DEEP THINKING ABOUT

[Deborah J]

Hi CP!

I am so sorry about your cat. It hurts so much when you have to let them go. I love all animals. I just really miss the companionship of a dog. Since I lost my little Taylor back in January, this is the first time that I have not had a doggie, buddy, pal since I was 2 years old:-) 

Thanks for the support as I know I need to wait. I have always had a great pet sitter who came to my house and would overnight so my babies could stay in the comfort of their own home and not in some cage at the Vet's office. I just thought am I supposed to have this dog? It was so strange for that meet to happen. How many times do you get offered a well trained service dog. They spend a lot of money on these dogs to help people. They stated they will keep Heidi so I do know either way she will have a great home. 

I just hope that I can soon get another child with fur.:-) I just love this commercial! Checking off the list:-) 

 

 

 

   

 

[Patrycja]

^  It takes time to be ready for another pet. Hope it works out how it's supposed to for you, Deb. Good luck

I've posted some thoughts and articles about trends in education, and here's another that is just bizarre, enforced coddling under the guise of not hurting students. Profs and fellow students now must be careful to not offend with 'microaggressions.' Yep, it now has its own term. From the article: "The list of offensive statements included: 'America is the land of opportunity' and 'I believe the most qualified person should get the job.'" No, this is not an Onion write-up. Hello, 1984!

The Coddling of the American Mind

In the name of emotional well-being, college students are increasingly demanding protection from words and ideas they don’t like. Here’s why that’s disastrous for education—and mental health.

GREG LUKIANOFF AND JONATHAN HAIDT SEPTEMBER 2015 ISSUE

 A couple of highlight paragraphs:

We have been studying this development for a while now, with rising alarm. (Greg Lukianoff is a constitutional lawyer and the president and CEO of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which defends free speech and academic freedom on campus, and has advocated for students and faculty involved in many of the incidents this article describes; Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist who studies the American culture wars. The stories of how we each came to this subject can be read here.) The dangers that these trends pose to scholarship and to the quality of American universities are significant; we could write a whole essay detailing them. But in this essay we focus on a different question: What are the effects of this new protectiveness on the students themselves? Does it benefit the people it is supposed to help? What exactly are students learning when they spend four years or more in a community that polices unintentional slights, places warning labels on works of classic literature, and in many other ways conveys the sense that words can be forms of violence that require strict control by campus authorities, who are expected to act as both protectors and prosecutors?

 

But vindictive protectiveness teaches students to think in a very different way. It prepares them poorly for professional life, which often demands intellectual engagement with people and ideas one might find uncongenial or wrong. The harm may be more immediate, too. A campus culture devoted to policing speech and punishing speakers is likely to engender patterns of thought that are surprisingly similar to those long identified by cognitive behavioral therapists as causes of depression and anxiety. The new protectiveness may be teaching students to think pathologically.

It's a very long Atlantic article, but well worth the read. A brief but insightful and articulate video interview as well. 

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/

 

[geekfreak]

roll up roll its the crazies show in town...dancing the ????? its only Tuesday I`m in need ofooh yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

[Charles J. White]

I don't understand women at all...My daughter is giving me headaches, I don't know if its normal but she seems so independent, annoyed, and angry in the mornings when she wakes up. I don't get it at all. Every day for a month now…

[Charles J. White]

I actually feel like we all belong or all connected in some sort of weird way, it's hard for me to put my finger on it but the universe has a weird way of connecting people. The older I get the more I realize I don't know shit...

[ebk]

 

I don't understand women at all...My daughter is giving me headaches, I don't know if its normal but she seems so independent, annoyed, and angry in the mornings when she wakes up. I don't get it at all. Every day for a month now…

 

Is she a teenager?  All teens are like that (or so I've heard).  Your son will hate you, too, when he's a teen 

 

(I know you've said how old your kids are, but I've totally forgotten...sorry)

[geekfreak]

well hello all I`m BACK...its been to long away from the forum but all the craziness as settled down. only the madness of employment going down...so hope all is right with chillumpuffer CJW and everyone else here....

[Charles J. White]

well hello all I`m BACK...its been to long away from the forum but all the craziness as settled down. only the madness of employment going down...so hope all is right with chillumpuffer CJW and everyone else here....

You too, hope all is well with you. I bought a new SUV this week. Sold the ski mobile, felt really guilty for the guy who bought it, but he insisted so I let it go

[Charles J. White]

 

[geekfreak]

You too, hope all is well with you. I bought a new SUV this week. Sold the ski mobile, felt really guilty for the guy who bought it, but he insisted so I let it go

yep all well dude just to little time to do the loads of fun things to do not the time.

[geekfreak]

well I`m of on the road to discovery of the land of interviews again...sometimes I`ve vile, hurt and hated within my mind which isn't health ways of being the freak all my life you know there`s anyone`s but purely putting us Loony Tunes on med to dull our downward part aren't gone there just hiding in a cloud of med`s isn't the case to shedding  the demons holding you from human caring because when they find your on med`s they`ll not touch or talk to you...this is what helps me through the daily boring bits of life,,,

[Strider]

 

Grotesque. Why would anyone want to listen to an hour of 'roided-up self-obsessed muscle-heads? Daniel Lugo? He was a murdering asshole. What's next...the motivational tapes of Charles Manson?

Give me Brother Theodore any day.

[Charles J. White]

Hanging out in hotels for 2 months is a lot of fun, especially when it's the Ramada...

Edited November 8, 2015 by Charles J. White

[geekfreak]

well its the start of another life changing week of work, talk about dull the senses its as boring as watching paint drying...much of the television news is full of terror, bombs on aircraft, butt kissesing PM`s or Polices bullshit or another child with a gunshot out...thank fuck I`ve learn to staying care free these days these rose tinted glasses are great. plus there`s the MUSIC to aid me through the rest of it lol. sadly as of late I`ve been questioning so of my own points of view on some subjects which also has me questioning my own FAITH. due to a few personnel issues going down at this time. one being the lack of care from the metal health team my med aren't working causing  me to have shitty time of it all, then there`s the health issues of  my mother not being done  are giving us the information scream I couldn't even spit. well there`s other bullshit going down like bosses paying low shift rate to me others on my shift of nights  higher rate 40% me 60% other bollocks...still I`m alive and in goodish health...think all play    three favoriive of mine...cool bluesy soulful rock n` roll music...which is possible the best ideal I`ll have today or another day really as I`ve said in the past realties SUCKS so tune in and drop out, even if its only till your music stops...sometimes I`d wish its all sunny and roses but that`s just HOLLYWOOD...bullet proof poet couldn't take much more so I`ll hang up the peace symbols and lower my fist,,, that's the truth of it all... peace, love and understanding to you all...

[Charles J. White]

 then there`s the health issues of  my mother not being done  

Hope things will work out for your mom, keep your chin up

[geekfreak]

the only way to answer this is no mom near going to be ok...keeping the chin up is all I can do...I`ve found a new musician " The London Souls " I totally like...

[geekfreak]

well I`ve been finding the peace is now that's the way to do it...

[geekfreak]

wow wee happier not...due to seeking questions with answers which didn't have answers which is crap. so if you like I`m forward to the seek out the  friends of happier times. these friends are musicians which aid me through the daily duties of normal daily bullshit...never will the bullshit go way so music will set you FREE...

[Charles J. White]

wow wee happier not...due to seeking questions with answers which didn't have answers which is crap. so if you like I`m forward to the seek out the  friends of happier times. these friends are musicians which aid me through the daily duties of normal daily bullshit...never will the bullshit go way so music will set you FREE...

Music has been my escape since I was a kid, so clearly I have a problem that I prefer to listen to music instead of reading or watching tv which is odd to most of my friends.

[geekfreak]

Music has been my escape since I was a kid, so clearly I have a problem that I prefer to listen to music instead of reading or watching tv which is odd to most of my friends.

me to dude....

[Patrycja]

Hoping our Parisian friends are all right...

Three locations targeted - two restaurants had shootings, explosions around the football stadium - 18 dead, 60 hostages in a theatre... oh my God...

[Charles J. White]

Vive La France!!!

[apantherfrommd]

Vive La France!!!

Vive La Paris, Brother. Good deal, my friend. Rock On!

[Kiwi_Zep_Fan87]

This is incredibly interesting!!

When is Thanksgiving 2015? What is it and why do Americans celebrate Turkey Day?

Roast dinner, American football and giant balloons - what is Thanksgiving Day really all about?

Image 1 of 2

Turkeys have little to be thankful for on Thanksgiving meanwhile New Yorkers could be blown away with this year's Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade Photo: Reuters/Getty

 

When is Thanksgiving Day?

On the fourth Thursday in November. This year the day falls on November 26th.

Thanksgiving Day traditionally kicks off the 'holiday season' in the United States. The day was set in stone by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939 and approved by Congress in 1941. FDR changed it from Abraham Lincoln's designation as the last Thursday in November.

While Britons think of it as a warm-up for the Yuletide period, many Americans think it of it as just as important as Christmas.

A delicious roast turkey

In fact, more people in the US celebrate Thanksgiving than do Christmas. Thanksgiving Day is secular holiday in a country that officially separates church and state so this probably makes sense.

 

What is the history of Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving Day can be traced back to the 1621 celebration at the Plymouth Plantation, where the religious refugees from England known popularly as the Pilgrims invited the local Native Americans to a harvest feast after a particularly successful growing season.

The previous year's harvests had failed and in the winter of 1620 half of the pilgrims had starved to death.

The First Thanksgiving 1621, oil on canvas by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris (1899)

Luckily for the rest, members of the local Wampanoag tribe taught the Pilgrims how to grow corn, beans and squash (the Three Sisters); catch fish, and collect seafood.

There are only two contemporary accounts of the 1621 Thanksgiving, but it's clear that Turkey was not on the menu. The three-day feast included goose, lobster, cod and deer.

So why do Americans eat Turkey on Thanksgiving Day? Pilgrim Edward Winslow wrote a letter about that now-famous meal in 1621 which mentioned a turkey hunt before the dinner.

Another theory says the choice of turkey was inspired by Queen Elizabeth I who was eating dinner when she heard that Spanish ships had sunk on their way to attack England.

Queenie was so thrilled with the news she ordered another goose be served. Some claim early US settlers roasted turkeys as they were inspired by her actions.

Others say that as wild turkeys are native to North America, they were a natural choice for early settlers.

 

Who set the date of Thanksgiving Day?

'The National Thanksgiving Proclamation' was the first formal proclamation of Thanksgiving in America. The first President of the United States George Washington made this proclamation on October 3, 1789.

Then in 1846, author Sarah Josepha Hale waged a one-woman campaign for Thanksgiving to be recognised as a truly national holiday.

Abraham Lincoln and Sarah Josepha Hale conspired to fix Thankgiving Day across the US

In the US the day had previously been celebrated only in New England and was largely unknown in the American South. All the other states scheduled their own Thanksgiving holidays at different times, some as early as October and others as late as January.

Hale's advocacy for the national holiday lasted 17 years and four presidencies before the letter she wrote to Lincoln was successful. In 1863 at the height of the Civil War he supported legislation which established a national holiday of Thanksgiving on the last Thursday of November.

Lincoln perhaps wanted the date to tie in with the anchoring of the Mayflower at Cape Cod, which occurred on November 21, 1620. Although we now use the Gregorian calendar. In 1621 the date would have been November 11 to the Pilgrims who used the Julian calendar.

So Hale finally got her wish. She is perhaps now better known, though, for writing the nursery rhyme 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'.

Franksgiving

In 1939, President Roosevelt moved Thanksgiving up a week to try and energise the shopping period before Christmas during the Great Depression.

Several states followed FDR’s lead but 16 states refused move the holiday shift, leaving the country with rival Thanksgivings. FDR changed his mind after coming under pressure from Congress and in 1941, the a resolution was passeed returning the holiday to the fourth Thursday of November.

Atlantic City mayor Thomas D. Taggart later described the Thanksgiving holiday from 1939–1941 as "Franksgiving".

 

There are still two Thanksgivings

Canadians mark Turkey Day, too, in fact it was the first country to do so. Canada celebrates a separate Thanksgiving on the second Monday in October.

It was first celebrated by the arctic explorer Martin Frobisher in 1578 - more than 40 years before the Pilgrim fathers arrived in the New World.

 

Football!

Like soccer on Boxing Day in the UK, football (the American version) plays a major role in Thanksgiving.

The University of Detroit Stadium hosted the first Thanksgiving Day football game in 1934, pitting the Detroit Lions against the Chicago Bears.

Go Lions: A pair of pilgrims cheer on Detroit

The game was the brainchild of G.A. Richards, the first owner of the Detroit Lions. He was keen to promote the new franchise in a baseball-mad city, so he approached NBC to get them to broadcast the game across their national radio network. They agreed and the game became the first ever network broadcast event.

The game was such a hit it became a tradition in the US and football is now an integral part of the day.

 

The annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade

Another Thanksgiving tradition is the Macy's parade in New York City - an annual pageant of floats, cheerleaders, marching bands and gigantic balloons.

A giant Spiderman balloon in the 2014 Macys parade  Photo: REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

The parade dates back to the 1920s when many of the immigrant workers at Macy's department store were keen to celebrate the American holiday of Thanksgiving with the type of festival their parents had loved in Europe.

It originally started from 145th Street in Harlem and ended at Herald Square, making a 6-mile (9.7 km) route.

The newest route was introduced with the 2012 parade. This change eliminated Times Square and rerouted the parade down Sixth Avenue, a move that was protested by the Times Square BID, Broadway theatre owners and other groups.

The 2015 Thanksgiving Day Parade route

New York City officials preview the parade route and try to move as many potential obstacles out of the way, including traffic signals.

 

Let's talk turkey

When European settlers encountered turkeys for the first time in the early 1500s, they incorrectly identified the birds as a type of guinea fowl.

Since this group of birds were thought to come from Turkey, the North American bird was dubbed 'turkey fowl'.

This later became shortened to 'turkey' and entered the vernacular. The English navigator William Strickland, who introduced the turkey into England in 1550, was granted a coat of arms (left) which included a "turkey-cock in his pride proper".

The official record of his crest in the archives of the College of Arms is said to be the oldest surviving European drawing of a turkey.

(In Portuguese the translation of turkey is 'peru'. The exotic birds taken back to 16th century Portugal had come from there, you see.)

 

The Presidential reprieve

Eating turkey is actually more associated with Thanksgiving than it is Christmas in the States with over 50 million turkeys served up every year in the US.

Every year, though, the President ‘pardons’ at least one turkey.

'Go in peace, not in pieces': President Obama - watched by his daughers Sasha and Malia - pardons a lucky turkey  Photo: Getty Images

The public presentation of two prize turkeys to the commander-in-chief in the lead-up to Thanksgiving had been a time-honoured photo op since the 1940s.

But on Nov 17, 1989 - 200 years after George Washington's proclamation (see above) - President George H.W. Bush introduced a new tradition of his own and pardoned a 50-pound turkey in the White House Rose Garden.

“Let me assure you," Bush said to the 30 schoolchildren present. "This fine turkey will not end up on anyone’s dinner table, not this guy. He’s granted a presidential pardon as of right now.”

The presidential turkey pardon has remained an annual Thanksgiving ritual ever since.

 

Trains, planes and automobiles: some stats

The 12-day Thanksgiving period between from Nov 20 to Dec 1 will likely see over 25 million travelling to destinations worldwide according to trade organisation Airlines for America (A4A).

The projected number of 25.3 million is three per cent higher than the estimated 24.5 million passengers who made the journey in 2014.

That equates to approximately 65,000 people per day on top of average passengers for a total of 2.7 million people per day.

The title of this section of course refers to the best film ever on the subject.

^{Steve Martin and John Candy in their pomp}

 

Can I celebrate Thanksgiving in the UK?

According the 2011 census there were 177,185 Americans living in England and Wales so it’s becoming increasingly fashionable for restaurants and pop-ups to host Thanksgiving meals.

Also a lot Yanks will be coming to the UK on vacation so they will need to be fed. Here is our round-up of the best places to go to enjoy a Thanksgiving feast in the UK.

 

Does Britain have an equivalent?

Yes, it's called Harvest Day, although it's a lot less of a big deal. While we usually take a few non-perishables down to our local church and enter our autumn vegetables in competitions, Thanksgiving in North America is a much more plentiful and extravagent affair.

A prize-winning pumpkin at The London Harvest Festival at Lindley Hall, Westminster. The little pumpkin on the right is Henry Watkins (Getty)

 

Does the UK care about Thanksgiving?

Yes, sort of in a commercial sense, although we maybe don't realise it.Black Friday first arrived in the UK five years ago when Amazon thought it would try its luck bringing the American shopping sensation to a new market.

In 2013, Asda, which is owned by American retail giant Walmart, participated in UK's version of Black Friday, and last year most major UK retailers including John Lewis, Marks & Spencer, Argos and even British Airways jumped on board.

And with that, any remaining English decorum flew out the window. Shoppers trampled over each other in their rush to enter stores and police were called to break up fights as consumers grappled over discounted televisions and behaved "like animals".

 

 

Black Friday kicks off in

12	:	09	:	53	:	42
Days		Hrs		Mins		Secs

 

This year, police chiefs have urged stores to cancel Black Friday altogether after Asda decided to become the first retailer in the UK to abandon event.

 

Source : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/11983413/When-is-Thanksgiving-2015-What-is-it-and-why-do-Americans-celebrate-Turkey-Day.html

 

 

Edited November 14, 2015 by Kiwi_Zep_Fan87

[Anjin-san]

Beverly vs. Salem

Salem High School and Beverly High School have played each other since 1891. The 100th meeting between the two schools in 1998 at Hurd Stadium attracted over 11,000 fans.