You know what bothers me the most about my chosen profession? It’s the negative image of the communications/PR professional. But not in the way you think I mean.

To be sure, there is a prevailing derogatory stereotype of PR pros. Just about every euphemism for PR practitioner has negative connotations. Spin Doctor. Flak. Bulls&$t artist. I challenge you to tell me one positive (and widely used) euphemism for someone in this line of work. And is it really a wonder? With stories of PR agencies pulling shenanigans like this (reported earlier this month at the Bad Pitch Blog), it’s no surprise that people have less than lofty opinions of our kind.

The fact that these stereotypes exist is something I came to terms with years ago. I can’t change macro-attitudes about the PR profession, but I can influence the people within my own circles; letting them see that idealism, good business practice, and something I like to call “mensch-iness” does have a place in our world (in fact it actually leads to more successful outcomes).

No. It’s not the external negative image that is so troubling to me – it’s the negative self-image that is the real tragedy. Kids out of college are entering PR agencies or communications departments and learning that it’s fine to be self-deprecating about our profession. In earlier jobs, I would often hear PR folks covering for a lack of knowledge or professionalism with a constituent by saying, “apologies, I’m just a PR flak.” What is that?!?

Hey… it’s not okay to refer to ourselves as flaks. Take some pride in what it is that we’re doing, or at least what we should be doing: helping to communicate inspiring ideas and stories to communities. And helping clients navigate a complex and ever-changing world of traditional and social media. Without taking pride in what we do, we won’t ever love our work. And if we embrace and perpetuate the negative stereotypes of this profession from within, than external attitudes will never change. I’m just touching the surface with this post, but needed to get this off my chest.

I know I’m not the only one who cringes when a peer, even jokingly, disparages our profession. Unfortunately, I think we tend to be the silent majority. Who else feels the way I do?

On Thursday I got called both a fair and irresponsible journalist by two different media relations persons.

The first one was from my past work in Fort McMurray where I was an oilsands/business reporter.

She was the head of the communications department in one of the oilsands giants. I never really had any direct dealings with her. It was her underlings who dealt with me.

When I announced my departure from Fort McMurray to head to Edmonton one of her underlings told me, “It’s too bad you’re leaving. I really appreciate your work because you’re fair.”

That’s a music to a journalist’s ears.

Aside from uncovering the truth we also strive to be fair to all parties involved in a story and if you were dealing with an oilsands company it’s not difficult to be biased.

That woman, who I never dealt with, repeated about my being fair Thursday morning when I met her at an early morning press conference. She too had moved out of the oilsands and is now working for a non-profit group.

My shoes felt like they had wings as I walked back to my car, feeling good about myself.

I headed to my office, to write the story from the presser and then I headed to the technical budget briefings at the city hall.

I forgot to wear my most fabulous tie and I didn’t pick up a copy of Thursday’s Sun. So nope I didn’t do what I had plan to do as I stated on my Wednesday note.

As I was writing a budget story, I got an e-mail from a media relations person from one of the school boards.

I had been writing about this incident that a Calgary Parking Authority officer “allegedly” ticketed more than 20 vehicles, while they were attending a Remembrance Day assembly in one of the city schools.

For two days I’d been trying to get confirmation from the parking authority whether that’s accurate or not. But no one returned my calls.

For two days we decided to run the story stating that an eyewitness reported this.

It turns out that there were only two cars ticketed, which definitely warrants a follow up story, airing the side of the parking authority.

I didn’t get an apology from the the parking authority boss for not returning my calls promptly. I wasn’t pissy about it either. I was polite and friendly when I spoke with him.

About 2:20 p.m., I got a scathing e-mail from the school board spokesperson, demanding a correction.

I told him that I will be writing a follow-up story because I finally got a hold of parking authority boss.

He replied to me with another scathing e-mail, questioning my news judgement and why would such an incident merit two consecutive stories with a new follow-up.

This particular spokesperson isn’t necessarily friendly. In fact he’s one of those who don’t return phone calls whenever the story is not going to put the school board in a good light. 

He also regularly sends “good news stories.” 

Honest to goodness his pitches wouldn’t interest even the laziest journalist, well especially the laziest kind.

I told him that the confirmation from the parking authority was crucial to the story, but the time element of the incident is also important. 

It’s an incident that took place around Remembrance Day and must be reported immediately.

Of course, since he’s all about let the media wait, he doesn’t get that.

I stopped responding to his messages because I know the exchange wasn’t going anywhere and I will end up calling him names, I might regret later.

I think he was just covering the school’s sorry ass because nobody called the parking authority to notify officials about the event. A school is supposed to call the parking authority about an event so nobody gets ticketed.

None of these would have happened.

As for the eyewitness who reported this incident and miscalculated the number of tickets, I still give him credit because he wasn’t the kind who wouldn’t give his or her name.

He put his credibility out there by giving me and allowing me to print his name. He didn’t hide with the cloak of anonymity.

I admit I shouldn’t have taken his word for what he thought he saw.

And that’s why I wrote a follow-up story to correct the wrong information that was floated out there.

As for the school, it still hasn’t come up with a valid explanation why it didn’t notify the parking authority.

Nov. 12, 2009

Close-up of German 2 cm Flakvierling 38 showing details of the mount and guns, November 1943.

Bilden har jag “snott” från en vän. Han sitter på ett flak till en polisbil i Thailand (vad han gör på flaket har jag ännu inte fått reda på). Men det märkligaste av allt är väl ändå vad Sveriges riksvapen gör där? Jag fattar verkligen inte…. någon som vet?

click to enlarge

Un ricognitore fotografico McDonnell RF-101 Voodoo sorvola postazioni di artiglieria contraerea dell’esercito Nordvietnamita durante l’operazione Rolling Thunder. Al centro e’ possibile scorgere il radar SON-9 “Fire Can”,  usato per dirigere il tiro dei pezzi da 57 e 100mm.  (US Air Force photo).

Guten Abend die Damen und Herrn Leserschaft.
Nun möchte ich mich einem Thema widmen, welches ich schon lange vor mir herschiebe: Die verblüffenden Ähnlichkeiten zwischen Bandlogos und der Natur und auch anderen Logos.

So, lasst uns nun beginnen mit dem Logo der Metalband Arch Enemy, hier zu sehen, auch hier und sogar einmal in Aktion: hier. Es weist meiner Meinung nach verblüffende Parallelen zum Logo der Punkband Blink 182 auf, welches hier und hier zu sehen ist. Die wesentlichen Unterschiede sind lediglich die krakeligere Linienart, der Smiley statt Pentagramm und die vier Pfeile statt der fünf ,,Rohre” (Anm.: Ich nenns jetzt einfach mal Rohre, da sie mich persönlich an Kanonen- oder Flakrohre erinnern und das wohl auch, auf eine brachiale Art und Weise, die Musik unterschreichen würde) beim Blink 182 Logo. Woher nun diese verblüffenden Ähnlichkeiten kommen, sei eurer Fantasie überlassen, könnt ja Vorschläge zu den Comments Posten. Die langweilige Variante, dass eine Band es der anderen nachgemacht hat schließe ich persönlich jedoch aus, da Blink 182 sich bereits 1992 formierten, Arch Enemy jedoch erst 1996 entstanden. Eine Trve-Melodic-Death-Metal-Band, die obendrein noch aus dem skandinavischen Schweden kommt, würde einfach niemals das Logo einer Punkband nachahmen. Erst recht nicht bei solchen Musikvideos! Ich mein, mal im ernst, der Papst is  trver als die. Also abgehakt.

So ist das nun aber noch lange nicht alles. Neulich fiel mir nämlich solch ein Samen, *Hust* *Blatt* *Hust*, über den weg:

Dies ist, wie allseitsbekannt, der Samen einer Hainbuche (Danke Martin!). Da ich mir in letzter Zeit des öfteren Musik von In Flames zu Gemüte führte, bemerkte ich natürlich sofort eine frappierende Ähnlichkeit zu ihrem Maskottchen, dem sogenannten Jesterhead (Jester= Gaukler, Hofnarr ; Head=… ihr wisst schon^^). Was hat dies zu bedeuten? Besteht die Band etwa aus Hainbuchenfetischisten? Will die Band eine Botschaft zum Umweltschutz durchsickern lassen, oder leitet sich diese Form vielleicht von der eines Gauklers mit typischer Mütze ab, wie hier zu sehen, oder hier. Wir werden es vielleicht nie erfahren… es sei denn, Galileo widmet diesem Thema eine eigene Galileo Mystery Folge, da wird immer alles geklärt…ALLES.

Jetzt denkt ihr vielleicht, hier wäre Schluss…..FALSCH! Denn eine Kleinigkeit hab ich noch. Da, wie bereits erwähnt, In Flames derzeit häufiger in meiner Playlist auftaucht, bin ich natürlich auch auf das Cover von Come Clarity gestoßen. So trägt es sich zufälligerweise zu, dass ein Freund aus meiner Klasse ein T-Shirt der Band Enraged by Beauty besitzt.  Dieses zeigt das Cover des Albums Vae Victis und hat verblüffende, frapierende und schockierende Parallelen zum Come Clarity Cover. Beide zeigen eine mit einfachen Strichen skizzierte Figur, die eine in leicht, die andere in stark gebeugter Haltung. Beide sind Verletzt. Während die eine ihren  Arm zu nähen scheint, hat die andere ihr eigenes Herz herausgerissen und hält dies in die Höhe. Beim Vae Victis Cover ist es interessant, dass der Faden mit dem der Arm genäht wird sich kaum von den Strichen, aus denen die Person besteht, abhebt. Sie scheint sich also mit sich selbst zu heilen, eigenständig, regenerativ (Spontaninterpretation). Beim Come Clarity Cover ist die Person ebenfalls, simpel und in schwarz-weiß gehalten, das Herz und Blut jedoch sind farblich durch Rot- und Blautöne klar abgegrenzt. So scheint has Herz  nicht zum Körper zu gehören, was der Grund sein könnte, warum jene Person es sich entriss.
So stehen Beide Covers, trotz ihres ähnlichen Ersteindrucks ziemlich gegensätzlich zueinander: Einmal wird die Figur mit dem eigenen Körper geheilt, andermal wird die Figur durch den eigenen Körper verwundet und fängt an zu bluten. Ob dies gewollt ist… auch hier Ungewissheit. Zufälle gibt es überall und ich habe schon ziemlich frei interpretiert muss ich zugeben. Doch hierzu kann sich jeder selbst ein Bild im Kopf formen.

So, das wars wieder von meiner Seite. Wenn ihr noch irgendwas kennt, das auch unter die Kategorie *Ähnlichkeiten – kann das wirklich zufall sein?* fällt, könnt ihrs gerne in die Comments schreiben und Anregungen geben.
Ansonsten: Der gesamte Beitrag ist natürlich Objektiv, jeder sieht das anders. Ich hab nur das geschrieben, was mir spontan eingefallen ist.
So verabschied ich mich dann mal bis zum nächsten mal.

Verblüfft, Martin²

PS: Fürs erste können noch Rechtschreibfehler drin sein, is mir grade zu spät alles nochma zu prüfen. Wer welche findet, darf sie gerne mitnehmen. ( sry, der musste sein )

PPS: Bin`s jetzt nochmal durchgegangen, dürfte nun Fehlerfrei sein. Sollten doch noch welche drin sein, schreibts eifnach in die Comments, bearbeitet selbst ( als teil der Red.) oder werdet so glücklich.

flak- shells being shot at you (org. in WWII) - Catch a lot of flak.

flack- fight, gripe

These two are easily confused because saying you are “catching flack” can make sense also. However, the original idiom would be to “catch flak”.

Unloading the German 88-mm

The Flying Heritage Collection, located at Everett, Washington, has added two WWII German 88-mm Flak 37 antiaircraft guns to their collection of aircraft and artifacts.  The 88-mm guns were built in Pilsen, Czechoslovakia for the German military, recently found in Spain, brought back to Germany by a collector, and restored last year.  The museum will put one gun on permanent display and use the other gun to fire blanks at events.

Jag har känt mig lite förvirrad stundvis, så inte blev jag mer balanserad av att tomten cyklade förbi  mig idag. Ja,tomten. Idag den 6-e juni. Tog snabbt en bild för att folk inte ska tro att jag pratar i nattmössan, då det var fest under mig igen och sov lite.

antingen för tidigt eller är han sen...vet bara han

Det är bara i Stockholm. Originellt. Allt för att märkas.

Sen var det den ensamma studenten. Vet inte om det är vanligt, jag har bara sätt de i grupp. Han var kanske utstött av klassens gemenskap, eller tyckte han själv inte gemenskapet. Såg ensamt ut, men han syntes också tydligare än i gruppdito.

ensam på flaken...

Och så var det soffan i en butik jag såg. Det är den mest smaklösa möbeln jag har sett. Vem kommer köpa den? Om nu någon nu kommer att köpa den. För billigt var det inte heller.  Men desto fulare…även om det ser något snyggare ut på bild än i verkligheten.

silversoffan

Idag har det varit studentfirande för fullt i Stockholm. Egentligen har det varit det non-stop med utspark och studentflak i snart två veckor men idag peakade det så det var otroligt många studenter  över hela Stockholm. Det började med att det var fullt med människor vid Handen stationen som alla skulle fira sin lilla student, sedan kom man in till City där det var FULLT ÖS. Hjälp alltså vad studenterna i Stockholm jämfört med Gävle firar HÅRT...! Jag funderade först varför de inte hade på sig de fina studentkostymerna & klänningarna men insåg sedan att alkoholen, helst öl, skulle drickas OCH ösas ner PÅ varandra så att alla blev dyngblöta i alkohol. OCH gärna spruta ner ALLA civila som gick förbi ett studentflak. Oj. Sånt händer INTE i Gävle, vi som stod i finkläder och firade glatt ändå.

Sedan var epicentrum vid Sergels Torg där det kunde vara tretton studentflak samtidigt i rullning. Behöver jag säga att folk sprang runt som galningar där och skrek? Och ett ÖPPET telefonbås vid Regeringsgatan/Kungsträdgården blev en OFFENTLIG toalett för studenterna…! Stackars gamlingarna som gick förbi… 

Men jag kunde inte låta bli att ryckas med i glädjen! Studentdagen var en av de bästa dagarna i mitt liv och den kommer jag aldrig glömma. Synd för studenterna idag att det var svinkallt ute med regn och blåst…

Przebiliście kiedyś oponę? Tak? Wiecie więc, że zazwyczaj zdarza się to w najmniej odpowiednim momencie.
Na autostradzie, zatłoczonej drodze bez pobocza, podczas wyjazdu na długi weekend/wymarzone wakacje, kiedy szkoda nam każdej straconej chwili.

Wymiana koła nie należy do czynności najprzyjemniejszych. Ubabrze się człowiek, napoci, nawdycha spalin, nasłucha narzekań lub co gorsza “dobrych rad” od pasażerów. Nigdy więcej.

Na szczęście ktoś wpadł na genialny pomysł i wyprodukował to:

Ta niepozorna puszka zawiera chemiczny uszczelniacz do opon i taką ilość sprężonego powietrza, która wystarczy by  z powrotem napompować przebitą oponę. Cała akcja wymaga od nas podłączenia puszki do wentylka oraz odczekania mniej więcej trzech minut. Prawda, że fajnie?

Oczywiście jest to działanie doraźna. Na tak naprawionej oponie należy nie przekraczając 80 km/h skierować się
do najbliższego wulkanizatora. Na “dojazdówce” przecież jednak także, a roboty przy tym jakby mniej.

Z drugiej jednak strony, jeśli nie dotyczy to nas samych, guma potrafi mieć także swoje zalety

some years ago, one of the flak-towers in vienna opened it’s roof for visitors to have a nice view over the city. i uploaded some pics:

click on the pic and see more at my Panoramio-Site

By Terese Saplys

April, as we all know by now, is both cruel and (for being cruel?) an occasion for poetry: it’s National Poetry Month for our fair southern neighbours, and the New York Review of Books and Farrar, Straus & Giroux are both celebrating by posting a daily poem from one of their authors.

Only a wunderkind like Mark Sarvas could pull together an issue of Open Letters during one of the most common and heartbreaking tragedies of our poor human lives.

Must-read novel of the month is Lowboy. A delicious, sink-your-teeth-into-an-old-fashioned-humanistic-review by James Wood in this week’s New Yorker, and, for didactic value, an earthier one from Emily Bobrow in The Second Pass.

As Gogol’s 200^th birthday approaches, the push and pull between Ukraine and Russia for the Gogol legacy-and the retroactive crusades historically staged for national literary saviours-gets teased out in the Guardian.

The Weirdness: Flak Magazine pulls the most twilight-zoned-out TV pilots from networks’ rejection lists.

Tickled myself nerdy exploring Yale’s online rare books archives. Don’t miss the edited pages of Crying Holy, the draft novel that became James Baldwin’s Go Tell It on the Mountain.

Speaking of the mountain (and April), graphic novelist Robert Crumb’s Genesis project is finished and due out in the fall. He talked to Time about it (scroll about three-quarters of the way down).

Oh my god I pissed my pants.

HAPPY WEEKEND!

p.s. Photo cred. goes to: Merricat.

Si fa presto a dire Santo!

Da qualche tempo abbiamo un nuovo papa e diciamocelo chiaramente: piace a pochi. Vuoi perché ha un po’ l’aspetto da Nosferatu in cerca di vittime innocenti da dissanguare, vuoi perché la sua parlata in italiano con accento tedesco fa molto nazista (anche se lui nazista non lo è mai stato, ha “solo” fatto parte degli ausiliari della FLAK, l’artiglieria contraerea della Wehrmacht), vuoi perché chi c’era prima di lui ha lasciato un buon ricordo di sé, talmente buono che già si parla di farlo santo. Insomma papa Ratzinger non piace a nessuno, invece quell’altro no, quello piaceva a tutti. Anche a mia mamma. “Papa Wojtyla è stato uno dei papi più buoni della storia”, buono d’animo e d’intenzioni s’intende, questo pensava la mia mamma il giorno del funerale di papa Giovanni Paolo II. E come lei erano in tanti a beatificare le sue azioni e parole. Invece io, che per natura diffido di chi si veste di bianco e ti da buoni consigli, sia esso un infermiere, un gelataio oppure il monarca assoluto di uno staterello grande come Milano2, cerco sempre di andare oltre le apparenze. E in effetti Ratzinger non è poi così peggio di Wojtyla. Infondo lui non è andato fino in Cile nell’aprile del 1987 a trovare il generale Augusto Pinochet, il sanguinario dittatore cileno responsabile di uccisioni e torture di massa, non è andato a stringergli la mano, a condividere con lui il piacere di farsi osannare da una folla festante. “Due grandi leader anticomunisti s’incontrano” titola ancora oggi un sito della destra cilena a corollario di una serie di fotografie dei due in affettuosa complicità sul balcone della Moneda a Santiago del Cile (i vecchi Litfiba dedicheranno all’evento alcuni versi di una canzone). Ratzinger non ha neanche pensato qualche anno più tardi, nel 1999, come invece ha fatto Giovanni Paolo II, di spendere fiumi di parole per tentare di salvare lo stesso Pinochet da una imputazione di tortura e omicidio di cittadini spagnoli, imputazione per cui era stata chiesta dal giudice iberico Baltasàr Garzon l’estradizione dall’Inghilterra, paese in cui si trovava il Generale cileno in quel momento. Tutto questo Ratzinger non lo ha fatto, in una cosa però i due hanno trovato lo stesso stimolo e la stessa convinzione: ripetere a migliaia di poveri africani, molti dei quali malati, che l’AIDS è una tragedia che non può essere vinta attraverso la distribuzione gratuita di condom, che possono anche aumentare il problema. A molti questo concetto può apparire come una bestemmia, per me e per  l’Assemblea Mondiale della Sanità (WHA) lo è in effetti, ma questo non è importante, l’importante è capire che non bisogna prendersela con Ratzinger, lui amministra un paese e i suoi cittadini nel migliore dei modi e soprattutto non è peggio di Wojtyla. Anche il papa polacco lo ha detto, gridato più volte: non usate il preservativo, ma praticate l’astinenza. E in fondo non era neanche colpa sua se la maggior parte di quelle persone, cittadini dell’Africa sub-sahariana, non erano andate mai a scuola e quindi non conoscevano il significato della parola “astinenza” (senza contare che molti concetti come “pratica sessuale sicura” o “prevenzione del rischio” sono intraducibili in certi linguaggi locali). E quindi l’eminenza tedesca non ha fatto altro che seguire il suo predecessore, che fra l’altro per quelle parole venne accusato dal quotidiano inglese THE GUARDIAN di avere le mani sporche di sangue (The Pope has blood in his hand). Vogliamo condannarlo per questo? Io credo di no, piuttosto se proprio vogliamo trovare una giustificazione lombrosiana al suo mefistofelico aspetto cerchiamola nel suo rapporto sulla pedofilia negli USA, rapporto redatto dall’allora cardinale Ratzinger nel 1996 che tendeva a minimizzare la portata del fenomeno stimandola attorno all’1% dei preti in carica. Si scoprirà che in realtà ben il 4% di preti statunitensi erano dediti a pratiche sessuali con minori di 18 anni e addirittura nel 1991 il 66% dei preti in servizio a Los Angeles era pedofilo, compresi due vescovi. Questa una delle sue poche colpe, avere taciuto. Certo ha avuto i suoi effetti negativi sul mondo cattolico e sulle sue istituzioni: si calcola che in totale siano 11.093 le vittime di oltre 5.000 preti, compresi 16 vescovi. Il costo in termini di processi e risarcimenti si aggira attorno a un miliardo e mezzo di dollari. Se fossimo in Italia si potrebbe dire “un otto per mille ben speso”. Per cui cattolici, credenti e praticanti, state sereni: questo papa non è migliore nè peggiore dei precedenti, è solo un papa, solo un capo di stato che detiene il potere esecutivo, legislativo e giudiziario nelle sue mani, è solo un capo di governo che si interessa dei governi altrui, un’anima peccatrice che si preoccupa dei peccati altrui. È solo questo, nient’altro. E poco importa se nel frattempo la mia mamma è diventata atea.

ALCUNE DELLE FONTI:

www.ildialogo.org/Ratzinger/pedofiliachiese.htm

Il Generale E Il Giudice - L.Sepulveda – Guanda edizioni

http://taggatore.com/articoli/benedetto+xvi

I am putting the Mr Foster Monkey on hold for a bit. Not to say I won’t work on him at all, but not as fervently. I want to focus on getting my MIL’s cardigan done. It is coming along. I am holding a nice pace on the body now. Because I am worried about running out of yarn, I switched the colors around a little from how they are in the sleeves. I don’t think it will be badly noticeable. As a matter of fact they suggest it in the book as a way to change things up and make it more interesting. I think being it is a fair isle design it will come out nice.  Now that the body of the sweater is going strong I am enjoying this project much more.

I have finished the knitting up of the Baby Kimono sweater and started with the seaming yesterday. The sides came out beautifully, but the underarm seam looked awful! I took it all out and started a thread on Ravelry asking for suggestions for a nicer stitch for seaming these arms. Here is a picture of how it came out the first time.

Baby Kimono

I have gotten a couple of suggestions. One is a crocheted slip stitch which I may try. Or I will just try the grafting stitch again, but looser. You can see that my tension was not consistent and that may have been the problem. Here is another picture of it after. I will add that this Reynolds Rapture is soooo soft after blocking. Wow. Nice stuff.

Baby Kimono

And now for some depressing news. It has been nearly a month since I ordered my Jamiesons DK for the Alba Jacket I have been planning and it has not arrived. I spoke to Nina at Camilla Valley Farms where I had ordered it and she is putting a tracer on it. Hopefully it is just stuck in customs and it will arrive. I am hoping and praying it is not lost. If it is I will not be able to afford to replace it and the Alba Jacket will have to wait until next year. I am so disappointed. I should have had her insure it but did not think of it.

On a more happier note, I have sold a collectable book I owned for enough money to buy a sweater kit from Virtual Yarns! I ordered the Luskentyre. It was such a hard choice. I really love the Marina and Rona as well. Maybe someday I will be able to order these. The exchange rate has gone down enough that it is much more affordable to get these kits for VY and I did not want to miss my opportunity. This will not be on the project list for this year, but I will start it as soon as I can!

I have one more thing to share. I purchased a ‘pattern’ yesterday from Big Sky Knitting and I am very impressed. It calls itself a pattern, but it is more like a booklette for top down knitting. It comes in 8 parts and in these parts each step of the construction is meticulously spelled out. These instructions can be used for many patterns if you want to knit them top down. I am going to try using it for Marc’s Duxbury Point Sweater that I will be making for him. I plan on starting this very shortly. The ‘pattern’ is by Janet Szabo and is called The Follow the Leader Aran Knit Along or FLAK. Great stuff and only $8! Worth every penny! You will be hearing more from me about how this works out!

It happens sometimes to assiduous Flaks that your carefully sculpted, brilliantly messaged inquiries or pieces of literature fall before the eyes of an unintended recipient resulting in the ubiquitous, “Please remove me from your email list, I do not cover trends in small-dog winter fashion,” or some such reply.
 
Such an occurrence confronted me during my steadfast International Builder Show (IBS) outreach on behalf of the preeminent brand in loudspeakers worldwide (www.paradigm.com). The offended was a senior editor from a major national consumer magazine who also writes a blog and presented me with a valuable fork in the road.
 
HIM: Please remove me from your email list, as I do not cover electronics. Thank you.
 
One option was to disregard a response, remove him from all lists and go on sending emails while watching street fights on Youtube (haha, jk Boss). Or, I could stand up for myself and try to turn the situation into a positive (and blogpost) by taking the time to see where I went wrong.
 
ME: My apologies (obscured), we’ll make sure you’re removed from our list. For your reference, the Vocus media service has this listed under your profile: (obscured) is a senior editor at (obscured) and covers appliances, do-it-yourself, gardening, home furnishings/housewares, electronics, and technology. He has written five books on consumer topics.

With a feeling of slight exoneration I continued my servitude and was pleasantly surprised a few minutes later to receive the following:
 
HIM: It’s wrong! No wonder I get plagued. Thanks for the heads-up. Here’s something more precise: (obscured) is a senior editor at (obscured) and covers appliances, home improvement and outdoor power equipment. He has written no books on consumer topics.
 
Ha, the homefield advantage has shifted. Once seen as the villain, I now held court over the situation and was actually thanked for offering the enlightenment of our media services’ failure (Don’t worry, I still heart you Vocus). One more exchange and I think our lesson should come full circle:
 
ME: If you don’t tell them to change it, maybe next year you’ll have written 10 books and be interested in water sports and nanotechnology.
 
HIM: Alas, I won’t be going after all—but I was registered, so your info isn’t off-base on that count. But I like those additions.
 
A little extra legwork with a positive attitude can mean the difference between being a good PR person and an indolent blob disseminating information to those who don’t need or want it.
 
- Nick

Or rather, overachieving. There are many, many people in this wide world of ours who feel the need to outshine, to outperform everyone else. Their reasons vary. Perhaps they come from poor families, and getting the best grades and the best education available to them is the only way out of the mudhole they live in. Others do it because they have an extreme competitive drive. They absolutely cannot stomach the thought of someone, somewhere, possibly doing better than them in anything. So they spend days and nights slaving over their grades, grubbing for just one more point on that essay so that they’ll have a 98 instead of a 97 average. I’ve met people who fit into both these categories. But there is a third category: the group of people who are quite capable of getting acceptable grades, yet still kill themselves on a daily basis for grades that they could easily get without all the wasted effort. For those of you who don’t know what “acceptable” means, here’s a comparison chart:

• A=Acceptable
• B=Bad
• C=Crap
• D=Damn
• F=F*** (hey, this blog is G-rated, all right?)

OK, back to the point. Namely, that every day I interact with people who walk in half-delirious from lack of sleep, rubbing their eyes, and proceed to go to six AP classes plus orchestra. These people get maybe 3 hours of sleep a night, 4 if they are lucky, and yet somehow manage to function as human beings (to some extent). And it hurts to watch. It really does. I’m looking at them, thinking to myself, “You are smarter than 90% of the human race, and yet you still needlessly torture yourself by doing this? Why?” Is it some insane competitiveness for grades? Could be.

But I think it’s really for another reason: these children don’t know when to stop. They don’t know when enough studying is enough studying. They always say to themselves, “Oh my god I haven’t studied enough I heard this test is tough from that kid who took it last year OMG OMG OMG AAAH!” But in reality, all they had to do was memorize a formula and do a couple problems to learn where and how to apply it. Simple, really. Or perhaps we are talking about history. In that case, would not 2 hours’ studying and memorization of facts be enough? For what is a history test if not information recall? 

“But wait,” you say. “What if the test is really so tough that I can’t figure it out at all without staying up all night?” Well, the only subject in which that could conceivably happen is math. All the other courses end up boiling down to, “Do you know it or don’t you know it?” If you don’t, you don’t. Whether or not you stayed up all night studying. I mean, maybe you memorized that fact that saved your butt at 3:21 AM, but most likely you didn’t. You memorized it at 8:53 PM, when you were still active. This is also backed up by scientific evidence, like this article here. Mostly, I’d like to look at this paragraph:

Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, found that a function of sleep is to help consolidate the effects of waking experiences on cortical plasticity, converting memory into more permanent and /or enhanced forms. Marcos G. Frank, PhD., postdoctoral fellow says, “if you reviewed your notes thoroughly until you were tired and then slept, you’d achieve as much plasticity, or ‘learning,’ in the brain as if you’d pulled an all-nighter repeating your review of the material.” 

I mean, what else can be said? Pulling all-nighters to study really doesn’t help. It just makes you look  like shit in the morning (all right, all right, so the G-rated thing can be pushed a bit), doesn’t help your ability to remember information, and may actually cause you to perform worse due to lack of sleep. It just shows a failure to study efficiently combined with an irrational fear of underachievement. 

In short: STOP STAYING UP ALL NIGHT STUDYING. Thanks.

P.S.: I realize that some people have a schedule that doesn’t permit going to sleep before 12:00 AM, and they have my sincere condolences. They also need to learn time-management. Don’t spend the time when you’re not doing stuff not doing stuff. Study then.

Or maybe you have work. OK, awesome. Nice that you’re working. Stop working so much. Normally, I wouldn’t say something like this, but I say it because I know 90%  of you don’t need to work right now. You are living in an affluent suburb of Philadelphia, in a pricey area, median household income $100,000 a year, possibly higher. You are a spoiled rich kid to the rest of the world, whether or not you feel like one. It’s OK to act like one for now. 

And then there are some to whom this will be extraordinarily offensive or wrong or something, and you’ll IM me angrily in order to pick my argument apart. Please, don’t IM me. You’re free to post comments on the post, and I’ll answer stuff through that medium. Just a little thing, because I know this post’s gonna get a lot of flak. Tyvm.

Aus dem Tagebuch einer jungen Inselbewohnerin. Eintrag vom 1.7.40:

“In der letzten Nacht um 1 Uhr weckte mich meine Mutter, denn die Flak schoss und wir hörten auch Flugzeuge. Wir gingen sofort in den Luftschutzkeller. Nach einer kurzen Zeit wurden es schon wieder ruhig. Ich legte mich dann ins Bett zum schlafen, während die anderen noch aufblieben. Als ich eben eingeschlafen war wurde ich wieder aufgeweckt. Wir waren gerade im Luftschutzkeller, als ein scharfer Knall ertönt. Als wir draußen waren (…) sahen wir eine große Rauchwolke. Mein Vater und Tjark-Georg fuhren sofort weg, denn sie sind beide in der Feuerwehr. Als sie wiederkamen erzählten sie, dass sechs Bomben abgeworfen worden wären und Uli Peters, Heini Peters und unser Gendarm Schuchard, die beim Wasserturm standen, dadurch getötet wurden. Schuchard lebte erst noch, während Uli und Heini Peters sofort tot waren. Unter den 6 Bomben war eine mit Zeitzündung. Die Bewohner der umliegenden Häuser mussten das Gebiet sofort verlassen. Die Bombe explodierte am Mittag. Sie richtete keine größeren Schäden an. Die Bewohner konnten dann wieder in ihre Häuser gehen. Am Nachmittag haben wir uns die Unglücksstelle angesehen. Die Verkaufsbuden von Tillmann und Scharnbeck waren schwer beschädigt. Auch das Dünenschlösschen und die Schokoladenbude hatten viel abgekriegt. Bei Westerkamps Haus war der Giebel eingedrückt und in den Mauern waren Löcher. In den umliegenden Häusern waren die Fenster zertrümmert.”

Das von der Bombe beschädigte Dünenschlösschen

Dünenschlösschen von innen

(*Disclosure: I’m a PR professional in real life, and have a master’s in public communication — so I have a vested interest in changing perceptions and building relationships — two basic tenets of good PR).

Are you your own best PR person?

Are you putting your best image, er, foot forward every day, or are you still hung up on your looks, imperfections, and short-comings?

This was one of the topics of the keynote yesterday by journalist, writer and blogger Penelope Trunk at the Public Relations Society of America conference I am attending here in Detroit.

Her argument was that, when it comes to women and their careers (she authored a book called The Brazen Careerist and writes a blog under the same premise), all too often, women are not being their own best PR person, even though they are most qualified to do so.

Women today have the power to carve their own path, regardless of the state of the economy or if they’ve been out of the working world for a while, she says. We can be our own biggest PR flaks.

Penelope contends that we ought to be out there pitching ourselves (our authentic “brand”, what makes us unique and desirable) like mad … because jobs don’t last forever, career tracks change, but we’re still “us,” and we’re worth investing a little time to polish the image we portray to the world.

We don’t need to be perfect by any means (something I’m coming to terms with). But like it or not, perceptions matter.

If you’re perceived at a job interview, for example, as confident and firm, people will think you are. It essentially becomes your reality.

On the flip side, if you walk into a room with your eyes down and are constantly touching your hair or fidgeting, people will see you as insecure. That becomes your “reality,” because that’s the image you’re portraying.

So how does this translate to body image issues so many of us face? Oftentimes it is these issues that hold us back from becoming our own best PR person. If we don’t think we look good, well, we probably won’t carry ourselves with confidence.

But, for example, if you carefully dress yourself for work every day and feel awesome in your clothes (be it a size 6, 16, or 26), you’re probably giving off positive vibes about yourself — your “brand.” You’re probably going to carry yourself with pride, probably smiling a lot more, maybe glancing at your butt in the mirror.

(Side note: These are the women some of of you admitted yesterday that you envy in your comments re: the body snarking post).

Taking it a step further, if your clothes are tailored and have clean lines, and you are maybe wearing a little make-up, a spritz of perfume and perhaps you took some time to do your hair vs “showering and going” … chances are, your body size or shape has very little to do with how put-together you look and feel.

Am I right?

You’re putting your “brand” out there, and it’s confident, self-assured, poised. In fact, I’d argue how you carry yourself speaks volumes, significantly more than your physical appearance.

When I lived in DC, I always felt so good going to work because I was always dressed up — in a suit, skirts, dresses, slacks, twin-sets, blouses, etc. I was always told to “dress for the position you want, not the position you have.” And so I did played the part, working for trade associations and for the federal government.

Even when I was heavy, I was always complimented for looking so put-together. Thanks to my mom’s advice, I finally learned how to dress my body and figure out my mess of tresses. It didn’t need to be expensive clothing — but dressing well helped me feel confident and I was able to portray confidence, even when inside I wasn’t always feeling it.

Seriously, my wardrobe helped build confidence and improve my body image. In an A-line tweed skirt, tights and tall boots, I looked fierce and ready to tackle any curve ball thrown my way … not “fat.”

Now, I work at a digital advertising agency in the Midwest where it’s uber-casual (save for client meetings), and where we’re running up and down three flights of stairs all day long. So practical flats, cords, cute fitted blouses, and jeans are much more the norm than the much more “dressed up” wardrobe I was accustomed to in my former life.

Since deep down I’m still a pretty preppy dresser (it’s part of my ”brand”), I’ve learned over the past two years to find a level of balance that I’m comfortable with. I still do my hair/make-up, perfume routine because those things make me feel good about myself.

And I’ve learned that, regardless of size or body type, you can look just as put-together in a blazer and great jeans as you do in a suit (especially with the right accessories, shoes and bag).

I know that if I dressed this casually at my job in DC, I’d probably have been asked to reassess my wardrobe choices, as the perception in my government job would be that I wasn’t “dressed conservatively enough”. But here, it’s absolutely acceptable and I’m embracing it.

It’s not to say I don’t feel wonderful when I’m all decked out … but it’s nice to know that, given the creative industry I’m in now, I’m not judged the same parameters as I was, perhaps, back in DC.

Again, it’s all about perception. How you carry yourself (personality, attitude, appearance, etc.) is critical. When we feel good on the inside, it exudes on the outside.

And that confidence (however tough to find at first) can, in time, become your reality.

So how can you put your best foot forward at work, in school, in your personal life? Do you agree that body confidence is related to how you carry yourself more than physical shape/size? What helps you to feel confident, regardless of the number on your scale?

PAGE CONTENTS

WWII PERSISTENT CONTRAIL STORY – WAKEUPCALLCHANNEL Control!

Don’t forget my other posts and links are available to the top right of the page…

A WORLD WAR TWO PERSISTENT CONTRAIL STORY

This is an excerpt from a long and fascinating interview (conducted by kued.org UTAH WW II Stories) with Dr. Ray Matheny, who was the flight engineer on a bombing raid over North Germany which, for him, culminated in being shot down in an aerial battle with defending BF-109s. (After all, you’ve ploughed through 40,000 words so you deserve some infotainment!)

Okay the green burst of flak comes up which is a signal for the German fighters to come down and engage us because the flak barrage is over and they wouldn’t want to fly in their own flak barrage. So at that point our airplanes tighten up our formation – we see the green bursts so the airplanes just slide together as close as we can manage and that means (every airplane has thirteen 50-calibre guns on it) so that means there’s a bristling mass of guns out there and these fighter planes have to engage the enemy no matter what.

That flak burst went off and we were ready and I remember a Messerschmidt 109 often called a ‘BF109′ came diving in on us and I have a gun sight that’s a flat piece of glass that’s horizontal and then one bar is up and one bar is down and these bars move back and forth according to little bicycle controls I have on my turret and I can frame a sight but first I have to crank in the dimension of the target. So the fuselage length on that airplane is 29 feet six inches and so I cranked that in and I was tracking this fighter plane now…we’re going one way and he’s coming the same way so the closure isn’t too bad. So I’m tracking and ‘brrpppdd, brrpppdd, brrrpppdd’ I get about six rounds shot off as I track and you really can’t get any more than that with any accuracy and then as I swung around all of a sudden I saw the tail guns fly up in the air like that…

Now the tail guns (remember I told you they were 64 pounds apiece) and they’re balanced but when you let go of the breeches the barrels go up like that. So here we’re under fighter attack and the tail gunner lets go of his guns. Well that only means one thing – that he’s hit and I then became aware that in the same line of fire the radio operator dropped his gun and his gun went straight up.

Well I’m next in that same line of fire so those two boys probably got hit and sure enough there was a Messerschmidt 109 on our tail. Now that day being as cold as it was, our engines produce these huge contrails (not these little streaky things that you see jets producing here) I think it was about 32 airplanes that day and each engine was producing these huge contrails and they were just lining the sky – no wind up there and you could see them for 300 miles. They were just there and all of us were leaving those…

So this Messerschmitt 109 pilot was down in our contrail, snuck up behind us and let go a burst and then I could see him dive down into the contrail. I said “hey I’m going to be ready for that guy”, so I swung around my turret and then I set my wing dimension for the 109 – thirty two feet nine inches right there. I set that right there and then I tried to judge the distance that he would be because he was very close and sure enough I could see his propeller chopping through the contrails and his nose came up and he was coming up too high. So I bore down and tried to adjust on his wingtips for range and that means my turret guns would be accurate to 25 percent which is very very good for a mechanical analog computer in those days.

He leveled off and by the time he started firing, I started firing.

So we were both firing at each other in a duel right at the same time but he was still high and I could see his 20mm cannon shells, his wings just lit up with blasts and flashes and I could actually see those 20mm cannon shells stringing over the top of my turret. I just held down the trigger just blasting! My right gun quit firing and I think there’s an interrupter cam on the outside of my turret track so you wont blow your own vertical fin off but the left gun just kept firing away and the first thing you know I could see he was getting very, very close. It was frighteningly close and his propeller just ground to a halt and pieces of cowling started to fly off the engine and I yelled into the intercom at that moment to “jump it!”

That’s an evasive action because we’ve had experiences before where the fighter pilot has been killed and his airplane is still alive and it comes and crashes into you and I thought maybe it was possible that I could have killed the pilot and here’s a live airplane still going much faster than us and it could collide with us so I yelled “jump it!”

The pilots have a big yoke there and this is a 60 ton airplane and we burned off a lot of that weight but they have to haul back all their strength because there are no boost controls on B17s, just cables and lever horns that they operate and so that means that we would go up like this and let the airplane pass under us. So at that moment we undergo a terrific G-force because we’re inducing that G-force and you’re massed down like that but we’re… tail end Charlie ‘purple heart corner’ is the favorite saying there and we’re stacked up twelve twelve and whatever – ten there, we didn’t have a full compliment.

And so we go up but we can only go up for a second and then they have to slam the yoke down and we have to go through weightlessness. So I felt the G-force and we’re going up. So I threw both of my arms over the ammunition cans inside of my turret because I knew when we were going through weightlessness anything that’s not tied down in an airplane while going back down will just stay there and the airplane will go around it.

Now that sounds weird but combat airplanes are build for very high stresses and that maneuver is very necessary and all that ammunition in my ammo cans would just stay there and the airplane would go there and they would… the ammunition would go right through the top of my turret – right through the plexiglass out into space.

So I was all braced like this and then there was just a big explosion and it threw me out of the turret right on the bottom of the cockpit and you know if you’re going to be a survivor in any flying combat you have to be mentally set to take instant action or else you’ll die and we witnessed it many times. You have three maybe five seconds to take positive action and if you don’t there’s a good chance you’ll not make it. So I knew from the impact of the explosion and everything that that airplane was not going to fly anymore.

Our airplane went up like this. It turned out that the right outer panel of the wing was blown off. It’s about twenty feet long, it was full of 130-octane fuel, it weighed about a ton, so all of a sudden all that was gone from the airplane. The left wing is still flying and so it raised us up in the air like this and eyewitnesses say that here we have these airplanes stacked like this (three stories of airplanes) and our airplane did a roll up as high as the high echelon and came around and then entered into a flat spin.

Well I grabbed my parachute which was… I wore the harness but I safety wired my chest pack (because I couldn’t wear it in the turret – there’s no room) to longerons which are bare metal inside of the airplane, part of the structure with breakaway safety wire – it’s 15 thou soft copper and that’s its purpose – and I ripped off my parachute and by that time I’m being mashed down into the floor of the airplane and I pick up my parachute and I hook on to the right hook, I reached and tried to pick up the parachute and pull it up to the left hook but I can’t lift the parachute – it weighs too much.

We’re in a spin and the centrifugal force has induced these forces and it makes everything weigh so much more than it normally is. I couldn’t pick it up to hook it on the left hook and I just kept being mashed and mashed down.

The peculiar thing here is that in my turret I have this little small oxygen hose that hooks up to my oxygen mask and supply and as I moved around the cockpit (it was short) I would pull it loose and the first thing you know I would be out of oxygen. So a day or two or before (I don’t remember) an airplane crashed on our airfield taking off one of the short runways and it tipped over and burned up and the tail assembly did not burn up with the rest of the airplane.

So I went in there and I took the tail gunner’s oxygen hose which is a great big long thing – I took that off, threw mine away (the little short one) and put the long one on.

So now I’m in this spin and I’m exerting myself at 25,000 feet and I have a good flow of oxygen and as I’m rolling forward there is a crawlway, there’s a pilot and co-pilot here, instrument panel and controls right there and then this crawlway gives you access to the nose section. Also down at the bottom of the crawlway on the left behind number two propeller is an escape hatch about so big.

My goal was to get to that escape hatch…

I could see the co-pilot and the pilots. They were supposed to have backpack parachutes but they ran out of them so they issued chestpack parachutes. Well these men were big enough where they couldn’t wear a chestpack and work the controls so I had safety wired their parachutes on the backs of their seats.

I remember the co-pilot, I could see his left hand reaching back trying to get to his parachute but it was just hopeless, he couldn’t even raise his arm and the pilot, you know, he’s twenty years old now and his duty is a different duty from everybody else’s, and I could see him working the yoke and the controls trying to right the airplane so everybody can bale out. But there’s no chance.

It was a totally uncontrollable airplane at this point, and the last I saw of them both of them were leaning over like this and being scrunched down into their seats and I know what was happening to them. This spin was very different from a normal spin because when over a ton of your airplane’s gone you have a new center of gravity for the airplane.

Normally the cockpit is the center of gravity so when you’re in a spin the forces are minimal but now the cockpit is no longer the center of gravity and it’s swinging around like you’re on a skating rink – the whip.

So the forces are terrible and the blood is draining out of their brains and they’re just going into oblivion unable to help themselves or do anything…

I crawled forward head down into this crawlway. What a fortunate thing! I have oxygen; I have blood in my brain! So I crawled down and the control cables are being drawn out of the pulleys and two sets of them are like this… and I have to crawl through those or just past them like that… and I can remember black smoke just coming in like this… and in front of me is the navigator Lieutenant Dodi and he has a steel helmet on, he has his flak suit and he’s the only crew member that has a steel helmet and a flak suit and he had this awful premonition and talked about it too much. He knew he was going to die and so he tried to get this protection; but he was on his back like a turtle. He had a backpack parachute and he was on his back and his arm was out trying to get to the escape hatch but there’s no way he could do anything.

He couldn’t even turn over, and I could not help him that’s for sure, and there’s no way anybody can help anybody else in those moments, so I crawled up to the escape hatch to the forward part. There was a red D-handle and on the D-handle are two little cables that go to the hinge pins.

Now this is the leading edge of the escape hatch so I pull that and pull the hinge pins out. The escape hatch is supposed to fly off into space but because the airplane’s under this terrible stress from the spin it locks the door in place. So by that time I am flat on the floor. My whole body is just mashed down on the floor…

The last memory I have – I propped my arm up like this, my elbow on the floor and I reach up and grab the handle and it’s at the aft end of the door (a normal bullet-shaped handle) and I pull it down and it stays down, and the last thing I remember I was beating my fist on the door trying to force it open.

My next consciousness is – I’m free falling feet-first, the parachute’s on the right hook and it’s beating me in the forehead like this… and you know who’s thinking about anything, who’s rational or anything at this moment! I know I’ve got to get that parachute open! I’ve gone through this in my mind ten thousand times what I’ve got to do to get out of that airplane and get that parachute open. And I just reached up and clawed open or clawed at the D-ring (it’s another red one right there on my parachute) and ripped it open and out came this beautiful white silk – it went “sshhooopp”, and then it popped open really hard, and it pulled up on this right hook, and that’s all that was needed…

But the force was so great it displaced these left ribs and those darn ribs never went back. I still can’t lay on my stomach today because they stick out there. Anyway…

WAKEUPCALLCHANNEL Control

“plenty of footage and evidence contrail and chemtrail differences at the SAME TIME!”
Chemtrails don’t exist so you CAN’T spot “the difference”.

“Get it through your head that I’m not saying that all chemtrails are “BAD” and that contrails don’t exist.”
Get it through your head that I’m saying that no chemtrails exist at all.

“Try thinking outside your brainwashed manipulated head for a few hours and do more research.”
You feeble hypocrite. “Research” has demonstrated your point of view to be dross for nearly a hundred years.

“Understand that these dumbass elite of dumbed down cowards persist on making mock videos about chemtrails distorting information.”
NO. They are worried about the riot-speech jargon of a group of ignorant idiots.

“THE GREATEST ENEMY OF KNOWLEDGE IS NOT IGNORANCE, IT IS THE ILLUSION OF KNOWLEDGE“
Your illusion permeates you. I have an urge to vomit.

“You have both ignorance and the illusion of knowledge.”
I am tough and accustomed to talking with anuses with pretensions. A brain – isn’t expected at this time.

“It’s time for you and stars and Sprite and all the trolls to understand that.”
YOU are the TROLL. You befoul everything you touch with your ignorant hypocrisy (and bad spelling and grammar).

“Let me ask you this.. Does Eugenics exist?”
Yuch. The answer is NO, they don’t. The reasoning behind eugenics has been known to be faulty ever since the work of Mendel.

“Is flouride and aspartame bad for you?”
Yuch. “Flouride” is unknown. Aspartame is a sweetener which no-one should choose.

“I bet you like the idea of population reduction don’t you?”
If it were to be YOU – yes – a great idea.

“Do you feel like your part of something beyond anyone understands?”
Yuch. Fuck off. Speak English.

“I’ve done research for years on the nonsense you’re pushing.”
Must have been recent, for I’ve only heard about this snake-oil for eighteen months. (So, you are also a liar. But who cares.)

“Oh and I’m not a religious nut either. I just see through the bullshit and the disinformation.”
You’re a chemtard, and couldn’t give good advice to my cat.

“Ok then. I’ll be the bigger man and actually discuss some topics Instead of calling you an old stupid ignorant fool or some stupid lingo you deniers like to use.”
See this ring? It will whisper to you…

“Explain to me why I have evidence of a contrail flying in the same area of a jet spraying chemtrails that stay in the sky while the Contrail dissipates?”
A waste of time, arsehole, but here goes. Kerosine in jet engines burns to form carbon dioxide and steam. (You exhale approximately the same, for you too, live by COMBUSTION). The steam freezes to ice in about a twentieth of a second into the LAYERED stratosphere with its -40 temperature. Then it attempts to evaporate into water vapor. Already present in the air is a certain amount of water, called its vapor pressure. When there is a sufficiently high vapor pressure resisting the sublimation of the ice to water vapor, then NO sublimation will take place, and the ice will remain. Not only that, but if the vapor is in SUPERSATURATION, it will add ice by the thousandfold.. ..it simply depends on which layer the aircraft is in as to whichever sort of trail it makes..

“I do understand the difference between the two. Do you? Cause I don’t think you do.”
You are a piss-poor ignoramus to set yourself up against human society’s understanding of atmospheric science. But who else is suited?

“Your a complete and utter moron. Everything you messaged me was complete non sense. Have fun paying your carbon taxes and being a miserable know it all.”
So the “man” accusing others of blocking him is QUITE EASY blocking others. WAKE UP CALL for CHANELLING away all that HYPOCRISY!
Chemtard. (I know THAT much!)

One of my favorite things about Gmail involves Gchat status updates. Earlier this week, two former interns from a former workplace (who I am pretty sure are friends in real life) had oddly complimentary updates, each featuring a hipster stereotype. As our good friend M3rb0t pointed out to us earlier this week, hipsters seem to be getting a lot of flak these days. So, without further ado, I’d like to introduce you all to Amazing Girl and Whimpster, courtesy of two cool ladies that I don’t really see anymore but still think about because they consistently say interesting things in their Gchat status updates.

Amazing Girl can best be summed up thusly:

Backpacking through South America, smoking hash with locals; reading Sylvia Plath in the park; earnestly worshipping Frida Kahlo in museums; dancing barefoot in the rain everywhere. While many are hippies, they are not all, by any means. They come in all nationalities, all shapes and sizes, from earth mother to ethereal. Some are insipid, others lively, some bisexual and others not, some vegan and some merely vegetarian.
But to them all there is a certain underlying sameness. All are vaguely creative, all sort of political, all sweet and kind and sympathetic and all lacking in any critical judgment whatsoever. Indeed, a lack of harsh judgment might be called the central tenet of their sisterhood, and perhaps a key to their particular magic.

And her gendered counterpart, Whimpster, fares little better:

Whimpsters are men who use cultural artifacts and politically correct platitudes in place of the empty spaces where real thought and emotion should be. Whimpsters are men who unwittingly enjoy Bukowski’s misogyny. Whimpsters walk a tenuous tightrope between their secreted, terribly warped masculinity and the mainstream manliness that they claim to abhor

Both of these rants must have been written by young, jilted hipsters. I love how they skewer, and yet subconsciously idolize these stereotypes. It’s hard work, hating on someone that the counter culture declares cool. I have totally been there. I have slept with and been spurned by (or even worse, for) Amazing Girls and Whimpsters. (Thank God I am getting Too Old For That!). I guess what I’m saying is that encountering these shitters is all a part of growing up. Especially since, in the era of the Internet, it’s so easy to flame them. I’m pretty sure this is the modern evolution of Edna St. Vincent Millay’s work…and that’s actually kind of depressing.

Obama and rapper Ludacris

I must give props to the Washington Post for its article “Rappers’ Shout-Outs Make Obama Skip a Beat,” published on August 1st (it even has a little sidebar where you can listen to a few songs that shout Obama out). The article chronicles Obama’s relationship with Hip-Hop, gives a comprehensive list of Obama shout-outs and explains that while Hip-Hop can endorse Obama, Obama cannot completely endorse Hip-Hop. As usual, here are some key quotes:

Some of the Democrat’s most vocal (literally) supporters are sticking him with a hip-hop dilemma: how to respond to an art form that has a long history as a cultural wedge issue but whose fans and wildly unpredictable practitioners are a part of his base?

Obama: “I love the art of hip-hop; I don’t always love the message of hip-hop,” he told BET earlier this year. “There are times where even . . . with the artists I love, you know, there’s a message that is not only sometimes degrading to women; not only uses the n-word a little too frequently; but — also something I’m really concerned about — it’s always talking about material things.”

Obama is the first viable presidential candidate with an acknowledged affinity for hip-hop culture, having spoken fondly of Kanye West, Jay-Z and, yes, Ludacris. He borrowed Jay-Z’s dirt-off-my-shoulder gesture to brush off his “haters” during a much-analyzed April speech that was loaded with the sort of swagger that’s typical of hip-hop.

This is the kind of flak you get for being a fan of a misunderstood genre. In this Fox News clip Sean Hannity identifies Ludacris as another “radical” friend of Obama’s and is convinced that it is a contradiction to appreciate Ludacris’ talent but disagree with his lyrics. Luckily one of his guests had some sense in her (fast forward through the song if you’ve heard it):

Before I continue, if there’s any doubt that Obama is a Hip-Hop president, check out this hilarious montage featuring clips of Obama breaking it down on the Ellen Degeneres show and brushing the dirt off his shoulders during a speech in April, set to Jay-Z’s “Dirt Off Your Shoulder:”

If you check out the clip of the speech where he brushes those h8ers off, the place absolutely erupts (the black guy sitting behind Obama looks like one of the first people who understands what just happened and then his white compatriots catch on, haha). As I mentioned in the “Two Celebrities” post, people are star-struck by Obama’s normality. The applause is for Obama’s REALNESS: someone who is inches away from the most powerful office in the world just brushed the dirt off his shoulders like a P-I-M-P.

Moving on. There is no doubt in my mind that personally, Obama is down with Hip-Hop. He listens to it, he understands it, he references it, but politically (as the Washington Post article explains) he cannot endorse it. When Ludacris came out with “Politics: Obama is here,” Obama’s statement acknowledged Ludacris’ talent, not his music. Why not the music? Because of songs like this:

“Area Codes” is one of my favorite Ludacris songs. It’s hilarious, very witty and catchy. It’s a playful and hyperbolic incarnation of the misogyny that saturates Hip-Hop. Though some of you may be scandalized by the music video (the same ones that don’t think urban youth can distinguish parody from morality), at least the hos in the video are warranted because of the subject matter: how Luda’s got hos in different area codes. Other rappers will throw scantily clad women in their videos just because they can. Because of songs like Ludacris’ and countless others, Obama cannot endorse Hip-Hop, he needs to qualify his support by denouncing the materialism, misogyny and violence it often depicts.

It’s a terrible sign for Hip-Hop when someone running for president needs to be a closet Hip-Hop head in order to be accepted by mainstream America. Undoubtedly, mainstream Hip-Hop needs to clean up its act and come out with some serious music, but there’s another side to the problem: America does not know how to listen to Hip-Hop. Hip-Hop is very unique because it embodies a majority and minority at the same time. Though it has become practically synonymous with popular culture, the music itself originated in the black community and has evolved within it. Though many people’s ears are familiar to Hip-Hop, it is disconnected from many people’s lives. Here’s the key: When we realize the misogyny, materialism and violence that saturates Hip-Hop is just microcosm for America, then maybe it can be taken as seriously by America.

Hip-Hop’s problems are America’s problems. America makes other countries its hos through globalization, conducts drive-by wars and blings harder than almost any other country (besides Saudi Arabia). Because hustling is hustling whether it’s dope or commodities. A ho is a ho, whether she’s walking the streets or a high-class escort (Spitzer). Violence is violence, whether it’s in the hood or in Iraq. Materialism is materialism, whether it’s an iced-out chain or a fucking private jumbo-jet. It’s easier for America to see the problems in Hip-Hop because so many are detached from urban culture (like Hannity and O’Reilly). Get the beam out your eye, ya’ll.