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Photos: Five things about the Broncos that make us madder than those stupid Joe Flacco signs
Westword Staff | September 5, 2013 | 6:50am
We love the Broncos; we bleed orange; we have season tickets. But we just can't quite muster enough righteous indignation to be angry about the Joe Flacco signs that went up around Denver last week, infuriating so many.
Sportscaster Vic Lombardi pretended to be so upset about it that he illegally defaced one of the banners. Woody Paige blathered predictably about it on ESPN, while a group of fans circulated a Change.org petition, even though there are plenty of other things to be angry about. Or at least five.
The petition asked NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to "Take the Joe Flacco signage off my Mile High Stadium! Get it out of my Mile High City! Broncos Nation will not endure this detestable and audacious act. Who in their right mind thought that we would just let this fly?! We stand united against your unbearable Joe Flacco signage."
Even Mayor Michael Hancock weighed in, telling 104.3/The Fan radio sports guys Big Al and D-Mac that sometimes you have to swallow your pride for the greater good -- in this case, the honor of hosting the first NFL regular-season game of the year.
And we agree with him. It's awesome that Denver gets to take the stage in a rematch with Super Bowl champions the Ravens, the team that -- oh, by the way -- knocked the Broncos out of the playoffs last year, derailing our Super Bowl dreams.
But that doesn't mean we're not indignant about other things. In fact, there's plenty to be pissed off about when it comes to the Broncos. Here are five things that make us a lot madder than some stupid signs paid for by the NFL.
Number 5: Bag's End We understand the need for security at major sporting events, but the new rule that forbids fans from carrying any kind of bag -- save for the clear ones issued by the NFL -- or even seat cushions is taking things too far. The most obnoxious part of the process, though, is the handheld metal-detector wands that security guards now use to sweep everyone -- even kids -- as they hand over their tickets. Take out your keys and hold up your cell phones: Getting into a Broncos game is now harder than entering the Denver City and County Building, and almost as bad as flying out of Denver International Airport. Continue to keep counting down the five things about the Broncos that make us madder than those stupid Joe Flacco signs. Number 4: Sports Authority Field's craft beer desert Sports Authority Field is located in the nation's best craft-beer state -- one with nearly 200 independent breweries -- and yet there is almost no craft-beer representation among the dozens and dozens of beer stands throughout the park. It's time to update the beer choices, along with the scoreboards. Number 3: Walking the line Speaking of booze, why is the Broncos' front office drunker than the fans? Continue to keep counting down the five things about the Broncos that make us madder than those stupid Joe Flacco signs. Number 2: Von Miller When we watched Miller do a little dance after a tackle two weeks ago in the first preseason home game against the St. Louis Rams, it made us want to vomit. What are you dancing for, Von? You've been suspended for the first six games of the season for being an idiot. How about you just shut up and sit down, since your backups are going to have to fill in for you for a while? Do your dancing if you can still get twelve sacks in the remaining ten games. Number 1: The fact that the Ravens beat us in the first place This banner thing wouldn't be an issue if Peyton Manning could play in cold weather, and if the Broncos hadn't curled up in a ball and let Ray Lewis and company punch us in the mouth last year. If we had won, there would be banners depicting the Lombardi Trophy around town, and we wouldn't have this mess.
More from our Sports archive: "Photos: Peyton F*ckin' Manning T-shirts but no Peyton F*ckin' Manning at Broncos game."


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When the user do this, all the stored data and even the DB disappears.
Any hint on why iOS do this?

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Random Thoughts on Avengers: Endgame
May 24, 2019 May 22, 2019 ErikLeave a comment
It took us a while to get to see Avengers: Endgame a second time, but here we finally are. As usual, thoughts in no particular order. Spoiler warnings in effect.
Eppu's random thoughts
What worked:
It was partly what I expected, but only partly. Mostly it was really not at all what I thought it would be. That's great.
So many smaller Marvel characters we've glimpsed over the years got brief moments, if not a line or two.
A Stan Lee cameo for one more (last?) time.
The pacing was quite good; the movie did not feel three hours long. While Avengers: Infinity War felt stuffed to the gills, parts of A:E felt almost meditative. The slow lead down to the final fight (because of course there has to be a big final fight) was especially welcome. I might have wanted to see the post-snap world (not just USA) get more development, but what can you do—the movie is already so long.
Jeremy Renner got some very emotional stuff to perform, and he was especially great. Kudos.
So much of the dialogue is so funny, especially Ant-Man's!
Captain America's second elevator scene at the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters with H.Y.D.R.A. agents. Thih!
At the big final fight, it was great to see several characters—pun fully intended—running the gauntlet with the gauntlet. Teamwork!
The women of Marvel got to assemble, too (albeit in one token moment).
It was interesting that they kept Thor's beer belly all the way to the end and specifically didn't clean him up with Asgardian magic or whatever.
What I absolutely LOVED:
How BEAUTIFUL everything looked. I know new special effects have been developed along these 22 movies, and Marvel's really got them down now. Also, the cinematographer Trent Opaloch did an awesome job again, and the special effects teams seemed to have had more time to work (compared to A:IW).
Tony Stark with his daughter—LOVED him in those scenes.
Captain America vs. Captain America. *snicker*
Professor Hulk's tete-a-tete with the Ancient One remained verbal after the initial yoinking-out-of-physical-body.
Nat and Clint were clearly shown to be good friends, not romantic partners. Same for Nat and Cap.
Director Carter. 🙂
So many of the men cried at many different points in the story. Because men are not monsters.
When Clint came back alone from Vormir, there was literally no dialogue while the rest were trying to come to grips with Nat's death. Amazing scene, amazing acting!
When Professor Hulk first attempted to undo the snap and the rest were wondering whether it worked, Scott Lang went to the window and looked at the birds, absolutely delighted. Great stuff.
All of the snap-ashed supers and super groups showing up to stand by Captain America's side for the final fight. YIBAMBE!
Captain America wielding Mjölnir! Aaaaah! I knew he could!
Avengers: assemble!
Okoye and Shuri! And Pepper Potts in an Iron Suit!
Yes, Peter Parker, genuine hugs are really nice.
Sam as the new Captain America.
That the best, most touching moments weren't about fisticuffs but people and the relationships between people. Supers are still people, at least in these stories, as are the rest of us.
What I thought wasn't optimal:
The beginning of the movie could have included Captain Marvel's arrival to the compound.
Considering how little time Nebula had in the previous movies, it was odd how much time she had in A:E.
As great as it was to see side characters pop up here and there, I miss Maria Hill; she was barely there. (Like Nick Fury, only at Tony's funeral.) We didn't see Luis from Ant-Man, either.
Hawkeye's vigilante storyline felt like it was copypasted straight from comics. (I've no idea; haven't read any of those.) As interesting as that might have been, it felt disconnected from everything else tonally and emotionally. I get that that the intent was to have Nat poetically give Clint a chance just like he gave her one, but the integration of the story should've been handled better.
For such an ensemble movie, it was oddly low in actual team stuff. The main focus and space were on Tony Stark, Captain America, and Thor. Too many moments on those three for an Avengers story, especially when they picked the dudes who already have their own franchises.
Speaking of Thor: satisfying hammer-axe action, disappointingly little thunder and lightning.
The time-travel plot gimmick felt exactly like that, a gimmick instead of A Rational Plot. Besides, how was Steve able to marry Peggy if doodling with time wasn't supposed to work that way?
What's this rubbish about barely having Black Panther there?
At Stark's funeral, there was one young dude I didn't recognize. Apparently he was the young kid from Iron Man 3. O-kay; he wasn't well integrated at all.
Captain Marvel was MASSIVELY underused. What's the point of having a star player and building up her impact in stingers and trailers if you're going to bench her for most of the film? Absurd. (I did read a comment online saying that the basic edit of A:E was locked down before Captain Marvel even finished filming. If so, it still doesn't justify the bad balancing act in the stingers and trailers.)
The same also applies to Thor, Doctor Strange, and Scarlet Witch. Doctor Strange had nothing plot-related to do in this film? Really?! You could perhaps argue that acquiring the beer belly might've affected Thor's ability to control lightning; then again, he wasn't affectected at all by losing an eye in Thor: Ragnarok, so not really. And what on earth was stopping Wanda from either mind controlling Thanos or snapping a bunch of capillaries in his brain!? Marvel really must get its act together and start actually using powerful characters, including the women, as long as they keep insisting on incorporating them into the MCU.
Peter Quill got what was coming to him—getting kneed into his privates—for touching someone out of the blue like that, but it didn't feel satisfactory at all. He needs to have some sense written into him, but this wasn't the way and I doubt he learned anything.
At the very end, Steve's Old Man Beige(TM) jacket gave me the creeps. Where is it writ that Upon Attaining a Venerable Age, Men Must Wear Beige?!?
What I hated:
Thor's PTSD was a plausible story arc, but done clumsily—too much focus (literally!) was placed on his beer belly, which was played for laughs.
Tony Stark may be great with his daughter, but otherwise he's sill a jerk: asking Pepper a question, then interrupting her in the next breath; all of his needs and wants overriding hers. So, basically, the only time Tony thinks a woman is worthy of respectful treatment is when she's literally sprung from his own DNA? FFS.
If Nebula knew, for her not to have told the Avengers what getting the soulstone requires was nigh on sadistic and not in line with the Nebula the movie spent its beginning establishing. If she merely suspected, it still isn't in line with the new Nebula. At least she did mention Gamora died on Vormir.
You can argue back and forth whether it should've been Nat or Clint who got to sacrifice themselves. Since they went the way they did, the fact remains that the writers have now killed two characters for the soulstone, and both are women. It was tiresome already in A:IW (as we see so many dead women in American entertainment which MCU stories are part of—nothing is created in a vacuum). Now they've stepped it up (remember how both broken bodies were on display on screen?). The most spot-on comment on this I've seen: "'Vormir' means 'refrigerator', right?" Or, in a longer take: "I don't think anyone involved in making Infinity War understood how viscerally disturbing Gamora's death was, especially for women in the audience—to be murdered by your abuser in what he claims to be proof of his love, and to have the universe itself validate that proof by giving him what he wants in exchange." Disgusting.
Where was Natasha's funeral? Why were the men allowed to wallow after losing people, but Pepper got, what, 15 seconds? This stinks of fridging: women die for men to Have Feels.
When the women of Marvel got to assemble (albeit in a way that felt forced), they were pretty much stopped there; not even 60 seconds. A:IW had a better all-women fight scene.
What questions I was left with:
Um, wasn't the whole point with Laura and their kids that Clint explicitly wanted to keep 'em off S.H.I.E.L.D.'s radar? (It was mentioned in Avengers: Age of Ultron.) We see him wearing an ankle monitor, which means they're exposed to at least one agency, possibly many. And he was fine with it??
What about phase 4??? Seems like whichever way you look, there's a lot (a lot!) to explain after A:E, and that doesn't sound like an easy task.
Erik's random thoughts
My random thoughts come in two varieties: gripes and cheers.
The gripes:
This is a movie trying to do too much. It has too many characters to serve, too many plots to ravel up, too many nostalgia beats to hit, too much narrative debt to pay off. As with Infinity War before it, it is a tribute to the writers and directors that this movie works at all, but it still feels like twenty pounds of story in a ten-pound bag.
Given that the movie is overstuffed, it is no surprise that most of my problems with it concern the things it doesn't have time for. It is perhaps unfair to complain that a movie with several dozen heroes doesn't spend enough time with some of them, but there a few cases that feel particularly galling. Chief among those is Captain Marvel. After a movie and two stingers building up her potential as a game-changing hero, she barely appears in Endgame. Her most significant contribution to the plot is delivering Tony Stark back to Earth, after which she disappears for most of the rest of the runtime. The movie practically spends more time making excuses for Carol Danvers's absence than it does explaining the central time heist.
The movie's handling of women in general is pretty awful. They mostly appear as emotional supports to men or in roles so small as to be effectively meaningless. When the female heroes assemble in the midst of the final battle, all they really get to do is pose together before the general melee resumes. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has had a problem with is female characters for the whole decade, yet the fact that the filmmakers evidently thought a quick photo-op in a three-hour movie was good enough is somehow even more enraging than the usual neglect.
In a similar vein, it is not nothing that this movie includes the first openly, explicitly gay character in the MCU, and the fact that he is taken seriously as a person, without comment or surprise—and by Captain America, no less—is unequivocally good. At the same time, an unnamed throwaway character in a scene that does not advance the plot and will be easy to edit out in less tolerant markets is about as close to nothing as you can get.
There is a reason why the original Avengers movie worked so brilliantly: not only did the movie as a whole have a clear narrative line, but all of the major characters had their own arcs. You could watch it as an Iron Man movie, a Captain America movie, a Hulk movie, a Thor movie, a Black Widow movie, even a Hawkeye movie, and it worked. If Avengers proved that there can be room for six main characters in a movie, Infinty War and Endgame have proved that there isn't room for several dozen. Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are the only characters who really have narrative throughlines in the movie. Thor and Bruce Banner each get a couple of good scenes, but not enough for a real story. Natasha and Clint have the suggestion of a story without really getting time to develop.
Another thing that made Avengers so successful is that, of all the movies Tony Stark has appeared in, Avengers is the one least dominated by his emotional issues. Endgame sadly falls right into line, devoting more screen time to Tony Stark's feelings than to anything else.
The cheers:
While the whole of this movie may be less than the sum of its parts, some of those parts are pretty good. The scene between Nat and Clint on Vormir sticks out in my mind. For the two poor relations of the Avengers, it was a haunting, beautifully-acted performance that showed the depths of their friendship in a way that has only been hinted at before. I could not guess which of them was going to fall, but it was clear that it would be heartbreaking either way.
I appreciated that this movie took the time to show us a post-snap world, even if only in a fragmentary way.
A lovely, tiny detail of character development: Tony and Pepper's daughter tells Tony "I love you 3,000." When recording a message for her, he says: "I love you 3,000." Not 3,001 or 4,000, but the same number. For once, he doesn't feel the need to one-up someone.
The final battle is a gloriously overloaded superhero rampage. I usually like cinematic fights to have a clear narrative progression, but there is something to be said for the joy of sheer chaos.
Many of the callbacks to previous movies were ingeniously done, but I think my favorite is Falcon announcing the arrival of the un-snapped on the battlefield with: "On your left."
Even though it was far too brief and inconsequential, the assembly of the Marvel women was glorious as long as it lasted, and it made the point that the MCU has lots of powerful female characters. Now they just need movies.
There were also nice moments sprinkled through the film of women doing things: Nat running the reduced Avengers, Okoye managing the Wakanda branch (and perhaps the whole African division?) of same, Carol Danvers punching through a spaceship (as she is wont to do), and Nebula reconnecting with a previous version of Gamora. They are not enough, but they are good for what they are.
On Nebula and Gamora: in one of the few exceptions to women acting primarily as emotional supports to men, the most important relationship that Gamora develops when brought back from the past is with Nebula, not Peter Quill. The movie in fact gives Nebula, a secondary character from a second-string franchise, a surprising amount of screen time and development. At the end of the movie, Gamora and Nebula's sisterhood is poised to take over as the most important relationship among the Guardians of the Galaxy, while Thor is in position to replace Quill as leader. If this leads to Quill being sidelined from the group or developing as a character into something more than a petulant overgrown child, I support either change.
Steve gets to have a life with Peggy. I'll let other people worry about the time-travel implications—it is the ending they both deserve, and I'm happy with it.
Also: we know that Peggy Carter went on to be someone important in S.H.I.E.L.D. (her office door says Director), while Steve Rogers was a national hero whose face had been all over the newsreels. If he wanted to stay out of history's way in his life with Peggy, he'd have to keep out of the public eye. Conclusion: Peggy Carter was working a high-powered job in the 1950s while Steve Rogers was a stay-at-home husband. I support this idea, and I believe Captain America would support it, too.
Image: Avengers: Endgame poster via IMDb
In the Seen on Screen occasional feature, we discuss movies and television shows of interest.
Seen on ScreenAnt-Man, Avengers, Black Panther, Black Widow, Captain America, Captain Marvel, Guardians of the Galaxy, Hulk, Iron Man, Marvel, movies, superheroes, Thor, time travel
Aithiopia Forever
February 18, 2019 February 17, 2019 ErikLeave a comment
The Greek historian Herodotus tells us some interesting stories about the people he refers to as Ethiopians (or Aithiopes in Greek). The term Ethiopians/Aithiopes was widely used in ancient Greece for any dark-skinned people from the southern regions of Africa or India, but the people Herodotus means were those who lived in the northeastern African interior, south of Egypt along the Nile, in the region we know as Nubia.
Herodotus reports several remarkable things about these Ethiopians.While many of these stories are fanciful, or at least greatly exaggerated, they paint an interesting picture of what Herodotus and his fellow Greeks imagined the people of inner Africa to be like.
They were physically impressive and long-lived:
The Ethiopians are said to be the tallest and most beautiful of all peoples.
– Herodotus, Histories 3.20
Most of them live to 120 and some surpass this.
They enjoyed a life of ease and good health, enabled by the special resources of their land:
There is a meadow outside the city filled with boiled meats from animals of all kinds. The lords of the city make it their custom to set these meats out at night, and during the day anyone who wants to may feast there. The locals say that the earth itself provides these things.
[The Ethiopians possessed] a spring where they washed themselves and became sleeker, as if they had bathed in oil, even though it smelled of violets. … [T]he water of this spring was so light that nothing could float on it, neither wood nor anything lighter. Everything just sank to the bottom. If what they say is true, it seems likely that it is their regular use of this spring that makes them all so long-lived.
They have an interesting way of choosing their leader:
Their customs are unlike those of any other people, and especially their kingship: they choose as king the one among them who is tallest and has the strength to match his height.
And they preferred to be left alone and not be bothered by the rest of the world's problems:
The Ethiopian king said [to the Persian king's emissaries]: "The king of the Persians does not send you with these gifts because he desires my friendship, nor have you spoken the truth, for you have come here to spy on my kingdom. Nor is that man just, for if he were he would not desire the lands of others or enslave men who have done him no wrong. Now, give him this bow and say to him: 'The king of the Ethiopians advises the king of the Persians that when a Persian can draw so strong a bow as easily as I do, then he may contemplate making war upon the long-lived Ethiopians. Until then, let him thank the gods for not putting the sons of the Ethiopians in a mood to conquer other lands.'"
I think you can see where I'm going with this.
Herodotus' Aithiopia is essentially Wakanda.
Happy anniversary, Black Panther!
Image: T'Challa and Shuri via Giphy
Quotes, Seen on ScreenBlack Panther, Herodotus, history, Marvel, movies
Black Panther Is Coming to the Smithsonian African American Museum
June 29, 2018 June 25, 2018 EppuLeave a comment
Earlier this year, the Smithsonian African American Museum of History and Culture screened the superhero movie Black Panther as part of their programming.
Now the museum has plans to incorporate the movie into their collections in a larger way:
"The museum acquired several objects from Disney's record-breaking film Black Panther, including the hero costume worn by actor Chadwick Boseman; a shooting script signed by Ryan Coogler (co-writer; director), Kevin Feige (producer, president of Marvel Studios), Nate Moore (executive producer) and Joe Robert Cole (co-writer; producer); two pages of spec script; and 24 high-resolution production photographs. Plans for display of the objects are under consideration by the museum." […]
"Black Panther is the first superhero of African descent to appear in mainstream American comics, and the film itself is the first major cinematic production based on the character. Black Panther illustrates the progression of blacks in film, an industry that in the past has overlooked blacks, or regulated them to flat, one-dimensional and marginalized figures. The film, like the museum, provides a fuller story of black culture and identity."
Interesting! "Plans for display … are under consideration" definitely sounds like museum speak for planning a permanent exhibit. 🙂 In the meanwhile, the collection spotlight blog post, "Wakanda to Smithsonian", includes a few images of the Black Panther hero costume (armor) on the premises.
Image by The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture
NewsBlack Panther, Marvel, movies, museums, superheroes
Geeky, Feminist Motivational Posters for the International Women's Day
April 4, 2018 April 1, 2018 EppuLeave a comment
Due to a post-winterstorm blackout a week more than two weeks ago, I'm still catching up on my Internet reading, so I only saw these awesome, nerdy motivational posters now after the International Women's Day. It was worth the wait, though:
Risa Rodil on Tumblr.
"Just because something works doesn't mean it can't be improved."
Referring of course to Shuri from the movie Black Panther. As another tinkerer, I wholeheartedly agree! 😀
"Behind every successful woman is herself."
The posters are by letterer, illustrator and designerd Risa Rodil. She posted them on Tumblr in honor of the International Women's Day (March 08).
Visit Risa Tumblr post for more geeky feminist posters. And while there, look at the rest of her work – such a distinct, lively, whimsical style. I especially liked this library poster:
"When in doubt, go to the library."
Find more about Risa on her website, including where to buy her designs.
Crossposted from the Playfully Grownup Home blog (with slight editing).
Images by Risa Rodil via Tumblr: Shuri and successful woman. Library.
Out Thereadaptations, art, Black Panther, material culture
Downloadable Pattern for Nakia's Scarf from Black Panther
March 21, 2018 March 10, 2018 EppuLeave a comment
Ruth E. Carter, costume designer for Black Panther, tweeted the knitting pattern for Nakia's scarf. The pattern and scarf were created by Jeff Gillies.
Pattern for Nakia Scarf! pic.twitter.com/YDMww6xIia
— Ruth E Carter (@iamRuthECarter) March 3, 2018
Since the pattern didn't come through in full on Twitter, Gillies made the whole pattern available for download at Ravelry, including gauge information and recommended yarns.
Squee! How awesome!
Images by Walt Disney Pictures, Marvel Entertainment via Jeff Gillies at Ravelry
Making StuffBlack Panther, DIY, movies, textiles
Black Panther Reaction Links
March 6, 2018 March 5, 2018 EppuLeave a comment
Sharing links to and quotes from some reaction pieces on the Black Panther movie adaptation.
Brandon O'Brien at Tor.com: "Building Bridges: Black Panther and the Difference Between Rage and Revolution"
"[Nakia]'s been doing it all alone, with no backup, even insisting on not being disturbed as she trots about the globe, righting capitalist neo-imperialist wrongs through her own wits. Nakia sees the value of providing a more lasting sense of peace for the disenfranchised, and knows that the late stage of that goal requires the commitment of Wakanda—not to wage war on other countries, but to seek out the downtrodden and lift them up and out of struggle. In her first scene in the film, she even has the empathy to see a child soldier as a boy first and an aggressor second, preferring to send him back home than to fight him."
Brandon O'Brien at Tor.com: "'Who are you?': Black Panther and the Politics of Belonging"
"Black Panther, however, is a revolution. Not merely in the sense that "it is revolutionary to see blackness this way," though it is. But also in the sense that this movie is a revolutionary dialogue. […]
"Most of the introductions in the film happen in a very particular way. When Wakandans ask each other 'Who are you?', it happens not with any distrust or confusion, but with a display of pride. They are asking you to confess yourself, to admit that you are one of their own with the gusto of someone who deeply values what that means. You get to be someone. You get to be."
Bridget Boakye at Face 2 Face Africa: "The Legendary Dahomey Amazons Are the Real-Life All-Women's Army in Black Panther"
"In the 1800s, there was an all-female army in modern-day Benin that pledged a similar loyalty to the throne [as Dora Milaje did]. They were known as the Dahomey Warriors and were praised for their bravery and strength by local leaders and European colonizers alike who encountered them."
Chika Oduah at The Root: "Audiences Across Africa Hail Black Panther for Humanizing Black Characters"
"For many Africans, the film brought to the big screen a reality that they see every day—the Basotho blankets the warriors used as a protective shield, the queen's Zulu hat, the ochre-dyed locks of the Himba, the flowing fabrics of the Wolof. It was the sheer Pan-Africanism of it all that astounded me. The cinematic display of the diversity of Africanness was beautiful."
Damon Young at Very Smart Brothas / The Root: "Yet Another Reason Why Shuri From Black Panther Is the Greatest Disney Princess Ever"
"In the last half of the movie alone, [Shuri] saved a man's life—even if the man was 'another broken white boy.' She guided said primitive white boy on how to use the advanced technology she created, which ultimately helped save the entire planet from mass war and anarchy. And then she went out and literally fought (and held her own for a while) against a supervillain. Cinderella ain't got shit on her. [original emphasis]"
Emily Asher-Perrin at Tor.com: "Why Are You Reading Reviews About Black Panther When You Could Be Watching Black Panther?"
"You could call it Shakespearean, you could call it mythic, but that's not where the film lives. It's not about the broad strokes, it's about the details. It's about all the little choices in concert, creating something brand new, and creating it on a scale that cinema has never seen before."
Karlton Jahmal at Hot New Hip Hop: "Black Panther's Killmonger Is the Best Supervillain Since The Dark Knight's Joker"
"[T]he emotion that Michael B. Jordan left me with was more powerful than anything I've felt at the movies. That painful rage, that feeling of angst that builds up when the topic of slavery or Jim Crown is brought up. That acrimonious tension that resonates in my gut when I see videos of police brutality or ignorant politicians fueling a race war. That feeling was replaced. A resolve, a euphoric feeling of relief spread from inside me instead."
Liz Bourke at Tor.com: "Sleeps With Monsters: The Women of Black Panther Are Amazing"
"It's also a film that, while it centres on a man—and on questions of kingship, legitimacy, and responsibility—is the first superhero film I've ever seen to surround its main male character with women who are in many ways equally powerful, and who don't depend on him for purpose or characterisation. No, seriously: this is the first superhero film I've ever seen—maybe the first SFF film I've ever seen—where pretty much the hero's entire back-up team, his entire support network, were women. Women who teased him and challenged him and demanded he do better."
Samuel James at Black Girl in Maine: "The Reality of Blackness in the Fiction of Black Panther"
"[…] Black Panther shows Black characters in an unusual way. In the movie, not only are we not drug dealers and pimps and rapists, we are intellectuals and leaders and heroes—but not only are we intellectuals and leaders and heroes, we multifaceted and complicated. We are human. Black Panther celebrates the humanity of Blackness."
Shay Stewart Bouley at Black Girl in Maine: "A Film and the Affirmation of Blackness… My Musings on Black Panther"
"In a world that centers all things white, whiteness and proximity to whiteness, a blockbuster film that centers Blackness and uplifts Black women is a much-needed paradigm shift. It is not just a new way to re-envision our world through the lens of Afro-futurism but it is also an opportunity to take stock of the Nakia's, Okoye's and Shuri's who are already in our midst but who are often overlooked. I imagine a world where a Black woman won't feel that she is traveling life without a roadmap as an anomaly but instead will know that she is another in a long line of changemakers because Blackness will not be relegated to the margins."
Finally, a great video clip where co-writer and director Ryan Coogler breaks down a section of the casino fight scene:
Black Panther's Director Ryan Coogler Breaks Down a Fight Scene | Notes on a Scene | Vanity Fair
(Our random thoughts on the movie are here.)
Seen on Screenadaptations, Black Panther, Marvel, movies, race, superheroes
To the Lady Queen
An official from a Western superpower arrives in a rich and powerful African kingdom and offers his respect and support to a royal woman. It may sound like Everett Ross from Black Panther, but it's actually two millennia older:
Good fortune to the Lady Queen, may she live happily for many years. Acutus came from the city and [saw the place (?)] on the 15th of April.
(My own translation)
This inscription, the southernmost Latin inscription yet discovered, comes from Musawwarat es-Suffra in modern-day Sudan, which in antiquity was part of the kingdom of Kush. Kush, often called Meroë by Greek and Roman authors after its capital city, was a powerful state on the central Nile river. After the Roman conquest of Egypt in 30 BCE, the Roman Empire and Kush fought a brief border war, but the Kushan Queen Amanirenas soon made a peace treaty with Rome that was respected by both sides for centuries to come. (Greco-Roman authors mistakenly call Amanirenas "Candance," which is not a name but a Kushan title for a royal woman.)
This inscription, which is in rather poor condition and cannot be read fully, probably dates to sometime in the third century CE. The Acutus who dedicated it was most likely a Roman envoy ("the city" being Rome) who had come to Kush on diplomatic business. His effusive good wishes to another (unnamed) ruling queen were in keeping with how Roman ambassadors demonstrated respect for foreign rulers. This inscription shows that Rome regarded its relationship with Meroë as worth maintaining with proper diplomatic dignity. Kush profited handsomely from facilitating trade between the Roman Mediterranean and both sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian Ocean, and had every reason to encourage ongoing good relations.
The history of interactions between Europeans and Africans is filled with bloodshed and inhumanity. It is understandable how appealing Black Panther's fantasy of an isolated African state untouched by European invasion or interference is to many fans. But it is also worth remembering that isolation is not the only option, and history also contains examples of European-African contacts that were peaceful and respectful.
Image: CIL III 83 via Adam Łajtar and Jacques van der Vliet, "Rome-Meroe-Berlin. The Southernmost Latin Inscription Rediscovered ("CIL" III 83)," Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 157 (2006), 193-198.
QuotesBlack Panther, Kush, Rome
Some Random Thoughts on Black Panther
February 20, 2018 April 14, 2019 Erik3 Comments
In no particular order. Spoiler warnings in effect.
Erik's random thoughts:
This is the movie that Thor was trying to be: a Shakespearean family drama about an exiled hero coming to terms with the destiny of his people and his father's failures in the midst of a gorgeous futuristic city-state. (On a side note: does anyone actually remember the original Thor movie or have we collectively agreed that the franchise starts with number 3?)
I love the architecture of Wakanda. It looks like the product of thousands of years of African tradition with the highest of modern technology, just as it should.
Even for a fantasy of African exceptionalism, the story does not shy away from the bitter real history of imperialism, exploitation, slavery, and its modern-day consequences, and the movie is richer and stronger for it.
Shuri is awesome. Her combination of flippancy in the face of tradition, passion for technological tinkering, and powerful love for her family and home make her a delight to watch. I think she's my favorite character in the whole movie, and that's not an easy pick in this one.
Could we have T'Challa and Shuri take over the Tony Stark role in the Marvel Universe, please? I appreciate what Iron Man did to kickstart the MCU and hold the early installments together, but I've had enough of him now. I honestly don't think I can handle one more movie about Tony Stark's emotional issues. T'Challa can be the guy in the super suit who cracks wise while leading the fight and Shuri can be the tinkerer who keeps upgrading everybody's gear.
Even in a franchise that includes a movie about waking up one morning to discover that literal Nazis have taken over the US government, Black Panther feels like the movie we most need in 2018: a meditation on the temptations of division, resentment, and revenge and the hard choice of embracing a flawed and fractured world with hope. As crucially as Black Panther contributes to the representation of black people in genre media—and by Bast it does—it has a lot to say outside the dialogue of race as well.
For the record: as a white man, I have no problem whatsoever identifying with the characters of this movie. I'm not talking about Martin Freeman's Everett Ross, either—Zuri is my guy.
Eppu's random thoughts:
Note: These thoughts are based on one viewing. I'm fully aware that some of them are just scratching the surface and that I need to see the move (at least!) a second time and mull things over properly.
If I had to use one word to describe Black Panther, on a meta level it would be confelicity: I am so, so, SO glad for those black people who are exited, overjoyed, and exhilarated over seeing a full cast of people that look like them acting with grace and agency, not minimized but celebrated! On a story level, I'd use equality.
I knew from reading non-spoiler reviews beforehand that the movie passes the Bechdel test, so I didn't even bother tracking it. It was very nice not to have to care.
If it was nice not to have to care about whether the Bechdel test passes or not, it was outright GLORIOUS to see that WOMEN ARE PEOPLE in their own right, with their own interior lives, not just breasts and posteriors for men to ogle. And such a spread of different women, too, each doing their thing according to their interests and skills. Because that's who we are, and what we do, and have done for millenia, and it's damn time that the self-absorbed, able-bodied, white cis hetero men in Hollywood respected that. (Yes, I know that the Black Panther team behind the camera included many, many people of color, including women, but that's not the default, is it.)
And of course it's not just that women are people in their own right, but that there are so many diverse black women. Have you any idea what a disservice (to put it mildly) your typical Anglo-American fiction does to women of color, especially black women? I didn't until I started paying attention. It's atrocious and shameful.
Black Panther was visually beautiful. Beautiful! It was so beautiful my brain experienced a moment of "this looks wrong" when stepping out of the movie theater into the dim and snowless February evening in Massachusetts.
Also, the sets and costumes were breathtaking just like I thought. Everything looked like it was produced by a living culture, with layers of history and development alike.
OMG, the tech. Those dragonfly helicopters! Attack rhinos! I kinda want those 3d phone calls! No—scratch that. The maglev trains and über-advanced health care. Like now.
The opening sequence (T'Chaka voiceover telling a story to young T'Challa) and the end credit visuals I thought nodded back to the superhero fight statue end credits for Avengers: Age of Ultron. Yet neither ever lost sight of the fact that they were for and about Black Panther.
A superhero movie with a male lead confident and mature enough to listen to others ROCKS! (Hat tip to Justina Ireland for pointing out T'Challa's ability to listen as a core personality trait.)
I liked Martin Freeman's character Everett Ross in this movie. He started with "I know what I'm doing, piss off little people" claptrap. In Wakanda, however, he quickly—and without too much whining—realized how out of his depth he was and spent a good while looking and listening and learning. In the final battle, he redeemed himself to some extent in my eyes when he hopped back into the fighter jet holo-interface to destoy the final cargo plane after he'd discovered that the base he was sitting in was under attack and that there was less than a minute before the gunfire broke through. And never, ever was he written or played as a Mighty Whitey.
It was also good to see a thoroughly accomplished man (T'Challa) grapple with impostor syndrome (not ready to be King). We don't see or hear much of that; mostly it's women who are saddled with it in the public discussion.
I liked T'Challa's relationship with the rest of his family members, but I LOVED every moment between him and Princess Shuri. They so clearly love and respect each other as equals—with different skill sets, sure, but equals nevertheless—plus jostle around like real-life siblings.
Finally, all of the acting was so good. I won't miss Andy Serkis's character. At. All! Props to Serkis, his incredible performance made the dude truly terrifying and disgusting, but I'd rather watch the competent and kind Africans, thank you.
Images: Black Panther poster via IMDb. Shuri and T'Challa gif via media.riffsy.com.
Seen on ScreenBlack Panther, gender, inclusion, Marvel, movies, race, viewing
Black Panther Opens Today!
February 16, 2018 February 11, 2018 EppuLeave a comment
Black Panther opens today, finally! Like I said elsewhere in a comment, every poster, clip, and trailer looks more and more awesome.
And tomorrow we get to see the movie! So excite!
Images: Black Panther Dolby Cinema poster via Mark Ruffalo on Tumblr. Kermit flail via Walker—Bait on Tumblr.
Hey, look! We found a thing on the internet! We thought it was cool, and wanted to share it with you.
Ooh, Shiny!Black Panther, Marvel, movies, superheroes
Black Panther Official Trailer
October 17, 2017 October 16, 2017 Eppu3 Comments
The Black Panther official trailer dropped yesterday and it's looking mighty shiny:
Marvel Studios' Black Panther – Official Trailer by Marvel Entertainment
Judging by this trailer and some of the tidbits we saw in the teaser trailer, this might well be the visually most astounding Marvel Cinematic Universe movie to date. (And that's saying something, since we've visited Thor, Loki et al.'s domain and the deep corners of space…) Also, the Wakandan design ethos looks deep—like it rises from a long line of traditional crafts still practiced, and acknowledges the country's history. Wonderful!
Four months to go.
Ooh, Shiny!Black Panther, Marvel, movies, superheroes, videos

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Suppliers: Hunger Hydraulics C.C., Ltd.
Producing high quality products requires the highest manufacturing technology available today. Hunger Hydraulics C.C., Ltd. meets these standards with quality processes starting with high precision CNC milling and turning machines that have capacities up to 48 inch diameter and 28 feet in length. Hunger Hydraulics C.C., Ltd. utilizes certified welders for MIG, TIG, Sub Arc and solid rod welding. As required, welded seams are inspected with ultrasound by approved and certified inspectors. Hunger Hydraulics C.C., Ltd. has a manufacturing site of 65,000 sq. ft. and offices for sales and engineering of 6,000 sq ft. In our facility, we do repair work of all makes of hydraulic cylinders as well as new cylinder manufacturing.


EATON —During a meeting on Monday, April 1, Preble County Commissioners met with CDM Smith regarding Sewer District Six (SD6) and plans the company had previously submitted for it.
•The scope of the project and if Stoneridge is included. There are 261 houses included in the scope of the project, including Stoneridge.
•Whether Eaton or West Alexandria would be willing to partner on the project and allow a connection into their plant. Eaton has previously said it does not have the capacity, but CDM Smith has had only "baseline" conversations with West Alexandria.
•Are grant and loan combinations realistic and obtainable? Fred Smith, with CDM Smith, replied that in his experience it is realistic to combine grant and loan options and, further, his options he listed in the plans are obtainable.
•According to Smith, the timeline for this project, from planning to execution, is typically five years.
•The cost to residents who are going to be expected to utilize this system. CDM Smith estimates approximately $10,000 for residents to decommission their old system and tap into the new one.
•Possible locations for the treatment facility.
"As we move forward, we have some pretty stringent deadlines we have to meet and we have to get through this document so we can come up with cost," Commissioner Chris Day said. "That being said, we're going to have to have some very good communications at this point.
Smith promised to have an update by April 12.


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Q: Catching all java.lang.Error for logging purposes and allowing them to work their way up the stack Short version:  How do I catch all java.lang.Error thrown in a particular section of code in order to log them, and also allow them to propogate up the call stack as if I hadn't caught them at all?
Long version...
In a section of code I want to catch all java.lang.Error in order to log them.  But I also want to let the Error continue to work its way up the call stack so the behaviour would be the same as if I hadn't caught it at all.
Additionally, I want to catch and log all java.lang.Exceptions and then let them ALSO propogate up the call stack.
I tried this...
    } catch (Throwable e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        throw e;
    }

...but the problem with that is I have to modify every method higher up in the call stack to throw Throwable, and some of those methods aren't mine to modify (my method is called by a method in a third party framework).
I would be happy with some kind of wrapping technique, whereby I would put the Throwable in something else and throw that, but I would much prefer to let any java.lang.Errors propogate upward in their natural fashion, as if I hadn't caught them at all.
Suggestions?
EDIT:  It was asked "Why do I want to do this?".  I think that's a good question which I will clarify:  This is a framework for use in my company. It depends on other frameworks contained in jars, that the system admin might have forgotten to include. In that case there is a NoClassDefFoundError in certain places in the code. But only the user sees this Error in the browser, it is not found in the server logs. I want to log it so the system admin can know that this Error has occurred, as he will have instructions for dealing with it.

A: You said: "I tried this..."
    } catch (Throwable e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        throw e;
    }

You should try instead:
    } catch (Error e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        throw e;
    }

Errors are not checked exceptions. You don't have to declare them in any method signature. Just put that in your outermost method and it will do what you want.
Edit:
If you want to also catch and rethrow Exception, let's think about it. You have three kinds of Throwable: Error, Exception and RuntimeException. Error and RuntimeException are not checked, but Exception which are not RuntimeException are.
So, you can do the same thing for RuntimeException as we do for Error:
    } catch (RuntimeException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        throw e;
    } catch (Error e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
        throw e;
    }

And what about Exception who are not RuntimeException? The thing to understand is that these are checked exceptions and if they are not declared in the methods that the code is calling, then they will not be thrown. So you don't need to catch/rethrow them. If some of the methods called actually throw such an exception, then you will have to catch/rethrow it and mark your method as throwing that exception, but you would have to do that anyway since they are coming from methods the outer method is calling.


Most travelers journey to Emeraude Pier with their tour group. But independent travelers can elect to take the Emeraude Shuttle.
Two 16-seat Mercedes Sprinter mini buses make daily departures from Hanoi and Halong City. The eastbound bus to Halong leaves from the Emeraude's sales office at 46 Le Thai To every morning at 8.30am. The westbound bus leaves Emeraude Pier for the return trip to Hanoi at 9.30am. The three-hour each-way trip costs $40 return.
While aboard the Emeraude, be as active or as indolent as you please.
Behold the silver screen. After dark, gather topside for a viewing of "Indochine," projected on deck with surround sound and surround scenery. An unparalleled movie experience.
All Hands on Deck. Foot and shoulder massages in the sunshine or go below deck for body wraps and scrubs - without losing that Halong Bay View.
Accommodation in luxury AC en-suite 10m2 cabin with twin/double basic.
Welcome cocktail on Arrival, Vietnamese buffet lunch and dinner on first day. European breakfast buffet in the next day.


text:
Vitameter returns from Bayer's accelerator
WATERLOO, Ont. – Velocity Foundry startup Vitameter has returned from Germany after spending the last four months at Bayer Grants4Apps Accelerator. Vitameter uses nanotechnology and bio-sensors to create a personal handheld device that allows people to track their vitamin levels, and eventually other biomarkers with a single drop of blood in the comfort of their home.
Each test is inexpensive and provides the information needed to manage diet and supplements. Last year, Vitameter won $25,000 for the device in the Velocity Fund Finals, and also garnered a $10,000 award as the best hardware startup. The Vitameter device can tell users if they need to increase or decrease their intake of vitamins and supplements.
Velocity caught up with Business Lead Bobby Green, and Co-Founder James Maclean to discuss their time spent in Berlin, Germany, what they learned, and their goals for Vitameter.
Q: A year ago Vitameter won both the $25K and the $10K Velocity Fund Finals. How has your company grown since then?
A: We started as one of the first groups in Velocity Science, and moved into the Foundry last May. That allowed us to have a permanent workspace to work in and expand our team. Since then, we've kept up the momentum, winning the Velocity Fund Finals, moving to Germany to work at Bayer, releasing our first prototype, and now we're looking to raise and start beta-testing our prototype, so that will be our next big milestone.
Q: What are your current goals for Vitameter, or alternatively, your vision for the future?
A: On the business side of things, we're doing the raising process, running through the clinical trials which are required to get to market, and doing the legwork needed to get us to pre-sales, and then eventually sales, hopefully a year from now. We are doing the beta testing of the product and looking for people, so anyone interested can contact us.
Q: How did Vitameter develop while being at Bayer Grants4Apps Accelerator?
A: We got a global perspective of the healthcare industry, which was quite helpful in developing our business plan. In addition, we were sitting right next to top scientists so we were able to continue our prototype development in their collaborative space. This was similar to Velocity Science, but at a different scale. Some of the direct mentorship we received from Bayer executives helped impose the idea of metrics-based tracking, which is definitely something Vitameter will incorporate.
Q: Any interesting stories that occurred during your time at Bayer?
A: It was hard to convince security to let us work past 10 pm because it's illegal in Germany for employees to work past certain hours. We had to get special permission to come in on the weekends and got yelled at by security guards all the time.
Q: What advice would you give future startups about preparing for the shift from working at an incubator like Velocity, to working at an accelerator?
A: Make sure you understand the country you're going to, and their import and export laws, as well as the costs and time delays associated with moving hardware. We weren't prepared for those changes and it cost us some drawbacks in productivity. Some good things, amongst many, about being at an accelerator are stricter deadlines which push one's productivity.
Q: If you could give Velocity companies some parting advice, what would it be?
A: People are too okay with failure, startups especially, and it's slightly glorified in the industry. Realistically, you want to avoid that, as redundant as that sounds. Have dialogue with as many people as you can; it's an invaluable resource for anyone starting a new business. Sleep tomorrow.


text:
Somme Prairie Grove tour: Early August
August 6, 2017 - the 40th anniversary of the first North Branch "workday."
About 20 people in three groups toured Somme Prairie Grove.
The points where we stopped to talk:
At the end of this post is a list of the plants in bloom along the trail, point by point.
The Somme ecosystem explodes up in mid-summer. Back in early July, the vegetation was rich, but compact. Before we look at today's photos, let's look at two from mid July:
July 10: the flowers and grasses were mostly knee-high.
In bloom here: butterflyweed, leadplant, wild quinine, and black-eyed Susan.
July 28: the gayfeather (spiked blazing star) is in full bloom with rattlesnake master, Culver's root,
and sweet black-eyed Susan - all twice as tall as the flowers on July 10. But the explosion is just starting.
On August 6, the big bluestem grass is well over the head of co-steward Eriko Kojima.
The blazing stars, Culver's roots, and rattlesnake masters are well down underneath the grass.
A month ago, the prairie grasses were up to our waists. Today in some places, they'll be well over our heads. The main tall grasses in this section will be big bluestem (turkey foot top) and switchgrass (delicate, wide-spreading heads).
Bright ribbons around trees here show where the Illinois Natural History Survey and Forest Preserve District staff are studying Somme Prairie Grove as a model for the Next Century Conservation Plan
This area has too many pole trees. (More and better woods photos later.)
Seeds are forming on some of early-season bloomers. Notice here, seeds from New Jersey tea, white false indigo, meadow parsnip (Thaspium), and golden Alexanders.
We'll soon gather, prep, and broadcast these seeds to spread them to needy areas.
Our youngest ecologist spotted a snake sunning in the bush here. Good job, Cormick.
This is a good place to look at the major habitats at SPG: thickets (here), prairie-like openings, woodlands, savanna, wetlands
This thicket is becoming more "natural" through a lot of work. Is that "gardening" or ecological restoration? We discuss.
Think about this area: 2,000 years ago. The bison and wolves were in the prairies. Deer, elk, and mountain lions were mostly in the woods and savannas. The bison prefer the prairie because they eat mostly grass. The deer in the summer eat mostly wildflowers; in the winter they eat mostly the live bark of twigs (browse). The elk ate all those categories.
Parts of Somme have been utterly degraded, ecologically. This area was clear-cut and plowed. All the trees are young. But many species survived in nearby remnants (like the woods edges we've just passed though and the too-wet-to-plow swale edge just north of us). So when the Forest Preserve District bought the land, the species of these remnant areas started to spread. Later the stewards brought in seed of the species that hadn't survived here.
The historic larger trees in this savanna were mostly bur oaks. Today the trees in this disturbed area are mostly scarlet oaks. That's because the scarlets are dispersed over distances by blue jays. (Heavy bur oak acorns aren't. Squirrels disperse these bigger, heavier ones. But squirrels don't venture far out into the prairies or pastures. Thus, bur oak doesn't get restored by squirrels until other trees are established -to serve as highways for the squirrels.) But bur oaks are needed here. They are the heart of the savanna. They have the thick bark that withstands enough fire to make the savanna. We already see the thinner barked scarlet and white oaks being burned down. So we help out the recovery of the few bur oak saplings that we do find (see below), and we help the squirrels move acorns.
The bur oak "recruits" you see here were protected from the deer in cages until they were tall enough to escape (both mouths and antlers).
More basswood here should be cut, but we didn't want to lose too much shade too early.
Distinctive plants here: starry campion, Kalm's brome, pale Indian plantain.
Note the cage that helped this bur oak get tall enough to be above deer browse height.
The controlled burn this spring was hot enough to "cook" its finer branches.
But, despite natural setbacks, this tree is vigorously becoming part of the structure of the savanna.
Don't be impatient, just give it one hundred years or so.
In this area, notice many caged oaks and many more un-caged burned scarlet and bur oaks down in the grass. Re-sprouting, burned-off oaks are a natural part of the savanna.
This is one of the areas where Forest Preserve staff ecologists have been collecting scientific data.
To the left is Deborah Antlitz, and to the right is Monica Mueller.
The data will help set standards for more ambitious restoration initiatives.
Point 6. Summit: Coyote Knob – good and gravelly reminder of the glacier. This gravel hill was deposited here by the glacier - about 12,000 years ago.
In the cages are now-rare prairie gentians (which need protection from deer and voles if they are to make enough seed to recover their numbers).
In bloom here also is: Solidago (or Aster) ptarmacoides. It it an aster or a goldenrod? Scientific knowledge of the ecosystem is so rudimentary that we haven't even known which genus to put this plant into.
Our endangered "slender wheat grass" and "bearded wheat grass" (very tall and thin grasses, both of which we've been seeing along the trail) have recently been re-classified twice. A few years ago they were a wheat (Agropyron). When they were made an Illinois Endangered species, they were re-classified as a rye (Elymus). Anyone hungry for rye bread? Then the new Flora of the Chicago Region announced them with a third genus (Roegneria).
We humans know the moon's geography better than the floor of Earth's ocean. Similarly, our knowledge of space and particle physics has increased vastly more rapidly than our knowledge of the ecosystem. Space has military implications. The ecosystem doesn't get that kind of attention – though it's so much more crucial to our lives, futures, and peace. Just a thought.
As we enter the stretch of trail shown by a dashed line of the map, we'll walk a trail maintained only by feet. Experience the savanna wilderness.
Point 7. The Party Spot: this little area has a great history. When we first started restoring this site, it was littered with old car seats, milk crates, vehicle tracks, and beer bottles and cans. It was a teen party spot. All around it were dense invasive trees and brush. After we cleaned up and thinned the brush, it was a pretty opening, and we began to notice many rare plants surviving here. It was on the edge of an old fence line, and the "partying" kept the brush at bay to some degree (by trampling and cutting wood for camp fires). That actually helped preserve some species - like the threatened small sundrops, shooting star, violet wood sorrel, poverty oaks, etc. It seems likely that it was open enough to be picked as a party spot because the soil had eroded away. Thus, it had both challenges and surviving ecological riches. We scattered seed, and it is now one of the botanically richest areas - in part perhaps because the brush never killed off the turf and its soil biota.
Point 8. Cross the Central Swale again. Notice three more-or-less distinct bands of vegetation:
In the swale (wet prairie): cord grass, sedges, swamp milkweed, Indian hemp, blue vervain
Next band (wet-mesic prairie): saw-tooth sunflower, Culver's root, big bluestem, switchgrass
Next band (mesic prairie): little bluestem grass, dropseed grass, leadplant, prairie clovers, bush clovers
A beautiful but strange (and temporary?) woods. See below.
Point 9. The woods along the western edge are all artificial in that they consist entirely of invaders and inappropriate species planted long ago by Forest Preserve staff - before restoration and conservation were well understood. Some of the planted trees were birch, pine, black locust and other non-savanna species, which we removed decades ago. But many of the planted trees were white oaks. White oaks are "natural" and make "ecological sense" on the east side of the moraine here. But this area was originally most likely the openest part of the prairie and savanna border - with the only trees being bur and scarlet oaks. Cutting down all these big old white oaks seemed like a lot of work - and a low priority, compared to other needs. So we've restored this area as woodland – for now.
Highlights now (all planted by us): woodland sunflower, Joe-Pye weed, starry campion, bottlebrush grass, wide-leaved panic grass, long-awned woodgrass.
Point 10. Prairie swale. There is remnant prairie here, but the wetland is artificial - its wetness resulting from the railroad making a dam here.
One of our many mistakes and disappointments, as stewards, is that the original prairie here was neglected. We thought a conservative approach was best. We should mostly leave it alone, we thought. That turned out to be a mistake. Over forty years, while we weren't paying as much attention as we should, it lost much of its quality to shade of the slowly growing white oaks and brush. The oaks, brush, and artificial wetland (dammed by railroad) discouraged fire. The prairie remnant here needed more care; without it, its richness declined substantially. Now it's getting some of the help it deserved.
Point 11. Southwest Meadow.
Very beautiful – at this time of year – at this stage of its restoration. This open meadow was solid buckthorn and ash with understory of bare ground. It was formerly prairie. The oak savanna started up hill, where the morainal slope begins, according the the 1839 Public Land Survey. We had some group workdays here, but most of the brush was cut in the summer of 2008 by Rett Donnelley who was looking for a new job in the mornings and expending his excess energies on buckthorn in the afternoons.
Grasses among the flowers: cord grass, switchgrass, and Canada wild rye. Hard to make out? See discussion below.
Wildflowers here include ironweed, sweet black-eyed Susan, gayfeather, and rattlesnake master.
The grasses are the foundation of a grassland ecosystem. Every quality bit of prairie or savanna is thick with them. The wildflowers catch your eye first. But the elegance of the grasses sneak up on you. In this photo you can just make out a cord grass head (to the right of the two dead tree trunks); a long leaf of cord grass arches away from it to the right. Canada wild rye can be seen as a shaggy green head arching under the cord grass leaf (and seeming to come out of a purple ironweed head). The arcing grass leaves are symphonic in grace and complexity.
Switch grass is even more obscure here, yet covering most of the photo; it's the little reddish brown dots everywhere. If you can expand this photo, you can get a look at the structure of switchgrass head against the dark trees in the upper left - just above another purple iron weed.
A wrecked elm (left) and basswood (right) remind us that the former, dense pole buckthorns
and other invaders are doomed as nature recovers here.
We saved some of the elms and basswoods. But over time, they're not making it. Why did we save them? In part because cutting them would be too much work for too little reward. We had more important work to do. Also, dead elms makes great woodpecker, and they mostly die before too long from Dutch elm disease. The basswood was huge, with five of six substantial trunks. All of them were gradually blown down except the skinny pathetic pole on the right. The bushy mess on the left is trying to recover; the top two thirds of a big trunk was snapped off by wind. Pole trees are often blown down when the supporting other pole trees are cut away.
This area was originally the edge of the prairie that stretched from here to the horizon. The savanna started fifty or a hundred yards or so to the east, where the morainal slope starts to rise. An argument could be made to restore savanna here. A little patch of restored prairie wouldn't amount to much here, as there is no prairie adjacent, and the savanna would be more sustainable for its animals (and for many ecological processes including the evolution of plants to adapt to changing conditions) if it were bigger.
On the other hand, an argument could be made to restore prairie - if the Somme Prairie to the west could be expanded this far. That however would be a long time from now, if ever.
The dense patch of willow aster in the foreground of the above photo is a reminder of our indecision here. We planted little seed, as we didn't know whether to restore as "prairie" or "savanna" - and we didn't want to waste precious seed. Interestingly, the willow aster - a quality plant - is taking over from the weedy tall goldenrod that was dense here for the first few years after cutting the brush. The quality plants that are gradually taking over in this area help us decide what else to plant now.
Big old limb, bigger than many whole trees, stretches west from the edge of Vestal Grove.
It once stretched over pasture, but perhaps not the prairie that preceded the farm.
The much larger original prairie fires would have burned it off.
Point 12. Stepping into Vestal Grove
Big old bur oaks. Some with huge limbs reaching out to the west. Probably not a feature of the pre-European times, but a feature of pasture, after the fires stopped. (Are those limbs 200 years old, or 100, or what. (Please don't saw one off to count the rings, but when those trees die, I hope somebody counts the rings.)
One of the best (and one of the world's first) restored oak groves. Probably was originally savanna rather than the woodland it's been restored to. But the original savanna is on its edges.
People think of woods as having a spring flora. Most people don't know that woodlands once had a rich flora all season long. There are distinct floral seasons, all rich with wildflowers, grasses, and sedges:
Early spring (toothwort, spring beauty, trout lily, false mermaid), late spring (trilliums, bellwort, rue anemone, starry false Solomon's seal, wood betony), early summer (wild hyacinth, golden Alexanders, Solomon's seal, wild columbine, doll's eyes), late summer (tick-tre-foils, woodland sunflower, Joe Pye weed, starry campion), early fall (zigzag goldenrod, elm-leaved goldenrod, Short's aster) and late fall (elegant seeds and leaves).
Of course, there are whole different seasonal lists for the savanna and prairie, and whole different lists for each of those shade categories according to wet, wet-mesic, etc. There are currently 486 "native species" known from this site. A study of the diversity and conservativeness of the herb flora of Vestal Grove shows that it has been increasing in quality since 1985 and is still increasing today. No one knows how high the scores might be expected to go.
The wildflowers, butterflies, and birds of Vestal Grove are getting more diverse, year by year.
And the prairie, savanna, woodland, and wetland increasingly blend seamlessly into each other.
Point 13. In the middle of the woods. Here a wet woodland swale runs through it. Don't think that "wetlands" are something different from prairies and woods. There are wooded wetlands and prairie wetlands.
Point 14. Cages are protecting two species of rare plants on this last part of the trail. Please don't knock them over.
The three sections of the tour were led by Eriko Kojima, Linda Masters, and Stephen Packard. Thanks to all participants for joining us and contributing questions, insights, and spirit.
If you'd like to review the July 9th tour of this same area, you can find it at:
http://woodsandprairie.blogspot.com/2017/07/july-9-2017-restoration-tour-of-somme.html
LIST OF THE PLANTS WE SAW ON THE TOUR
This list gives the common names names of plants - only the first time we see each species.
Plants at Point 1: wild bergamot, mullein foxglove, yellow giant hyssop, riverbank rye, Virginia rye, bottlebrush grass, sweet black-eyed Susan, purple Joe Pye weed, figwort, blue lettuce, white vervain, wild coffee (no flowers, but people ask about the big green seed capsules).
Plants as we go north from Point 1:
Starting in the wet-mesic prairie: gayfeather, rattlesnake master, big bluestem grass, narrow-leaved mountain mint wild qinine, compass plant, Culver's root, winged loosestrife, rosinweed, switchgrass, nodding wild onion, prairie dock, early goldenrod, grass-leaved goldenrod.
Plants on the first rise (mesic prairie): purple prairie clover, rigid goldenrod, daisy fleabane, dropseed grass, yellow coneflower, common St. John's wort.
At the edge of the woods: woodland sunflower and ironweed.
As we walk through the woods: starry campion, woodland brome (in seed), cowbane, forked aster, white grass, dotted St.John's-wort, purple giant hyssop.
Point 2: No new species, great masses of woodland sunflower and purple Joe Pye weed.
As we exit the woods: smooth tick-trefoil, red-top grass, showy tick-trefoil, heal-all.
Focus here on seeds: Note them forming on New Jersey tea, white false indigo, meadow parsnip (Thaspium), and golden Alexanders.
New species in bloom here: Compass plant and leadplant.
Plants in bloom as we walk north: flowering spurge
Point 4: No new species.
Walking west from Point 4: cream gentian and savanna blazing star (both only in bud), milk vetch, round-headed bush clover, wild carrot, pale Indian-plantain, bearded wheat grass.
Point 5: starry campion, Kalm's brome, pale Indian plantain.
As we cross Central Swale (a flowing stream after rains): water parsnip, winged loosestrife, wet-prairie obedient plant, cordgrass, mad-dog skullcap, Virginia mountain mint.
On the little rise we call Coyote Knob: stiff white aster (or goldenrod), butterflyweed.
(Here we start skipping points – if there are no new species in bloom.)
Point 8. Again crossing the Central Swale – this time on the west Inner Loop.
Notice three distinct bands of vegetation:
In the center of the swale (wet prairie): cord grass, swamp milkweed, Indian hemp, blue vervain
Next band (mesic prairie): little bluestem grass, dropseed grass, leadplant, both purple and white prairie clovers, round-headed bush clover.
Here the woodland sunflower, Joe-Pye weed, starry campion, and bottlebrush grass are joined by wide-leaved panic grass, long-awned woodgrass, and silky rye grass.
Obedient plant. Turtlehead. Prairie loosestrife, jewelweed.
As we go south from Point 10:
False sunflower (or "ox-eye") and wood reed.
Then in a very lightly wooded semi-open area:
Great blue lobelia, white snakeroot, water hemlock, spotted Joe-Pye weed, manna grass. Then ahead, under the white oaks: blue lettuce.
Cardinal flower, cut-leaved water horehound, Canada rye grass.
Woodland obedient plant.
In the thickets as you emerge from the woods: hedge bindweed, fringed loosestrife, elm-leaved goldenrod.
That's a lot of plants. Enjoy as many as you can!
Do you think of savanna which receives periodic fire as being at an equilibrium (climax community) or in a constant state of flux (succeeding to woodland or prairie then back to savanna)?
Well, James, I don't know if you'd find my perspective helpful. All communities that are "fire adapted" or "fire dependent" seem to go through cycles, long term and short term, and at varied spacial scales. Any "equilibrium" they may have must take into account the fact that trees grow and die and thus change the habitats for all the other species.
As trees grow bigger and wider, of course, shade-adapted species spread. As trees die, blow over, or burn up (wholly or in part), light-dependent species increase. If there area is a big and diverse one, there may consistently over the millennia be enough habitat of the three types you mention that all species survive, evolve, and move around as conditions change. You could say that the "fire climax" versions of these communities achieve stability within a dynamic complex.
For another example, during a few years (or decades) of cooler than average fires, shrub thickets may expand, with the gradual build-up of shade decreasing (or locally eliminating) some plant and animal species while increasing habitat for others. Then a very hot fire top-kills all the shrubs, and the species that need the shade are much diminished or eliminated, locally. At that point, perhaps for a period of years or decades, fires burn through the former thicket area annually, top-killing the surviving shrubs, and the species of open grassland increase. Various factors may result in a long term prairie at this spot, or thicket, or savanna, or woodland. If a given thousand acres for millennia had all those communities - and supported species adapted to each - then the goal for conservation might be for all to continue. It might or might not be part of a needed dynamic for the communities to move around the map a bit (thus requiring successional processes before some species could compete in a new place).
Hmmmm. I thought perhaps I could write something helpful in a quick blog response. Perhaps not? I do agree that there are interesting questions here. I am concerned that definitions might get in the way of thinking helpfully about those questions. In the short run, for me, the most important concern is that we conserve as many as possible of the diverse species of these ecosystems in all their forms (with all their alleles). The more we're able to do that, the more we can learn about these systems over time.
Considering your comment about squirrels not venturing far out into prairies, I thought you might find the following photo amusing.
https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/photo/107874019080399894118/6452008491712372130?icm=false
Somme Woods East - Progress Report


More than 800 participants took part in the Bromley Santa Dash last month as the festive fitness tradition entered its seventh year.
On November 18, Bromley residents geared up with beards and red hats crossed the finish line of the annual family event.
Bromley saw the launch of the Santa Dash, which takes place around the Midlands and the South of England.
The run moved on to the West Midlands last weekend (December 1) before the final two events take place at Southampton and Priory Gardens in Orpington this Sunday (December 9).
There is still time for people to join the final events with registration online via Mytime Active's website.
Deborah Raymond completed the Santa Dash in Bromley.
Ann Brown, Santa Dash event co-ordinator, said: "It was fantastic to see so many friends and families join together and have so much fun.
"Our volunteer marshals from the Police Cadets did a grand job ringing their bells, encouraging the Santas towards the finish line to receive their medals.
"That sense of community is what it's all about. We have been astounded by the popularity of these events each year with more people taking part than ever.
Mytime Active is a social enterprise providing preventative health services and gyms around the country.
Each Santa Dash starts with a mass Christmas-themed warmup before participants complete the 2km courses as a fun run, jog or walk.
The mixed terrain is suitable for pushchairs, so the littlest members of the family can join in the fun.
All entrants receive a runners' pack, containing a Santa suit and race number to be worn on the day and a medal at the finish line.
To register for the event, visit Mytime Active's website.
The 2018 entry fees are £6.50 for adults, £4.50 for under 12s and free for under threes.


text:
A Jewish Lens
Jackie Headapohl
Panelists: Dr. Elise Gilbert Aronowitz, Dr. Shawn Achtman, moderator Stephanie Steinberg, Josh Roberts and Judge Edward Sosnick.
Jason Rubenfire Special to the Jewish News
The Well explores opioid addiction.
The opiate crisis in America has reached epidemic standards. According to the CDC, overdose deaths claimed approximately 64,000 American lives in 2016, with the numbers showing few signs of falling. No corner of America or any one particular culture or nationality is shielded from the epidemic.
Recently, The Well hosted "Addicted: Opiates and Jewish Wisdom" to explore a Judaic answer to this crisis.
The event began with Josh Roberts talking about his struggles and recovery from opiate addiction. Roberts grew up in West Bloomfield and had what he called a normal childhood, surrounded by family and friends. As a young adult, he participated in occasional drug and alcohol use out of what he called "a need to fit in."
While he was in law school, Roberts' mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. It was through her treatment that he says he was first exposed to opiate painkillers.
"Being high quickly became more important than anything … I did OK in law school, but I started to compromise the morals and values I grew up with," Roberts told the crowd of about 50 at The Office Coffee Shop in Royal Oak. He eventually spiraled into lying, stealing and other behaviors that furthered his addiction. "I didn't do them to hurt people in my life; I didn't do it out of malice. I did it because I had a disease that was out of control."
After his mother died, Roberts' recovery blossomed when he joined the Judaic treatment center Beit T'Shuvah in Los Angeles. In his recovery, he has always strived to combine the Judaic teachings of his youth and heritage with typical tenants of Alcoholics/Narcotics Anonymous (AA/NA) rehabilitation. Roberts stresses you don't need to belong to any religion at all to follow the principles; you just need to "realize you're not the center of the universe," that there's something bigger than you out there.
"It isn't necessarily about being 'struck by God,'" Roberts says. "The spiritual experience is one of education, living my life, [and finding] new emotions, new ideas and a new attitude, all based on spiritual principles."
As his rehabilitation has progressed, he now is working to help others by telling his story and sharing his own uniquely Jewish take on rehabilitation.
Jewish Traditions
Following his speech, participants split into groups to talk about discussion questions that used Jewish texts as well as traditional texts from other religions and tenets of recovery. This sparked lively discussion and debate.
Jeff Dreifus, a student rabbi interning with The Well, leads a discussion.
The event concluded with a panel discussion on opioid addiction led by Stephanie Steinberg, managing editor of SEEN magazine. Panelists were Dr. Shawn Achtman, a local doctor specializing in physical medicine and rehabilitation; Dr. Elise Gilbert Aronowitz, a licensed pharmacist with extensive experience working with opioid issues; and retired Judge Edward Sosnick, the first presiding judge of Oakland County's Juvenile Drug Court.
Sosnick and Roberts agreed that people need to be educated that addiction is not a moral weakness but a disease. Sosnick stressed that addiction "permanently changes the brain" and addicts need help rather than punishment.
When asked how the epidemic got this far, Achtman pointed to the ease with which doctors have prescribed opioid medication and the difficulty of determining whether a patient is truly in pain. He says while caution is now being implemented, it is difficult to determine who may or may not be lying to obtain drugs.
Aronowitz emphasized the importance of making a distinction between medically necessary longterm opioid use and addiction; the latter involves a repeated pattern of use without some medical reasoning behind it.
"Addicts move between three states: high, low and normal," she explained. "Addicts will need to feel that high, while patients who need the medicine need it just to get to normal."
"Trust God. Clean House. Help Others." This quote, a defining principle of AA, has helped Roberts through his own recovery.
If you or someone you know is suffering from opioid addiction, the West Bloomfield-based Daniel B. Sobel Friendship House features teen and adult programs, AA meetings, Jewish recovery meetings and even Shabbat dinners for addicts and their families. Call (248) 788-7878 or go to friendshipcircle.org/friendshiphouse.
Other resources include Henry Ford Health System Opioid Resources and the Jewish Addiction Awareness Network.
Addicted: Opiates and Jewish Wisdom
Beit T'Shuvah
Daniel B. Sobel Friendship House
Dr. Elise Gilbert Aronowitz
Dr. Shawn Achtman
Henry Ford Health System Opioid Resources
Jason Rubenfire
Jewish Addiction Awareness Network
Jewish recovery. recovery
Jewish text
Jews In the D
Josh Roberts
Judaic teachings
Judaic treatment center
Judge Edward Sosnick
Juvenile Drug Court
Office Coffee Shop
opiate crisis
Opioid Resources
SEEN magazine
Stephanie Steinberg
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The Conference will take place from 13th – 15th July in Ballaghaderreen, Co. Roscommon to coincide with the Lakes & Legends Festival.
Willows in the walled Victorian Gardens on the 6th of August at 5pm.
This year, we are asking all festival and event organisers to make an online submission of the details of their festival or event.
We are delighted to announce that the Co. Roscommon Calendar of Events 2017 is now live! This year, we are asking all festival and event organisers to make an online submission of the details of their festival or event. Once submitted and verified the event details will be made accessible to members of the public through a Calendar of Events mobile and web application live on the Council's website. This new approach allows us to better capture, and locate, the many events and festivals that will be taking place throughout the county during the year and it allows us to promote these as widely as possible to potential visitors from both home and abroad.


text:
V roce 1928 byl ve Velké Británii vyroben tančík Carden-Loyd Mk.VI., o který projevilo zájem několik zemí. Jeho licenci zakoupilo i Polsko, které začalo roku 1931 tyto stroje vyrábět pod označením TK-3. Stejně jako podobná vozidla měl i tento tančík malou hranatou korbu, přičemž pancéřové pláty byly spojeny nýty. Jako pohonná jednotka byl motor Ford A o výkonu 40 hp. Rámový podvozek sestával na každé straně z hnacího kola vpředu, čtyř pojezdových kol, napínacího kola vzadu a čtyř napínacích kladek. V nástavbě korby byl umístěn kulomet Hotchkiss ráže 7,92 mm. Celkem bylo vyrobeno 300 ks tančíků TK-3.

Za druhé světové války se zcela jasně ukázalo, že tento typ obrněného prostředku je v moderní válce překonaným typem. Tančíky se spíše hodily pro průzkum, případně jako tahače.

Externí odkazy

Polské tančíky

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Blockchain Firm Bitfury Turns to AI for Big Data Mining
makemoney Crypto Currency August 13, 2019 AI, Big Data, BitFury, Business News, News	0 Comment
The Bitfury Group may soon be known as a data miner, as well as a crypto mining firm.
In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, the firm's co-founder and CEO Valery Vavilov said Bitfury has launched an artificial intelligence (AI) division in order to break down the world's vast amount of data and derive value from it.
Calling data "the next oil," Vavilov said that 98 percent of all data is just sitting waiting to be analyzed.
While giving away few details, he added that the data analyses would utilize blockchain. "We also need to trust that data so that's where blockchain comes in," Vavilov said.
Bitfury offers a number of blockchain services, as well as making computer and crypto mining hardware and running crypto mining data centers.
Last November, Bitfury closed an $80 million funding round led by venture capital firm Korelya Capital. Mike Novogratz's Galaxy Digital, Macquarie Capital, Dentsu Inc., Armat Group and others, also participated.
A month prior, the firm was said by Bloomberg sources to be considering holding an initial public offering (IPO) via a stock exchange listing in Amsterdam, London or Hong Kong. The sources said Bitfury may be valued as high as $3 billion–$5 billion if it goes public within the next two years.
Bitfury's AI division is currently in "research mode," according to Vavilov, with a clearer vision of its potential use cases and products expected at the end of the year or early 2020.
To head up the new unit, the firm has appointed tech veteran Fabrizio Del Maffeo, formerly vice president and managing director of AAEON Technology Europe, a firm that focuses on AI and IoT as part of the ASUS Group.
Prior to that, Del Maffeo held positions at at Advantech, Esprinet and Accenture, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Data image via Shutterstock
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"A very special thank you must go to our primary sponsor, the City of Johannesburg, and the partners we worked with to make 2016 Fak'ugesi Festival come alive," says Tegan Bristow, 2016 Festival Director.
"The City of Johannesburg has a vested interest in developing Johannesburg as a technologically advanced and engaged city, and with this is a dedication to supporting the digital creative sector as well as making technology accessible to all those who want to learn more and innovate," she adds. The festival's partners also included the JCSE, Wits University, the British Council's ConnectZA and InnovationZA, and the Goethe Institut, and new partners for 2016, Pro Helvetia Johannesburg and the Innovation Hub.
Among the many highlights of the festival was the Smart City Day, a celebration of Johannesburg's innovations and developments for service delivery which included a special showcase of the young graduates enrolled in the COJEDI (City of Johannesburg Educating Digital Interns) programme.
Annual favourites also made a return to Fak'ugesi including A MAZE Johannesburg – a festival in its own right focused on local and independent gaming, playful media and game development.
The British Council's Connect ZA 2016 programme again brought innovation and creativity to life and hosted a Maker Library for the duration of the festival, as well as the ever-popular annual Market Hack, as well as the Soweto Pop Up; a special collaboration with local artists and dancers with British digital artists, SDNA.
The SDNA collaboration resulted in show stopping giant projections that could be seen on the buildings of Braamfontein for the official Tshimologong Precinct launch and the Alight party held with Future Sounds and Between 10 and 5 on 1 September.
"For the Fak'ugesi African Digital Innovation festival, these collaborations and their respective developments are paramount to the definition of the festival; as not just a festival where you can come to see and hear, but a festival that is a location for learning, making, developing and innovating," explains Bristow.
The spirit of sharing, fun, making and collaborating was also evident in the Goethe Institut's partnership with Create Africa and film maker Lebogang Rasethaba to create Future Sounds; a week-long festival development between performers and technologists based in Joburg and Cape Town, and German based digital interactive group The Constitute. The outcome of these developments was performed at the Alight party stage and through various installations throughout Fak'ugesi.
Hello, I found this information for you: "Fak'ugesi African Innovation Festival Lights Up Johannesburg". Here is the website link: https://www.entrepreneurmag.co.za/entrepreneur-today/fakugesi-african-innovation-festival-lights-up-johannesburg/. Thank you.


Courage My Love's printed garments feature hand cut fabric. This might sound like an odd thing to promote but there is a specific reason behind our process.
Most activewear is manufactured in a mass production environment where fabric is stacked up in dozens or even hundreds of layers and cut all at once. This process is efficient but lacks precision and can only be done with repeated patterned fabric. A common characteristic for clothing with prints (as opposed to solid blocks of colour) is that it is cut by machine from fabric which has a repeated pattern printed on it. This is common practice and a cost-effective way to mass produce printed apparel.
If you look at our printed Legskin tights, you will notice that our logos sit exactly where they need to and that the labeling is all within the actual printed pattern. Achieving this requires that when we print fabric for our activewear, we print the label and branding onto the piece at the same time.
We do this to preserve the original artwork.
Placement of the original artwork featured in our clothing is of utmost importance to Courage My Love. Respecting the art in this way is part of our brand's ethos and our goal is always to preserve the placement and detail of the original painting or artwork that the artist created.
If we were to stack up hundreds of layers of our printed fabric and cut through it all at once, the detail and placement would be random and the outcome would not be the quality designer apparel you our customers have expect from Courage My Love.
Cutting our fabric by hand also helps to ensure the fit of our fitness to fashion activewear. When garments are cut in stacks, there is no control over where the prints sit on the finished piece. People often write to us and share how whenever they wear Courage My Love Legskin tights, everyone comments on the beautiful prints.
Some consumers take for granted the clever technology, time and design that goes into creating designer clothing. People you have the privilege of owning and wearing Courage My Love apparel, the benefits are obvious.