firehose

Etsy's protective shell is looking more and more fragile. Lone craftspeople are being squeezed on three fronts: the proliferation of mini factories that fit uneasily into Etsy's vague new rules, the Chinese manufacturers stealing user designs, and Etsy storefronts brimming with factory-made goods.

	Courtney shared this story from this cage is worms:
	between this and The Toast, oh geez, it's almost too much stuff I don't hate.

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Awesome scholar Sara Ahmed has started a research blog called feminist killjoys. 

She has a brilliant list of qualities to let you know if you could be interested in the blog:

• Are told you are angry no matter what you say
• Witness people’s eyes rolling as soon as you open your mouth as if to say: ‘oh here she goes!’
• Are  angry because that’s a sensible response to what is wrong
• Are often accused of getting in the way of the happiness of others (or just getting in the way)
• Have ruined the atmosphere by turning up or speaking up
• Have a body that reminds people of histories they find disturbing
• Are willing to make disturbance a political cause
• Are willing to cause unhappiness to follow your desire
• Will not laugh at jokes designed to cause offense
• Will take offense when it is there to be taken
• Will point out when men cite men about men as a learned social habit that is diminishing (ie. most or usual citational practice)
• Will notice and name whiteness. Will keep noticing and naming whiteness.
• Will use words like ‘sexism’ and ‘racism’ even if that means being heard as the cause of bad feeling (and are willing to cause bad feeling)
• Will refuse to look away from what compromises happiness
• Are willing to be silly and display other inappropriate positive affects
• Are willing to listen and learn from the work of feminists over time and refuse the caricatures of feminism and feminists that enables a disengagement from feminism
•  Are prepared to be other peoples’ worst feminist nightmare
• Are prepared to be called a kill joy
•  Are willing to kill joy

Check it out here!

Filed under: General Features Tagged: feminism, feminist killjoys, sara ahmed, theory

popular shared this story from Leigh Alexander.

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This isn’t an article about video games. In fact, it has nothing to do with video games.

In the small, predominantly white and Irish-Catholic suburbia where I grew up, the neighbor kids I played with would report, in whispers, that they thought my dad was “scary.” Or “angry.”

And he was, a bit, to be honest. He remains a fairly solitary man, not especially neighborly by picket-fence definitions, and has a mistrust of overfriendliness, of rehearsed social overtures, that causes others to read him as unfriendly. I remember being nine years old or so, watching, mortified, from the window of my bedroom as Dad argued with a playmate’s dad after the kid had been caught sawing down small trees in our yard.

The other father, a small-town real estate magnate who drove a custom Acura, threatened to “deck” my father, I can remember him scoffing when he came back in the house. The other father had insisted, aggressively, on calling my dad by a belittling foreshortening of his first name, which he always preferred in full.

My dad has been a journalist for most of his life. He told me a few times about how when young, in interviews for various writing positions, he was frequently complimented on his articulateness, told he “speaks so well.” Though born in New York he is often asked “where he is from.” When I was a child I would represent him in drawings by a head bookended by twin scribbles, shorthand for the kinky hair that had already retreated from the top of his brown, shiny head by the time I was born. Later on, once most of the hair was gone he started shaving his head and wearing Kangol caps and we started calling him Samuel L.

Dad is one of four black boys born to a black soldier from Texas and a Frenchwoman Grandpa met and married while overseas for World War II. I suppose this makes Dad half black, technically, the same as First Black President Barack Obama, but thankfully we don’t measure identity in quarters of blood.

I have some idea what color has made of my father and his life. I better understand the incredible tragedy that made my little white friends avoid my father, nervously, in our house when they came over to play. I understand, maybe, that my dad is not so “angry” as the caricature even his own children have gleefully drawn of him, and why he never seemed to trust the Howdy-Neighbor sorts.

I’ve had a much harder time knowing what color makes of me.

***

I’m often asked “what I am,” and in a good mood I’ll explain I have a black Dad and a Jewish mom. At other times, pressed out of nowhere by taxi cab drivers or strangers in parties, the answer’s sharper: “American.”

“Where are you from?”
“New York.”
“You were born there?”
“I was born in Massachusetts.”

I am light; I’m white, really, white-skinned, and sometimes incidental news of my ethnicity comes as a surprise to friends who never would have guessed. I am uncomfortable with being told I “look exotic,” even when it’s meant as a compliment, but I’m also uncomfortable when to others Sometimes this bothers me, that this strain of my heritage isn’t visible, because it means I’m presumed to be the same as others who have not experienced the alienation I have.

I did not know any other black people growing up; only my Dad. I’m sure there had to have been some other black kids in town, but at the dance classes and summer camps and Montessori middle school that were generously given to me to attend I rarely encountered any classmates of color at all. I only knew white people, the snarls of my obscenely thick curls unwelcome and perplexing at French braid time during sleepovers.

Dad again frightened the kids at school when he came in one day to ask my teacher, very civilly and not frighteningly at all, to no longer allow the boy I had a crush on to make fun of my “afro.” He must have talked about racism, but I only remember being mortified about the scene, worried that the chastisement would attract further unwanted attention.

In high school I wanted to be Kate Moss, but my short figure insisted on being stubbornly curvy from an early age. I was not built for field hockey or cheerleading, the popular pastimes for girls that required we wear uniforms with skirts to class on game days. I was not built for it, but I tried anyway. I still remember what the other girls said about my ass, which was lampooned for seeming to move on its own when I walked. I wanted to fit into Gap straight-leg pants, but it was never going to happen.

I can’t blame all my alienation on race. I was a weird girl, and latently queer, and a nerd, and still carry the complex cultural condition of being raised Jewish, in a Jewish family, even though as an adult I have no use for religion and all of the rituals feel like my Jewish mother’s business, not mine. I probably would have inherited this volume of coarse hair from her anyway (memory: Mom and I both anguished, green-haired, after a relaxer we bought from an infomercial went awry), and my figure is most definitely her figure. My mother and I are quite alike-looking, except for the part where I turn properly bronze in just a little sun and she can’t take any, occupied with an obsession with sunblock I’ve never had to share.

My younger sister looks more like my father, and is darker, is brown-eyed. One day when I was in high school she came home crying because the other kids down the block where she tried to play had insisted on calling her “Mexican,” their idea of an insult. I was sixteen, and big at the time, and in all my mouthy temperamental teen angst it seemed like a constant effort not to throttle anyone who upset my baby sister, so out I came into the suburban cul-de-sac where I confronted all these pale blond children and I told a six year old child I’d knock him out if he ever said anything about my sister’s looks to her again. This with their blond mamas looking on, agog, standing on their green lawns in their cargo shorts and polos.

When I got a car with a radio I developed a sudden affinity for corporate rock songs about how Christianity was for sheep, man, and I played that junk as loud as I could. I was a nightmare. I’m sure eventually the family’s reputation for being “angry” owed much more to me than to Dad, in the end. Looking back, I think I may have been driven by an unconscious desire to be the one to take the hit, to be “decked” by others’ fear.

***

I went wrong for a while, engaging in a campaign of war against my own body, my hair, anything that would have made me unsuited to the cover of Seventeen magazine. Any whiff of ethnicity in myself, really. There were departures, moments of hesitant efforts toward self-acceptance. When Halle Berry, a mixed race actress, first became a style icon in the 1990s, I decided to cut my hair short like hers. She represented, to me, a way that I could maybe embrace some aspect of myself and still be considered acceptable, attractive.

The result was everyone said I looked like a lesbian, an impression I was trying to avoid with all the fervent denial I could muster of a thing that has a grain of truth in it, lest fate had doomed me to be any more “strange” than I already was. Everyone said I looked like a lesbian except my crush at the time, who when asked why he would not go out with me, replied it was because my hair “looked like pubes.” I still struggle with a virulent distaste for Halle Berry’s acting work that seems a little suspicious to me.

***

I stop short at saying that I “experienced racism.” I have had far too much privilege to be comfortable with that — and, I’m sad to say, boy did my younger, ignorant self levy that privilege against others whenever I got tired of feeling like the one who ought not to belong. I harmed others and I definitely harmed myself through the kind of profound self-hatred that longed, even threatened, to rip my own body in half. There would come a hospital stint where rather than lament my wasted life or fear what was at the time an imminent death, I took pleasure in my “glamorous” Girl, Interrupted bony pallor, in the fact that more than half my hated hair had fallen out and was quite manageable with a straight-iron.

Still, I have some compassion for that brat: my upbringing was a series of confusing microaggressions in which my race was one factor in a painful collision with my desire for conformity and I had no lens to sort it out. My family raised me with the ideal of all-are-equal, but other than slowly learning about how my father was treated differently for being black in suburbia, the idea that race prejudice toward others or toward myself was something I’d have to be equipped to address was not something I internalized at the time.

And that there was any blackness in me, either of the kind one can note with the eye or the sort that can be quantified through experience, was something that took me longer to understand and to accept. Daring to celebrate it is coming even more slowly, as in my adulthood I understand far better the complex systems of oppression that live in our society. I can empathize with others, and I can urgently want justice on their behalf, but being able to claim any group’s experience for my own is a more complicated proposition.

I have not felt “white” in my life, but I have not lived as “black” either, not Jewish but not-not, and too ignorant to gender and identity politics most of my life to even understand my own until recent years, let alone to know whether I have a community around them. Even having become comfortable with myself I don’t know how to talk about my race, about any of it, really, without sounding or being afraid that I sound appropriative, privileged, insensitive, narcissistic, worse.

***

I took a brief stint at community college in my late teens and had black friends and classmates for the first time. I made friends with a girl named Tayisha, who asked me why I didn’t just get extensions like hers if I hated my natural hair so much, and I told her it had never occurred to me, to deal with my hair as black girls did. Then I told her I had a black Dad.

“I know,” she said.
“How did you know?”
“Because,” she replied, laughing, “you got a n***a nose!”

I can’t remember what I replied, only that the conversation sticks in my head more than a decade later because I was so shocked, because I felt so many conflicting things at once — oh, no, that word, can she say that, and what do I say, and also really, I do?! and the strange commingling of affront and profound relief I experienced. I still don’t know how I feel when I think back on that conversation; I don‘t have enough vocabulary to comfortably unpack it. There is only the memory of a sensation that a needle moved in me, a little bit, when I felt Tayisha was accepting me.

I’m sure it’s problematic. Everything is probably a little problematic, like is it okay that another black friend of mine said to me last year “girl, you sure enough do have some black in you” because I’d lost my temper and was talking animatedly with hand punctuation. I mean, I’m sure I’m not the one who gets to decide what’s okay. Or maybe I’m the only one who gets to decide what’s okay for me. I don’t know, and maybe I never will, and maybe that’s how I experience the conundrum of being mixed-race.

Into my early twenties when I started feeding myself again I began to heal. My hair came back and I started picking it out, sometimes sporting a giant dark, spongy dome stinking of Pink brand spray that I think looks fucking awesome and that girls in club bathrooms longingly ask to touch. I say yes, because I don’t really mind, and I wasted way too much of my life feeling like just because one can’t run fingers through it no one ought to touch it. Sometimes I still flatiron it and put twee little hipster pigtails in it or whatever, too. But less.

The Booty also came back, a looming gravitational object so ceaselessly pointed to by all kinds of people throughout my life as incontrovertible evidence of my unwhiteness. Whether it is or not, I have let go of the idea that I must stop it from moving to avoid being laughed at by the Katies and Kellys and Kristines of the world, and have instead begun indulging the idea that to move is the natural and righteous condition of a large hind end, especially if one likes sashaying, or dancing. Owning this ass has been probably the single biggest step I’ve taken toward accepting that I exist, am comprised of many things, should not look like someone other than myself. It is Music Video Ass. There is no reason not to be happy about having a Music Video Ass.

I started writing this essay because I was thinking about twerking. I mean, I wasn’t really thinking about doing it — when I feel like doing it I just kind of do it, a little bit here and there, like, in the grocery store or the apartment balcony or something like that. Not dropping it to the floor or being really inappropriate to the venue, just a little milkshake sort of thing, because it makes me happy.

I mean, I was thinking about Miley Cyrus, and voraciously devouring the articles about her VMA performance, in which she most definitely did, no questions asked, exploit and appropriate the sexuality of black women and prey, culture-vampire style, on whatever ideas she had about black people and black music in order to make herself more famous. And how all of these things Miley did (with the support and participation of many other individuals and forces) are encapsulated by her twerking, like this dance move she lifted from black music videos and the fact she did it so shamelessly, are really shorthand for the rest of the problem.

And I thought about how letting my music video ass do what it seemed to want to do had been a form of healing, I guess, for me, a permission, a declaration that yes, I do not have a Seventeen-magazine pair of hips, a way to feel happy about how I looked and what I move like and where I come from. And that since it’s not okay for Miley maybe it’s not okay for me. And that if my only idea about how to solve it is to take a poll of every black person I know and ask “am I allowed to twerk” then probably it’s not okay for me.

Thinking about twerking and being unable to decide for myself is what it feels like to be mixed-race, for me. Being mixed race, for me, is about never being quite sure what is okay for me and who gets to decide. It’s hard. It’s not as hard as being oppressed, that’s for sure, and there is a positive in it.

The positive is this: If there was anything I needed to learn in my life to grow out of being an awful brat and into someone who wants to be a good person, it is that sometimes I should think a lot and listen a lot and defer to others before I make up my mind. To understand many things without necessarily trying to claim any of them and say they’re mine.

It’s the first time I’ve ever talked about this. Maybe I’ll learn to do it more as time goes on. That’d be nice. I can just twerk in the shower by myself for now.

Nothing good ever comes from U-S-A chants.

Boardwalk Empire would be nothing without its roaring soundtrack. Jazz was on the up and up during the show's 1920s setting, and the music itself has become a character that's almost as important as Nucky himself. The first volume of the show's tunes won a Grammy for best compilation soundtrack for visual media, and the second volume will be out next week. For those who can't wait, Boardwalk Empire Volume 2 is streaming exclusively via Billboard (or below) until its Sept. 3 release. It's easy to forget how many great songs came out of the 1920s, and with artists like Patti Smith, Liza Minelli, Neko Case, and Rufus Wainwright belting out their own renditions, it's the bee's knees. Consider this soundtrack best enjoyed whilst sipping on the finest hooch and cutting a rug with a few swell shebas and sheiks.  

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©Daniela Conteras from Identidades


©Daniela Conteras from Identidades


©Daniela Conteras from Identidades


©Daniela Conteras from Identidades

Village of the damned

Before he invented the safety razor, King Camp Gillette was a futurist. In 1894, he published plans for a porcelain, hexagonal city with transparent sidewalks. Why do so many innovators dream of building the perfect city?

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The Enchroma Cx line of sunglasses corrects varying types of colorblindless — either protanomalous or deuteranomalous — by selectively adjusting the colors that pass through the lenses. The sunglasses don’t work indoors without exceptionally bright light, weren’t designed to be used with a computer screen, and won’t help colorblind individuals pass the standard Ishihara color test. However, David Pogue of The New York Times tested out the sunglasses himself and had an emotional experience:

I took them outside on a sunny day — and was floored. I mean, I had a visceral reaction to what I saw.

Colors I see just fine — blues, yellows, oranges — looked exactly the same. But all of a sudden, greens and reds looked richer. It’s almost impossible to describe in words.

You can find out more about how the lenses work at EnChroma’s website, and read Pogue’s full review about his experience at The New York Times.

image and video via EnChromatic

via The New York Times, DesignTAXI, The Awesomer

Party for Socialism and Liberation

Long waits cause frustration at security checkpoint for March on Washington event Washington Times The sole security checkpoint set up for the public to gain access to Wednesday's event commemorating the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington was bottlenecked early, with frustrated crowds angrily chanting to be admitted and reports of people ... Watch live: Let Freedom Ring CeremonyBoston.com Reports of Heat Exhaustion at Security Checkpoints for 'Let Freedom Ring ...NBC4 Washington March on Washington Celebrations to End With Obama Speech and Bell RingingBET USA TODAY -KTLA -Washington Post all 64 news articles »

https://twitter.com/birdiebent/status/372414169250689024/

Original Source

Kernel Kurtz has released “The Dark Notebook Rises,” a romantic mashup of The Dark Knight Rises and The Notebook. The overly sentimental dialogue between Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams dubbed over a heated scene with Bane and Batman is so wrong, but it feels so right. The video was created by Mark Petro and Tom Ross.

The Dark Knight. Bane. What do they have in common? They’re CRAZY about each other.

via UPROXX

OnlyMrGodKnowsWhy

@talex and @hodad (further to previous discussions of Brony culture)

Confound these ponies, they have found a way into my spirituality.

I’m a religious brony, I’m not afraid to admit it. I work a lot in my church with the teens and I have had to explain to a few of them what a brony is and had to defend why I am a brony to others. What I tell them is this: “The ponies have a lot to teach”

Every Saturday, I sit and watch the ponies with my 8 year old daughter and my 4 year old son. We laugh for a half hour and when the show is down, we turn off the television and talk for a few minutes about what we saw. I like to take the episodes lesson and see if they can apply it to their life. Often I find that it boils down to the Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism, which got me to thinking; “Seven principles, six ponies plus the princess… I wonder…”

I decided to try to apply the ponies to the principles and found that there are a lot of similarities. Lemme explain:

The first principle is, “The inherent worth and dignity of every person.” This is the principle that all the UU’s remember because many believe it to be the most important one. If you were to boil it down, it could very easily be stated as “Love & Tolerate.” Sound familiar? All of the Mane 6 strive to Love & Tolerate everyone, but the one who embodies it the most, is Princess Celestia. In the season premiere, she sends Twilight Sparkle to Poniville to learn about the magic of friendship. Twilight learns about different personalities and learns to find the value in their diversity, the “worth and dignity of everypony.” Celestia knows that in order for Twilight’s magic to be at its most powerful, she must learn to open her heart to new people.

The second principle is “Justice, equity and compassion in human relations.” Justice, equality, fairness all scream Apple Jack. In the running of the leaves, all she wants is a fair chance to compete against Rainbow Dash. Who is the first pony to realize they are putting too much pressure on Twilight in The Ticket Master, realizing it is unfair to do so? Justice is honesty in action, and who is more honest than AppleJack?

The third principle is “Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.” I see spirituality as a search for inner peace and joy. Pinkie has set a very specific role for herself in life, to bring joy to others. She is often regarded as frivolous and silly by others, but is at peace with herself. I find her to be very spiritually centered (if not a little codependent) by finding joy in the joys of others and wanting them to be happy and helping them pursue that happiness (who else would accompany Twilight Sparkle in breaking into the library?)

The fourth principle is “A free and responsible search for truth and meaning.” Who is always looking for answers, wanting to know more? Who has a library in their house? Who wants to know how “Pinkie Sense” works? One pony is always on the quest for knowledge. Twilight Sparkle.

The fifth principle is ”The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large.” Who is all about the democratic process? Okay, this one was a bit of a stretch, I’ll admit, but I ended up with Rarity for this one. In Suited For Success Rarity gives each pony input on how their dress should look, against her better judgement, she goes with the will of the ponies. The idea of “democratic process” is closely tied to the first, second, sixth and seventh principles, so it was hard to nail down a specific pony, but Raritys behavior in Suited For Success is a great example.

The sixth principle is “The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all.” Peace. Harmony. Kindness. Fluttershy, the pony who avoids conflict to a fault. In Green Isn’t Your Color she put herself through a lot of trouble just to keep Rarity happy. This pony pushes the envelope when it comes to peaceful resolution.

Lastly, the seventh principle is “Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.” This is another very important principle. Everything that we do affects the world around us. Our actions have consequences and we must choose them carefully. I really wanted this to be either Twilight or Celestia, because those are the two “power” characters in the series, but there was one pony whose actions tied everyone together. Little Miss Sonic Rainboom herself, Rainbow Dash. Her first sonic rainboom started a chain of events that allowed the other ponies of the Mane 6 to get their cutie marks. There is no better example of how our actions, intended or not, can affect others.

Yes, the ponies are somewhat molded into these seven principles, but I do so to make a point: There is a lot to be said for this show and the lessons it has to teach. Yes, the animation is great and the characters are wonderful, but it’s the lessons that keep me coming. The examples it has to offer my kids, the hope to make “an Equestria on Earth” so to speak.

Below are the seven principles to re-cap, as well as their respective ponies.

• The inherent worth and dignity of every person; Princess Celestia

• Justice, equity and compassion in human relations; AppleJack

• Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations; Pinkie Pie

• A free and responsible search for truth and meaning; Twilight Sparkle

• The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large; Rarity

• The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all; FlutterShy

• Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. Rainbow Dash 

Original Source

“Oh what a day. We should go home. We’re drunk…”

Star Drunk is a short sci-fi action film that was both written and acted by a group of drunk people. It is a hilarious five minutes full of alcohol, word slurring and uncoordinated battles. This mashup of Star Trek, Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica was directed by Chris R. Wilson and Zach Persson. All of the booze consumed by cast and crew members was provided by the New Deal Distillery.

‘Star Drunk’ is the sequel to the viral short film ‘Cleverbot: Do You Love Me.’ Star Drunk is an experiment in writing a short film while drunk; several writers from Portland got together one night to write the script. We promised each other that whatever we wrote that night, we’d produce as a short film.

Here is a behind the scenes look at the “drunken hijinks on the set of Star Drunk“:

videos via ChrisRWilsonFilm’s

via The Daily Dot

OnlyMrGodKnowsWhy

With the hater test verified and known haters identified, researchers asked their participants to read about the “Monahan LPI-800 Compact 2/3-Cubic-Foot 700-Watt Microwave Oven.” This not a real microwave but one dreamt up by researchers to test how much people would hate it.

It is an age-old adage of Twitter, which apparently traces its roots back to a 3LW video from 2000: Haters gonna hate.

Now, scientists have taken it upon themselves to figure out whether this is true. Do verified haters tend to hate everything else they stumble upon? Yes, according to a new study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. People who tend to hate things they already know about are (surprise!) more disposed to hate things they have not yet come in contact with.

To test out this theory, a team of psychologists asked study participants how they felt about a number of mundane and unrelated subjects that included (but was not limited to) architecture, health care, crossword puzzles, taxidermy and Japan.

They wanted to figure out if people tended to like or dislike things in general. This was dubbed the individual’s dispositional attitude or, more simply put, checked for whether they were a hater who pretty much hates on everything that comes across their path.

“If individuals differ in the general tendency to like versus dislike objects, an intriguing possibility is that attitudes toward independent objects may actually be related,” they write. “So someone’s attitude toward architecture may in fact tell us something about their attitude toward health care because both attitudes would be biased by a disposition to like or dislike stimuli.”

The researchers did run one group through the hater test, as I like to think of it, twice with a month in between trials, to ensure that it didn’t just represent some people having a bad day.

With the hater test verified and known haters identified, researchers asked their participants to read about the “Monahan LPI-800 Compact 2/3-Cubic-Foot 700-Watt Microwave Oven.” This not a real microwave but one dreamt up by researchers to test how much people would hate it.

The haters, perhaps unsurprisingly, were much less enthused than those who had more positive attitudes about camping, Japan and the like. This was also true in a question about vaccines, where the likers were more likely to have a positive opinion about getting vaccine shots then the haters.

“The present research demonstrated that some people tend to like things, whereas others tend to dislike things,” the researchers conclude, contending that “A more thorough understanding of this tendency will lead to a more thorough understanding of the psychology of attitudes.”

Hate on, haters. It was what you were meant to do.

Original Source

A surgeon at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center is the first in the United States to consult with a distant colleague using live, point-of-view video from the operating room via Google Glass, a head-mounted computer and camera device.

Piper Chapman: Attempts to endear herself to the Queen of Thorns by providing her with artisanal soaps—rose-scented, of course.

A Reuters photographer talks about how he viewed the now infamous Miley Cyrus routine.

The Atlantic Wire

Teen Inspired by 'Into the Wild' Found Dead in Oregon Forest The Atlantic Wire An Arizona teenager inspired by the wilderness adventure story of Into the Wild was found dead near an Oregon forest last night after going missing earlier this month. The body of Johnathan Croom, 18, was found just 1,000 feet from his car near Riddle, ... and more »

New submitter the eric conspiracy sends this quote from NBC: "An outbreak of measles tied to a Texas megachurch where ministers have questioned vaccination has sickened at least 21 people, including a 4-month-old infant — and it's expected to spread further, state and federal health officials said. 'There's likely a lot more susceptible people,' said Dr. Jane Seward, the deputy director for the viral diseases division at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ... All of the cases are linked to the Eagle Mountain International Church in Newark, Texas, where a visitor who'd traveled to Indonesia became infected with measles – and then returned to the U.S., spreading it to the largely unvaccinated church community, said Russell Jones, the Texas state epidemiologist. ... Terri Pearsons, a senior pastor of Eagle Mountain International said she has had concerns about possible ties between early childhood vaccines and autism. In the wake of the measles outbreak, however, Pearsons has urged followers to get vaccinated and the church has held several vaccination clinics. ... 'In this community, these cases so far are all in people who refused vaccination for themselves and their children,' [Steward] added. The disease that once killed 500 people a year in the U.S. and hospitalized 48,000 had been considered virtually eradicated after a vaccine introduced in 1963. Cases now show up typically when an unvaccinated person contracts the disease abroad and spreads it upon return to the U.S."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Early this year, the Quartet restaurant was hailed by the city’s food press as a further sign Portland’s economic storms were calming.

The posh eatery opened up shop in a prized bit of waterfront real estate—a building that hadn’t been occupied since the short-lived and opulent Lucier flamed out four years prior.

Back then, recession embattled diners couldn’t justify the high-end prices. Would the new “contemporary American” restaurant avoid the same fate?

“The butterflies are not there,” restaurateur Frank Taylor told the Oregonian before Quartet’s opening. But perhaps Taylor’s stomach should have housed a Monarch or two.

Almost as soon as its Valentine’s Day launch, Quartet began falling behind in payments to suppliers, according to a lawsuit filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court this month. The restaurant is said to be “hemorrhaging” money, leaving its investors on the hook for what was pitched as a lucrative opportunity. What’s more, current and former employees of Taylor’s tell tales of paychecks bouncing, and of tips withheld so the company can pay its bills.

“Actually, it’s worse here than it is over there,” said a woman who answered the phone recently at Portland Prime, a downtown steakhouse also run by Taylor. “We’re all sweating bullets.”

The August 20 lawsuit was filed by Roy Jay, a Portland businessman who’s publicly mulled past runs for mayor, and who has ties to public money via a role in operation of the city’s Smart Park garages.

Jay says Taylor and a business partner out of Arizona, Paul Keeler, approached him last November with a business proposition: For a $60,000 investment, they said Jay could have a piece of a restaurant that would net at least $1 million profit in a year’s time, the suit says. Jay claims he eventually invested $70,000, and signed his name to a sublease, “exposing himself to personal liability.”

But two months into operation, the restaurant was already on a “cash basis” with its suppliers, Jay says he’s learned. “In other words, vendors would no longer accept the LLC’s checks or credit,” the suit says. “Given the foregoing, the LLC is in imminent danger of insolvency.”

The exact state of Quartet’s finances are “murky” says Alec Laidlaw, the attorney who filed the suit. “The situation is just as dire as is listed in the complaint,” Laidlaw says. “It’s just really hard to get an accurate picture.”

The upshot: Jay wants his $70,000 back, plus half a million dollars in non-economic damages. He tells the Mercury he'd not be surprised if his fellow investors filed similar suits.

"It is unfortunate, but necessary based upon what we know, observed and have been told," Jay said via e-mail.

Taylor and Keeler did not return repeated calls for comment.

But people who’ve worked for the pair are happy to confirm some of Jay’s claims. According to the woman who answered the phone at Portland Prime, it’s not uncommon for paychecks to bounce, and the staff’s credit card tips are withheld for weeks.

“They keep our tips in order to keep the lights on,” she said, declining to give her name. “You get them in a month or so.”

And a man who worked a stint as a server at Quartet earlier this year tells the Mercury many of the same stories.

“There was a poor cook—he made no money there and had to feed his family,” said the former employee, who asked not to be named. “He cashed his check and it bounced, of course. He was yelled at for cashing his paycheck.”

Too-low prices aren’t responsible for the alleged financial problems. Diners are hard-pressed to find an entrée for less than $30 at Quartet, and the restaurant sells steak dishes for as much as $95 a plate.

Quartet has seen some high-profile action in its short life.

In May, Stevie Wonder played a small fundraiser in the glass-walled dining room—on his 63rd birthday no less. A month later, a policy advisor to Mayor Charlie Hales spurred heated controversy (and an internal investigation) after he made suggestive comments about a county commissioner at the restaurant.

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I've been an Amazon Prime member for about 6 years. I've purchased some crap from Amazon over those years. But experience has taught me well. I've learned what to look for and what to avoid. I'm now skilled in the art of parsing Amazon reviews and avoiding shady sellers. This year I've purchased some truly great products and I thought I'd share them.¹

300 lb Wheelbarrow | $166

This Rubbermaid wheelbarrow was so amazing that the 3-man delivery team that brought it to my door fawned all over it. It arrived mostly assembled in a huge box with free 2-day shipping. I've used this monster for moving mulch, earth and bodies. Umm. Well, let's just move on.

The Energizer Cup Converter | $32

This one was a big shock. I expected something named after the Energizer battery brand to be a piece of junk. For $32 it was a gamble that paid off. The Cup is a power converter for cars that provides 4 USB female charger ports and one US 120V 3-prong outlet. The Cup is designed to go in a cup holder but I keep mine in the center console with several different iPhone adapters plugged in. It even provides enough power to charge an iPad.

Squeakie Green Bottle Opener | $5

If you think I have a lot of bottle openers, I'd tell you that I can quit any time. Any time, dammit! This Squeakie opener is really nice and maybe one of the easiest to use of any I have. It's also a great way to introduce your toddler to opening your beers.

An Amazon Tip

Get the stupid Amazon credit card from Chase Bank. Just use it for everything and pay it off every day if you have to. The amount of Amazon points you'll accumulate is crazy. If you're like me and buy everything through Amazon Prime anyway, this will feel like paying for crack with more crack that gives you crack back.

Generac Gas Power Washer | $400

Yeah. It's cool. If you own a home, you are either addicted to destroying your property with a power washer or you've never used a power washer. There are only two kinds of home owners.

The Generac gas powered washer strikes a nice balance between removing sidewalk stains and industrial apocalypse simulator. It's plenty powerful enough for every job I've tackled with it and only caused minor damage to my siding.

When you order something like this and pay nothing for delivery, you will do a little fist pump.

Karcher Wide Area Cleaner | $59

Yup, hook up this bad boy by Karcher and you have a super fast way to clean your walkway and strip your deck. I was surprised at how efficient this simple little attachment was. If you have a power washer, you're an idiot. If you don't have one of these Karcher attachments, you're just plain ignorant.

SanDisk Extreme Pro 64GB SDXC | $150

Who doesn't like more memory in their portable camera? With this little beauty, I've been able to record video and take full resolution photos over a long weekend and never filled the card. It's super fast too.

Thai Sriracha | $15

It's Sriracha but actually good. It's a bit less hot than the more popular brand but significantly more tasty. Just shut your pie hole and try it. It's better.

Cantilever Steel Tool Box | $27

This is my "special" toolbox. It's filled with weird stuff like wire strippers, Ethernet crimpers and scissors that fit adult hands. The cantilever design means the box stays organized and is compact. When opened completely you have access to every tool.

Channellock 13 in 1 Ratcheting Driver | $28

Let me tell you a "life-hack". Buy two multi-bit screwdrivers. One cheap one and one good one. Put the cheap one in the kitchen and keep the good one in your special toolbox. Within 7 minutes, the cheap one will be missing all of the bits except one.

This Channellock driver is my good one and it rocks. It also still has all of its bits.

So there you have it. I think it was a pretty good year with Amazon. Of course I did buy some junk, but overall most of it was solid. I even managed to thrill my kid with a few.

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ABC News

George Zimmerman's Wife Admits Perjury, Apologizes to Judge ABC News The wife of George Zimmerman, the Florida man acquitted in the death of Trayvon Martin, pleaded guilty today to perjury charges and apologized for her lie saying "the truth will set you free." The plea deal allows Shellie Zimmerman to avoid a felony charge. Wife of George Zimmerman: Divorce is not off the tableNew York Daily News George Zimmerman's Wife Might Leave HimNew York Magazine George Zimmerman not by wife's side as she pleads guilty to perjuryWashington Times HLNtv.com -Orlando Sentinel -WBFS all 275 news articles »

Boston Globe

Majority oppose GOP plan to defund Obamacare, poll finds CBS News A clear majority of Americans are opposed to the Republican-led effort to defund Obamacare, a new poll shows. Fifty-seven percent of Americans say they disapprove of the proposal to cut off funding as a way to stop the implementation of the Affordable Care ... Republicans Who Love ObamacareDaily Beast Push to defund ObamaCare big test for DeMint at Heritage and rest of RepublicansFox News Big Majority Of Americans Opposed To Defunding ObamacareTPM MiamiHerald.com -Washington Times (blog) -Boston Globe all 125 news articles »

Nerval's Lobster writes "Kernel editor-in-chief and noted firebrand Milo Yiannopoulos swings away at Silicon Valley's current startup culture, noting that it's resulted in herds of wannabe founders and startup groupies who don't exactly have a track record of starting successful companies or even producing solid code. 'Though they produce little of value, they are the naive soft power behind aggressive capitalist machines in Silicon Valley: the trend-setting vanguard of the global Web and mobile industries,' he writes. 'We should be very wary indeed of these vacuous cheerleaders whose vague waffle about the transformational potential of photo-sharing apps is more sinister and Orwellian than anything dreamt up by a dictator.' How long can such a culture continue before it dries up, and the whole tech-investment cycle begins anew?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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[sahhay]

Concept and text by Mallory Ortberg. Images by Matt Lubchansky, who makes comics and occasionally leaves his apartment in New York. His work includes Please Listen to Me and New Amsterdam Mystery Company. He’s on Twitter, and doesn’t expect you to get his name right.

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