Summer Inspirations

Height we love the new height on the wedge , the taller the better.

Denim Shirt dress or over sized mens shirt how ever you do it do denim 

CLASH

Sheer and Leopard Print yes please 

Structure and Geometric Prints oh la la 

Pastel Platforms we die 

Corset as a crop tee never looked so chic 

Color Blocking and Flare pants 70s come back 

Perfection and Confidence 

Does it get any better then this 

Mui Mui does the walking 

Nature + Fashion= Great combo 

Clash and Personal style always a must 

Art and Red Bottoms WOW!

Sheer Maxi Dress all you need for Summer 

Street Fashion 

The shorter the better 

Peachy Dreams 

White

Hey

We trust your having a great summer and are keep up with exams good luck to all our readers and fellow bloggers. We are ready for summer and we can't wait to keep inspiring you on your journey and vacations.


Happy Holidays.


PMB Team.
xoxo

Kim Kardashian Halloween Poison Ivy Costume 2011

Happy Halloween

We have a few more black-footed albatrosses are hanging around, and 2 Laysan albatrosses just showed up today.  We are just about done with all of our projects that have to be done before the birds come back en masse. Speaking of that, our lead paint remediation project is going well.  The workers will be able to work for only about 2 more weeks before there are too many albatrosses around.

You may have also heard that a lot of the tsunami debris from Japan is making its way toward Midway and may be here sometime this winter.  There are a lot of articles about it, but here's a link to a good one:  http://news.discovery.com/earth/tsunami-debris-floating-fast-towards-hawaii-111025.html

This was the only Black-footed albatross I saw on Eastern Island last week.

 This is one of the early Laysan albatrosses.   

 I strung some new cable to our remote cameras on Eastern Island.  This camera monitors the ducks at the Monument seep. 

 Anthony, Leann, and Anette are weeding the Short-tailed albatross plot so we can put the decoys in.

 We haven't seen the Short-tailed albatrosses yet this season, but the decoys are freshly painted and enough of the verbesina is gone to allow easy access for the birds.

Clyde and Lynn from NOAA came out to do some work on the tide station.  They gave a tour of their gear and a short presentation.  I learned a couple of new things.

 As I posted last week, Sak is leaving the island after almost 29 years.  This is the line of people saying goodbye to him.

We had a Halloween party last night at Capt Brooks' Tavern. 

Patty got rid of some expired light sticks for her costume.

Servant Leaders

There’s a wonderful quote by the great Carmelite foundress, mystic, and saint, Teresa of Avila, in her autobiography which says: “Life is spent in an uncomfortable inn.” That Teresa and most, if not all the saints, experienced this should be a comforting reassurance for you and me, particularly at this time of unsettledness and confusion in our nation and in the Church.

It so happens that we celebrate the feast of All Saints on Tuesday of this week, providing a perfect background for our reflection on Matthew’s Gospel passage today (23:1-12). One of the Church’s seven principal feasts, All Saints Day honors all the saints, or holy ones, known and unknown. Its originated as early as the 4th century, when Christians began to honor notably holy people, particularly martyrs, witnesses to the Christian faith.  In the 7th century, the Western Emperor, Phocas, gave the ancient Pantheon, a temple to all the pagan gods, and which was and still is located on the Piazza della Rotunda in Rome, to the Church. Pope Boniface IV consecrated it, dedicating it to “Santa Maria della Rotunda” and all the martyrs. Eventually, the feast was fixed on November 1 for the entire Church. Thomas Cranmer, author of the Book of Common Prayer in 1549, retained in the calendar only those feasts of saints mentioned in the New Testament, as well as this feast of All Saints.

The Church is holy not only because a few of her members are held up as saints, but because each and all of us who are the Church are called to be channels of God’s holiness, life, and presence to one another. Recall the Genesis story, where the Creator is described as pausing over each created thing and being, and observing: “It is good.” God, source of all being, goodness, beauty, wholeness, and therefore, holiness, puts a stamp of approval, a stamp of holiness, on all of creation. Holiness or sanctity doesn’t come from a person’s own heroism or efforts, but from the fact that s/he is “gifted”, graced, with God’s own life and motivated by God to share God’s life and presence with others. Holiness, therefore, is an ideal, but a realizable ideal, meant to help build up the Church and, indeed, all of human society. It’s not just for a few select souls, but for all of us. Despite our being sinners before God, Jesus nevertheless says: “I come not to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Through Baptism into Christ, holiness becomes part of our spiritual DNA. Plunged into the very life of God, which is love and service, we’re one-ed to God and to one another. Jesus is the unique pattern and model for humankind, living as the Holy One who loved God to the point of identification, and loved others as a servant, attending to their pain, hunger and need. None of us has the luxury of saying: “But being a saint, being holy, isn’t for me -- it may be for the canonized saints, but surely not for me.” That’s an evasion of one’s baptismal commitment. It’s never a question of “worthiness”, but of willingness: willingness to deliberately commit oneself in love to God, and willingness to commit oneself to the service of one’s sisters and brothers.

Saints aren’t just select heroes chosen by the Church, but all of us who’ve been reborn in Jesus and His Spirit through Baptism, and who take seriously the pledge we’ve made to follow Jesus. In that covenant we declare that we’ll resist evil, and return to the Lord when our weakness and selfishness overcome our resolve. More importantly, we pledge to proclaim the Good News of God in Christ by what we say and by what we do each day. We agree to seek and serve God in all people, to love them as we love ourselves. In the cause of justice and peace, we agree to respect every person’s dignity. Dom Hélder Camara, late Brazilian Archbishop, summed it up this way:

“...Let no one be scandalized if I frequent

Those who are considered unworthy

Or sinful. Who is not a sinner?

Let no one be alarmed if I am seen

With compromised and dangerous people,

On the left or the right,

Let no one bind me to a group.

My door, my heart, must be open

To everyone, absolutely everyone.

Lesbia Scott composed the popular “saints” hymn, #293 in our Hymnal, I Sing a Song of the Saints of God,  along with other children’s hymns, which she sang to her own children in the 1920’s. It caught on in the U.S. during the 1940’s, particularly after it was set to a new tune by a retired Episcopal priest, The Rev. John Henry Hopkins, Jr. Her hymn celebrates the kind of holy people, “saints”, whom you and I run into all the time. It gives just a sampling of a veritable catalog of folks who continually inspire us to become more “holy” as well as more “whole” in our lives: doctors and nurses, farmers and field workers, soldiers, martyrs, school students, seafarers and fisher folk, church workers, train operators, taxi drivers and passengers, shopkeepers, even priests; people who not only serve tea, but Starbucks barristas, restaurant wait, cooking and cleaning staff, bosses and co-workers, teachers and fellow students, neighbors and friends. The thing which we all have in common, as the hymn notes, is that they’re “just folks like me” and you.

To become holy means to become whole, integrated, communal, as human persons and as followers of Jesus. Though that is a lifetime project, and a costly one at that, none of us can weasel out of it. Jesus has pledged to all of us who “labor”: “I will give you rest.” Jesus renews that promise to you and me each time we come forward, hands outstretched, to share his Body and Blood in the Eucharist: the “communion of saints”.

Perhaps the key sentence in Matthew’s Gospel today is the one where Jesus says: “The greatest among you will be your servant…” It’s a really important message during this important time of transition in the Church’s life. What Jesus is talking about in the sentence quoted is servant leadership. Speaking from my own 25 years of experience in my own Diocese, especially in mutual parish ministry in several churches, servant leadership isn’t something new in the Church. Nevertheless, it’s taken many folks a while to absorb exactly what the Book of Common Prayer is saying in the Outline of Faith (p. 855): “Who are the ministers of the Church? The ministers of the Church are lay persons, bishops, priests, and deacons. What is the ministry of the laity? The ministry of lay persons is to represent [re-present] Christ and his Church; to bear witness [martyr] to him wherever they may be; and, according to the gifts given them, to carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world; and to take their place in the life, worship, and governance of the Church…” 

Please note that phrase: “...according to the gifts given them…” “Servant leader” doesn’t mean that every single member is called to be a Senior Warden, or the director of the Altar Guild, or a Convention delegate, or a Church School teacher. But every member is called to be a servant leader, “according to the gifts given them”. The very best way in which one can be a true minister in one’s local community of faith is, as Jesus recommends, to be willing to serve, according to the gifts given to you.

I was totally amazed when I Googled “Servant Leadership” and found how widespread this concept has been and is, not only in the Church, but in the secular, particularly business and management, sector of the world for some time now. Robert K. Greenleaf (1904-1990), who formally coined and defined the words “servant leadership” in the secular setting, lists 10 characteristics  which describe a servant leader:

- Listening: not just hearing, but actively listening; paying attention to others’ unspoken needs; supporting others in decisions.

- Empathy: putting oneself in the others’ shoes, so to speak; trying to understand their point of view; respecting and appreciating others.

- Healing: attending to both one’s self and others; helping to resolve conflict in ways that educate and help others grow and mature; utilizing humor and fun, and creating an atmosphere free of the fear of failure.

- Awareness: again, both of oneself and others; really “being there” when communicating with others.

- Persuasion: not by exerting power, status, or rank, but influencing others by being clear, speaking from conviction, and by reasoning together.

- Conceptualization: thinking “outside the box”; looking with vision beyond day-to-day realities and limits to what can be; setting specific goals and strategies to achieve them.

- Foresight: learning about the past so as to better understand the current reality, and being able to foresee the likely outcome of situations as well as their consequences.

- Stewardship: holding the institution in trust for the greater good of its members and of others in the surrounding society, by advocating for honesty, openness and accountability.

- Commitment to peoples’ growth: recognizing the other’s intrinsic value, beyond simply what they do or can do; encouraging others to nurture their gifts and their spiritual lives; welcoming ideas or input by anyone, and involving others in decision-making through consensus.

- Building community: dedicating oneself to find ways to build an ever stronger community within the institution, as well as trying to develop genuine community within the surrounding society.

“The greatest among you will be your servant…” Undoubtedly, the finest summary of these, Jesus words in the Gospel, in a Christian context, are found in St. Paul’s encouragement to the Ephesian Christian community: “I...beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace…

...Each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ’s gift...to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up of the body of Christ…

...speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped...promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.” (Ephesians 4:1-3; 7; 12; 15-16)

Puss in Boots HD Poster 3D Wallpapers

Grim Reaper HD Wallpapers

Guest blogger exclusive #10

Leading conspiracy writer Kenn Thomas returns for the tenth instalment of the Silver Screen Saucers guest blogger series.

In this, his second guest article for SSS, Kenn explains how an almost-forgotten story from one of the more bizarre chapters in UFO history provided significant inspiration for the 1956 movie Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers. 

There’s also a Roswell connection… and cloudbusters! It’s a fascinating article. Read on...

Guest blogger: Kenn Thomas

Earth Vs. Flying Saucers With Cloudbusters

By Kenn Thomas

Critics skeptical of the Roswell flying saucer crash story often claim that interest in the event dropped off immediately after its initial media flash in 1947, only to be revived in the 1980s by unreliable UFO researchers seeking to profiteer from a myth of their own making. I have often contradicted this assertion by pointing out that the scientist Wilhelm Reich paid a visit to Roswell in 1955 and made clear references to aliens in relation to the town in his final book, Contact With Space. It is an unusual book primarily documenting Reich and his assistants using beam cannons to clash with flying saucers--in real life, not on the silver screen.

Researchers have slowly been accumulating Roswell references in movies and other pop culture forms to support the idea that the incident had more of a cultural impact on pre-1980s pop culture than previously has been presupposed. The little Roswell grey aliens appear in a mid-1960s episode of the anime cartoon Prince Planet, for instance. Recently, a 1951 wristwatch ad from the Hamilton Corporation was discovered that referred to the weather balloon explanation for flying saucers, an explanation offered only for Roswell in 1947 until adopted by the Robertson UFO investigation panel of 1952. Another obvious example often escapes notice; however, that again ties the tale back to Wilhelm Reich. It involves the famous 1956 Ray Harryhausen movie Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers.

Roswell-like alien in Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers.

In that movie, aliens attack the earth in flying saucers and in a few instances the aliens hobble out onto the surface. The creatures look a bit like roll-on deodorant cans with stiff arms and legs. The costumes were used briefly in one other movie, 1961’s The Creation of Humanoids, most recently broadcast following an episode of cable TV’s The Walking Dead series. In Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers, the costumes’ rounded helmets with no features conceal the aliens’ real form until one is killed and his roll-cap removed. The alien looks like a Roswell grey.

Wilhelm Reich had Ruidoso, New Mexico as his destination in 1955 for an overnight stay on his way to Tuscon, Arizona. Passing through Roswell—and Stanton Friedman often makes the point at lectures that few just “pass through” Roswell’s out of the way location—Reich clearly was looking for signs of aliens. In Contact With Space, he writes: “Although it was very hot as we neared Roswell, New Mexico, no OR flow [OR was Reich’s abbreviation for orgone, or natural earth energy] was visible on the road, which should have been shimmering with ‘heatwaves’. Instead, DOR [Reich’s abbreviation for “deadly orgone radiation”, which he believed came from the exhaust of UFOs].”

Some of Reich's assistants, including his daughter, Eva, with a cloudbuster gun mounted on a truck, circa 1955.

Reich’s concern about the environmental impact of UFOs stemmed from experiences he had in his lab in Rangeley, Maine called Orgonon. In 1951 he first discovered the DOR business by putting a milligram of radium into one of his orgone boxes, an invention of his designed to harness the natural earth energy. It resulted in highly polluted air around the lab, causing fauna to wilt and animals to become ill. Strange red UFOs appeared in the sky over Rangeley. In response to all this, Reich came up with another invention, the “cloudbuster,” a cannon mounted on the back of a truck that concentrated and redirected orgone, which was aimed and fired at the UFOs, causing them to disappear. In the following years, he brought these devices with him to Tucson, Arizona, passing through Roswell, and did battle with UFOs there.

That happened in real life. It’s an obscure story to many now but apparently a paradigm for the major Hollywood science fiction of the time. Reich’s cloudbuster battles with UFOs are virtually reproduced in Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers. Instead of orgone, earth's scientists develop a sonar canon, but they are mounted onto trucks and directed at the space ships in the same way Reich did it. And the movie was released just shortly after the end of Reich’s desert UFO adventure, so it can’t be said that Reich took his ideas from a fanciful movie. In fact, it seems quite the reverse.

Scenes from Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers, including cloudbuster-like cannon (upper right).

The controversies about Earth Vs. the Flying Saucers in the UFO community relate to Donald Keyhoe's request that his name be removed from the credits following his discovery that it would be a “fictional” movie (see here for details). But was it fictional? The movie may have had little relation to Keyhoe’s book at the time, but did it have another uncredited real life analog?

Kenn Thomas’ essay, “Wilhelm Reich, Eisenhower and the Aliens” appears in Secret and Suppressed II: Banned Ideas and Hidden History into the 21st Century, Edited by Adam Parfrey and Kenn Thomas, available at feralhouse.com. Mr. Thomas’ current book, JFK & UFO, is also available from Feral House. Thomas’ web site is steamshovelpress.com.

DICACO 2012, the 21sth Daejeon International Cartoon Contest, Korea

The 21sth Daejeon International Cartoon Contest (DICACO 2012) - Korea
The Daejeon City is inviting world cartoonists to take part in DICACO 2012 (the 21sth Daejeon International Cartoon Contest).
1. This year’s contest comprises a Theme section (titled New City & Eco Story) and a Free section.
2. The size of works should be smaller than 297 mm × 420 mm.
3. Any color, free style, and unlimited items. (+2 Works)
4. Each entrant should provide title, name, age, address, career, e-mail, and telephone number on reverse.
5. The deadline for entry of original works is Jun. 30, 2012.
6. Entries should be addressed to the Daejean International Cartoon Institute, 450, Wolpyeongdong, Daejeon, Seoul 302-280, Korea.
7. The most creative cartoon will win the Grand prize of $3,000, Gold prize of $1,000, Silver prize of $500, Bronze prize of $300, and 300 Selected works will be awarded.
8. Exhibit the cartoons at the City Gallery in Oct. 2012.
9. Submitted cartoons will not be returned, but exhibited forever in Korean public halls, art galleries, & museums.
10. Your cartoon may be used for promotional purposes : cards, posters, catalogs, newspapers, magazine, and books etc.
From Dr.Lim, Cheong San, President of the Daejeon Int’l Cartoon Institute
450, Wolpyeongdong, Daejeon, Seoul 302-280, Korea
Tel: 82 (42) 487-5034 C.P: 82-11-425-6115
E-mail: csanlim@naver.com * http://www.dicaco.com/
http://dicaco.kongju.ac.kr/ (all works).

Results 20th Daejeon International Cartoon Contest 2011, Korea

Results DICACO 2011 (20th Daejeon International Cartoon Contest), Korea
Received a couple of days ago the color catalog of DICACO 2011. According to the catalog, the winners of major prizes are:
Grand Prize: Yuriy Kosobukin (Ukraine) (See bottom)
Gold Prize: Jing Shan Li (China)
Silver Prizes: Zaenal Abidin (Indonesia), Gopal Sarkar (India).
Bronze Prizes: Valentin Druzhinin (Russia), Urmas Nemvalts (Estonia), Seyran Caferli (Azerbaijan), Muhittin Köroğlu (Turkey).
The catalog is also titled as “World Cartoon Encyclopedia Vol.20”. President of Contest Committee, Dr Cheong San Lim points out that they received 1470 cartoons by 463 cartoonists from 59 nations and regions including Korea and awarded 352 winners this year. The most entries are from the home country with 59 artists and 114 works. Korea is followed by Chinese artists (51), Iran (40), Serbia (38), Turkey (25), and Indonesia (24).
Turkish cartoonists are awarded the following prizes in the contest:
Bronze Prize: Muhittin Köroğlu.
Student Prize: Burhan Demircan.
Student Honorable Mention: Çevik Basmacı.
Best Cartoon Prize: Musa Gümüş, Recep Bayramoğlu, Nuri Bilgin, Kemal Özyurt, Ahmet Ümit Akkoca, Erdoğan Başol, Musa Keklik, Ümit Müfit Dinçay, Ercan Baysal, Mete Ağaoğlu, Aşkın Ayrancıoğlu, Mümin Bayram, Seyit Saatçi.
Honorable Mention: Hayati Kayhan, Halit Kurtulmuş Aytoslu, İ. Serdar Sayar, Sema Ündeğer, Elsin Altın.
The front cover cartoon is by the Korean student, Han Na Cho: a theme cartoon. The theme this year was “Orient + Occident --> Convergence”. The organisers received 530 theme cartoons and 940 with free theme.
The Jury selected some works first time this year for Achievement Awards also; you can see them through this link.

Kyoto International Cartoon Special Exhibition 2011: "Never giving up: Japan"

Received a couple of days ago the wonderful catalog of Kyoto International Cartoon Special Exhibition 2011 titled "Never giving up: Japan". The exhibition was held from 6th to 11th September in the Kyoto Municipal Museum, Annex. All entry fee will be contributed to victims of earthquake and tsunami. Now they are planning this exhibition in Fukushima.

With only two months' notice and no prizes this time, they still received about 300 cartoons by 127 cartoonists from 41 countries.

Among the artists contributing to the event are Ferhat Demirbaş, Kemal Özyurt, Osman Güral Suroğlu, Erdoğan Başol, Ahmet Ümit Akkoca, Eray Özbek, and Musa Gümüş, from Turkey.

The color catalog consists of 76 pages including the covers and is 18.2 x 25.7 cm in size. The cover cartoon is by John Jensen from UK and has the legend: "I've found our good luck charm. It's not even cracked." (Top above)

Blogger's Choice: G. M. Sudarta (Indonesia).