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1. Cocoon 2. Traces 3. before the fire - part 1 4. before the fire - part 2 5. Home 6. the flower burning 7. forget our mothers and past lovers... 8. ...forget everyone 9. Awakening 10. i wish i had a river (i could skate away on) 11. Tracks 12. you tell me stories of the sea... — part 1 13. you tell me stories of the sea... — part 2 14. you tell me stories of the sea... - part 3
Full-page index
Life is Strange (Video Game)
Rachel Amber/Chloe Price
Maxine "Max" Caulfield & Chloe Price
Chloe Price & Frank Bowers
Chloe Price (Life is Strange)
Rachel Amber
Maxine "Max" Caulfield
Frank Bowers
Steph Gingrich
Joyce Price
Sera Gearhardt
Nathan Prescott (Life is Strange)
Rose Amber
James Amber
Mark Jefferson
Anne Lamont (OC)
POV Chloe
Parallel Narrative
Complicated Relationships
Recreational Drug Use
Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction
Part 1 of the To the Lighthouse series
Favorite Amberprice Fics
To the Lighthouse: Photograph
GinFlameRebellion
Chapter 2: Traces
TW for grief/loss.
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
It has been five years since Max and Chloe last saw each other; faces reflected in the polished wood of William Price's casket. Unable to speak, not knowing what to say, as he was lowered forever into the ground on that mild October afternoon.
Five years, since Max Caulfield rode out of Chloe's life, her small hand pressed up against the back window of her parents' old sedan as they rattled out of the cemetery gates, away from Arcadia Bay to Seattle. Never to return.
Five years, since Chloe lost her childhood best friend, her only childhood friend, on the same day she buried her father.
In those first empty months after Max left town, Chloe had clung to the same fantasy: Lying in bed, she would hear the crunch of tires on the driveway and the loud honking of a horn. She would run to the window and there they would be: The Caulfields. All three of them, sitting in their yellow Chrysler, windows rolled down and waving up at Chloe with huge smiles on their faces. She would dart from her room, clatter down the wooden stairs, throw open the front door… And there she would be—Max—waiting for her with arms outstretched.
Back then, it wasn't so much fantasy as expectation. Of course they would visit. Of course they would come back. It was only five hours away: Of course they would come back.
When Chloe was seven and Max nearly six, Chloe's dad had built them a tree fort. Nothing fancy, just a way to fill a lazy weekend—William humming as he worked, the girls playing skittles on the ground below with pinecones and his empty bottles of beer. Hot sun on their backs, laughter on the summer breeze. They had hoisted a couple of 2x6s up a tree and nailed them into the bark for a base, added smaller timber for decking and walls. A giggling Chloe had liberated an old rope ladder from a neighbor's dumpster while Max stood lookout. They'd built it at the end of the street, on the tree line, where the asphalt meets the forest at the edge of town. Where Chloe's Cedar Avenue met Max's Maple Lane. Where C met M. Literally, figuratively… Always.
Over the summers they'd added to it—an extra plank of flooring here, a little spy hole there, a retractable tarpaulin roof for the constant threat of Oregon rain. It had been their escape, their sanctuary, their fairy castle in the trees and their pirate ship tossed about at sea. After Max's departure, Chloe would sit up there alone, knees pulled up to her chest to protect herself from the chill of the oncoming winter. Sit there and stare at the mementos of their friendship she had used to re-decorate the place; their old scribbled comic strips; the immortal jawbreaker they'd never had a chance to conquer; some of Max's photos, pinned on a string and draped from one corner of the fort to the other: Pictures of better times. Not much. Just things. But things that reminded Chloe that Max was real, that she did exist, that she would come back.
As the months passed, and Chloe's life—both at school and at home—became more intolerable; as the texts, calls and messages from Max became fewer and farther between, the fantasy also changed. Gone first were Max's parents: Fuck them. Fuck them for taking Max away. Fuck them for never bringing her to visit. Fuck them and their single Christmas card in all that time: Dear Joyce and Chloe… Too formal, written too far over to the left, as though they'd forgotten there were only two names now. They'd signed it The Caulfields—no Ryan, no Vanessa… no Max. Not even a message. The pre-printed Happy Holidays! sitting adrift in the center of the white card, its excited exclamation mark hovering like a dagger. Joyce had tossed it straight in the trash.
In Chloe's new fantasy, Max would arrive alone—a runaway, dusty from the trail, smudged and sweaty after hitchhiking and freight surfing her way down the state. This was a Max who would have done whatever it took, whatever it took, to get back to her old friend. Because it must be her parents keeping them apart. Her parents who had poisoned Chloe in Max's mind for some unknown and imagined misdemeanor—for being too poor, for being a bad influence. But Max would fight, she would get back, and when she did Chloe would fall on her knees before her, press her head into Max's stomach as her friend's hands cradled the back of her neck: "It's okay," Max would say. "I'm here now. It's okay."
But still she didn't come.
Chloe's visits to the fort became fewer and fewer. Got shorter and shorter. One day she climbed up there to find the neighborhood kids had moved in. Memories lay scattered, the comic strips charred, the photos tugged down, many flung to the ground below. The gobstopper was gone—beaten at last. In its place, a Coca-Cola can used as an ashtray, the carcasses of dead flies in the corners, the stench of male piss. Chloe scrunched up her nose against the smell. Guys were such jerks. Why would they piss in here? Marking their territory or too stoned to climb down? They had tagged the wall with a huge, anatomically incorrect vagina; two cartoon legs splayed at either side. In the very center, a would-be artist had later added a smiley face in red marker pen, as though the original scrawl was giving birth to a tiny emoji. Chloe tried to feel angry, to feel something, but on that day it just felt like an end. She salvaged what she could that was still hers—still theirs—and clambered down the shaky rope ladder. It would be months before she returned.
Once the texts and calls from Max had stopped completely, Chloe would still sometimes check in on her; scroll through the Facebook page Max had set up before her departure and had sworn to keep updated, although she rarely did. There were a few nothing comments about hockey games, a picture of Max and her dad under a tree. Most of Max's posts were straight-to-Instagram, artsy images that barely showed Max at all. One was a picture of the moon, visible in the day against a bright blue sky, and a hand—Max's hand—reaching out towards it, like she was clutching it in her palm. Superimposed below was a single line of text: All photographs are accurate. None are the truth—Richard Avedon. Chloe had looked across her desk, at the photograph of her and Max as pirates, still pinned to her bookshelf. "That photo says best friends to me," Chloe snapped at the glossy, grinning Max. "So, I guess that really wasn't the truth, was it, Max?" She ripped the photograph down, stuffed it into the desk drawer. A couple of days later she took it out to look at it. Pinned it back.
Had their friendship ever been the truth? For Chloe it was the only truth she'd ever known: She needed Max. Right from the very day Max left, she needed her. That afternoon she arrived home from the cemetery, back to the sickly stench of lilies, the hubbub of well-intentioned insincerity pounding in her ears and a huge, empty space where her dad had once been.
She needed arms around her in the months that followed, as that empty space grew more terrifying, more suffocating, threatened to suck her in and swallow her whole. Needed arms that didn't belong to the hollowed, still-living carcass of her mother, who so repulsed Chloe in her grief, who remained alive, while he died, because she didn't want to ride with her fucking grocery bags on the bus.
In those moments, in those dark moments when Chloe would find reminders of him everywhere; his name on letters stacked up in the hall, his favorite song played in a store, one of his old, dusty socks found behind a dresser. When her stomach would plummet and the pain became physical, choked her, sent her chest into spasm so she could only curl up in a tiny ball, screw up her face and groan into the wet patch where snot and saliva mingled on the fabric of her pillow. In those moments, it was still Max's familiar and comforting embrace she wanted to sink into. Max's arms she wanted to pull her up, away from the pain, away from that place where her father should be yet wasn't.
But Max was just as absent as he was.
She never did come back. No tires on the driveway, no knock at the door.
She never did fight.
Then Rachel came and set everything on fire. Set the world alight and left the ashes of Chloe's old life strewn on the ground around her. Ashes picked up by the wind, some lost forever to the breeze, soaring off into the sky, and others, like Max, left to flutter and settle in the corners of things, a light film of dust in places just out of reach. Still there, still always there…
A song that Chloe once knew all the words to, but now barely remembers the tune.
Just minutes ago, Max had been something put aside—an old pirate hat in a closet, kindergarten scribbles in a box in the attic: A yesterday, a before, a never to return. Now, suddenly, here she is. Max. Scrambling up onto the passenger seat of the truck, slamming the door behind her in a cloud of childhood memories and fabric softener. Chloe floors the gas, peels out of the Blackwell parking lot and leaves Nathan Prescott behind, his impotent screams drowned out by the screech of tires.
It is Max—her Max—now sitting beside her, hands on the door panel, head twisted to look back at the road as it disappears behind them. Chloe glances in the rear-view but there is nothing there, just the empty blacktop winding back through the trees. "Yo, it's okay," she says at last. "He's gone."
Max flops back into the seat, lets out a long breath. "Wow, Nathan Prescott is messed up!"
"You're telling me." Chloe says, still feeling the residual weight of cold metal digging into her stomach. She winces, whips her mind away. "Oh, and thanks, Chloe!" she prompts, stealing a glance at her unexpected passenger. It's her, definitely her: A ghost, sitting with eyes cast downwards, playing with the sleeve of an ugly, gray-marl hoodie. And Chloe can feel it, the depth of it—the chasm of years on the seat between them. "After five years you're still Max Caulfield," she says and Max turns away, shrinks lower, like she's nervous. Like she's scared. Chloe mentally laughs that off. Since when was Max ever scared of her? "C'mon, don't give me the guilty face. At least pretend you're glad to see me."
She hears Max's breath hitch, and when she speaks her voice is earnest, the way it always was. Smooth, soft—warm milk on a rainy afternoon: "Chloe, I'm seriously glad to see you! And thank you. It makes perfect sense I'd see you today."
"Yeah," says Chloe, almost to herself. "It's been that kind of day." She squints out through the windshield, the low-hanging sun stings her eyes, bathes the cab in a surreal haze. How many times did she imagine this: the return of Max Caulfield? How many times did she roll it around in her head, laying in her bed unable to sleep, dozing at her school desk unable to stay awake, drifting forward and back on the swing in her backyard, sneakers dragging twin channels through the dirt beneath her? How often did she chew through every last detail of it—every last kink and crease of it—pick it up every so often and blow the dust from it; imagine what she would do, what she would say, how she would feel? And now, from nowhere, the moment is here. It's here. And somewhere, deep in the singed wasteland between Chloe's ribs, a distant but familiar song begins to play.
Ahead of them, the road weaves its way out through the dense trees. Chloe isn't sure where she's headed, she just drives. Tries to concentrate on the road as her mind, still fuzzy from liquor, attempts to unravel a thousand tangled thoughts. What is Max even doing here? Why was she at Blackwell? Does she go to school here now? Why didn't she call?
"So I guess Seattle sucked hard?" Chloe asks, searching for an opening.
Max is still staring down at her hands, pulling her sleeves over her palms and then pulling them back out again. "I guess," she says. "It was cool, but…" Her hands fall still and she exhales slowly. "I felt kinda lonely, out of my league."
So, she was lonely too? The grubby parts of Chloe glow a little at that.
"I would think you'd fit right in with the art school hipsters," Chloe says with a fleeting smile and catches Max looking at her, almost for the first time. She still looks so young. Below the hipster haircut peeps a small, smooth face—delicate and freckled like a duck egg. She's not beautiful, that would be the wrong word, but there is an inner calm there, something gentle and soothing. As though, at some previous point in time, she was captured in a flash of light and has never grown older. It's not her thirteen-year-old face still, of course not; it's longer, the angles more pointed, but the kid is still there, in her wide eyes, in the flush on her cheeks.
"Right. And you look like the cover of Hipster Girl dot com," Max says, and Chloe can't be sure, but she thinks she sees the hint of a smile on Max's lips. In Chloe's chest, the song grows louder, the beat familiar, the words teasing the tip of her tongue. Could she and Max be friends again? Would she finally have a friend again? Could it be like it used to be? Could they be like they used to be? They could go home, grab some beers, head up to the tree fort and—
Images of the last time Chloe saw their tree fort cut through her hazy nostalgia like glass. Crushed beer cans, dead flies, a sixteen-year-old girl with tears in her eyes and her knees held to her chest. She left me, Chloe reminds herself, Max left. She's only back for school.
A click, a jolt. The song stops.
"So, I guess you came back for Blackwell Academy?" she asks. It is a trap, deliberate. And Max springs it.
"Of course. It's one of the best photography programs in the whole country. And for the teacher, Mark Jefferson."
Her voice is too honest, too enthusiastic. An acute resentment, whetted on five years of broken promises, scythes down the warm feelings budding in Chloe's chest. So Max is here for Jefferson? She remembers Rachel going on about him like he was some kind of fucking celebrity. "So, you came back to Arcadia for a teacher, not your best friend?"
Max is visibly thrown. "Don't you think I'm happy to see you?"
Why didn't she call?
"No," Chloe says, the all-too-familiar taste of rejection pooling at the back of her throat— thick and sticky, coating every word. "You were happy to ghost me for five years. What happened to writing and talking all the time, huh? You just forget?"
She needs an excuse, any excuse. Something from Max to explain away that silence. To justify all those unanswered texts that Chloe scrolled through for hours each night, searching for something, anything she might have said wrong. To explain away those evenings spent staring at a blank computer screen, waiting for promised Skype calls that never came. It doesn't even have to be the truth, does it? Does she even care about the truth? She just needs Max to make it okay. But the excuse doesn't come. Max seems to shrink away, plays again with the cuff of her hoodie. At last, manages an understatement so heavy it seems to weigh the truck down around them: "I'm sorry. I know things were tough on you when I left."
Chloe's jaw pulses, saliva acrid in her mouth. "And how would you know, exactly? You weren't even here."
No knock on the door. No tires on the driveway.
Max's head turns away and when she eventually speaks, there is something on the edge of her voice, a tinge of something metallic. Not an attack. A defense: "I didn't order my parents to move specifically to fuck you over, Chloe."
Chloe's grip on the wheel tightens, and she grapples with the temptation to stop the truck, to kick Max out, yell at her to fuck off and get the hell out of her life forever. Max didn't come back for Chloe, she came back for Blackwell—that shit-stain on the hill. For a fucking teacher! When did school start? A month ago? Max would have known since the summer that Blackwell had accepted her, applied in the spring. How long before that did she intend to apply? A year ago? More? For over a year Max had been planning her return to Arcadia, and… nothing? Not a text, not a call… Fucking nothing?
The road ahead is slick with sunlight, blurred, moving faster and faster under the truck as Chloe pumps at the gas. She scratches at a patch of acne on her chin. Why is she even surprised? Of course Max didn't call. She must have sensed what a loser Chloe's become. Maybe someone at her fancy school told her. Chloe knows she looks like shit—greasy hair stuffed under a ratty beanie; stained, unwashed clothing. She must reek of weed and stale sweat, of vodka. Yeah, Chloe Price is a real fucking prize—an uncomfortable past Max must have spent weeks avoiding while she forges a different future with her shiny, new rich friends. The thought of Max being back here since school started, being poisoned by those Blackwell cunts, leaves a bitterness like a crushed pill on the back of Chloe's tongue. "You've been at Blackwell for almost a month without letting me know," she spits. "Enough said."
Max turns away, gaze lost to the window, to the fir trees flashing past. "I wanted to settle in first and not be such a shy cliché geek," she says softly, almost a whisper. "I totally would have contacted you."
A click in Chloe's head. A cassette player whirring. A familiar, gentle voice made dull by magnetic tape: We're always together, okay? it had said. Even when we're apart. We're still Max and Chloe. Except they weren't, were they? The voice had lied. A voice Chloe had trusted more than anything, a voice that belonged to her best friend in the whole world… Even that voice, that Max, had let her down. Even that Max hadn't contacted her. Why would this one?
"Yeah, right. I bet you don't use those pathetic excuses on your new friends. Don't use them on me."
At Chloe's words Max slides lower down the seat, shoulders hunched, a bird desperate for flight. Parts of Chloe want to push further, to land the final blow; the venomous, vengeful parts of her, the barbed knots she's built around herself like a scaffold, holding her up, locking her in. Those parts. They long to prod at that wound, to sting, to hurt. The arrow cocks on the end of her tongue, pulled taut, targeted.
Then she sees Max's face. The arrow dissolves.
It is a look she has seen before, so long ago the memory is almost lost to time. She remembers a picture, a child's scrawl of red crayon on white craft paper: A circle for a head, an oval for a body, wobbly lines as limbs, two dots for eyes and a huge curve for a smile—a picture of Chloe. Behind the drawing she sees Max's face, the round cheeks and wide eyes of a young child, staring up at Chloe and clutching her kindergarten masterpiece. She looks proud, expectant, seeking approval from her older, more worldly, six-year-old friend.
"It's dumb," Chloe had said.
She hadn't meant it to hurt. She'd been angry at Joyce because she couldn't have a second cookie, or for some other grave insult she doesn't remember. But she remembers Max's face, how it had fallen, crumpled, how her eyes just died. And Chloe's chest had grown both heavy and hollow. A feeling she would later know as guilt. That was me. I did that. Head bowed, Max had carried the drawing away to Joyce, who had cooed and patted her head and told her it was lovely, then chided Chloe for her insensitivity. The scolding was unnecessary, Chloe had never called anything Max did 'dumb' ever again.
The late afternoon sun fills the truck, rolls shadows like film reels over Max's ashen face. And that same hollowness once again weighs heavy in Chloe's chest. I did that.
It is Max that eventually breaks the silence, fumbling in her bag for her camera and turning it over in her hands. Broken. It needs special tools, Max says, and Chloe senses an opportunity. She doesn't know yet if it's an opportunity she wants, but an opening nonetheless. "Maybe you can fix it at my place."
Chloe's childhood home sits about halfway up Cedar Avenue, a quiet street to the east of town, lined on both sides by neat two-story, timber-framed houses. Number 44 stands out from the rest; it is shabbier, neglected, as though life here stopped some time ago. Stopped, while all around everything else has moved on, moved up, leaving only this house behind. The roof tiles have been dislodged and need replacing, the grass on front lawn has been burned yellow by the hot summer and bushy weeds sprout from cracks in the driveway. But most noticeable is the siding: the upper half painted deep blue, while the lower section has been left a pale gray, splintered in places and darkened by mildew. As though, one day, the painter put down his paintbrush and never picked it up again. Went for lunch but never came back.
And five years ago, he never did.
There aren't really any happy endings, someone once told Chloe. Real life always finishes mid-sentence. For William Price, it finished mid-paint job. In the months following his death there had neither been the money nor the will to finish painting the siding. Since then, David has made plenty of noise about completing it, but Joyce has always found some reason to stop him. She will say there are more important things to spend money on, that painting isn't a priority. But Chloe secretly thinks—hopes—that her mom's reluctance is fueled by a desire to keep something of William about the place. A reminder, each time she arrives home from a shift at the diner, rounds the corner from the bus stop and catches sight of their house from the street: He did that. He did that with hands that were alive. He was alive when he did that. And so, the two-tone paint job remains; the blue of their home's upper siding now a faded memorial to a task—a life—left unfinished.
Chloe rolls the truck up onto the empty driveway. No David yet. He must have gone straight to the shooting range from work. She gets out and hops up the porch steps to the front door. Behind her, Max tries to close the passenger door of the truck like she's worried about hurting its feelings. Her small brows furrow deeper and deeper each time it bounces back open. Chloe sighs, is about to tell Max to give it a kick, when Max works it out for herself. She throws her whole, albeit limited, body weight behind the door and it slams shut with a loud thump. Chloe permits herself a small smile. Yep, still Max. "Come on in," she calls down. "Don't be shy." She turns the key in the lock, holds it there for a second and takes a deep breath. "Home, shit home."
Max has been here before, hundreds of times, but Chloe still feels a familiar stab of shame, nervous at the imminent reveal of what lies within. Like the first time Rachel was here. Back then, she'd been desperate to keep Rachel from seeing where she lived. After the satinwood and stained glass of the Amber House, 44 Cedar Avenue seemed so lame: Her dad's half-finished paint job left to fade, weeds running riot on the front lawn. Inside, a film of dirt coating each skirting board and old flowers left to rot in their vase—a decaying reminder of how scarcely flowers changed hands in this place and how treasured they were when they did.
She hadn't kept Rachel away for long. Only until that wet afternoon when they'd sprinted down the hill from the lighthouse, jackets pulled over their heads in weak defense against a freak rainstorm. Rachel had insisted they go back to Chloe's for hot chocolate and dry clothes. She hadn't taken no for an answer.
When they got inside, Rachel bounded up the stairs first, as though she were the one who lived there. "Which one is your room?" she asked, grinning down from the top step.
"First on the right."
Rachel stepped inside, pushing her way past a discarded article of clothing that had gotten jammed between the door and the floorboards, and strode into the middle of the bedroom. She looked around, took it all in, before spinning back to Chloe, mussed hair falling about her still-damp shoulders. Like a fresh breeze blowing through the stale air. Too perfect. Too perfect for that shitty bedroom.
"Price, your room is amazing! It's so you!"
"You mean a mess?" Chloe kicked away the accidental door stop—an old tank—into a dusty corner.
"No," said Rachel, looking around her at the posters, the tags, the trinkets, the trash that decorated the place. "I mean it's really cool. Your house is cool."
Chloe's brow creased and her hand went to the back of her neck. "Yeah, right…"
"What's wrong? Are you worried I'll think less of you because you don't live in some dumb Real Housewives of Arcadia mansion?"
"You wouldn't be the first."
"Meaning who? Marisa and the Morons?" She rolled her eyes. "Since when did you give a fuck what they think? A gilded cage is still a cage, Chloe, believe me." She stepped up to Chloe and took her hand. "I adore your room,"—kissed her palm—"I adore you."
Chloe's heart had galloped through her chest as Rachel pulled away with a wink and an easy smile and turned her attention to looking through Chloe's things.
Three years later, and now it is Max who drifts around the room, eyes darting this way and that. Over the torn magazine pages and overlapping posters that douse the walls; the dusty knick-knacks on shelves, the internet-philosophy graffiti. All the chaotic remnants of passing years.
Chloe watches Max from the bed, rolling up a joint from her last good bud, so eager for the high her fingers itch. She remembers asking Max to put on a CD, and she's pretty sure she gestured towards the shelf as she'd said it, the one where her CDs are stacked in a haphazard pile of dusty, plastic cases. Not neat, but still kind of obvious. But Max seems lost in a dream world, gaze resting on everything as she takes her own trip down memory lane. Chloe's lips stray into a smile and she shakes her head as she breaks up nugs between her fingers, flecks of green falling onto the paper. She remembers teasing Max when they were little, trying to impress her by paraphrasing Einstein: Only two things are infinite, Max, the universe and your capacity for nosiness, and I'm not sure about the first one. Max had stuck her tongue out, pushed her away with a grin. But she hadn't denied it.
Does Max remember the last time she was here? Chloe wets the rolling paper with her tongue, lets Max keep snooping around. It had been the day before the funeral. Max's parents had brought her over to say a final goodbye since, things will be pretty hectic tomorrow, honey, you might not get a chance. Chloe had sat next to Max on the edge of her bed, an unbearable silence heavy between them. She was so angry. So angry that Max was leaving. So angry that she had to leave the next day, on that day. So angry that he was gone. So she'd said nothing, grunted when Max tried to talk to her, pushed her away when she tried to clasp her trembling shoulders. It was only much later she came to regret it, asked herself over and over if that's why Max never called.
Now, five years later, Max stands over by the window, face softened by pale shards of light, dust motes playing in the gauzy haze around her head. Chloe gives the joint a final roll between her fingers, watches as Max roots around the desk for a CD. Sees her pick things up, almost with reverence, place them back exactly as she found them. Cautious. Mindful. Like a little kid who's been told not to touch. It's kind of sweet but also a reminder of how much between them has changed. Chloe rolls over onto her stomach in search of her ashtray and catches sight of herself in the tiny vanity mirror on the dresser. Bloodshot eyes stare back at her, their 'whites' a tepid pink. Even a liberal coating of mascara can't detract from the dark circles around them. They're eyes that could be beautiful, and maybe once they were. Didn't Rachel always tell her she had beautiful eyes? Now they're as jaded as the rest of her, like they've seen far too much. Shit, when did she start feeling so old?
She tumbles onto her back, lights the joint and takes a long toke. The smoke floods into her mouth, down her throat, into her lungs, and immediately smooths the serrated edges inside. She glances over at Max again, her gentle face and hipster haircut. Still playing with that sleeve. Should she offer her a hit? She pauses, remembers that Max used the phrase are you cereal? in the truck. No, she's not about to waste the last of her good bud. Even for Caulfield.
Especially for Caulfield. While Chloe is lost to her thoughts, and before she can stop her, Max reaches under the bed and pulls out Chloe's stash box. Opens it like its nothing. Chloe leaps up, spraying ash all over her duvet. The fuck, Max? She reaches Max, who is holding a photograph in her hand. The one of Chloe and Rachel in Frank's RV last year. The one from the missing poster. "Hey, give me that!" Chloe yells, snatching the photo away.
Max stumbles backwards, caught in the cookie jar. "Sorry. I wasn't trying to be nosy."
Chloe flashes a glare at Max before looking down at the photograph in her hands. At that image she has stared at countless times, rippling on posters as they flutter from walls and trees or floating with the wind along the sidewalk. A face she's seen emerge on endless loop from the Xerox at the public library—born anew over and over. The eyes come first, then nose then mouth. Then the face—her face—sliding out onto the catch tray, until with a whirr and a click, an identical copy drops on top. Another, and another. Again and again. Yes, the image is imprinted on the inside of Chloe's eyes, but seeing it now still sets alight that coal, ever-burning in her chest. This photo isn't like those copies. There is color in it. Light.
"Obviously she was a good friend," she hears Max say.
A 'good friend'? It makes her sound so everyday, like a good TV show or a good cup of coffee. If only. Chloe sighs, settling herself cross-legged on the end of the bed. "That's putting it mildly," she says.
Max perches next to her. A safe distance. "So, who is she?"
Chloe lifts her eyes, and for a moment the world bends inwards, tumbles inwards, and shatters on the ground all around. Such a simple question: Who is she? But the answer? How does she answer that?
She is…
She's that click of the stereo before the music starts… yes, that's it… that last good hit before the end of each joint. She's in windows and reflections, in crowds, where Chloe catches fleeting glimpses of her in the half-turned faces and sloping hips of strangers. She's the anticipation each time a door creaks open, and the soft sigh of disappointment as it closes. She's the space on the pillow that Chloe keeps empty every night, the sweet split-second before waking when she's still there beside her. She's the force behind every throw, every punch, every hit and the delicious release that follows. She's the center of the lighter flame Chloe stares at until her fingers burn; the darkness on the highway, just beyond the glare of the headlamps, where the blacktop dissolves into oblivion. Always unreachable however hard Chloe hits the gas. She's the stillness in the air before a thunderstorm, the pinprick of red light on the horizon as the sun is consumed by the sea. She is—
"Rachel Amber," Chloe manages at last, still unsure how to condense all that Rachel is into anything that would make any sense. "My angel."
The picture has been folded up the middle, a groove that separates Rachel's smile from Chloe's snarl. Sometimes Chloe folds it outwards so that they're looking away from each other from opposite sides of the photo. Always apart. Sometimes she folds it inwards, so their faces are together. If she keeps folding it, eventually the photo will break in two completely. This time she doesn't fold it at all, but drops it on the bed next to Max, unable to look at it anymore. "We were gonna kick the world's ass," she says, eyes fixed on the floor. "You'd laugh at how different we were. She wanted to be a star."
"She looks like a model."
"Yeah, that was her plan. Our plan. Get the hell out of Bigfootville and go make it in Los Angeles."
"When did she disappear?"
Chloe picks at a flap of torn leather on her boot. "About six months ago. She just left town. Without a word," She flicks her eyes towards the window. "Without me."
"What about her parents? Aren't they looking for her?"
Not where they should be looking. Not asking the questions they should be asking. Chloe scoffs. "They're in denial, Max. I know something's not right. I know she's missing."
She'd tried to tell them, she had, but they'd been like everyone else—all too willing to accept that damn police report: No foul play suspected. The evidence shows the subject left town voluntarily and traveled to Los Angeles. So that's where they think she is, in LA. And that's where they're looking. The only place they're looking. Chloe knows James Amber has private investigators combing the streets out there day and night, asking questions, trawling under bridges and underpasses, as though in a city of four million people you could find someone who doesn't want to be found.
The last time Chloe saw James was a few weeks after Rachel went missing. Joyce must have let him in. He had come flying into Chloe's room, spittle and puffy red cheeks, his usually perfectly groomed hair hanging in ridiculous tufts over his forehead. He'd launched himself at a surprised Chloe, grabbing her by her shirt and pushing her backwards. Liquor hung on his breath.
"Where the fuck is my daughter?" he yelled as David came barreling up the stairs behind him. "Where is she?"
Chloe looked on, dazed, as David's arms clamped around James's shoulders, pulling him away. "That's enough!" she heard David shout. She was high—really high—her head light on her shoulders as she watched the two men grapple before her in a slow-motion blur. "I dunno, Mr. A. I dunno," was all she could manage, stumbling backwards, hands up in defense.
James wriggled his arm free, thrust his finger at her. "I know you planned all this together, Chloe. Don't think I don't know. The police say there must be somebody else involved. She couldn't have acted alone. It's you, isn't it? If I find out you're hiding her from me, if I find out—"
"James, you need to leave right now." Joyce's voice from the doorway, low and stern.
James was raving, thrashing like a fish in a net, trying to untangle himself from David's grasp. Flecks of spit bubbled from his lips, glistened on his chin. "I should have put you away when I had the chance! But I kept letting Rachel's strange little infatuation with you get the better of me. Well, you better pray she's okay or I'll make sure you rot!"
"Okay, Mr. Amber, time to go," David huffed, heaving the other man out of the door. Chloe closed it behind them, leaned her forehead against the wood as she listened to their raised voices, their heavy footfall on the stairs, and the front door, at last, slam shut.
Back here with Max, she stares out at the reddish sky beyond the window. As though, months later, she can still hear James's curses exploding like gunfire from the driveway.
Somebody else. She wishes he'd been right. She wishes that somebody was her, that they had planned it together. And they had, hadn't they? Before the somebody else. She turns her head to Max. "Not long before Rachel left, she said she met somebody who changed her life. Then, poof."
"And you haven't heard anything from her since?"
"Like everybody in my life. My dad, you… now Rachel. Gone." She sinks backwards onto the bed, picks up the ashtray and balances it on her stomach. Exhales long plumes of smoke into the cold, empty space around her. "Can you put on some music now?"
Max takes the CD from the stash box, the one full of tracks that remind Chloe of Rachel, and puts it in the Hi-Fi. Chloe thinks about stopping her but doesn't. She feels her eyes start to sting, an overwhelming desire to be alone.
"Anyway," she says. "You can find tools to fix your camera in the garage."
Max takes the hint. She gets up and shuffles towards the door, but as she reaches for the handle she pauses, turns back. "Chloe, are you okay?"
The question catches Chloe off-guard. It's the first time in months anyone has asked her that. Her mom has given up trying and nobody else gives a shit. She's not okay, of course she's not okay. "Sure, I'm awesome," she says. "I just want to blaze and be alone for a moment."
Max cedes a sad smile, a momentary acceptance of the lie, and leaves.
Alone again, Chloe takes another deep hit, closes her eyes and tries to lose herself to the gentle song floating across from the Hi-Fi.
Another hit.
The smoke expands and burns inside her, billowing down through her chest and into her solar plexus; a cloud on which she, at last, floats gently into the high. Time distorts, her fingers tingle and, when the music reaches her favorite part, she allows the chords and the lyrics to flow through her, milky and smooth, the notes rippling like waves, so she can hear the notes between the notes, the beats between beats.
"Your friend seems nice."
It's a voice without form, made of air.
Not quite right.
Chloe rolls it around in her head for a bit. Over time, she has learned to fine-tune it—intonation, expression, depth, lilt. She stops trying to concentrate on it, lets it come to her. Ah, there it is: "Your friend seems nice."
She opens her eyes. And sees Rachel.
She is sitting astride her, palms resting on Chloe's stomach. It's so real that Chloe can almost feel it, Rachel's body weight pressing down into her navel, her bare thighs brushing against her hips. She is dressed as she always is—torn-off denim shorts and a red and black flannel shirt. Loosely buttoned, flashes of sun-kissed skin. Her face is fresh and smiling, the way it was the first summer they met. That's how Chloe likes to remember her, when she was at her most beautiful, at her most alive. Before all the rest of it happened.
Rachel's face is curious, and she tilts her head, raising an eyebrow. "So that's the famous Max?"
Chloe traces her thumb across the skin of Rachel's stomach. "Yep, that's the famous Max. And yeah, she's nice. I guess."
"You don't seem sure."
"She ghosted me for five years and then—boom—landed back in my life, like, less than an hour ago. So, no, I'm not sure. I dunno… I dunno what to think."
She stares back up at the smoke-yellowed ceiling, takes another hit. In the background, the same wistful lyrics ripple through the room, melancholy acoustics. This song always reminds Chloe of Rachel, of Santa Monica. "I just… I wish it had been you," she says, tears stinging her eyelids. "Does that sound crazy? All that fucking time I spent thinking about her, missing her, and she finally turns up out of nowhere and… And I feel like I want to be happy, like I should be happy, like I have no right not to be happy but… fuck. I miss you."
Rachel leans her face down close to Chloe's, nuzzles the end of Chloe's nose with her own and then… bites the tip. Just a nip. Enough to hurt.
"Ow!"
Rachel laughs. "Jesus, Price, don't be so fucking maudlin!" she says, grabbing Chloe's wrist and pulling the hand holding the joint up to her lips. She takes a hit, and Chloe feels all of it, the crackle as Rachel breathes in, the cherry scorching her palm. "Look on the bright side for once," Rachel continues, enveloping Chloe in a chimerical cloud of smoke. "You have your friend back! She came back! And she seems nice and is obviously happy to see you, and—more importantly—she's here right now, downstairs, in your fucking house. And you're upstairs sulking, getting high and talking to yourself."
Chloe jerks her hand away. "To you."
"To yourself."
"To you. I'd give myself more sympathy."
Rachel laughs again and Chloe lets the sound of it gush through her like a warm wave—rich, deep, dirty, fantastic. She can't imagine ever forgetting that laugh.
The spirit is Chloe's creation, she knows that. Rachel in form, but lacking her crazy unpredictability; a series of things Rachel could say and do, not what she would. Sometimes, like now, she arrives on demand; at other times, she is just there—standing in corners, down corridors, by the side of the road, on benches under trees. A flash of flannel, a blue feather earring.
Chloe could once conjure her dad as easily, but now he exists only as static outlines, like photographs scattered over a table, single images, well-worn sounds—a hey, kiddo, a Chloe, honey. Occasionally, the smell of him, wafting from the garage or from a stranger on the street, hitting her like a cinder block in the chest. Things that were, now gone. She lost him. She dreads losing her.
Rachel's eyes are lost already, her eyes that now give her away. Chloe was never sure what color they were even when she was… even when she used to see her all the time. Were they green? Hazel? Both? And the shape of them, the shape of them is hard to recall. Curious eyes, was how Joyce had once described them. Pretty, but curious. However hard she tries, Chloe can't get them back. So she looks past them. She still sees something there looking down at her, not quite a blank space, not yet… but, no, not quite right.
"I am sympathetic," Rachel is saying. "But you need to play nice. Just don't pull a you."
"A me?"
"Chloe, you know you can be a colossal bitch when you want to be."
"Takes one to know one."
"Touché," Rachel smiles, raking a thumbnail slowly across Chloe's forehead, brushing the bangs from her eyes. "All I'm saying is don't give her a reason to run straight back to Blackwell and all the assholes up there."
"Speaking of Blackwell assholes, your psycho ex pulled a fucking gun on me today."
Rachel's eyes—her sort-of-eyes—flick upwards. "Not my ex."
"Whatever." Chloe is silent, and the spirit waits patiently. It always waits patiently. Another clue it isn't her. "Do you think he's trying to kill me? Over that stuff he thinks I know?"
Rachel sighs. The outline flickers, almost imperceptible. She can't answer that. "Chloe, did you really bring me here to talk about Nathan?"
"No…" Chloe reaches over and extinguishes the half-smoked joint.
"She'll be back any minute."
"Fine." Chloe's fingers reach underneath Rachel's shirt and find her waist, still hot to the touch, just like it always was.
She closes her eyes. Peels back flannel, searches under layers, reveals only memories.
Next up: Back into the past and before the fire...
Thanks again to my beta MagmaCombLatte for keeping this real!
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Phil Kogan is a Washington DC based photographer specializing in fashion, beauty, portrait, and fashion event photography. Phil's work has appeared in Elléments Magazine, Northern Virginia Magazine, Front Desk (DC Modern Luxury's Visitor's Guide), Jett Magazine, Ça Va Magazine, Charleston Magazine, Council Magazine, K Street Magazine, and the DC Fashion Week Newsletter as well as DC on Heels Blog and other web sites and blogs. His work is featured in the portfolios of notable Washington designers. Phil's photos were displayed in the "Portraits of DC" exhibition at the Washington Convention Center and the "Faces" show at the Washington School of Photography. He has photographed local actors, musicians, and notables in the Washington, DC area.


text:
Q: PHP check to make sure request is either xmlhttp from my site or normal request from a certain domain How would the condition be written to ensure a page is either accessed by xmlhttp request from my site or from an allowed outside domain?
<?php
    $referrer = $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER'];
    if($_SERVER["HTTP_X_REQUESTED_WITH"] !== 'XMLHttpRequest') {
        if(preg_match("/accepteddomain.com/",$referrer) {
    header("Location: http://www.domain.com/desiredpage.php");
        } else {
    header("Location: http://www.domain.com/nondesiredpage.php");
        }
    }
?>

A: Considering that both Referer and X-Request-With headers are sent (or not sent) by the client (the browser, or anything else that can send an HTTP request), they cannot be trusted.
You can use those as hints, to enhance user-experience ; but you must not rely on them to be either present or correct.
Basically, you have no way to be sure that a request comes from a specific domain (even for XmlHttpRequest : the browser can only use XHR on the same domain... But you have no way to be sure that a request you receive is, or is not, coming from XHR).

Amongst possible ideas (not sure what your real problem / need is), you might try using some kind of API-key, to limit request-rates or so ?

A: You spelt referrer correctly but unfortunately the person who wrote the HTTP spec couldn't! You need to use HTTP_REFERER.
You might also want to escape the dot \. so it only matches a dot and not everything.

A: Ajax requests are only possible from the same domain. You cannot make an XMLHttp request from another site due to inbuilt security reasons.
This site outlines states perfectly that you cannot launch a cross-domain XMLHTTPRequest
http://developer.yahoo.com/javascript/howto-proxy.html
All modern web browsers impose a security restriction on network connections, which includes calls to XMLHttpRequest. This restriction prevents a script or application from making a connection to any web server other than the one the web page originally came from (Internet Explorer will allow cross-domain requests if the option has been enabled in the preferences). If both your web application and the XML data that application uses come directly from the same server, then you do not run into this restriction.

A: You need to be aware that HTTP headers are easily spoofed so someone could easily telnet and send that HTTP header and access the page. Do not rely upon HTTP REFERER for sensitive data. The only reasonably safe prevention is to use logins.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
How Marquez Valdes-Scantling Can Factor Into the Heated Patrick Mahomes vs. Aaron Rodgers Debate
Pat Riley Wouldn't Be Pat Riley if Not for a Freak Accident
Published on 26 March 2022, 11:31 -06:00
The NFL's third quarter of the season has been dominated by one storyline: Aaron Rodgers making a comeback and Patrick Mahomes losing his grip on being this year's MVP. Enter Marquez Valdes-Scantling, who may be able to play a crucial role in determining which player achieves that status. What will it take for him to make an impact?
The "marquez valdes-scantling" is a wide receiver for the Green Bay Packers. He is a key player in the heated Patrick Mahomes vs Aaron Rodgers debate.
Marquez Valdes-Scantling has more than just the "turbo button" in his offensive arsenal, as he hopes to demonstrate now that he's with a new club, the Kansas City Chiefs, and a new quarterback, Patrick Mahomes.
The wideout who became known as MVS with the Green Bay Packers is hopeful that the new quarterback and new strategy may enable him achieve heights he never could before.
For the Kansas City Chiefs, Marquez Valdes-Scantling should be a good deep threat.
Green Bay Packers wide receiver Marquez Valdes-Scantling #83 sprints downfield against the Kansas City Chiefs | Peter G. Aiken/Getty Images
Tyreek Hill isn't going to be replaced by MVS for the Chiefs. That was the purpose of the five draft selections (including a first-rounder in 2022).
MVS is a quick wide receiver with a reputation for hauling in long balls, but he's a far cry from the star Hill had become in Kansas City with Mahomes. You don't replace a three-time All-Pro and six-time Pro Bowler with a player whose best year was 690 yards and six touchdowns while playing with Rodgers, the MVP. However, the Chiefs have replaced some of the speed and big-play potential that they lost when Hill was dealt to the Miami Dolphins.
For example, in six NFL seasons, Hill has averaged 13.8 yards per catch. His career's longest reception was 78.9 yards.
MVS has been significantly less productive, but when he's healthy and locked in, he can be a great deep danger. Over four seasons with Green Bay, he's averaged 17.5 yards per reception, with a career-long grab of 78 yards.
According to The Kansas City Star, Valdes-Scantling remarked, "I believe the departure of him [Hill] offered me a very wonderful chance to be in position to come in and have an instant effect right immediately."
Despite offers from the New Orleans Saints and the Packers, the 6-foot-4, 204-pound wideout revealed that being able to take over for Hill was one of the reasons he selected Kansas City.
He said, "That was a significant influence into it."
MVS might have a role in the Patrick Mahomes vs. Aaron Rodgers matchup.
Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers (12) shakes hands with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes (15). Marquez Valdes-Scantling has now transitioned from one quarterback to the next. Getty Images/Quinn Harris
Tom Brady is widely regarded as the greatest quarterback of all time. If he wasn't already a six-ring winner after leaving the New England Patriots, he clinched the deal when he won his sixth Lomabardi Trophy in his first season with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
There's always a lot of talk about who the next great quarterback will be, and Rodgers is often included in that discussion. With four MVP awards under his belt, including two in a row in the previous two seasons, he seems to be making a strong case for himself, and he shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
Before Mahomes exploded onto the scene in Kansas City, Rodgers was widely regarded as the NFL's most gifted quarterback.
Instead of Rodgers hitting the highlight reels for a spectacular pass on the run while under duress, Mahomes, who is younger and flashier, received the attention. Rodgers has been a magician with his ability to deliver the no-look ball throughout the years, but Mahomes has recently become more well-known for his deception and flawless execution as a great quarterback.
While each have just one Super Bowl victory to their credit, Rodgers' came over a decade ago in Super Bowl 45, while Mahomes' came only a few seasons ago in Super Bowl 54.
Both players have a long way to go to catch Brady, but we'll be able to watch what MVS can accomplish with Mahomes compared to what he was able to do with Rodgers for the near future.
The comparison will be slanted, to be fair to Rodgers.
As a rookie coming out of USF, Rodgers had to learn how to create chemistry with MVS. It's also not like Valdes-Scantling was a first-round choice with whom the four-time MVP had trouble connecting. MVS was a fifth-round selection by the Packers in 2018, and he's had his fair share of drops and inconsistency since then.
Hill, a fifth-round pick himself, rapidly rose to prominence in the league, not just because of his speed, but also because of his ability to produce huge plays when the Chiefs needed it.
MVS has showed glimpses, like as his four-catch, 115-yard, one-touchdown effort in the 2020 NFC Championship against the Buccaneers, but his potential to be more than a straight-line speed player down the field has been limited.
Drops and his inability to get more out of his game have played a part. Injuries have played a role in some of the incidents.
Some of it may even be blamed on Rodgers, who has had trouble keeping up with MVS at times, particularly this season.
Whatever it was, Valdes-Scantling hopes to break free from the mold and develop into a well-rounded receiver for Mahomes and the Chiefs.
"Obviously, over the four years of my career, I've been a top deep threat in the league. Those numbers speak for themselves, but at the end of the day, (I'm) not confined to simply that," he remarked. "Coach (Andy) Reid does an excellent job of delivering the ball to his playmakers. I believe I'll fit right in with Pat (Mahomes) at the helm and Coach Reid calling the plays."
If Mahomes can help MVS become the receiver he never could with Rodgers and the Packers, the Chiefs may not miss Hill as much as it seems.
ESPN and Pro Football Reference provided the statistics. Spotrac provides contract information.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The New Zealand Marist Colts came to visit us. They talked to us about our School Values. After that they spent an hour playing sports with us. They donated us lots of new sports equipment.
This week we had our second after school session of Reading Together. Our focus was to support our parents with how to select appropriate reading books for their children to read.
We painted our self portraits and then made ourselves have crazy hair by blowing dye through a straw. These are displayed in the library.
We have been learning how to skip count in twos by using our special penguins. We have also been making numbers out of beans.
At the start of the week we had our poetry presentation. Miss Patrick was very proud of the students who represented our class.
You are so lucky to get all the sports gear. I hope you are able to get out and use it a lot. I was wondering who are The New Zealand Marist Colts?


text:
Video Games »
General Game News
Author Topic: General Game News (Read 256080 times)
Re: General Game News
The Hearthstone beta is now open.
When the newcomers resurface in a week, we'll see what they think.
Variety of Cells
Assassins Creed set in Middle Earth with cool mind control features and Arkham Asylum-esque combat? Sounds pretty awesome.
http://www.youtube.com/v/ZmiF-_7PX3c?version=3&hl=en_US&rel=0
MSTJedi likes this
Compsognathus
Look at me!!
That game could definitely be a reskinned version of Assassin's Creed.
I was bieng threated with death by wolf raping before it was cool!.
Quote from: Sideswipe on January 24, 2014, 10:47:10 AM
I know one of the programmers for Assassin's Creed was complaining that it looked exactly like the code he wrote for AC 2, and he's pretty sure it is his code. It's unclear if Ubisoft licensed out the engine or not. I'd say they mostly likely did.
But that that doesn't make me any less interested in the game.
d00hickey likes this
Not at all. There are plenty worse games to rip off. Assassin's Creed 2 is a great game to play. If they can craft an engaging story it could turn out pretty well. The art design from the LoTR movie universe is all ready top notch.
d00hickey
Rohan Stan the Jelly Man
Quote from: Variety of Cells on January 24, 2014, 10:53:42 AM
I had Deja Vu watching this, the animations are something I'm very familiar with having played every Assassins Creed game. If the game doesn't rely on combat and free climbing too much I will still play it.
Source engine 2.0 screenshots leaked
http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/01/28/these-might-be-images-of-valves-source-2-0-engine/
Just posted this in the movie thread, but it applies here too.
https://www.youtube.com/v/oFNJW8AoYSs
A Sly Cooper movie. If they keep the characters true to how they were in the games, I think it has a lot of potential. Sounds like the same voices for the gang, so that's a good sign. Really, the only thing I don't like is the wifebeater they put on Murray.
k1 likes this
The Lurker
Lucario announced for Smash Bros.
These character announcements are incredibly annoying. I don't have a Wii U and judging by how it's going I never will, but these announcements still bother me. It's like announcing that Flanders will be in the next season of the Simpsons. Well of course! He's not dead, so we all kind of just assumed he would be. It's not news that the same stuff you had is in the new game.
Sorry, I'll calm down.
I'm just surprised that the roster will be intact for the 3DS. Usually portable systems end up with watered down ports of fighting games, with characters missing and other issues.
Quantum Vagina
I believe that they actually stated that the character list will be about the same size as Brawl's, which means with them adding characters, some of the old ones are dropping. I'm actually surprised they brought Lucario back; I thought they were going to drop him to bring in Mewtwo. I'm thinking Pokemon Trainer will probably bow out, too. Ike's fate is up in the air, though. They generally pick characters from games they're planning on doing something with, though. I think Rob will drop, which is sad, because he's a fun unique character. One of the space animals that isn't Fox will probably disappear, and I think Metaknight will either get hardcore reworked or be dropped, since he's that guy everyone hates to play against. I hope Snake stays in the game, though. Nothing is more fun than watching someone's confusion when you DACUS halfway across the screen at them.
Yeah, I'll admit that this round of Smash Bros. announcements isn't nearly as exciting as the last game. The roster was expanded SO MUCH for Melee, so every other week brought a new exciting character. This time around it's mostly more of the same. I'm excited for Mega Man and the Villager, of course. And the Wii Fit instructor should be a hoot (Especially since I'm committing to Wii Fit U at the moment and have a certain love-hate thing going on with the instructor as I have all videotaped or digital fitness instructors who have vowed to get me in shape). It's been a while, though, and it might be time to throw us someone new.
OneWallCinema: Like a snake to the heart.
Quote from: Pak-Man on January 31, 2014, 09:38:37 AM
(Especially since I'm committing to Wii Fit U at the moment and have a certain love-hate thing going on with the instructor as I have all videotaped or digital fitness instructors who have vowed to get me in shape). It's been a while, though, and it might be time to throw us someone new.
The luge game on Wii Fit U is kinda fun.
I still think we should play some Sports Club online bowling at some point. (My nintendo ID is onewallcinema)
KIDS UNBOXING STUFF! WACKY NEW iRIFF SERIES! CHEVY LEADER NEWS (Ep 10.) available now on Gumroad
A steam leak indicates a Killing Floor 2 coming soon
http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/01/08/rumoured-steam-stats-leak-suggests-the-existence-of-killing-floor-2-arkham-origins-blackgate-hd/?ns_campaign=article-feed&ns_mchannel=ref&ns_source=steam&ns_linkname=0&ns_fee=0
I'm pretty sure no one on these forums likes the Killing Floor besides me but YAY non the less.


Nine bowlers from the Warren Hills bowling team entered the North Jersey Singles Tournament at Parkway Lanes, and several found success - led by our seniors.
Both Jenna Henderson (556, ranked #8) and Jake Irwin (554) made the first cut after three games, and each broke 200 in the rolloff round to make the quarterfinals. The tournament is structured to make the quarterfinal round a real pressure cooker - only the top 3 girls and the top 5 boys make the cut to the semifinals - and unfortunately the Streaks came up just short. But in a tournament that attracted over 170 entries, getting that far was impressive.
Even making the first cut was impressive; only the top 24 girls and top 40 boys after 3 games were able to advance. And those advancers included Warren Hills senior Darryl Price, who was in the top 10 after 3 games (624, including a 231 single), junior Avante Wilson (577), who was ranked 18th, and junior Katie Winch (545), who came back from a tough 2nd game to shoot a big 214 in game 3 to qualify easily.
Warren Hills' final Senior, Elizabeth Hudock, faced as much pressure as anyone when she tied for the final qualifying spot and had to face a one-ball rolloff. And then she had to face it AGAIN when the first resulted in a tie. But she came through with the win in the second rolloff and advanced.
Congratulations to all the Streaks bowlers. They'll be back at practice for 3 days before Thursday's home match at Oakwood against Hunterdon Central.


A while ago on Christmas, I got a new desk. But now it is time for an upgrade.
First of all, just look at how messy it is!
I really need to clean it up and get rid of stuff. Most of the stuff on the side is garbage except for the calculator, jar of change, and various unfinished Lego cars. To make it easier, my sister from Hannah's Hot Mess made several boxes for school supplies, keep, trash, recycle, and stuff I don't know what to do with.
Once I was done, I took all of the stuff that is staying on my desk to its future location. My bedroom. I have a couple black boxes that I put notebooks in and brought up basic office supplies. I probably have enough room for a couple of pencil holders and maybe a small drawer.
Once I finished all of that, my desk looked bare. Which is exactly what I wanted. Now all I need to do is make finishing touches to it, build the new desk and install it. I plan to have the new desk in this nook in my room. It won't have legs but be attached at the walls. This will allow for a comfy simple desk. Next time, I will getting into the construction of my desk.
If you haven't already done so, please subscribe and stay tuned for more weekly posts.Thank you so much for reading. Hope to see you in the next post. Till next time!


What is the Netomata Project?
The Netomata Project is an open source project to develop and support network automation software.
Who sponsors the Netomata Project?
The Netomata Project is sponsored by Great Circle Associates, Inc. See our Sponsor page for more information, including contact information.
Who manages the Netomata Project?
See the Management section of our Sponsor page for information about the management of the Netomata Project.
Netomata is intended to suggest "network automata", similar to "cellular automata". The inspiration for the name was a comment by our founder's spouse, Janet Salsman.


text:
Pet deer kills man and injures wife in rural Australia
AOL.com 17 April 2019
A man was gored to death and his wife critically injured on Wednesday when they were attacked by their pet deer on a rural Australian property, police said.
The 46-year-old man entered the stag's enclosure in the morning at Moyhu in Victoria state, Police Sergeant Paul Pursell said.
"His wife and son heard the commotion and went out to see what was going on," Pursell told reporters. "His wife entered the enclosure to assist her husband and she was also attacked."
Police shot the deer before a paramedic treated the couple.
The husband died at the scene and his wife was flown by helicopter to the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne where she condition was described as critical.
The stag was a cross between a red deer and an elk, Pursell said. The family had kept the animal for about two years.
Pursell warned that deer behaviour could be unpredictable.
David Voss, president of the Australian Deer Association, a hunting and deer management organisation, said farmed deer tend to be more aggressive than wild deer, but he had only heard of similar attacks "very occasionally."
Deer were introduced to Australia by British settlers in the 19th century and have established wild populations.
Britons urged to help record influx of painted lady butterflies
Millions of Painted Lady butterflies expected to start arriving in Britain
UK experiencing once-in-a-decade influx of painted lady butterflies


text:
Q: How to convert System.Drawing.Bitmap to java.awt.image.BufferedImage? I'm using IKVM and PDFBox to create accessible PDF using C#. To add image to the document, I need to convert System.Drawing.Bitmap to java.awt.image.BufferedImage. I'm trying it with below code segment.
Code:
System.Drawing.Bitmap bitmap = new System.Drawing.Bitmap(imgLoc);
java.awt.image.BufferedImage bufImg = .... //TO DO
PDJpeg img = new PDJpeg(document,bufImg);
contentStream.drawImage(img,50,50);

Can anyone please help me to add image to PDFdoc using PDFBOX in C#?
Thank You

A: I resolved the issue as below.Used PDPixelMap instead of Bitmap.
//png image
java.io.File file = new java.io.File(fileLoc);
java.awt.image.BufferedImage bufImg = javax.imageio.ImageIO.read(file);
PDXObject image = new PDPixelMap(doc,bufImg);
contentStream.drawXObject(image ,50,50, image.getWidth().image.getHeight());


This summer, Wyomissing Public Library will join multiple libraries across Pennsylvania in A Summer Read. The initiative, which runs May through September, provides the public with a collective read on a topic about health and wellness. This year's selection is Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones.
A Summer Read is a WITF Transforming Health and Aligning Forces for Quality – South Central PA initiative sponsored by WITF, PennState Health, WellSpan Health, PA Forward, and Aligning Forces for Quality.


When I puchased a new rose arbor several years ago, I planted Westerlund and Madame Alfred Carriere roses after much research. I live in Portland with a dry South exposure. My criteria included disease resistence (especially blankspot), strong scent and repeat bloomers. My choices have been very disappointing, especially from the disease resistance standpoint. Can anyone recommend "the perfect climbing rose"?
Here is a link to Heirloom roses in Oregon, they are a good place and give their experience with disease resistance.
Here is a link to another good website with rose info.
I have Westerlund and I love it. Last year was disappointing because it did get black spot worse than usual and I got a bit discouraged. But this year seems much better again.
It sounds like you've had yours several years, has it been bad every year?
What problems are you having? Is it black spot, powdery mildew or both? What is your cultural care for them? Overhead watering, mulching, water through the dry summer? Research shows that powdery mildew is more prevalent when plants are water-starved - along with the other cultural culprits.
What else is nearby? I visited a garden Tuesday whose owner complained about the neighbors' diseased roses planted next to her resistant forms. No matter what she did, she couldn't get rid of the disease problems because they became reinfected by her neighbor's plants.
I second the Heirloom roses recommendation. Love that place! I bought 'Trier' (a rambler I think) from them some years ago. Its blooms are small, creamy white, lightly fragrant and the plant is quite-disease free. It's been very easy care for me and I'd recommend it, although I'm not sure I'd call it the "perfect climbing rose" (does such a plant exist? ).
Oooh! I just learned a lot! My rosebed has been afflicted with what I thought was black spot this year and I was sure I was doing something horribly wrong. Now, I feel a little better--or, I guess, less guilty, cause they are still struggling. Thanks for the tips about Seranade and Heirloom Roses. Bella Stella, I too have been looking for a climber with much of your criterion! If you find the rose of your dreams, would you be kind enough to send out a post? I'd love to check it out too! Thanks.


Congregation KINS is a vibrant, exciting synagogue offering opportunities for constant growth in Avodat Hashem, while strengthening community and commitment to the Jewish people.
We hope that you will join us as members and we look forward to welcoming you into our community.
We offer various levels of membership, including discounts for young members and new members. You can complete the membership application on this page or print the forms using the link below.
To become a member, either register on this site and someone will be in touch with you shortly to discuss membership, or feel free to fill out our membership form and submit it to the office.


Beard grooming balm, oil, brush and comb are wonderful helpers for men to take care of their beard. Why not have a look and bring these tools home? After all, a smooth beard can add your male charm and make a good impression on others. Combination of essential oil, balm, brush and comb can meet various demands, a sweet and practical gift.
- Material: Wood and oil.


Year after year, our goal is to craft naturally organic and elegant wines we are proud to share with the world and wines we want to drink ourselves.
We're not driven by reviews and ratings but it's always a pleasure for our wines to be recognized by the wine world.
The first reviews of 2018 are in and we have to extend our thanks to Wine Enthusiast and Kerin O'Keefe for the 91 points for our L'aura Chianti Classico 2015 and 93 points for Sei Chianti Classico Gran Selezione 2013 and the positive and thoughtful tasting notes.
Earthy aromas of sunbaked soil, new leather, overripe plum and a whiff of game come together on this. The chewy, savory palate doles out fleshy black cherry, crushed raspberry, cinnamon and star anise framed in lithe tannins. It's already hit its ideal drinking window so enjoy soon.
Aromas of wild blackberry, cedar, violet and a hint of mocha lead the way on this 100% Sangiovese. The polished, balanced palate doles out ripe black cherry, cinnamon, vanilla and tobacco alongside fine-grained tannins that give the finish grip. Enjoy through 2028.
Both wines are available for purchase via the online wine shop or you can email wineorders@querceto.com.


1. Traditional crop plants, wild plants, mushrooms, and food that is made of them.
2. Original animal species and food that is made of them.
3. Heritage and cultural landscape in rural areas.
1. Main action type: preparation of publications of international concern.
2. Additional action type: organization of international conferences, seminars.
3. Additional action type: participation in internships.
Task 2: Traditional crop plants, wild plants, mushrooms, and food that is made of them.
Task 3: Original animal species and food that is made of them.
Task 4: Source Catalogue of Traditional Cultural Heritage in Rural Areas.


To Cite: Mogharab M , Ayoubzadeh K , Sharif-zadeh G R . Effect of Peppermint Aromatherapy on the Level of Anxiety in Patients Undergoing Colonoscopy, Med Surg Nurs J. 2030 ; 6(1):e67861.
Background: Anxiety is one of the main problems in patients waiting for diagnostic procedures for digestive disorders, which unfavourably affects their recovery process. Therefore, it is essential to modify or eliminate it by approved methods that are not associated with major adverse effects. This study aimed to determine the effect of peppermint aromatherapy on the level of anxiety in patients undergoing colonoscopy.
Methods: This clinical trial was conducted on 50 patients undergoing colonoscopy referred to one of the training Quaem Hospital affiliated to Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Iran, in 2015. The samples were selected through convenience sampling method, and they were randomly assigned into two groups of intervention and control. The subjects in the intervention group inhaled three drops of pure peppermint essential oil and 5 cc distilled water with a nebulizer mask for 10 min, half an hour prior to the colonoscopy. However, the patients in the control group inhaled distilled water. The level of anxiety was estimated in the pre- and post-intervention phases using Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Data analysis was performed in SPSS software, version 19 using Fisher's exact and Chi-squared tests, as well as paired and independent samples t-tests.
Results: According to the results of this study, the mean scores of anxiety were changed from 52.1±6.9 and 52.4±7.2 at the pre-intervention phase to 45.5±4.0 and 50.1±5.9 at the post-intervention stage, respectively (P<0.009).
Conclusion: Regarding the results, peppermint aromatherapy can decrease the level of anxiety before undergoing a colonoscopy. Therefore, it is recommended to employ this non-pharmacological, low-risk, and pleasant method for patients before invasive procedures such as colonoscopy.


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Advice for New Writers
Ted the Cat
Donald Antrim and the Case of the Vanishing Epiphany
by RasoirJ | Apr 13, 2012
Author Donald Antrim.
Faithful readers of 317am know I've been on an epiphany kick lately. What got me started was reading a story in the New Yorker a month or so back ("Ever Since" by Donald Antrim), a story in which that essential piece of short-story scaffolding, the epiphany, a device generations of readers grew up savoring, seems to have disappeared entirely. Upon rereading Antrim's story I think I did find the glimmer of an epiphany. More about that in a minute, but what intrigued me is how a vital trope for writers had been invented and developed, how it had flourished and become the standard, and how it had faded down to a subtle nubbin of meaning, all in a bit less than 100 years – the period from James Joyce's story collection Dubliners (1914) to Antrim.
Briefly summarized, the plot of "Ever Since" (that title, like just about everything in the story, is in the ironic mode) goes like this: the protagonist, a 30-somethingish urban male named Jonathan attends a book-publication party that his new girlfriend, Sarah, a publicist, is associated with. A desultory evening ensues. Much drinking, many aimless conversations, a lot of desperate gaiety. The back story, we learn in the first sentence, is that Jonathan's previous girlfriend, Rachel, has left not long before for another man. The rudderless Jonathan is described as:
….the sort of lurking man who, say, at work or at a party, mainly hovers on the outskirts of other people's conversations, leaning close but not too close, listening while gazing out vaguely over their heads in order to seem distracted and inattentive, waiting for the conversation to wind down, so that he can weigh in gloomily and summarize whatever has just been said.
New Yorker in which Antrim's story appeared.
This, in my view, is fine stuff. In this-is-the-way-we-live-now fashion, Antrim nails what I'm willing to believe is a certain type of lost urban male. But the story's lack of a clear-cut epiphany is disconcerting to some readers. As one commenter on the New Yorker site puts it:
What is the point of this story anyway? I don't get it. I think that writing is meant to enrich other people's lives. I find nothing enriching in this story. It's about people who waste their time at meaningless parties.
So what did happen to the epiphany, both for the short-story form generally and for Antrim?
My theory is that epiphanies, useful and satisfying as they are in structuring a story, had two problems, almost from the beginning. First, epiphanies clash with realism. Joyce's Catholic boyhood conditioned him to see the magical in the moment, a shining through of spiritual stuff into the every-day humdrum, but let's be frank – how often does that happen for anyone?
Epiphany skeptic Charles Baxter.
In a 1997 interview with the Atlantic, Charles Baxter, an acclaimed fiction writer, had this to say when interviewer Ryan Nally pointed out that Baxter had written an essay titled "Against Epiphanies," and "yet the characters in your short stories often do experience moments of startling revelation – and, in fact, many critics identify your graceful use of epiphanies as one of your unique talents":
I can't reconcile them. Or maybe I'm like Huck Finn's father, who has perfected his denunciation of alcohol during the day and his back-alley binges at night. I disapprove of epiphanies and their phony auras but I am besotted by them – can't get enough of them in life or elsewhere. So sue me. Seriously though, as a person who was brought up with religious faith and then got out of it, I'm always looking for secular manifestations of the sacred. At the same time I know that when these moments are arranged – particularly at the end of short stories – they acquire an absolutely formulaic quality. I noticed it particularly a few years ago when I was reading an edition of Best American Short Stories and, just out of curiosity, I started skipping to the endings of all the short stories. It was an unsettling experience because in that edition I kept coming upon final pages in which there was a moment when a character stopped and looked off into the distance, and then a sentence the equivalent of "Suddenly she realized…" appeared…. If you're trying to write a story with a beginning, middle, and end but haven't found a way of tying it up dramatically, an epiphany will do the job. But it often ends up feeling like a shortcut, and besides, as I wrote in the essay, I've had so god-damned few epiphanies in my life that I'm suspicious of them. And most of them have been wrong anyway!
Second, it's an ironclad rule in the arts that today's cool new idea is tomorrow's tired convention. For years now what is known as "the New Yorker short story" has been shrinking the epiphany.
In 2003 Ruth Franklin, in a Slate piece on McSweeney's magazine titled "The 98-Pound Gorilla in the Room," had this to say about that kind of story:
The type? One that rejects the very idea of revelation. The McSweeney's story may share certain things with the sub-genre [Michael] Chabon identified as "the New Yorker short story"—it's contemporary, it's often quotidian, it's certainly plotless—but it substitutes nihilism for epiphany. In an early issue, a set of facetious manuscript guidelines warned that "material possessing beginnings, middles, or ends will be read with suspicion"—which isn't a bad description of the work of the young writers the magazine has consistently championed. … But their work replaces the joyful playfulness that characterized the experimentalists of the 1960s and '70s with a lugubrious fictional haze in which ideas and images float unbound by anything resembling form or insight.
Critic Ruth Franklin.
In some ways Franklin's piece could be read as a prescient critique of the sort of story Donald Antrim likes to write. But in my view Antrim does offer the reader a kind of epiphany, though it is a small, quiet one.
At one point in "Ever Since," well on in the evening, a well-oiled Jonathan slips outside, calls his old flame, Rachel, and receives definitive word that it's over for them. She's moving with her new guy to LA. The crucial lines of their conversation:
"Jonathan, we've been over everything. We don't have anything to talk about any more."
"You're right."
"I was ready to marry you," she said.
"Why are you bringing that up?"
"Because you were never going to ask."
The conversation ends with Jonathan weeping and Rachel telling him, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." But the story continues for another page and a half of dense New Yorker type. Has Jonathan learned his lesson? Will things be different with Sarah?
The epiphanic moment in this story comes when Jonathan gets down on his knees and curls a cherry stem around Sarah's finger.
"What in the world are you doing?" she asked.
It was a good question – what was he doing? "What does it look like?" he said, and he wondered, briefly, whether he meant it, whether he would still feel this strongly about her after he'd sobered up. And he thought he would. Surely, he would. He had the idea he was seeing into his future, and he felt, quite naturally, at that drunken hour, that they would share it.
"Are you proposing?" Sarah asked.
He said, "I'm not sure that I can propose without a real ring. But at least you'll know."
"I'll know what?"
But he was afraid to say.
He stood and kissed her on the cheek. Then he gave her a kiss on the lips. They came close and wrapped their arms around each other.
So there it is – that's about all you're going to get from Antrim in the way of epiphany. It's hedged, deeply ironic, and provisional, but in my book still an epiphany. Will it lead anywhere? Will Sarah and Jonathan live happily ever after? I don't think so.
Note: Donald Antrim's story "Ever Since" appeared in the March 12, 2012, issue of the New Yorker. It's a story the magazine makes available online only to its subscribers.
Department: Advice for New Writers
tags: charles baxter, donald antrim, dubliners, epiphany, james joyce, new yorker story, ruth franklin, short story
"The Dead": James Joyce on a Roll
Not Every Critic's a Parasite, but . . .
2 Responses to Donald Antrim and the Case of the Vanishing Epiphany
Laura Vivanco Apr 13, 2012 at 6:18 am
epiphanies clash with realism. Joyce's Catholic boyhood conditioned him to see the magical in the moment, a shining through of spiritual stuff into the every-day humdrum, but let's be frank – how often does that happen for anyone?
I think I can see much more clearly now why popular romance fiction really isn't going to be to your taste. It's a genre which is very, very strongly based around epiphanies; it wallows in them, usually with no irony at all, and guarantees happy ever afters. As Catherine Roach writes,
The story of romance is the most powerful narrative in Western art and culture, sharing roots with Christianity and functioning as a mythic story about the meaning and purpose of life, particularly in regards to the HEA ending of redemption and wholeness.
Angela Toscano suggests that the quasi-religious nature of romance fiction affects the language used in these novels:
the categorical and metaphorical nature of language means that there are certain points where it breaks down, where it cannot go, where description is insufficient as a means of representing what is or what has happened.
This is where the ineffable comes in. The ineffable is that which cannot or should not be uttered. It is no surprise then, that the two ineffable experiences or encounters common to humans become metaphors for each other. The divine is uttered in terms of sexuality, and sexuality is uttered in terms of the divine. Our inability to speak of these encounters, to convey in language the effect of that encounter upon our person stems from the seeming unique and singular nature of that experience. Ironically or paradoxically, cliché becomes necessary precisely in the moment that is most unique to the person experiencing it.
Romance is a genre that deals in the ineffable—the ineffable nature of love, the ineffable nature of sex, of identity, of God, of beauty. Yet, how does one tell a story about something that cannot be uttered? How does one narrate the experience of, the encounter with the ineffable? [...]
Cliché is not only performative but invocative. It is an invocation. It is performative not because it does what it says, but because it repeatedly does what it says. It is not limited to a single instance that can be regarded as a success or failure. It does not simply promise a happily ever after, but more completely, in the repetition of language is alters not itself but the story. Cliché does something not to its own various instances, but to the characters in the text as well as to the reader reading the text.
In this way, it is liturgical.
RasoirJ Apr 17, 2012 at 8:32 am
Thanks once again, Laura. You're providing me in your comments with quite an education in romance fiction, and the things you say actually do make me want to try more of it. I think you may have hit here on the fundamental mismatch between my sensibility and that of the romance-novel devotee – the genre's absence of irony, which in many ways feels to me like an absence of authenticity.
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From left: Rashid Skaf, and Michael Peveler, AMX; Todd Constantine and Ed Hipditch, Memorial; Michael Olinger, AMX; and Dann Kinneman, ProMedia Group.
Memorial University's Distance Education, Learning and Teaching Support's (DELTS) classroom support team received the AMX Innovation Award at EduComm conference this week in Orlando, Florida.
The team at DELTS submitted the redesign plans for an existing 250-seat main lecture theatre in Memorial's Faculty of Medicine. The new theatre will contain state-of-the-art, multimedia rich equipment that will ensure an engaging and innovative environment for professors and students.
AMX manufactures equipment to create and enhance technology-friendly classrooms on environmentally friendly campuses. DELTS has been using AMX automation and control systems for over 15 years, and when the School of Medicine approached the unit to redesign their main lecture theatre, the challenge was to replace older analog equipment with newer, more complex and advanced 16x10 digital technology.
Ed Hipditch (manager of classroom technology, DELTS) and electronic technologist Todd Constantine (DELTS) accepted the award.
Mr. Hipditch said the lecture theatre's makeover will allow futuristic yet simplistic lecture presentations.
"The new equipment allows the flexibility for a complex multimedia room, but one that's user-friendly to instructors," he said. "When they realize how seamless it is, they'll want to use the equipment to enrich their teaching. It's complex to install, but easy to use."
DELTS' classroom support division has redesigned and refurbished just over 200 classrooms, boardrooms and seminar rooms across campus. The unit is also responsible for multimedia maintenance in these rooms.
Whether it's a classroom with 30 seats and just a Smartboard, or a large-scale lecture theatre with 300 seats and all the bells and whistles, classroom support at DELTS has serviced units from the schools of medicine, pharmacy and nursing, to Spencer Hall, to Queen's College to the department of history.
Associate Director Rob Wells is delighted that classroom support is being recognized for their constant dedication to their work across campus.
"The opportunity for DELTS to work creatively with faculties and schools at Memorial to create learning spaces that provide our students and faculty with memorable learning experiences is central to who we are in the unit," he said. "A partnership here with the Faculty of Medicine is evidence of the talent in DELTS."
As a result of this most recent win for DELTS, the unit has received a $25,000 credit for AMX equipment, which will be used to expand the facilities within Memorial, to continue the development of state-of-the-art learning spaces. Memorial will also be featured in the September issue of University Business magazine.


Each country has its unique foods based on its culture, the same can be said for Japan as well.
Because of the peculiar appearance, taste or smell, sometimes they are avoided by people from overseas.
It is very fun to get to know them because you are able to understand the culture behind them and maybe not be so scared of these food the next time you are in Japan or while you are still here.
This article introduces 5 most peculiar Japanese foods which are avoided by foreigners.
It is one of the most common Japanese food which is symbolized as a unique food in Japan.
In Japanese traditional style of breakfast, it is often served as one of the side dishes.
Because of its strong smell and unique appearance, which gets sticky when you mix it by chopsticks, it is often avoided by foreigners.
In fact, not only foreigners but some Japanese people also do not like it.
It is often eaten in Japan, but there are very few other countries in the world where people eat it as well.
It is also known as "devil fish", in English, and often treated as one of the very bad and strange creature in the world.
The situation is, however, different in Japan; it is not seen as a "devil fish" in Japanese people's eyes.
On the contrary, it is known as a very smart creature.
In addition to that, it contains many nutrients.
It is very often eaten as sushi and sashimi in Japan, and in many other ways in the Japanese Cuisine.
Although it is believed to have come from China, it is a very familiar food to people in Japan.
Many foreigners avoided it because of the sour taste.
A lunch box meal which has one piece of pickled plum placed on the center of white rice is called "Hinomaru Bento" in Japanese.
"Hinomaru" means the red circle which resembles the sun, and it symbolize the Japanese flag.
Because the lunch box with pickled plum put on white rice resembles the flag, it is called "Hinomaru Bento".
Raw Horse meat is one of the most peculiar foods in Japan, due to the fact that it is mostly eaten in Japan.
Raw food itself is not so common for people overseas.
It is, however, eaten only in certain regions, and it is difficult to find at super markets except in those regions.
One of the most region where it is very popular is in the Kumamoto prefecture. It has the largest production volume and consumption amount of horse meat.
Raw Horse meat can be one of strangest sight for people overseas because horses are often seen has close companions.
Soft Roe is seen has as an expensive food in Japan. Soft Roe or milt(milt being particularly male) are fish sperms, and there are many fishes that their milt are eaten.
These are: cod, monkfish, blowfish, and salmon.
The eating of the milt of a blowfish is particularly seen as very strange from the perspective of people overseas, because it has poison.
The poison of blowfish is tetrodotoxin, and it is known as a very strong poison as it can kill people.
Therefore, blowfish is not eaten overseas because of this, and it is often a surprise to see it eaten in Japan.
Due to the poison, the cook who prepares blowfish needs a license in Japan, it is a special food and can only be eaten at certain restaurants.
If you are interested in these unique Japanese foods, make sure to try it while you are in Japan.
Beer Garden in the Sky 2018 – At the World Renowned Hilton Tokyo!


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13th Congressional District, 802 Votes, Adriano Espaillat, Charlie Rangel, Margin of Victory, New York, Politics, Upper Manhattan - July 02, 2012
Rangel recount shows margin of victory down to 802 votes
In the race for the 13th Congressional District in Upper Manhattan, Congressman Charlie Rangel was initially declared the winner over State Senator Adriano Espaillat. After reports were made about several precincts' votes in the district being left out, a recount has ensued. Rangel's margin of victory is down to 802 votes. The Politicker reports:
The race between veteran Congressman Charlie Rangel and State Senator Adriano Espaillat for the 13th Congressional District in Upper Manhattan will come down to paper ballots. Mr. Rangel was initially declared the winner by the Associated Press based on initial results provided by the New York City Board of Elections, but it was subsequently revealed those results did not include votes from many of the precincts in the district. After a re-examination of the votes, the BOE released unofficial results tonight including votes cast in all of the district's 506 precincts that show Mr. Rangel defeating Mr. Espaillat by a margin of just 802 votes. According to the BOE, Mr. Rangel received 18,075 votes, or 44.29 percent of the total cast, compared to Mr. Espaillat's 17,273, 42.33 percent of the votes cast.
These unofficial results do not include paper ballots cast by absentee voters and affidavit ballots submitted by those whose name is not on the voter rolls when they arrive at the polling place. Those paper ballots, which include votes for both candidates, will be counted by the BOE next Thursday and will be the deciding factor in this tight race.
On Thursday, Mr. Espaillat's supporters held a press conference in front of Mr. Rangel's office where they called for a federal monitor to oversee the counting of votes after the issues with the initial results.
The post Rangel recount shows margin of victory down to 802 votes appeared first on theGrio.


Summary: Elizabeth Rew's life has all the elements of a good fairy tale. Her mother has died; her father has remarried so that she now has a stepmother and two college-age stepsisters. While the stepmother and stepsisters are not evil, they do take advantage of Elizabeth. She has had to transfer to a new high school where she has no friends. A research paper she does on Grimm's fairy tales for her history teacher leads to an after-school job as a page at a very unusual library. The New York Circulating Material Repository is a lending library of objects rather than books—objects both contemporary and historical (such as Marie Antoinette's wig), common and obscure. She learns that the basement houses several secret collections including the Grimm Collection, a room full of magical items mentioned in Grimm's fairy tales. She is intrigued by the seven-league boots, a mermaid's comb, the magic mirror belonging to Snow White's stepmother, and other items. But some of the items are disappearing and others are losing their magical qualities. Elizabeth and her fellow pages are suspects. Even though the pages don't completely trust each other, they set off on a dangerous and exciting quest to find the real culprit.
Literary Elements at work in the story: Even though The Grimm Legacy is fantasy, it remains grounded in reality. Problems are not solved through the use of magic. In fact, some of the magical items cause more problems than they solve. Missteps while wearing the seven-league boots can cause the wearer to crash into walls or ended up far from their intended destination. The magic mirror must tell the truth but can be snide and catty in its responses (saying that Elizabeth is brave and true, but not pretty, for example). The four teen-age protagonists have problems with which the reader can identify: being an outsider at a new school, being jealous or envious of others, having a pesky younger sibling, family problems, etc.
Perspective on gender/race/culture/economic/ability: The four teen-age main characters are of different ethnicities. But their ethnicity is merely a factor that describes appearance, much in the same way that someone would be described as having brown eyes or curly hair. The ethnicity does not describe abilities or character traits. The girls and the boys are equally brave and compassionate. The girls have initiative and are willing to risk safety to rescue others who are in danger. Marc, the high school basketball star, takes care of his three-year-old brother with caring and without embarrassment or resentment.
Elizabeth's father does not seem to pay much attention to her. Why? What would you say to him? What could you say in his defense?
How do Elizabeth, Marc, Aaron, and Anjali honor and respect their parents?
If you could borrow an item from the Grimm Collection, what would you want? Why? What would you leave as a deposit? How would this affect your daily life?
Because the main characters do not know whom to trust, they find it difficult to work together to find the thief. Why do we sometimes find it difficult to work together? What are some advantages of working together?
Elizabeth has strong memories of her mother and their shared love of fairy tales. What memories do you have of an activity shared with a parent or grandparent?
Where is God at work in this book?
This review is written by Union Presbyterian Seminary graduate Mary Anne Welch.
The Grimm Legacy by Storypath is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.