#john is also half-exempt

[pennielane]

THE BEATLES in the PAPERBACK WRITER music video, 1966

[justinspoliticalcorner]

John Knefel at MMFA:

Project 2025, a sprawling right-wing plan to provide policy and staffing to a future Republican president, proposes an extreme anti-worker agenda that would severely curtail unions’ ability to collectively bargain on behalf of their members and reverse gains organized labor has made in recent years. It would also weaken overtime regulations, give corporations wider latitude in misclassifying workers as independent contractors, and dismantle safety regulations that prohibit young people from working dangerous jobs.

The initiative’s policy book, Mandate for Leadership, is an attempt to roll back New Deal-era, working class victories by allowing state-level exemptions from the National Labor Relations Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act, and by creating nonunion “employee involvement organizations” to undermine unions’ negotiating power. It additionally calls for sharp reductions in the budgets of the National Labor Relations Board and the Department of Labor and a freeze on new hires. Project 2025 is organized by The Heritage Foundation and includes more than 100 conservative groups on its advisory board, which have collectively received more than $55 million from groups tied to conservative megadonors Leonard Leo and Charles Koch. Leo has been pushing the Supreme Court to further erode the power of organized labor, and the Koch family has waged a war on unions for more than 60 years.

[...]

Project 2025: Eviscerate overtime and dismantle pro-worker regulations

One central proposal in Mandate that illuminates Project 2025’s extreme anti-work posture is the suggestion that employers should be allowed to eviscerate overtime regulations and potentially withhold pay. The attacks on overtime take several forms, including a proposal to allow workers to accrue vacation instead of time-and-a-half compensation — but at least 40 percent of lower- and middle-income workers already don’t use their allotted paid time off. Under this policy employers could coerce workers into “voluntarily” selecting vacation that they’re either formally or informally prohibited from taking, thereby denying them overtime compensation. Project 2025 further recommends that workers and bosses agree to extend the overtime threshold to a period of two weeks or one month. The policy would empower management to overload busy weeks with extra-long shifts and take advantage of slow periods through under-scheduling — effectively eliminating overtime altogether. 

[...]

A return to company unionism

Project 2025 seeks to roll back New Deal-era labor victories by proposing that Congress “pass legislation allowing waivers from federal labor laws” — like the National Labor Relations Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act — “under certain conditions.” Allowing state-level exemptions to the NLRA and FLSA would almost certainly trigger a race-to-the-bottom dynamic, where firms relocate to states with the weakest (or nonexistent) labor protections at the expense of workers. That’s what happened in states that passed so-called “right-to-work” laws — which starve unions of resources by preventing them from collecting fees from all employees they represent, thereby creating a free-rider problem — where employers were able to depress wages and union membership.    Unions have made significant gains under the Biden administration’s National Labor Relations Board, which enforces labor law and investigates anti-union practices. That progress is largely thanks to NLRB general counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, who has taken an aggressive, pro-worker enforcement posture. Project 2025 promises to fire her on “Day One.” It also calls for reductions in the budgets of the NLRB and the Department of Labor to the “low end of the historical average,” as well as implementing a “hiring freeze for career officials.” 

[...] Project 2025 would further undermine unions by eliminating “card check” — where a majority of workers who have signed union authorization forms can ask their employer for voluntary recognition — and mandating “the secret ballot exclusively.” Although the idea of a secret ballot has the veneer of democracy, in practice it’s a power grab for management. By forcing organizers to go through the byzantine NLRB election process, an employer can buy itself time to wage an anti-union campaign and bog down the process, often through illegal means. A 2019 study found that employers violated labor laws in 41.5% of NLRB-supervised union elections in 2016 and 2017 and intimidated or coerced workers in nearly a third of all elections. 

The radical right-wing Project 2025 spearheaded by The Heritage Foundation in association with over 100 organizations has an agenda attacking labor and unions.

[justforbooks]

The actor Ian Lavender, who has died aged 77, played the awkward, impulsive Private Frank Pike in the long-running BBC comedy Dad’s Army, and was the last surviving member of the cast who portrayed Captain Mainwaring’s Home Guard platoon.

Most of the part-time soldiers depicted in the series, which ran from 1968 to 1977, were exempted from call-up to the army during the second world war because of advanced age. Pike, their junior in most cases by several decades, had been excused because of his weak chest, and always wore the scarf insisted upon by his widowed mum, Mavis.

In spite of their foibles and foolishness, Mainwaring’s pomposity and the frequent slapstick sequences, the heroes of Dad’s Army were courageous men prepared to give their lives to protect their country, and it was this innate nobility that lifted the series, written by David Croft and Jimmy Perry, to greatness. At its peak it had more than 18 million weekly viewers, and is still regularly rerun.

There were many catchphrases – Lance Corporal Jones’s “Don’t panic!”, Private Frazer’s “We’re doomed!” and Sergeant Wilson’s languid “Do you think that’s wise, sir?” – and the best-remembered belongs to the gangster movie-fixated Pike, though he did not utter it himself: Mainwaring’s weary “You stupid boy!”

Pike was also involved in Dad’s Army’s most frequently quoted joke. “What is your name?” snarls the German U-boat commander who has been captured by the platoon. “Don’t tell him, Pike,” shouts Mainwaring. There was often great subtlety in the inter-platoon relationships, best exemplified by that of Pike and Wilson (John Le Mesurier). Wilson, whom Pike calls Uncle Arthur, is Mrs Pike’s lodger, and is forever fussing around the boy, making sure his scarf is on tight and gently steering him away from danger. It was not until the end of the final series that Lavender asked Croft if “Uncle Arthur” was actually Pike’s father. “Of course,” replied Croft.

Born in Birmingham, Ian was the son of Edward, a policeman, and Kathleen (nee Johnson), a housewife; his mother often took him to see pantomimes, variety shows and Saturday morning cinema, which gave him his first ambitions to become an actor. After performing in many school drama productions at Bournville boys’ technical school he was accepted, with the help of a grant from the city of Birmingham, by the Bristol Old Vic acting school. Clearly far from being a stupid boy, he passed 12 O-levels and four A-levels. “The only reason I don’t have a degree is because I went to drama school,” he said years later.

He made his first television appearance soon after he graduated from Bristol in 1968, playing an aspiring writer whose family want him to get a proper job, in Ted Allan’s play for the Half Hour Story series, Flowers at My Feet, with Angela Baddeley and Jane Hylton.

In the same year, he was cast as Pike, joining the seasoned veterans of comedy and the classics Le Mesurier, Arthur Lowe (Mainwaring), Clive Dunn (Jones), John Laurie (Frazer), James Beck (Private Walker), Arnold Ridley (Private Godfrey) and Bill Pertwee as Air Raid Warden Hodges. Janet Davies played Mrs Pike.

While Dad’s Army catapulted Lavender to national fame at the age of 22, the role of Pike haunted him for the rest of his long career. Not that he had any complaints.

Asked in 2014 if he got fed up with a lifetime of having “stupid boy” called out to him in the street, he replied: “I’m very proud of Dad’s Army. If you asked me ‘Would you like to be in a sitcom that was watched by 18 million people, was on screen for 10 years, and will create lots of work for you and provide not just for you but for your children for the next 40-odd years?’ – which is what happened – I’d be a fool to say ‘Bugger off.’ I’d be a fool to have regrets.”

After Dad’s Army, Lavender made further television appearances, including Mr Big (1977), with Peter Jones and Prunella Scales, and in 1983 he revived Pike for the BBC radio sitcom It Sticks Out Half a Mile, a sequel to Dad’s Army, but it was not a success and lasted only one series. In contrast, the original series, with most of the regular cast, had been rerecorded for radio from 1974 to 1976 and proved very popular.

He was also in the BBC TV series Come Back Mrs Noah (1977-78), co-written by Croft; and played Ron in a new version of The Glums (1979) for London Weekend Television, adapted from Frank Muir and Denis Norden’s original radio scripts of the 1950s. There were more smallish television parts in the 80s, such as two episodes of Yes, Minister, and bits in Keeping Up Appearances, Goodnight Sweetheart, Rising Damp and Casualty. He starred in the unsuccessful BBC series The Hello Goodbye Man in 1984 and provided the lead voice in the children’s cartoon series PC Pinkerton in 1988.

He was also in various quiz shows, including Cluedo (1990). On Celebrity Mastermind, broadcast on BBC1 on New Year’s Day 2009, when the presenter John Humphrys asked him to state his name, a fellow contestant, Rick Wakeman, shouted: “Don’t tell him, Pike!”

In addition to co-starring in the first film version of Dad’s Army (1971), he appeared in various low-level British sex farces of the 1970s, including Confessions of a Pop Performer (1975), Carry on Behind (1975), Adventures of a Taxi Driver (1976) and Adventures of a Private Eye (1976). He also starred in the thriller 31 North 62 East (2009). “I was close to getting two very big movies in the 70s,” he said without rancour in 2014, “but in the end they said: ‘We can’t get past Private Pike.’”

Lavender’s second best-known role was his delicate and sympathetic portrayal of Derek Harkinson, Pauline Fowler’s gay friend, in the BBC soap EastEnders from 2001 to 2005, and again in 2016-17.

In addition to various live Dad’s Army productions, his stage work included the Royal Shakespeare Company’s The Merchant of Venice, directed by Peter Hall and with Dustin Hoffman as Shylock in 1989, touring as the Narrator in The Rocky Horror Show in 2005, Monsignor Howard in the London Palladium production of the musical Sister Act in 2009, The Shawshank Redemption at the Edinburgh fringe in 2013, and his own one-man show of reminiscences, Don’t Tell Him, Pike.

Lavender had a great admiration for Buster Keaton, and was an expert on the silent comedian’s career. In 2011 he introduced Keaton’s Sherlock Jr (1924) at the Slapstick silent comedy festival in Bristol, and commented that finding Keaton’s grave in the Fountain Lawns cemetery in Hollywood had been one of his life’s special moments.

In 2016 a new cinema version of Dad’s Army was released, with Toby Jones as Mainwaring and Bill Nighy as Wilson. Private Pike was played by Blake Harrison, and Lavender was promoted to play Brigadier Pritchard. In a touching in-joke, his younger face was also seen on an advertisement poster in a street scene.

Lavender is survived by his second wife, Miki Hardy, whom he married in 1993; by his sons, Sam and Daniel, from his first marriage, to the actor Suzanne Kershiss, which ended in divorce; and by two granddaughters.

🔔 Arthur Ian Lavender, actor, born 16 February 1946; died 2 February 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[soullessjack]

so let’s say hypothetically (not really) all the apprentices are autistic (they are) headcanon them

rubs my hands together like a little fly

to start, I think they all have a strong sense of justice. I mean, Mark’s whole motive for setting up Seth’s inescapable saw trap and subsequently becoming an apprentice was literally getting justice for his sister’s death when he saw the system wouldn’t do anything about it. Amanda was a victim of systemic injustice via Eric framing her and turning her into a junkie, and she enacts her own justice on him and others as an apprentice. I feel like this could also be why the apprentices are so swayed into John’s ideology; it’s a solid structure and a clear routine and it follows through on their own senses of justice and morality.

Gordon’s a low-empathy autistic for sure. Kramer makes it a point that he coldly breaks the most emotionally destroying news of inoperability or death to his patients/their families, and he remains collected throughout the beginning of the bathroom trap with open annoyance at Adam for panicking instead of acting the way he thinks is better, with astute rationale. He’s also unable to really care about the situation until it becomes personal and his wife and daughter are revealed to have been threatened as well.

There’s also his issues with lying, and the fact that he holds other people to a standard he exempts himself from because of personal justification/inability to empathize. He accuses Adam of being a liar despite literally lying to his wife, and furthermore says adam is a terrible liar despite telling Alison the half-truth at best.

[jackienautism]

No queen it’s not ridiculous to block that person. Like lynnmanda is the one semi popular wlw ship in this fandom when it’s a sea of white dudes and to literally turn them into guys like ?? Why do you hate gay woman (also low key who is it I wanna block )

OK IM GLAD IM NOT JUST BEING A BITCH LMAO THANK YOU DEAR ANON. but yeah . i feel awful like vagueing and bitching but im TIRED of seeing it and ive only been here for NOT EVEN a month. andit like ??? it wasnt even in a necessarily trans context either..... meaning they dont necessarily see them as trans or anything. atleast to my knowledge . just turning them into guys just cause YOU find it more appealing is BAD imo. ESP WHEN FANDOM HATES WOMEN TO BEGIN WITH

AND NO LITERALLY????? like. im not gonna be like this pairing is revolutionary! when amanda is still white. and they canonically arent a fan of each other😭 due to the situation they both were put it. but just. the fact that lynn is a poc... and that its between 2 girls... LIKE. as a mixed (race) lesbian im THRILLED to see something like this in a fandom im relatively interested in. so to a degree, yes!!! it is important! esp to me! and i KNOW that asia is a huge country and that the sections are WILDLY different.b tu asian girl.......... in a pretty popular pairing............. makes me very happy

AND I DONT WANNA GET INTO IT BUT LMAOOOOOOOO yeah . like. saw as a whole isnt great when it comes to representation. which like. why shoudl it be bc youre wayching these ppl be tortured lol . but yeah. to the bits that they DO give us, im gonna latch onto it!!!!!! bc im gonna be real w/ you! i dont give a FUCK abt adam or lawrence or hoffman or john! and those are like ! the biggest characters in the fandom! once again, not saying amanda is exempt from this, since she too is white but. you get ewhat im saying

SORRY IM JUST RAMBLING AT THIS POINT LMAO but seriously..... i feel bad bc they HAVE made stuff for and w/ gay women before (2 of like their many many other art pieces though, mind you) but they've only ever drawn lynnmanda in an amanda and adam swap i believe? but that wasnt like . a full piece of anything. but its just......... ughhhh cmon now. read the room. genderbends in general im very ,........ iffy with. bc half of the time they ARENT done well. but come ON. IM SORRY BUT IT LOOKS WEIRD WHEN YOU TURN 2 OF THE ONLY BIG WOMEN OF THE FANDOM INTO GUYS😭😭😭😭 JUST CAUSE YOU /FEEL/ LIKE IT

dont mind me im just tryign to justify my bitchiness lmao. im just TIRED!!!!!!!! DRAW THEM NORMALLY IDC

and ill get the name in one sec anon LMAO

[scotianostra]

The Poet and author George MacDonald died on September 18th 1905.

George MacDonald might not be a name you are familiar with, but he was friends and was admired by some of the 19th century’s most famous writers, as seen in the group pic.

After being raised in Huntley, Aberdeenshire, by devout Calvinist parents, he attended King's College in Aberdeen. At Highbury Theological College, he received his divinity degree, and in 1850 he became a pastor of a Congregational church in Arundel. Early the following year, he married Louisa Powell, with whom he enjoyed a long and happy marriage.

McDonald was forced to resign his pulpit in 1853 because he liked to dabble in "German theology," meaning the new higher critical approach to biblical studies emerging from that country. He never took another church but spent the rest of his life lecturing, preaching, and especially writing.

Between 1851 and 1897, he wrote over 50 books in all manner of genre: novels, plays, essays, sermons, poems, and fairy tales. And then there were his two fantasies for adults, Phantastes and Lilith. During these years, Lewis Carroll became a good friend and gave him the first manuscript of Alice in Wonderland to read to his children. Other British literary luminaries—like John Ruskin, Charles Kingsley, Lord Tennyson, and Matthew Arnold—were among his associates and admirers.

When McDonald visited the United States in 1872 for a lecture tour, the likes of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Greenleaf Whittier, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and Mark Twain paid him homage. After his stay in New York City, one large Fifth Avenue church offered him the almost unheard of salary of $20,000 a year to become its pastor. MacDonald thought the idea preposterous.

His success did not exempt him from more-than-ordinary suffering. Poverty plagued him so much that his family occasionally faced literal starvation. His own lungs were diseased, and tuberculosis killed two brothers and two half-sisters. It also ravaged his children, four of whom died before him. He himself had a stroke at age 74 and lapsed into virtual silence for the last seven years of his life.

C.S. Lewis who wrote that he regarded MacDonald as his "master": "Picking up a copy of Phantastes one day at a train-station bookstall, I began to read. A few hours later," said Lewis, "I knew that I had crossed a great frontier” G K Chesterton cited The Princess and the Goblin as a book that had "made a difference to my whole existence."

Looking through George McDonalds poems I found amongst them two very famous one, Little Boy Blue, and Little Bo Peep. Now am not sure if he first created them, but just to see these was an eye opener. Most of his verse is religious, but I found one I really like in the Scots Tongue.

ANE BY ANE.

Ane by ane they gang awa’,

The Getherer gethers grit an smaa;

Ane by ane maks ane an aa.

Aye whan ane sets doun the cup

Ane ahint maun tak it up:

Yet thegither thy will sup!

Goulden-heidit, ripe an strang,

Shorn will be the hairst or lang:

Syne begins a better sang!

[pauls1967moustache]

6, 19, 29 :)

6. Favorite title you used

Aninut! i was really stuck on a title for that one. i was literally at the posting stage like "well i can't call this paul grief.docx anymore". couldn't think of a default song title that was appropriate, but i'd been thinking about the general concept of sitting shiva, and how that was something the beatles definitely should've done after brian (especially our favourite workaholic, paul!). so i started googling jewish mourning traditions to see if there was anything i could use, and came across the concept of aninut, which is the period between learning of a loved one's death and the burial, in which mourners are exempt from prayer and other actions, in order to organise funeral arrangements. i liked it because it's a short period of time (like the time between brian's death and mmt) and there's the sad irony of paul painstakingly trying to arrange for ways to keep the band together and moving forward (which is his own sort of metaphorical funeral arrangement but also the complete opposite of what the jewish tradition would have him doing).

19. What’s one pairing you want to explore next year?

while we're on the topic of aninut... paul/brian :) i have half an idea for a fic, but i need to flesh it out, still.

29. Favorite line/passage you wrote this year?

this is hard bc i'm very proud of everything i wrote tbh. i absolutely love the scene between john and jane in i thought i knew you, what did i know.

also idk why but i love the vibe in this little paragraph in Angles:

The camera shakes a moment, and then stills, abruptly. The picture is a blur, and—with the camera angled like that—upright. It's hard to tell what's happening, though the contrasting lights and darks make sense. He can tell the parts of them that are hair, and the parts of them that are legs. The rest is out of focus—their bodies blending together like watercolours. The two of them amalgamated into one formless shape, moving eerily in the sunlight. That's us, Paul thinks, something strange, and broad, and heavy blossoming in his chest. It's like watching a dream.

[coochiequeens]

The last days of 2022 had some good news for women

The U.S. Senate passed two acts that help working moms who are pregnant or breastfeeding. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act (known as the PUMP Act) were added to the 2023 omnibus spending bill, which now passed the Senate and is headed for a House vote.

The PUMP Act

The PUMP Act for nursing mothers requires organizations to provide time and space for breastfeeding parents. The Affordable Care Act of 2010 already requires that employers provide reasonable time to express breast milk and provide a place for pumping, other than the bathroom, that is shielded from view and private.

But the previous pumping law excluded most salaried employees, and the PUMP Act will extend these rights to all breastfeeding employees for the first year of the baby’s life. In addition, the new bill states, “Further, time spent to express breast milk must be considered hours worked if the employee is also working.”

According to the Surgeon General, breastfeeding can help protect babies from illnesses like ear infections, diarrhea and pneumonia and longer-term conditions such as obesity and asthma. It also lowers mothers’ risk of breast and ovarian cancer. Three out of four mothers in the U.S. start breastfeeding at birth, but only 13% of babies are exclusively breastfed by the end of six months.

One study in the journal Pediatricsestimates that if 90% of U.S. families breastfed for six months, the U.S. would save $13 billion from reduced medical and other costs and prevent over 900 infant deaths. In addition, individual families would save up to $1500 per year in infant formula costs.

The complications involved with pumping at work may contribute to women’s decision to stop breastfeeding. Nearly half of moms have expressed concern that breastfeeding at work could impact their career growth, according to a survey by a breast pump maker. And almost half of these women have considered a job change because of their desire to pump at work. A whopping 62% said there is a stigma attached to moms who breastfeed at work, indicating that workplaces still have much room for improvement.

Even when an organization wants to help women pump, individual managers can make expressing milk at work challenging. In her book Bully Market, Jamie Fiore Higgins describes her experience working at Goldman Sachs after her children were born. “Goldman had a lactation center, an entire floor with hospital-grade pumps, private lockers, a full-size kitchen and lactation consultants available 24/7,” she writes. But when her boss noticed Fiore had signed up for the lactation rooms, he allegedly told her that she needed to be at her desk working, not pumping, if she wanted to be promoted to managing director.

The PUMP Act garnered bipartisan support with some pushback from the airline industry. Given the small space on board flights, airlines had legitimate concerns about finding private areas for breastfeeding employees. The current bill made accommodations for the airline and rail industry and was amended to include a hardship exemption for small businesses. The PUMP Act was approved in a 92-5 Senate vote, with Republican Senators Rand Paul, John Cornyn, Mike Lee, Ron Johnson and Patrick Toomey voting against it.

Pregnant Workers Fairness Act

The second bill which helps mothers is the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act which requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations for medical conditions related to pregnancy and childbirth. While this bill also had bilateral support, the Senate voted to include it in the spending bill with a vote of 73 to 24. The law states that employers can’t deny employment opportunities based on these pregnancy accommodations, and they can’t “require employees to take paid or unpaid leave if another reasonable accommodation can be provided.”

“If a woman requests a stool to sit on or bathroom breaks, or a water bottle, even accommodations that are that simple, that basic and the subject of so much consensus — employers don’t have to provide those right now,” Senator Bob Casey said in an interviewafter the vote.

Although the bill has widespread bipartisan support, not everyone was in favor. Some felt the bill could force employers to make accommodations for abortions. Senator Thom Tillis told the Senate, “the legislation would subject pro-life organizations to potentially crippling lawsuits if they refuse to facilitate abortions in direct violation of their religious beliefs and their moral convictions.”

Tillis’ comments came after the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) had endorsed the bill and after the law had been revised to clarify that no employer would have to subsidize “any particular item, procedure or treatment.”

James Rogers, a spokesperson for the USCCB said the bill “helps advance USCCB’s goal of ensuring that no woman ever feels forced to choose between her future and the life of her child.”

This vital act comes at a time when one in five mothers is afraid to tell their employer about their pregnancy. And nearly one in four mothers (23%) have considered leaving their jobs due to a lack of reasonable pregnancy accommodations or fear of discrimination, according to a Morning Consult survey conducted in February 2022.

Working women should be able to choose to procreate and take steps to raise healthy children without jeopardizing their jobs. The PUMP Act and the pregnancy bill are steps in the right direction.

By

Kim ElsesserFollow

I cover women’s issues at work—including the wage gap, sexual harassment and female leadership. My prior careers include developing a quantitative hedge fund for Morgan Stanley and teaching about gender at UCLA. I hold a Ph.D. in Psychology from UCLA and two graduate degrees (management and operations research) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and an undergrad degree in mathematics and computer science from Vassar College. Follow me on Twitter

[whitepolaris]

Cemetery Beneath Seattle's Suburbia?

In the movie Poltergeist, a real estate developer built houses on top of an old cemetery. While the tombstones had been removed, the bodies remained buried, causing suddenly restless spirits to throw a temper tantrum of Hollywood proportions.

Some believe a similar is taking place in real life on Seattle's Beacon Hill.

Comey Lodge Cemetery is located on South Graham Street between Twenty-second and twenty-third avenues South. The vibrant grass of the 2.5 acres memorial park is a surreal contrast to the weathered old grave markers dispersed throughout the grounds. It's a marked improvement from the bramble jungle it had been for decades, but given its history, any perceived serenity in this final resting place is fleeting at best.

Bereavement, Bureaucracy, and Breakdown

First known as the Old Burial Grounds, this is where the Duwamish Indians laid their loved ones to rest. The Mapel family, among Seattle's first settlers, bought the original five acres of property as part of their estate. They began interring their own here in 1880. in 1895, they officially established the land as Comet Lodge Cemetery for an Independent Order of Odd Fellows lodge which a Mapel family member was president. The cemetery was used until 1936.

Two years later Seattle and King County foreclosed on the property, citing failure to pay back taxes. Some considered this a blatant land grab, since cemeteries are legally exempt from foreclosure. Regardless, it set the stage for decades of controversy. The cemetery was caught in a bureaucratic limbo as confusion reigned over its rightful ownership. The only certainty was that the more time passed, the more the cemetery succumbed to neglect and vandalism. In a 1948 letter to the Seattle City Council, city treasure Herbert Collier described the cemetery as being "in a deplorable condition. Graves were sunken, tombstones were scattered here and there, and the brush has overgrown everything with the exception of a few foot paths. It would almost impossible to estimate the number of graves, but a rough guess would be . . . considerably more than one hundred."

One way or another, Collier was drastically underestimating. King County records indicate 494 burials at Comet Lodge Cemetery. Others report as many as 1,000. Why such a great disparity? The extra 500 could represent estimated burials by the Duwamish Nation. Or, as some believe, it accounts for burials in the northern 2.5 acres, where eleven homes were eventually built atop possibly unexhumed graves. Some of these are said to be part of the cemetery's Babyland, a section for common burials of children prior to the purchase of a family plot.

John Dickinson, a local activist who has ancestors buried in the cemetery, has gathered about one thousand pages of evidence that he contends demonstrate several unethical and (potentially illegal) indignities committed against Comet Lodge Cemetery by Seattle and King County. His research shows that in addition to houses, both a portion of Twenty-second Avenue South and the western half of Twenty-third Avenue South are also built on grave sites.

As suburban homes expanded onto Beacon Hill, residents launched occasional cleanup efforts at the graveyard, which for various never reached fruition. Meanwhile, vagrants camped in it, trash was dumped in the wild brush, and gravestones were damaged or stolen.

In 1987, local resident Don Kipper obtained permission to clean up the site. By the time officials realized he was an unabashed eccentric who wanted to build a dream home on the cemetery, he'd already bulldozed about two hundred grave markers. Eyewitnesses still mention the startling sight of broken gravestones in a pile and visitors who helped themselves to these "mementos." Although Seattle city leaders were supposedly incensed by Kipper's actions, more graves were later bulldozed (ironically on All Souls' Day) to install a new sewer line.

In the 1990s, John Dickinson organized a volunteer group and obtained a permit to attempt his own restoration, but efforts were impeded, he said, by claims that the work was destroying trees "where falcons were nesting." He pointed out it in the middle of winter and that no nests were in the trees.

Eventually, King County executives Ron Smis proposed clearing out the remaining graves and turning the property into an off-leash dog park. Activists balked; they would accept no less than a dignified restoration of the cemetery. So the county finally took up the effort, grooming it into its current well-kept state. However, controversy remains.

Of the 494 graves on official record, only thirty-one grave markers have been salvaged or retrieved, Eighteen of these remained on (or were matched to) their corresponding graves. The remaining thirteen were dispersed "aesthetically" around the grounds, but their intended grave sites are unknown. A pile of broken grave markers still lies beneath a tree on the property. A promised fence was never installed, and dogs run leash-free there.

The Dead Weigh In

How might the dead in Comet Lodge Cemetery feel about all the decades of neglect and disturbance? Film fantasies like Poltergeist are hardly required to answer this question. According to local legend, deceased residents make themselves known from time to time.

There are recurring accounts of the spirit of a little boy walking around the grounds and of the distant sound of children laughing. It's said that stepping over certain unmarked graves might yield a sudden, mild feeling of distress. Or you might hear sticks breaking underfoot, even if you're alone and didn't step on any. Floating orbs of light are occasionally spotted at night.

Beverly Washington, who lived in one of the houses on the northern half of the cemetery, gained some fame by sharing her supernatural experiences with the local media. She claimed to have peacefully shared her home with some ghostly Comet Lodge inhabitants. A spectral woman and a little boy (perhaps the same one who walks around the grounds) would sit at the foot of her granddaughter's bed. She described flickering lights and a cloudlike transparent figure swooping from room to room. When some of her yard was dug up in 1987 for the sewer line, her phantom housemates panicked. Suddenly more aggressive, they engaged in threatening and destructive behavior until the construction ended. Similar activity was reported in other nearby homes.

If these incidents are meant to express dissatisfaction with the cemetery's current state of affairs, the ghosts certainly have living allies. John Dickinson, for one, continues to promote the cause whenever possible. As he puts it: "There is no statue of limitations excusing ongoing desecration of a federally protected, Native American, designated Historic Cemetery."

Clearly, this elysian field has a long way to go before it's truly at rest.

[academyguide]

Hello, my dear friends today we talk about Kelly Osbourne. Her real name is Kali Michelle Leo Osbourne. She was born s on 27 October 1984. She is an English singer, actress, fashion designer, model and television personality. Her parents are Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne. She is also known for her manifestations on the reality television show, The Osbournes (2002-2005) with her family, for which they won a 2002 Emmy Award for an outstanding reality program, as well as on El’s Fashion Police, where she was a presenter from 2010 to 2015. In 2009, she seemed in dancing with the stars, in Kelly and her dance partner Louis Van Amstell took third place. In an energetic series the 7D in (2014-2016), Osbourne played the voice of Hildy Gloom. She has also been a judge on Project Runway Junior (2015-present) and Australia’s Got Talent (2016). In 2019, she occurred on the second season of “The Masked” singer as “Ladybug”. Kelly Osbourne quick bio Born27 October 1984, Westminster,London, EnglandAge37 yrsOccupation Singer, Actress, Fashion Designer, Model, Television Personality Television The Osbournes Fashion PoliceParentsOzzy Osbourne Sharon Osbourne RelativsAimee Osbourne (sister)Jack Osbourne (brother)Don Arden (maternal grandfather)kelly Osbourne Musical Carrer Kelly Osbourne Early Life Osbourne was born in Westminster London. She had an elder sister, Aimee and a younger brother, Jack. From Ozzy’s first marriage, she also had 2 half-siblings, named Jessica Hoobs and Louis John Osbourne. She had an unofficially acquired brother, Robert Marcato, whom Sharon and Ozzy took in after Marcato’s mother died. Kelly grew up with her father and live in more than 20 homes, mostly in the US as adequately as in the UK. Her maternal grandfather was Don Arden (Hary Levy), an English music manager. Her mother is of Iris and Jewish descent. Osbourne visited private schools in England encompassing the girl’s school Piper Corners School. Kelly Osbourne Personal Life In September 2006, she dated a musician Matty Derman of fields. In 2008, she dated a model Luke Worrall. They were committed in 2009 but insulated in 2010. In 2018, she mourned from misophonia a sound phobia related to mouth disturbances that cause anger. On May 12, 2022, see currently dating Slipknot DJ, Sid Wilson. Osbourne declared via an Instagram page that she was pregnant with her first child. Where is kelly Osbourne from ? She is from Westminster, London, England. She had an elder sister, Aimee and a younger brother, Jack. Why is Kelly Osbourne famous ? She is become famous after seeming on MTV’s reality show. Since then, she has risen to fame and become known as more than just the daughter of Ozzy and Sharon. Did Kelly Osbourne attend college ? She attends Pipers Corner school a dominant day school for girls in great Kingshill, Buckinghamshire, England. In the school, there are 571 students aged from 4 to 18 years. The school is an Educational Charitable Trust administrated by a board of governors. Its recent headmistress is Helen Ness-Gifford. Does Kelly Osbourne have children ? She has declared her pregnancy on Instagram. Reality TV star Kelly has announced that she is pregnant with her first child. Kelly Osbourne husband Kelly and her Slipknot rocker boyfriend declared they are exempting a baby together on Thursday. From pals to lovers, Kelly and Wilson are taking the next step. Kelly Osbourne married She had married her boyfriend Slipknot, recently she declared openly they are freeing a baby together. Kelly Osbourne Net worth She has been able to accumulate a large net worth that is estimated at 16 million, according to celebrity Net worth. FAQs of Kelly Osbourne Q.1 Kelly Osbourne Husband name ? Q.2 Kelly Osbourne Net worth ? Q.3 Kelly Osbourne Instagram official account ? [ Source link

[raviposting]

So I was talking to my wonderful friend @mauvesockss about seeing a lot of posts calling the trio queerbait, and I think maybe some people don’t fully know the difference but (unless something drastically changes with the show) the OT3 is queer coding, not queerbait.

This post goes over that difference pretty well, and we see that the OT3 has been supported by the creators multiple times. And if we look at the language within the show, I think it’s clear that - while it may go over the gen audience’s heads - that the OT3 is not coded as straight.

Think about how most straight ships are written - Parker and Hardison would most likely be paired together and Eliot would help them out time to time. We hear some stories about the trio, but also about just the duo as well. But when we look at the OT3, they’re often framed together in the revival, and it’s to the point that even when Hardison is gone, Eliot and Parker still constantly mention him. When Hardison says he’s leaving, we only see a goodbye from Eliot and Parker, Parker specifically mentions to Hardison a mission and says that he didn’t want to hurt Eliot’s feelings. They’re implied (and confirmed by John Rogers) to have lived together for years, when Breanna asks if everything about her brother is true Eliot and Parker jump to specify page 42. These are scenes they could have easily been made a duo moment - have Eliot specify they made it for “your” home to show he doesn’t live with them, only have Parker mention page 42, not have them talk about Eliot’s role in the mission. But they don’t.

I can’t think of a single thing with the OT3 in the revival that doesn’t include all three of them, even when Hardison leaves, because they’re still constantly mentioning him, things they did with him, and missions he would love. The scenes all inherently involve all three of them - to the point where I’ve seen multiple comments in the tag from fans who said that oblivious family members and friends are starting to pick up on this. While there’s many reasons - platonic or not - that 3 people could live together for years and be as involved as the OT3 is, I think a lot of people default to romance and by having the trio live together for 8 years and make it so clear that everything they do is together is what helps people realize this isn’t straight. And by having that, even though the OT3 hasn’t inherently changed, how people begin to view them with that added layer can.

Those are all conscious decisions that were made by the writers and creators (who have actively supported the ship), which I don’t think some new and/or young fans quite get when they call it queerbait. That’s not to say it’s free from criticism of course - for every line I see where it could have been typically straight and they directly tied it in to the OT3 instead, there’s a line where they could have made it explicitly clear to gen audiences but didn’t (at least, in the first half of the season that we have). It is canon to me, but coding isn’t my ideal form of rep as well, and while I don’t need their writing to change I’d personally be wildly happy with them simply saying the three are together. By reiterating that it’s coding and not baiting isn’t to say it’s now exempt from all criticism, but it’s important to realize and acknowledge the difference when talking about Leverage’s poly rep.

[exlibrisfangirl]

So did I ever tell you that the ONLY reason I finally watched BBC Robin Hood S3 (after having watched S1-2 several years previously) was after I had watched Black Sails and found out that Toby Stephens (Flint) played Prince John? because that was the only reason. I needed to see what the hell was up with that. And I cannot say I vibe with that show at all anymore because it's such a hot mess, S3 especially, but Toby Prince John Stephens was a TRIP AND A HALF. most everyone else in the cast looked like they Really didn't want to be there anymore at that point but mr stephens put his all into that role. he made some Choices. scenery was chewed thoroughly and with relish. he is the only part of s3 that is completely exempt from my salt. A+. no notes. carry on you deranged slut

(Gif credit to @fruityadobo)

DUDE. Toby Stephens was the ONLY good thing about S3, and I, conversely, watched Black Sails *because* I loved him so much in BBC Robin Hood!!! (Funny how that works, innit?) They are VERY different characters, obviously, but the Chaotic Bisexual Vibes are still very much there.

(I also quite liked seeing his broodier side in the 2006 Jane Eyre miniseries opposite Ruth Wilson. That's probably still my favorite Jane Eyre adaptation.)

Anyway, Toby put his whole bussy into that minor role, and Prince John is a DELIGHT.

[violenceenthusiast]

im curious why people are saying supernatural is jewish like idk if jewish writers makes an inherently jewish story especially when things like following out the christian apocalypse from revelations and showing a real physical g-d who is just some guy i think is super jarring since though christians claim to be against idolatry they seem totally fine showing depictions of gd or whatever i dont get jesus honestly but jews are far more strict and the idea of showing gds appearance is pretty wrong

WOOF okay um. Maybe this is one of those Tone Doesn’t Come Thru Well Online things but to me this is soo fucking rude… I’m half way between John Mulaney we don't have time to unpack all of that & Ben Wyatt wait it’s gonna bother me if I don’t explain why you’re wrong. 

This turned into all my thoughts. 

So like. First off, it’s all fun and games. We’re all just joking and joshing and projecting here on destiel dot tumblr dot com and Jupernatural is not an exception in a lot of ways. And so when someone shits on what we’re doing here (yes, even unintentionally) what you get is what happened: oh you think you’re funny well I’m about to be hilarious!!! aka I’m gonna do it even more now out of spite specifically because you said not to. Like it really is all jokes but also you know what’s not a joke? Antisemitism in all its forms, even the casual shit! It’s really draining and it builds up in your veins!! Just. Yeah. You saw a lot of people talking about it today in particular because much like other topics of the day, one thing kicks off a whole other turn of events. So like. one misguided comment that’s playfully antisemitic and then one more little one, and then one big/obvious one launched us (Jewish spn fans) into a whole bigger discussion about antisemitism and erasure of Jews in the spn fandom writ large. It’s one thing to be descriptive, offer a headcanon/what if, or employ a certain mode of analysis. It’s another thing to definitively say This Is The Truth, specifically when to do so overrides something else, especially in this case when what’s being overridden is Jews, an ethnoreligious minority. It’s also another thing to talk over Jews. And mind this has been building for days. Not in a bad way just like, it’s been topical for days and then today one big thing pushed it over the edge to us actually posting abt it (partially bc at that point it’s a pattern, which feels like it needs to be addressed). Like, destiel tumblr is small we pretty much all see all the same posts, and then Jewish spn fans… we’re friends, we chat about life? We joke around together, y’know? If you’re being antisemitic (yes, even unintentionally) we’re all gonna hear abt it. It’s how we stay safe or in this case, curate the online exp.

That being said tho projecting on fiction is like fun and even a good thing at times, and def opens up new modes of analysis. But! the other big thing here is that there IS a LOT of evidence for a Jewish reading of spn, in a lot of ways, and particularly if you know what to look for. Like there’s lots of niche Jewish slang (non-Jews just don’t know these things, and that is a reflection primarily of the writers but once you put it in the script it implies things about the characters too of course), the theology of the early seasons (I’ll get to that in a second), main character motivations (hold on), “Moishe Campbell” implying Mary is (and therefore Sam and Dean are) Jewish, etc. 

It’s not surprising to me or anything that non-Jews don’t catch anything/everything Jewish about spn but that Jews catch both sides of it, because that’s just how being part of a marginalized group works. You learn about your own stuff AND the dominant culture’s stuff because that’s how you survive (socially, psychologically, literally). Members of the dominant culture don’t need to learn the marginalized one, are never confronted with it, and so they just.. don’t. I don’t even mean that in a normative or accusatory way, that’s just an observation on the state of things. Non-Jews who aren’t part of another marginalized religion, aka expressed xtians and cultural xtians, have a ton of misconceptions about Judaism, for example, “Jesus was Jewish” and not, “Jesus was an asshole of an apostate who made life harder for Jews at the time in a myriad of ways and whose movement has had a lasting negative impact on world Jewry (and other peoples) for the ensuing millenia”. I truly Don’t Have Time right now to get into the varied and intense history of antisemitism in all its forms but. the point I’m making here is that I’m not shocked I need to explain that life experience shapes your worldview?? So if you’re Jewish you’re always gonna be living life through that version of the world and it does impact you?? Same as anything else?? As unwell as they may be, spn writers aren’t exempt from that. Jewish people writing about xtianity are doing so thru a primarily Jewish understanding and vice versa. Jews can (and did!) write about xtian lore but in a Jewish way! Some core Jewish themes: wrestling with angels/G-d, questioning G-d, IF there’s a G-d they will have to beg MY forgiveness, the afterlife isn’t really a big thing so all that matters is your time on earth, make amends to others directly and thru your actions rather than seeking absolution with G-d, you are not obligated to complete the work nor may you abandon it, etc… So that’s the other reasoning why we say “spn is Jewish” based solely on it being written by Jews. Rather than Death of The Author, let’s look at what the author has imbued the story with, both intentionally and unintentionally. And re: Chuck and idolatry… I don’t even know where to start with the way you phrased this but. the Jewish Spn Writers of Note are apparently Kripke, Gamble, and Edlund. All of whom stopped writing for the show years before the Chuck Is God plot! 

Like yes it feels very stupid to be writing a thousand words on antisemitism and supernatural but like. this is a spn blog run by a Jew so. This whole thing is also just the same every time. This is very representative of typical casual antisemitism.

[obsessivelollipoplalala]

People: Omg, Freddie was so lucky to have Mary! She was so sweet and supportive and open-minded!!! 😊

Mary:

Made Freddie feel guilty for leaving her, to the point where he felt like he was obligated to look after her for life.

Intimidated Freddie’s boyfriends and viewed them as “disposable.”

Treated his loved ones like shit after Freddie died, including promising Phoebe he could keep his job, then turning around and going, “oops, sorry, not going to happen!” When he came back from holiday.

Became a spokesperson for an AIDS charity, yet refused to let a man dying of AIDS to one final Christmas dinner with his adopted family because she “didn’t like him.”

Gave away two of Freddie’s cats to strangers after refusing to let Jim have any. Also started a public war with a neighbour over Oscar, despite Freddie’s wish for Oscar to be happy (and he wasn’t happy at GL.)

Said she was glad Freddie came out to her because if he hadn’t, she would have got AIDS.

Cut ties with everyone Freddie knew, including his family, then claimed they abandoned her.

Claimed the band and all of Freddie’s friends were jealous of her and didn’t believe the rest of Queen deserved their half of the royalties.

Claimed she actually didn’t want Freddie’s fortune and Freddie essentially pressured her into accepting it.

Did a tacky photoshoot around Garden Lodge, posing like a model in Freddie’s home which had always been his private sanctuary.

Allegedly tried to turn Freddie against Jim in order to split them up (Jim was aware someone inside GL was out to get him and Joe apparently confirmed to Shaun Matthews it was Mary.)

Told John Reid that she “won in the end” because she was the last one to hold Freddie’s ashes. Then didn’t pick up said ashes from the undertakers for almost a year.

Turned Garden Lodge into something akin to a prison and got rid of all the fan’s messages on the walls, even blocking it from Google Maps.

Implied that everyone else, apart from her, only wanted Freddie for his money.

Claimed she “never betrayed Freddie,” despite doing all of the above.

“H-he…b-b-became a gay.”

Wow…what a supportive, open-minded person.

Lol you really came through with receipts, anon. Don't forget that she told Jim that Freddie was probably waiting for him after he died, which he thought was incredibly insensitive to say to another HIV+ person.

People can only like a fictionalized version of Mary because the real Miss Thing is thoroughly despicable, as shown by that laundry list of dickhead moves you provided. If people earnestly defend all of those things, it's either they're the mayor of Simp City or they're as callous as she is (I think some of the insta stans are tbh). It's just dumb. She's literally just some ex. She's done nothing to warrant such vehement defense, and no, being Freddie's ex doesn't automatically exempt one from criticism lol

[scotianostra]

The Poet George MacDonald died on September 18th 1905.

George MacDonald might not be a name you are familiar with, but he was friends and was admired by some of the 19th century’s most famous writers.

After being raised in Huntley, Aberdeenshire, by devout Calvinist parents, he attended King's College in Aberdeen. At Highbury Theological College, he received his divinity degree, and in 1850 he became a pastor of a Congregational church in Arundel. Early the following year, he married Louisa Powell, with whom he enjoyed a long and happy marriage.

McDonald  was forced to resign his pulpit in 1853 because he liked to dabble in "German theology," meaning the new higher critical approach to biblical studies emerging from that country. He never took another church but spent the rest of his life lecturing, preaching, and especially writing.

Between 1851 and 1897, he wrote over 50 books in all manner of genre: novels, plays, essays, sermons, poems, and fairy tales. And then there were his two fantasies for adults, Phantastes  and Lilith. During these years, Lewis Carroll became a good friend and gave him the first manuscript of Alice in Wonderland to read to his children. Other British literary luminaries—like John Ruskin, Charles Kingsley, Lord Tennyson, and Matthew Arnold—were among his associates and admirers.

When McDonald visited the United States in 1872 for a lecture tour, the likes of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Greenleaf Whittier, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and Mark Twain paid him homage. After his stay in New York City, one large Fifth Avenue church offered him the almost unheard of salary of $20,000 a year to become its pastor. MacDonald thought the idea preposterous.

His success did not exempt him from more-than-ordinary suffering. Poverty plagued him so much that his family occasionally faced literal starvation. His own lungs were diseased, and tuberculosis killed two brothers and two half-sisters. It also ravaged his children, four of whom died before him. He himself had a stroke at age 74 and lapsed into virtual silence for the last seven years of his life.

C.S. Lewis who wrote that he regarded MacDonald as his "master": "Picking up a copy of Phantastes one day at a train-station bookstall, I began to read. A few hours later," said Lewis, "I knew that I had crossed a great frontier” G K Chesterton cited The Princess and the Goblin as a book that had "made a difference to my whole existence."

Looking through George McDonalds poems I found amongst them two very famous one, Little Boy Blue, and Little Bo Peep. Now am not sure if he first created them, but just to see these was an eye opener. Most of his verse is religious, but I found one I really like in the Scots Tongue.

Ane by Ane

Ane by ane they gang awa’, The Getherer gethers grit an smaa; Ane by ane maks ane an aa.

Aye whan ane sets doun the cup Ane ahint maun tak it up: Yet thegither thy will sup!

Goulden-heidit, ripe an strang, Shorn will be the hairst or lang: Syne begins a better sang!