#owner's representative Boston

[goldenseresinretriever]

You Catch More Bees With Honey: Prologue

Pairing: Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw x Reader

Part of the San Diego Dogfighters universe

Summary: Bradley Bradshaw, blindsided by a team he trusted like family has been traded to the San Diego Dogfighters. Across the country from the place he calls home, Bradley feels lost and betrayed. Not to mention the familiar faces and ghosts from his past that he now has to face every day at work. Bradley’s caught between wanting to show his former team the mistake they made in double-crossing him and wondering if it’s time to hang up his skates after one final season. You’re living your dream as the PR representative for the Dogfighters. When Coach Maverick made a bid to bring his godson to the team, you hadn’t batted an eye. Bradley was a good teammate, and a good player. Unfortunately, the Bradley that shows up in San Diego is nothing like your research suggested. He’s moody, irritable, aggressive, and angry, throwing a wrench in all your careful planning. What’s caused such a drastic change in him? And can you figure out how to help him before he makes a mistake you can’t fix?

Chapter CW: 18+ ONLY, None so far other than the patriarchy. No use of Y/N.

Word Count: 1.2k

A/N: A very happy birthday to @roosterforme !!! As a birthday present for patiently waiting for SDD!Bradley, I present the prologue of YCMBWH!

Series Masterlist // Next Chapter

“Bradley Bradshaw.” You zone back into the conversation as Maverick offers his suggestion. You sneak a glance at the clock on the wall. Your bones are aching from sitting pin-straight for the last four hours. It’s been thirty minutes since you’ve been actively present in the conversation with the three grown men sitting at the conference table with you. At the head of the table is Tom “Iceman” Kazansky, the owner of the newly formed San Diego Dogfighters. At age 64, he’s aged gracefully since his glory days playing for the Boston Bruins and later, more famously, for the Anaheim Ducks, but not quite as gracefully as the man seated across from him. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell somehow still has the aura of pure charisma that he oozed through his lengthy, thirty-one-year hockey career. After an infamous stint with the Philadelphia Flyers in the eighties, he went on to play for the Anaheim Ducks for a whopping twenty-five years alongside both Iceman and the man sitting next to him. Beau “Cyclone” Simpson’s hockey career both on paper and in practice shows off his intense desire to be the next Iceman, but he seems to have fallen short. He followed Kazansky’s footsteps from Boston to Anaheim, taking a brief detour in Dallas on the way. And yet here he sits, the general manager for the Dogfighters.

The three of you are going through potential players who could be recruited, drafted, or traded for to create the roster for the new team. As the team’s PR representative, you don’t have much of a reason to be here but you’ve made yourself useful. One of your specialties is keeping meticulous records of the pasts and presents of your players and that means you run a killer background check. You’re here to evaluate the potential players based on their personal lives. Nobody wants to hire a PR nightmare, especially when you’re a new franchise.

This extracurricular project isn’t without its perks, however, just an hour ago you pitched the winger duo of rookie Mickey Garcia and seasoned veteran Reuben Fitch currently signed with the New Jersey Devils. Mickey and you have been friends since you met in college at the University of Wisconsin. Ever since Mickey got drafted to the Devils, you’ve been doing your best at maintaining your friendship long-distance, so when you got a job with the Dogfighters, Mickey was your first call, and after several lengthy conversations, he and Reuben agreed to you offering them as a potential trade prospect. You’d presented your meticulously rehearsed pitch to the three men at this table and they’d agreed that the duo would make a good addition to the Dogfighters.

After your pitch, you’d let yourself relax mentally. It wouldn’t do you any good to relax physically in front of your bosses. You’ve already clocked the looks Cyclone’s been giving you since you showed up on your first day in one of your signature pastel suits. Today you’re wearing one of your personal favorites, a baby pink number. You needed the extra burst of confidence that it always gives you. You know what it takes to be a woman in this business but that doesn’t mean you have to become a man. You flaunt your femininity as much as you pride yourself in your poised and polished appearance. Your suits are colorful enough to draw attention to yourself, but not indecent enough to make that attention bad. You stand out and you’re proud to do so. Men may command the room with their deep voices and raging testosterone tantrums, but you can command one just as well without even speaking a word. Curious attention is still attention and that’s what matters most.

“Bradley Bradshaw? From Philadelphia?” Cyclone sounds dubious as he muses over Maverick’s pick. Then again, he tends to sound dubious whenever it comes to Maverick generally. “He’s getting a little old, isn’t he?” His eyes flick to you, prompting you silently. Your perfectly manicured fingers fly across the keyboard as you speak up.

“Bradley Bradshaw, left defenseman for the Philadelphia Flyers. He was scouted by them straight out of college, and has been playing for them and their AHL affiliate for a total of sixteen years.”

“He’s never played for any other teams?” Cyclone says, raising an eyebrow. He’s right to be surprised, it’s unusual for any one player to stay with a franchise for so long, let alone their first one. Sure, both Ice and Maverick played for the Ducks for over a decade but they signed to other teams first. They established themselves before they established a home.

“His father, Nick Bradshaw played the same position for the Flyers from 1984 to 1986.” You rattle off as your eyes scan the various articles you have pulled up. “At the same time as Maverick,” your eyes flick up from your screen to where Maverick is shifting uncomfortably.

“You played with his old man?” It’s a statement phrased like a question. Cyclone’s piercing green eyes join yours on Maverick.

“I did. Bradley’s my godson, actually.” You can’t stop your eyebrows from raising at that. That particular tidbit wasn’t in any of the articles you’ve been skimming. You want to scoff at how easily Maverick offers up the information. He’s making his intentions clear from the get-go. This is personal for him. You’d kept your cards as close to your chest as you could when you’d pitched Mickey and Reuben. To make it personal was to tank the pitch in your eyes. You were here to be objective and offer objective suggestions for the team. You wait for Cyclone or Ice to chastise Maverick and when neither of them moves to do so, you feel your brow twitch with irritation. The privilege of being a man. Men are rational, and even an emotional decision is still more reasonable than the most rational statement a woman can make.

“Zam, what else do you have on Bradshaw?” Zam, your nickname, is short for Zamboni. You were given it during your first experience with managing public relations for your college’s hockey team. Your job, much like that of a Zamboni, is to smooth things over, both on and off the ice.

“He’s squeaky clean, sir.” Your eyes are back on the busy screen of your laptop, fingers flying across the keys. “He’s known as an enforcer on the ice, but doesn’t seem to be prone to any kind of violence or erratic behavior off the ice. He’s a team player, and his teammates have nothing but good things to say about him.” You rattle off his stats next, projecting them onto the screen at the head of the table. Other than his age being on the older side, as Cyclone had noted, he isn’t the worst pick in the world by a long shot. You know the importance of having senior members on a team, they form pillars for the rookies to build around and Bradley is the model pillar player. He’s well-rounded and the perfect balance between being well-known, and not an outright celebrity. Bradley Bradshaw is an ideal choice for the Dogfighters.

“Alright Maverick, we’ll give the Flyers a call about Bradshaw first thing tomorrow.” And with that, Bradley Bradshaw is halfway to the San Diego.

A/N: I wanted to get this out asap to drum up excitement for YCMBWH, but I’m going to be taking the rest of the week off from writing to focus on the SDD press conference in celebration of the end of “Snitches Get Stitches!” Happy birthday yet again to Emily!!!

#you catch more bees with honey // sdd #ycmbwh // sdd #san diego dogfighters #san diego dogfighters au #san diego dogfighters hockey au #tgm hockey au #top gun maverick hockey au #TGM #top gun maverick #bradley bradshaw x reader #bradley bradshaw x you #bradley rooster bradshaw x reader #Bradley rooster Bradshaw x you #bradley bradshaw #bradley rooster bradshaw #rooster x reader #rooster x you

[arthistoryanimalia]

#MetalMonday :

Ewer in the form of a Hamsa (Gander)

Indian, Deccan or Northern India, ca. 16th c.

Bronze with later brass repairs, copper-arsenic paste

H 15 3/16 in (38.5 cm)

on view at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

“The body of this ewer takes the form of a goose (hamsa), another common motif in ancient Hindu and Buddhist iconography, where it is associated both with the waters of life, because of its aquatic nature, and with wisdom and purity, on account of its legendary ability to separate milk from water. The spout takes the form of a makara—a mythological aquatic creature that resembles a crocodile with an elephant’s trunk and a fish’s tail—another quintessentially South Asian motif and one of the most commonly used propitious emblems in Indian decorative art.

Other features of the ewer resonate more closely with Islamic artistic traditions, which came to South Asia with travelers and traders soon after the emergence of Islam itself in the seventh century CE. Thus, while vessels in the form of animals are quite rare in Indian metalwork before the Sultanate period (1206–1526), when Muslim-ruled kingdoms first controlled large areas of South Asia, zoomorphic ewers have a long history in Islamic metalwork going back to the eighth century CE. The hamsa ewer beautifully represents a confluence of motifs, mythologies, and objects that belong solely to neither Islamic nor Hindu cultural traditions. Indeed, it would have served equally well the needs of either a Muslim or a Hindu owner, facilitating the performance of ritual ablutions before religious observances within the home; or it may have been proffered by a servant at an elite banquet, enabling Muslim and Hindu guests alike to cleanse their hands before and after the meal.”

https://collections.mfa.org/objects/18461/ewer-in-the-form-of-a-hamsa-gander

#animals in art #museum visit #birds in art #bird #hamsa #gander #metalwork #bronze #ewer #Indian art #South Asian art #Asian art #Museum of Fine Arts Boston #16th century art

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

"The district recreation club was the social center for the slum boys what the Y. M. C. A. was to their fellows at a slightly higher level of the social structure. At the age of fourteen, Williams was as tall and strong as most boys of sixteen or eighteen; and because of his fistic powers and general toughness was soon on terms of intimacy with members of the notorious Tanner Smith mob, which was then staging its last fight for control of the district (they lost out to the equally notorious Madden mob, which still controls that and other districts of the city). With other members of the mob, Williams took part in the various gangster activities; robbing freight cars, wharves, warehouses; exacting financial tributes from local store owners whom they terrorized with threats of bombing and other atrocities; but mainly in voting illegally and terrorizing non-Tammany voters on election day; and at other times terrorizing strikers or their employers (whichever side paid the most), and fighting with and raiding the headquarters of the Madden mob. Williams proved a valuable recruit and was soon as dangerous and skillful with a knife, club, or gun as he was with his clever fists.

Gradually he began going in with other gangsters for the more remunerative crimes (pay-roll robberies, safe-cracking, hold-ups, and the like); and before he was eighteen Williams was "keeping" a girl in a Broadway apartment and getting initiated into the night life of the city. His mother and sisters remained at the old home on West 49th Street, but Williams did not neglect them. He had long ago dropped even the pretence of legitimate work; but he contributed regularly and generously to the support of his mother and sisters and visited them almost daily.

Before he was twenty, Williams had been arrested a dozen times as a suspect in the various gangster killings and other activities of the city; but never did he serve a day in prison after appearing in court. The usual procedure (which the gangsters themselves preferred to formal arraignment and trial) was as follows: after a killing or robbery, the detectives would arrest and bring to headquarters any gangsters whom they could find, subject them to an intensive third degree (often beating them unmercifully), and then turn them loose when the beatings had failed to elicit evidence connecting them with the crime in question.

This was all a part of the regular routine of Williams's life; and while he took it as a matter of course, he had seen so much of corruption among detectives, district attorneys, and even judges that he came to have a strong hatred for representatives of law and order. Wise to the ways of the under-world, a shrewd and clever criminal who never worked except after laying carefully-thought-out plans, it was not until Williams tried to operate in a strange city, with gangsters he did not know, that he got into serious trouble.

In 1918, at the age of twenty, he was asked to come to Boston with three other gangsters to steal the pay roll of a large corporation. It was to be the Christmas pay roll, estimated at $60,000. Through some carelessness of the local tipsters, the information was inaccurate; so that Williams got only a comparatively small pay roll of $15,000, in the seizing of which he shot an armed guard who attempted to draw his gun. Because of the shooting (although the guard did not die for two years) and because of the prestige of the corporation, there was a great hue and cry about the crime. One of the Boston gangsters was arrested on suspicion.

Fearing a long prison term for himself, he implicated Williams and three other men. In spite of this, it is doubtful that Williams could have been convicted. The books of a New York firm of longshoremen showed that Williams and his pals had been working in New York on the day of the robbery! Thus did Williams plan his crimes before he went to work. But the man who had implicated him was persuaded to turn state's evidence; so, in spite of the efforts of a former district attorney, who had been paid a retainer of $3,000 to "fix" the case, Williams and his pals were given ten to fifteen-year terms in the state prison (the crooked ex-district attorney, by the way, was later disbarred and sent to prison at the time when two other district attorneys were disbarred and removed from office). The informer, as it happens, was killed within a few months.

Williams, as I came to know him in the prison, was in many ways a fine character. He was entirely reliable and honest with his friends, deceitful and treacherous with his enemies, and utterly without fear. He would never steal or harm poor people; he would select his victims solely from among the moneyed classes. From one point of view I have always found certain gangsters to be, on the whole, the very highest type of criminal. Although there are many hangers-on of a much lower grade in gang circles, the real gangster is in many ways a fellow who lives strictly up to a stern though predatory code of his own. I liked Williams, personally, better than any other criminal I have ever known.

But he was definitely antisocial in his attitude toward law and order and reformation. While he would admit the theoretical necessity of laws and policemen, he had seen so much of corruption in the ranks of law-enforcement officials that he knew himself to be no worse than many of these, and far better than some. He took the cynical attitude. "What the hell," he would say. "Everybody's out for the money. Get it, long as you don't have to take it from some poor bastard that can't afford to lose it. But get it. Once you've got it, nobody cares ---- where you got it."

When he left prison, after serving a little more than nine years, he merely became more cautious, going in for the bootleg and night-club racketeering which had developed during his years in prison. I met him in New York in the autumn of 1931. We were discussing the state of affairs in regard to unemployment and the slackness in racketeering profits. "It's pretty tough," said Williams. "I've got my apartment and my mother's home to keep up. My two sisters are married and their husbands haven't had work for months. There's not much money in the rackets, the way things are nowadays." I asked him, in view of this, how he was able to keep up his own establishment and his mother's and also help his sisters keep alive during the current depression.

"There's only one thing to do," said Williams. "I'm doing it, and so is almost every one I know. Grab a gun and go out and steal!" In his various attitudes and general character, Williams was typical of his kind of criminal.

- Victor F. Nelson, Prison Days and Nights. Second edition. With an introduction by Abraham Myerson, M.D. Garden City: Garden City Publishing Co., 1936. p. 85-88.

#words from the inside #prisoner autobiography #prison community #convict code #gangsters #prison days and nights #victor nelson #history of crime and punishment #professional criminals #gunmen #reading 2024 #sentenced to the penitentiary #massachusetts state prison #american prison system #armed robbery #armed robbers #robbing hoods #boston #new york #research quote

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Two nonprofits have sued a white nationalist hate group in North Dakota, alleging that it committed racial intimidation by defacing businesses and public property around the city of Fargo with the group’s logo and other graffiti.

The lawsuit filed against Patriot Front in federal court on Friday alleges that the group, two of the group’s leaders and 10 others violated the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, which the complaint says “was designed to prevent precisely the kind of conspiratorial racist activity that Defendants perpetrated in this case.”

The lawsuit, filed by the North Dakota Human Rights Coalition, the Immigrant Development Center and the center’s executive director, says Patriot Front also posted “anti-immigrant propaganda” days after a man of Syrian descent fatally shot a Fargo police officer and wounded two others in July. The suit seeks a jury trial and damages of an amount to be determined at trial, as well as attorneys’ fees and other relief.

No attorney is listed on the case docket for Patriot Front or the other defendants. Attorney Jason Lee Van Dyke, who has represented members of Patriot Front in other cases, did not respond to a message left with his office. Attorney Robert Sargent, who recently represented group members at a criminal trial in Idaho, said he knew nothing of the lawsuits against Patriot Front.

Patriot Front “is probably one of the most active white nationalist hate groups in the U.S.,” said Rachel Carroll Rivas of the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors such groups but did not participate in the lawsuit.

The group emphasizes “public actions” such as posting racist flyers, holding demonstrations and engaging in public displays “meant to make people fearful,” said Carroll Rivas, deputy director for research and analysis with the center’s Intelligence Project.

The lawsuit filed Friday alleges that Patriot Front members vandalized businesses and public property in the summer and fall of 2022. It specifically cites Patriot Front logos and designs spray-painted on the International Market Plaza, an indoor market area for immigrant business owners, and defaced murals, including one depicting Black women wearing hijabs.

As a result of the vandalism, the complaint says, shopkeepers have lost customers, reduced their hours and fear for their safety.

Patriot Front’s actions “were intended to cause fear and deprive others — especially immigrants of color — of their rights, and, unfortunately, Patriot Front achieved that result,” the complaint states.

Vandalism also occurred near a Liberian-owned restaurant, in a pedestrian tunnel, and at a coffee shop and arts collective owned by LGBTQ people and people of color, according to the complaint.

Recent vandalism took place after the July 14 fatal shooting in Fargo carried out by 37-year-old Mohamad Barakat, a Syrian national who came to the U.S. in 2012 on an asylum request and became a U.S. citizen in 2019. North Dakota Attorney General Drew Wrigley said last month that Barakat’s motive remains unknown, but he appeared to be targeting police officers in what authorities have said was likely part of a larger, planned attack.

Other lawsuits in recent years have cited the Ku Klux Klan Act, including cases brought against former President Donald Trump and others in connection with the siege of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

A Black teacher and musician cited the law last month in his federal lawsuit alleging that Patriot Front members surrounded and assaulted him in a coordinated and racially motived attack last year in Boston.

The Reconstruction-era law seeks to protect the civil rights of marginalized groups of people. The statute has been cited in employment-law cases and in contract-dispute cases between corporations, and also in lawsuits alleging violence and terroristic fear since the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, said Ayesha Bell Hardaway, professor of law at Case Western Reserve University’s School of Law and director of the school’s Social Justice Law Center.

“It’s important, I think, for us to be mindful of the fact that violence ... and terrorism related to white supremacy isn’t a relic of the past,” she told The Associated Press.

#us politics #news #republicans #conservatives #the associated press #ap news #2023 #north dakota #white nationalists #white nationalism #Patriot Front #Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871 #klu klux klan act #North Dakota Human Rights Coalition #Immigrant Development Center #propaganda #vandalism #xenophobia #Robert Sargent #Jason Lee Van Dyke #Rachel Carroll Rivas #southern poverty law center #Mohamad Barakat #Drew Wrigley #civil rights

[sappymix1]

as someone who literally learnt eeuu history because of hamilton What's up with mulligan

I pulled out my laptop to type this so sorry for the sporadic autocorrect capitalization lmao

okay so the thing that bothers me about him is that I feel like he's such a random person to include. Hamilton, Laurens, and Lafayette were an established friend group like they were Washington's aides and kinda like the dream team of the fucking continental army you know lmao. like they existed as a trio. mulligan on the other hand as far as im aware was not part of that group at all. he and Hamilton did have a significant relationship like they lived together, he helped Hamilton enroll in university if I remember correctly, and his impact on Hamilton becoming involved in the revolution is really significant, but he just wasn't part of that friend group!! I don't really know anything significant connecting him to Lafayette and Laurens at all

he's such a random person to include and I think there are other people who would have been a better fit. ben tallmadge is the first that comes to mind -- he was also one of washington's aides and he ran the Culper spy ring so you'd still have the spy connection. I don't know if he was at Yorktown (I was going to say he was bc oh he was in the Yorktown episode of turn but the more I think about it I think they gave him Laurens' role bc I remember both the initial anti John Laurens erasure discourse immediately followed by the pushback that people only care bc of Hamilton lol) but I think in terms of fitting into the group of Laurens, Lafayette, and Hamilton, he makes way more sense than mulligan.

otherwise if the spy part in Yorktown was so important, I would rather they have somehow found a way to shoutout James armistead Lafayette. tldr bc idk how well known he is -- he was an enslaved man who escaped his loyalist owner and spied for Washington, he was the only successful (continental at least; I don't remember if the British had any?) spy out of Yorktown, and after the revolution when he was not awarded the freedom he was promised, he and the marquis de Lafayette fought with the us until he was freed, after which he took the last name Lafayette in the other Lafayette's honor. like he was the one who was actually successful!!!! why are we hyping up the flop guy sm

and I think with the James armistead Lafayette point specifically it comes back to something that kind of annoys me about Hamilton in general in like the larger meta of American revolution scholarship and popular media. its a pretty regressive take on the history overall -- a "great man" biopic when the field in general is moving more towards broader narratives and particularly highlighting the experiences of under represented groups (ie women, native Americans, enslaved/formerly enslaved people, loyalists, people outside of Boston lmao) and causes of the break in the relationship between Britain and the colonies beyond the typical sons of liberty style patriotism. so like I really wish that they had taken the opportunities to highlight some of these lesser known experiences when possible. there were a lot of black men in particular who were involved with the continental army and often involved in espionage specifically. like even if they wanted to keep Hercules mulligan so badly, he worked extremely closely with an enslaved man he owned, Cato, who was literally crucial to his spy work because Cato was able to exploit his position as an enslaved person to be less suspicious to the British while acquiring information and it seems so neglectful to exclude him.

anyway yeah that's it lmao

#I can't be assed to find sources im sorry this is a bro trust me post #asks #nunki tag

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

[W. D. Cooper, “Boston Tea Party,” The History of North America (London: E. Newberry, 1789); Library of Congress, public domain. Accessed on Wikipedia Commons.]

* * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

December 16, 2023 (Saturday)

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

DEC 17, 2023

Today is the 250th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, when 30 or more men boarded three trading vessels in Boston Harbor. They broke open 342 chests of tea and dumped about 90,000 pounds of the valuable leaves overboard.

The pointed destruction of a cargo worth about $1.7 million in today’s dollars escalated the ongoing struggle between the British government and thirteen of its North American colonies. 

Trouble had been growing since the end in 1763 of what the colonists knew as the French and Indian War. That conflict dramatically expanded British possessions in North America, but at the cost of badly stretching the Treasury. To raise revenue, the king’s ministers and Parliament placed a number of taxes on the colonists, including the 1765 Stamp Act. This law hit virtually everyone by taxing printed material from newspapers and legal documents to playing cards. 

The Stamp Act shocked colonists. At issue was not just money, but a central political struggle that had been going on in England for more than a century: could the king be checked by the people or were his powers unlimited? Colonists were not directly represented in Parliament and believed they were losing their fundamental right as Englishmen to have a say in their government. They responded to the Stamp Act with widespread protests. 

In 1766, Parliament repealed the Stamp Act but claimed for Parliament “full power and authority to make laws and statutes…to bind the colonies and people of America…in all cases whatsoever.” This act echoed the 1719 Irish Declaratory Act, which asserted that Ireland was subordinate to the British king and Parliament. It also imposed new taxes.

As soon as news of the Declaratory Act and the new taxes reached Boston in 1767, the Massachusetts legislature circulated a letter to the other colonies standing firm on the right to equality in the British empire. Local groups boycotted taxed goods and broke into warehouses whose owners they thought were breaking the boycott. In 1768, British officials sent troops to Boston to restore order. 

Events began to move faster and faster. In March 1770, British soldiers in Boston shot into a crowd of men and boys who were harassing them, killing five and wounding six others. Engraver Paul Revere made an instantly-famous image showing soldiers in red coats smiling as they shot at colonists, including Black man Crispus Attucks. The altercation became known as the Boston Massacre.

Parliament removed all but one of the new taxes—the tax on tea—but trouble continued to simmer. In 1771 and 1772, an official in New Hampshire ordered a search of sawmills for white pine that bore the mark of the King’s Broad Arrow, three blazes on a tree— one straight up and two making an upside-down V— designating trunks thicker than 12 inches as the property of the king. New Englanders had never liked the law that claimed their valuable forests for Royal Navy masts, and had ignored it when they could.

But in April 1772, officials charged six sawmill owners with milling trunks that had been marked with the King’s Broad Arrow. One of the owners was arrested and then released with the promise that he would provide bail the next day. Instead, the following morning he and 30 to 40 men, their faces disguised with soot, assaulted the government officials and ran them out of town. 

The so-called Pine Tree Riot suggested that British authority could be defied. Just two months later, a Royal Navy customs schooner, the HMS Gaspee, ran aground in Rhode Island while chasing a packet boat suspected of smuggling. As the captain waited for high tide to float the schooner free, Rhode Island men rowed to the ship, boarded it, and burned it to the waterline.

Eight of the men who participated in the Pine Tree Riot were later charged with assault, but the local judges who sentenced them let them off so lightly the verdict could easily be seen as support for their actions. The government had even less luck prosecuting the men who burned the Gaspee: it could not identify suspects. But its threat to extradite colonists to England for trial seemed to the colonists to prove the British government intended to strip them of their civil rights. 

Then, in May 1773, Parliament tried to bail out the failing East India Company by giving it a monopoly on tea sales in the colonies. This would make tea cheaper in the colonies than it had been. It seemed to colonists the plan was to convince people to accept the cheaper tea…and thus establish Parliament’s right to govern without colonists’ input.

Ships carrying the East India tea sailed for the colonies in fall 1773, but mass protests convinced the captains of the ships headed to every city but Boston to return to England. In Boston the royal governor was determined to land the cargo. On December 16, 1773, after attendees at a meeting at Boston’s Old South Meeting House heard that the governor refused to let ships loaded with tea leave the harbor until the tax was paid, a group of colonists hid their faces, some with soot, other with overt symbols of their new identification with North America rather than England: as Indigenous Americans.

The men boarded three ships moored at a wharf in Boston Harbor, hauled the chests of tea out of the holds with the ships’ block and tackle, broke them open with axes and pry bars, and dumped the tea at an exceptionally low tide, turning the harbor into muck. They were careful to make sure that no other cargo was harmed and that none of the tea was stolen. They were making a political statement.

Parliament responded by closing the port of Boston, moving the seat of government to Salem, stripping the colony of its charter, requiring colonists to pay for the quartering of soldiers in the town, and demanding payment for the tea.  

By fall 1774, concern about the government’s actions had grown deep enough that delegates from the colonies met for six weeks at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia to figure out how to respond, and also how to work together to advance a constitutional opposition to tyranny, as Boston leader Samuel Adams put it.

Over the next two years, American politicians would find an answer to the question of whether the king could be checked by the people. They would get rid of monarchs altogether and declare that the people had the right to govern themselves. 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

#History #Heather Cox Richardson #Letters From An American #Boston Tea Party #American History #Library of Congress

[danijimenezv]

Late Night Talking

Summary: Jill opens up about her background to Ethan. It takes place in OH1 Ch10.

Pairing: Ethan Ramsey x MC (Jillian Valentine).

Word Count: 2356 words.

A/N: In other words, Ethan likes Boston Jillian too. This was inspired by @jamespotterthefirst's book 1 replay, and I felt like I had to add to one of my favorite moments in the series. Also, huge shoutout to the lovely @bex-la-get for reading it first and encouraging me to write again.

“What kind of doctor do you see yourself being in ten years?”

The question took her by surprise, and Jillian moved to refill her glass of wine as she thought about her answer. She closed her eyes for a few seconds, simply enjoying the Miami night’s soft breeze that the waves of the Atlantic brought, while Ethan stared at her with genuine curiosity, taking his time to study every crease on her face in a dazzle.

“If I tell you this…” Jillian started, finally looking back at him, “Can you promise me to keep this between us? To not tell anyone back at Boston?”

“Did you do something illegal?” Ethan teased, earning a soft snort from her.

“No.”

“Then I won’t say anything. You can trust me.”

It was a simple statement, but that meant so much for both of them. Ethan had trusted her with the whole Naveen situation, and he wanted nothing more than for Jill to trust him as much as he did her.

“Okay, here goes nothing.” she took a huge gulp of wine before focusing her gaze on his azure eyes, and she shook her head in amusement, “I’m sure you’ve already deciphered some of my life.”

“Wasn’t hard to figure out.” he shrugged, “Back at the baseball game, you excluded yourself when you made a statement about the debt interns have to deal with, which made me suspect that you come from a wealthy family that paid your medical school tuition in full, hence why you’re not in debt. You also mentioned that your family prepared you to deal with health representatives, among other nuisances. And lastly, for the past half hour, you’ve been slightly scrunching up your nose every time you take a sip of the wine, probably because you’re used to finer options.”

“This is good wine.” Jill denied.

“No, this is regular wine. And you know it.”

“Maybe I’m just a wine snob.”

“Oh, that’s for sure. But I doubt that’s a secret that you want kept from the people in Boston.”

Jill let out a breathy chuckle and took another sip of her glass, trying hard not to scrunch her nose this time, “I hate that you’re so good at reading me.”

She hadn’t said Ethan was good at reading people; she’d said he was good at reading her. For some reason, that knowledge made him unbelievably happy.

“You’re not wrong, though.” Jillian admitted, looking away vulnerably as she finally admitted what she had been hiding from everyone for years, “I do come from a wealthy family.”

“And that’s what you don’t want to be known?”

“When people find out you come from money, they start treating you differently.” she explained, fidgeting with her fingers, “Suddenly who you are as a person doesn’t matter as much as what you have or what you can get. I don’t want my friends to think differently of me… I don’t want anyone to think differently of me. But it’s more than just that.”

“Your parents are doctors…” Ethan guessed.

“Yes, veterinarians.”

It took Ethan a few seconds to put two and two together, and realization dawned on his face, “Your family are the owners of The Valentine Clinic. Which means you’re also–”

“Senator Westbrook’s niece, yes. Mom’s side of the family.” she chuckled bitterly, looking down at the wine in the swirling glass.

“Most people would gloat about that.”

“The thing is… I like Boston Jillian.”

“Excuse me?” he frowned in confusion.

“I like the person I am, the person I’ve become since I moved to Boston.” she opened up, taking a shuddering breath, and Ethan listened attentively, “My life in New York was… complicated. The whole socialite environment is draining, and overwhelming. Back home, it never mattered what I wanted for my life or who I was; all that mattered was my reputation and what people thought about me, what people made of me. Everything about my life was scrutinized and could potentially be turned into a scandal. But it was okay because I was a Valentine, and that’s all that mattered to people. I didn’t get to bemy own self, I was the person I was expected to be. But it gets worse… because being that relevant and being surrounded by that kind of people, that ambiance can really change someone. It starts with the feeling of superiority, thinking other people are beneath you, and feeling entitled to anything. And that influence, that much power on a teenager is dangerous. But as long as you stay relevant and you have money, you can get away with almost anything. And that’s just wrong.” when Jill looked back at him, Ethan noticed her whiskey eyes brimming with a couple of tears, which he gently wiped, causing her cheeks to tint with a soft pink color, and he pulled his hand back in embarrassment, “So, I hate New York Jillian. I’m not proud of the person I was back then. And I know I was just a teenager doing what she needed to survive, but I still hate it. I never felt like myself. I was Jillian Valentine, teenage socialite, Doctors Matthew and Haley Valentine’s daughter, the Senator’s niece, but I was never me, not really. And the pressure and expectations from being a Valentine were too much.”

And with her declaration, more pieces of the puzzle fell in place in Ethan’s mind. Now he understood where many of her actions came from. And he was mesmerized at the person he was discovering her to be.

“Jillian, I’m sure your friends wouldn’t blame you. I don’t blame you. All of it would be too much on anyone. And like you said, you were a child.” Ethan reassured her and placed a warm hand over her arm, ignoring the jolts of electricity that her contact brought.

“When I moved away for college, I realized the magnitude of the bubble I lived in all my life. I realized that the real world wasn’t like that, that life didn’t have to be like that. So I tried to put as much distance between me and them, tried to stop being a Valentine, or at least what that entailed in Manhattan’s society. I left New York behind, and Boston was my fresh start.”

“That’s when you applied to medical school.”

“Which was a mistake in their eyes.” she sighed sadly, and Ethan stayed silent, urging her to continue, “For my family, there are only two paths; law school, like the rest of the Westbrooks, or vet school, like every Valentine.”

“And you chose med school.” Ethan stared in amazement.

“I worked at the Clinic as a teenager, and I fell in love with medicine. I knew it was what I wanted. And then I stumbled upon your work.” Jill grinned breathtakingly, making his heart skip a beat, “And I realized there was another way, that I could pursue medicine and step out of my family’s shadow. So yes, I applied, thanks to you. My family was furious with me, but they weren’t going to deter me; I knew this was the path for me. Still, I’m grateful that my parents paid my tuition even when they didn’t approve. After that, I pretty much cut ties with them. I promised to not use my trustfund unless it was an emergency, and started working as a waitress to survive.”

She had stated that previous times, how he had been an inspiration for her to go to medical school and become a doctor. He had heard that before, from several people. It wasn’t an uncommon statement in his life. Though, most people did it to kiss ass and gain his favor; Jillian didn’t. Realizing the extent of the role his life’s work played in Jill’s decision left him speechless. Now he could see in her eyes how much his work meant to her.

He nodded, trying to keep her talking, desperate to find out more about her, “You left that life behind. That’s why you don’t want people to find out about your life in New York, because it’s not you.”

“Exactly. I love my parents and my siblings, but being a Valentine was hard. I don’t want to go back to that, ever. Though, even if I tried to put as much distance between us, there’s something I know for sure.”

“Which is?”

“I want to be the kind of doctor that my parents are.” she rounded up, going back to the original question, and let out a laugh of disbelief, like she couldn’t believe what she was saying either, “They’re amazing doctors. Even my older brother and sister. They cure major diseases every day, even contributing with research of their own.”

“Who says you can’t do that?”

“Do you remember my struggle the first few months? And even now as the first-ranking intern, I feel like I’ll drown at any second.”

“But you’ve already got the persistence down.” Ethan insisted, “And that counts for much more than you think.”

“Really?”

“I’ve never seen you give up on anything yet. That’s important.” he scooted closer to her almost automatically.

“Maybe it’s a family trait.” she shrugged, looking back at the waves, “And it’s different, they have their own hospital, so they make the rules, it’s easier for them, but I’ve seen them do so much good. I’d be insane to not want to be like them.”

“What would you say is your main goal?” he enquired, his undivided attention on her.

“I have many, but I think the main one would be to make a difference in patient care.”

“More than you do now?”

“I’m only an intern.” Jill pointed out, “I do barely anything now.”

“That’s not true.” Ethan noticed he still had his hand on her arm, but instead of removing it, he gently ran his fingers across her smooth skin, making her sigh in content, “I’ve seen how hard you work for your patients. Even if they don’t always value it, you do make a difference.”

“But not enough. I helped one uninsured patient receive care, but I can’t find loopholes for everyone.” her frustration then turned to determination, “The entire system needs to change, and I want to be a part of it.”

“And I have no doubt you’ll find a way.” Ethan smiled softly, “That’s the same drive I saw in your application.”

Jill’s cheeks flared up once again, but she tried to downplay her embarrassment with a teasing remark, “Enough drive to lead the diagnostics team?”

Ethan let out a few chuckles, shaking his head in amusement, “It’s less fun than it looks, I promise you that. I wanted this job until the exact second Naveen told me it was mine.”

Her eyes softened at the mention of the older doctor, “When Doctor Banerji is well again, I’m sure you’ll feel differently.”

“Perhaps. And perhaps one day, it’ll be yours to lead.”

“Are you serious?”

“I did say perhaps.”

“So you do think I’m the future of medicine.”

Ethan couldn’t help the laugh that escaped past his lips, “I remember telling you not to let it get to your head.”

“Too late.” Jill grinned, before turning serious once again, “It just seems like… the higher I aspire, the more I stand to lose.”

“I… certainly understand that.”

The attending got up from his seat and went to the balcony railing, leaning on it with his wine glass in both hands. Jill followed him slowly, brushing his side slightly as she settled beside him.

“What you saw tonight, that’s not me.” it was Ethan’s turn to open up, and he gazed out at the dark sea pensively, “I don’t gamble… on anything. I don’t take chances. Medicine is an assembly of facts leading to a conclusion. Once you know the rules and understand the diseases you’re working with, the risk should be minimal. Your decisions are informed, and you choose the safest path. But that card game… I’ve never done anything like that before.”

“I don’t know. It seemed like a pretty well-informed decision to me. A decision you made based on your people-reading skills.”

“Maybe, but risking Naveen’s treatment on a game? Having to hope I’d judged Declan’s character well enough to risk losing instead of using a winning hand? There were too many variables, I could have lost everything”

“But you didn’t, and you were right. Your risk paid off.”

“It did… and I’m beginning to realize…” Ethan turned to look at Jillian with an intensity that was foreign for both of them, “There are some things that are worth any risk.”

She stared up, meeting his eyes, and the look she gave him was enough to make him forget about everything other than the woman before him. A look that made his heart flutter and his lips to part as he took a sharp intake of breath, while staring at her with total admiration, unable to look away. The golden specs dancing in her caramel eyes seemed even brighter under the moonlight. Ethan glanced at her redenned lips hesitantly but with undenying desire, and noticed her gaze fixed on his own mouth. He leaned closer, and their breaths mixed as both of them breathed heavily.

Jill’s heart started to race and thump loudly against her ribcage at the close proximity. And when she leaned closer to him as well, Ethan’s breath hitched in his throat, and his own heart felt like stopping. Holding his deep blue gaze, Jillian reached tentatively out and touched his cheek tenderly.

“Jill, I…”

“I know.” she whispered, not wanting to disrupt the magical atmosphere.

Ethan closed his eyes and leaned into her touch, his stubble fresh and rough beneath her fingertips. Their noses bumped, and both of their bodies filled with excitement, nerves and exhilaration. Ethan opened his eyes once again to stare at hers.

It was as if a dam broke within him.

In one strong move, he looped his arm around her waist, pulling Jill close until their bodies were flushed together. And after what felt like an eternity of waiting, Ethan hungrily captured her lips, finally kissing her.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tags: @jamespotterthefirst, @takeharryandgo, @aestheticartsx, @choicesfanaf, @liaromancewriter, @trappedinfanfiction, @bex-la-get, @genevievemd, @lucy-268, @jerzwriter, @a-crepusculo, @writer-ish, @potionsprefect, @writinghereandthere, @queencarb, @gryffindordaughterofathena, @ohchoices, @anntoldst0ries, @bluebellot, @schnitzelbutterfingers, @mysticaurathings, @iemcpbchoices, @itsjustamesshonestly, @shanzay44, @lsvdw-blog, @heauxplesslydevoted, @starryeyedrookie, @rosebudde, @crazy-loca-blog, @mercury84choices, @quixoticdreamer16, @peonierose, @maurine07, @choiceskatie, @rookiemartin

#ethan x mc #ethan ramsey x mc #ethan ramsey x jillian valentine #ethan x jill #choices fic writers creations #choices fic #open heart fic #open heart #dani writes

[livinginacanineworld]

The Seven Dog Groups Explained

The are seven different dog groups and each breed is assigned to a group based on the purpose they were originally bred for and their characteristics.

By the end of this post you will know the seven dog groups, a description of each group, and give different breeds that have been assigned to each group.

Herding Group

The herding group was first created/founded in the year 1983. The breeds in this group all have the ability to control the movement of other animals, also known as herding. When one of these breeds are household pets it is rare that they actually see or herd farm animals and because of this, their natural instinct tends to have them lightly herd their owners or the kids of the family. Though they tend to try and herd their owners, these intelligent dogs are fantastic companions and can be easily trained.

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Australian Cattle Dog

Australian Shepered

Bearded Collie

Beauceron

Belgian Laekenois

Hound Group

Originally Hound dog breeds are classified and members of the Sporting group, until the year 1930, when the American Kennel Club created the hound group. Breeds that are assigned to this group all share the trait of being used for hunting. Some hound were used more intensely than others. Some use acute smelling power to track a trail while others use extraordinary stamina that they use to chase and catch quarry. Other hounds have the ability to make a very unique hunting noise called baying. Some day before getting a hound, it is better to hear the noise first.

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Afghan Hound

American English Coonhound

Bassett Houjd

Beagle

American Foxhound

Toy Group

The petite and delightful style of Toy dogs represents one main duty this group has, which is to exemplify a large amount of joy. But Toy dog breeds are tough and have always been very popular when it comes to those who live in apartments or in the city.

(There are small dog breeds in each group – just because the breed is small doesn’t always mean they belong to the toy group)

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Affenpinscher

Brussels Griffon

Cavalier King Charles Spaniel

Chihuahua

Chinese Crested

Non-sporting Group

There really isn’t much to say about the non-sporting group except for all the breeds assigned to this group have a high variety of size, coats, personality, and their overall appearance.

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Boston Terrier

Bulldog

Dalmatian

Chow Chow

American Eskimo Dog

Sporting Group

The Sporting Group includes pointers, retrievers, setters, and spaniel breeds which all are extremely active and are always on high alert.  They have outstanding instinct when it comes to hunting and other field activities that still to this day,  they participate in such activities. 

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Cocker Spaniel

English Setter

German-Shorthaired Pointer

Golden Retriever

Brittany

Terrier Group

Terrier’s vary in size – from target smash breeds to large breeds. Most people already know how the Terrier personality is: courageous with a high energy level. The Terrier was originally need to hunt and kill vermin so they normally have a very low tolerance when it come to other animals, including other dogs. In order to make sure they keep one of the Terriers characteristic looks, they need a special type of grooming technique known as stripping.

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

American Staffordshire Terrier

Bull Terrier

Russell Terrier

Norwich Terrier

Smooth Fox Terrier

Working Group

The breeds that are in this group are highly intelligent and are extremely quick learners. They perform duties like pulling sleds, water rescues, and guarding homes/ property. Throughout the many years, the breed in this group have provided great value to humans. These dogs make wonderful companions but their size and strength makes it difficult for families to have them as pets, die to the amount of exercise they must have and the fact that they must be properly trained.

Breeds in this group include but are not limited to:

Akita

Boxer

Cane Corso

Dogo Argentino

Rottweiler

And there you have it, the seven different dog groups explained. If you would like to learn more about the different dog breeds in each group, check out our series: The Different Dog Breeds.

#dog #dog breeds #sighthound #doglover #doglife #dog groups

[mywifeleftme]

90: Joe Coleman // Infernal Machine

Infernal Machine Joe Coleman 1990, Blast First

Joe Coleman emerged in the late 1970s from the alternative comix scene established by artists like Art Spiegelman (Maus), Kim Deitch (Waldo the Cat), and Bill Griffith (Zippy the Pinhead), but found greater notoriety as a painter and a shock artist. Here’s Spin’s Dean Kuipers on a performance (as his character Professor Mombooze-o) that resulted in one of Coleman’s numerous arrests:

“Boston, October 22, 1989. Reel after reel of ancient hardcore porno films flash onto a black screen onstage at BF/VF—the Boston Film/Video Foundation—grey and grainy, somebody else's fucking and sucking memories of indeterminate age. After 20 minutes, the hundred people in the audience are quiet and disarmed. The lights come up.

Joe Coleman instantly comes whapping through the film screen from behind, hanging upside down from a climber's harness attached to the ceiling, screaming and choking like a man condemned. This is the man everyone came to see. Green flames and acrid smoke belch from his chest as strapped-on explosives detonate under layers of shirt, ratty duck jacket and lab coat. Half a minute later, the booming and gnarling subside and Coleman's wife, Nancy, leaps out and douses him with goats’ blood to put out the fires. She cuts him down and he tears away what's left of the black screen to reveal a dead goat hanging upside down, twisting slowly. The goat is real. The odor of spattered blood and gunpowder seeps into the stunned crowd.

'Here are Mommy and Daddy!' cries Coleman, rushing to the front of the stage and pulling two live white mice from his pockets. He sits down on the edge of the stage and holds Mommy and Daddy up to his scorched beard and talks to them. Meanwhile, Nancy pulls out her Zippo and torches a cloth/plastic effigy of Coleman. The stage is consumed by fire as Joe screams at the squirming mice, 'I'll eat the cancer out of you!' and bites the head off Daddy, spewing it back into the audience. Then he snaps Mommy's head: hers he swallows.

This is Joe Coleman's stone ritualization of his mother's death. Four days earlier, she had died of cancer.

The befuddled firemen who arrive minutes later are sure that this must be the meeting of a satanic cult. As police investigators pick through the chaos of greening humans, brown smoke and bloody carcasses, the owners of BF/VF finger Joe and Nancy, then fire manager Jeri Rossi. All three are arrested and Joe is charged with—among other things—an old Massachusetts blue law charge that hasn't been used since the 1800s: Possession of an Infernal Machine."

(You can watch an excerpt of a similar performance in the 1988 pseudo-documentary Mondo New York, though I do not recommend doing so if you’re troubled by animal cruelty.)

The Infernal Machine LP is a figurative soundtrack to the Mombooze-o character, which he retired following the Boston bloodbath. Side one (“Homage to Mass Murderers”) intersperses vintage country and blues murder ballads with exploitation film clips and interviews with murderers Ed Kemper and Charles Manson. Side two (“Infernal Machine”) is a collage of clips from TV shows and ‘40s films noir, audio from Coleman’s Mondo New York performance, and early live recordings by NYC noise punks Steel Tips.

The overall effect is eerie, and there are some powerful juxtapositions. The way the clip of Kemper’s tearful description of murdering his own mother segues into Eddie Noack’s 1968 recording of “Psycho” underscores the song’s unnerving potency; tucked between relatively jaunty tunes by Bessie Smith and Tex Ritter, a long clip of character actor Don Russell’s genuinely moving performance as a kidnapped schoolteacher begging for his life from 1963’s The Sadist (based on the Charles Starkweather murders) seems to represent man’s powerlessness in a capricious universe. Side two is bookended by excerpts from the 1947 film Nightmare Alley, in which a series of disasters reduce cocksure Stan Carlisle (played by Tyrone Power) from his position as a carnival barker to the role of a despised geek who earns a meagre living by biting the heads off chickens in front of jeering crowds. The implication is that, as Mombooze-o, Coleman himself has been similarly forced into the role of a freak by the diseased contemporary world.

The LP includes a twelve-page booklet of Coleman’s paintings and, most interestingly, a picture-disc reproduction of details from its cover image, Portrait of Professor Mombooze-o. I’m not normally much interested in picture discs, but the sight of Coleman’s zombified head spinning on the table (or the dead fish bursting from his crotch on the flip) really does complete the package. It’s as a visual artist that Coleman’s chief gifts reveal themselves. His obsessively detailed paintings, which he works out over months and sometimes years using a single horsehair brush, are the most successful transference of an alt. comix sensibility to the gallery I’ve come across. If the work in R. Crumb’s classic Weirdo anthologies could feel like a mutated, devolved descendent of the feverish iconography of sixteenth century religious art, Coleman’s paintings are that mutant culture’s return to high art.

Coleman frequently conflates people like Charles Manson with Jesus Christ, saying in a ‘90s tour of his collection of oddities that he keeps a lock of Manson’s hair and a sample of Christ’s marrow. Falling back on the Blakean idea of a marriage of heaven and hell, he claims that if the pair’s DNA could be mixed in a clone it would create a perfect Messiah. However, the mingling of deviants and prophets in Coleman’s hagiographic art does not, as Coleman seems to mystically intend, elevate the former towards divinity so much as it pulls the latter earthward. Serial killers are, almost without exception, insipid creatures, powerless to explain their own behaviour with any real insight—as are for that matter, many holy men. Maniacs and religious figures are akin in the sense that each possesses intense evocative potential. A crazed killer’s actions, which seem both primal and alien, tear at the fabric of our notion of a shared reality. It is tempting to read their murders, being as superficially inexplicable as miraculous events, as signs or portents, the killers themselves as visionaries. Put another way, both religious phenomena and psychopathic behaviour create a void of ostensible meaning that humans are agitated to fill. Meaning does not arise from their actions but is imputed to them by witnesses. In Coleman, these boring, broken men who kill find a witness capable of making them a genuinely mythic force.

Portrait of Charles Manson, 1988 I find Coleman’s art as inspired and fascinating as I find his philosophy stunted and dull. In an interview with Richard Metzger on the BBC series Disinformation, Coleman says, with reference to mass murderer Richard Speck, “I don't want to kill anybody, but I want to express that pain. I want to express what he was trying to express. What if he didn't have to do that? And maybe, just maybe, art is a thing where you can do that.” Ten years previously, Coleman told an anecdote in Mondo New York about covering himself in blood and harassing random women at New York bars; when their boyfriends would intervene, he’d light the fuse on the hidden explosives attached to his chest and then calmly walk out of the bar in the confusion, enjoying the screams and smoke. Whether he’s spinning a yarn or recounting something he actually did, it’s clear he gets the same petty thrill out of terrifying strangers as the sickos (both real and fictional) excerpted on the Infernal Machine LP do. This doesn’t make him a monster, but it does clarify that when he talks about “expressing” their pain he also wants his share of their freedom to do violence. Of all the reasons it’s good for Coleman that he ended up an artist instead of a cut-rate David Berkowitz, the most telling is this: if he had, what artist of his quality would’ve wanted to take him as their subject?

90/365

#joe coleman #vinyl record #music review #picture disc #serial killers #charles starkweather #charles manson #manson family #richard speck #richard metzger #nightmare alley #alt. comix #comix #weirdo #mondo #'80s music #'50s music #'40s music #'60s music #'70s music

[anitabyars]

Book description

From USA Today and Amazon Charts bestselling authors Kerrigan Byrne and Cynthia St. Aubin, comes their latest Romcom featuring a quirky cast of characters who represent the hilarious absurdity of life while making you fall head-over-heels in love. This steamy, laugh out loud, opposites-attract small town romance reminds us that we don't have to be perfect to deserve our own happily ever after!

Gemini "Gemma" McKendrick knows just about everything about everybody in Townsend Harbor. When she's not serving on one of the many civic positions or leaping headlong into another hobby, she's hosting the Sunday Stitch 'N Bitch at her yarn and craft shop, Bazaar Girls. With her quirky boutique in big financial trouble, she makes a snap decision to rent out the basement of her cozy craftsman to Townsend Harbor newcomer Gabe Kelly. A man with a past as colorful as his tattoo sleeves, who has become an urban legend since he blew into town. And who better than Gemma, Townsend Harbor's own gossip guru, to answer the rumor mill's most pressing questions? Like whether the silver-tongued mechanic is as good with his hands as he is with a socket wrench.

Gabriel "Gabe" Kelly wasn't born into a family so much as a criminal enterprise. Taught to lift, chop, and rebuild cars since before he could tie his own shoes, he's obliged to pay his debt to society before deserting South Boston for Townsend Harbor, Washington. Surely he can stay out of trouble here, right? He immediately finds the only position an ex-con with prison muscles and neck tattoos could easily find in a town like this, and buys the vintage car mechanic shop from it's retiring owner . Moonlighting as the only tow truck in a thirty-mile radius, he rescues the absent-minded hottie who runs the local yarn shop. But he quickly discovers that a toy-sized car with a dashboard lit up by Christmas isn't the only thing in Gemma McKendrick's life desperately in need of maintenance. Gabe, who is uniquely qualified to diagnose and fix complicated mechanisms, finds his sexy landlord is impossible to figure out. Looks like he'll have to take a peek at her undercarriage to find out what makes her purr before he hits the road again.

Because women of her caliber don't take home guys with his make and model...

But he knows she wants a test drive.

Order link: https://amzn.to/47rIQSV

My Review

5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

One of the most entertaining series I’ve read in a long time! So many laugh out loud moments, sexual innuendo, secrets and with a great group of strong-willed, independent, women, who all have their own unique problems. These women have bonded together to support each other, any way they can, as they find their way through life…and love! Townsend Harbor seems to be the perfect place with its quaintness and quirkiness for all these characters to blend and live in. This is Gemma and Gabe’s story and I never saw this sizzling relationship coming!!!! And it is an eye opener! Just saying Gemma really surprised me in this opposites-attract romance!

Gemma McKendrick lives in a constant state of clutter and disorganization due to her inability to stay on task for any length of time. Thanks all to her ADHD’s delightful bonus, of body betrayals but also because she constantly overextended herself in Townsend Harbor. But when her father and sister start questioning her, regarding her quirky boutique and its profit margin, she suddenly decides to rent out the basement of her house to Gabe Kelly. The same Gabe Kelly that happened to be the most soul-crushingly beautiful man Gemma had ever met. But when her identical twin Lyra and her fiancé Harrison shows up unexpectedly, and catches her in a rather awkward position, what will her family think of her attraction to the hot bad boy? Her family surely wouldn’t approve of him, if she brought him home for Sunday dinner. But she wants so much more out of life and she was willing to finally reach out and take it.

"If experience is what you want, I'd be more than willing to help you with that. Anything you want to know, anything you want to try, anything you want do. No strings attached."

Gabe "The Babe" Kelly was an old friend of Darby's from Boston, who had made his Townsend Harbor debut in a duet on aerial silks that left neither eyes nor panties dry. A man with a past as colorful as his sleeves of tattoos. Born into a family of criminals, he’d learned at an early age to lift, chop, and rebuild cars. Gabe was full of a past filled with darkness and danger, Southie trash with a rap sheet to prove it. As an ex-con he decides to buys a vintage car mechanic shop from it retiring owner in hopes of staying out of trouble in Townsend Harbour. But when Gemma McKendrick offers him her basement to rent out, he knew he was in deep trouble. Because he hadn't been able to get the image of her out of his head, since the night of Darby's benefit. Which was exactly why he couldn't get tangled up with her. Gemma was sweetness and light, the girl next door with a heart of gold. Until she needed him!

"I'm attracted to you," she said, her voice barely audible above the waves. "Like, a lot. Like, so much that it's basically an obsession”

These two are so…HOT! Sexy, charming and totally head over heels in…lust with each other. Their relationship is so sweet and captivating, I loved watching these two opposites come together and be exactly what the other needed. With Gemma, Gabe was starting to imagine a real future together. But when trouble shows up again, will Gemma and Gabe get their HEA? Or will family cause the end of their future together? You will want to read this one to get all the spicy and sexy details!

I received an early copy and this is my honest review.

#newrelease #BazaarGirls #TownsendHarbor #Townsendites #kerrigan byrne #GetKnotty #Cynthia st.aubin #spicy

[news4dzhozhar]

41st Execution Under Biden: President Pledged End Of Death Penalty But Has Made Little Progress On Issue

President Joe Biden’s promise to eliminate the death penalty at the federal level and work to end capital punishment in states seems to have gone dormant as the Department of Justice continues to press for the death penalty in certain cases and Biden—the first president to openly oppose the execution of prisoners—stays quiet on the issue as they continue in states.

Key Facts

Biden pledged to push for the death penalty’s elimination on the campaign trail in 2020 and did order a moratorium on carrying out federal death sentences, but since then his administration has been largely silent on the matter.

The nonpartisan Death Policy Information Center says there are 43 federal death row prisoners with sentences dating back as far as 1997, with the most recent death row inmate, Brandon Council of South Carolina, sentenced in 2019.

While no defendants have been sentenced to death since the start of the Biden administration, the Department of Justice has sought to uphold death sentences in previously prosecuted cases including those of church shooter Dylann Roof, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Rejon Taylor, sentenced in 2008 for killing a restaurant owner.

A federal jury in Pennsylvania earlier this month found Robert Bowers, convicted of killing 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018, eligible for the death penalty and is considering whether to recommend it, a process that could last several weeks, CNN reported.

Advocates have called on Biden to commute federal death penalties and abolish the capital punishment system, the New York Times reported, which would require Congress to pass legislation.

Earlier this month, Senators Ed Markey (D-MA) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), with Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), reintroduced the Federal Death Penalty Prohibition Act of 2023 that would stop judges from imposing federal death sentences and require re-sentencing of those currently on death row.

The White House in January told the Associated Press that "the DOJ makes decisions about prosecutions independently."

There have been no federal executions under the Biden administration, but 41 people have been put to death in seven states since he took office.

White House representatives did not immediately respond to request for comment Friday.

News Peg

Alabama executed its first prisoner in a year early Friday morning when convicted murderer James Barber, 64, died by lethal injection. Barber told NBC he had "no fear of death," but did worry about the lethal injection after Alabama was forced to stop three executions due to challenges finding a vein through which to administer lethal drugs. Barber’s attorneys appealed to the Supreme Court Thursday night to halt the execution, but the Court denied the request, with three liberal judges accusing Alabama of using Barber as a "guinea pig.” Barber was not a federal inmate.

Key Background

The death penalty in the United States dates back to the first establishment of the colonies. The Massachusetts Bay Colony held its first execution in 1630. The state of Massachusetts has since abolished the practice. Death sentences peaked in the mid 1990s, when more than 300 people were sentenced to death row per year, and have since sharply declined, the Death Penalty Information Center says. Lethal injection was first used in 1982, when Charles Brooks was given a lethal dose of sodium thiopental via an intravenous line in Texas. Between December 7, 1982 and the practice's 40th anniversary last year, the federal government has killed 1,377 prisoners using some version of the method, the nonprofit says. The Pew Research Center most recently in 2021 conducted a poll on how Americans feel about capital punishment—60% of U.S. adults favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder while 78% admit there is some risk that an innocent person will be put to death.

Tangent

There are 27 states that still allow the death penalty to be imposed in certain cases, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, three of which have governors who have imposed moratoriums on executing inmates—California, Pennsylvania and Oregon. Arizona and Ohio's governors have paused the death penalty while the state systems are reviewed. Arizona Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs said there will be no executions until there is "confidence that the state is not violating the law," and Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said the state will no longer use lethal injection, pausing execution until lawmakers choose a different method of capital punishment, per AP.

#jahar tsarnaev #dzhokhar tsarnaev #abolish the death penalty #abolish capital punishment #end capital punishment #end the death penalty #empty campaign promises #campaign promises #false promises #political lies

[anniekoh]

elsewhere on the internet: the internet

How Facebook Screwed Us All (Mother Jones, 2019)

First, starting in the 2000s, came the giant migration of advertising dollars from publishers to Facebook and Google. Today, the two control an estimated 58 percent of the US digital ad market, with Amazon, Microsoft, and the like dividing up the rest and publishers representing barely a rounding error. In large part as a result, there are now roughly 24,000 journalists working in America’s daily print newsrooms, down from some 56,000 in the early 2000s. And more and more of them work for hedge-fund owners who milk what remains of newspapers’ profits—mostly through layoffs—while further degrading coverage. Here in the Bay Area, all the daily papers except the San Francisco Chronicle are owned by one of these hedge funds, Alden Global Capital. There were once more than 1,000 journalists working for these papers, including 440 at the San Jose-based Mercury News, then one of the nation’s strongest regional outlets. Today there are 145 left across more than two dozen publications, covering a region of 7.6 million people.

Tech’s Reckoning (Ed Zitron, 2023)

Raising capital — especially at the scale that Reddit has — always leads to the bill coming due. Every time that Reddit has had to raise money, it has had to express how it will grow its userbase, its headcount, and its revenue. Every time that Reddit has taken on hundreds of millions of dollars of equity funding, it has promised these investors that Reddit will, as a result of the cash injection, become bigger and more fiscally valuable, and each raise has been paired with more promises about how much more Reddit can be worth. And now Reddit has put itself in a corner, promising shadowy organizations like Tencent that their money was well-spent.

Elon Musk broke Twitter, and he's breaking research communities, too. (Paul Musgrave, 2023)

The awful thing, of course, is that in lighting his own money on fire Elon has also decided to knock away the good part of Twitter. Twitter has, over the past decade, come to provide invisible but load-bearing supports for researchers and academics. It’s been a great way for those of us at out-of-the-way institutions to bring visibility to our arguments and research profile (and if you think Amherst isn’t out-of-the-way, just ask someone who’s Boston or New York-based to come out—a drive that we would do without thinking is a major imposition for those in the metropole). We know that scholarly conferences spur connections and research productivity; Twitter has been the conference bar or the post-panel chatter available 24/7 and across (most) borders. It’s accelerated research dissemination and it’s brought me and others into contact with people we otherwise never would have met. And it also connected us to editors and publishers in ways that did more to enrich and diversify the discourse than any number of assistant vice provosts for JEDI initiatives.

#internet #elsewhere on the internet

[cutlerlawbostonma]

Business Name: Cutler Law Boston

Street Address: 100 State Street

City: Boston

State: Massachusetts (MA)

Zip Code: 02109

Country: USA

Business Phone Number: [phone]

Business Email Address: [email protected]

Website: https://cutlerlawboston.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100080011984095

Description: Choosing the right attorney can be a difficult and daunting task. You need someone who is aggressive and professional, yet caring and attentive to you, the client. Cutler Law Boston is a law firm that strives to offer the right balance of these qualities, a firm you can trust to serve you with a wide range of legal experience. We will do our very best to protect your rights and represent you to the best of our abilities, all while providing you with a nuanced atmosphere of interaction. We give you the personal attention and the peace of mind you need in order to achieve a fair and optimal resolution of your legal matters.

Google My Business CID URL: https://www.google.com/maps?cid=1632994824291658498

Business Hours: Sunday Closed Monday 9:00am-5:00pm Tuesday 9:00am-5:00pm Wednesday 9:00am-5:00pm Thursday 9:00am-5:00pm Friday 9:00am-5:00pm Saturday Closed

Services: legal, criminal defense, drug criminal defense, employment law, contract law, truck accident lawyer, commercial trucking attorney, discrimination law, traffic citation defense, criminal traffic citation defense

Keywords: legal, criminal defense, drug criminal defense, employment law, contract law, truck accident lawyer, commercial trucking attorney, discrimination law

Payment Methods: Cash, Check, Debit

Business/Company Establishment Year: 1985

Number of Employees: 5

Owner Name, Email, and Contact Number: Corey Cutler, [email protected], [phone]

Location:

Service Areas:

#Youtube

[pwlanier]

A large-medallion Ushak from the early 1500s has travelled between the Near East, Europe and America over the centuries. In HALI 205, Autumn 2020, Ted Mast places this exceptional carpet in context and uncovers its history.

Above: The carpet as it appeared in the 1932 Benguiat sale, unchanged when exhibited in 2006.

Below : Large-medallion Ushak carpet (after restoration in 2010) circa 1500–1510. (9′ 8″ x 20′ 11″).

Carpets currently called large-medallion Ushaks are unique—their basic design has been woven almost continuously for over five centuries. Probably the most identifiable of all rugs and carpets, they were originally produced in and around Uşak, a large town in western Anatolia known for its extensive rug production since the dawn of the Ottoman Empire. Their popularity proved to be widespread and enduring. The genre includes a well-known category of 19th-century Bijars, faithful to the original large medallion design.

Above: Detail after restoration.

The earliest ‘first phase’ examples, now dated circa 1450–1525, are considered to be the purest and most desirable. They can be distinguished by their careful draughtsmanship, with graceful arabesques and minimal distortion. The colour palette is limited but effective, with either red or blue fields, typically with a lattice of vinery and leaves over the field.

The design has been around for so long that it is considered traditional, but when it first appeared it represented a radical departure from the aesthetics of the era. A closely related precursor is found in the Baba Nakkas pattern book used in the court studios of Mehmed II (r. 1444–46, then 1451–81), but versions had been used earlier in leather bookbinding, metalwork and other media. The essential elements consist of a central medallion with semi-foliate pendants at either end. A few early examples have ovoid medallions, a seeming carry-over from bookbinding design, but there are equally old examples with round medallions; the preponderance of the latter suggests this was the preferred version.

Ushaks of any age short of new were in high demand throughout America’s ‘Gilded Age’ between the late 19th century and the mid-1920s. Dealers and auction houses in the US clamoured to supply the well-housed gentry in the eastern states from Boston to Miami. The Turkish émigré carpet dealer Vitall ‘the Pasha’ Benguiat (1859–1937) partnered with the Art Sales Corporation, a subsidiary of the American Art Association and precursor to Sotheby’s. The Association funded his scouring of Europe and the Near East to find important carpets and textiles to be sold at auction, and provided him a studio above its New York salesroom. But his extravagant lifestyle and a waning market took their toll, and by 1927 he owed the AAA a half million dollars. Cortlandt Field Bishop, co-owner of the AAA, demanded payment via immediate liquidation. After postponements, the first and most important liquidation sale was held on 23 April 1932, followed by another in 1935. Prices were fractions of what they had been ten years earlier, and it was said that losing his prized collection irreparably broke the Pasha’s spirit. He was rarely seen in the trade thereafter.

The Great Depression notwithstanding, tastes had changed. The proportions of large-medallion Ushaks were now seen as awkward, their designs were considered grandiose, and they were soon regarded as curios or relics, not as components of modern interiors. Nor was there much collector interest. During the second half of the 20th century, arguably a high point of rug studies and collecting, they were shunned to the point of wilful ignorance. It hardly mattered whether they were early or late, they were all seen as export-orientated, formulaic and devoid of personal expression. What’s more, for most collectors they were too large to display or store; typically heavily worn, damaged and dirty, they were not thought worth restoring.

A few years ago, the present owner yielded stewardship and entrusted it to Antique Textile Conservation (ATC) in Izmir, Turkey, for a comprehensive cleaning and restoration operation. It took over two years to complete and exceeded all expectations. The Ushak did not now look like a new carpet, but rather a 500-year-old carpet in near-mint condition. By coincidence, shortly after completion the owner was contacted by Michael Franses, who was conducting research in the Bardini Museum, Florence; he had discovered a photograph of this very carpet when it was evidently in the possession of the museum’s founder. Stefano Bardini (1836–1922) was an internationally known art dealer, painter and restorer whose focus was the Renaissance. He was known to have restored or repaired an array of objects, from paintings and furniture to architecture, including the deconsecrated church that is now the Bardini Museum.

Notably, in the photograph the carpet is unrepaired, making it likely that Bardini tried his hand at carpet repair and realised it was more difficult than he had imagined. Further research might tell when ownership passed to Benguiat, possibly in Bardini’s de facto ‘going out of business’ sale of 1918 in New York. Bardini and Benguiat would have been astounded by ATC’s uncanny abilities, and would surely have agreed that this restoration is a good thing for art history—to have a significant piece now museum-ready. Fortuitously Michael Franses and Alberto Boralevi have been researching this carpet, in preparation, it is rumoured, for a forthcoming exhibition at the Bardini in 2022. If so the event will undoubtedly include this carpet, now looking as it probably did when Copernicus proposed that the earth revolves around the sun.

HALI

[cutler-law]

Business Name: Cutler & Associates

Street Address: 100 State Street

City: Boston

State: Massachusetts (MA)

Zip Code: 02109

Country: USA

Business Phone Number: [phone]

Business Email Address: [email protected]

Website: https://cutler-law.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100080011984095

Description: Choosing the right attorney can be a difficult and daunting task. You need someone who is aggressive and professional, yet caring and attentive to you, the client. Cutler & Associates is a law firm that strives to offer the right balance of these qualities, a firm you can trust to serve you with a wide range of legal experience. We will do our very best to protect your rights and represent you to the best of our abilities, all while providing you with a nuanced atmosphere of interaction. We give you the personal attention and the peace of mind you need in order to achieve a fair and optimal resolution of your legal matters.

Google My Business CID URL: https://www.google.com/maps?cid=1632994824291658498

Business Hours: Sunday Closed Monday 9:00am-5:00pm Tuesday 9:00am-5:00pm Wednesday 9:00am-5:00pm Thursday 9:00am-5:00pm Friday 9:00am-5:00pm Saturday Closed

Services: legal, criminal defense, drug criminal defense, employment law, contract law, truck accident lawyer, commercial trucking attorney, discrimination law

Keywords: legal, criminal defense, drug criminal defense, employment law, contract law, truck accident lawyer, commercial trucking attorney, discrimination law

Payment Methods: Cash, Check, Debit

Business/Company Establishment Year: 1985

Number of Employees: 5

Owner Name, Email, and Contact Number: Corey Cutler [email protected] [phone]

Location:

Service Areas:

#Youtube

[lboogie1906]

Hakeem Abdul Olajuwon (born January 21, 1963), is a Nigerian-American former basketball player. From 1984 to 2002, he played the center position in the NBA for the Houston Rockets and the Toronto Raptors. He led the Rockets to back-to-back NBA championships in 1994 and 1995. In 2008, he was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame, and in 2016, he was inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame. He is considered one of the greatest centers ever to play the game. He was nicknamed "The Dream" during his basketball career after he dunked so effortlessly that his college coach said it "looked like a dream." Born in Lagos, Nigeria, he was born to Salim and Abike Olajuwon, working-class Yoruba owners of a cement business in Lagos, Nigeria. He traveled from his home country to play for the University of Houston. His college career for the Cougars included three trips to the Final Four. He was drafted by the Houston Rockets with the first overall selection of the 1984 NBA draft, a draft that included Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, and John Stockton. He combined with Ralph Sampson to form a duo dubbed the "Twin Towers". The two led the Rockets to the 1986 NBA Finals, where they lost in six games to the Boston Celtics. He became the Rockets' undisputed leader. He led the league in rebounding twice and blocks three times. He married Dalia Asafi (1996-) and the couple has four children together. He has an older daughter, Abisola, who represented the West Girls in the McDonald's All-American Game and played in the WNBA. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence https://www.instagram.com/p/CnrRgvduxDU/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#africanhistory365 #africanexcellence