Actress Carrie Fisher suffered a medical emergency aboard a flight Friday afternoon and her condition remains unclear.
Her brother, Todd Fisher, told the AP that she was “out of emergency” and stabilized at a Los Angeles hospital Friday afternoon. He said he could not discuss any other details about what happened.
But both the
LA Times
and TMZ say Fisher is still in critical condition. A local ABC affiliate
Actress Anna Akana was on board the flight when Fisher went into medical distress and she described the upsetting scene in a series of tweets.
She said Fisher stopped breathing and was helped by a doctor and nurse who happened to be on board.
A United Airlines spokesperson said: “Medical personnel met United flight 935 from London to Los Angeles upon arrival today after the crew reported that a passenger was unresponsive.
"Our thoughts are with our customer at this time and any requests for additional information should be directed to local authorities.”
Akana, 27, wrote: “Don’t know how else to process this but Carrie Fisher stopped breathing on the flight home. Hope she’s gonna be OK.
"So many thanks to the United flight crew who jumped into action, and the awesome doctor and nurse passengers who helped.”
Akana wrote that Fisher wasn’t breathing “for 10 minutes or so” and CPR was administered until the plane landed.
X X X
The DRUDGE REPORT tonight is showcasing an image of Fisher from the newest ROGUE ONE film–the CGI version that appears at the end of the film..
This year started strange. Was weird in the middle.. and ending in the same style as it began. Nothing predictable happened. No ordinary events … all big magnitude, big “yuge” style happenings littered the months of 2016.
And it ends as odd as it began. With Kanye West to Trump Tower!
Let me first say, all politics aside, Donald Trump is a media genius. There are countless media organizations focused like a laser beam on the Trump tower elevators… Cameras pointed to catch every guest of honor or deplorable. Trump is eating up the attention.. Yesterday, big news took place in Aleppo, Syria. But the media instead was more concerned with West’s brief meeting with the President-Elect and post even briefer media presser..
Later on Twitter, West posted a #2024 and mentioned that he spoke to Trump about important issues, such as violence in Chicago.
And the media was shocked. Stunned faces as West appeared..and the Twitterverse went mad, angry people saying hateful things is a normal course of business on the social network.. but Trump’s daily actions ignite more passion than anything of recent memory.
If this 2016 cycle is any predictor of next year, 2017 is going to be as wild by the day as the latter half of our current calendar was..
The Trump show is a skilled media performance. It is not a circus, as some have deemed. Instead it is an intelligent and formalized media sucker punch each and every day. And they fall for it.
Every news network has tuned into Trump TV. His face is everywhere.. his actions are noted … at some point I expect his bowel movements to be live-streamed and for his colon to have a Twitter following.
Yes indeed. This year as shaped us up for a much different 2017 than many expected.
And some Kanye West sprinkled on top for good measure as this year slips and slides into oblivion just as quickly as it began…
Yet another tragic celebrity death.. 2016 has been unkind..
Alan Thicke shockingly passed away on Dec. 13 after suffering a heart attack while playing hockey with his 19-year-old son Carter. He was 69 years old and still working as an actor.
He has flirted with the idea of replacing some fast-food employees with robots to combat rising minimum wages.
In March, he told Business Insider: “They’re always polite, they always upsell, they never take a vacation, they never show up late, there’s never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex, or race discrimination case.”
He has also fiercely defended controversial ads for Carl’s Jr. that have featured women in bikinis eating burgers in a suggestive manner.
“I like our ads. I like beautiful women eating burgers in bikinis. I think it’s very American,” Puzder told Entrepreneur last year. “I used to hear, brands take on the personality of the CEO. And I rarely thought that was true, but I think this one, in this case, it kind of did take on my personality.”
Donald Trump will remain as an executive producer on NBC’s “Celebrity Apprentice,” even while serving as president of the United States. That agreement, first reported by Variety and confirmed by sources at NBC and the Trump campaign, means the president will have an interest in a show aired by a media company that also reports on his presidency – a major conflict of interest for the network.
THE WITCH. THE CONJURING 2 DON’T BREATH… So many others.. (And I would even couple some movies from 2015 into this category because they were ahead of their time, films like BABADOOK and IT FOLLOWS) ..
This was the year for horror. So many people analyzing such things are attempting to figure out why.. I can tell you why. There has been a generational shift.. and with it, a newfound burst of creativity and not movies that rely on just the typical and stale forms of scaring people. We had movies this year that dug deep–emotional films with a gritty sense of reality.. and a self-awareness that it was all, thankfully, just fiction. Maybe. You hope.
That is why horror works WHEN it works. When horror does what it is supposed to do, you are scared and have a reason to be scared… you are trapped in the emotional roller coaster along with the main character.. and in the end, the release from the films comes with the self-realizaiton your mind has that you WERE NOT the one in danger. Someone else was. Your brain that release the energy and calm down by closing credits.
There were lots of those very films this year.. and it was a scary year. Don’t think for a second that the reality around you does not play in.. This election was divisive and unkind, sometimes crude, rude, and even scary. Pop culture can be scary. Reality can be scary. That is why horror, again WHEN it works, works well. Because in the end horror is fiction .. horror is just a few hours on a big screen in front of us .. for even the gory films, horror is an escape from the true gore of life. The reality of reality is that it’s plain out dangerous and scary. Your brain often is looking, constantly, for ways to keep your body to surive. At least you know by the end of a film that you did survive.
And quite frankly, this year, movies were better than other years. It all just worked well, it flowed perfectly.. the box office release schedule also seemed to favor horror. The summer–for some weird reason–always works better for horror than the autumn. Especially August and early September. No different this year.
But this year we were delivered classic films instead of rubbish that would have been better going ‘straight to video.’
So thanks, Hollywood, for a change. It was a fun scary year. Here’s hoping that it was not fluke, and that it continues in 17.
Hold on to 16 as long as you can. Changes come around real soon make us demons and men.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said that the Turkish Army entered Syria to end the rule of President Bashar Assad, whom he accused of terrorism and causing the deaths of thousands. “We entered [Syria] to end the rule of the tyrant al-Assad who terrorizes with state terror. [We didn’t enter] for any other reason,” the Turkish president said at the first Inter-Parliamentary Jerusalem Platform Symposium in Istanbul, as quoted by Hurriyet daily.
I am somewhat surprised that the world media, you know, that reliable ‘mainstream’ crowd that says everything online is fake, isn’t paying attention to the words of the Turkish president. This situation is heating up.. this is getting close to .. well .. warfare..
Don’t forget.Turkey is in NATO. And so are many other nations.. there is a pact within NATO that if one nation is attacked or at war, all of NATO could theoretically be involved. And …. Russia is also in Syria.. and Russia has been pushing against NATO expansion in eastern Europe. And Turkey is pushing into Syria, which is allied to Russia.. and Donald Trump will become president in 50 days..
And….see the pattern? This is heading in the wrong direction for those who want world peace in our time. This is heading to .. a war? I do not want to predict it and if I did say World War III was about to occur I would want to be dead wrong in my tracks.
But … we need to start listening to the words of the Erdogan….who says he is entering the conflict to remove Bashir.
…this story has been developing for several days. Clyde Lewis even did a show on the topic last night.. there seems to be additional evidence that the trending UFO over Turkey hashtag on Twitter was removed for some strange reason…
There are also claims from some UFO ‘experts,’ whoever they are, that the UFO flap is a purposely hoax. ..
Nothing to see here..
But the story has gone viral.. the images look somewhat like the late 90s’ Phoenix lights incident..
And with all of the OTHER news coming from Turkey lately, this just adds to the bizarre mix of other-worldly and paranormal with warfare..
WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE 16 AND RETWEETED BY THE PRESIDENT-ELECT (A READOUT OF THE TIME WE DMed WITH A TEENAGER) - Monday evening, as President-elect Trump was tirading against CNN, 16-year-old California high school student Seth Morton tweeted at the network’s Jeff Zeleny, “Pathetic - you have no sufficient evidence that Donald Trump did not suffer from voter fraud, shame! @realDonaldTrump.” As sometimes happens when a teenager demands someone on Twitter prove a negative, the President-elect retweeted it. Morton tells us that it was an “incredible experience” and that when he arrived at school the next day, he was swarmed by classmates. “Before I could say anything, my classmates, along with students that I didn’t know, all congratulated me.” His teachers were somewhat skeptical, many of whom “didn’t believe my classmates until surprisingly discovering it on the internet.” Them and us both, Seth!
The result has been described as ‘unexpected’ and 'exciting’ because most prostate cancer therapies work by depriving tumours of testosterone, because cancer uses it as a fuel.
Other seriously ill men taking part in the same trial showed responses that astounded scientists, with tumours shrinking and the progress of their disease halted.
Roadside America is a quaint little place in eastern Pennsylvania that plays God Bless America every 20 minutes.. their roof is leaking and need some help on a Go Fund Me page
A charter plane carrying 81 people, including players from a rising Brazilian soccer team headed for a championship match, crashed en route to Medellín’s airport in Colombia Monday night, according to authorities. At least five passengers survived and the rest were killed, Colombia’s aviation authority confirmed Tuesday morning. It was uncertain whether that was a final count, however, as the figures had fluctuated during the night.
General José Acevedo, commander of Medellín police, told a Colombian radio station that 75 people had been killed at the site of the crash and six others had been injured and rescued from the scene. One of the rescued passengers died on the way to the hospital, Acevedo said. A local television station, Telemedellín, reported that a sixth survivor was rescued from the crash at about 5 a.m. Tuesday morning.
A horrific and developing story..
A reminder, if you needed one, that game and fortune never matters and sooner or later God’s gonna cut you down..
Nine people were injured when a man ran into pedestrians with his car on the Ohio State University campus, then exited the vehicle with a butcher knife and started cutting victims.
Less than a minute after the attack, an OSU police officer shot and killed the suspect. Despite rumors of a second suspect, police and campus officials say there was one person involved in the attack.
The attack happened outside of Watts Hall at W. 19th St. west of College Road. Earlier in the morning, the building had been evacuated because of a report of a gas leak. It’s unclear if that was related to the attack or if that’s why people were outside at the time of the attack.
OSU President Michael Drake, Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther, Columbus police Chief Kim Jacobs, the medical director from Ohio State’s Wexner Medical Center and the OSU police Chief Craig Stone spoke this afternoon outside the OSU hospital. Officials said nine people were taken to area hospitals.
Wexner Medical Center treated five patients: two were stabbed, two were hit by the car and one who hid after the attack and just arrived. The last victim’s injuries were being assessed.
Two victims with lacerations were taken to OhioHealth Grant Medical Center. Two victims who were struck by the car were taken to OhioHealth Riverside Methodist Hospital.
The attack happened at 9:52 a.m. An “active shooter” alert was sent at 9:55 to the campus community urging people to hid in place.
At 11:30 a.m., the university said the scene is secure and that all classes are canceled on campus. The shelter-in-place order was lifted at 11:14 a.m., but more than a dozen buildings remain closed.
Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Jefferson Township, who had spoken to OSU president Michael Drake, reported that a car drove into a crowd and most of those affected appeared to have stab wounds.
“The university appear to be secure now, the students appear to be safe,” said. “What we don’t know is what was the motive,” she said.
Columbus Police, Ohio State police and deputies with the Franklin County sheriff’s deputies rushed to the scene. Students took to social media to find information, and posted video and pictures to Twitter of the scene.
Police were searching the area, and there was intense police and SWAT activity at a garage at W. Lane Avenue and Tuttle Park Place on campus, just east of St. John Arena. Officers with long guns and two armored vehicles were seen there before the threat was lifted.
Thanksgiving weekend in Chicago dust clearing: 8 dead and 58 injured.. the city’s homicide rate at a 10 year high.. this is a crisis of horrid proportions that few in the major media ever even talk about .. That many deaths and injuries, you would think if not for the racism among media elite, would be top story status..
Speaking of MOANA, it was a holiday hit: Box offices for the Disney film was $81.1 mil while ALLIED and BAD SANTA 2 struggled in the family friendly atmosphere.. MORE.. Moana topped the extended holiday box office with the second largest five-day Thanksgiving opening of all-time and the third largest three-day Thanksgiving opening of all-time, leading a top twelve that grossed a combined $173 million. Moana was, however, the only real success story..
Scientists claim: West Antarctic ice shelf is breaking up from the inside out.. // It’s generally accepted that it’s no longer a question of whether the West Antarctic Ice Sheet will melt, it’s a question of when,” said study leader Ian Howat, associate professor of earth sciences at Ohio State. “This kind of rifting behavior provides another mechanism for rapid retreat of these glaciers, adding to the probability that we may see significant collapse of West Antarctica in our lifetimes.”
Study claims that, yes, time travel IS POSSIBLE.. Dr Michael Hall and Professor Howard Wiseman from the Center say that parallel universes are not science fiction. They explain that if multiple, interacting universes exist, time travelers then could visit Earth… BUT… detractors abound: Other physics experts are divided on the theory. Dr Lawrence Kraus from the Arizona State University is skeptical of the hypothesis. Huffington Post cites a Czech Republic physicist who says the theory is “a hopeless enterprise and a huge waste of time.”
This has been the pattern for years.. My little experience allowed me to surprise this result.. my wife and son and I stopped by a Walmart Thanksgiving night after a family dinner. It was empty.. We had to go get, of all things, groceries on Friday.. and still nobody.. NADA.. Empty.
The facts speak for themselves..
Internet sales rose in the double digits on both days, surpassing $3 billion for the first time on Black Friday, according to data released on Saturday.
Data from analytics firm RetailNext showed net sales at brick-and-mortar stores fell 5.0 percent over the two days, while the number of transactions fell 7.9 percent.
Thousands of people gathered in an Austrian town Saturday for a scary tradition.
Scores of people dressed as the evil companion of Santa Claus, known as Krampus, charged through the town’s streets after dark.
The event known as the “Krampus Run” is based in Germanic folklore.
Krampus punishes bad kids by beating them and putting them into a woven wicker basket on his back.
Over 120 Krampus impersonators charged through the town’s market square.
Some jumped the barricades to cane several of the six-thousand people in attendance.
Little bruises are an accepted side effect of the caning attacks.
But young children usually get away with getting their caps taken away.
Groups from all over Austria and some neighboring countries participated in the event.
This may be one of the highest things to do on my bucket list .. I would so LOVE to be at the Krampus run..
I have written about Krampus plenty of times on here, just search the archives for that information.. The idea of Krampus has been with me since my childhood thanks to Russian and eastern European nuns who taught me in grade school.
My son also knows of Krampus, but we have shielded him from the worst of it all..
Jolly ole Saint Nick needs a rival. Each year, around this time, Krampus rears his head to be the rival who Santa deserves.
Krampus in Austria! I am jealous of anyone who went
This whole ‘fake news’ scandal is starting to bug me.. People are still falling for 'fake news’ just as easily as they did a year ago. Nothing in that avenue has changed..
The concerning part is this newfound approach to dealing with media.. the INTERCEPT is one of my favorite sites, and they back up some of my fears: The shady “McCarthyism” approach to website shaming, by claiming that places like the Drudge Report are Russian-fake news sites.
I get it.. some are alt-right, wherever that term arose from this year I don’t quite yet know.. But there are also some very average ho-hum websites on there.. And suddenly, they are literally blacklisted
On the free web! On the information superhighway.. On a place where I thought everyone had and SHOULD HAVE a voice!?
Yes indeed.. this crackdown on 'fake news’ is going well beyond click bait.
Both sides are trying to brandish the other as fake. Information, in the mean time, is suffering.
The Drudge Report is as perfectly fine as the Raw Story or Buzzflash–I visit all three sites on a regular basis. And in no way do I want them 'banned.’
This rise of newfound 1984-style media shaming is going to become an Orweilian nightmare.
The US Army Corps of Engineers announced it will close the portion of federal land on which water protectors are camping in North Dakota by December 5, to protect the public amid violent confrontations between protesters and law enforcement. The Army Corps of Engineers said it is “closing the portion of the Corps-managed federal property north of the Cannonball River to all public use and access effective December 5, 2016,” according to a statement tweeted by the Young Turks’ Jordan Chariton.
No other Third World leader prompted so much U.S. hostility for so long. Castro brought the planet to the brink of nuclear war in 1962, sent tens of thousands of troops to aid leftist governments in Africa and nurtured guerrilla movements that fought U.S.-backed governments across Latin America. He endured a crippling U.S. embargo and outlasted 10 U.S. presidents — all of them preaching regime change in Cuba — finally resigning 11 months before Barack Obama moved into the White House, not from U.S. pressure but because of serious illness.
After Castro transferred power to his brother Raul, first temporarily in 2006 and then permanently on Feb. 19, 2008, he survived another eight years in quiet retirement before finally dying on Friday. By hanging on in the shadows, he helped his followers avoid political unrest and ease the island into a communist future without the only leader most Cubans had ever known.
His legacy in Cuba and elsewhere has been a mixed record of social progress and abject poverty, of racial equality and political persecution, of medical advances and a degree of misery comparable to the conditions that existed in Cuba when he entered Havana as a victorious guerrilla commander in 1959.
If you believe in an afterlife, then you believe Fidel has now gone somewhere else. …to an eternal damnation? Or did he find forgiveness with God and do enough decent things amidst the mire of dictatorship on earth? Only he knows that now.
Apparently PR folks in big stores are claiming victory for Thanksgiving sales and Black Friday profits.. we will see. Similar projections were made last year and it ended up being a less than stellar brick and mirror weekend and better online by cyber Monday..
If it happens… it’s back to the 20th century feeling..
Aaron Orbey actually summarized why since my own childhood I also took more to horror movies than other genres.. And I agree with him, the goriest movies actually were not the scariest, instead the deem and dreadfully painfully accurate horror movies are among those that I can only watch one time..
The money quote from his very well written article in NEW YORKER:
We say of most tragedies that enough time will distance us. As the years have elapsed, I’ve continued searching for the worst I can witness onscreen, testing myself with images of agony that seem crueller than my own, worlds in which the unthinkable is valid. I’ve never gotten around to seeing “Forrest Gump,” but I’ve savored “The Forest,” in which an American woman tracks her troubled twin sister to the haunted woods of Aokigahara. “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” is still on my list of films to see, but I rather liked “Dead Snow,” in which Nazi zombies terrorize seven Norwegian vacationers on the slopes of Øksfjord. No carnage can startle me these days, but smaller sights—a toddler asleep, slanted on his dad’s chest—might bring me to tears. When I Google my father, the Turkish word for murder auto-fills after his name.
The worst pain still takes me to theatres, where I sit alone—no snacks—always by the exit, in case of emergency. Since the mass shooting in a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado, I have begun watching for gunmen, turning around as each latecomer sneaks in during previews. The most frightening movies, I’ve found, are rarely the goriest. In “The Babadook,” a black-hatted monster torments a grieving woman who struggles to raise a son after the sudden death of her husband. In the film’s final scenes, the widow locks the Babadook in the basement, where she must retreat, daily, to bring it something to eat. Like most haunting spirits, hers doesn’t ever vanish. She has to keep seeing it, keep feeding it, in order to leave it behind.
RIP to Florence Henderson .. she has been around for decades, so much so that just about every generation knew her in some capacity for some different reason.
The short video – a take on the Mannequin Challenge – was created by the Revolutionary Forces of Syria (RFS), an opposition media group, to draw attention to the crisis amid a renewed aerial assault on the besieged city. More than 300 people have been killed in Aleppo’s rebel-held eastern districts since the Syrian regime resumed heavy bombardment last Tuesday following a three-week lull.
The full video for your own discernment and judgement..
This has been a dreadful story–anyone with parents and even those without are affected.. Children dying in a bus accident right before Thanksgiving.
I have purposely kept a self-imposed news blackout going on this story, knowing only headlines but not subjecting myself to reading anything but that.
Until today – I have to report this information..
According to one report, as the bus driver sped around a turn before the accident, he apparently asked the children if they were ready to die..Michael Walsh at Yahoo News reporting:
The driver, Johnthony Walker, 24, was arrested and charged with five counts of vehicular homicide, reckless endangerment and reckless driving for the crash on the winding road.
As the city mourns, chilling reports have emerged alleging that Walker asked the students, “Are y’all ready to die?” before swerving off the road into a tree.
Jasmine Mateen, the mother of three children aboard the bus, lost her 6-year-old daughter in the crash. She told CBS News what one of her other children had to say about the driver.
“My daughter said right before the bus flipped that he was speeding around the curve and asked them ‘Are y’all ready to die?’” Mateen said to CBS correspondent Mark Strassmann.
And more..
She also said she had complained about Walker’s behavior many times since August, but nothing had been done to redress her grievances. The private bus company involved has had 36 crashes with injuries in Tennessee alone since 2014, the Tennessean newspaper reported.
Authorities have not confirmed Mateen’s statements.
Chattanooga Police Chief Fred Fletcher said at a press conference late Monday that the type of accident to which his department and others were responding is “every public safety professional’s worst nightmare.”
The information is obviously under investigation.. as are all of the other circumstances of this bus crash. But it’s troubling to see this.. it’s horrendous to imagine what these families are going through. I cannot fathom it.. I am sending my love and prayers, my virtual hugs and every bit of joy and love I can conjure in my mind for those who perished in this accident and the remaining families members now attempting to cope with the heartbreak..
Gobble until you wobble.. Eat until defeat.. avoid the political talk and the Donald Trump heat..It has been a while since I did a news run down . . no better time than a holiday to get that running. For your viewing displeasure or regurgitation, the latest goings-on across the world on this Thanksgiving..
Retailers yet again are putting hopes in brick and mortar.. one of these years it will be for the last time. My local mall this year may have its last rush if it even gets one. The idea of black Friday has changed considerably… perhaps it’s time to give off for ‘cyber Monday’ instead of the traditional.. Nonetheless, here are the 5 things you should expect from Black Friday if you’re a shopper.. But here is a strange trend to grapple with mentally; Of all of the people who are more inclined to stand in line on Black Friday, the millennials once again take the prize. . they are much more likely than baby boomers to do it. Perhaps there is hope for brick and mortar after all!?
Always recall this when discovering history: Ignorance is usually bliss.. On this Thanksgiving, it’s easier to devour a pumpkin pie with TURKEY NOT knowing this: Abraham Lincoln declared in 1863 that Thanksgiving Day would be a national holiday on the last Thursday in November. He also ordered troops to march against Sioux Indian..
Lecturer in Chief: Donald Trump tells Tim Cook directly that he wants Apple products made in the United States and gives word of heavy tax incentives to do so.. It is interesting.. the president and Congress may not really have power to force private companies to do anything, but Trump of all people could surely do public shaming and go on nationwide TV and call out CEOs by name for not, according to his logic, making America Great Again..
Beebs gone wild: Bieber accused of punching a fan.. But .. for the first time perhaps ever, I am going to rush to Justin’s defense.. A group of screaming fans are greeting the car containing Bieber when a man sticks his hand in the window and appears to touch the singer. Bieber’s hand can then be seen making contact with the man’s face. Perhaps deservedly so.. Kanye West gone wild: According to the normally reliable TMZ, the situation is worse than sleep and water problems for the star.. A well-connected Kanye source tells us Kanye’s psychological problems are significant enough so that his insurance policy – which covers lost profits and financial obligations for cancelled concerts due to illness – will almost certainly cover the losses for the 21 concerts he’s cancelled … But it still seems very strange that the moment West began slamming JAY-Z and publicly supporting Donald Trump, the white coats took him away 'ha ha, ha ha’.. (pause for appreciation on the old song reference)
Miley Cyrus desperate for attention on Instagram.. MOANA is heading for a very large $88 million or more Thanksgiving weekend opening.. My wife and I already took our son to see the film.. It may have been (being honest here) one of the best animated Disney movies in a very long time. The music was amazing, the message was great.. the film was not boring during any point. It is the perfect movie for a long Thanksgiving weekend. So good, maybe my son will even want to see it again. I recommend MOANA for anyone who needs an escape from family and friends and .. reality..
On the other hand, the movie TROLLS was less than desirable. I had hoped for more. And on a final note about movies.. I realized recently that since having a child, the chances of me going to see a sci-fi, horror, or action movie have diminished considerably, going instead to children’s flicks. But you know what? I think I’m actually quite okay with that..
Three are critical and 9 in intensive care in Australia after rare thunderstorm asthma.. Doctors were amazed there were not more fatalities given the numbers of people who suffered cardiac arrests and struggled to breathe when a wild thunderstorm struck Melbourne on Monday night, Victoria state Health Minister Jill Hennessy said.The storm caused rain-sodden ryegrass pollen to explode and disperse over the city, with ruptured particles penetrating deep into lungs. Almost one third of patients who suffered asthma attacks on Monday reported never having asthma before..
Speaking of boilo, here is a recipe for those not aware of the ancient coal region tradition during holiday time:
Boilo recipe #1: Crock pot style 2 oranges (med-large size) 2 lemons 1 small box raisins (about 1 ½ ounces) 8 oz honey 12 oz whiskey (or more, to taste). Use Four Roses, or Seagrams 7, or something similar. At least 80 proof (40% alcohol). ½ to 1 teaspoon each of any or all of these spices: Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Cloves, Caraway seed, Anise seed
Make this in a crock pot. It’s easier than cooking on the stove and much less likely to overcook or scorch. For the quantities shown here, a small (1.5 quart) crock pot will do.
Peel the oranges and lemons. Cut up the fruit and squeeze them into the crock pot. A garlic press works, or you can use some kind of juicer or fruit squeezer if you have one. Put the remaining fruit pulp into the crock pot as well. Add the raisins, honey, and spices. Stir. NOTE: do not add whiskey yet!
Start the crock pot and let the mixture cook for about 2-4 hours. Stir occasionally. It’s done when the fruit pulp gets “cooked-down”. Strain into a pitcher. Mash down the fruit in the strainer to get all the liquid. NOW add the whiskey to the pitcher and stir. If you cook the whiskey, even for a short time, the alcohol will start to evaporate (and who wants that to happen??). Taste, and add more whiskey to your liking.
Serve hot in shot glasses, espresso cups, or coffee mugs. After the first round, each individual serving can be heated in the microwave.
This recipe makes about 12 ounces of “virgin” boilo. Add 12 ounces of whiskey to this and you get 24 ounces of coal region nectar, enough for 12-18 servings.
“Just because someone is wearing lingerie doesn’t mean you can touch them,” said Ellen Robin, the consent guardian at a risqué party held last Thursday in Bushwick, Brooklyn.
Her face covered in sequins, Ms. Robin, 28, a set designer from Williamsburg, stood on the sidewalk outside Lot 45, a large event space on Troutman Street. She had a clipboard full of release forms. “This is a sexy party, not a sex party,” she cautioned.
After patrons signed the releases, they were patted down by a gruff security officer and led into a cavernous room drenched in red light and velvet. Bodies were in various stages of dishabille and discipline.
A man with a gray ponytail rhythmically flogged a mostly nude woman draped over a small picnic table. Surrounding them, diners reclined on pillows, sultan style, around nine human “tables,” naked but for flesh-tone underwear and high heels. Dinner, consisting of North African comfort food prepared by a former “Chopped” contestant named Samia Behaya, was artfully arranged atop them.
“I would recommend not using your hands,” said one comely female platter, covered in raw sliced root vegetables. A man obligingly knelt beside her and plucked a radish from her torso with his teeth. “Vegetables are sexy,” cooed a nearby woman in a bustier bodysuit.
The most risqué on the dinner table for my family today: A sugar free apple pie that we picked up quickly last night at a local CrackerBarrel. I guess … we are missing out..
THIS IS IT! The big day.. the first Thanksgiving since we were told the world ended when Donald Trump won the November election.. and forgive me for speaking politically in another post, but let’s face it: This election and reaction has been visceral..
As I write this in a dark room during what we have always been told is the ‘biggest party night of the year,’ I have a light beer cracked open and Ground Zero with Clyde Lewis in playing the background.. I am perusing the online world of 'news’ article and realized that there are hundreds posted online from news sources across the nation all about how Thanksgiving dinner will be hit with politics.. and how to avoid it.
Every year I post this image online. I have had a website since the year 2000, and around 2001, this was a shot taken by an AP photographer and it was posted online .. it was the first Thanksgiving that America had to live through since 9/11 .. that first Thanksgiving was difficult. It was intense.. The feeling of unity, however, was strong. There were American flags and pumpkin pies in every town and on every table. The photo of this man, on the eve of Thanksgiving, struck me.. it was someone who seemingly was racing through life, and with the events of that year racing around his head and our collective spirit, the whirlwind of time finally seemed to hit him as he raced for his subway.. and since 01, I posted this photo somewhere..
This year, time has moved on.. today the LA TIMES posted this photograph of people on the Left Coast struck in snail’s pace traffic jams..
Some are racing home.. some are pacing themselves.
We have come a long way since 9/11.. we have are now going into a term of a third president since the terror attack took place. And ….united we stood then.. Divided we stand now.
x x x
I question whether we are really as divided as media sources would tell us.. I have divergent opinions in my own family and undoubtedly, as we always do, we will discuss politics at the dinner table. We never had that 'dinner is too sacred’ attitude to not talk about it.. I can also, however, acknowledge that this year there may be reasons to avoid talk. Hillary…Trump.. it’s been a long and hateful year.
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President Obama pardoned his final turkey today.
This has always been one of my favorite moments of any year.. it’s the time when you realize the holidays have begun. The famed presidential pardon. I assume Donald Trump will continue the tradition.. but he will surely look strange doing it.
You can easily get used to seeing someone in the White House. When Bush left the keys to Obama, it took time to get used to a new face. Just as much as it took when Clinton handed over the White House to Junior. And when Trump takes the reigns? Well that will be the weirdest sight of all.
We are going on the second week since Trump’s victory and it still feels like the same election fight from prior to November 8 is taking place. Tonight, CNN’s headline is showcasing Hillary Clinton’s popular vote victory of 2million as their main headline.. ….something perhaps only reinvigorating the debate that may take place at tomorrow’s dinner table.
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I think political talk at tables is fine.. There was always politics discussed in my family’s house when I grew up. There were battles, too! Oh my were there battles. Anger.. hostility.. The Iraq war was the same, as I can recall. As will, probably, be tomorrow. And any other holiday.
I think it is healthy, in this nation, to have a good old fashioned debate or chat over turkey and yams .. anything goes.
Instead of avoiding political talk, just have it! Don’t be afraid!
Just.. be calm. Careful. And kind. Those traits go well with opinionated Thanksgiving dinner talk.
Nakedness quickly becoming the apt way to protest the Trump presidency.. 
7-year-old Tweets (his Twitter run by his mother) showcases the horror of Aleppo and lives of children during wartime.. 
Scientists claim: West Antarctic ice shelf is breaking up from the inside out.. // It’s generally accepted that it’s no longer a question of whether the West Antarctic Ice Sheet will melt, it’s a question of when,” said study leader Ian Howat, associate professor of earth sciences at Ohio State. “This kind of rifting behavior provides another mechanism for rapid retreat of these glaciers, adding to the probability that we may see significant collapse of West Antarctica in our lifetimes.”
All of the quakes and now this: Volcano erupts and fires three miles into the sky .. and triggers a quake in Mexico.. 
Celebrating the best female graffiti artists across the world .. a new film called GIRL POWER.. 
