#east point impound

[make-mine-movie]

Lady and the Tramp (1955)

Lady and the Tramp, released in 1955, marks the middle of the Silver Age. This story continues the significant trope of a predominant animal main cast, similar to that of Dumbo and Bambi, a trope that becomes continuously more popular as Walt Disney Animation progresses. This movie earned a wonderful 93% after the lower scores of Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan.

Lady and the Tramp is a decent recovery from the failings of Peter Pan. As previously mentioned, it is also the continuation of Disney’s notable use of a predominant/main animal cast. It has a wonderful artstyle and enjoyable characters, including Tramp, who is initially set up to be unlikable and later redeems himself. Similar to its predecessors, Lady and the Tramp does have some bigoted elements. The most notable is that of Si and Am, Siamese twin cats who have buck teeth and speak in broken English. They are obvious culminations of racist East Asian stereotypes. Additionally, they resemble the villainous cat concept initially found in Cinderella and later continued in films such as this one. This film also features a chihuahua character who is another blatant stereotype, this time of Latine people. His name is Pedro, and he has a sister named “Rosita Chiquita Juanita Chihuahua.” He also has a heavy Mexican accent. Another concerning point, or rather points, in Lady in the Tramp are a couple of the disturbing scenes. One that I found particularly alarming was the theme of dog euthanization throughout the film, but specifically when the other dogs in the pound have to explain to Lady that the dogcatchers are going to kill Nutsy. However, the worst scene is when the rat tries to kill the baby and Tramp therefore has to kill the rat. This scene terrified me as a child, and it terrifies me now.

In conclusion, Lady and the Tramp is an entertaining movie that definitely has its merits, but it has its flaws too. Overall, Lady and the Tramp receives 3.5 out of 10 stars, an unfortunate score considering that this movie definitely was enjoyable and rather beautiful. Lady and the Tramp lost points for each account of a stereotypically racist character, as well as villainizing its feline cast, and both disturbing scenes. A half point was taken in the song category as the music was appropriate for the film and enjoyable but not groundbreaking or “playlist-worthy.” Lady and the Tramp also lost a point as it does not pass the Bechdel Test.

Summary of the film under the cut.

Lady and the Tramp opens with a short photographic sequence of some of the significant scenes viewed later in the movie. Shortly afterwards, the audience is introduced to the protagonist, Lady. She is a Cocker Spaniel puppy. Lady is a present for Jim Dear’s wife, Darling, for Christmas. At night Jim Dear insists Lady sleep in the kitchen in a dog bed, but she tries to break out, succeeding multiple times. Jim Dear and Darling finally give in, allowing Lady to sleep in their bed for one night. However, the scene transitions into Lady sleeping on their bed as an adult, implying that this was not for the sole night that Jim Dear initially agreed to. Lady one day receives a collar and license from Jim Dear and Darling, who have continuously incorporated her more and more into their lives. She is super excited as this has finalized her relationship with her owners, and decides to show her neighborhood friends, a Scottish terrier named Jock and a bloodhound named Trusty. Meanwhile, the story pans over to another dog, this one a stray, starting his daily routine. He runs about looking for which restaurant he is going to get food from. He lands on Tony’s Restaurant. They give him a bone, and while he is chewing on it he notices the dogcatcher is putting up a sign, which states that any  unlicensed dog will be impounded. Two dogs are in the back of his carriage, which are later introduced as Peg and Bull. Tramp, the main dog from earlier, notices this and frees them. A few more months pass by, and Jim Dear and Darling’s interactions with Lady start to strain somewhat. Thinking she has done something wrong, Lady consults Jock and Trusty, who caution her that her owners are going to have a baby, which will make them care about her less. They reassure her, though, that they will still love Lady but will have less time for her, and this will gradually improve. However, Tramp overhears and infiltrates their conversation, exaggerating to Lady the consequences and making her more anxious. Jock and Trusty chase Tramp away, but by now the damage has been done. Jim Dear and Darling later have their baby, leading them to treat Lady somewhat differently as they are preoccupied, but not necessarily poorly. Shortly after the baby is born they decide to go away together, leaving Aunt Sarah to watch the house. Aunt Sarah has a pre-existing terrible opinion of Lady. This only heightens when her two cats, Si and Am, wreck the entire house and chase after the baby, and then frame Lady for their actions. Aunt Sarah takes Lady to get a muzzle, which goes horribly. While in the pet store trying on the muzzle, Lady runs away with it still on. Tramp finds her and promises to help her get it off. He takes her to the zoo where they debate getting various other animals to help them. Finally, they settle on the beaver, whose name is Mr. Busy. Tramp convinces Mr. Busy to help them remove the muzzle by lying to him and telling him it is a contraption that will help him transport fallen logs. Somehow this not only works, but also the log is successfully transported, and Lady’s muzzle is removed. Throughout the rest of the evening, Tramp dedicates his time to show Lady how he lives. They go back to Tony’s Restaurant, where Tony and Joe make them an elaborate romantic dinner consisting of music and spaghetti. During the dinner, Lady and the Tramp eat the same noodle, resulting in them kissing by accident. Afterwards, they walk around a park together and eventually settle there for the night. Lady wakes up lying next to Tramp but decides with determination that despite Aunt Sarah mistreating her, she has to go home. He agrees, but before taking her home they chase chickens together. The owner of the chickens gets mad and starts shooting at them, so they run away in a hurry. While trying to escape, Lady gets caught by the dogcatcher and taken to the pound. While there she meets Peg and Bull from earlier, who supposedly got caught despite Tramp saving them. She also meets Dachsie, Toughy, Boris, and Pedro. Dachsie is trying to dig a hole to escape. The dogcatcher goes into the pound to run Lady’s tags, since she is wearing a collar and can therefore be returned to her family. Another dogcatcher leaves with a dog referred to as Nutsy, who is taken to be euthanized. Then the dogs remaining in the kennel begin to tell Lady about their personal experiences with Tramp, who is apparently somewhat of a “player,” having relations with a multitude of other female dogs. This infuriates Lady. Eventually, Aunt Sarah brings Lady home, but this time she chains her in the backyard. Tramp comes by to apologize for what happened with the dogcatcher, but Lady confronts him with the newfound information concerning his multitudinous girlfriends and previous partners. She shuns him. Later, a rat that has been sneaking into the yard returns. Lady typically chases the rat away, but struggles to do so chained up. The rat gets into the house, and Lady’s barking alerts Tramp to something wrong. She informs him of the current situation, and Tramp rushes inside to attack the rat, which is heading straight for the baby’s room. Lady eventually frees herself to help him. The rat attacks and wakes the baby, but Tramp eventually kills it. However, Aunt Sarah does not see the rat’s body, and assumes that Tramp was attacking the baby. She has him sent to the pound, implicitly to be euthanized as she tells the dogcatcher that she wants him “destroyed.” Jim Dear and Darling return just in time to see Tramp being carted off with Lady in a tizzy while Aunt Sarah tells them they attacked the baby. Jock and Trusty also arrive at the scene, and Lady tells them that Tramp is innocent and was really the hero. The two of them try to track down the dogcatcher’s carriage, but Trusty has been rumored to have lost his sense of smell, which makes this difficult. Meanwhile, Lady is trying to alert her owners to the rat, which she succeeds in doing, implying that Aunt Sarah is not telling the entirety of the story, and that Tramp is being unrightfully sentenced to death. Jock and Trusty catch up to the dogcatcher and try to stop him, frightening the horse pulling the carriage and toppling it over. Tramp is freed, but a wheel crashes over Trusty, and it is implied he is killed. Jim Dear, Darling, and Lady pull up to the scene of multiple men attempting to restrain the horse. The film concludes during Christmas, Lady and Tramp living with Jim Dear and Darling. They have four puppies, and are accompanied by a healthy Jim Jr., Jock, and Trusty.

[pcttrailsidereader]

Lewis, Clark, and the PCT

Although the current crossing of the Columbia River using the Bridge of the Gods has its own dangers (e.g., no sidewalk), the historical barriers were monumental. The Columbia River was both waterway and obstacle. For the contemporary PCT hiker, the 1,854’ long Bridge of the Gods represents the lowest point on the entire PCT.

By David Foscue

Image from Charles Fritz’s “The Corps of Discovery in the Great Shute of the Columbia”, 2006

You can imagine the excitement aboard the canoes that day at the end of October, 1805.   Merriweather Lewis and William Clark were about to lead their expedition around the “Great Shute” of the Columbia River. Surely they paused to consider the adventurers of the future who would stare in awe at these treacherous cascades that blocked their route from Mexico to Canada on the great Pacific Crest Trail.  Well, … maybe not.

The men of the Corps of Discovery did, however, stand in awe of the Great Shute, which was the last of four major barriers on the Columbia River.  This treacherous passage is now spanned by the Bridge of the Gods and the PCT. 

Bridge of the Gods (Photo Credit: Weathercarrot)

Clark wrote:

This Great Shute or falls is about ½ a mile with the water of this great river Compressed within the Space of 150 paces in which there is great numbers of … rocks, water passing with great velocity forming & boiling in a most horriable manner …

The journals do not reveal if Lewis and Clark knew of the Indian legend surrounding this obstacle. The original Bridge of the Gods was a natural bridge built by the Great Spirit to bring peace the brothers Wy-East (Mt. Hood) and Pah-toe (Mt. Adams) who were fighting over Beautiful Mountain Woman.  The peace lasted until Beautiful Mountain Woman started flirting with Pah-toe, which enraged Wy-East.  The brothers began to fight again, throwing rocks and molten fire at each other.  The skies darkened; the earth shook so terribly that the great natural Bridge of the Gods fell into Wauna forming the Great Shute.  

The Indian legend is not mentioned, but the journals do make a more prosaic reference to the geologic processes at work:  

Several rocks above in the river & 4 large rocks in the head of the Shute; those obstructions together with the high Stones which are continually braking loose from the mountain on the Stard Side and roleing down into the Shute aded to those which brake loose from those Islands above and lodge in the Shute, must be the Cause of the rivers daming up to Such a distance above …

After spending a night on a now submerged island the expedition headed down-river, portaging past the rapids:

we got all our baggage over the Portage of 940 yards, after which we got the 4 large Canoes over by Slipping them over the rocks on poles placed across from one rock to another, and at Some places along partial Streams of the river.  in passing those canoes over the rocks &c. three or them received injuries which obliged us to delay to have them repaired.

The focus of the explorers was not exclusively on negotiating the cascades.   Lewis found and first described vine maple where the Bridge now stands.  He also took a shot at a California Condor.  He missed and the California Condor survived a little longer.

Six and a half months later the Corps of Discovery returned to the perils of the Great Shute on its way home:

This morning as we were drawing the fifth canoe round a projecting rock, against which the current sets with great violence, she unfortunately offered too much of her side to the stream. It then drove her with such force, that with all the exertions of the party we were unable to hold her, and were forced to let go the cord, and see her drift down the stream, and be irrecoverably lost. We then began to carry our effects across the portage,… The portage is two thousand eight hundred yards, along a narrow road, at all times rough, and now rendered slippery by the rain.

This same portage was used by later pioneers heading west until a portage road was built in 1850.  Plans began for a canal around the cascade with a Congressional appropriation in 1876.  The canal was completed in 1914.  The Bridge of the Gods spanning the rapids was completed in 1926.  The bridge was later raised to accommodate the higher waters impounded by the Bonneville Dam, which was completed in 1938.  At last the Great Shute was conquered.

The men of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, however, were too busy dealing with the cascades to imagine this obstacle ever disappearing.   Indeed, these cascades were so formidable that the mountains through which they sliced soon became known as the Cascade Range.

[litwitlady]

When You Go, Take Me With You

On a warm July morning, Thomas Mann – not his real name, mind you – finds himself hauling ass down 285, praying that the airstream doesn’t come unhitched. Tommy has spent the last 11 months in Santa Fe grifting seniors in assisted living facilities out of their hard-earned nest eggs. But someone’s greedy little grandson finally noticed his grandmother’s savings dwindling away and called the authorities. He’s been riding hard all night and can’t remember the last time he ate. But he’s got a rap sheet three pages long and knows if he gets caught, he’ll never see the light of day again.

Eventually, his stomach wears him down, though, and he stops in Roswell at a kitschy little diner he hopes he can disappear into long enough to satisfy his basic needs. Halfway through his cheese fries, three sheriff’s deputies walk in and as they are chatting with the waitress at the counter, Tommy sneaks out and takes the scenic route back towards his pickup. He can’t really say he’s much surprised to find the actual Sheriff knocking on the airstream’s door. Knowing he’s lost this battle, he decides to cut his losses and run. The old Ford pickup is eventually auctioned off, but the airstream ends up in the impound lot collecting dust for the next year.

And then one day Michael Guerin accidentally illegally parks his truck on the Long farm where he promptly passes out drunk across the bench seat. Daddy Long calls the Sheriff and Michael’s arrested. Again. Max bails him out and drives him over to the Chavez County impound lot to collect his truck. And that’s where Michael Guerin falls in love for the second time in his life. The shiny, silver airstream gleams in the morning sunlight and he’s never seen anything more beautiful. Not in a long while, anyway. He convinces Max to bargain with the county in order to buy the airstream for him. Michael knows they will laugh him out of the precinct, but Max is one of their own. He parts ways with every single penny he’s ever made, but he’s rewarded with the first permanent roof he’s ever had.

Not that Michael expects the trailer to be a permanent thing. After all, no home has ever been forever. Most haven’t lasted longer than a year or so. Besides his truck, of course. The mere idea that the airstream is mobile proves the impermanence of the situation. He can flit from place to ungodly place without settling down with any actual intent. There’s beauty in the nomadic nature of it all. Mostly, he doesn’t have to worry about being rained on any longer or crashing on Isobel’s sofa or cuddling up with Sanders’ dog. So, he’s happy. Content. Proud, even.

The trailer is cramped. The engine is shit. And the toilet is literally two feet from where he lays his head at night. How he convinces any of his hookups to climb into that tiny bed with him is anyone’s guess. There’s been more than one conquest sent home with multiple bruises. Once he burns a piece of toast so badly that he can’t sleep inside for a week. There’s no storage, the floor is lopsided, and Isobel refuses to step inside for two whole years. But hey, nothing’s perfect.

After a year together, Michael and the airstream find a balance that works for them. He covers the windows with old newspaper, adapts to being very, very tidy, and sleeps outside when the claustrophobia sets in. He even fashions a front patio out of some old oak pallets he finds in the junkyard. In return, the trailer gives him privacy, a sense of autonomy, and a place to bring Alex Manes when he returns from his first tour overseas. And every tour after that.

Not that he was looking to bring Alex back to his place, of course. He hadn’t even known Alex was back. And then suddenly, there he is. Laughing with Arturo in the Crashdown. Michael hardly recognizes him with the regulation haircut and newly lean body. He tells himself to walk away, but the universe has other ideas. Alex spots him and his whole face lights up. No one has ever looked at Michael like that and he’s lost all over again.

Over the next decade, the airstream begins to collect memories. Isobel blowing the door open and taking her first steps inside to shout at him that she’s engaged. Max showing up at 3 am like clockwork every year on Liz Ortecho’s birthday because he’s smashed and doesn’t want to hear Iz’s lectures. The Sheriff’s random visits for one reason or another; he suspects she’s spying on him. The brief time he lets an old, senior dog share his space. There’s still dog hair in the many nooks and crannies.

And then there’s Alex.

He’s everywhere - in every corner, every empty inch of space – filling up the entire trailer. Sprawled naked across the narrow bed, one long, gorgeous leg hanging off the side. Standing over the small stove laughing as Michael teaches him how to make the perfect omelet. Two old Air Force t-shirts stashed deep in his closet that Michael will swear up and down he doesn’t know exist. The silly little cartoon of a cowboy he’s scribbled on every single yellowed newspaper taped to the windows. And the one solitary heart drawn in permanent ink right above Michael’s pillow. He’ll never admit how many times he’s traced that doodle and prayed that Alex’s heart is still beating.

Not every memory is happy, however. He and Alex have always fought as hard as they’ve loved. How many times Alex has stormed out, slamming the door behind him. The sound echoing off the trailer’s tinny walls, door hinges growing whinier as the years go by. Tears shed in anger and in desperate sadness every time the Air Force calls him back to some violent conflict a world away. Damn near feral sex fucked out through those same tears. The sun rising over two beaten, broken hearts the next morning. Another goodbye. Another lonely year stretching out into the desert wasteland. And suddenly the airstream feels suffocating and enduring. Set in stone and unmovable as Alex walks away one more time.

In the in-between times, Michael nurses his bruised heart out on Foster’s Ranch, punishing his body with grueling manual labor. He settles the trailer into an anonymous patch of dust and scrub brush. He begins to collect various trailer accoutrement. First, a rusted, used patio set he grabs off someone’s teetering trash pile. Next, a ‘free parking’ sign he finds abandoned on the side of Route 60. On Alex’s next leave, he’ll mark out the ‘free’ and write ‘no’ in its place. Michael will try hard not to overthink the implication. Isobel says he’s nesting, jokes that he should hang up a cross-stitched ‘Home Sweet Home’. Michael begins to panic.

At the end of ten years, he gives up. The airstream is home. There’s no point in denying the most basic fact of his existence any longer. The impermanent is now permanent. He flicks off the tin bucket and then lovingly wipes away some mud caked on the tire well. Love/hate, defined.

He returns to the trailer after another stint in the drunk tank (a home away from home, if you will) to find a uniformed Alex Manes knocking on his door. He knows he shouldn’t be surprised to find him there – Isobel, after all, had been the one to organize his hero’s parade down Main Street. But it’s been two years with no contact – the longest they’ve ever gone – and so when Alex turns to meet his eyes, the breath is knocked right out of him. So begins another cycle of fight or flight. The airstream will play centerstage. He can almost hear the aging trailer sigh.

But this time the cycle ends differently. Michael moves the airstream into the Wild Pony’s parking lot, shocking everyone. Ostensibly to keep Maria DeLuca safe. But really just to be near her energy, her spirit, her laughter. He hopes to love her. He wants to be good for someone, goddammit. But deep down he’s worried he never will be. That he’s about as solid and steady as his home on wheels. Good enough for a little while, but never long enough to last. Always ready to roll off a cliff with the slightest push.  

He hates when he’s right.

Maria breaks up with him in a hospital room. The next night he meticulously searches the airstream for anything she might have left behind. A shoe, a bra, some lipstick. But there’s nothing and he feels like the trailer is out to get him, shoving those two old Air Force t-shirts in his face. The tiny, scribbled cowboys serenading him with derisive laughter. The black heart mocking him. And Michael can’t take it anymore. He slams the airstream’s door shut, nearly knocking it off its stupid creaky hinges and calls Isobel, all but demanding she meet him at the Pony. He needs a drink. Maybe several. And a shoulder to brood on. Perhaps he should call Max instead.

Michael doesn’t expect open mic night. He doesn’t expect Alex Manes and his dumb angel voice. He doesn’t expect to be confronted with the one answer he’s always wanted. But home is a tricky business. Especially for an alien stranded in the foster care system on the wrong planet. As Alex sings his song – asking Michael to come home – everything becomes crystal clear. And Michael tries to telepathically tell the airstream to go fuck itself. He’s pretty sure it doesn’t work.

Because here’s the thing. Home can be a person.

The answer has always been that easy and that impossible. And the airstream has always known. Watching all these years as the two of them danced around each other. The ultimate grift. The longest con job this side of the Milky Way. Michael Guerin has been played, marked, and left wanting. His genius brain duped and cheated. The airstream has never been more than a shit engine and lopsided floors.

After Michael leaves the Pony that night, he moves in with Isobel. And he goes to work. On himself – AA meetings, college classes, mending all his relationships with Max, with Maria. With Alex. And on the airstream – gutting the inside and converting the space into an admittedly revolutionary eco-friendly garden greenhouse.

Once the project is finished, he attaches the toe hitch to his Chevy and heads east until he pulls into the Chavez County Children’s Home. The director meets him outside and shakes his hand with tears in her eyes. Michael walks her and several of the children through the garden, excitedly explaining all the vegetables and flowers he’s planted. Isobel arrives to take pictures for the local paper and secretly shed several of her own tears. She watches Michael happily playing with all the kids and teaching them the wonders of composting. Soon, he gives her a kiss on the cheek and climbs back into his truck. He’s got one final stop to make.

As he drives through the center of Roswell, something swells in Michael’s chest. He knows this place so well – has been arrested on nearly every corner. The Crashdown has always welcomed him with a warm meal and silly antennae. New Roswell High – with all its memories, good and bad. The UFO Emporium – or what was the UFO Emporium – with its fake alien displays and empty corners perfect for kissing sweet emo boys with the biggest of hearts. Of all the places to crash land, Roswell hasn’t turned out so bad. It’s truly a stunning conclusion.

When he arrives at his destination, he pulls into the driveway next to Alex’s green Explorer, grabs his two duffel bags, and heads to the front door. He opens the lock with his key and shouts to Alex that he’s home.

[azahshehadeh1]

Political score settling continues as Lebanon literally plunges into darkness

Many Lebanese citizens seem to have missed Energy Minister Raymond Ghajar’s key revelations on 9 July on a central issue affecting the country’s worsening energy predicament. In a three-hour interview on MTV News with Yassine Jaber, Member of Parliament, Ghajar lamented the general enduring inefficiencies at the Ministry of Energy, and specifically touched upon two major misrepresented facts about a baffling legal case in Lebanon involving allegedly “tempered” fuel shipments from Algeria.

Sometimes referred to as the “fraudulent fuel file”, the dispute has plagued Lebanon for months by contributing to electricity shortages across the country. Lebanese power plants had relied on two crucial fuel shipments that were impounded by the Mount Lebanon Court back in May of 2020. One was later released while the other was held on grounds that its cargo did not meet contract specifications.

While Ghajar himself refrained from openly blaming the Lebanese judiciary for mishandling this complex issue, his statements helped undermine much of the legal basis for the court case, which involves Algerian state company Sonatrach as well as private intermediaries and officials on the Lebanese side.

When Minister Ghajar was asked by host Marcel Ghanem if the fuel shipment was indeed tempered, Ghajar wanted to know the definition of the term “tempered” (see time marker 1:01:22 in the interview). Ghanem said it meant “if the fuel met specifications or not”. The Minister responded by saying, “I would say the fuel does not match the standards. This fuel does not exist in nature, it is a blend of 10 to12 elements. The broker does not always match the high standards of the blend, but it keeps a margin so the profit would be realistic.” His statements underline the point that, at least in terms of legal definitions pertaining to the agreement, there can be no such thing as “fraudulent fuel” since shipments either comply with the specifications of a contract or they do not. While issues of nonconformity may come up from time to time and can be dealt with between the parties, it does not mean that the shipment is “fraudulent” or “tempered”.

Another fundamental clarification Ghajar made was that the contract signed between the Lebanese authorities and Sonatrach on the fuel shipments was “state-to-state” in nature. When the host asked if Teddy Rahmeh, owner of ZR Group, was guilty, the Minister responded that he “did not know” because “it was a legal issue” (see time marker 1:30:00). He added, however, that he knew the contract was signed between the Lebanese government and Sonatrach, and that “Sonatrach has the right to subcontract the fuel shipment. In case there is something wrong with the shipment, then the Lebanese government should go after Sonatrach.” To state it simply: The agreement stipulates that Sonatrach can supply fuel from its own refineries and/or use intermediaries, but Lebanon needs to address Sonatrach in case of a dispute, and not its intermediaries. Yet this is precisely what happened when Lebanese judges issued arrest warrants for representatives of the intermediary, ZR Energy.

How did Lebanon’s judiciary get it so wrong for several months? A larger view of the issue provides a clearer picture. Individuals associated with the governing Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) have been hiding behind a pretense of fighting corruption to wage a political war against competitors of their allies. They do this primarily through public judges and prosecutors aligned with them as well as by using their media outlets to influence and mislead public opinion, including in this specific legal case where the energy company involved is outside FPM’s political circle.

As always, Lebanese citizens pay the high price of political greed and corruption. The worst outcome has been the suffering of the common people as they struggle to ration electricity amid debilitating power shortages. Unsubstantiated attacks by the government and its arms in the judiciary have prompted Sonatrach to finally withdraw its ships from the Lebanese territorial waters earlier this month. But the government’s spectacular failure in managing the energy issue, and its attempts to use an unfounded case as a means to attack opponents, will lead to even more losses. The fiasco has tarnished Lebanon’s reputation in the international community and weakened its negotiating position with the International Monetary Fund, which requires reforms in the energy sector as a condition for aid. More importantly, a country unable to demonstrate confidence in its rule of law will be hard pressed to find reliable global suppliers and long-term partners at a time it needs them the most.

Hassan Mousa is the Executive Director at the Washington D.C. based Institute for Middle East Policy (IMEP)

[serararku]

Overture: Of Plight and Purpose

<Theme>

S'era swayed and bobbed in her saddle, clutching the reins of her chocobo like her life depended on it - because it did. The dust of Thanalan still gripped her coat and hair, as did the exhaustion of battle cling to her bones. She nearly fell from her chocobo more times than she could count, no longer aware of where she was truly going; the skin of spring water bouncing on her hip was long emptied and dried, and she wouldn’t make it much further without something to drink. Through dirty goggles she eventually looked up to witness her surroundings, now realizing she was no longer at the mercy of Azeyma’s most cherished champion - the sun.

The land surrounding her was dark and barren. What was once an endless blue sky stretching onward in all directions was now scorched and muddled with thick grey clouds, yet she knew it would be folly to hope for rain. Strange crystalline spires of pink and violet stretched from the sundered earth to reach toward the cloud ceiling, and there was this choking miasma in the air that made her feel dizzy and weak. This was no place for the living.

Yet she had searched nearly everywhere else for him. She started in her ancestral homelands of Thanalan to the south; through the streets of Ul’dah, across the sun-blasted drylands, and along the rolling dunes of the Sagolii Desert. Next she searched high and low on the island of La Noscea to the west, fending off against pirates and cutthroats in Limsa Lominsa and beyond its borders. When that proved fruitless she went east until she was lost in the wooden sea of the Black Shroud. Deep in the forest all she found was frustration and danger. Out of any other options, S’era decided to go north, as that was the only direction she had left to go.

She was close, she could feel it.

Kwehzimoto squawked and chirped anxiously, twisting his head to scan their surroundings before abruptly turning off the old beaten road. S'era had just enough time to slip the device back into her coat and tug at the reins before her chocobo broke into a sprint, leaping over crags and weaving through tight crevices. "Moto!" She squeaked, covering her face before the dead branches hanging overhead raked at her skin and eyes. She was blinded from the withered trees and fragile rocks jutting out from the walls snapping against her arms, barely able to stay in her saddle from Kwehzimoto weaving through the long dead thicket.

It wasn't until the unruly chocobo slowed down to a standstill did she open her eyes. Before her sat a great lake of shimmering blue water - a stark contrast to the otherwise barren and dusty hellscape she’s witnessed so far. And she wasted no time either; the sight of fresh water filled her with renewed vigor, giving her the strength to slide down the side of her chocobo’s saddle, pluck the water skin from her pack, and collapse to her knees at the edge of the lake. The water tasted awful, or at least it should have; her maddening thirst was just the seasoning she needed to happily drink to her heart’s content, shoving her face into the cool water to chug until she felt sick. Rehydrated and refreshed, S’era sat back and wiped her face, before reaching for the skin to fill that up too. Kwehzimoto stopped halfway through his own drinking to chirp angrily at S’era, before his tail feathers bristled. Was it an intruder? A dangerous wild animal? It was neither. 

It was a corpse. S’era squinted her eyes to see a body along the edge of the lake. Arrows were buried in his back, at least three or four. Garlean arrows. Given the track marks behind him, it was likely he was dragging himself through the dust before collapsing just short of reaching the water. Two ragged ears trembled under the dead wind. They were partially hidden beneath a tangled mess of hair clogged with dried blood and sand; without a doubt he was a Miqo’te like her.

“Azeyma guide him to your endless fields of eternal sunlight.” S’era sighed, rising to her feet to approach the corpse. If nothing else, he deserved a proper burial. She looked down at him with pity, wondering if he had anything worthwhile on his person before expiring; but the ragged clothes didn’t make him appear like anyone well traveled. She reached down and grabbed one of the arrows, deciding it best to pull them all out before she began digging a hole. The first one came out clean enough.

“Argh-!” The groan nearly caused her to leap right out of her skin!

"Oh gods! You're alive?!" S'era dropped the arrow in her grasp and fell to her knees beside him. Frantically she pulled him onto his side, revealing his grimacing face and dirt-caked lips. Another groan slipped through his clenched teeth- he was desperately clinging to life. She pulled off the cork of her water skin with her teeth and began pouring a thin but steady stream into his mouth. The stranger could barely move, let alone drink, but the taste of water was enough to stir him.

"Th...thaaugh.." he mumbled, before coughing. The man opened his bright yellow eyes and stared up at S’era; if it weren’t for his ragged breath, she could have sworn he died right then and there.

She gave him a gentle smile before placing her palm against his forehead. If he didn’t bleed out first, this fever would burn right through him. “You can’t stay here… I’m going to lift you onto my chocobo, okay? This will hurt.” The man didn’t move to object, his breath weak and steady when she gripped him by the arm to pull him out of the dirt.

Kwehzimoto chirped nervously when she strapped him to the saddle. As she tugged the reins to follow the road to the nearest town, she couldn't shake that old anxious feeling. S'era strained to look across the great dusty valley before her- toward the direction this man had crawled from. Smoke billowed along the horizon as the glare of the setting sun distorted the silhouettes of large spiraling towers pointing to the sky. "A castrum?!" She hissed, taking a tentative step closer; S'tage could be there, fighting for his life!

“Uugh…” The man wheezed again, his voice weaker than before. S’era knew he didn’t have much time; his chance of survival was dubious at best, but he would definitely die by the time she reached S’tage if she didn’t get him some medical help immediately. She looked to the smoke, then to the wounded man, then back to the smoke, unsure of what- or who- to pursue; all in all she was left with a difficult choice to make. And she lacked the time to think it through.

When next the man opened his bright yellow eyes, he was greeted not to ash, dust, and darkness, but to pale light and warmth. He was laying on his back, surrounded by silk sheets and white pillows, more comfortable now than he has been in well over a year- well over a decade, even. Above him shined a light so bright and blinding, he swore it was his people’s chosen deity herself; for who else but the Goddess of the Sun blind him so effortlessly? He was adrift- alone on a sea of white water, surrounded by the comforting warmth of his goddess Azeyma, and blinded as well as dumbstruck by the searing light dangling low overhead. “This is it.” He thought to himself, humbled by her approaching beauty. “This is the end.”

“Oh. Oh!” An unfamiliar voice squeaked. He heard the hard thud of feet before they scampered off into the distance, but it was far too bright to see anything past Azeyma’s light. Yet slowly, his eyes adjusted, and the longer he squinted, the more he came to realize how false his initial fever-dream truly was.

It wasn’t the afterlife at all. He blinked until he could make sense of his surroundings, finding himself not in the presence of the Warden Herself, but in some makeshift hospital bed. The divine light was but a lantern dangling over his bed, and the warm white water was in fact his own bedsheets. Discovering how alive he remained made him both disappointed and relieved, further impounded by the fact that he was obviously not in Garlean possession again. He moved to rise from his bed and sit up straight, but the agony in his back sapped what little strength he had left, forcing him to drop the back of his head onto the sunken pillow from whence it came.

Then the door swung open, and he half-expected a Garlean interrogator to waltz in. "Good morning!" A voice beamed in between labored breaths. A lalafell waddled into the room, glistening with sweat and out of breath. "Welcome back to the land of the living!"

"Where am I…? What… how long have…"

"You're in the Revenant's Toll, and you've been in and out of it for nearly two days." She answered as sweetly as she could, lifting up her cupped hands to reveal a crisp red apple. "Here… you must be hungry."

It was agony to move. Through his pained wince he noticed the arrows sitting on the nearby table, cleaned and displayed for him. He had a dozen more questions, true, but the mention of food highlighted how hungry he truly was. The lalafellin woman waddled to the edge of his bed and graciously handed over the fruit, before turning on a heel to jump up into the seat of the chair.

"You're really lucky she found you when she did." The woman beamed at him as he devoured the offering. "Men larger and healthier than you have died from far lesser injuries. I thought you would never open your eyes again." Her smile vanished when she leaned in. "I don't mean to rush you, but your rescuer has some urgent questions regarding your former peril. Shall I let her in?"

"Aye…" Was all he could manage to say. The little woman slid off the edge of the chair and waddled back to the door, arms swinging all the way out to help keep her balance. He couldn't help but smile at how lalafells walk around, but his subtle smile didn't last long; out from the hallway stepped in a familiar face he swore he had seen in a dream before.

Short hair as black as raven feathers. Soft fair skin peppered with freckles. Full lips cracked and dry from the desert heat. And a pair of big bright eyes, one the color of ice, the other blue and deep enough to drown in. He stared at her while she cautiously approached the side of his bed, awestruck and dumbfounded. It took a conscious effort to pick his jaw off his lap; she was the first real woman he had seen in years, after all.

"My name is S'era Rarku." He snapped out of his stupor at the sound of her voice, and the mention of her surname. It was a name he knew well. "May I have yours?"

Through an itchy throat and in between ragged breaths he answered. "K'thalen Tia, lass…"

"I don't want to disturb your rest any more than necessary, so I'll get straight to the point." S'era lowered herself into the nearby chair, her eyes fixated on him. "I'm looking for a Tia. He has pale silver hair and deep orange eyes. Does that sound familiar?"

K'thalen could hear the hopeless desperation she failed to hide in her voice, so he wasn't eager to give her the good- and bad- news. "There's only one Tia I know that matches your description. You must be talking about S'tage, aye?"

Like the floodgates swinging wide open, he noticed relief wash over her face and body. She slouched in her chair before running her hands through her hair, still seemingly in disbelief. "Thank Azeyma…! My long search is finally-! Is he alive?! D-do you know where he is?! I have so much to tell him!"

"He's alive, aye. But lass… I wouldn't celebrate so soon. Tage is being held prisoner by Garlean bastards. He's locked up tight in Castrum Aeternium."

The beaming smile and light in her eyes both vanished as quickly as they first arrived. "Then I need to rescue him and bring him home."

K'thalen watched her carefully. "Much easier said than done. Much easier. We're talking about Castrum Aeternium. A fortified fortress…! You couldn't hope to sneak past all those guards, and even if you did, dragging out a prisoner would be impossible!"

"I have to try." She responded, rising to her feet. "Get some rest… and thank you for the information and warning."

He couldn't bear the thought of her marching to her death. "Many tried to rescue their loved ones, lass. All failed. And if they capture you… they'll torture you until they discover who you meant to save. Then they'll execute them and make you take their place."

Her tail bristled, but her face remained a stone mask. "They won't take me alive. I'll fight my way in, and fight my way out."

"Fight your way out? By yourself?" He ignored the blistering pain shooting up his back when he reached out to gesture at the daggers fastened to her belt. "You think those cake cutters stand a chance against reinforced Garlean steel? You wouldn't even know where to go, lass. You would be wandering blind, until they found you."

"What else can I do? I can't leave him there to die. I won't!"

K'thalen stroked his chin, deep in thought. "He won't be going anywhere. They'll keep him alive as long as he doesn't try anything." He paused long enough to gauge her reaction. "You'll need training. Proper training, lass. And lots and lots of friends."

"I don't have friends…" S'era did her best to ignore how pathetic that sounded, choosing to move on to her next point sooner than later. "Where am I supposed to get training? And what weapon would help me against Garlean machines?"

K'thalen fell silent at first, seemingly lost in thought. "... I've seen a man slice through armor as thick as a door with a sword. But you would need to find a master to teach you how to do that… and unless you have double my weight in gil…"

The idea of leaving S’tage in chains when she was less than a few hours away from reuniting with him at last put a lump in her stomach; how could she turn back now when she was so close? Maybe she could sneak into this Castrum Aeternium, avoid all the guards and sentries, find him, free him, then… then…

“Thank you for the tip. I should be heading back to the free cities to look for a master, then.” S’era politely bowed before eyeing K’thalen closely. “I’m… afraid I used up the last of my gil to give you the care you need. I hope you recover quickly, K’thalen. Goodbye and good luck…”

“H-hold on, now…” He seemed reluctant to speak, and not just because it was painful. “That makes twice you saved my life, lass… take me with you back to the Black Shroud- if I can reconnect with my old job and acquaintances then we’ll have a roof over our head. Plus, I can draw you a map of the castrum once I’ve fully recovered.”

S’era’s eyes widened a bit while her ears perked up. “You would do all that? For me?”

Slowly a pained smile spread across his face. “I owe you my life. What sort of Tia could I call myself if I didn’t pay my debts?”

[route22ny]

Ira Wilson & Son Dairy, Detroit - undated photo by Carmilo J Vergara

A post from a few weeks ago showed a relatively current photo of this place, cleaned up and for sale.  Sadly, the fascinating link at that post no longer works, a scant 4 weeks later (!)  Fortunately I saved it as a PDF, and here’s the gist of it:

***

A Tale of Two Cow Heads

It’s true! Detroit was once home to not one, but two giant cow heads. The Bovine billboards were a unique advertising gimmick designed to help promote Ira Wilson & Sons Dairy. For twenty five years one cow stood guard on the west side of Detroit, the other still watches over a decaying east side Detroit neighborhood.

The west side cow was mounted above the main entrance of the Ira Wilson & Sons Dairy, a huge complex located on the I-94 service drive at the Jeffries Freeway. The dairy was founded in 1930 and soon became one of thetop three milk producers in southeast Michigan. The 14-foot tall plastic cow head was installed in the late 1950s and was a favorite landmark for a couple of generations of Detroit children.

In 1983 Ernest W. Sharpe, chairman of the board of Wilson Dairy, decided to have the iconic landmark removed. The weathered cow had never been repaired or maintained since its installation and was in bad shape. Over the years the cow suffered major structural damage, including a rusted out steel support frame and dozens of bullet holes.

Sharpe’s plan was to store the cow head in a warehouse until repairs could be made, then reinstall it at a different location. Ira Wilson Dairy was ultimately sold to Melody Farms, who closed the I-94 dairy complex. The building is now used by the Detroit Police Department as an impound lot. The whereabouts of the cow head are unknown.

In the late 1920s the corner of Mack and Lenox in Detroit was home to a Puritan Oil filling station. Wilson purchased the property in 1955 to build a dairy store. This was their third store on Mack Avenue; the other two were in the Grosse Pointes. The Wilson Dairy Stores offered ice cream, baked goods and candy. The Mack and Lenox location was the only one with a cow head on the roof.

Wilson closed the Mack and Lenox store in the early 1960s. It reopened as Dairy Ann, and served soft serve ice cream until the early 1980s. It reopened briefly as the C & P Ice Cream Bar, then a take-out barbecue joint, but the building has been closed for more than thirty years.

The cow head had its fifteen minutes of fame when it appeared in the 2002 Eminem film 8 Mile. The film’s producers pried the plywood off the long abandoned ice cream store’s windows and gave both the building and the cow a fresh coat of paint. In the film, Eminem’s character and his posse drive in front of the building and shoot the giant cow between the eyes with a pink paintball. The owner of the building at the time didn’t want his cow defaced, so the paintball splat was created with computer graphics.

Almost fifteen years after 8 Mile’s debut, the area clearly has seen much better days. The once bustling neighborhood has transformed into a surreal urban prairie, probably the only urban prairie with a giant cow head. The remaining buildings, including the old Wilson’s Dairy store, have been tagged by graffiti vandals, but the cow head remains untouched and in remarkably good shape.

Maybe because it’s an icon of rap history, or maybe because it’s an icon of the neighborhood, it’s clear that the people in the area respect the cow.

Original link: http://detroitkidshow.com/A_Tale_Of_Two_Cow_Heads.htm

Thank you, Microsoft Print-To-PDF

https://www.camilojosevergara.com/

[broussardfxaugustere15insur-blog]

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no insurance ticket texas dismissed

[ericfruits]

Methamphetamines from Myanmar are causing problems across Asia

THE CHINESE cemetery in Kutkai, a town in the north of Myanmar’s Shan state, is a popular spot to get high. Twitchy men with gaunt faces and wild eyes lurk near its entrance. The ornate tombs provide a good place to stash drugs and weapons away from home. The “Golden Triangle”, where Laos, Myanmar and Thailand meet, has a long history of drug production and use. For centuries farmers have grown poppies on the hillsides and used them to make opium. For the past 50 years or so, much of that opium has been refined into heroin. More recently the region around Kutkai has become one of the world’s largest production hubs for methamphetamine. Yaba (Thai for “crazy drug”), which is meth mixed with various adulterants, is a fifth of the price it was a few years ago. A single pill costs only 300 kyat ($0.2).

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Across Asia, demand for drugs is shifting from heroin to meth. In 2013 each drug had a market of about $15bn in East Asia and the Pacific, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Since then the supply of heroin has tailed off, while meth production has surged (see chart ).

In 2017 some 450m yaba pills were seized in East Asia, up from 250m in 2013. Confiscations of crystal meth, a stronger, pricier form, rose from 14 tonnes to 33 tonnes. That suggests a huge market. Police guess that they seize barely a tenth of the total supply. In 2015 the region is thought to have become the biggest meth market in the world, overtaking North and Central America. Demand still seems to be rising. Of the ten countries in South-East Asia, seven say they impounded more meth in 2018 than they did in 2017, says Jeremy Douglas of the UNODC.

Much of that meth gets cooked in Myanmar’s ungoverned borderlands. Militias, which are backed by the army, and ethnic armed groups, which are not, control these areas. Drug-enforcement officials rarely venture there. When they do, the suppliers get tipped off. A raid in Kutkai in February led to the seizure of $7m-worth of meth and heroin, but no arrests. The drugmakers had already fled.

The boom has several causes. A ban on poppy-growing in 2005, although far from universally observed, prompted some drugmakers to shift to meth. Around 2010 a series of ceasefire agreements between the government and various insurgents brought enough stability to do business, but not enough to let the state intrude on it much. Better infrastructure has also made trade easier. The four-lane main road in Kutkai is smooth and uncongested. Demand has risen too, as Asia grows richer and yaba more fashionable.

Drugmakers have upgraded their factories. Unlike opium, meth is a synthetic drug made by mixing chemicals. Output on this scale requires hundreds of laboratories with special equipment, such as pressure cookers and hydrogen-gas containers, as well as generators as big as those used by hotels and thousands of tonnes of ingredients, mostly trucked in from China.

The cooking process is sophisticated. The meth produced is of a high purity. Hydrochloric acid, one component, is deadly and explodes if heated to the wrong temperature. Yet no leaks of poisonous gas or chemical blasts have been reported in Shan state. That suggests the chemists are highly skilled, says a Western law-enforcement official: “These are not just some guys making meth in a bathtub in the jungle.”

Finding out who is controlling the meth trade is tricky. Major De Khan of the Kwang Hka militia, which is based in Kutkai and has about 4,000 troops, claims to have no idea who is responsible. His group is not involved in the drugs trade, he insists, though individual members have been punished for trafficking. Experts scoff at such denials, pointing out that the army and militias maintain checkpoints on the roads and at border crossings. Lorries full of chemicals and equipment could not pass unnoticed.

The most likely explanation is that militias, ethnic insurgents and the army are all involved. The money made is probably laundered through casinos and suspiciously empty restaurants owned by militia groups. Many believe the ringleader is the United Wa State Army (UWSA), an armed group that controls large parts of Shan state and has about 30,000 soldiers. Some call it the biggest international criminal organisation in the world.

In Myanmar yaba is now a feature of life, as it has been in neighbouring Thailand for years. It has spread from partygoers to casual labourers, not always by choice. Some opium farmers in Shan state are said to receive half their pay in pills. Jade-miners are reportedly given the drug to help them work 20-hour days, and then heroin at night to relax. When miners return to their villages, they bring addiction with them.

Smuggling meth out of Myanmar is easy. One way is to convince locals to strap on a meth-filled rucksack and walk through the jungle to Thailand, Laos or China. Another method is to truck it down to the Andaman Sea, where a fishing boat will motor a few miles from shore and transfer the drugs to a bigger vessel.

International trafficking is highly profitable. The retail price of a gram of crystal meth is about $16 in Myanmar, but around $300 in Australia. So distribution networks are fanning out. Drugmakers probably rely on UWSA’s connections with organised-crime groups abroad, like China’s triads, Japan’s yakuza and Australia’s motorbike gangs. Burmese meth has reached Australia, New Zealand, South Korea and Taiwan (see map).

One fast-growing trafficking route is to Bangladesh. The number of pills recovered by authorities there has jumped from 3m in 2013 to 40m in 2017. Smugglers’ jobs have been made easier by the crisis in Rakhine state, where murdering, raping soldiers have forced 700,000 Rohingya Muslims to flee to Bangladesh. Desperate and destitute, many refugees are paid by traffickers to take yaba across the border.

The new route has caused a surge in consumption. No official data exist on users, but some estimate that there are 6m of them, or almost 4% of Bangladeshis. Low-quality pills can cost $1, less than a beer. Better ones go for about $4, says a doctoral student and former addict. Her preferred brands are “CR7”, a reference to Cristiano Ronaldo, a footballer, and “Champa”, Bengali for the frangipani flower. She began taking yaba to increase her creativity and boost her sex drive. The habit soon spiralled and she started “chasing” daily, heating a pill and inhaling the fumes.

Government responses range from promising to awful. In May Bangladesh’s government declared a “war on drugs”, inspired by similar campaigns in Thailand in 2003 and the Philippines since 2016. Like its precursors, the crackdown has become a bloodbath. Suspects are often shot dead, the result, the authorities unconvincingly claim, of shoot-outs. “We find bodies on the side of the road and in the paddy fields,” says Adilur Rahman Khan of Odhikar, a human-rights group. Since May his organisation has counted 380 extra-judicial killings of alleged drug users and sellers. The actual number could be two or three times higher, as ashamed families are reluctant to come forward when loved ones go missing.

Bangladesh would do well to learn from Thailand. The war on drugs there, which killed around 2,500 people, failed to diminish demand in the long run. It did, however, overcrowd the jails. Seven out of ten inmates are locked up for drug-related offences. The prison budget swallows half the spending of the ministry of justice. There is now a push to decriminalise drug use, and focus more on health and social services. A parliamentary vote on a new drug law is expected in early 2019.

Myanmar may be heading that way, too. Its drug-enforcement agency is understaffed and its rehab centres are underfunded. Communities shun drug users. But the government is slowly coming round, says Tom Kramer of Transnational Institute, a think-tank. In February it rolled out its first drug-control policy and amended its narcotics law. The changes stop short of decriminalisation, but do shift the focus from eradicating drugs to public-health interventions.

Such measures should help users. In time, demand for meth may fall. However, there is little hope of stemming supply. The conditions which make Myanmar’s wild borderlands an ideal place to produce drugs show no sign of changing. Up in the hills of Shan state, U San Maung Hla, the head of a village near Kutkai, shakes his head sorrowfully when asked about the future. He says a tenth of the young men in his village are drug addicts. The local rehab centre has no funding. The police do little to help. “The situation will not get better,” he sighs, “only worse.”

This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline "Breaking Burma"

[amarantine-amirite]

How The Test Wasn’t Won

Things are not what they appear. For example, you're promised a fun activity day, and then you wind up writing a boring as hell psych-ed test. 

I can only think of two occasions where I took a psych-ed test. Once when I was nine, and again when I was 16. Both times, I have missed a ballet recital to do the assessment. The first time I did the test was so I could get transferred back to my regular classes at school as opposed to being in a SpEd class (where I was the only female, since even the teacher and the helper dog were both male). In order to get me to do the test, the tester (a young woman who was an utter bitch) said that if I finished the first half of the test, I could do my recital, and then come back and do the second half of the test. Once I finished the first half of the test, she changed her mind and said that I had to do the second half of the test before I could go anywhere. By the time I did the second half of the test (which wasn't even the second half of the psych ed assessment, but the Florida State Bar Exam) my recital was over. Worse, she got mad at me for telling her (repeatedly) that she had given me the Bar Exam rather than the second half of the test. I was in a crappy mood all day, and I swore that I wouldn't be letting that happen to me again

Flash forward to when I'm 16. I have to do a psych-ed test again, this time at the behest of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Again, this test was scheduled the same day as my recital (actually, I was filling in for a girl who had been injured stealing a refrigerator.) I remembered what happened when I was 9, and thus looked for a way to get out of writing the test. I bugged one of my friends to give me a ride to the hotel where the recital was going to be, but she said that she had to go to the dentist that day (she was getting her braces off). Once I found out her dentist is only across the street from the car garage where my dad was getting his car fixed, I went with this girl straight away!

Getting the car turned out to be easier than I anticipated. Dad already paid before they fixed the car, and so all I had to do was tell them that I was picking the car up. Just like that, I was off! I didn't hit any speed traps or traffic; I just sailed. Once I got to the hotel, I parked the car in the East parking lot. I didn't expect any difficulties after that point, so I just got into my costume and got out there. Apparently, this girl was in three different dances, but was supposed to wear a green costume for all three (so that made filling in for her easy since I could just use the same costume three times).

I got through the first and second dances OK, but the third was the first one after the break. Before I could go back on, a guy called Mr Shields (who worked for the IMF and would administer the psych-ed test) demanded to know why his car was impounded. Turns out, the car was timeshared, and this week; it belonged to Mr. Shields. Told you things are not what they appear, since I wasn't expecting the car to be timeshared; much less with the dolt from the IMF who was going to proctor the test!

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

A Modern Lake in an Ancient Crater In southeastern Québec lies one of the world’s largest and oldest impact craters. Manicouagan Crater was formed 214 million years ago, near the end of the Triassic Period, when an asteroid 5 kilometers (3 miles) wide struck what is now Canada. Today, the remnants of the crater are made visible by water and, sometimes, ice. These images of Manicouagan Lake were acquired by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite on January 20, 2022. A natural-color image of the frozen lake is compared with a false-color image. In the false-color image, which uses MODIS bands 7-2-1, snow or ice appears electric blue and vegetation appears green. A blanket of snow covering the surrounding vegetation gives it a greenish-blue color. Sometimes called the "Eye of Québec," the 1,940-square-kilometer (750-square-mile) ring-shaped lake is readily identifiable from space. The unique shape makes it a popular feature in satellite imagery and a favorite subject of astronaut photography. Despite the crater’s ancient age, the events that gave rise to the lake coincided with the dawn of the Space Age. In the 1960s, Hydro-Québec constructed the Daniel-Johnson Dam—the largest multiple arch-and-buttress concrete dam in the world—on the Manicouagan River. Prior to the dam’s completion in 1968, two separate crescent-shaped lakes flanked the sides of the impact crater: Manicouagan Lake on the east and Mouchalagane (Mushalagan) Lake on the west. As the water levels rose over the next few years, the previously isolated water bodies joined to form the Manicouagan Reservoir, which finished filling in 1977. Today, the reservoir reaches a depth of roughly 350 meters (1,150 feet) and holds 140 cubic kilometers (34 cubic miles) of water, making it one of the largest freshwater reservoirs in the world. The outflow from the dam drains south into the Manicouagan River, which empties into the St. Lawrence River. After the river was impounded, water rising behind the dam encircled the higher land in the center of the impact crater; René-Levasseur Island was formed. The highest point on the island is Mount Babel, which rises 600 meters (1,970 feet) above the lake level on its northern end. Mount Babel is the crater’s central peak, which formed in the aftermath of the impact when shattered rock and debris was uplifted. Geologists estimate that the crater was initially about 100 kilometers (60 miles) wide. It has since been heavily eroded and scoured by ice sheets and today measures 72 kilometers (45 miles) in diameter. NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS LANCE and GIBS/Worldview. Story by Sara E. Pratt.

[ledenews]

Ferry's Fiscal Picture Keeps Improving

Martins Ferry’s overall financial position improved to fiscal year 2020 from the previous year, during Mayor John Davies first year in office. Davies recently told residents gathered at a town hall meeting at the rec center that the city’s budget is “more stable than we’ve seen it in a long time.” The city’s 2020 state audit stated as much. Located here, it shows that, in short, the city’s total net position increased $471,838 from 2019 to 2020, a 7-percent increase. Similar numbers will likely be shown when the 2021 audit is released later this year. After all, the city is feeling the full effects of having East Ohio Regional Hospital back up and running, from income tax revenue collected, to utility purchases by the facility. That money also filters down to secondary income tax revenue as both employees and patients of the hospital spend their dollars inside city limits, patronizing restaurants, gas stations, and other businesses. That’s money that could have gone elsewhere, had the hospital not reopened. It certainly makes a difference. “We came in and the budget was tight and now, (auditor) Rita (Randall) and (Service Director) Andy (Sutak) work really well together and keep funding and moving forward,” Davies said. “All the departments are working well together, including the people, from supervisors down to the hourly employees. They are working hand and glove for this city. “And the hospital has been a great thing, not only to us, but for the health case of the entire Ohio Valley.” Recently it was announced that Senior Services of Belmont County was officially partnering with all three major medical players locally, and not just WVU Medicine. Now, EORH and also Trinity Medical will all reap the rewards of working with the county’s agency for the elderly. That too, will provide a boost to the hospital in Ferry and, subsequently, the city’s coffers. But it’s more than just the hospital providing said boost.

Finding the Money

Within the last 10-15 years, when local government funding received cuts and funding issues needed tackled, one of the first things bandied about yet—thankfully for the employees never acted upon—was potentially eliminating the dispatcher positions in the city building. Unlike most municipalities in Belmont County, Martins Ferry dispatches its own Police, Fire, and EMS calls with employees inside the city building. But that system and those workers cost money. Their status, in the past, was put in jeopardy, at least in theory. That’s not been an issue for quite some time. “That’s never even been brought up,” Davies said. “Budget-wise, we’re pretty solid. But we’re always looking to increase our coffers.” One is the former Rose Café location in town. Recently demolished, the city will be using the property for an impound lot. Vehicles get towed and taken for an assortment of reasons. Davies figured there’s no reason the city couldn’t get in on that action and reap the benefits of vehicles in town, and potentially, from out of town. In fact, it was actually Police Chief John McFarland that approached the mayor about the idea. “Chief McFarland came up with the impound lot and we thought it was a great idea to keep generating more revenue,” Davies said. “Now when people get towed, they’ll get towed to our facility and it’ll generate revenue.” Once open and running, Davies said the chief may talk to his counterparts in both Bridgeport and Yorkville about using Ferry’s impound lot moving forward. “He’s going to run with that,” Davies said. Another boost, however, fiscally small at the moment, is the city’s taking over the running of the recreation center. The Park District, which will still run the city pool, used to run the rec center as well. The city, however, was charged with paying for the utilities as it owns the building. When the city opted to take over operational duties, it made it a point to increase offerings and, in turn, work to create a little revenue in addition to being able to pay for the utilities and the space, not at a loss. The second batting cage has been installed and both are available to teams and individuals to rent by the hour. The weight room received the influx of equipment from the school district, coming from the weight room at the field house. There’s cardio equipment in a separate room and monthly memberships are available. The racquetball court areas will soon be home to both wrestling mats and a golf simulator is in the works. The aim is to not only make the rec center a beacon of activity for residents of all ages, but a positive portion of the city’s ledger. It’s little things like that, when coupled together with an overall town-wide mission to move the Purple City forward and further into the black, that seem to be working. The administration and employees, along with non-profits and private businesses are all on board in helping revitalize the city. The budget shows that much, and when the next audit is released, the numbers won’t lie. Read the full article

[livinginlandmarketing]

Here are the restaurants and other food facilities that Riverside County Department of Environmental Health inspectors temporarily shut down because of imminent health hazards between Sept. 2 and 9, 2021. If no reopening date is mentioned, the department had not listed that facility as reopened as of this publication.

Wendy’s, 735 N. Main St., Corona

Closed: Sept. 9

Grade: 98/A, passing, issued after reopening

Reason: No water. The restaurant had continued operating without hot or cold potable water after a water main had broken.

Reopened: Later that day after the water main was repaired

Chris Burgers, 28325 Winchester Road, Winchester

Closed: Sept. 8

Grade: 80/B, failing

Reason: Insufficient refrigeration. The walk-in refrigerator and three other coolers were impounded for not keeping cold. About 45 containers of food had to be discarded and the restaurant had to close because it didn’t have enough working refrigerators to operate. This was the restaurant’s second closure this year (there was a sewage backup in May) and its fifth failed inspection in the past three years; it now faces a permit suspension/revocation hearing.

La Michoacana Famous Ice Cream Parlor, 2560 N. Perris Blvd. Suite G8, Perris

Closed: Sept. 7

Grade: 94/A, passing

Reason: No hot water. The person in charge told the inspector the water heater had broken and they were waiting on a replacement.

Reopened: Later that day

Ristorante Mamma Gina, 73705 El Paseo, Palm Desert

Closed: Sept. 7

Grade: 97/A, passing, issued after reopening

Reason: Rodent infestation. The inspector saw rodent droppings on equipment throughout the cook line, and said all equipment was dirty and stained.

Reopened: Sept. 8 after a visit from pest control; the inspector saw no more droppings

Snack bar at Santana Park East, 2830 Kellogg Ave., Corona

Closed: Sept. 2

Grade: Not graded

Reason: Rodent infestation. The inspector saw two live mice caught in a sticky trap, and droppings inside the ice machine. The person in charge said pest control had visited the day before and put out the traps. This is the second time in just under a year that the snack bar has been closed because of rodents.

Non-closure inspections of note

Here are selected inspections at facilities that weren’t closed but had significant issues.

Jensen’s Finest Foods, at 73601 Highway 111 in Palm Desert, was inspected Sept. 9 and received grades of 84/B in the deli, 91/A in the bakery and 97/A in the main market. There was one critical violation in the deli: The walk-in cooler was 48 degrees inside (41 or below is required) and several containers of food were at unsafe temperatures. Among the other violations, there were flies in the deli and seafood areas, and stagnant water in a pit on the floor in the bakery where a dishwasher had been.

Oceana Restaurant, at 77932 Country Club Drive Suites 2-4 in Palm Desert, was inspected Sept. 7 and received a failing grade of 80/B with three critical violations. The dishwasher wasn’t dispensing enough sanitizer (it was repaired right away) and surfaces weren’t being wiped down with sanitizer. Bread crumbs were being stored in a bucket that had contained dishwashing soap (containers that held chemicals can’t be repurposed for food). And the manager had a burn on his hand that wasn’t covered by a bandage or glove. Among the six other violations, fish weren’t being thawed safely and a bottle of wine was stashed in the ice machine, touching ice used in customers’ drinks.

Related Articles

Cockroaches, no hot water: Restaurant closures, inspections in San Bernardino County, Sept. 2-9

Cockroaches, water issues: Restaurant closures, inspections in Riverside County, Aug. 27-Sept. 2

Rodents in the mall: Restaurant closures, inspections in San Bernardino County, Aug. 27-Sept. 2

Rodents, foodborne illness: Restaurant closures, inspections in San Bernardino County, Aug. 20-26

Roaches, broken cooler, fire damage: Restaurant closures, inspections in Riverside County, Aug. 18-26

About this list

This list is published online on Fridays. Any updates as restaurants are reopened will be included in next week’s list.

All food facilities in the county are routinely inspected to ensure they meet health codes. A facility loses four points for each critical violation — and may have to close if the violation can’t be corrected immediately — and one or two points for minor violations. An A grade (90 to 100 points) is passing. Grades of B (80 to 89 points) and C (79 or below) are failing and typically require the proprietor to make improvements and be re-inspected.

For more information on inspections of these or any restaurants in Riverside County, visit restaurantgrading.rivcoeh.org. To submit a health complaint about a restaurant, go to www.rivcoeh.org/Complaint or call 888-722-4234 during business hours or 951-782-2968 after-hours.

Sign up for The Localist, our daily email newsletter with handpicked stories relevant to where you live. Subscribe here.

-on September 10, 2021 at 09:04AM by Nikie Johnson

[juniperpublishers-civileng]

Instrumentation Issues and Problems in Earth Dams(Case Study; Shah Qasim Dam in Yasouj, Iran)- Juniper Publishers

Abstract

Installation and monitoring of instrumentation is one of the practical methods for controlling safety and stability of earth dams. Piezometers existing in dam body and dam abutments are one of the various types of precision instruments used in dams, which indicate the height of water level in different parts of the dam. In order to evaluate the performance of piezometers of Shah Qasim Dam in Kohgiluyeh and Boyerahmad province (in south east of Iran), we compare water level changes in piezometer and water level changes in the dam lake over time. In this paper, the above-mentioned dam is modelled using the SEEP/W software, then after imposing boundary conditions, water levels are computed at various points. For more accurate comparison, water level changes are plotted in transverse and longitudinal piezometers over time. The results of analysis indicate significant increase of permeability in vicinity of some piezometers. The piezometers BX4, BX14, BX13 and SP6, and the region near them, as well as piezometers SP24 and SP18 and their surrounding area, have critical conditions which should be inspected as soon as possible.

Keywords:Earth dam; Piezometer; Water level; Instrumentation

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Introduction

The importance of monitoring programs for dam safety is widely accepted. A well designed and executed instrumentation monitoring program can provide information that is needed for a solid understanding of the ongoing performance of a dam and may help detect early warning signs of trouble, [1]. Monitoring programs, including instrumentation and visual inspection, result in better estimation of probability of failure for dam owners. Furthermore, prediction of maintenance cost and rehabilitation time of the dam would be an easy issue using instrumentation. Many researchers and scientists have been interested in assessment of performance of various types of dams by analyzing and processing reliable data prepared by inserted instruments and modern monitoring settlements. Dam safety monitoring program for earthen dams has been considered by the National Hydrologic Warning Council in November 11, 2013. Modes of dam failure and monitoring and measuring techniques were investigated under the supervision of environment agency of England (Almog, E, 2011). A comprehensive research with the title [2]; Evaluating and Maintaining Piezometers, Relief Wells, and Drains were performed by Charles N. Easton et al for Association of State Dam Safety Officials, Inc (2016). There are a practical project about instrumentation of large dams which is issued by the ministry of water resources of india (2017). Well-planned and implemented monitoring is an essential component of successful dam construction and operation. Dam monitoring is subject to numerous regulations [3] and in many countries it is regulated by strict administrative standards (SMARTEC SA, 2017). Masoumi et al, considered reliable monitoring of embankment dams with optimal selection of geotechnical instruments (2017). Behaviors of earth and rockfill dams during construction and initial impounding using instrumentation data and numerical modeling were evaluated by Rashidi and Haeri (2016). In this research, we have evaluated problems and difficulties related to inserting monitoring settlements and measuring instruments in earth dams [4]. The target dam is an earth dam near Yasouj, center of Kohgiluyeh and Boyerahmad province in south east of Iran. In the Shah Qasim Dam, which was exploited in the mid-1970s, there is a considerable leakage and water escape due to some problems (design, implementation and monitoring), according to field observations; for this purpose, downstream lands are drained.

Leakage from the body and abutments of a dam threatens its stability [5]. The leakage from the dam destructs the dam structure due to underwater phenomenon over time and destroys parts of Yasouj and leads to considerable damages to agriculture and industries located at downstream. Therefore, a comprehensive study is essential to investigate the problem of leakage from the body and foundation of the Shah Qasim dam. General objectives of this research are:

1. Evaluating performance of different dam components by comparing numerical and field results.

2. Determining parts of the dam which have an unreasonable function.

Geotechnical precision instrument was invented as a tool for helping workshop observations in the 1930s and 1940s. Early measuring systems of precision instruments were simple hydraulic and mechanical tools and were mostly used by experts and designers who purposefully sought to measure their estimated parameters [6]. Safety of structures must be ensured during operation; thus, monitoring of this period is a reliable and appropriate way to ensure the safety of structures. Dams like living creatures always require care and maintenance. Management of water resources and exploitation of dams and hydroelectric power stations are vital through continuous monitoring. Since observation and monitoring of earth dams is very important during construction phase and exploitation phase, therefore, suilevel tools and equipment are installed in dam foundation, lateral abutments, dam body and lateral structure and the resulting data is analyzed continuously in order to achieve this goal [7]. In addition to assessing the current behavior of a dam, availability of this type of data will allow assessment of accuracy of the predicted parameters at the design phase and provide designers and engineers with a more thorough scientific basis for designing structures to be built in the future. In the Shah Qasim Dam, no precision instruments such as strain gauges, barometers and inclinometers have been installed. Among common precision instruments, there are only piezometric and accelerator wells in the Shah Qasim earth dam.

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Materials and Methods

The Shah Qasim dam is located at coordinates X = 554440 eastern longitude and Y = 3382851 northern latitude and 15 km south of the Yasouj city. It is an earth dam with thick core. Crest length is 220 meters, the river elevation is 1860 meters alongside the dam, normal water elevation is 1894, and crest elevation of the dam is 1896 meters above sea level. Volume of the lake is 9 million cubic meters and the regulated volume is 12 million cubic meters. The dam was constructed to irrigate about 1800 hectares of Servak plain in the vicinity of Yasouj and provide a recreationaltourist center for tourism attraction. Figure 1 shows its plan of geological, and Figure 2 shows position of piezometers on the body and abutments of the Shah Qasim dam [1].

The first step in monitoring the dam is to study piezometer data of this dam. For 105 days, the height of the water level in perimeters of the dam and abutments was recorded by a catheter. To obtain calculation data, the dam was modelled in Seep/w software; boundary conditions were applied to calculate water level values in various parts. Seep/w is a software product with limited elements which can be used to model displacement and distribution of pore pressure inside porous materials such as soil and rock. Its comprehensive and extensive formulation allows analysis of simple and very complex problems of water leakage. This software is used in analysis and design of geotechnical, developmental, hydrological, and mining projects.

To quantify the difference between precision instrument data and the results obtained from numerical formula, relative error (RE) percentage was used as follows:

Greater REs indicates high difference between numerical results and precision instrument; smaller REs (closer to zero) indicate high correlation between numerical results and precision instrument. For further study, performance of piezometers existing in a longitudinal or transverse axis was examined in terms of physical principles, and physically dysfunctional piezometers were determined.

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Results and Discussion

Observed and Calculated Results of Water Level

At first, water level variations of piezometers and the dam lake were plotted over time. For example, Table 1 shows variations in the piezometer SP23 and (Figure 3) shows variations in piezometer BX5. At the upper level, variations in observed data and calculated data were similar. At the lower level, observed data was more than calculated data, which was due to increased permeability. Thus, it had logical function.

It can be claimed that it functioned properly. Although the difference was greater in the lower levels, it was not high enough to cause a problem and the piezometer had no problem (Figure 4). For better comparison, variations in water level of piezometers were plotted over time for transverse and longitudinal axes.

Comparison of Transverse Axis

Figure 5 shows physically proper functioning of the A-A axis; water level decreased with the movement from upstream to downstream of the dam. Physically, water always moves from a higher level to a lower level. Regarding this, the concept of hydraulic gradient is presented by;

Where, 1 h is upstream pressure equivalent height; 2 h is downstream pressure equivalent height; l is the distance between 1 and 2.

At B-B axis, water level of the piezometer SP6 was lower than water level of the piezometers SP5 and SP4. Thus, the above rule was violated because the piezometer SP6 was located on upstream, while it had lower pressure equivalent height than downstream piezometers. Therefore, the piezometer SP6 or its surroundings were dysfunctional (Figure 6). At C-C, the water level, moving from SP18 to SP17, suddenly had a high upward jump. Physically, the fluid travels from a point with more energy to a point with less energy; therefore, upstream piezometer should have a higher water level than downstream observational well. In this way, this law was violated. Thus, results of the piezometer SP18 indicate a problem (Figure 4).

Longitudinal Axis

At the E-E axis, only SP3 and BX12 functioned properly and logically. Water level should be close to each other in all piezometers of this axis, while it was 15 m lower in SP6 and SP24, 20 m lower in BX14 and approximately 25 m lower in BX13. Given the close proximity of SP6, BX14 and BX13, a major problem can be expected in this area (Figure 7). All piezometers in the F-F axis functioned logically; permeability increased in their surroundings. Observed water level was more than calculated water level. Perhaps the reason for differences in water level of these piezometers can be explained by the difference in permeability along the dam and the fact that permeability changed curly along the dam (Figure 8). At the D-D axis, water level was even lower in SP24 than the water level in the last piezometer of this axis and violated physical rules, as well as the SP18. The close proximity to SP24 proves the existence of a problem in the vicinity of these two piezometers or a problem with two piezometers (Figure 9).

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Conclusion

Function of piezometers is summarized in Table 2. BX4, BX14, BX13, SP6 or close proximity of these piezometers, as well as SP24 and SP18 or the area surrounding these piezometers have a fundamental problem requiring rapid examination, because water level in this area is very low; this is despite the fact that these piezometers are located above the dam. Permeability increased in the area surrounding some of the piezometers, particularly near A-A transverse axis.

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23 year-old Phoenix Coldon disappeared from her family’s Spanish Lake, Missouri home on the evening of December 18th, 2011. Earlier that day, Phoenix attended church and did some shopping with her family. After returning home, Phoenix sat in her 1998 Chevy Blazer in her family’s driveway. She did this often at home while making phone calls. Phoenix’s father said he saw her drive away from the house around 2:20pm. He thought she was possibly just going to the convenience store around the corner and that she would be back soon. Unfortunately, Phoenix did not return and that was the last time that her father has seen her.

A few hours later, around 5:30 p.m., Phoenix's car was found abandoned at an intersection in East St. Louis. It was still running, the driver's side door was open and her purse was inside. Not knowing that the car belonged to a missing person, St. Louis police had the car towed to an impound lot. Phoenix’s parents began to worry about her around midnight when they were unable reach her, and spent the following day calling their friends and relatives to look for her. Eventually, her parents called the police to report her missing. The police subsequently plugged her license plate number into a database and found nothing. Phoenix’s car sat at the impound lot for more than two weeks until it was eventually spotted by one of Phoenix’s relatives on January 2nd, 2012.

Police have never publicly announced any suspects or persons of interest in Phoenix’s disappearance. Sometime before her disappearance, Phoenix’s family found out that she had been in a relationship with a man that nobody in her family knew about. When Phoenix was 18, she moved out of her parent’s house and told them that she had moved in with a female friend. Phoenix’s mother, Gloria, had signed a lease for Phoenix’s apartment. At some point, Gloria found out that Phoenix was actually living there with an older man. Not much is known about what happened after this discovery, but Phoenix moved back in with her parents sometime in 2011. Gloria has tried to reach out to this man on many occasions since Phoenix’s disappearance, but he has never responded. Despite this, both police and Gloria do not believe this man is a suspect in Phoenix’s disappearance. Gloria, however, does believe that he may have introduced Phoenix to a “bad crowd” and that he may have some valuable information.

If you think you have any information pertaining to Phoenix’s case, please contact the St. Louis police department at (314) 615-5400.