Deity In Our Own Image

Deity In Our Own Image

March 27, 2016

When you accept a picture of the deity assigned to you by another people, you become the spiritual prisoners of that other people. —John Henrik Clarke

If we’re going to resurrect a deity, why not resurrect ourselves?

The morning is still quiet as I write. The only noise is that of the heater trying to balance the temperature between the West end of the house, which is always warm, and the East end of the house, which is always a bit cool. For the moment, everything is peaceful and I am enjoying that temporary situation as I know it won’t be long before the younger children are awake and anxiously chasing the myth of some rabbit. I could do without the myths associated with today, but in this momentary tranquility, my mind involuntarily yields to thoughts of deity and our roles not only in creating them, but maintaining them as well.

I realize that, for some, challenging the concept of deity encroaches upon sacred territory. People are protective of their gods because to challenge one’s deity is to put the source of one’s faith at risk. Yet, I would argue that if one does not understand their god how can they truly understand matters of worship or devotion to the faith in that god? Dissecting deity is a requirement if one ever expects to hold their faith not as a corporate purchase of a cosmic mythology but as a personal belief system that is foundational to their lives.

Therefore, the first question one must ask is this: Who created your deity? Many would hold that their god(s) were not created, but rather revealed their presence either through some event or in the presumed creation of nature. Yet, before we begin accepting as gospel the stories and legends of past millennia we must realize that the oral tradition in which they were handed down factors prominently in how one’s perception of god takes shape. Even if all the story tellers of old had witnessed the events of which they told, and few did, their representations of those events would still differ dramatically and it is in those differences that our perceptions begin to take shape. We then create an interpretation of our deity based less on the event and more on our interpretation of those story teller’s version of those events. We create our own gods.

Our belief systems are very personal, and so are our deities. Ask a million people who god is and a million different answers ensue. Millions are monotheistic, firmly convinced that a singular deity rules all. This works for us because we, too, view ourselves in some fashion as singular rulers of our own lives, attempting to control the chaotic cosmos of our immediate situation. We can relate to that god because he faces the same struggles we do, just on a larger scale. Still, millions of others view god as a concept, an energy, or a life force rather than an actual being. That concept works as well for those whose inherent view of this life is temporal and regenerative as part of a greater spiritual whole. While we may work within the greater framework of a religious structure, we still create a god that best fits our view of life.

The National Geographic Channel begins a new series tonight that I find timely. The Story of God with Morgan Freeman attempts to take an objective yet personal view of the deities we worship through the quest of one who has portrayed someone else’s version of god but has historically stated that he is not a “man of god,” but rather a “person of faith.” Even in choosing Morgan Freeman to lead this journey, the program’s producers are playing to one of the more common construction elements of deity with an actor whose voice is deep and authoritative. Morgan Freeman’s voice sounds like what we want god’s voice to sound like. Here’s the 30-second version of the trailer for tonight’s show:

Over the course of the series, the program takes a look at the larger umbrella of deity through personal stories. While I cannot imagine that such exploration uncovers anything we didn’t already know, what the stories ultimately show us is exactly what I have posited here from the beginning: our deities are of our own creation, even if we call them by the same name, even if we worship them corporately with thousands of others, our concepts of god are as personal and individual as each of us.

Where does that leave those who don’t believe in a god? I would argue that we all create gods of some form or fashion even if we choose to not refer to them by that name. We place our faith in something. Some construct deities of science and philosophy. Others hold the belief that there is nothing that exists outside one’s self, therefore making themselves the deity. Whatever rules one’s belief system becomes one’s deity.

I would not dare to challenge that anyone’s concept of god is wrong but I am abhorrent of those who would just as soon kill anyone who disagrees with their construct of a violent and wrathful god. That such views exist, again, emphasizes the sometimes severe degree to which we create deity in our own image, to justify our own views of life, and to act as an authoritative bully in manipulating the behavior of others.

Whether or not one is observing a celebration of today, I hope you might take some time and consider this deity you have constructed. Consider how it serves your faith and the ways in which your faith constructs your perception of god.

And may everyone find peace.

Music / PotD

A Little Bit Country

March 26, 2016

I write some country music. There’s a song called ‘I Hope You Dance.’ Incredible. I was going to write that poem; somebody beat me to it. —Maya Angelou

charles i. letbetter 0 a little bit country

Listening to country music means being in a certain emotional place and giving your ears fair warning.

Patsy Cline. Little Jimmy Dickens. Charlie Pride. Conway Twitty. Hank Williams, Sr.

I’m listening to some country music as we make final preparations for my youngest son to visit later today. We’re excited. This is the first time in eleven years that any of my boys have been able to come to Indianapolis. So, we’ve made sure that my schedule is clear, that there are chips and soft drinks readily available for snacking, and that the refrigerator is well stocked. We’re looking forward to a lot of fun. There’s just one thing I’ve not yet warned Kat about: he listens to country music.

I’ll admit, the country/rock fence isn’t one I mind straddling. I was born at a wonderful time for music, back when radio was alive with some truly great sounds. I cut my teeth on the Beatles, learned to ride my bike with Peter, Paul, and Mary coming through the kitchen window, and learned to drive with the Doobie Brothers blasting from the stereo in the car. When our parents were gone, or not exactly paying attention, my brother and I were playing KISS, AC/DC, The Rolling Stones, and Three Dog Night on the console stereo in the back room. The music with which we grew up was nothing short of fantastic, which is why many of those songs are still alive and those bands are touring, even though their members pop blood pressure meds and swig Geritol instead of the more nefarious contents of the past.

At the same time, though, we were raised on a good balance of classic country music. Some of my favorite memories are sitting at the tiny little breakfast table in Towanda, Kansas and listening to Hank Williams, Roy Acuff, and Flatt & Scruggs on KFDI, 1070 AM, out of Wichita. Mother would sing along as she was cooking bacon or gently frying eggs sunny side up. We might listen to Foreigner or Boston in the afternoon, but the mornings belonged to Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, and The Oak Ridge Boys.

So yeah, I can enjoy a touch of country music as long as I am mentally prepared for it. One has to be in a special emotional place to listen to country music. The sad ballads common to artist such as Bobby Goldsboro and George Jones can kill even the happiest buzz. If you’re too depressed, a bit of Bill Monroe might just make a person suicidal. One also has to warn their ears that they are about to be assaulted. If you are accustomed to hearing pure, clear, well-trained vocal tones, a bit of Ricky Skaggs or Ronnie Milsap might come as a bit of a shock. If one listens to country all the time, it’s no big deal, your ears are desensitized. For the rest of us though, the sound requires a moment of auditory adjustment no matter how much we like it.

Which brings us to my biggest concern for the week. While I don’t have any problem with any of the artists I’ve mentioned, and will make everyone in the room observe a moment of silence when Allison Krauss goes “Down To The River To Pray,” my dear son listens to contemporary country. This could be a problem. I prefer classic country. Blake Shelton is about the newest artist I can handle, and that’s pretty much only because I still remember that boy when he was playing county fairs in Oklahoma. I tried listening to Luke Bryan’s latest song a while ago and had to turn it off after four bars. What if he wants to listen to that Zac Brown Band or Dustin Lynch? I can deal with some Rascal Flatts, but I’m not so sure about Brantley Gilbert or Maddie & Tae.

I understand, music never stays the same. Our parents didn’t understand any of the music we listened to, which was probably a good thing. My parents could go to a different room when we were playing REO Speedwagon or Jefferson Starship. The house here is smaller, though. There’s no place to escape. I want my son to feel comfortable and at home, but if he asks to listen to Maren Morris I’m not sure how I’m going to respond (is that actually a clap track at the beginning of that song?).

Fortunately, there’s so much more to my son than his music choices. We’re going to have a great week with him and I’m sure you’ll see me mention my favorite G-man more than once this week. I’m looking forward to showing him around Indianapolis and having a good time. We’ll eat Long’s Donuts and drink coffee at Lino’s and I might even introduce him to Mug & Bun. I wouldn’t even mind if he were to meet an attractive and friendly female friend while he’s here.

The music, though … maybe we’ll just leave the radio on NPR this week.

Advertising / Art

End Oppressive Advertising. Maybe.

March 25, 2016

charles i. letbetter - day against advertising

The irony is, the advertising industry knows everyone hates what they produce. This is why they keep looking for new ways to force people to stay tuned. —Simon Sinek

charles i. letbetter - end oppressive advertising

Yes, advertising is annoying at times, but can we really exist economically without it?

For people who dislike advertising, March 25 is an important day. It was on this day in 2013 that a French constitutional court judge found a group of people not guilty on a charge of “degradation,” that is, defacing property in a way that reduces its value. The persons charged had spray painted a group of billboards back in 2009, but the judge found that the actions were protected as free speech as a form of protest. From that judgement, a movement was born to eliminate the scourge of advertising from the face of the planet.

I get it. There are times when the sheer number of ads goes beyond annoying. Advertising dominates so much of our lives, especially considering that we spend such a great amount of our time involved with some form of media, whether it be social or print or digital. Everywhere we look, there is an ad staring right back at us. Blatant. Insulting. Inferring that our lives are somehow incomplete, or that we are bad at business, or that we do not care for our families if we do not buy these products. I understand: we’re all tired of seeing ads all over the place.

So, the folks at this organization in France called R.A.P. have taken it upon themselves to create and promote this thing called International Day of Action Against Advertising. Today. And while they are attempting to make this a global initiative, it seems a majority of the activity is coming from the UK, where Brandalism is located. This year, they’re specifically targeting creatives by placing display ads (irony noted) outside the headquarters of some of the UK’s largest advertising agencies. The charge they’re making to creatives is that their artistic energies are not being put to good use; that advertising is a waste of their talent.

They’re right, of course. Advertising is a waste of creative talent and all those ads are a blight on the landscape and do a disservice to society. I have absolutely no problem agreeing with the premise being made.

However, eradicating advertising as we know it only creates more problems and solves very little. An underlying objective of the whole anti-advertising campaign is that we could be putting our creative energies to use doing more important things such as addressing matters of environmentalism and human rights and poverty. Without advertising, however, we wouldn’t be nearly as involved, nor have as much information as to how we might participate in a solution to those problems. Take away all the ads for non-profits and NGO’s around the world and all the good work that is being done by those agencies comes to a screeching halt.

Obviously, the folks at Brandalism don’t mean all advertising is bad. After all, had it not been for their own advertising we probably wouldn’t have even been aware that this Day Against Advertising even exists. What they’re focusing on is the oppressive and permeating amount of advertising to which we are subjected. Everywhere we turn is another ad. And while we can deface or destroy some forms of outdoor and display advertising as an act of rebellion, one can’t do the same with all the mobile ads that account for somewhere close to 60% of the market across a great number of industries. Already, companies and agencies are putting less and less money toward print and display advertising in favor of digital because that’s where your attention already is.

The rub with digital and mobile advertising is that those ads are the economic engine fueling the Internet and everything that goes along with it. Take away the advertising, and Facebook and other social media folds up and shuts down within twelve months. All those apps that make everyone’s life more convenient go away if their developers are unable to make money off advertising. Even apps that are helpful, such as child monitoring apps and apps that remind us to take our medicine on time, depend on advertising to pay for that software.

While most creatives I know would rather spend their time creating art for the sake of art itself, those in advertising at least have the advantage of being in an industry where they can put those skills and talents to use. How many of our colleagues are doing less, working at more menial jobs where they don’t have the opportunity to create anything at all? I’m lucky that I get to spend my days taking pictures and writing. Sure, some of that goes to promoting products and fashion that I can’t afford, but I would rather be doing this than trying to get by waiting tables or some other soul-sucking day job.

On its website, the folks at Brandalism attempt to get creatives to jump ship. Abandon the advertising industry. Do something better. Unfortunately, for all the noble altruism, the movement is lacking a sense of direction. If we remove what they consider “oppressive” advertising, what replaces it for promotional communication? If creatives were to leave ad agencies in droves, what would those creatives do for income? Beg? Do something totally non-creative? I’m not seeing any great alternatives here.

The copy on the website gives a disturbing answer: “Where and how we take things from here, we’re not quite sure.”

That’s rather like saying, “Here, let’s all jump off this cliff into the darkness and hope that there are marshmallows and not jagged rocks at the bottom.”

Uhm, no.

I have no problem supporting a day without advertising. I think we need to more seriously engage in a conversation as to how we can legitimately promote products, services, and humanitarian causes in ways that are not annoying and offensive. I think we could dramatically reduce the number of billboards without detrimentally impacting the revenue stream of anyone other than ClearChannel. I have no problems with any of those goals or others that might be similar.

Asking people to quit their jobs without anything concrete to take their place is nothing short of irresponsible, however. Maybe next year you make sure you have all your own ducks in a row first, okay?

Thanks.

Advertising / Art / Fashion / Photography / PotD

Pole Dancing For Everyone

March 25, 2016

Yeah, it turns out that guys don’t like deals on laser hair removal or pole dancing lessons. —Andrew Mason

Pole dancing as a communication tool may not be what you were expecting, but it works.

Communicating across different areas of interest and different social structures can be difficult. What gets the attention of one group may be completely ignored by another. It seems, though, that there is, at least, one medium capable of cutting across art, fitness, fashion, and advertising in ways that are universally effective: pole dancing. I’m guessing that’s not a topic that was covered in your communications class in college, but pole dancing has the ability to conquer one of the biggest challenges in communication: getting people’s attention. If you have a pole dancer in front of you, for whatever reason, you can’t help but watch. What other communications medium can dominate a room in such a way?

Sure, there’s a stigma that exists with pole dancing and always will as long as there are seedy little strip joints where the only thing safe is the coffee. That doesn’t change the fact that pole dancing itself is a skill that some have turned into an art form, requiring tremendous strength and muscle tone across the entire body. As provocative as it may appear, one doesn’t simply jump on a pole and start dancing. In fact, doing it wrong can result in serious injury.

One of my favorite figure models was a champion pole dancer. Having worked with the pole daily for several years, she had an incredible muscle tone and could control each major muscle group separately. Even relaxed, she presented a strong physical definition that is difficult to find outside the bodybuilding world. When she flexed, it was almost like the anatomy chart in your biology textbook had come alive. Every muscle group was identifiable in a manner that was exquisitely beautiful.

Pole dancing as exercise has been around for quite awhile now. Despite all the giggles and side glances that come whenever someone mentions that they’re taking a class, many women, and yes, some men, across all strata of society have found the pole to be an effective and enjoyable way of working their core. Both gymnast and swimmers have found the pole to be a good way to maintain their strength during the off-season while business executives find the dancing to be a welcome relief from the stress of the office. This part of pole dancing is well documented.

What has been a little more surprising, though, is some of the other places pole dancing has shown up recently, such as Alexander Wang’s spring/summer fashion show. While Wang stopped short of putting the dancers center stage during the runway presentation, their presence at the after party, held in the same building just steps off the catwalk, was all anyone talked about for weeks afterward. The typical conversation went something like this:

“Did you see Alexander Wang’s show?”

“Oh my god, yes! Those pole dancers were amazing! I can’t believe he did that!”

“I know! I can’t wait to buy everything from the collection!”

Using pole dancers to sell fashion may not seem like a natural course of action, and one might argue that their presence was more for shock and entertainment, but the fact remains that it was the pole dancers, not the runway presentation, that brought consumer-level attention to the collection (which should be hitting stores right about now).

Then, there’s the rather humorous case of this ad for MoneySupermarket, a financial services website in the UK:

The ad worked, not only in the company’s target market, which focuses specifically on financial services in the United Kingdom, but around the world. Moreover, it made a bit of a celebrity of pole dancer Kyle McIntosh who used the opportunity to speak out against body and fat shaming. Pole dancing and financial services may not seem to be natural partners, but the ad was effective in communicating the uniqueness of the brand and bringing global attention to the website.

With pole dancing seeing such success as a communications medium, perhaps we should be asking ourselves what other ways it can be put to good use. Can we imagine using pole dancing in the classroom? Certainly, biology and anatomy would seem to have logical connections, but what about physics? If you think defying gravity hanging upside down from a pole is easy, give it a try; just make sure your insurance is up to date first. I think other match and science-related subjects could be applied to pole dancing as well.

I will even go so far as saying pole dancing might be effective in the church. Think about it a moment. Many Christians are observing Good Friday today. A pole could easily be symbolic of a cross and a skilled dancer could create a very beautiful depiction of the whole Passion story. Use some imagination. It could work.

I think what we are slowly discovering is that pole dancing, because of the stigma of its background, is a unique way of capturing an audience. Taken out of the atmosphere with which it is generally associated, viewers are not sure what to expect from a pole dance, therefore, they give it significantly more attention than they would more traditional forms of communication. Those who experience communication that involves pole dancing are also more likely to retain the brand/product name over a six-month period, significantly longer than with print advertising.

As long as there are strip clubs, and I can’t imagine those going away anytime soon, pole dancing is going to have a bit of a PR issue. I think that can be used to its advantage, though, and pole dancing can be a very effective, entertaining, and low-tech means of communication.

Given its communications value, perhaps we should be giving pole dancing, and those who perform it, a little more respect. Even when they’re not wearing clothes.

Advertising / Fashion

Self-Cleaning Clothes Are (Almost) Here!

March 24, 2016

The software program for motherhood is impossible to fully download into the male brain. You give them two tasks and they’re like, ‘I have to change the baby and get the dry cleaning?’ —Allison Pearson

When we shot this photo back in 2011, the idea of self-cleaning clothes was still a fantasy

Seriously, when we mocked up this ad campaign for a fictional brand of self-cleaning fabrics back in 2011, the whole concept seemed absurd. How could clothes possibly ever be both self-cleaning and comfortable? We assumed any such invention was still a generation or two away. We were wrong.

Slackers everywhere can rejoice because the International Business Times – UK is reporting that self-cleaning clothes are, in fact, possible within the next few years. The technology, which is part biology, is cheap, easy to produce, and works off one of the world’s most plentiful sources of energy: sunlight. I know, that last little detail makes our friends in Oregon and Washington state a little less happy, but I’m sure there’s some workaround. Maybe you can take your clothes to the tanning booth, which would be the first time putting a tanning booth in a laundry actually made sense..

The invention comes from a team at RMIT University in Australia and was just published in the journal Advanced Materials Interfaces. What they have done is create special nanostructures that degrade in sunlight or under a light bulb. By growing these nanostructures on fabric, they render the material self-cleaning. Anything that is dropped onto the fabric dissolves once exposed to sufficient sunlight.

Is this not the coolest thing you’ve read all day, or what?

Don’t start throwing out your washing machine just yet, though. There’s still some research yet to go. Primarily, it is still unknown how long it will take to get out severe/stubborn stains like tomato sauce and wine. There’s also a question of how the nanostructures will respond to totally synthetic materials, especially those created by 3D printers. Not many designers are experimenting with those fabrics, yet, so that particular development is one that can be done in conjunction with the progress of the material.

The other bad news for slackers is that while the nanostructures may clean the clothes, they don’t do anything about body odor. Sorry dudes, but you’re going to have to pause that video game long enough to get up and take a shower at least once a week or something. Really. It’s bad.

We also don’t know if one will be able to post-treat clothes that you already have. If not, that means you ‘re going to need that washing machine a lot longer. And speaking of washing machines, what will this do to the whole appliance and laundry industry? I’m sure they’re not exactly welcoming of a technology that could put them completely out of business. There are multiple considerations at play here beyond the immediate advantages for fashion.

Still, the advantages of a self-cleaning fabric are considerable. They’ll make clothes more durable not having to go through the washing machine on a regular basis. Not having to wash all those clothes means less detergent in the water system. Less energy is required to maintain the clothes. Not having to worry about the delicacies of dry cleaning gives designers more freedom to add texture to their designs with sequins, applique, embroidery, and other difficult to clean elements. One would actually be able to wear delicate fabrics more frequently! And imagine what you could do with all the time you’ll save not having to wash clothes!

There’s no promise as to when this new technology may be commercially available, but know that it is possible and it is going to happen. There is hope for an end to the washday blues!

Photography / PotD

DO NOT EDIT MY PHOTOS!

March 24, 2016

Those who want to be serious photographers, you’re really going to have to edit your work. You’re going to have to understand what you’re doing. You’re going to have to not just shoot, shoot, shoot. To stop and look at your work is the most important thing you can do. —Annie Leibovitz

Editing photos without permission is a problem of the digital age that is only getting worse.

Back when photography was a more analog process involving darkrooms and chemicals, how much editing could be done to a photo was a nightmare. Even things we now consider fairly simple, such as blemish removal, involved actual airbrushing which held the risk of ruining the photograph. Editing could also cost a lot more. When one went to a portrait studio for family photos and the like, one would first be shown unedited proofs and the photographer would then attempt to upsell the editing, such as fixing Jr’s acne problem or little Joey’s fly away hair. Photographers didn’t worry that a customer or client might edit photos for themselves because they didn’t have the tools.

With the advent of digital photography, however, all that changed. Everyone, or so it seems, has access to some form of low-end image editing software. While not everyone knows how to use that software, that hasn’t stopped them from going ahead and adding filters and effects to digital photos. When one decides to edit their own photos, that’s fine. I’ve no objections. Editing your own photos is a great way to learn. When one decides to edit someone else’s photo, though, that’s a whole different issue. In short: don’t do it. Ever. For any reason.

Instagram was not the first but certainly has been the most popular consumer-level program to provide for easy, and horrible, editing directly within the app. For all the advantages that Instagram delivers from an advertising perspective, it has also been responsible for the display of millions of wretched images that should have been deleted. Professional photographers have had to scold more than a few “models” who, when posting their professional pictures, decided to edit them with one of Instagram’s filters. If you are guilty of doing this, you should apologize to your photographer immediately.

The situation is getting worse, however, as technology is making it possible to add digital stickers to photographs. We’ve already seen a rudimentary version pop up on Facebook, but now, it appears Twitter may be about to unleash a whole new can of worms. An article surfaced this week claiming that the social media messaging system is testing a “stickers” feature that not only allows users to add stickers to photos, but allows them to see how other people have edited the same photo. Even worse? Twitter would “suggest photos that you can edit and post to participate in trending conversations and breaking news.”

For professional photographers, this is a potential nightmare. There is no word as to whether there are any copyright protections (probably not) or any recourse for a photographer whose photo is edited without permission. Once again, we are faced with the challenging misconception that once something is posted to social media or published on the Internet that it must be public domain. Nothing could be further from the truth. Copyrights still remain with the photographer, no matter where they are published or how they are used, unless the photographer specifically indicates otherwise. Going around slapping stickers on photographs is a form of editing and therefore, in most cases, illegal!

Photographers have been fighting people who want to edit their photos for years. We don’t like it. When you edit one of our photos, you are not only defacing our creative property, you are insulting our artistic vision. When you edit on of my pictures, you are telling me that I wasted my time, that your opinion is more important than mine, and that you have no regard for my work. Don’t expect me or any other photographer to respond positively to such situations.

Hopefully, to avoid the legal entanglement that would be inevitable, Twitter will limit this feature to public domain photos that pass at least some superficial form of scrutiny before being slapped with stupid stickers. I don’t understand the appeal of such a feature in the first place, but I’m chalking that up to the fact I’m a grumpy old man. I’ll just assume that people who use such a feature also still buy sticker books and hide them from their children. Photographs are not sticker books, though. Putting stickers on photos isn’t editing, it’s defacing and demonstrates a lack of respect for the image.

The fact that Twitter put this information out into the press indicates that, barring some severe backlash, the feature is almost certainly headed for public release within the next few months. If that should happen, when that happens, I hope you will be thoughtful. If you want to deface your own pictures, go right ahead. Deface one of mine, though, and my response will not be friendly.

Do not edit my photos without my express permission. Ever.

Fashion

No More Fur At Armani

March 23, 2016

You don’t have to wear fur. They make such great fakes. There’s no reason to kill an animal. —Grace Slick

Could this be the beginning of the end for the fur industry

Fur has been a never-ending part of the fashion industry since early man covered himself in animal pelts in an attempt to keep warm. There was a time when fur was not so much a luxury as it was a necessary means of surviving through cold winters. With time, though, we’ve learned to do more with other fabrics that do a much better job of insulating the body from the cold. Today, there is no legitimate need to use furs of any kind in clothing.

Yet, it happens, a lot, especially among French and Italian designers. While a few designers such as Calvin Klein and Ralph Lauren have committed to using synthetic furs, and we tend to see more synthetics used by Asian designers, European labels still make heavy use of furs. In fact, for the fall/winter season that was just shown, the use of furs was exceptionally heavy, making at least a token appearance in almost every collection. Italian labels, some of which began as furriers over 100 years ago, have been especially reluctant to drop the material.

So when Giorgio Armani announced yesterday that new technologies “render the use of cruel practices unnecessary as regards animals,” and pledged to end his use of furs beyond the 2016 fall/winter collection, one has to wonder if this is the first domino to drop in a very long-standing chain of European designers. Armani has, for many years, been the most successful and most profitable brand among Italian designers. Armani himself is one of the richest people in the country and carries a lot of influence not only in the fashion community but across all of Italy. If Armani stops using fur, everyone is going to notice.

The whole issue of whether fur is still appropriate for fashion remains a heated debate. On one side, Elisa Allen, Vice-President of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) writes that, “… there is no kind way to obtain fur, unless you are willing to go out on the motorway and dodge lorries while scraping dead foxes off the asphalt.”

At the same time, Jan Erik Carlson of Saga furs counters PETA criticism by saying, “We have not yet reached the boundaries of quality, creativity and excellence in fur design.” He claims that high standards in fur production eliminate the cruelty aspect that is so often the primary point of fur’s critics.

While synthetic furs have been used much more frequently, fur production across Europe remains a $40 billion industry. It is questionable whether the faux-fur industry could ever replace that kind of revenue stream, especially when quality among faux furs tends to run the gamut from hideous to a level impossible to discern from real. Popular sentiment among high-profile celebrities tends to be very strongly anti-fur, but at the retail level fur remains a top seller that retailers can’t afford to give up, especially when other related sales are declining.

Amidst this continuing debate, Armani’s move is a strong one. I cannot imagine that there will not be other prominent labels who will join him in banning furs from their collections. Should this increase public pressure for all designers to eliminate furs, the result could be quite dramatic.

But then, Chanel creative director Karl Lagerfeld has said, “In a meat-eating world, wearing leather for shoes and clothes and even handbags, the discussion of fur is childish.” His point has to be taken seriously. Can we honestly complain about one manner of animal exploitation without changing our attitudes about all use of animal products? We seem rather hypocritical when we complain about the use of fur while wearing leather boots and eating a hamburger.

This debate is far from over, but those wanting Armani furs had better buy them now. They won’t be here after the fall season.

Current Issues / PotD

Shaking Feelings Of Impending Doom

March 23, 2016

A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom. —Martin Luther King, Jr.

Between terrorists’ bombs and bad politics, feelings of impending doom are difficult to shake.

I hate to admit it, but yesterday’s bombings in Brussels hit me extra hard. I was sitting here yesterday morning, looking for a picture in the archives, when the news flash came across my screen. I wasn’t surprised. Police have been focusing on Belgium since the Paris attacks in November. At the moment, it seemed just another sad facet of the increasingly violent reality in which we live. Push forward. Keep going.

There was something different this time, though; something I have more difficulty explaining. Kat and I were having a rare quiet lunch at one of our favorite Mass Ave. restaurants and instead of enjoying the brief moment without children I couldn’t shake the feeling that something in the universe had changed that morning, and not for the better. There was an emotional shift toward that feeling of impending doom. This was before I heard of the Peruvian mother of three-year-old twins who died at the ticket counter. Neither had I seen the pictures and videos of broken glass and strewn bodies. Brussels, somehow, was different.

Be sure, security forces around the world are on heightened alert and I don’t expect they’ll be too friendly with anyone they see wearing only one glove as yesterday’s suspected bombers did. At almost exactly the same time, without knowledge of the Brussels attacks, the US military conducted an airstrike against an Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula training camp in Yemen. If we’re counting body bags, we killed more of them than they did us. Is this feeling of doom really necessary and warranted?

Politics isn’t helping. The US presidential primary race has done a very good job of demonstrating the Dilbert principle of the least qualified rising to the top. If Scott Adams were to illustrate the current nominees, he’d have nothing but a row of pointy-haired bosses lined up making excuses and blaming everyone else for all the world’s problems, making the most bizarre and nonsensical statements, each trying to outdo the other’s stupidity. Given that from this set of clowns we are destined to choose our next president, it is difficult to imagine the next four years going in a positive direction.

Top that with tensions in East Asia. Every time North Korea lobs another set of missiles into the Sea of Japan or China sends warships into portions of the South China Sea claimed by Japan, I get nervous. I have a son stationed on one of the bases in Okinawa. It doesn’t take a great military strategist to figure out that should tensions escalate into actual fighting, our first line of defense, and offense, is going to come from those bases. Marines have a history of being the first into a situation. That does not give me any comfort at the moment.

My dreams last night played off this feeling of impending doom. In my dreams, I was supposed to be on a multi-city European photography tour, but I missed my flight at one of the stops and was stuck in, of all places, Brussels. The dreams weren’t necessarily horrific in any way; they centered on the frustration of not being able to find anyone who could help me catch up with the group. But that challenge of not being able to find help when it was needed lasted all night long. I was rather relieved when my alarm went off.

So, how do we shake this feeling of impending doom? We all know that we can’t be productive with such negative emotions dominating our lives. Is this just common anxiety run amok? If so, Kat’s continual charge that I need to chill would seem to be appropriate. Oh, but did you know that physical issues such as cardiac arrhythmia and myocardial infarction can also cause one to have feelings of impending doom? Ah, and apparently too much Nutmeg can cause hallucinations and feelings of impending doom. Anything that interrupts the natural, steady heart rate can result in us feeling as though the entire world is about to end. I’ll be sure to take my blood pressure meds this morning.

Beyond all that, though, I think we have to take control of the information we receive and how we respond to those things we cannot control. I have a list of things that I think might help. Mind you, I’m not a medical or psychiatric professional, but a quick survey of materials didn’t give me much faith in the ability of professionals to address the situation, either. So, let’s go with this and see what happens.

Limit the amount of news intake. I’ll admit to being a news junkie and there are times when I can stayed glued to news feeds for hours. Now is not a good time to do that. I’m limiting myself to twice a day, no more than 30 minutes each time. Your limits may vary.
Spend time with people, live, in person. Now is not the time to be a social hermit. We see the worst in people when our only exposure to them is Facebook. Having real conversations with people helps restore our faith in humanity as a whole.
Give a pet a rub, unless your pet is a goldfish, in which case just watching is probably enough. Pets have a wonderful way of absorbing our anxieties, giving us a chance to relax a moment, get our breathing back on a normal pattern, and giving us a positive feeling.
Indulge in a comfort food. Singular. One. Mine will be chocolate. While this isn’t a good time to overeat, the pleasure of a comfort food releases happy little endorphins that boosts our moods and gives us a more hopeful feeling.
Go for a walk. Again, it’s that combination of removing yourself from those stressors, getting some exercise, and being out in nature. Precautions might be appropriate for those who have allergy issues this time of year, though. Sneezing and runny noses don’t help.
Smoke ’em if you’ve got ’em. I know, every health professional on the planet just screamed in anguish at that one. Let’s get real, though. If we’re all going to die (and we are), we want to feel in control of what takes us there. The pain of lung cancer is preferable to being a bombing victim because we’re the ones in control. Yes, it’s a bad habit and you really should stop. But a couple of puffs of a pipe or a good cigar can be therapeautic. And if you’re smoking green rather than brown, all the better.

if none of those work, then perhaps it’s time to consult a professional. I would recommend starting with your family doctor. Cardiac issues really do impact our emotional state and feelings of impending doom. We can shake this, though. If we don’t, we seal our own fate.

Good luck.

PotD / Social Commentary

The Art Of Being Chill

March 22, 2016

I don’t want to sound like a grumpy old man, but nothing winds me up more than people saying, ‘Chill out’ to me when I’m irritated! —Martin Freeman

Being chill comes easily for many people, but there are some who have turned it into an art form

Like many people my age, I have to deal with high blood pressure. Medically, there are a lot of reasons for having blood-pumping issues: our lifestyles being hectic, our diets being too high in sodium, and a general fear that we might die without having accomplished enough. There are plenty of things that would probably solve all but the worst of blood pressure problems without medication, but that would require we actually alter how we live rather dramatically. We’re not likely to do that, being the stubborn folk that we are, so the doctor gives us pills that try to force our blood pressure back down to a manageable level that won’t kill us quite so quickly.

The pills don’t always work, though. The doctor has increased the strength of my medication twice before and I’m still generating systolic and diastolic readings that are far too high to be safe. Kat keeps telling me I need to chill. She makes it sound so easy. She makes it look so easy. Just “chill.” She drinks coffee and relaxes. I drink coffee and feel the need to take a thousand new pictures. She sees something stupid in her news feed and ignores it. I see something stupid in my news feed and am ready to rip someone’s head off their shoulders. I am so very much not chill.

About a month ago, Forbes magazine published a story Finding Chill in Valparaíso, Chile. The article contains beautiful photos full of the color and culture of this relatively small Chilean city. The author talks about his hotel with hammocks on the roof, the delicious yet inexpensive food, and stray dogs that will walk you home at night (not kidding). Everything in the article sounds so wonderful that I was almost ready to pack my bags and go, until the author discloses that, while there, he tripped on a seawall and broke his leg in two places. That’s a risk I can’t take. Scratch Chile off my travel list.

It seems obvious that I need to go somewhere to chill. Indianapolis is definitely not a chill type of city. We get uptight about almost everything around here. With the 100th running of the Indianapolis 500 this year, the entire neighborhood around us is anything but chill. But with Valparaíso off the list, where should I go?

Back in 2010, Forbes also published a list of the most relaxed cities in America. The twin cities of Minneapolis-St. Paul topped the list. They won because they have short commute times, get plenty of exercise, and had good insurance. Note, this survey took place before the Affordable Care Act took affect so that last detail might have changed. Looking through the other cities on the list, Milwaukee, Portland, Seattle, Denver, San Jose, it seems to me that all those cities have experienced some significant change in the past six years. Political changes have ruined Wisconsin. Portland’s population of hipsters has exploded. Seattle has become one of the most expensive cities in the country. Denver won a Super Bowl. San Jose’s Silicon Valley has experienced a lot of employment upheaval while real estate prices soared. Not seeing a number of benefits there.

Music is supposed to help people chill, right? According to the British Academy of Sound Therapy, the song Weightless is the best choice to help people chill. In fact, the song is apparently so effective one some people that the scientists involved in the study recommend that one not drive while listening to the piece. The song, which was specifically composed for this study. starts at 60 beats per minute and gradually slows to 50. I tried listening. I made it about 30 seconds before wanting to shoot something. Weightless has no freaking melody! It’s just electronic noise with carefully constructed pulsing.

From what I can tell, if one is going to master the art of being chill, they need to successfully do the following:

Live somewhere inexpensive. Paying a lot of bills or not being able to afford food is stressful.
Exercise. Being able to get out and walk without getting killed seems to be a plus.
Have friendly neighbors. You know, the kind that don’t fire weapons indiscriminately in the middle of the night.
Consume fresh food that is easily accessible. Having stores within walking distance helps (hint, hint).
Enjoy live, non-sedentary entertainment. I’m not sure whether Netflix and chill counts or not.
Have something constructive to do that you enjoy and provides sufficient income. Stressful jobs are inherently chill killers.
Don’t over-commit your time. Saying “no” and not feeling guilty about staying home helps.
Avoid toxic people. That friend who is constantly inducing drama? Ditch ’em.
Sleep more. Not getting enough rest is one of the primary causes of stress.

Anyone who can successfully do those things can master the art of being chill.

I’m probably going to die.

Art / Photography

Five Years’ Difference

March 21, 2016

Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference. —Winston Churchill

Five years can seem like a long time, but having the time to mature can make some things all the more beautiful

I sometimes joke that I know I’m getting old when the even the best scotch in the world is half my age. While that’s not entirely true on either end of the equation, there’s a point at which one no longer thinks that they’re improving with age. There’s no definitive point at which that occurs. Some start feeling old when they hit 30. Others still feel young at 70. Only you can determine how you are going to feel at any given stage of your life.

The kids were watching a cooking show recently wherein Bo Derek was a guest judge. Yes, the same Bo Derek that raised more than eye brows when she appeared in the 1979 movie 10 opposite Dudley Moore. The difference between her look then and now, more than 35 years later, was astonishing. Derek, who turns 60 later this year, had not bothered to attempt to conceal her age nor the marks of a lifetime of experience. She was still beautiful, but in a way defined by maturity.

Our model for this set of portraits, who I’ll simply refer to as K. in order to keep stalking to a minimum, hadn’t quite hit that 25-year-old mark when life led her to do other things. She changed occupations, had new experiences, and even attempted to settle down a bit. There were ups and there were downs and there were lessons learned that one would rather read about than experience. She comes back now, five years since she was last in front of the camera, more mature, wiser for the experience, and even more beautiful than before. She’s sporting some amazing new ink on her back, and a revised attitude toward life. The difference is significant.

We have Owen Tate to thank for the take on K.’s hair and make-up, a slight revision from what he did for a contest last month. I found the violet color on her lips and the just-rolled-out-of-bed look to her hair a refreshing difference from her older pictures.

I don’t mean to imply that every young model should take five years off and mature. I’ve missed having K. in front of the camera and I can’t say that going through some of the same experiences would make as positive a difference as it did with K. Not everyone would necessarily survive. Yet, that five years’ difference is a positive for K. I’m hoping this set of portrats might prove inspirational for others we’ve not seen in a while to take a moment and try again.

Beauty doesn’t stop at any given age. Beauty grows with us if we let it. Don’t ever hide because of a few years difference. Embrace your beauty and enjoy.

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Advertising / Current Issues

Days Of Importance

March 21, 2016

I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest. I do not judge the universe. —Dalai Lama

There are always celebrations of some kind for every day of the calendar, but a few are actually important

There is something on the calendar for every day of the year, no matter where one lives or what one does. Someone is always celebrating something. For example, today, March 21, is Single Parent’s Day. I’m sure we all know a few single parents who could use a world of encouragement, or maybe a babysitter for three or four hours. Today is also Memory Day, Common Courtesy Day, World Down Syndrome Day, and French Bread Day. Just so you’ll be prepared, tomorrow is National Goof-Off Day; you may want to adjust your plans accordingly.

With so many different days of recognition, it is sometimes difficult to know which ones are truly important versus those that are just rather silly things to toss into a calendar somewhere. I’m not sure exactly what one is supposed to do with French Bread Day, for example, beyond the obvious: Have a baguette. However, there are some days when, especially in the realms of advertising and marketing, the opportunities are great as long as we don’t miss them.

Case in point: Today is Twitter’s 10-year anniversary. They’ve celebrated with this video full of moments when tweeting mattered.

Starting in 🇦🇺 on 3/21 and moving across the 🌍, we thank you for 10 incredible years.

Love, Twitter#LoveTwitter https://t.co/pH4WWdgK6q

— Twitter (@twitter) March 20, 2016

Celebrating the anniversary of a social media platform may not seem like all that big a deal, but be certain that any message sent with the #LoveTwitter hashtag is going to get thousands, and quite possibly millions of views. Attaching the hashtag to your tweet, which could include a link back to your website or a product page, has the same potential as a general piece of direct mail. And while we tend to think of tweets as time sensitive, it’s not unusual to get likes and retweets and click-throughs on tweets that are several months old. So, while it may seem on one level that celebrating Twitter’s birthday is a bit shallow, it can potentially be a powerful marketing tool.

At the same time, however, acknowledging special days also gives one the opportunity to align with global causes and charities as a way of showing involvement in one’s community and opens the door for making a broader impact. For example, today is also #HumanRightsDay around the world. Human rights represents a struggle that extends from the farthest reaches of the globe to our own backyard. Gender rights. Race issues. Immigration. Child labor. Hunger. Disease. Anything that involves people, any place where the playing field is not totally even, human rights comes into play.

Not only does participating in Human Rights Day allow others to see that you or your company cares about the condition of people around the world, not participating in such an event also says that one doesn’t care, which can develop into a PR nightmare. Show how diverse your workforce is. Highlight ways in which your company addresses matters related to human rights in a positive fashion. Even better, actually get your employees together and do something, such as such as organizing a clean water drive or volunteering at a homeless shelter as a demonstration of your commitment to human rights. Use Periscope or Snapchat to broadcast your activity so people can see you’re not just a lot of marketing hot air. Being in touch and participating in days like this is increasingly important in employee and customer retention. People need to know you’re not just out for a quick profit.

Then, you might also want to consider celebrating #WorldPoetryDay both on a personal and professional basis. World Poetry Day was established by UNESCO to, “to support linguistic diversity through poetic expression and to offer endangered languages the opportunity to be heard within their communities.” Poetry is such an incredibly important part of how we communicate, how we express ourselves, that to not celebrate poetry is to ignore one of the most fundamental aspects of free speech. I especially love this quote from Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO:

By paying tribute to the men and women whose only instrument is free speech, who imagine and act, UNESCO recognizes in poetry its value as a symbol of the human spirit’s creativity. By giving form and words to that which has none – such as the unfathomable beauty that surrounds us, the immense suffering and misery of the world – poetry contributes to the expansion of our common humanity, helping to increase its strength, solidarity, and self-awareness.

World Poetry Day is more than just a marketing opportunity. This is a time to celebrate the diversity of language and communication. Poetry is more than just the careful construction of verse, but a key element in the very construct of our civilization. To ignore poetry is itself a form of illiteracy. This is one of those days we should not only celebrate for ourselves, but encourage everyone around us to do so as well, not simply for the literary exercise, but for the betterment of our whole society.

Days like today are important. When we exist at a time where turmoil is ever present, where unrest is a daily reality, where tragedy stands waiting on every street corner in even the most quiet of neighborhoods, we need days like this where we can embrace something good, something positive. Days like today don’t require one to embrace a religious ideology or a political point of view. Days like today simply require us to be human, to embrace ourselves and each other as common survivors of a world in chaos.

We need days like today, you and I. Don’t miss out.

Current Issues / PotD / Social Commentary

Recovering From The Weekend

March 21, 2016

It’s not that hard to imagine the natural world recovering it’s health in our absence: it’s more difficult, and more necessary, to imagine it recovering its health in our presence. —Alex Steffen

Needing to recover from a weekend aren’t that unusual, but the reasons this morning are quite sad.

There is, in the following words, no attempt to be funny. I’m well aware that the thought of recovering from the weekend typically involves stories of a more whimsical nature, often involving some level of drunkenness and subsequent shenanigans, but that’s just not possible. This wasn’t a fun weekend, and even now, since I started typing, we’re finding out more that is absolutely breaking our hearts. Here’s a synopsis of the things that got our attention this weekend, in no particular order.

Shortly after noon on Friday, a young mother with whom we are acquainted delivered a baby boy. He was not healthy. He was not bouncing. He was stillborn from his umbilical cord being wrapped around his neck. After a full nine months of waiting and excitement, her baby was gone.
Saturday evening, a young mother was killed when a semi plowed into the back of her car that was, for reasons likely to remain unknown, stopped in the right lane of the interstate. Her son, who is a very precious special needs little boy, attended the same daycare as Kat’s little ones and always came running to say hi when we picked them up.
Early Sunday morning, a 27-year-old police officer and a supervising sergeant were attempting to serve an arrest warrant for, of all things, drug paraphernalia at a trailer park near Kokomo. The situation went bad quickly and both officers were hit in a shootout that killed the suspect. The younger officer died from his injuries Sunday morning, leaving behind a wife and baby boy.
Over 150 firefighters responded to a three-alarm fire Sunday night at a truck stop on Indy’s west side. The fire started outside the Denny’s restaurant attached to the truck stop. Damages are estimated to be over $2 million.
A school bus carrying a high school basketball team and coaches from Northwest Indiana was sideswiped by a car on Saturday, resulting in it rolling off the highway. Miraculously, none of the boys were severely hurt, though there were, understandably, a number of cuts and severe bruises. One coach was airlifted to the hospital but is in good condition. What caused the driver of the car to swerve into the bus? Her drink spilled.
Shots were fired at a police cruiser on Indianapolis’ near Northside a little after 11:15 last night. No officers were hit, but the event underscores tensions in that neighborhood.
No fewer than three people were killed in additional traffic accidents over the weekend.

Yesterday was supposed to be the International Day of Happiness, but for a large number of people across Indiana, there was nothing to be happy about. The things I’ve listed here are just a fraction of events that occurred around the world. In Spain, a bus carrying exchange students crashed, killing 14. In Southern Russia, a FlyDubai flight crashed as it attempted to land at an airport, killing all 62 people on board. A suicide bomber killed four in a busy market in Istanbul. North Korea fired at least five short-range missiles into the Sea of Japan, raising international tensions.

So much tragedy in such a short period of time leaves our senses reeling. Anyone of those events was horribly traumatic for the families of those involved. Even for those of us who might not be directly effected, the number of events is disturbing.

Sunday was also the vernal equinox, the start of Spring, a time we typically associate with freshness and new beginning. We think of Spring as a time of renewal, a chance to start over, to break free of the dreariness of the winter. Yet, with all the tragedy of this weekend, feeling those positive vibes is difficult.

Recovering from all this takes a moment. Recovering from a single tragedy, even when we weren’t directly involved, is like waiting for a bruise to heal. With so many, so close in time, recovering feels a bit like trying to get over losing a prize fight. When one is empathetic with the world, as one should be, recovering requires acts of kindness to offset the cruelty and tragedy. Finding such kindness, especially on a Monday, can be difficult.

What bothers me more, though, are people who can shrug everything off without feeling anything at all. They are totally disconnected emotionally from the rest of the world. When bad things happen around them, they feel nothing. These people scare me, for those who do not share empathy with those around them are more likely to commit violent acts themselves, or tolerate acts of violence by others. When there is a lack of empathy among those who would be our world leaders, we are at risk of war.

Recovering from this weekend is going to take a moment. I would ask that you please be kind to those you encounter because you never know who has had tragedy in their life this weekend. We all can use a smile and maybe a hug where it’s appropriate. We need this week to get better quickly, but it will take all of us to make that happen.

Current Issues / pop culture

International Day of Happiness

March 20, 2016

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony. —Mahatma Gandhi

What does environmental sustainability have to do with happiness? Well … we’re thinking

Today is International Day of Happiness. The United Nations has declared it, so I guess we don’t really have any choice but to go along with it. Please, everyone together now, BE HAPPY! Here, I’ll even give you some music to go along with it:

There, did that make you feel happy? If so, my work here is done. There’s no need for you to read any further, we’re good. I won’t be offended if you go outside and do something now.

What’s that? You’re still not happy? Yeah, I feel you. Most days it takes more than just saying, “I think I’ll be happy today,” for us to actually feel happy. Happiness can be elusive and is especially difficult to find when one is surrounded by jackasses and Republicans. Yes, I just made this post political when it didn’t need to be. Sue a duck. Politics is actually one of the primary barricades to anyone, anywhere, ever feeling happy at all. I don’t know of a faster way to suck the happy air right out of a room than with politics.

Happiness isn’t something one can mandate, which is why I find it interesting that the United Nations would choose to name a day about environmental conservancy the International Day of Happiness. There are so very many ways to be happy, to make others happy, and to bring happiness the entire planet that have absolutely nothing to do with the environment. Well, at least, they don’t seem to meet that qualification.

Stop and think about the things that bring happiness, whether to yourself or others. Giving someone flowers can bring happiness; helping someone plant flowers might bring them happiness even longer, and it’s the right time of year to be doing that sort of thing. Going for a hike in the woods can make one very happy, and hiking and enjoying nature is so much better for the planet than driving around in circles looking for a parking place at the mall. Helping a child get a drink of water so they don’t waste a gallon in the process makes people happy and helps keep the planet sustainable at the same time. So yes, being environmentally friendly can result in happiness. The UN even created this video to prove it:

Uhm, is it me or does Red not really look all that happy about any of the environmentally friendly things he was doing? Maybe Red’s just an old grouch, like me. We old grouches don’t do happiness without a damn good reason and not too many of our good reasons are especially environmentally friendly. I hate to be the one to second-guess the United Nations on anything, but the correlation here environmental activism and happiness doesn’t seem to make a great deal of sense. The planet is not sustainable in its current condition. Getting it back to a state of sustainability is going to be work, not fun, and much of that work is not going to be happiness-inducing. Too much environmental work involves politics, and politics makes no one happy but the politicians.

So, what does make people happy? Everyone’s list is going to be different, but let me just toss out a few ideas that I know would make me happy.

Free chocolate for everyone!
More attention toward making coffee growing and harvesting sustainable so that coffee prices can maybe come down a dime or two.
More photography clients.
More naked photography clients.
More naked photography clients who come bearing chocolate.
More naked people, in general.
Long’s donuts.
Children who actually listen the first time you tell them to do something rather than waiting until you’ve told them 4,478,926 times before moving.
Having a babysitter on a Friday or Saturday night
Very large bottles of scotch in every room of the house.
New cameras, lenses, lighting, and all that other cool photography equipment I can’t afford because there aren’t more naked photography clients.
Guests who come bearing chocolate … and coffee … and scotch. Naked.

I could go on. There are a lot of things that have the potential to bring happiness into my life. Sleeping in a bed rather than on the couch makes me happy. Kisses make me happy. It really isn’t all that difficult to make me happy.

So, why am I not happy more often than grouchy? Obviously, you’re not trying hard enough. Unfriendly neighborhood ordinances that require cutting the lawn too early are not environmentally friendly and do not make me happy. Having a state governor who protects corporate polluters and ruins our state’s waterways does not make me happy. A political system that protects corporate profits in the face of unprecedented climate change make me exceedingly unhappy. Fashion that uses real fur when faux is cheaper and more readily available totally pisses me off, and yes, Dennis Basso, I’m looking right at you. At the end of the day, there are far too many people doing things to upset me than there are those attempting to contribute to my happiness.

And I’m sure the same is true for almost everyone. I know two small children who are going to be extremely unhappy when I ground them to their rooms after telling them to stop running up and down the hallway 5. 387 times this morning. I have the ability to make a lot of people very unhappy without hardly even trying.

So, maybe we should all try harder. You show up naked with chocolates and I’ll not shoot the neighbor whose stereo is entirely too loud for a Sunday morning, and maybe we’ll all go for a walk later.

I hope that makes the UN happier, because you know I wouldn’t want to ruin International Day of Happiness. Would you?

Advertising / PotD

Spam Out Of Context

March 20, 2016

If variety is the spice of life, marriage is the big can of leftover Spam. —Johnny Carson

I understand why I get spam, but so little of it seems meant for me.

Every time I see or use the word Spam, I wonder how many people understand how the word originated. The processed meat, which my late grandfather ate with crackers on a daily basis, is composed of, now pay attention, Shoulder of Pork And Ham. See it? SPAM. Never mind that it was the trash pieces of those cuts, or that the congealed fat that gathered on the outside of a cut could be used as a substitute for bicycle grease, nor that one could consistently find large, inedible pieces of gristle back in the day. What actually gave the product its bad reputation was that is low price often made it the only meat-like product poor people could afford. The stigma was social more than anything else.

Ray Tomlinson, who invented the first email program on what would eventually become the Internet, passed away earlier this month and was appropriately mourned by tech geeks everywhere. His program that allowed for the digital communication of direct messages was exploited almost the instant it became public. For many of us, the first email we received was from a systems administrator explaining how email works. The second email we received was from a Nigerian prince who needed our assistance. In that instant, we started referring to the junk mail of the Internet as spam.

While I’ve not received a request from a Nigerian prince in several years now, I do still get plenty of spam. Microsoft co-founder and richest person in the world, Bill Gates, has famously said that he gets more spam than anyone, and I’ve no reason to doubt that is true because a) his name has a high recognition factor, b) his email address was, for many years, public knowledge, and c) he uses the Internet a lot. It is that last aspect, our Internet use, that sparks a great deal of the spam we now get. We leave a trail when we visit websites and marketers are able to follow that trail to see where our interests might be and then send us spam accordingly.

Even with all the data mining tools available, though, sometimes spam shows up that has no bearing on anything we might ever need, totally out of context. I get enough spam that I have to empty my spam folder on a daily basis. I pay a little attention to this because, occasionally, email I actually need gets caught in the spam folder and I might otherwise miss it. I never fail to be amused, though, by the spam that comes in so amazingly out of context.

For example, here are some examples from my morning spam:

Bra comfort. “Comfy, seamless, front-zip bras” the subject line teases. That’s nice. I know I’ve put on a little weight, but not only do I not wear a bra, Kat doesn’t either. We don’t shop for lingerie at all, so this popping up every day just makes me shake my head.
Private jet rentals. This has been a recent but frequent addition to my spam folder. I haven’t even flown commercially in over 11 years, so I’m not sure why anyone would mistakenly think that I need to use private aircraft and it’s absolutely laughable to think I could afford them.
Savory cherries. “How you can grow your own delectable cherries,” is the subject line. This one’s a little more curious because, while we do have a garden, cherries require something more in the orchard category and take years of growth before there’s anything to harvest. And who in their right mind mail-orders trees? You have to look at those things.
Yacht rentals. Same category as the private jet rentals. These people obviously don’t realize how little money I have.
Magical African Safaris. When this first showed up in my spam box I assumed they were talking about photo safaris. No, they’re not. The funniest thing about this spam, though, is that it is incomplete. Apparently the mass email program they’re using has a character limit the copywriter didn’t know about. The email actually ends mid-sentence.
Exotic Arabian Girls. Today, they’re Arabian. Tomorrow, they may be Russian and the day after that they’ll be Brazillian. Given my profession, I can see where my email might accidentally get mixed up into this group. But the joke’s on them: people pay me for pictures, not the other way around.

I could go on for pages. Understand, as long as the spam doesn’t contain viruses or trojans, and little does anymore (there are more effective ways to hack your computer), I can’t get upset with marketers who are just trying to get my attention. Be sure, someone out there is clicking on this stuff. The numbers ultimately work, even when there is zero chance of me actually using the product.

What pisses me off are the pieces that are frighteningly accurate in their targeting. Walk-in showers. Natural arthritis medications. Soft sole shoes. What really gets my goat is the wrinkle cream. Don’t remind me I’m getting old. Every morning I have to ask Kat for help getting out of bed is enough of a reminder that I’m not getting any younger. I don’t need your spam to remind me.

Oh, but look, I may have just qualified for a $50 Sam’s card! Too bad we’re only members at Costco.

Photography

Photography Improvement Time

March 19, 2016

Photography is the simplest thing in the world, but it is incredibly complicated to make it really work. —Martin Parr

charles i. letbetter - photography improvement

Improving your photography doesn’t have to cost thousands of dollars

Spring officially arrives this next week and along with that comes the annual spade full of photography workshops, seminars, and “master” classes all of which have one primary goal in mind: separating you from your money. I’m not saying the people holding those seminars don’t have any valuable insight or information, they very well may have just the words you need to transform your work. What I’m saying is that, in most cases, there is not enough value to match the price of admission. Many of the people I see holding workshops today are only doing so because they can’t make enough money as photographers to pay the bills. Are any of the workshops out there actually worth $200, $500, or even $2500? None that I’ve seen.

Every photographer should always be looking for ways to refine and improve their photography. Given that we live and work in a digital age, the honing of our skills changes every time a new software update is release. When Adobe pushed out an update to the RAW engine this week, I wasn’t expecting much other than the addition of new camera profiles. First time I opened an image, though, the entire interface had changed! There is always a need to continue learning, to keep up to date, and to improve our skills. But do you need a workshop for that? Absolutely not!

If YouTube is not already one of your most trusted sources of information, that needs to change. With thousands of photographers online and willing to share their experiences and information, there are myriad sources to help you hone your craft and become a better photographer. Photographer-oriented website PetaPixel published a list last week of 13 Photography Channels on YouTube You Should Follow. Actually, their current list is up to 23, which just goes to make my point: the Internet is loaded with more than enough free sources that paying for seminars should be limisted to the very few instances where you can get one-on-one, hands-on help with your photography.

Caveat #1: not every photography-oriented video is created equal. There is a lot of ego-driven bullshit here just as there is with live seminars. That’s why I’m not giving you links to whole channels. I’ve yet to find one that doesn’t have its share of time-wasting nonsense. Some discretion is necessary and in some cases, especially those involving software tutorials, video quality can make all the difference in the world.

Caveat #2: even with the best instruction available, it is up to you to adapt that instruction to your specific style of shooting. New Mexico doesn’t need 10,000 Ansel Adams clones running around in the desert. Make use of what you learn to develop your style more creatively and proficiently.

All that being said, here are five videos that stand out and may just be something that changes the way you take pictures. A couple of them are pretty long, so you may want to bookmark this page or save the video on YouTube if you have an account there. Creating your own playlist is a good way to keep track of useful videos you find so you can reference the information again later. However you choose to handle them, I sincerely hope they all help in some way. Becoming better photographers not only increases the value of your own work but increases the value of all photography.

Using Any Light Source

There’s no such thing as “bad” light, especially with today’s digital cameras that can shoot with practically no light at all. This is over an hour, though, so make sure you have time to get through the whole thing before you start.

50 Quick Photography Tricks

Many of these are common sense to those with sufficient experience, but others are things we just don’t think about and represent some bad or sloppy habits that are easy to fall into. The video isn’t too long. Take a look and see how many of these things you’re already doing.

Are You An Artist?

Want to start an argument among photographers? Ask them this question. There are many opinions as to whether photography can even be an art. Artist Roger Ballen gives you his answer and I find it quite instructive for anyone who wants an artistic edge to their work. The video is just over two minutes but the impact may alter everything you shoot the rest of yourlife.

Finding Photographic Style

Here’s another long one (two hours) from the manager of the B&H event space. This is like getting a whole seminar for free. He really gets deep into the various concepts and methods one can use to explore their own style and stimulate creativity. Block out the time so you don’t have any interuptions.

Creating Visual Stories.

This is an increibly important topic and photographic documentarian Dan Milnor provides some great insight into how to give storytelling abilities to your photographs. In just seven minutes, he can change the way you look at photographs.

That should keep you busy for a while. I strongly suggest that after every one of the videos you take your camera out and see how you can apply what you’ve learned to the pictures you take. Bookmark this page, bookmark the article on PetaPixel, and create a list of your favorite and most isueful videos. Visit them again and again, and search out more. There is plenty of information being shared. What’s left is for you to receive it.

PotD / Social Commentary

Saturday Morning Trailer Time

March 19, 2016

Every man has a right to a Saturday night bath. —Lyndon B. Johnson

Saturday morning is a perfect time to catch up on the trailers for movies we don’t have time to see

Who doesn’t remember the joy of Saturday morning when we were kids? Anyone born before, oh, let’s say 2000 or so, probably still remembers getting up on Saturday mornings and binge watching cartoons while consuming large amounts of processed sugar in whatever form we could convince our parents to buy. For my brother and me, it was cold cereal. For my kids, it was french toast sticks. We would sit there and watch one cartoon show after another, sad when the networks switched to sports around noon, sometimes 11:00.

Kids today don’t understand why Saturday mornings were once so very special; they have Netflix and Cartoon Network and can watch animated programs anytime they want until their eyeballs bleed. Gone are the days of Bugs Bunny and friends, Hannah-Barbera’s predictability, and Sid & Marty Kroft’s strange puppetry. No wonder this generation of kids is so messed up: they don’t know the fear of a coyote possibly dropping an anvil on their heads.

Saturday was also once movie night. While new movies have typically been released on Fridays for more than 60 years, it’s still Saturday night, date night, that traditionally was the biggest movie draw. Again, that has been usurped by Netflix, streaming, and sheer exhaustion. We know we’re adults when we sit home on Saturday nights hoping the phone doesn’t ring.

There are also cost and time factors to going to the movies and for me, personally, that tends to limit my activity more than anything. Saturdays are often typical work days for me. By the time I get done, assuming there’s such a thing as done, I couldn’t stay awake through one no matter how good it might be. I still love movies, though. So, I’ve taken to watching trailers on Saturday mornings, typically early before the kids are up and I have to be concerned about the content. Not that I’ll ever get to actually watch any of the movies whose trailers excite me. I suppose they’ll eventually make it to Netflix. And no, it’s not lost on me that we now wait for movies to be on streaming services much like we once waited for them to be shown on network television.

Anyway, rather than just sitting here and talking about it for another 500 words, why don’t I just share some of the trailers I’m watching this morning? If you get to actually see the movies in theaters, please let me know how they were. My Netflix cue is already pretty full, so any help keeping that manageable is appreciated. I should probably also state that the presence of a trailer here does not imply endorsement of the movie. Even bad movies can have good trailers.

Here’s what I’m watching this morning.

X-Men: Apocolypse

Put this in your religious mythology pipe and smoke it. Could deities actually be mutants? And if so, what happens when that mutant deity isn’t a nice person? Probably something like this:

Ben-Hur

For anyone who remembers the original with Charleston Heston, there’s no way this version isn’t going to be a disappointment. Even with Morgan Freeman in the cast, the look and feel of the movie just isn’t the same. I’m also wondering if this isn’t another case of us knowing too much about a period for us to be entertained by its barbarity. Still, if you like action, and I do, this may have potential.

The Legend of Tarzan

I doubt Edgar Rice Burroughs ever imagined that he was penning the underlying premise for a stream of movies that continues to morph with every generation. Tarzan has been movie fodder almost from the very beginning of cinema. So, here’s another take, perhaps a little more real and with a very different concept of romance. Can it match the book? Probably not, but all those CGI animals could make it interesting.

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

Oh my. If ever there were a movie destined to become an instant classic, this may be it. Ransom Rigg’s novel has been a children’s favorite for years and now it gets the full Tim Burton treatment with all the special effects and interesting camera angles he brings to a story. Granted, I’m not sure this is going to be appropriate for little ones, but for anyone who is old enough to actually read and understand the book, this may well be a visual delight.

The Man Who Knew Infinity

Some movies we watch to escape. Some movies we watch for the spectacle. Then, there are those rare movies that inspire us. This movie has that potential. With the power of actors Jeremy Irons, Dav Patel, and Stephen Fry, amazing things could happen in this movie. We need a movie like this to not just be good, but life-altering. Let’s hope it achieves that goal.

Things bog down when I put more than five videos on a page, so we’ll have to stop there for now. After all, it is Saturday. You have things to do. I have things to do. The fantasy world of cartoons and movies can’t last forever, can it?

Well, there is always Netflix …

Advertising / Fashion

Hashtag Use Might Be Trademark Violation

March 18, 2016

Just because there are not yet specific trade laws dealing with hashtag use doesn’t mean you can’t get into a lot of trouble using them.

Maybe that intern needs a little training before being given access to your social media accounts

Starting a new business, especially a new fashion business, is far more challenging than most people realize when they begin. Even those who have done startups more than once routinely find that the process only gets more difficult as business and industry landscapes change. What worked last year may not work this year. What was true five years ago is likely to be the opposite of current conditions. How does one break out and become recognized in a crowded field that some would consider already over-saturated?

Most everyone recognizes that social media use is a critical aspect of any new business and with social media comes hashtag use. Hashtags help group the flood of information into some form of loose order so that people who are looking for a specific industry or topic can find related information without having to scroll through endless lists. For example, using the hashtag #womenswear or #springfashion might help promote your social media entry so that people looking for women’s wear or spring fashion are more likely to see it. There is an entire genre of social marketing devoted to hashtag creation and strategy so that businesses can get the most from their social media use.

However, just as hashtag use can benefit a business, it can also cause a bit of trouble if one is not careful. Specifically, some hashtag use may fall under trademark law. Even if the use was inadvertent and not meant to cause a problem, defending your company against such a charge incurs tremendous legal expense at a point where your business really doesn’t have that kind of capital to expend.

An article posted on StartupFashion.com this week attempts to address this very gray legal area. This is another of those times when technology has moved faster than the law and there are not, at the moment, specific laws that directly spell out what hashtag use might not be acceptable. However, general trademark law still applies, even online, even if the person creating the hashtag didn’t know anything about the trademark.

Where small and startup businesses can be particularly vulnerable is when the person in charge of social media accounts doesn’t know what caution to exercise. Many use interns, recent college graduates, or even their own high school-age children to work social media because we assume they know how to navigate social media well. While that presumption may be accurate, we cannot assume they know the first thing about trademark law and how easily one can create a lot of problems.

For example: Let’s pretend a brand uses the slogan, “Bigger, Better, Bouncier” to promote their line of trampolines. Your social media person sees that slogan somewhere and decides it would make a good hashtag for promoting your new line of support bras. They start posting pictures of models wearing the bras with the hashtag #BiggerBetterBouncier and, the Internet being what it is, the hashtag suddenly takes off. Next thing you know, everyone is associating the slogan with your new bras. Sales are going through the roof. This is a good thing, right?

Not if you own the trampoline company who had the slogan trademarked. Even though you are in an entirely different, unrelated industry, your successful use of the slogan in hashtag form could be in violation of trademark law for creating confusion within the originating market. You have effectively stolen the trampoline company’s trademarked slogan, even though your actions may have been inadvertent.

The waters here are murky and every time a new case comes up it tends to be long and complicated because there is no real precedent for judges to consider. So, how does one make sure their hashtags aren’t getting them into trouble, or inversely, leaving them vulnerable?

One good place to start is the website for the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). If you’re not sure whether a phrase or slogan has been trademarked, use the search engine here to find out. Also, if you have a phrase or slogan you plan to use in marketing your products or services, getting that trademarked is probably not a bad idea. Be aware, however, that the trademark process is not especially inexpensive. Only trademark phrases and slogans you want permanently identified with your brand.

Also consider instructing the person in charge of your social media accounts to only use hashtags that are approved and apply directly to your brand. Using a regularly trending hashtag such as #FridayFeeling or #MondayMotivation is probably safe, but a hashtag that involves a specific event, venue, or infers a different brand should probably be avoided.

Hashtag use can be an extremely powerful marketing tool not only for fashion startups but any small business, especially those with small marketing budgets. A little care and consideration, though, can help prevent legal nightmares that might sink your new business before it even gets started.

Photography / PotD

Indianapolis St. Patrick’s Day Parade

March 18, 2016

Group conformity scares the pants off me because it’s so often a prelude to cruelty towards anyone who doesn’t want to – or can’t – join the Big Parade. —Bette Midler

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Yesterday’s Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in downtown Indianapolis might have been the biggest crowd turnout yet and, as promised, we have pictures. While temperatures were still a bit on the chilly side, it was not nearly as cold as last year, which may have encouraged a lot of people to abandon whatever they were doing and get out. Indianapolis throws a good parade and kids in town know it. They lined the curbs early holding bags and buckets with which to carry home all the candy. Parade participants can no longer throw candy from a float or even into crowds from the street. They have to actually hand the candy to someone. As a result, only those along the curb are likely to get anything. Indy kids know that and came prepared.

The St. Pat’s parade is a little different from other parades in that there are fewer (practically none) large colorful floats and more groups of people just walking down the street celebrating (sort of) their shared heritage. There are a lot of people of Irish descent in Indianapolis and they’re not the least bit shy about letting their Irish fly year round. As a result, when we take pictures at this parade we tend to focus on interesting people rather than large groups. Groups, especially large numbers of Catholic school kids looking as though they’d rather be in math class, don’t provide the story that individuals do. We try to zero in on smaller sets and individuals. When we do capture a group, it tends to be because there is something unique about them, like carrying folding chairs.

There were some notable differences in this year’s parade, at least from our perspective. Kat actually walked the entire parade route and got a good feel for the crowd while I stayed near the starting point and snapped pictures. Here are some of the things we noticed:

Babies. Since it wasn’t bone-chilling cold this year, there seemed to be tiny ones all over the place. We’re guessing it has something to do with that whole Catholic ban on contraception.
Not nearly as many dogs. There were Irish setters and other breeds in abundance last year, but we didn’t see nearly as many this year.
References to alcohol were missing, or we just didn’t see them. There was no one in a Guinness costume nor any entry by local distributors.
Fewer politicians in the parade. Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett was there, of course, on foot, getting up close and personal with everyone. Surprisingly, though, he was the only one. Neither of the gubernatorial candidates were present (that we saw) and none of the City Council or Congressional candidates were present in an official capacity as part of the parade. However …
An oversized effigy of Governor Pence circulated through the crowds. It wasn’t part of the actual parade and we never were in position to get a decent picture. The anti-governor sentiment was strong, though.
Not as many media outlets participated. We didn’t see WISH (channel 8) at all and WTHR (channel 13) focused their coverage more on events around town. There weren’t as many radio stations this year, either.
There was less candy being distributed this year. Last year, Kat had her purse full, which we hadn’t expected. This year, neither of us got as much as a dum-dum. Those kids along the curb were disappointed more than once as groups passed without handing out anything.
Middle school kids still find the parade boring. We’ve noticed this before. The poor kids walking in the parade look as though they’re about to have teeth extracted. Perhaps some of those Catholic schools should reconsider. Let the kindergartners walk the parade. That would be interesting.
Everyone loves to pretend they’re Irish.

Indy’s St. Patrick’s day parade isn’t the all-out spectacle of cities such as New York or Savannah, but it’s still fun and honors a culture and history that is still very present in the city. Here’s to parade and Irish and not waking up with a horrible hangover this morning!

Advertising / Fashion

Instagram Kills Its Fashion Advantage

March 17, 2016

It’s joyful to give. But for people who want to take advantage of you, you’re kind of an easy mark. —Larry King

charles i. letbetter 0 AInstagram Kills Its Fashion Advantage

Fashion has had a love affair with Instagram the past few years, but the app may have just killed the reason it was so popular with designers

Instagram, the photo-sharing app that has made models out of ordinary people and created a whole new fascination with photo filters, may have just killed its primary advantage for fashion labels.

For the past several seasons, fashion PR folk have seen posting photos to Instagram as being the next best thing to live streaming, and a hell of a lot cheaper. From streetstyle to behind the scenes and, in many cases such as this season’s Saint Laurent show in Paris, the actual presentation itself, labels have taken advantage of the large audiences and real-time posting to communicate and share pictures with an adoring public. Instagram has been a critical part of creating excitement around brands and getting information about new styles pushed out to consumers in ways that traditional advertising can’t equal.

That may all come to an end soon, though, as Instagram, like Twitter and Facebook before it, moves from a chronologically based timeline to one that attempts to guess what each user likes the most. The concept is that most users miss the vast majority of what’s in their feed by not being on the app when the new material is posted. By using an algorithm that considers what one has liked, with whom they communicate, and what their previous activity has been, Instagram hopes to provide users with a feed that more accurately reflects their actual interest. For users, it sounds like a good idea.

As an article in Business of Fashion explains this morning, fashion brands and retailers may not see the move as an advantage, though. At the very least, they are going to have to reconsider and perhaps revamp how they utilize the app. If users are looking for real-time content, they may have difficulty finding it. During those times of year when multiple designers are releasing tons of new photos onto Instagram at the same time, finding the feed for the brand one wants may be almost impossible. So much for there being an advantage to the app!

If fashion labels can’t get the bang off Instagram to which they’ve grown accustomed, they’re likely to drop the app quickly. There are many others who have been looking to snatch up that fashion week business, specifically Snapchat and Periscope, both of which can provide real-time streaming without the expense incurred with major production costs. Already, during the past two seasons we’ve seen several brands replace high-dollar streaming with an intern holding an iPhone. If they lose the primary advantage of using Instagram, why would they continue?

Obviously, fashion is but a part of an immense network on Instagram, but the ripple effect could be significant. One of the apps big draws is for perspective models to take a chance at being discovered by an ad agency, modeling firm, or fashion label. With the real-time factor removed, none of those industries are as likely to see new models as quickly, if at all, based upon how Instagram interprets the brand’s interest.

There’s a lot at stake here and I’m not sure the folks at Instagram thought through the decision all that well. Be sure, fashion PR people will be giving their whole Instagram campaigns a second look now. Without the real-time advantage, other live apps start to look a lot better.

pop culture / PotD

Pinch Me, I’m Not Wearing Green

March 17, 2016

All theory, dear friend, is gray, but the golden tree of life springs ever green. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Celebrating a culture is one thing, totally misappropriating it is quite another

I’m not always the most observant person in the world. I turned on Spotify last night and discovered they’d added a new playlist for me: Greatest St. Paddy’s Day Hits. Apparently, it’s been there a week and will go away after today. I’m still trying to figure out what is Irish about Tracy Chapman’s cover of Stand By Me or Ray Charles’ I’ve Got A Woman. I think the creators of the list might have been stretching a bit to come up with 12 hours worth of music on the theme. I’m thankful, though, they didn’t just include songs with the word green in the title. That would be a strange list.These are the type of things we encounter on St. Patrick’s Day each year. They turned Indianapolis’ downtown canal green yesterday (not that it needed much help) and I’m sure several other cities did something similar. .

These are the type of things we encounter on St. Patrick’s Day each year. They turned Indianapolis’ downtown canal green yesterday (not that it needed much help) and I’m sure several other cities did something similar. There will be orange, white, and green flags flying everywhere. Children will wear silly green mustaches. People will get drunk on really weak green beer and the truly desperate will wear “Kiss Me, I’m Irish” t-shirts. The party starts early and won’t end until the last redhead falls under the table.

I don’t have any problem with celebrating Irish tradition and culture; theirs is a very rich and very long history that can be reasonably dated to 4,000 BCE and even further than that if one wants to believe certain overly-patriotic Irish authors. I once attempted to read a very large book that supposedly contained the exhaustive history of Ireland in which the author claimed the Irish ancestors were responsible for everything from the creation of language to the invention of the wheel. Unfortunately, I never finished the book as I kept falling asleep on top of its pages. The book is demonstrative, though, of just how long and deep Irish culture is. There are plenty of reasons to celebrate.

Still, you might as well go ahead and pinch me now, I’m not wearing green. The reasons are simple: 1. I don’t have anything green. If you know me, you know my wardrobe is very monochrome, occupying only the black palette. 2. I’m not Irish. Not even a little bit. In the great melting pot that is our family bloodline, about a third is Cherokee/Choctaw and the rest is a mix of Dutch, German, French, and Russian. No Irish at all. 3. I’m not Catholic. Never have been. Never want to be. This may be the most important reason because orange is just as important an Irish color as is green, but which one wears totally depends on whether one is Protestant (orange) or Catholic (green) and both sides are equally strong. This is why there are three colors, not one, in the Irish flag.

The line between celebrating a culture and misappropriating it can sometimes be quite thin. There’s nothing wrong with today’s parades and parties. Irish people have contributed significantly to the American culture and way of life despite the fact they were treated quite horribly when they first arrived. Had a certain presidential candidate been alive 100 years ago, he likely would have been proposing a ban on Irish; many politicians of the time actually suggested such a thing. Fortunately, that ban never happened, but they were still treated horrifically until after WWII. Celebrating all that the Irish have done for American is totally appropriate.

Unfortunately, like many things we Americans do, we take it too far. The Irish are a wonderfully hospitable people but that doesn’t give us the right to completely misappropriate and misrepresent their culture, even for a day, just so we can make a buck or have an excuse to take the day off work and get drunk. Wearing green is totally insincere if one is neither Irish or Catholic. All the stuff about leprechauns and pots of gold, green beer, silly t-shirts, and dying everything green has less to do with celebrating a culture and more to do with trying to make a quick buck off a culture the greater majority of people don’t even begin to understand. Just because our Irish friends invite us to party with them doesn’t give us a right to completely take over the day and completely misrepresent who they are.

Who are the Irish? They’re hard-working, god-fearing people with a tenacity that has gotten them through famine, drought, and unwarranted hostility. They’ve had their way of life threatened, they’ve survived the natural hardships of living on a craggy rock of an island in the North Atlantic, and still they’ve managed to flourish with a form of art, music, dance, literature, and fashion that is all their own. They are distinctive from other European tribes of the region. They work hard, fight harder, and have a passion unmatchable. Those are all things worthy of being celebrated.

Yes, we’ll be celebrating St. Patrick’s Day today, but we’ll attempt to do so appropriately. We’ll go to the parade and take pictures (which we’ll post here tomorrow), we’ll enjoy the company of an Irish friend or two, and at some point, we’ll likely enjoy one of the best beers made. Just don’t look for me to be wearing any green; not this year, not ever. Celebrate, don’t misappropriate.

Current Issues / Fashion

Fashion Without Gender

March 16, 2016

We pledge ourselves to liberate all our people from the continuing bondage of poverty, deprivation, suffering, gender and other discrimination. —Nelson Mandela

Fashion has always been dictated by one’s gender, but slowly that’s beginning to change

I wouldn’t necessarily call it a revolution, but there’s a change coming to fashion, a change that few are talking about. Not that it hasn’t gotten any press, but those articles go largely unnoticed in the wake of designers dropping from labels and shallow wannabe’s screaming about who is sitting front row at which show. Fashion is steadily making moves to support those for whom gender is either fluid or nonexistent and the result is not merely an added sales point but a shift in how society views gender.

There were two significant moments last week. One was the Dries Van Noten Fall/Winter collection. While I didn’t have space to cover the issue in our review, the folks over at Fashionista.com didn’t let pass the genderless aspect of the entire collection, including evening wear. No, this isn’t the first genderless collection we’ve seen on a Paris runway, but this one was significant in that the Belgian designer has traditionally been quite feminine in his designs. Last season we saw tight pencil skirts and bustier tops. Those were nowhere to be seen this season. Instead, we had a plethora of four-in-hand ties, trousers with plackets, and masculine tailored coats. Sure, there were some traditionally feminine touches here and there, but those were blended in to create as close to a genderless collection as we’ve seen from a major designer.

The next day, online fashion retail giant Zara very quietly, without so much as a press release, added a gender neutral section to their website. Contents may appear rather bland to some: hoodies, athletic wear, trousers, and jeans. Yet, each of those entries is important, especially the jeans, because they’re not assigned a gender target. The jeans are just jeans. That’s it. Either they fit or they don’t. There’s nothing about their design that promotes one gender over another.

Gender fluidity has been getting attention in fashion advertising for a while. You may remember when we told you about Jaden Smith appearing in an ad for Louis Vuitton wearing a dress. The gender-bending stunt drew a lot of attention to the brand at the time, but was quickly forgotten as it was replaced by something else in the line of our short attention spans. While the campaign was important, though, it was still primarily about women’s wear, clothes designed with a specific gender in mind but worn by the opposite gender, which is the exact same thing drag queens have been doing for decades.

What the Zara move promotes, though, is something different: clothes designed without a specific gender in mind. This shift could be more difficult for the fashion world simply because the system itself is set up to cater to each gender separately. We have menswear, we have womenswear, and we tend to keep the two completely separate. While some designers, such as Tom Ford and Burberry, routinely mix men and women in their runway shows, we are still set up to accommodate separate men’s fashion weeks and women’s fashion weeks.

Change happens slowly in fashion primarily because we’re all comfortable with what we’re wearing now. Designers who venture too far into something different find themselves stuck with inventory no one wants. With margins already so slim, not selling clothes is an untenable situation. Moves like the one Zara has made, though, open a door, no matter how slight that opening may be. Gender neutral clothing finally has a place with a dominant retailer.

As always, the question remaining is whether the new move results in selling more clothes. We’ll see. We’ll cross our fingers. Maybe we’ll even shop. Consider it.

PotD / Social Commentary

A Doom And Gloom Kind Of Morning

March 16, 2016

When I woke up this morning my girlfriend asked me, ‘Did you sleep good?’ I said ‘No, I made a few mistakes.’ —Steven Wright

Looking at the news first thing in the morning can make the whole day difficult

The day hasn’t really even started yet and already I’m depressed. When I turned off my alarm this morning, the first thing I saw were last night’s primary election results. I didn’t want to see that. I didn’t need to see that. I made the mistake of leaving Facebook up all night, though, and politics are the hot trending topic of the moment. This is not a positive way to start the day. I’m depressed now and may have difficulty making it to my minimum word count, which I usually exceed three-fold or more. I’m worried.

I’m worried about things over which I have no control and the fact that I have no control is what worries me. More than ever, I get the feeling that it is the primaries that are the more important elections this year. By the time we get to the general election in November we’ll be once more faced with a decision of choosing the lesser of two evils. When in politics, the good guy never wins. Why? Because people are stupid and vote against their own best interest every time.

So, as I’m looking for something, anything, to cheer me, or, at least, jar me from this doom and gloom morning, I run across an article from Business Insider: “5 Countries Where It’s Relatively Easy For Americans To Become Expats.” My first thought was, “Geez, someone flunked the headline writing course.” My second thought was, “Better bookmark this; it might come in handy later.

I’ve never really been one of those people who threaten to move if my candidate doesn’t win. That tactic has never worked for anyone. No one cares if you leave the country. In fact, I rather expect that for most people making those threats, especially alleged celebrities, there would be a reasonably lengthy line of people more than willing to help them pack. If you’re just moving across town, you’re on your own, but leaving the country as a martyred political dissident? You’ll have to turn the help away. No one likes a bad sport, even in politics.

Still, regardless of how this year’s elections turn out, I’m finding it difficult to put a positive spin on any of the possible outcomes. Faced with a partisan Congress that has its collective head stuck up its collective ass too far to do anything, President Obama seems reluctant to do anything that can’t be achieved by executive order. The economy, while currently okay, shows signs of fracturing in China and Europe, which could doom us all through no fault of our own. North Korea seems to be itching to start another war. Middle Eastern terrorists are pissed that they’re not making headlines in American newspapers as often. These are all things that November’s elections can’t fix, despite all the claims those loudmouths are making. All they can do is make a bad situation worse, which is probably what will happen.

So, okay, maybe leaving the country isn’t such a bad idea. Canada and Mexico both top the list. They actually have rather relaxed immigration laws, especially when it comes to Americans. They are much more accepting of us than we are of them. We could probably learn a lesson or two from them, but we’re too stupid, collectively, to be paying attention to that. The problem with either of those countries is that, A) they’re likely to become flooded with immigration requests at the end of the year, forcing them to be a little picky about who they accept, and B) having a member of a drug cartel as a neighbor is a bit too similar to where we live now.

A little country by the name of Svalbard is on the list. Don’t worry, I had to look it up, too. It’s a tiny place just North of the Arctic Circle. I can see why they’d have a wide-open immigration policy. I’m rather surprised they have enough people to even have a country. I would be worried that a place where the population is so small that everyone has to hold a political office of some kind just to cover all the necessary bases. I don’t want to be a politician, nor do I care to freeze my ass off year-round. I’ll pass, thank you.

Sweden’s on the list, which doesn’t surprise me. Sweden’s a nice place with a lot of amenities that help you forget you’re being taxed out the wazoo. They have a huge expat population and are very good at helping newcomers feel welcome. The recent wave of Syrian immigrants has taken a toll, however, and they’re part of the European Union, which certainly looks to be on the verge of economic crisis. Moving to Sweden at this particular moment might prove to be a case of trading a bad situation for a worse one.

New Zealand is the fifth country on this list and it just might be the better option. They seem to be having a rather serious skills shortage, so if you know how to do something, pretty much anything, they’ll happily hand over a permanent work visa. Granted, their seasons are exactly the opposite of ours, which means one can likely spend Christmas on the beach, butI think we can probably adjust to that. It’s technically not illegal to be naked anywhere in New Zealand, either, which may be an issue for those of certain points of view. That doesn’t mean everyone walks around topless, mind you, just that you’re less likely to get into trouble on those stressful days where you forget to wear pants.

The biggest challenge I see to moving to New Zeland is the cost of shipping your stuff so very far away. This isn’t a mere 10-hour flight from JFK. It’s a minimum 12 hours from LAX, and from anywhere else, such as Indy, just plan on losing 24 hours. Shipping costs are expensive, so you’d have to buy all new furniture and stuff when you get there. Ya’ might want to start saving now.

I still don’t see leaving the country as the optimal choice if for no other reason than not really wanting the US to become a nation of complete imbeciles, which is what happens if all the smart people like you and I leave. I’m not ready to pack my bags and leave my extended family members stranded. I would like to think there are other options.

But then, I look at the morning headlines again and see nothing but doom and gloom. Maybe if ya’ll would start voting more intelligently we could have a better day. This morning is just getting started. Maybe a presidential candidate will slip and fall and make us all laugh. That would make for a good morning.

Mythology / pop culture

Which Ides Of March Did You Mean?

March 15, 2016

A soothsayer bids you beware the ides of March.—Brutus, Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2, 15–19

charles i. letbetter - which ides of march did you mean

With the death of Julius Caesar, it seems the oracle’s prophecy came true, but what if he meant a different Ides of March?

Yeah, yeah, we all know the Shakespearian version of how Caesar’s death went down. If that version were true, one might wonder why an extremely superstitious person like Julius Caesar didn’t stay home from the Senate that day. Take a look at Plutarch’s Life of Julius Caesar, though, and the oracle’s statement lacks the drama ol’ Willie gave it. Transliterating the Greek into contemporary English, it comes off more like, “Hey, ya’ might wanna watch your step there around the 15th of March or so.” Go ahead, toss in a Brooklyn accent and give the oracle a wide-brimmed grey fedora to hide his face, just for effect. We can see where Julius might not have thought homicide was in the offing for the day.

We assume that since JC and Brutus had that fatal encounter that the oracle’s prophecy was fulfilled. What if that wasn’t the Ides of March the soothsayer had in mind, though? What if his divination applied to a time much further into the future, a time that an ancient Roman would not have understood, one where the calendar was the only thing he recognised? What if that most fateful of March Ides has yet to happen?

Granted, a number of other bad things have happened on this date. Russia’s Czar Nicholas II didn’t find March 15 especially hospitable. Czechoslovakia was effectively wiped off the map on this date in 1939. My guess is CBS show runners still steer clear of Les Moonves today after the network had the balls to cancel “The Ed Sullivan Show” on this date. If one is even the tiniest bit superstitious, it’s best to just stay home and nap, which is pretty much what I’d like to do.

There’s always that chance, though, that the worst is yet to come. So, just to stoke those fires of fear and imagination, here are a few things that could make the Ides of March much, much worse than being stabbed in the back by your best friend.

A very clumsy knife salesman could show up at your front door. This is why it is smart to keep your front door blocked with litter boxes. At least, that’s what we do. Any danger attempting to come through our front door gets stuck in cat poop. So far, that’s been a very strong deterrent. I’ve not had a single knife salesman show up in the past two years.
The Internet could die. There’s a tremendous amount of redundancy built into the structure of the Internet, but a significant amount of communication between the US and the rest of the world is carried through a series of trans-ocean cabling and a shit ton of financial transactions take place on the Internet using that cabling. Cut these cables and we’re looking at full-scale economic meltdown faster than you can say, “Have you tried unplugging it and plugging it back in?”
Weather could happen, especially if you live in Southern Louisiana or Texas. I’m guessing Shreveport is a rather moist place to be today and Interstate 10 is closed in some places. Some 3000 people were being evacuated last I looked. Those folks are not having a good Ides of March, but then, the past seven days haven’t been much of a picnic, either. The rest of the world, from what I can tell, is doing rather well in the weather department.
The FBI could ask you to unlock your phone. Okay, so maybe you’ve not actually killed anyone yet, but you might have expressed some frustration toward a certain presidential candidate or four and we all know the NSA is watching that crap so they don’t have a repeat of the whole Bobby Kennedy thing. So, they could show up and ask to look at your phone, just to make sure you were kidding, you know. Don’t expect Tim Cook to have your back, he’s rather busy.
Your parents could have named you Isis. I’m sure there’s some poor person out there who is currently looking into having their name changed because their mother, who was obsessed with ancient Egyptian mythology thought it would be cute to name their child after a goddess. We all know someone who’s suffered a similar misfortune. Talk about having a rough time getting credit …
You could be an unpaid intern for a certain loud-mouthed presidential candidate. Talk about a perfect storm of bad luck. Interns, by job description, get all the worst assignments anyway, but to constantly have to put up with all that hot air and not get paid is a fate that may actually be worse than death. Don’t put this on your resumé.
Starbucks could take your favorite drink off its menu. There are reasons I drink my coffee black. So many people I know are absolutely addicted to a very specific blend that only Starbucks baristas know how to make. Take these people to Italy and they are soooo screwed. Starbucks is known for switching up their menu from time to time. If they remove the wrong things, thousands of people just might die, or even worse, stab their barista.
Your photographer could tell you his Dropbox has been hacked and those nude pictures you took for “someone special” are missing. Worse yet, #NakedHousewives just started trending. “Lucy, you have some ‘splainin’ to do.”
Your lunch could be recalled 30 minutes after you ate it. There have been a lot of food recalls lately. You never know until it’s too late. That single-serve lasagna sure looked healthy in the picture on the cardboard container. Maybe you should have just eaten the cardboard.
This could be your real life:

These are just some of the reasons we should beware every Ides of March. One just never knows exactly which one that old soothsayer meant. No one bothered to ask. Damn you, Caesar. You’ve doomed us all.

Current Issues / pop culture / PotD

Comic Book Gospel

March 15, 2016

It is only the savage, whether of the African bush or of the American gospel tent, who pretends to know the will and intent of God exactly and completely. —Henry Louis Mencken

Rarely does our modern society equate gospel with peace, but, more often, with violence and dishonesty

Imagine Tom Cruise blowing up in front of a Church of Scientology. For a certain portion of the population, the very idea of such a thing makes us downright giddy. Those are the people who are likely to be very excited about the new AMC series Preacher, which is set to debut May 22. The pilot was premiered at SXSW this past Sunday and crowds cheered when Cruise went boom. Such is the general public attitude toward many religions who seem to be making up their own gospel as they go. Watching those who use the gospel for their own gain explode sounds like a rather enjoyable pastime and Preacher provides just that in its first episode.

Don’t expect more traditional churches to be too happy about this series. Based on the Vertigo comic book by Seth Ennis and Steve Dillon, Preacher tells the story of Jesse Custer, who has some “special” powers, his ex-girlfriend Tulip, and Cassidy, a rough-hewn Irishman with a penchant for using his fists [In the comic, Cassidy is a vampire, but no word as to whether he maintains that characteristic in the TV version]. In the pilot, various ministers are “possessed” by a strange alien force that then explodes them from the inside out. This is not exactly what the church has in mind when they talk about being filled with the Holy Spirit.

Initial reaction from folks at SXSW was favorable, but one has to consider that the population there is one already attuned to a more alternative culture in which a comic book gospel is more real to them than the version being preached on the street corner. They tend to like anything that has explosions and defies traditional authority and challenges our concepts of how society works. SXSW tends to be the AMC network’s core demographic, so showing them something like Preacher is rather like offering a digitized communion.

What is more disconcerting for the church, or should be, is that such a negative attitude toward people in ministry has become almost commonplace. Comics like Preacher do not come from a single, twisted mind, but rather are reflective of a perspective based on the reality of priests abusing children, ministers having affairs with church secretaries, and televangelists fleecing the poor to make millions of dollars. If there is a tendency to see evil in those who wear a collar, it is because evil is the example that has been set by far too many who claim to preach the gospel.

Consider the following tweet that came across my feed yesterday:

Joel Osteen ……

If being a Minister is making you a millionaire chances are you’re doing it wrong. pic.twitter.com/l3JuiMUjd7

— Bring back FDR’s CCC (@rarey4) March 14, 2016

Now, I can’t speak to the accuracy of that image and the fact that no source is cited makes its voracity somewhat suspect. What’s important for this particular conversation is that we see so-called ministers like this, quite literally raking in millions of dollars, living high on the hog, while those who donate to their “church” can barely scrape together enough money for their own food. These “ministers” take advantage of a biblical mandate to financially support the work of God and exploit those who faithfully believe that some good is being done. Instead of the money going to help people in need, though, it’s going to the construction of lavish mansions, multi-million dollar television production facilities, private jets, designer clothes, and lifestyles that would make a presidential candidate blush. When we see the gospel so blatantly and obviously misappropriated, then yes, we’re going to cheer at the thought of such charlatans being blown to smithereens.

All of this sits in stark contrast to what I know is true for those whose faith and intentions are sincere. My late father, and those like him, never looked at the pulpit as a way of filling their own wallet. Quite to the contrary, they sacrificed financial stability, time with their families, and in many cases even their health in order to better the lives of the congregations and communities to which they legitimately felt called. They understood that wealth and privilege on earth is meaningless and preached a gospel of caring for others, selflessness, and charity.

After Poppa died, my brother and I were going through his papers, trying to decide what we needed to keep. We weren’t surprised to find he had kept meticulous financial records. He was never audited, but he was always ready, just in case. As we looked back through tax returns from the 1960s and 70s, we were shocked. We always knew we had been on the lower end of the economic scale, but we hadn’t realized how severely. 1974 was the first time Poppa could claim more than $10,000 in income. Throughout the 80s, his salary barely tipped over $20K. Only after many years of service, after my brother and I had both left home, did his salary finally top out at $36,000. There were never new cars. New clothes were only bought on sale, and for Poppa especially, new suits were an expenditure difficult to manage more than once ever three or four years. Even then, they were from the clearance rack at Sears.

Real ministers don’t look for the limelight. A local radio station once offered to broadcast Poppa’s Sunday morning sermons if he could have someone tape them at sufficient quality. Taping the sermons wasn’t an issue. We were already doing that for shut-ins and nursing home residents that couldn’t make it to the service. Still, Poppa turned down the offer. He was concerned that the publicity that would come with such a broadcast might dilute the message.

Preachers like my father are not what the general public sees, though. Instead, we are faced with a Church fighting to hide the criminal sexual molestation committed by their own priests. We’re faced with the images of weeping ministers confessing to affairs only because they were caught and had no other choice. We’re insulted with pleas from televangelists begging for donations so they can buy a $65 million private jet. The people who perpetuate such absolute heresy are guilty of preaching a comic book gospel that leaves us so disgusted we’re not the least bit upset when something bad happens to them.

I’m actually rather anxious to compare Preacher the television series to the comic book. In the comic book, one of the plot lines is that God has left heaven and can’t be found. I have a feeling that there are millions of people whose experience with religion is just like that: God is not in heaven and he’s not doing anything good. If the church wants to change that perception, they need to do away with this ridiculous gospel of affluence, be more proactive in addressing their own sins, and let us see the example of selfless sacrifice that I know exists.

The gospel I was taught was the gospel of peace and love. Maybe we should try that one out for a while.

Current Issues / pop culture

Doing That March Sports Thingy

March 14, 2016

charles i. letbetter - march sports thing

Sports do not build character. They reveal it. —Heywood Broun

charles i. letbetter march sports thingy

I have NO pictures of anything related to basketball, so here are three beautiful blonds instead

I am nothing even close to being a sports fan. I appreciate sports. I enjoy watching sports on occasion. I understand the basic philosophy behind most sports. But do I have a team to which I’m loyal? No. Is there a sport about which I’m passionate? No. Do I keep stats in my head for anyone? You’ve got to be kidding. I try to be reasonably conversant in the big three: baseball, basketball, football. Those three sports help me prevent those awkward silences when in a social situation. Other than that, I’ve very little interest.

This time of year, however, this mid-March hair that gets stuck and gums up the whole works, I feel pressure. My television should be on. A basketball jersey should be hanging on my wall. I ought to be full of the madness that is the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Why? Because it’s never ending sports and I’m male and that’s what we’re supposed to do because it has something or the other to do with being a great lover. Allegedly. Your results may vary.

The biggest pressure is to complete a tournament bracket. For those of you who are blissfully naive, please allow me to suck you into this sports vortex. The NCAA men’s basketball tournament is huge. They start with 64 teams, selected in part by who won specific conferences, but mostly based on the decisions of a committee based at the NCAA headquarters here in Indianapolis. This committee not only decides who gets to play, they also decide how those 64 teams are ranked. How a team is ranked is HUGE because that determines who plays whom in the first round. Officials want to ensure really good games as the tournament goes along, so top ranked teams play against the lowest ranked teams in the first round with the assumption that the lowest ranked teams will loose.

All these games are divided into four regions. Each region is seeded separately and the whole thing is revealed during a televised program on CBS. Except, this year, that’s not exactly what happened. While NBA legend Charles Barkley was standing there trying to figure out how to work a touch screen, someone leaked the full bracket online via Twitter. Understand, this leak had absolutely ZERO effect over any of the games; it merely spoiled the sense of surprise when television cameras dropped in on smaller schools such as Gonzaga (no, I don’t know what a Gonzaga is) or Northern Iowa (poor kids up there never get picked for anything, so this is really big for them).

Once the initial bracket is released, the challenge is to try and guess how the tournament is going to go down. This is such a stupid and ridiculous pastime. If anyone ever gets a bracket completely right, it’s more by luck, rather like picking the winning lotto numbers. Sure, people like to pretend they know what they’re doing, but there’s no way to overcome the fact that on any night, in any game, one team can have a better-than-usual night while their opponents are totally off their feed and play lousy. Every year there are upsets: lower ranked teams beating higher ranked teams. In the best years, there’s a Cinderella: a low-ranked team from a small school that beats several higher ranked teams and makes it to the Final Four, which is rather like basketball heaven. Indianapolis’ Butler University has been that Cinderella before, making it all the way to the final game before losing.

So, every year I fill out my bracket. Every year, it’s worthless after the first round. I don’t have a clue what I’m doing. My choices are made solely on emotion, hearsay, and blatant favoritism. This year, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC) made it to the tournament. That’s exciting. I know people who teach there. Chattanooga is where two of my boys live. I would very much like for them to win at least the first round. Unfortunately, they’re up against Indiana, a fifth-seeded team that plays good ball but has a history, over the past several years at least, of choking in the really big games. Neither team is likely to make it past the second round when the winner from the first round is probably stuck getting whipped by Kentucky. As much as I like Chattanooga and think they might pull off an upset, I’m going with Indiana in the first round because an Indiana/Kentucky game would be hot.

A lot of people are picking Kentucky to win it all because they beat North Carolina earlier in the season. I say that’s hogwash. Coach Dean Smith doesn’t let anyone beat his team twice in the same season, especially not this season when his team is quite strong. Kentucky got lucky the first time around. Don’t expect that to happen again.

I ultimately have Kansas going up against Oklahoma and UNC taking on Purdue (a purely emotional choice) in the Final Four with UNC taking home the trophy. What do I know, though? Chances are actually very high that none of those four teams make it to the Final Four. There’s a lot of basketball to play between here and there and, because I’m a guy and don’t want to lose any more testosterone points, I’ll watch some if it. Just don’t expect me to get anything right.

I tried embedding my bracket here because it’s too large for a screenshot. That failed, though, which may be a good thing. This way I can conceal my embarrassment when I lose. Sports and I are the kind of friends who wave at each other from opposite sides of the street. Those of you who are true fans, good luck. We’ll see you when the tournament is done.

Blog Archives

When you accept a picture of the deity assigned to you by another people, you become the spiritual prisoners of that other people. —John Henrik Clarke

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You don’t have to wear fur. They make such great fakes. There’s no reason to kill an animal. —Grace Slick

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A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom. —Martin Luther King, Jr.

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I don’t want to sound like a grumpy old man, but nothing winds me up more than people saying, ‘Chill out’ to me when I’m irritated! —Martin Freeman

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Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference. —Winston Churchill

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Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony. —Mahatma Gandhi

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If variety is the spice of life, marriage is the big can of leftover Spam. —Johnny Carson

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X-Men: Apocolypse

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Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

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Just because there are not yet specific trade laws dealing with hashtag use doesn’t mean you can’t get into a lot of trouble using them.

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Group conformity scares the pants off me because it’s so often a prelude to cruelty towards anyone who doesn’t want to – or can’t – join the Big Parade. —Bette Midler

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It’s joyful to give. But for people who want to take advantage of you, you’re kind of an easy mark. —Larry King

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All theory, dear friend, is gray, but the golden tree of life springs ever green. —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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We pledge ourselves to liberate all our people from the continuing bondage of poverty, deprivation, suffering, gender and other discrimination. —Nelson Mandela

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When I woke up this morning my girlfriend asked me, ‘Did you sleep good?’ I said ‘No, I made a few mistakes.’ —Steven Wright

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A soothsayer bids you beware the ides of March.—Brutus, Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2, 15–19

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