHEPHERD: It certainly feels like it!
HOMILETICS: As I said, I wondered about "running away" themes in literature, and then I wondered about "running away" themes in Scripture. One that comes to mind is the Prodigal Son in one of the parables of Jesus.
SHEPHERD: I think Paul runs away. A lot of people — when God had a vision for them — tried to run away from that. Moses, Jonah.
HOMILETICS: Even the exodus is a story of the Hebrew children running away from an untenable situation, and then wandering in a wilderness, and the prophetic lament is often that the people of God have run away.
SHEPHERD: It's been something that's always fascinated me as a human thing, something I hope to explore in a book some day: People leave. People just leave. Sometimes that's what they have left, all they have left — in their own minds. I guess I am curious about it because I'm actually the kind of person who will call up old friends — people whom I haven't heard from for 10 years — they're likely to get a phone call or an e-mail from me, just kind of checking in. Maybe I am afraid of disappearing.
But some people just walk away and they go off to live a different life. And I am very curious about what would lead someone to do that.
HOMILETICS: Levi has this conversation near the end of the book with his sister, and she asks him, "Well, are you running away — again?" And now that God has gone and everything has come into focus he says, "No, it's more like not running away." He is running away, but it's more like not running away. Which means that in this action a decisive step is taken toward resolving the issues in his life.
SHEPHERD: Yes, that's his decisive step. He is finally on his own, taking some control.
HOMILETICS: So the concept of "more like not running away" is that sometimes we might take a step that might appear that we're running away, but it could be an action that really addresses the core issues.
SHEPHERD: Perhaps, but you can't run away from stuff. That's what they're all finding. No matter where you run, you're not going to run away from who you are. So it's more like not running away. The father couldn't run away. He was running away, but wherever he ran, this thing was with him.
HOMILETICS: This would be a book, I would think, that would appeal, to college kids.
SHEPHERD: One of the things this book has enabled me to do is to connect with some people who have also felt alienation, who have gone through violence and so on. A lot of college students and young people have contacted me. I am glad we can connect through this and that the connection has something redemptive.
I love Cormac McCarthy for a lot of reasons. He's just a terrific writer. But I know myself: When you're really in a difficult place, you're attracted to books that reflect that experience. If that book in the end, only reflects that experience, I have some concerns for what it means for the reader. The writers I admire are writers who take us there and then lift us up.
TO ORDER More Like Not Running Away, visit the book's Web site, morelikenotrunningaway.com, or the publisher's Web site: sarabandebooks.org/Authors/Paul%20Shepherd/downloads. The book can also be ordered from Amazon.com.


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Recovery of Losses in Volatility-linked Investments
November, 25, 2020
By Attorney Jared Levy
Morgan & Morgan's Business Trial Group and its securities attorneys are investigating financial losses in volatility-linked investments.
The SEC recently settled enforcement proceedings against five investment advisory and/or brokerage firms for selling customers unsuitable volatility products. The firms include Securities America Advisors Inc., Summit Financial Group Inc., American Portfolios Financial Services/American Portfolios Advisors Inc., Benjamin F. Edwards & Company Inc., and Royal Alliance Associates Inc. The settlements will return $3 million to harmed investors.
All five settlements relate to the firms' sales of volatility-linked products from 2016 to April 2020. These products try to track short-term market expectations of volatility. According to the settlement orders, the offering documents for these products make clear that they are best held only for short time periods because they are likely to decline when held for the long term. The orders find the firms did not understand the volatility products they sold, as they recommended that customers buy and hold them for long periods, sometimes for months and years. The orders also find that the firms didn't have proper procedures regarding suitability and volatility products.
The volatility-linked products include the following exchange-traded products: (1) iPath S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures ETN (VXX); (2) ProShares VIX Short-Term Futures EFT (VIXY); and VelocityShares Daily Inverse VIX Short-Term ETNs linked to the S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures Index (XIV).
Stephanie Avakian, Director of the SEC's Division of Enforcement, stated: "It is important for firms to put the appropriate protections in place to ensure complex products are properly evaluated and understood by their representatives. Failing to do so puts investors at risk. We take these failures seriously, and we will continue to look for sales that expose customers to unsuitable investments."
Each of the firms agreed to pay civil penalties ranging from $500,000 to $650,000. The Orders can be found here:
American Portfolios Financial Services/American Portfolios Advisors Inc.
Benjamin F. Edwards & Company Inc.
Summit Financial Group Inc.
Securities America Advisors Inc.
Royal Alliance Associates Inc.
There has been extreme market volatility throughout 2020, which has resulted in substantial losses for many exchange-traded products tied to volatility. If your financial advisor or stockbroker recommended a volatility-linked product for your portfolio, you may have suffered significant losses. The securities attorneys at Morgan & Morgan's Business Trial Group are here to help. Please contact us at 888.744.0142 for a free consultation.
The Business Trial Group at Morgan & Morgan helps investors recover their losses on a contingency basis. We are only paid if we successfully recover money for you. We have helped investors recover tens of millions of dollars of investment losses.
The Business Trial Group is part of the largest contingency law firm in the nation, with over 700 lawyers.
Fill Out This Form for a Free Case Review
Morgan & Morgan, P.A. 20 North Orange Ave, Suite 1600, Orlando, FL 32801


The September Community Newsletter is ready for you to view, packed full of information from Childhood Cancer Awareness to Fall Prevention. There is great information for everyone including our NEW SERVICES and upcoming events. Check it out!


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1/13/19 • Five Takeaways From 2018's PR And Marketing Blunders
As posted in the Gaston Gazette
2018 was a rough year in the world of public relations and marketing; there were a number of corporations that made missteps earning public interest – and public criticism. And sure, while every reliable business is bound to make a flub now and then, these particular decisions backfired more profoundly than others, in great part because of the way they impacted customers and the impression they made on the public.
So what lessons did we learn from 2018's public relations and marketing blunders? Take a look:
Gimmicks won't always get you the attention you want. When the International House of Pancakes (IHOP) announced on Twitter in June that it was changing its name from IHOP to IHOB in order to promote its new line of burgers, fans and critics alike were confused. People couldn't understand why the brand, which has had burgers on its menu since its opening in 1958, would choose to abandon its well-established reputation as a restaurant that primarily offers pancakes and other breakfast foods. The name change, it turned out, was simply a promotional tool: the company never intended to make it permanent, only to use it temporarily to advertise new burger offerings on their menu. But according to Foursquare, the gamble on changing the name didn't pay off as the company hoped: not only did it confuse the audience, but it also didn't provide an increase in foot traffic to the company's restaurants. The lesson here is that the old adage that any publicity is good publicity does not bear up under scrutiny, especially if it involves using a gimmick that dings the reputation of a well-established name and brand.
Whenever possible, give your customers a choice. At the end of 2017, Apple announced that it was going to "dynamically manage…maximum performance" on its iPhones to keep the phones from unexpectedly shutting down. What did that convoluted rhetoric amount to? Apple was actually announcing that it was throttling phone performance in order to preserve battery life. The decision sparked outrage across the Internet and earned the nickname "Batterygate." By early 2018, the company announced that it would offer discounted replacement batteries, but the damage was already done. Even though some customers would likely have agreed to the throttling, the problem for many customers and those reporting on Apple's announcement was the fact that Apple didn't give its customers a choice – they simply made an executive decision to restrict phone functionality. What can we learn from Apple's error? If you have a big decision to make that will affect how your product operates, it would be a good idea to poll loyal customers ahead of time about what option they'd prefer.
Put yourself in your customers' shoes. In early January 2018, the clothing company H&M offered a child's hoodie for sale on its website emblazoned with the phrase "coolest monkey in the jungle." The problem? The company featured it on a black child within advertisements. The decision sparked an immediate backlash on Twitter where users commented on the company's failure to consider the racially-charged implications of the phrase on a black child. No one claimed that H & M's error was malicious or intentional. But the company's failure to consider how the message might be received by its black customers illustrates a breakdown in empathy and a limited understanding of impact, both of which is key to securing and maintaining customer loyalty. What we can take away from this incident is that it's important to have a diverse group of people test your marketing materials because they are more likely to catch potential missteps before those materials go public.
Making product decisions based on stereotype isn't a good plan. Doritos made quite a misstep in early 2018 when PepsiCo (which owns Doritos) CEO Indra Nooyi said on a Freakonomics podcast that the company was developing snacks for women that were "designed and packaged differently." Essentially, she said, women "don't like to crunch too loudly in public. And they don't lick their fingers generously and they don't like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavor into their mouth." This pronouncement sparked widespread responses from women who contradicted the characterization of their eating habits and sparked viral jokes and memes about "Lady Doritos." The lesson? Trying to find a way to make your product appeal more to women can backfire if you root that appeal in what many people would consider a stereotype.
Jokes about domestic violence are never funny. In March of 2018, Snapchat released a series of ads for an app called "Would You Rather," which would require participants to choose between two difficult decisions. One of those ads asked if people would rather "Slap Rihanna" or "Punch Chris Brown." The ad sparked intense anger from across the board, including from Rihanna herself. No wonder, considering the history: in 2009, Rihanna accused Brown of punching her during an argument. Snapchat pulled the ad and apologized for it, but it left a bad taste in the mouth of many. What we can learn from this – in addition to the knowledge that making fun of a celebrity in a direct advertisement is probably not the wisest move – is that creating an ad that makes fun of a fraught subject like domestic violence will likely alienate more potential customers than earn them.
Every year brings new lessons from public relations and marketing mistakes, and 2018 was no different. The overall takeaway? Carefully consider how your message will be received by your customers and the public at large, and you're more likely to cut these kinds of mistakes off at the pass.


Quick quiz: Who was the first Japanese civilian to be issued a passport?
If your mind is drifting in the direction of a businessman who might have availed himself of an early opportunity to travel abroad in the mid-1860s, when the government first permitted such things, think again.
It was a circus performer named Sumidagawa Namigoro, whose speciality was to keep paper butterflies afloat in midair using only a fan. He is known to have delighted audiences the world over.
Sumidagawa is one of the many real-life characters who spring to life from the pages of a new book, "Professor Risley and the Imperial Japanese Troupe," which describes the exploits of one of Japan's first groups of touring performers and of the man who led them, an American by the name of Richard Risley Carlisle.
The book is the work of Frederik Schodt, an American whose name will be familiar to many readers — but likely not for his work on circuses. That's because Schodt is considered one of the foremost authorities on a more modern form of Japanese popular culture: manga and anime. And, perhaps more than any other Westerner, he can claim credit for the extraordinary boom in those two artistic forms that spread through the world just after the turn of the millennium.
Indeed, having come to Japan for the first time way back in 1965, when he was still a high school student, Schodt became an expert in the genre even before most Westerners knew it existed.
In 1983, Schodt distilled his many years of experience reading and translating manga into the first English-language introduction to the genre, a book titled "Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics" that is now a cult classic. The book was also cited along with his translations when in 2009 the Japanese government bestowed on him the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette.
Schodt was fortunate to catch two industries on the upswing. His books came out in time to ride a long wave of optimism surrounding Japan, its economy and its culture. But, as Schodt is the first to admit, things aren't so rosy nowadays.
Still, as the 62-year-old explained to The Japan Times during a recent trip to this country, he maintains his faith in the abilities of the country's rising generations to right the country's course.
What attracted you to Professor Risley and his circus?
I've always been interested in what you might call "lost histories" — people who fell through the cracks, eccentric characters who in some unusual way contributed to early communication between America and Japan. That is the territory I mine.
So what was the nature of Risley's contribution?
Well, first of all he introduced the Western circus into Japan. Most Japanese people these days, when they think of "circus," they think of the Western-style circus, which involves somebody with a top hat, maybe an arena, a trapeze and that sort of thing. It was Risley who introduced that type of circus into Japan, when he set up base here at Yokohama in 1864.
But Risley also did the opposite: He introduced traditional Japanese acts — the original Japanese idea of a "circus" — overseas. And this is the part that is the "lost" history, because it's been largely forgotten.
The Imperial Japanese Troupe, which Risley took from Japan around the world in the late 1860s, was one of the earliest exposures that Americans and Europeans had to not just Japanese popular culture, but to ordinary Japanese people.
It coincided with the Japonism art movement, but it was separate from that. It wasn't highbrow. Everyone liked it.
What do you think the American public took away from those performances?
I think first, on the level of skill, they were completely awed by the creativity of the Japanese acts, especially top-spinning. Top-spinning was very evolved in Japan in the Edo Period (1603-1867).
Some of the acts involved running tops down samurai swords, over your shoulder, over long distances. Some of them were huge tops that were very heavy.
Another act that I think was amazing to American audiences was the butterfly trick, which involved making origami-paper butterflies flitter and float in the air by manipulating a fan beneath them. They seemed to be so real at the time.
Then there were the acrobatic feats. There were perch acts, involving pirouetting and doing gyrations on top of a long bamboo pole. And then they had these ladder contraptions — cantilevered ladders that one person would be lying on the ground supporting in mid-air with his feet while some younger acrobat, a child, would crawl up to the top and run around on it.
But, on another level, I think people in the West were also intrigued by the exoticism, the costumes, the music.
Were the Japanese acrobats allowed to leave their country in the 1860s?
They were, but, actually, one of the interesting things is that the members of the Imperial Japanese Troupe received the first civilian visas to travel overseas.
The butterfly expert, a man named Sumidagawa Namigoro, received the first civilian passport in Japan.
Does that mean the government was giving its blessing to those circus tours?
I think so. In 1866, there were actually multiple troupes that left Japan, all headed for the Paris Exposition of the following year.
In the first year or half-year that the Japanese authorities started granting permits to civilians to travel outside of the country, something like 60 to 70 percent of them were issued to acrobats. This was a form of cultural export.
The "Cool Japan" program has a longer history than we thought!
Well, in a way, "Cool Japan" was happening back then.
You've probably done more than almost anyone to help promote the idea of Japanese culture being cool, but what was your first encounter with Japan?
When I was 15, we were living in Canberra, Australia, and my father, who was in the U.S. State Department, came home one day and announced we were going to Tokyo. That was how it happened.
What were your first memories of Japan?
I remember arriving in Yokohama and thinking it was all very gray. We traveled to the Sanno Hotel here in Tokyo and I just remember how gray it was. In Australia, I had a dog, a horse and a rifle, so it was quite a change.
And you spent about three years here.
Yes, I went to the American School in Japan. Then I went to the University of California Santa Barbara for a while before returning to Japan, when I went to the International Christian University in Mitaka, Tokyo, for a couple of years. After graduating, I worked in California for a while as a tour guide for Japanese tourists and then I went back to Japan again to study for a second time at ICU. I did interpreting and translation.
Why did you decide to come back to Japan after studying at the University of California? Had you decided already that you'd make a career here?
Well, before that, during the last year I'd spent in Japan, I was in a dormitory at the American School because my parents had left the country. The other dormitory kids were all missionary kids, and they were all fluent in Japanese as they had been raised in the country and they had gone through the Japanese school system. I was very influenced by them and I realized that knowing the language would really open up a new world.
When did you develop an interest in manga?
I didn't really encounter manga until I was living in a dormitory at ICU and so many of my dormmates were reading manga. That would have been around 1970.
What did you like about manga?
I think there were two things. I've always liked comic books as a form of entertainment. And Japanese comic books have always been very creative; they were very different from American comic books at the time.
A lot of Japanese manga artists were trying to make the comic format a place they could develop ideas just as novelists did. In many ways, the manga they produced were more fascinating than they are now.
Did you have any favorites?
I started reading works by Osamu Tezuka, Leiji Matsmoto and Fujio Akatsuka. I loved Akatsuka's gag comic strips, like "Tensai Bakabon (Genius Bakabon)." I was just a huge fan.
How did you get into working with Tezuka and translating his work?
When I was at ICU the second time, I read a lot of manga. Some friends from ICU and I wanted to somehow make people outside of Japan more aware of this phenomenon, so we — an American, Jared Cook, and two Japanese, Shinji Sakamoto and Midori Ueda — formed a little group. We thought we should translate something, and, being very young and naive, we thought we should start at the top.
Sakamoto somehow got a contact with Tezuka Productions and we just visited them directly. We asked if we could translate "The Phoenix" (a series published between 1967 and 1988) and Tezuka said yes. So we translated five volumes of what is actually a much longer series, consisting of 15 or so volumes.
Did Tezuka pay you for them?
Yes, they paid us something. Tezuka was the only manga artist at the time who had had any international exposure, mainly because of his animation "Astro Boy," which had been shown abroad.
So that's how we got started. And because of that I got to know Tezuka quite well. I served as his interpreter when he came to the United States. It was a very memorable experience. He was one of the most extraordinary people I've ever met in my life.
I think he was a genius. As an interpreter, I've met a lot of famous people, but I can say I think Tezuka really stands out. He had a near-photographic memory. He was extremely well read — Russian literature, German literature, American, British. He knew comics. He remembered everything. And he would use everything he experienced in his life in his manga.
He was like a factory, just constantly thinking of stories. And not just one; he'd be working on four, five stories at a time, developing them in his brain, because he was doing four or five serial stories a week in magazines. I've never seen anybody like him.
How was he received in the U.S.?
Probably the average American who had seen "Astro Boy" was not even aware that it was made in Japan. But Tezuka was great at interacting with all types of people — be they intellectuals or children.
And even though he didn't know English very well, he could always draw pictures draw somebody's portrait, draw one of his characters. Drawing was a kind of esperanto for him.
What prompted you to put all that experience into a book, and write "Manga! Manga!"?
I wrote "Manga! Manga!" specifically because, after the initial efforts of translating manga, I came to the conclusion the international market wasn't ready. We would never get anything published. People (in the early '80s) had no idea what Japanese manga was!
We're talking about an age when people were still aghast at the idea of sushi! It was a very different time. So I thought it would be a good idea to write a book that introduced manga and tried to show how vast that universe was. I wanted to break though some of the stereotypes that people had of manga and of comic books in general.
The market wasn't ready for manga translations, but it wasn't really ready for a book on manga either, was it? Many people have said that your books, including 1983's "Manga! Manga!," were way ahead of their time.
You could say that. I don't seem to have very commercial DNA. My books generally don't sell that well. But, what I take a lot of pleasure in today is that I meet people who say that "Manga! Manga!" had a big influence on them. I meet fans and scholars of manga in Iowa or Australia or Europe, and they say that reading my books made them want to learn more about manga or robots or whatever. I get a real thrill out of that.
Did you expect when you were writing "Manga! Manga!" that manga would become as big as it has?
No, I did not. That's been a really interesting thing for me to see. In France and North America and Australia, manga is huge. In the United States now, all the major cities have manga and anime conventions, some of which draw 30,000 or 40,000 people. I never imagined it would reach this scale.
But the other thing I never envisaged was that the manga and anime business would develop to such a high level and then implode — because of the Internet, piracy and so on. Even so, the number of fans doesn't seem to be decreasing, so you have this disconnect now between the business and the fan base.
Why do you think manga and anime became so popular overseas?
I think that for Americans and Europeans, when they started reading Japanese comics and watching Japanese animation, they realized that their preconceptions of those things were largely wrong.
Comic books did not have to be about superheroes. Animation wasn't just for children. People realized that comics and animation could be just as sophisticated as a live-action film or a novel. That is the real contribution that Japanese manga and anime have made.
The decline of anime as an export business is widely seen as a lost opportunity. There have been others, too, such as in the field of robotics. You championed Japan's robot technology in your 1988 book "Inside the Robot Kingdom," so why do you think the country was ill-equipped in terms of robots when the Fukushima nuclear power plant crisis began in March 2011?
Frankly speaking, I was very disappointed. When I wrote that book, I interviewed people throughout Japan and there was a large-scale national project at that point to develop robots that were autonomous or could function in extreme environments — undersea, near fires — and one of them was specifically for nuclear power plants. There was a lot of research being done in Japan.
I think the scientists who I interviewed at the time must have been absolutely devastated by what happened. Somewhere along the line, the funding stopped, the ball was dropped.
I'm sure the failure had something to do with the fact that it's very hard to commercially justify the development of robots, especially robots with such functionality, because, how many of them are you going to sell? There's not a huge market out there. Japan doesn't have a lot of funding from the military sector to develop robots, and that is what is driving a lot of the U.S. research these days.
But there has nevertheless been a lot of development of robots — Honda's ASIMO and so on. Was it a case of directing limited resources into the wrong areas?
I think there was an element of that. The robots that are developed in Japan are being developed in anticipation of a market that doesn't exist yet: personal robots. I believe that will eventually be a huge market, and it is emerging, slowly. It is one area where I'm hoping Japan is really going to be able to shine.
Honda's ASIMO is genuinely amazing — amazing. Japan is the only place in the world that's seriously developing humanoid robots. It's unique. So Japan is positioned well if they can pull this off. But obviously, that is where a lot of the funding went and they paid the price after March 11, 2011.
You used the term "drop the ball." A lot of people think Japan has dropped the ball on a lot of issues. Over the course of your career, you must have been in a position to observe as Japan grew phenomenally, but then … what went wrong?
Yes, I work as a conference interpreter in the technology field and, believe me, I would like very much for Japan to step up to the plate and do better, especially the young people. I have a lot of hopes for the young people. I think the system has really let them down.
But I think Japan is facing some troubles that are genuinely difficult to overcome, and I understand that no one has easy answers. They're not problems that are exclusive to Japan.
Are you thinking of the declining population?
And the aging population, especially.
That same thing will happen in South Korea and China, too. They could learn a lot from Japan. People talk about the Fukushima disaster, but I think a far more serious problem in Japan is the aging population. People have no experience of that.
When I meet young people — young engineers and whatnot — I … I just really hope they will step up to the plate.
Are you confident they will?
I think they will. I hope they are more interested in things overseas. They should go to America more. They should visit Australia and Europe more. They should stop playing video games, breathe the outside air, you know.
You've also written a lot about Japan's relationship with the U.S., and you've spoken about it being a foe, a friend, a model, a mirror. What is Japan to the U.S. now?
The bad news is that right now, Japan is not really on a lot of people's radar screens. It is for a lot of anime and manga fans, but I have to say that the Japanese presence, in the U.S., where I live, just doesn't cast as much of a shadow as it used to. China has really taken up a lot of people's bandwidth.
I do think the younger generation in Japan really do need to step up to the plate. … But, still, I believe Americans have a very positive attitude to Japan.
What do you think will be the legacy of this whole anime/manga boom? Will it just translate into goodwill.
Well, I think it will continue. It's extraordinary. In my country, you don't see 40,000 people turning up to conventions on French films or whatever. Americans generally don't like watching films with subtitles. But you have this huge group of Americans who are in love with Japanese anime and so on.
I think manga and anime have contributed to a lot of goodwill between the countries. And it's not something the government was involved with; it was really a grassroots thing.
I think Americans right now, their impression of Japan is very good. But as somebody who has been involved in Japan and wants to continue earning his living as a conference interpreter, I really do wish they would crank up the volume a little bit! I hate to use a hackneyed phrase, but it's really a case of Ganbare Nippon! (Go Japan!).
But you think the answer lies with the country's rising generations?
They have a lot of obstacles, the social hierarchy and so on. And there's a lot of ossification in society that has been taking place, and there are some big changes needed in Japan. I'm not advocating revolution or anything, but, you know …draw somebody's portrait, draw one of his characters. Drawing was a kind of esperanto for him.
I wrote "Manga! Manga!" specifically because, after the initial efforts of translating manga, I came to the conclusion that the international market wasn't ready. We would never get anything published. People (in the early '80s) had no idea what Japanese manga was!
The market wasn't ready for manga translations, but it wasn't really ready for a book on manga either, was it? Many people hae said that your books, including "Manga! Manga!," which came out in 1983, were way ahead of their time.
No, I did not. That has been a really interesting thing for me to see. In France and North America and Australia, manga is huge. In the U.S. now, all the major cities have manga and anime conventions, some of which draw 30,000 or 40,000 people. I never imagined it would reach this scale.
The decline of anime as a business is seen as a lost opportunity by many commentators. Japan has probably missed a lot of other opportunities, too — one being in robotics. You championed Japan's robot technology in your 1988 book "Inside the Robot Kingdom," so why do you think the country was so ill-equipped in terms of robots when the Fukushima nuclear power plant crisis started in March 2011?
I think there was an element of that. The robots that are developed in Japan are being developed in anticipation of a market that doesn't exist yet: personal robots. I believe that will eventually be a huge market, and it is emerging, slowly. It is one area where Japan, I'm hoping, is really going to be able to shine.
Honda's Asimo is genuinely amazing — amazing. Japan is really the only place in the world that is seriously developing humanoid robots. It's entirely unique. So Japan is positioned well if they can pull this off. But obviously, that is where a lot of the funding went and they paid the price after March 11, 2011.
I think they will. I hope they are more interested in things overseas. They should come to America more. They should visit Australia and Europe more. They should stop playing video games, breathe the outside air, you know.
You've also written a lot about Japan's relationship with the United States, and you've spoken about it being a foe, a friend, a model, a mirror. What is Japan to the U.S. now?
I think manga and anime have contributed to a lot of goodwill between the countries. And it's not something that the government was involved with; it was really a grassroots thing.
I think Americans right now, their impression of Japan is very good. But as somebody who has been involved in Japan and somebody who wants to continue earning their living as a conference interpreter, I really do wish they would crank up the volume a little bit! I hate to use a hackneyed phrase, but it's really a case of Ganbare Nippon! (Go Japan!).


3-D Monster: 3-D Monster Shirts Are In!
And they look GREAT!! I still have to get them photographed and put up in the store, but if you see anything you like, just let me know at; threedmonster@yahoo.com, and I can send one out to you before they hit the store! They are $25 each with $4.00 shipping.
The sizes are mostly Large and XL with a small smattering of Mediums. If you need a different size, let me know because I will be putting in another order soon. Also, these shirts run a little small, so keep that in mind when ordering. I usually wear a Large, but it was a bit snug on me, so I opted for an XL.