Me-Too snowflakes

It has become like a mass hysteria.And everybody is joining in especially the hypocrites that knew about it but never said a thing.Yes you Meryl Streep.
And of course the Golden (what is so Golden about it, it is all plastic?) Globes have become a platform for those who seek attention. Hollywood disgust me. After all they are only  mere actors desperately seeking attention.
So?
One individual that took full advantage of appearing on stage was Oprah Winfrey. Most definitely and without doubt to further her own ambitions.

Does anyone remember all the pseudoscience and quackery she’s promoted?

Pseudoscience and quackery? Oh, yes. In the early years of this blog, Oprah was a frequent topic of Orac’s Insolence, and for good reason. She was one of the foremost promoters of pseudoscience, quackery, and general New Age BS in the world. If you think I’m exaggerating, just think of it this way. Oprah not only gave the world America’s quack, Dr. Mehmet Oz, and the foremost promoter of pseudoscience in mental health, Dr. Phil McGraw, who also stands accused of providing alcohol and drugs to addicts featured on his show in order to ramp up the drama factor. It would be bad enough if that were all she had done, but it’s not. https://respectfulinsolence.com/2018/01/09/oprah-winfrey-president-anyone-remember-pseudoscience-quackery-shes-promoted/

As I say, she is an ecumenical promoter of fantasies. Remember the satanic panic, the mass hysteria during the 1980s and early ’90s about satanists abusing and murdering children that resulted in the wrongful convictions of dozens of people who collectively spent hundreds of years incarcerated? Multiple Oprah episodes featured the celebrity “victims” who got that fantasy going. When a Christian questioner in her audience once described her as New Age, Winfrey was pissed. “I am not ‘New Age’ anything,” she said, “and I resent being called that. I don’t see spirits in the trees, and I don’t sit in the room with crystals.” Maybe not those two things specifically; she’s the respectable promoter of New Age belief and practice and nostrums, a member of the elite and friend to presidents, five of whom have appeared on her shows. New Age, Oprah-style, shares with American Christianities their special mixtures of superstition, selfishness, and a refusal to believe in the random. “Nothing about my life is lucky,” she has said. “Nothing. A lot of grace. A lot of blessings. A lot of divine order. But I don’t believe in luck.” https://slate.com/health-and-science/2018/01/oprah-winfrey-helped-create-our-irrational-pseudoscientific-american-fantasyland.html

But do yourself a favour and read the book by kitty Kelley.
If there was one untruth Oprah would have sued Kitty to hell and back!

Things we thought were facts

In 1271, the Venetian merchant Marco Polo set off with his father and uncle on a legendary trek across Asia. Over the course of his 24-year journey, Polo would become one of the first Europeans to chronicle the cities, cultures and technology of the Far East. Discover 11 fascinating facts about the life of one of history’s greatest explorers.

http://www.history.com/news/history-lists/11-things-you-may-not-know-about-marco-polo

but

 There is no real record of the explorer Marco Polo. 

• Nowhere is he mentioned in Chinese writings and the Chinese were well known for documentation  and certainly they would have documented at least something about Marco Polo especially as he was claimed to be a mayor of some small province.
• A Man called Marco Polo did live in Venice but that was not the Marco Polo we learned about.
• What a disappointment!

In a book published in 1995, “Did Marco Polo Go to China?”, Frances Wood, the head of the Chinese section at the British Library, also argued that he probably did not make it beyond the Black Sea.

She pointed out that despite being an acute observer of daily life and rituals, there is no mention in Marco Polo’s chapters on China of the custom of binding women’s feet, chopsticks, tea drinking, or even the Great Wall.

“There’s nothing in the Venetian archives to say that the Polo family had direct contact with China at all,” Dr Wood told The Daily Telegraph. “Nothing from China has ever been found in the possessions they left behind.

“One theory is that Marco Polo copied a sort of guide book on China written by a Persian merchant. Only about 18 sentences in the entire manuscript are written in the first person – it is extremely rare for him to say ‘I saw this with my own eyes’.

“I believe that rather than being one person’s account, it’s a sort of medieval database of European knowledge of the Far East at the time.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/8691111/Explorer-Marco-Polo-never-actually-went-to-China.html

you can also read all about MP in Wikipedia of course. That is if you never read his travels.

A Gem

The trout is a beautiful creature. His colouring is the most delicate brushwork on a
glistening sheen, exquisitely streamlined: now gold and olive, now blue and silver,
now mottled with spots red and black.
Peter Cunningham.

The gem is the new author that I came across. Beautiful writing. The story does not really matter if someones writes as eloquently as this man. Obviously a lover of fly fishing of which I know nothing. But so far I love the story too….

Alex and Kay began their relationship many years ago in Ireland where Alex was destined to become a priest. His father, a well-respected doctor, is immensely proud of him until the day Alex meets Kay, a meeting which changes Alex’s life and his relationship with his father forever. Rejected by his father and his friends, Alex and Kay eventually settle in Canada to lead a normal family life. Normal life, however, is only a thin veneer covering a world of childhood secrets and lies and a letter arriving out of the blue triggers a long-buried guilt in Alex, leading him to risk all to track down its secrets. In a spellbinding story of one man’s search for the crucial secret locked in his memory since childhood, The Trout bursts up through the conventions and falsehoods of the past and hangs, beautiful and shimmering, in the clear and vital light of truth.

 

Dyslexia.

Not  easy for the ordinary ‘normal’ (is there such thing?) person to understand dyslexia. You know that people suffering from this have a hard time to write and read, but do you really know how hard it is?  It comes in degrees of course but for some reading is almost impossible. And parents / teachers often get impatient because they do not understand either.

In years gone by those suffering from dyslexia were regarded as stupid. Now we hopefully know better!

A sufferer (Daniel Britton)  has created a font to explain what words look like if you are dyslexic.

I have seen something simalar before but cannot remember where it was not the same.

To see more you can check this link Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3112756/Take-reading-test-shows-s-like-dyslexic-Font-recreate-frustration-felt-condition.html#ixzz3cHze1NAt

Have you read…?

From the #1 New York Timesbestselling author and master of narrative nonfiction comes the enthralling story of the sinking of the Lusitania, published to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the disaster

On May 1, 1915, a luxury ocean liner as richly appointed as an English country house sailed out of New York, bound for Liverpool, carrying a record number of children and infants. The passengers were anxious. Germany had declared the seas around Britain to be a war zone, and for months, its U-boats had brought terror to the North Atlantic. But the Lusitania was one of the era’s great transatlantic “Greyhounds” and her captain, William Thomas Turner, placed tremendous faith in the gentlemanly strictures of warfare that for a century had kept civilian ships safe from attack. He knew, moreover, that his ship–the fastest then in service–could outrun any threat.

Germany, however, was determined to change the rules of the game.

A really great book that sheds light on the USA entering the First World War and the sinking of the Lusitania is written by Erik Larson in Dead Wake.  This is a great read. You get to travel with the passengers on the Lusitania in 1915. It sheds light on how the Germans did not care if they sunk passenger liners with women and children, whether there was indeed ammunition on the Lusitania as claimed, and the clever code breaking done in secret. Also about Woodrow Wilson’s romance!

And a funny true little story –when the war broke out in 1904…

In Paris, the big fascination was the trial of Henriette Caillaux, wife of former prime minister Joseph Caillaux, arrested for killing the editor of the Paris newspaper LeFigaro after the newspaper had published an intimate letter that the prime minister had written to her before their marriage, when they were having an adulterous affair.

 

Enraged, Mrs. Caillaux bought a gun, practiced with it at the gunsmith’s shop, then went to the editor’s office and fired six times. In her testimony, offering an unintended metaphor for what was soon to befall Europe, she said, “These pistols are terrible things. They go off by themselves.” She was acquitted, after persuading the court that the murder was a crime of passion.

To Read or Not to Read

 

I started writing when I was eight—out of the blue, uninspired by any example. I’d never known anyone who wrote; indeed, I knew few people who read. But the fact was, the only four things that interested me were: reading books, going to the movies, tap dancing, and drawing pictures. Then one day I started writing, not knowing that I had chained myself for life to a noble but merciless master.

When God hands you a gift, he also hands you a whip; and the whip is intended solely for self-flagellation.

But of course I didn’t know that.

Music for Chameleons

TRUMAN CAPOTE, 1979

I read somewhere that 1 out of 5 (I suppose that is an average and not a mean) of books on a bookshelf goes unread. I wonder if the same apples to Kindle? With Amazon you can read a % free to see if you like it. I suppose I read 1 out of 5 that I taste so to speak.  And those that I try must have a good cover because sure,  I judge a book by its cover.

I never read romance and science fiction so I cannot speak.

But then I have become very fussy. I thought Gone Girl was rubbish! OK so I did not even finish it and I don’t know what all the hype is about. And the movie even rubbisher. But I liked The Girl on the Train, as I said to http://poeticparfait.com  it was errrrrr… engaging. Even better and it should not even be mentioned in the same breath was A S A Harrison’s The Silent Wife. Pity that she died before she saw the results of bestseller. Nicole Kidman is supposedly going to feature in the movie.

But then there are the writers that are artist of a very high standard not to be compared….

Like Julian Barnes and others too many to name. They fall in a different category.

 

Masters of the Game

A really enjoyable film was The Imitation Game –

The Bletchley Park codebreakers depicted in the film The Imitation Game (this year’s Oscar winner for Best Adapted Screenplay) worked around the clock to crack the secret of Nazi communications during World War II. Based on the book ‘Alan Turing: The Enigma’ by Andrew Hodges

The fascinating difference between fact and fiction you can read here:- http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/imitation-game/

But it is true that the  codebreakers could crack the secret of Nazi communications was kept a secret for 50 years Amazing!

But now I read in mental_floss that these guys were not just excellent codebreakers they also were skilled at palindromes.

A palindrome is a word, phrase, number, or other sequence of characters which reads the same backward or forward. Allowances may be made for adjustments to capital letters, punctuation, and word dividers.

 

As the author says It makes sense that those with a talent for uncovering meaning from patterns in strings of symbols would have a knack for creating palindromes. (A nut for a jar of tuna).

 

As for Birdman winning the Oscar, I had to go and read up all about it on the internet.  It was either a superb version of superhero films or a big batch of self congratulatory nonsense!

 

BUT MY FAVORITE Actor must be!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hollywood superstar Joaquin Phoenix is using his voice to help more people learn about how dogs are bludgeoned and killed so their skins can be turned into leather items to be sold around the world. http://petauk.org/b393

 http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/joaquin-phoenix-stars-peta-dog-778087

The Boy who did not come back from Heaven

http://newsfeed.gawker.com/little-boy-who-claimed-to-die-and-visit-heaven-admits-h-1679811262?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_facebook&utm_source=gawker_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

‘I did not go to heaven’: Paralyzed boy admits he made up best-selling book about how he ascended to paradise and met Jesus after car wreck.

Alex co-wrote the book with his father, pictured. He is now divorced from his mother and lives separately from his son

His story was made into the best-selling book The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven, which was co-authored with his father Kevin and first published in 2010.
The mother adds that Alex previously told a pastor that the book was made up, but was told the publication was ‘blessing’ people and to stay quiet.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2913259/Man-wrote-best-selling-book-saw-heaven-near-death-experience-six-year-old-admits-thing-up.html#ixzz3P3Ua9IhU
Some of the comments in the Dailymail are really very funny!

Was there not a similar case of a surgeon that also wrote a book about going to heaven but it was debunked by the doctors who attended to him?

So by the way near death experiences do have a neurological explanation about what happens when the brain is starved from oxygen. I am just saying. https://justfletcher.wordpress.com/2013/07/03/proof-of-heaven/

Tim’s retirement Plan

Tim’s Retirement Plan!

 

There is a new diet on the market at least once a week I guess and still the numbers of obese people are increasing. I am sure the want for magic has been with humans forever. But if there was this magic pill everybody would be slim. Look at Oprah, all the money in the world but…..

Saw this article http://m.news24.com/health24/Columnists/Too-much-too-soon-Tim-Noakes-20150109,

So many specialists (Noakes is a sport specialist please do not confuse!) have warned people, but I should have listened will come too late. Pretoria University has spoken out so many times, but  it seems to fall on deaf ears.  He has followers I am telling you, more than some prophets.

Banting is quite similar to the Dr Atkins diet, and do you know what he died from? And how much he weighed in the end?

Spoke to a gastroenterologist who said she has had to take several patients off this diet because of serious complications.

Of course Noakes will tell you this diet is not for everyone – he has to cover his arse.

Please read the article. And this one too http://www.health24.com/Diet-and-nutrition/News/Tim-Noakes-backtracks-on-dairy-20141020

We are so addicted to processed food, the easy way out. And if you don’t like animals and you don’t care how they are slaughtered sure eat meat 7 days a week and don’t cut the fatty bits off.

In the mean time Tim must be laughing all the way to the bank.

Cheers 2015!!! May this be your blessed year!

My favorite book of 2014?

Difficult to choose but this one for me takes the prize. If you like wine and you love France or is it the other way round, if you love France and well you have to be a wine lover  of course– the ghost of the grape – then you will get much enjoyment from this book. And some excitement too. I will now look at a glass of wine with a different eye. Excuse the pun!

The reviews:-

Journalist Maximillian Potter uncovers a fascinating plot to destroy the vines of La Romanée-Conti, Burgundy’s finest and most expensive wine.

In January 2010, Aubert de Villaine, the famed proprietor of the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, the tiny, storied vineyard that produces the most expensive, exquisite wines in the world, received an anonymous note threatening the destruction of his priceless vines by poison-a crime that in the world of high-end wine is akin to murder-unless he paid a one million euro ransom. Villaine believed it to be a sick joke, but that proved a fatal miscalculation and the crime shocked this fabled region of France. The sinister story that Vanity Fair journalist Maximillian Potter uncovered would lead to a sting operation by some of France’s top detectives, the primary suspect’s suicide, and a dramatic investigation. This botanical crime threatened to destroy the fiercely traditional culture surrounding the world’s greatest wine.

SHADOWS IN THE VINEYARD takes us deep into a captivating world full of fascinating characters, small-town French politics, an unforgettable narrative, and a local culture defined by the twinned veins of excess and vitality and the deep reverent attention to the land that runs through it.

 

“A rare book that transcends the narrow interests of wine lovers.”—The New York Times, named a Best Wine Book of 2014

 

 

Maximillian Potter, an award-winning journalist, is the senior media adviser for the governor of Colorado. He was the executive editor of 5280: Denver’s Magazine, and previously a staff writer at Premiere, Philadelphia, and GQ. He has been a contributing editor to Men’s Health/Best Life and Details, and contributes to Vanity Fair. Potter is a native of Philadelphia, with a BA from Allegheny College and an MSJ from Northwestern University’s Medill School. He lives in Denver with his wife and two sons.

Dijon 2012

Cheers!!!  On 2015!