Monday, August 29, 2011
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9:24 PM
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Like the astrological sign, Gemini was masculine and positive. He was the glue that held the American Gladiators together.
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Tyasia
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Gemini
Thursday, August 18, 2011
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5:05 PM
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Questions: conradojavier- 1.)Will there be a live-action Sonic the Hedgehog movie? 2.)What's the Difference Between Sonic & Shadow? 3.)Who the F**k is Segata Sanshiro? 4.)What's your thought about the Wiifit? 5.)When SNK Playmore created KOF Maximum Impact Regulation A,Why they get rid of Armor Ralf in favor of 4 Characters(Ash Crimson,"Blue" Mary Ryan,Xiaolon & Makoto Mizoguchi? 6.)Where's KOF XII? 1.)Why you dislike Acclaim when they have great games like:Legends of Wrestling,BMX XXX,Burnout,Turok & Others? 2.)Why you dislike LJN? 3.)Do you think Hentai & Doujinshi is an X-rated Anime & Manga? 4.)Which of them is the Worst of all time: A.)Atari's ETB)Superman 64 C.)Deadly Towers D.)Drake of the 99 Dragons E.)Big Rigs:Over the top Road racing F.)Bomberman:Act Zero G.)That Charlie's Angel Game randombguy- Hey Jedite,did you like wwf attitude? on the 64 and ps1 slayerking88- how come in anime dark skinned and/or african-american are rarely seened? because what i have seen most african-american characters are stereotypical drawn and are portrade as being dumb and funny. the only anime i have seen that has an african-american drawn correctly is afro samurai. jedite you should watch it because it really good action scenes and it's 6 episodes long. mr3urious- 1. What are your thoughts on Nintendo's Virtual Boy? 2. What are some of your favorite compliation games? 3. What do you think were some of the best years in which games were released? 4. Have you ever heard of the game ...
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Tyasia
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82307
Saturday, August 13, 2011
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8:59 AM
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American Flyer Smilin' Jack Martin, works with Chinese government to stop a Japanese covert spy ring called the Black Samurai, lead by Fraulein von Teufel.
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Tyasia
Labels:
Adventures,
Chapter,
Smilin
Sunday, August 7, 2011
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11:39 AM
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Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com:80/art-and-entertainment-articles/acting-classes-nyc-ny-advanced-acting-class-theatre-group-2869737.html
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
at
5:55 AM
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SNK (now known as SNK Playmore) is a Japanese video game hardware and software company. SNK is an acronym of Shin Nihon Kikaku (新日本企画), Japanese for "New Japan Project". The company's legal and trading name became SNK in 1986. The original SNK was founded in Osaka, Japan, in July 1978 by Eikichi Kawasaki, and existed until October 30, 2001. Anticipating the end of his first company, Kawasaki founded the company Playmore in August 2001, which in 2003 became SNK Playmore. Due to this strong resemblance to the previous company both in name and identity, SNK Playmore is sometimes referred to simply as SNK. SNK is most notable for creating the Neo-Geo arcade system, and several franchises of games including The King of Fighters, Metal Slug, Samurai Shodown and Fatal Fury. SNK also helped publish many games including Rage of the Dragons, World Heroes and Sengoku along with Double Dragon for the Neo Geo. When Eikichi Kawasaki noticed the rapid growth that was occurring in the coin-op video game market, he expanded SNK to include the development and marketing of stand-alone coin-op games. Their first one was Micon Block (April 1978), a ball-and-paddle game similar to Atari's 1972 arcade hit, Breakout. The next two titles out of the new coin-op division were Ozma Wars (1979), a vertically scrolling space shooter and Safari Rally (1980), a maze game. Game quality improved over time, most notably with 1981's Vanguard, a side-scrolling space shooter that many people consider the ...
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Tyasia
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Heroes
Sunday, July 17, 2011
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3:39 PM
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Detective Manzou trying to go undercover as an American
Sunday, July 10, 2011
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10:45 PM
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In this day and age, the origin of flags is a highly debatable matter even though flags were used as symbols thousands of years ago by ancient cultures. There is a section of people who believe that flags first originated in China, whereas there are others who say that Roman Empire's "vexillum" was the first true flag.
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Tyasia
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History
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
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12:33 PM
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In the land where “the sun always shines,” the heavenly globe had not shone its bright face for many days. I drove into town during a torrential downpour. I had yet to see any golden, warming rays. In fact, three weeks had passed since I drove to Los Angeles from my graduation at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. It’d been pouring ever since. I left the Midwest to escape the frigid, bleak days of rain, snow and clouds. This evening was especially ominous with pelting sheaths of wet and wind. It certainly wasn’t a night to venture outside my rented room where I’d been holed up since my arrival! Yet my inner guidance was insisting I take a soggy, dreary walk to nowhere.
Spirit was telling me I needed to go out, to break free of the claustrophobic, gray walls of my cramped, matchbox of a room. I did not want to go! The dismal weather gave me a very socially acceptable reason to stay in my refuge because it was cold and clammy outside. However, fear was the real reason I was avoiding leaving my room and exploring my new hometown. Venturing outside would mean taking the next ominous step in my spiritual odyssey.
All day my inner coach was incessantly urging me to put myself out into the flow of the River of Life, so I could bump into my destiny. Spirit was not buying my lame excuse of inclement weather. To my real self, taking a walk during this tropical deluge was an excellent opportunity to experience life as a river, to allow the natural pulse and rhythm of life to pump some vitality back into my reluctant psyche. My personality argued nothing of any importance could possibly happen to me on such a raw, inhospitable night. No sane person would be afoot. There would be no one to encounter! But my inner guide would not be swayed from its objective. I would leave my isolated room.
I’ve learned to follow my intuition when it’s demanding action as strongly as it was this particular evening. Reluctantly, I dressed myself against the drenching wind and left my safe haven for an unknown adventure in the “City of Angels.” I’d driven across the country to get a fresh start. The foul weather delayed my plans and dampened my hopes, but I was still open to encountering some sort of messenger of God, angel or otherwise. I set out for my wet adventure, thinking to myself, Perhaps my inner coach knows something about the city’s namesake I haven’t discovered yet.
Or maybe not! After a brisk walk of a dozen, deserted city blocks in the bone-chilling rain, I was soaked to the core and ready to retreat from what was quickly turning into an ill-fated excursion. Turning, I began the trek back to my apartment when a glimmering light in the gutter caught my eye. The bright beam seemed to be shining through a soggy, mud-covered flyer lying in the street gutter. Naturally, I stopped to inspect the phenomenon more closely. Yes, there was definitely a glow shining through the paper. My curiosity peaked; I bent over to pick up the sheet. As soon as I touched the flyer, the mysterious luminescence behind it faded away.
Not only am I soaked and miserable, I’m starting to see things, I conjectured to myself. Enough is enough! This crazy junket has come to an end. I’m going back to my nice, warm room.
I wiped the worst of the dirt off the leaflet, stuffed it into my jacket pocket and started for home at a hurried pace. I had a souvenir of my soggy journey. At least, I wouldn’t go home empty-handed!
Back in the cozy refuge of my toasty dry room, I carefully smoothed out the rain-swollen sheet of paper. I was very curious what the strange light was attracting my attention to. The shriveled notice was a public invitation to a home-cooked meal of natural foods. Hungry for nourishment from a source other than a tin can, I was thrilled at the prospect of a homemade feast and some human companionship. And the cost was only five dollars! Little did I know at the time that I’d just taken the bait laid by my soul on that gusty, damp night.
The following Thursday evening, I enjoyed a sumptuous meal of creamy leek soup, organic brown rice, garden-fresh vegetables and something green called nori seaweed at the East-West Institute of Los Angeles. The Institute was a macrobiotic school and retreat of the international healer and teacher Michio Kushi, founder of the center and our host for the evening.
With my stomach full and my mind and body relaxed, I was totally unprepared for my inner coach’s next outrageous move. Mr. Kushi asked the diners if there was a professional landscaper at the table. My hand shot up on its own!
What kind of adventure was my spirit getting me into this time? I sighed to myself. I hate yard work! I’ve never planted a garden. I don’t know the difference between a daffodil and a tulip. The only “landscaping” I’ve ever done was mowing the grass in our front yard when I was a kid. And I avoided that as much as possible. Besides, I’ve lived my whole life in a cool, northern climate. I’m totally ignorant of the subtropical foliage of Southern California. And I don’t care to learn!
“We’ve got several landscaped acres, including fruit trees, and flower, herb and vegetable gardens. Would you like to take over the duties of maintaining the estate’s extensive grounds?” queried Mr. Kushi. I couldn’t believe my mouth said, “Yes.”
This outrageous phenomenon wasn’t entirely new to me. I’ve been my spirit’s pawn before when my inner coach usurped control of my speech and answered a question for me. I had a gut feeling my real self was about to take me for the ride of my young life. Events soon validated this premonition. My new job set my personal path on an interception course with my first extraordinary life mentor: Michio Kushi.
Japanese to the core, Michio was an enigmatic, beguiling, modern-day samurai. In his forties when we met, Michio’s face was soft and pliable like a baby’s, his gait spirited and assured. Although he was most often charming and charismatic, he could be fierce and demanding, especially with his students—like me!
Michio’s domain was the Institute and the extensive grounds surrounding it. In the vibrant, romantic heyday of Hollywood, the magnificent estate had once been the home of jazz great Al Jolson and his paramour, film starlet Ruby Keeler. The manor house was a meandering forty-room Spanish villa with quaint French doors leading out to numerous patios and balconies overlooking the sprawling metropolis in the valley below. Avocado, banana, lemon, lime, grapefruit and orange groves; a rose garden; a grape arbor and a reflecting pool graced the hillside expanse. Antelope and deer frolicked through the pine forest in the surrounding acres. The estate’s gatehouse was bigger than most people’s homes.
I attracted Michio’s attention and respect by successfully sculpting the property into a neat, trim and healthy Shangri-La. No, I didn’t tap into an unknown gardening genius hidden within me. I discovered that the Greek and Italian groundskeepers for Hollywood stars met early every morning for espresso on nearby Sunset Boulevard. From these generous Old World gardeners, I learned how to care for my new horticultural charges. As their earthy wisdom had been ignored and unappreciated by their own sons, these talented landscapers were overjoyed to assist a young man interested in their broad knowledge of plant care. Before long, I was an expert in trimming and caring for bougainvillea bushes, carob trees, and every other common and exotic tropical plant.
Michio became a wonderful friend and mentor throughout the next ten years of my life. He helped me understand and integrate my first spiritual initiation in Montreal. Through him, I learned to view the world with a new perspective—one that was whole, vital and fresh. He soon promoted me to the position of director of the Institute, the person who coordinated all the diverse activities of the center. In addition to tending the grounds and gardens, I supervised the staff that provided the classes, meals and sleeping accommodations. At the facilities in Los Angeles and others around the world, Michio presented a fusion of Eastern and Western philosophy, psychology and applied practice that blended acupuncture, martial arts and macrobiotic, natural foods with pragmatic life coaching and community living.
This humble, yet very erudite healer had led a turbulent professional life. Considered a radical influence, Michio was forced in the late sixties by the American Medical Association to physically leave two of the most liberal communities in the country: Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Manhattan, New York. Ironically, he was run out of town for espousing the same philosophy of health he now teaches at the most prestigious institutions in those same cities: Harvard and Columbia University Medical Schools. The medical establishment and the mainstream public currently accept and endorse what Michio expounded in the sixties! In the intervening decades, his simple, effective principles of harmonious, nourishing living have helped thousands of people throughout the world.
Despite long days of private counseling and lengthy evening lectures to hundreds of students, Michio always had time to meet with me and share his practical knowledge. The most valuable lessons I absorbed from him were not so much what I gleaned in the lecture hall, although I did take copious notes on his talks about everything under the sun in the realm of healing, cosmology and spiritual disciplines. The priceless wisdom I assimilated from this unassuming sage was on a more subtle and profound level. Michio presented his spiritual savior faire to me in a way that wasn’t verbal or conceptual. He shared his world of wisdom in an existential, experiential way, through everyday actions and events. He was outwardly casual about his sharing, yet inwardly his way was very premeditated and deliberate. This was the knowledge that meant the most to me. We never discussed the life lessons he taught me. I simply absorbed them by being around him.
In Los Angeles and later in Boston, Michio and I would often sneak off together after his lectures to quiet, secluded French cafés where his fanatical disciples would never think to look for him. These quaint bistros served all the foods Michio warned against in his lectures, which focused primarily on how various foods affected one’s health and spirituality. In his talks, he advised eating a main diet of natural whole grains, fruits and vegetables. He spoke adamantly about avoiding alcohol, drugs, coffee, sugar, dairy, animal fats, red meat, white flour, white rice and all chemicalized, processed foods.
Yet on these frequent outings, Michio ordered buttery French croissants, eclairs and every other sugary delight available. Traditionally, the Japanese love to eat and talk about food. He was always very intrigued about whether a particular pastry was made with orange or lemon peel, or if it contained a touch of vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg or clove. In a ritual way similar to a Zen tea ceremony, he cut each pastry very carefully in half. Eating each piece slowly and delicately, we discussed what ingredients were used in creating the tastes and textures of the desserts, cleansing our palates between every bite with sips of strong, sweetened espresso.
On other evenings, we went to Italian eateries in Los Angeles and Boston. Consuming huge meals of white flour pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs, we’d sip red wine and enjoy sweet dessert cannolis—all foods on the absolute “Never Eat” list from Michio’s lectures on macrobiotic philosophy.
Michio and I dined out like this for years. We never spoke to anyone about our excursions. And we never discussed between ourselves the seeming discrepancies between his words and his actions, between his recommended diet and his savored delicacies. Yet in his own experiential, paradoxical ways, he was teaching me the life lessons I needed to learn: the importance of enjoying food and celebrating life with gusto, flexibility, intuitiveness and, especially, freedom.
As we sat eating pastries, Michio would lean toward me and speak with great earnestness, “Keit, you must be free man.” Very endearingly, he always pronounced “th” as a “t” in my name.
“You must be free to do anything you want. You must be free to eat anything you want. You must be free to be anything you want.”
Michio’s words felt good to me. At the time, I didn’t have a conceptual sense of what he was conveying, but I did take in the spirit and energy of what he was sharing. I know now that in his presence, I was absorbing his vibration of being free and living intuitively.
Michio spoke to me about being “sovereign.” He implored me to “never work for money. Never do anything you don’t want to do to obtain money. If you work for money, you are no better than a slave!”
His words had a strong and penetrating effect on me because I knew in my heart they were true. Yet I didn’t have a clue how to live this truth in my life. At the time, I couldn’t imagine how a person could have money without working at a job. Since then, I’ve learned to attract the financial support of the universe by aligning my professional path with my soul passion and purpose.
Michio emphasized the joy of being a free individual. He taught that everyone is equally able to be free, intuitive and creative. He’d move close to me, speaking right into the ear of my soul, “You must be free to do anything you want. And you must be strong enough to do only what you want to do in life.”
My mentor’s words were very empowering and prophetic for me. I felt sublime love from him when he said, “You must, you will, go far beyond me. You must leave me behind. I teach what I do now, but you will teach something much bigger and yet much simpler.” His words were foreshadowing The Dream Workshops I’d be facilitating twenty years hence. He foretold, “You will attract many people. They will come to learn something that is more pure, more basic and even more powerful than I teach now.”
Michio’s lectures focused on the exhaustive presentation of information, principles and universal laws concerning the best ways to eat and live. I asked him why he didn’t emphasize the primacy of intuition in his lectures to the degree he did in our café discussions.
“Oh, but I do,” he replied. “But not many people hear. At the very end of all my talks, I always say that to be happy and healthy, you must live intuitively. But few hear me.”
Incredulous upon hearing his words, I began to investigate the enigma. I began to pay close attention at the end of his public seminars. Sure enough, Michio did talk about intuitive eating being the healthiest manner of eating and intuitive living being the most joyful form of living: “The most creative and effective level of living is to make all life decisions from consulting one’s inner knowing. Pure, clear intuition supercedes all rules, concepts, principles and philosophies.” He did accentuate the supremacy of intuition at the end of every talk. Yet I wasn’t aware he made this concluding point until he brought it to my attention. I checked my friends’ notes. None of the students had recorded Michio’s views on the importance of intuition. I asked them if they’d ever heard him utter these ideas. They hadn’t. In fact, my friends were very dubious. They didn’t believe the macrobiotic leader ever spoke about intuitive eating or living! I even coached some of my friends on where to listen for the concept at the end of his lectures. They still didn’t hear it. It was obviously not their time to hear this message.
As we sat together late at night, I’d often ask Michio why he was wasting his time with me. I considered myself just a hair above a snail in terms of my degree of conscious awareness. He always answered very simply, “Because you listen. Because you hear. And because you will pass this on some day.” He certainly knew something I wasn’t aware of at the time!
Often Michio touched me poignantly with his compassion. One night over pastries and cappuccino, he said, “Keit, you are very scared right now because of all the changes you’re going through.”
He was right. At his side, I was witnessing spontaneous, physical healings and spiritual breakthroughs almost daily. I was also experiencing miracles in my own affairs. My life was becoming very magical indeed. The boundaries of my small world were continually expanding—including the psychological borders that comfortably defined who I thought I was, and the intellectual frontiers of what I reasoned were possible according to the laws of physics and science.
He continued in a very intimate tone, “Sometimes you have great anxiety. But, you know, I am as afraid to take my next step on my journey as you are to take your next step on your journey. We are together in our fear. We are terror twins!”
Then he laughed and giggled as he offered me another sweet tart to celebrate our union in fear.
What Michio offered me in all our encounters was very difficult for me to accept emotionally at the time. He extended to me not only loving friendship, but also respectful equality—something I wasn’t yet psychologically capable of receiving. He was inviting me to experience myself as his equal, to play and interact with him as a peer. This prospect was way beyond my self-image of my worth and substance. However, the vibration of peership did sneak in past my mental and emotional defenses. Michio did successfully plant the seed of equality deep within my being.
I’ll never forget how it touched my heart to hear him proclaim our commonality in regard to the fear of change. In that one statement, he bridged the false separation I felt between us, and between me and all other people. He connected me with the truth of the common bond I share with all humanity on this decidedly exciting and terrifying human journey on Earth. He was preparing me to anchor my Dream Workshops as a “Gathering of Equals.”
Spirit was telling me I needed to go out, to break free of the claustrophobic, gray walls of my cramped, matchbox of a room. I did not want to go! The dismal weather gave me a very socially acceptable reason to stay in my refuge because it was cold and clammy outside. However, fear was the real reason I was avoiding leaving my room and exploring my new hometown. Venturing outside would mean taking the next ominous step in my spiritual odyssey.
All day my inner coach was incessantly urging me to put myself out into the flow of the River of Life, so I could bump into my destiny. Spirit was not buying my lame excuse of inclement weather. To my real self, taking a walk during this tropical deluge was an excellent opportunity to experience life as a river, to allow the natural pulse and rhythm of life to pump some vitality back into my reluctant psyche. My personality argued nothing of any importance could possibly happen to me on such a raw, inhospitable night. No sane person would be afoot. There would be no one to encounter! But my inner guide would not be swayed from its objective. I would leave my isolated room.
I’ve learned to follow my intuition when it’s demanding action as strongly as it was this particular evening. Reluctantly, I dressed myself against the drenching wind and left my safe haven for an unknown adventure in the “City of Angels.” I’d driven across the country to get a fresh start. The foul weather delayed my plans and dampened my hopes, but I was still open to encountering some sort of messenger of God, angel or otherwise. I set out for my wet adventure, thinking to myself, Perhaps my inner coach knows something about the city’s namesake I haven’t discovered yet.
Or maybe not! After a brisk walk of a dozen, deserted city blocks in the bone-chilling rain, I was soaked to the core and ready to retreat from what was quickly turning into an ill-fated excursion. Turning, I began the trek back to my apartment when a glimmering light in the gutter caught my eye. The bright beam seemed to be shining through a soggy, mud-covered flyer lying in the street gutter. Naturally, I stopped to inspect the phenomenon more closely. Yes, there was definitely a glow shining through the paper. My curiosity peaked; I bent over to pick up the sheet. As soon as I touched the flyer, the mysterious luminescence behind it faded away.
Not only am I soaked and miserable, I’m starting to see things, I conjectured to myself. Enough is enough! This crazy junket has come to an end. I’m going back to my nice, warm room.
I wiped the worst of the dirt off the leaflet, stuffed it into my jacket pocket and started for home at a hurried pace. I had a souvenir of my soggy journey. At least, I wouldn’t go home empty-handed!
Back in the cozy refuge of my toasty dry room, I carefully smoothed out the rain-swollen sheet of paper. I was very curious what the strange light was attracting my attention to. The shriveled notice was a public invitation to a home-cooked meal of natural foods. Hungry for nourishment from a source other than a tin can, I was thrilled at the prospect of a homemade feast and some human companionship. And the cost was only five dollars! Little did I know at the time that I’d just taken the bait laid by my soul on that gusty, damp night.
The following Thursday evening, I enjoyed a sumptuous meal of creamy leek soup, organic brown rice, garden-fresh vegetables and something green called nori seaweed at the East-West Institute of Los Angeles. The Institute was a macrobiotic school and retreat of the international healer and teacher Michio Kushi, founder of the center and our host for the evening.
With my stomach full and my mind and body relaxed, I was totally unprepared for my inner coach’s next outrageous move. Mr. Kushi asked the diners if there was a professional landscaper at the table. My hand shot up on its own!
What kind of adventure was my spirit getting me into this time? I sighed to myself. I hate yard work! I’ve never planted a garden. I don’t know the difference between a daffodil and a tulip. The only “landscaping” I’ve ever done was mowing the grass in our front yard when I was a kid. And I avoided that as much as possible. Besides, I’ve lived my whole life in a cool, northern climate. I’m totally ignorant of the subtropical foliage of Southern California. And I don’t care to learn!
“We’ve got several landscaped acres, including fruit trees, and flower, herb and vegetable gardens. Would you like to take over the duties of maintaining the estate’s extensive grounds?” queried Mr. Kushi. I couldn’t believe my mouth said, “Yes.”
This outrageous phenomenon wasn’t entirely new to me. I’ve been my spirit’s pawn before when my inner coach usurped control of my speech and answered a question for me. I had a gut feeling my real self was about to take me for the ride of my young life. Events soon validated this premonition. My new job set my personal path on an interception course with my first extraordinary life mentor: Michio Kushi.
Japanese to the core, Michio was an enigmatic, beguiling, modern-day samurai. In his forties when we met, Michio’s face was soft and pliable like a baby’s, his gait spirited and assured. Although he was most often charming and charismatic, he could be fierce and demanding, especially with his students—like me!
Michio’s domain was the Institute and the extensive grounds surrounding it. In the vibrant, romantic heyday of Hollywood, the magnificent estate had once been the home of jazz great Al Jolson and his paramour, film starlet Ruby Keeler. The manor house was a meandering forty-room Spanish villa with quaint French doors leading out to numerous patios and balconies overlooking the sprawling metropolis in the valley below. Avocado, banana, lemon, lime, grapefruit and orange groves; a rose garden; a grape arbor and a reflecting pool graced the hillside expanse. Antelope and deer frolicked through the pine forest in the surrounding acres. The estate’s gatehouse was bigger than most people’s homes.
I attracted Michio’s attention and respect by successfully sculpting the property into a neat, trim and healthy Shangri-La. No, I didn’t tap into an unknown gardening genius hidden within me. I discovered that the Greek and Italian groundskeepers for Hollywood stars met early every morning for espresso on nearby Sunset Boulevard. From these generous Old World gardeners, I learned how to care for my new horticultural charges. As their earthy wisdom had been ignored and unappreciated by their own sons, these talented landscapers were overjoyed to assist a young man interested in their broad knowledge of plant care. Before long, I was an expert in trimming and caring for bougainvillea bushes, carob trees, and every other common and exotic tropical plant.
Michio became a wonderful friend and mentor throughout the next ten years of my life. He helped me understand and integrate my first spiritual initiation in Montreal. Through him, I learned to view the world with a new perspective—one that was whole, vital and fresh. He soon promoted me to the position of director of the Institute, the person who coordinated all the diverse activities of the center. In addition to tending the grounds and gardens, I supervised the staff that provided the classes, meals and sleeping accommodations. At the facilities in Los Angeles and others around the world, Michio presented a fusion of Eastern and Western philosophy, psychology and applied practice that blended acupuncture, martial arts and macrobiotic, natural foods with pragmatic life coaching and community living.
This humble, yet very erudite healer had led a turbulent professional life. Considered a radical influence, Michio was forced in the late sixties by the American Medical Association to physically leave two of the most liberal communities in the country: Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Manhattan, New York. Ironically, he was run out of town for espousing the same philosophy of health he now teaches at the most prestigious institutions in those same cities: Harvard and Columbia University Medical Schools. The medical establishment and the mainstream public currently accept and endorse what Michio expounded in the sixties! In the intervening decades, his simple, effective principles of harmonious, nourishing living have helped thousands of people throughout the world.
Despite long days of private counseling and lengthy evening lectures to hundreds of students, Michio always had time to meet with me and share his practical knowledge. The most valuable lessons I absorbed from him were not so much what I gleaned in the lecture hall, although I did take copious notes on his talks about everything under the sun in the realm of healing, cosmology and spiritual disciplines. The priceless wisdom I assimilated from this unassuming sage was on a more subtle and profound level. Michio presented his spiritual savior faire to me in a way that wasn’t verbal or conceptual. He shared his world of wisdom in an existential, experiential way, through everyday actions and events. He was outwardly casual about his sharing, yet inwardly his way was very premeditated and deliberate. This was the knowledge that meant the most to me. We never discussed the life lessons he taught me. I simply absorbed them by being around him.
In Los Angeles and later in Boston, Michio and I would often sneak off together after his lectures to quiet, secluded French cafés where his fanatical disciples would never think to look for him. These quaint bistros served all the foods Michio warned against in his lectures, which focused primarily on how various foods affected one’s health and spirituality. In his talks, he advised eating a main diet of natural whole grains, fruits and vegetables. He spoke adamantly about avoiding alcohol, drugs, coffee, sugar, dairy, animal fats, red meat, white flour, white rice and all chemicalized, processed foods.
Yet on these frequent outings, Michio ordered buttery French croissants, eclairs and every other sugary delight available. Traditionally, the Japanese love to eat and talk about food. He was always very intrigued about whether a particular pastry was made with orange or lemon peel, or if it contained a touch of vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg or clove. In a ritual way similar to a Zen tea ceremony, he cut each pastry very carefully in half. Eating each piece slowly and delicately, we discussed what ingredients were used in creating the tastes and textures of the desserts, cleansing our palates between every bite with sips of strong, sweetened espresso.
On other evenings, we went to Italian eateries in Los Angeles and Boston. Consuming huge meals of white flour pasta with tomato sauce and meatballs, we’d sip red wine and enjoy sweet dessert cannolis—all foods on the absolute “Never Eat” list from Michio’s lectures on macrobiotic philosophy.
Michio and I dined out like this for years. We never spoke to anyone about our excursions. And we never discussed between ourselves the seeming discrepancies between his words and his actions, between his recommended diet and his savored delicacies. Yet in his own experiential, paradoxical ways, he was teaching me the life lessons I needed to learn: the importance of enjoying food and celebrating life with gusto, flexibility, intuitiveness and, especially, freedom.
As we sat eating pastries, Michio would lean toward me and speak with great earnestness, “Keit, you must be free man.” Very endearingly, he always pronounced “th” as a “t” in my name.
“You must be free to do anything you want. You must be free to eat anything you want. You must be free to be anything you want.”
Michio’s words felt good to me. At the time, I didn’t have a conceptual sense of what he was conveying, but I did take in the spirit and energy of what he was sharing. I know now that in his presence, I was absorbing his vibration of being free and living intuitively.
Michio spoke to me about being “sovereign.” He implored me to “never work for money. Never do anything you don’t want to do to obtain money. If you work for money, you are no better than a slave!”
His words had a strong and penetrating effect on me because I knew in my heart they were true. Yet I didn’t have a clue how to live this truth in my life. At the time, I couldn’t imagine how a person could have money without working at a job. Since then, I’ve learned to attract the financial support of the universe by aligning my professional path with my soul passion and purpose.
Michio emphasized the joy of being a free individual. He taught that everyone is equally able to be free, intuitive and creative. He’d move close to me, speaking right into the ear of my soul, “You must be free to do anything you want. And you must be strong enough to do only what you want to do in life.”
My mentor’s words were very empowering and prophetic for me. I felt sublime love from him when he said, “You must, you will, go far beyond me. You must leave me behind. I teach what I do now, but you will teach something much bigger and yet much simpler.” His words were foreshadowing The Dream Workshops I’d be facilitating twenty years hence. He foretold, “You will attract many people. They will come to learn something that is more pure, more basic and even more powerful than I teach now.”
Michio’s lectures focused on the exhaustive presentation of information, principles and universal laws concerning the best ways to eat and live. I asked him why he didn’t emphasize the primacy of intuition in his lectures to the degree he did in our café discussions.
“Oh, but I do,” he replied. “But not many people hear. At the very end of all my talks, I always say that to be happy and healthy, you must live intuitively. But few hear me.”
Incredulous upon hearing his words, I began to investigate the enigma. I began to pay close attention at the end of his public seminars. Sure enough, Michio did talk about intuitive eating being the healthiest manner of eating and intuitive living being the most joyful form of living: “The most creative and effective level of living is to make all life decisions from consulting one’s inner knowing. Pure, clear intuition supercedes all rules, concepts, principles and philosophies.” He did accentuate the supremacy of intuition at the end of every talk. Yet I wasn’t aware he made this concluding point until he brought it to my attention. I checked my friends’ notes. None of the students had recorded Michio’s views on the importance of intuition. I asked them if they’d ever heard him utter these ideas. They hadn’t. In fact, my friends were very dubious. They didn’t believe the macrobiotic leader ever spoke about intuitive eating or living! I even coached some of my friends on where to listen for the concept at the end of his lectures. They still didn’t hear it. It was obviously not their time to hear this message.
As we sat together late at night, I’d often ask Michio why he was wasting his time with me. I considered myself just a hair above a snail in terms of my degree of conscious awareness. He always answered very simply, “Because you listen. Because you hear. And because you will pass this on some day.” He certainly knew something I wasn’t aware of at the time!
Often Michio touched me poignantly with his compassion. One night over pastries and cappuccino, he said, “Keit, you are very scared right now because of all the changes you’re going through.”
He was right. At his side, I was witnessing spontaneous, physical healings and spiritual breakthroughs almost daily. I was also experiencing miracles in my own affairs. My life was becoming very magical indeed. The boundaries of my small world were continually expanding—including the psychological borders that comfortably defined who I thought I was, and the intellectual frontiers of what I reasoned were possible according to the laws of physics and science.
He continued in a very intimate tone, “Sometimes you have great anxiety. But, you know, I am as afraid to take my next step on my journey as you are to take your next step on your journey. We are together in our fear. We are terror twins!”
Then he laughed and giggled as he offered me another sweet tart to celebrate our union in fear.
What Michio offered me in all our encounters was very difficult for me to accept emotionally at the time. He extended to me not only loving friendship, but also respectful equality—something I wasn’t yet psychologically capable of receiving. He was inviting me to experience myself as his equal, to play and interact with him as a peer. This prospect was way beyond my self-image of my worth and substance. However, the vibration of peership did sneak in past my mental and emotional defenses. Michio did successfully plant the seed of equality deep within my being.
I’ll never forget how it touched my heart to hear him proclaim our commonality in regard to the fear of change. In that one statement, he bridged the false separation I felt between us, and between me and all other people. He connected me with the truth of the common bond I share with all humanity on this decidedly exciting and terrifying human journey on Earth. He was preparing me to anchor my Dream Workshops as a “Gathering of Equals.”
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Freedom
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
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2:25 PM
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Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com:80/art-and-entertainment-articles/watch-rango-2011-online-free-megavideo-for-free-4366940.html
Friday, June 24, 2011
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7:32 AM
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i don't know what the hell this is but the trailer leaves no suprises for the audience what so ever
Saturday, June 18, 2011
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12:23 PM
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Note: WATCH IN HIGH QUALITY!!! =) Just a fun-filled day in Little Tokyo, Los Angeles spent with some friends during Nisei Week 2009. Out enjoying the Japanese culture, people-watching, delicious food, fun, music, sights and sounds. Lots of food booths, beautiful Japanese traditional art, kodomo nebuta(japanese floats), kanji caligraphy, Kimonos and of course a Import Car show. an outdoor concert....and did I mention the FOOD? YUMMMY! Yakisoba Noodles and Mochi Ice Cream (I SCREAM FOR EYES CREAM..errr ICE CREAM) to die for!!! $1 dollar beers in the JACC plaza also! woot woooot!!! Next Generation REMIX Concert was off the hook! Pretty damn cool featuring such fantastic acts as TAIKO PROJECT(Drummers), SIBRIAN, BAMBU, EyeASage, Kacie Yoshida, DJ ET, and Camille Velasco (American Idol Fame). Unfortuantaely I ran out of batteries and video so I didn't capture it all=( ( Nonetheless, we had a great time. =D Disclaimer: I do not own any of the music in this video and it's used for entertainment purposes only.
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Tyasia
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Angeles,
Little,
TokyoNISEI
Monday, June 13, 2011
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12:04 PM
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Episode 8 Mal-Kahn-Tent. Kilokahn decides to experience life in the real world by taking over Malcolm's body. He then sticks Malcolm inside of a mega-virus monster. Sam and the others notice that it really is Kilokahn inside Malcolm's body, and it is up to Servo to save Malcolm. Credit goes to Dic & Cookie Jar Entertainment, Source Footage from Denkou Choujin Gridman
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Tyasia
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episode,
Samurai,
Superhuman,
SyberSquad
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
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6:50 AM
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Episode 18 Water You Doing? After Malcolm's dramatic reading of Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is shunned at the school talent show, Malcolm enacts thematic revenge in turning all the water in the city into hydrochloric acid. Also, Tanker learns the danger of bingeing on dill pickles, and suffers from severe stomach pain, and learns where his limits lie. Credit goes to Dic & Cookie Jar Entertainment, Source Footage from Denkou Choujin Gridman
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Tyasia
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episode,
Samurai,
Superhuman,
SyberSquad
Thursday, June 2, 2011
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3:21 PM
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侍の子孫です。有名な剣豪だったようです。
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Tyasia
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Samurai
Friday, May 27, 2011
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5:24 PM
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American Samurai Español Spanish David Bradley - Mark Dacascos Enorme
Sunday, May 22, 2011
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3:26 AM
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The makers of "Dawn of the Redneck Samurai" and "Children of the Hunt" are going to teach you how to cut your hair.
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Tyasia
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Matthew
Monday, May 16, 2011
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9:28 PM
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www.midori-world.com Mnuel Terron's Original cocktail with MIDORI (ingredients) MIDORI, Sake, Green Chartreuse,Lemon juice,1 Passionfruit Sake based cocktail High alcoholic content Sour flavor, with Cocktail glass This vibrant drink was designed as a liquid representation of the classic samurai film Shogun Assassin that was released in the English speaking market in 1980, not long after the launch of MIDORI in the United States. Similar to MIDORIs start being inspired by a group of bartenders, the film was put together specifically for the American market from the first two of the famous Lone Wolf and Cub series of jidaigeki films. So when this drink was coming together the intent was to reflect a diversity by combining the old and the new. Sake seemed the logical base for the cocktail, as it is in every westerners perception the traditional beverage of choice in Japan. Sour was also an important component because the drink needed to be sharp like Ogamis sword yet graceful so I used both lemon juice and another great sour fruit, passionfruit, which also provided me with the perfect garnish in the black seeds. The sweetness of the MIDORI is subtle here and plays perfectly with the Sake then the final component of herbal complexity with the addition of Chartreuse. This is one cocktail that pleases on the attack.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
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12:43 PM
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Food franchises are the iconic picture of a franchise and, believe it or not, have actually been one of the minute few industries that have shown growth during our recent recession. Before you make the assumption that food franchises are invincible, understand that they have gained the recession-resistant status through the hard work of building strong brand names and products that appease the American appetite without devouring the American wallet. From the classic fast-food titans to the up-and-comers of the food franchise world, you're sure to find that every one of these food franchises can tame your customer's appetite and earn a sizeable income for you and your investors. Here's a quick look at the top 10 food franchises currently available.
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Tyasia
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Business,
Franchise,
Opportunities
Friday, May 6, 2011
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9:52 AM
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List of Famous Male Movie Actors:
Tom Hanks:
He is known for his acting skills matched with good looks. Tom Hanks (9th July, 1956) began with television and then moved on to comedies. From there on, he did have film offers but he finally made a connection with the box office with ‘Big'. He then had more hits to his credit with films such as ‘A League of Their Own', ‘Sleepless In Seattle', ‘Forest Gump', ‘Saving Private Ryan', ‘Cast Away', ‘Catch Me If You Can', etc. This talented actor has won Academy Awards as well Golden Globe Awards apart from several other nominations. The talent of this American actor is surely limitless!
Johnny Depp:
An actor of great potential, John Christopher Depp, famously known as Johnny Depp (9th June, 1963) has won the hearts of millions all around the world. Johnny Depp has always entertained people with his offbeat choice of roles. In the initial years, Johnny Depp appeared on some television series and then moved on to films. His appearance in ‘Edward Scissorhands' began his success story. Johnny Depp is particularly known for his portrayal of Captain Jack Sparrow, a pirate of the hit trilogy, ‘Pirates of the Caribbean'. He also starred in movies such as ‘Finding Neverland', ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', ‘Ed Wood' and more recently, ‘Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street' etc. This Academy Awards and Golden Globe Award winner has won many other awards and nominations apart from being rated as the sexiest actor ever in recent times!
Tom Cruise:
A true hunk of Hollywood, Tom Cruise (3rd July, 1962) is blessed with gorgeous looks and acting abilities! Thomas Cruise, known popularly as Tom Cruise, is an exceptionally talented actor whose first role happened in a movie called ‘Endless Love'. Tom Cruise further gained media attention with ‘Top Gun'. With ‘Cocktail' and ‘Rain Man', Tom Cruise further established himself as an actor of great potential. ‘Born of the Fourth of July', ‘A Few Good Men', ‘The Firm', ‘Jerry Maguire', ‘Eyes Wide Shut', ‘Mission Impossible Series', ‘The Last Samurai' etc are some of his other famous films. Tom Cruise is one of the most famous male movie actors till date and was also in the news due to his marriage and then divorce with Nicole Kidman. More recently, Tom Cruise has been in the news with his relationship with Katie Holmes.
Robin Williams:
An American actor of great acting prowess, this film actor is known for his many roles that showcase his dynamic abilities. Robin Williams (21st July, 1951) has many hit movies to his credit. The beginning of his career was mainly with films. Williams was also known as a voice actor. His movies such as, ‘Good Morning Vietnam', ‘Good Will Hunting', ‘Patch Adams', ‘The Birdcage', ‘Mrs. Doubtfire' showcased his range as an actor. This actor is a proud recipient of many Golden Globe Awards, Screen Actors Guild Awards as well as Grammy Awards.
Jim Carrey:
Whenever Jim Carrey (17th January, 1962) takes control of any movie, you are bound to receive a lot of laughs. Jim Carrey also has a range of movies under his belt that showcases his shades as an actor. However, he tasted success as a comedic actor. Jim had his debut with ‘Rubberface'. Carrey shot to stardom with the ‘Ace Ventura' series although critics had their own opinion. ‘The Cable Guy' further established his success ratio. ‘Liar Liar' helped him to make a mark in the comedy genre. ‘The Mask', ‘Bruce Almighty', ‘Dumb and Dumber', ‘Me, Myself & Irene' etc helped him to gain a strong foothold in this industry and also have a large fan following. He even portrayed roles with negative shades with great élan in ‘Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events'. Jim Carrey has won Golden Globe Awards and has also been nominated for numerous other awards.
Will Smith:
This former rapper is also a very successful actor in Hollywood. Willard Smith, fondly known as Will Smith (25th September, 1968), was first noticed as the rapper Fresh Prince especially with the success of the track, ‘Boom! Shake the Room'. Will Smith had very modest beginnings and shot to fame with a sitcom. From there on, Will Smith was noticed particularly in ‘Bad Boys', ‘Independence Day', ‘Agent K' and the very popular ‘Men in Black'. Will Smith won more hearts with his performances in ‘Wild Wild West', ‘Hitch', ‘The Pursuit of Happyness' etc. He has several Academy Award nominations as well as Golden Globe Awards and has also won several Grammy Awards.
Leonardo DiCaprio:
From ‘Titanic' to ‘Catch Me If You Can', this actor has enthralled everybody. Leonardo DiCaprio (11th November, 1974) has starred in many films that have wowed the audiences. He worked initially in commercials and on television. His breakthrough happened with ‘This Boy's Life'. His role as Jack Dawson propelled him to stardom in ‘Titanic'. ‘Romeo + Juliet', ‘The Aviator', ‘Gangs of New York' etc are some of his popular films. Read more about Leonardo DiCaprio.
Sylvester Stallone:
He is loved as Rambo or even Rocky Balboa. This American actor is more than an actor, he is known as a true star! ‘Rocky' helped Sylvestor Stallone (6th July, 1946) gain all the fame and adulation. Apart from this, he was also famous as ‘Rambo'. Read all about the tough guy, Sylvester Stallone.
Brad Pitt:
Known for his gorgeous looks as well as his relationships, here's all you need to know about Brad Pitt.
Antonio Banderas:
Antonio Banderas (10th August, 1960) is a high profile actor whose acting career began at the age of 19. He achieved critical acclaim for ‘The Mask of Zorro'. Antonio beautifully essayed the role of a Ballroom dance teacher in ‘Take the Lead'. He is also famous for his movies, ‘Assassins', ‘Desperado', ‘Evita', ‘Philadelphia' etc.
Tom Hanks:
He is known for his acting skills matched with good looks. Tom Hanks (9th July, 1956) began with television and then moved on to comedies. From there on, he did have film offers but he finally made a connection with the box office with ‘Big'. He then had more hits to his credit with films such as ‘A League of Their Own', ‘Sleepless In Seattle', ‘Forest Gump', ‘Saving Private Ryan', ‘Cast Away', ‘Catch Me If You Can', etc. This talented actor has won Academy Awards as well Golden Globe Awards apart from several other nominations. The talent of this American actor is surely limitless!
Johnny Depp:
An actor of great potential, John Christopher Depp, famously known as Johnny Depp (9th June, 1963) has won the hearts of millions all around the world. Johnny Depp has always entertained people with his offbeat choice of roles. In the initial years, Johnny Depp appeared on some television series and then moved on to films. His appearance in ‘Edward Scissorhands' began his success story. Johnny Depp is particularly known for his portrayal of Captain Jack Sparrow, a pirate of the hit trilogy, ‘Pirates of the Caribbean'. He also starred in movies such as ‘Finding Neverland', ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', ‘Ed Wood' and more recently, ‘Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street' etc. This Academy Awards and Golden Globe Award winner has won many other awards and nominations apart from being rated as the sexiest actor ever in recent times!
Tom Cruise:
A true hunk of Hollywood, Tom Cruise (3rd July, 1962) is blessed with gorgeous looks and acting abilities! Thomas Cruise, known popularly as Tom Cruise, is an exceptionally talented actor whose first role happened in a movie called ‘Endless Love'. Tom Cruise further gained media attention with ‘Top Gun'. With ‘Cocktail' and ‘Rain Man', Tom Cruise further established himself as an actor of great potential. ‘Born of the Fourth of July', ‘A Few Good Men', ‘The Firm', ‘Jerry Maguire', ‘Eyes Wide Shut', ‘Mission Impossible Series', ‘The Last Samurai' etc are some of his other famous films. Tom Cruise is one of the most famous male movie actors till date and was also in the news due to his marriage and then divorce with Nicole Kidman. More recently, Tom Cruise has been in the news with his relationship with Katie Holmes.
Robin Williams:
An American actor of great acting prowess, this film actor is known for his many roles that showcase his dynamic abilities. Robin Williams (21st July, 1951) has many hit movies to his credit. The beginning of his career was mainly with films. Williams was also known as a voice actor. His movies such as, ‘Good Morning Vietnam', ‘Good Will Hunting', ‘Patch Adams', ‘The Birdcage', ‘Mrs. Doubtfire' showcased his range as an actor. This actor is a proud recipient of many Golden Globe Awards, Screen Actors Guild Awards as well as Grammy Awards.
Jim Carrey:
Whenever Jim Carrey (17th January, 1962) takes control of any movie, you are bound to receive a lot of laughs. Jim Carrey also has a range of movies under his belt that showcases his shades as an actor. However, he tasted success as a comedic actor. Jim had his debut with ‘Rubberface'. Carrey shot to stardom with the ‘Ace Ventura' series although critics had their own opinion. ‘The Cable Guy' further established his success ratio. ‘Liar Liar' helped him to make a mark in the comedy genre. ‘The Mask', ‘Bruce Almighty', ‘Dumb and Dumber', ‘Me, Myself & Irene' etc helped him to gain a strong foothold in this industry and also have a large fan following. He even portrayed roles with negative shades with great élan in ‘Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events'. Jim Carrey has won Golden Globe Awards and has also been nominated for numerous other awards.
Will Smith:
This former rapper is also a very successful actor in Hollywood. Willard Smith, fondly known as Will Smith (25th September, 1968), was first noticed as the rapper Fresh Prince especially with the success of the track, ‘Boom! Shake the Room'. Will Smith had very modest beginnings and shot to fame with a sitcom. From there on, Will Smith was noticed particularly in ‘Bad Boys', ‘Independence Day', ‘Agent K' and the very popular ‘Men in Black'. Will Smith won more hearts with his performances in ‘Wild Wild West', ‘Hitch', ‘The Pursuit of Happyness' etc. He has several Academy Award nominations as well as Golden Globe Awards and has also won several Grammy Awards.
Leonardo DiCaprio:
From ‘Titanic' to ‘Catch Me If You Can', this actor has enthralled everybody. Leonardo DiCaprio (11th November, 1974) has starred in many films that have wowed the audiences. He worked initially in commercials and on television. His breakthrough happened with ‘This Boy's Life'. His role as Jack Dawson propelled him to stardom in ‘Titanic'. ‘Romeo + Juliet', ‘The Aviator', ‘Gangs of New York' etc are some of his popular films. Read more about Leonardo DiCaprio.
Sylvester Stallone:
He is loved as Rambo or even Rocky Balboa. This American actor is more than an actor, he is known as a true star! ‘Rocky' helped Sylvestor Stallone (6th July, 1946) gain all the fame and adulation. Apart from this, he was also famous as ‘Rambo'. Read all about the tough guy, Sylvester Stallone.
Brad Pitt:
Known for his gorgeous looks as well as his relationships, here's all you need to know about Brad Pitt.
Antonio Banderas:
Antonio Banderas (10th August, 1960) is a high profile actor whose acting career began at the age of 19. He achieved critical acclaim for ‘The Mask of Zorro'. Antonio beautifully essayed the role of a Ballroom dance teacher in ‘Take the Lead'. He is also famous for his movies, ‘Assassins', ‘Desperado', ‘Evita', ‘Philadelphia' etc.
Sunday, May 1, 2011
at
9:24 AM
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Over the last 14 years, The Daily Show has become a comedic institution with a far reaching influence that has really affected the American comedy scene far more than anyone could have imagined it would have. The show itself is one of the most popular shows on satellite tv, and is also one of the most popular news outlets for young people these days. Yet in addition to the show's success, it has also helped promote the careers of many comedians who got their big break by starting as correspondents on The Daily Show. Prior to the show's existence, Saturday Night Live was the only major comedy show to launch so many comedians into bigger careers, but the show has really pushed people like Stephen Colbert, Steve Carrell, and Ed Helms to go onto bigger comedy projects. Whether you live in Seattle, Boston, or anywhere in between you can catch up with these great comedians using satellite internet.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
at
3:41 AM
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model for Mason), Gardner was easily the best-selling and most prolific of all mystery writers. From the early thirties until his death in 1970, he produced two or three of his The Case of ... novels a year, enough to keep five secretaries busy transcribing his dictation full-time.
Technique #1: Put Your Story Front and Center Story was literally everything to Gardner. Characterization and background were of secondary, if any, importance. To Gardner, the novel was simply the most effective means of presenting his detective puzzles. Like Agatha Christie, Gardner relied heavily on dialogue, so that his books often read like scripts.
Here's the no-nonsense beginning of The Case of the Screaming Woman, an example of how Gardner hooks us immediately with the first bizarre aspect of his story:
Della Street, Perry Mason's confidential secretary, entered Mason's private office, walked over to the lawyer's desk and said, "You always like something out of the ordinary, Chief. This time I have a lulu!"
"Unusual?" Mason asked, looking up from the papers on his desk.
"Unique," she said.
"Give," Mason told her.
"A Mrs. John Kirby telephoned," Della Street said, "and wanted to retain you to cross-examine her husband."
"A divorce case?" Mason asked.
"No, she and her husband are good friends."
"Yet she wants me to cross-examine him?"
"That's right."
"About what?"
"About where he was last night."
Mason frowned. "Della, I'm not a lie detector. I'm not a psychoanalyst. I don't handle cases involving domestic relations."
"That's what I told Mrs. Kirby," Della Street said. "She told me she only wanted her husband's interests protected. She said she wanted you to listen to his story, puncture his self-assurance, and rip him to pieces."
Though few would be tempted to call Gardner a stylist, there's no arguing that he could arrest us with a wildly unlikely premise at the start of each of his books. It was this ability to build a novel on strength of story, rather than on how he told that story, that made him the favorite of millions.
Sometimes this kind of get-to-the-point storytelling is exactly what readers crave-for example, when what they really want is a challenging puzzle in novel form.
If you share Gardner's gift for ingenious plotting, why embellish your book with unnecessary detail or description? You might be doing yourself, and your book, a disservice. Bare-bones, plot-oriented writing may be the perfect approach for your novel of mystery or suspense.
ERSKINE CALDWELL
"From the day of my birth until I reached the age of twenty years, I rarely lived longer than six years in the same place," wrote this red-haired, Georgia-born son of a Presbyterian minister, who at eighteen was running guns for a revolt in Central America. He also worked as a plowboy, poolroom attendant, cotton picker, lumbermill hand, professional football player, taxi driver, stagehand in a burlesque theater, stonemason, soda jerk, cook and waiter, book reviewer and journalist.
Caldwell is best known, however, as the author of sometimes scandalous novels about the Southern poor, most notably 1933's God's Little Acre, among the most popular novels of all time. Not far behind is Tobacco Road, written the year before.
Technique #2: Paint Characters With Heart Caldwell's novels about "American primitives" have enjoyed their phenomenal success largely because Caldwell (like Mark Twain and Bret Harte, to whom he is frequently compared) truly loved the people he wrote about. This love for these people at their best and worst would not have existed if he had not known them so well, and it was this knowledge that allowed him to show them in all their humor, eccentricity and pathos-qualities that make these people irresistible to readers.
In this excerpt from Tobacco Road, Ellie May Lester shows her feelings for Lov Bensey. Lov is married to Ellie May's younger sister Pearl, who refuses to sleep with Lov. Ellie May, though harelipped, is all too willing to give Lov what he wants.
[Lov] was looking at Ellie May now. She had at last got him to give her some attention.
Ellie May was edging closer and closer to Lov. She was moving across the yard by raising her weight on her hands and sliding herself over the hard white sand. She was smiling at Lov, and trying to make him take more notice of her. She could not wait any longer for him to come to her, so she was going to him. Her harelip was spread open across her upper teeth, making her mouth appear as though she had no upper lip at all. Men usually would have nothing to do with Ellie May; but she was eighteen now, and she was beginning to discover that it should be possible for her to get a man in spite of her appearance.
"Ellie May's acting like your old hound used to do when he got the itch," Dude said to Jeeter. "Look at her scrape her bottom on the sand. That old hound used to make the same kind of sound Ellie May's making, too. It sounds just like a little pig squealing, don't it?"
Chances are these are not like the people you encounter daily, but to Erskine Caldwell they might as well have been, and he painted them exactly as he saw them, with a brush full of color, and broad, lively strokes.
In most novels it is vital that the author give us characters we can know and like as much as we find ourselves knowing and liking those in Caldwell's. To create such supersympathetic characters in your novels, look directly to the people you know and love better than any others. Only by knowing and loving your characters can you make us do the same.
IAN FLEMING
Drawing on his experience with British Naval Intelligence, Fleming created James Bond 007, and indeed Fleming and Bond often became confused in the public mind. Though Fleming called his work "trivial piffle," his espionage adventures had been phenomenally successful around the world, with John F. Kennedy among his most avid fans.
Technique #3: Appeal to Our Wildest Fantasies The success of Fleming's books has been attributed to the way they appeal to our wildest dreams. James Bond, more than any other fictional hero, lived many people's fantasy of a life of total self-sufficiency and self-indulgence.
At the climax of You Only Live Twice, Bond is a prisoner of his old nemesis, Ernst Blofeld, in the cliff-top Castle of Death. Bond manages to escape the deadly volcanic mud of the Question Room, save his neck from Blofeld's massive samurai sword, and ultimately overpower and strangle Blofeld. He even sets the Castle to self-destruct-only to climb out a window and find himself trapped on a narrow balustrade.
. . . He looked over the side. A sheer hundred-foot drop to the gravel. A soft fluted whistle above him caught his ear. He looked up. Only a breath of a wind in the moorings of that bloody balloon! But then a lunatic idea came to him, a flashback to one of the old Douglas Fairbanks films when the hero had swung across the wide hall by taking a flying leap at the chandelier. This helium balloon was strong enough to hold taut fifty feet of framed cotton strip bearing the warning sign! Why shouldn't it be powerful enough to bear the weight of a man?
Bond ran to the corner of the balustrade to which the mooring line was attached. He tested it. It was taut as a wire! From somewhere behind him there came a great clamour in the castle . . . Holding onto the straining rope, he climbed onto the railing, cut a foothold for himself in the cotton banner, and, grasping the mooring rope with his right hand, chopped downwards below him with Blofeld's sword and threw himself into space.
It worked! There was a light night breeze, and he felt himself wafted gently away over the moonlit park, over the glittering, steaming lake, towards the sea. But he was rising, not falling! The helium sphere was not in the least worried by his weight! Then blue-and-yellow fire fluttered from the upper storey of the castle, and an occasional angry wasp zipped past him. . . . Now the whole black silhouette of the castle swayed in the moonlight and seemed to jig upwards and sideways and then slowly dissolve like an ice cream cone in the sunshine. The top storey crumbled first, then the next, and the next, and then, after a moment, a huge jet of orange fire shot up from hell towards the moon. A buffet of hot wind, followed by an echoing crack of thunder, hit Bond and made his balloon sway violently.
. . . Punctured by a bullet, the balloon was fast losing height. Below, the softly swelling sea offered a bed. . . .
It seems clear that Fleming never forgot that most people who read for pleasure read to escape, and that these readers want as much escape as they can get for their time and money.
Are your own characters humdrum and mundane, doing humdrum and mundane things, when they would be so much for interesting being and doing things we've only dreamed of? Fleming knew-and every novelist should remember-that one of the greatest joys of writing is that the impossible can be made possible. Give your readers a run for their money. Let them find true, wonderful escape in the worlds you create for them.
MICKEY SPILLANE
His mystery-detective novels have been called nasty and sadistic, but they've won Spillane millions of fans just the same. The Brooklyn-born son of an Irish bartender began his writing career selling stories to the "slicks" and the "pulps," then writing comic books. His novels, most of them starring rough, tough Mike Hammer (said to resemble his creator), landed Spillane on the all-time best-seller list again and again, from 1947's I, The Jury to the fifties' My Gun is Quick, The Big Kill, One Lonely Night, The Long Wait and Kiss Me, Deadly, to 1961's The Deep.
Technique #4: Torture the Reader to the End Of his method of creating suspense, Spillane said: "You don't read a book to get to the middle. You read a book to get to the end. You deliberately torture yourself all the way through, hoping that after all the garbage the end will be worth all the time you spent in the reading thereof. True? It's got to be totally satisfactory in the last line.
A superb example of how Spillane puts his words into action is the ending of I, The Jury (I've used a few dashes so as not to give anything away):
"No, ----, I'm the jury now, and the judge, and I have a promise to keep. Beautiful as you are, as much as I almost loved you, I sentence you to death." . . .
The roar of the .45 shook the room. ---- staggered back a step. Her eyes were a symphony of incredulity, an unbelieving witness to truth. Slowly, she looked down to the ugly swelling in her naked belly where the bullet went in. A thin trickle of blood welled out.
I stood up in front of her and shoved the gun into my pocket. I turned and looked at the rubber plant behind me. There on the table was the gun, with the safety catch off and the silencer still attached. Those loving arms would have reached it nicely. A face that was waiting to be kissed was really waiting to be splattered with blood when she blew my head off. My blood. When I heard her fall I turned around. Her eyes had pain in them now, the pain preceding death. Pain and unbelief.
"How c-could you?" she gasped.
I only had a moment before talking to a corpse, but I got it in.
"It was easy," I said.
Remember how we all love being surprised, and hold some things back as you write your novel, whatever sort of novel it is. It's a wonderful feeling to read a book and realize that a truly skillful novelist has gotten the best of us. Be careful to play fair with your surprises, however; make them believable and be sure to plant any necessary precedents or clues.
FRANK YERBY
Georgia-born Yerby is best known for his vivid and complex Southern tales, the most successful of which are 1946's The Foxes of Harrow, 1947's The Vixens, and 1949's Pride's Castle. A critic once wrote that "Mr. Yerby could be a pretty good novelist if he ever got his mind off the neckline and the cash register," but the world always welcomed a new Yerby novel unconditionally.
Technique #5: Evoke the Magic of the Moment Yerby is famous for his vivid language, for his multiplicity of characters and for writing, in the words of Arna Bontemps, with "a flair for color, an air of easy abandon, the ability to live in the moment and to create characters that live in the moment, a touch of very elementary magic."
Devilseed is Yerby's story of Mireille Duclos, who, like many women of her time, sails penniless into gold-crazed San Francisco in the 1850s and there climbs to riches and respectability. In this scene we see Mireille riding into town as the new wife of Judge Alain Curtwright.
Mireille's imposing mahogany-and-rosewood-paneled landau swept eastward down Clay Street toward Portsmouth Square, drawn at a spanking trot behind her pair of night-black, imported Australian horses. Perched high on the driver's seat before her, the Swithers brothers, James and John, her coachman and footman, sat, clad in livery every bit as imposing as the landau, their faces, under their tall silk hats, blacker than the hides of her splendid five-gaited pair, set in frowns of stern self-importance.
"Mammy" Pleasant had sent the Blacks to Mireille with a note suggesting that she hire them, which Mireille had been pleased to do, even knowing that Mary Ellen Pleasant had surely placed them in her employ to spy on her. Now, staring at their sturdy backs straining against the frock coats of their livery, she had the wickedly delighted feeling that she had "turned" them both: that they now were, if not wholly on her side, at last double agents. For, by awarding them a treatment involving so much kindness, real consideration, even, at times, an easy, affectionate familiarity that no Black menservants in the 1850s could dream of receiving from a young, stunningly beautiful white woman, she got as much information about Mary Ellen Pleasant's weird, devious, and plain evil doings out of them as they carried back to the house on Washington Street about hers.
As she rolled along, with the rear calash top folded back and the breeze stirring her raven hair under her smart little bonnet, all the men on the sidewalks took off their hats and waved them in her direction. More than one of them grandly bowed. The women-what few there were-glared, and ostentatiously turned their backs. Mireille smiled with quiet satisfaction at that sight. Ever since the fabulous Lola Montez, mistress of the immortal pianist-composer Franz Liszt, mistress of the ex-King Ludwig of Bavaria, mistress of-the list was endless!-whose Spider Dance drove men of the cloth, not to mention mere miners and businessmen, out of their minds, had left San Francisco that preceding fall to settle-permanently, she swore-in the pleasant little California mountain town of Grass Valley, Mireille had inherited, by default, Lola's crown as the most celebrated demimondaine in the city. . . .
Yerby uses details of place and time as tools to evoke character, making Mireille and Mary Ellen functions of where and when they live, and vice versa. The Swithers brothers, coachman and footman, very much a sign of affluence at this time, are the device by which Mary Ellen spies of Mireille, who in turn uses them for the same purpose. We see the people on Clay Street showing their feelings for Mireille through social customs of the place and time-grand bows and waves of the hat from the men, exaggerated turns of the back from the women. Note the use of a real and colorful figure, Lola Montez, to bring Mireille and her role in San Francisco into even sharper focus.
Use these techniques to make the characters in your novel virtually an extension of their place and time. Have them use, abuse and react to objects and customs distinctly of their world, so that we cannot recall these characters without recalling how they were dressed, how they spoke, what they ate and all the other ways they interacted with their world.
Not a person has been born who has not been shaped to some degree by where and when he or she lived. The magic of moment in reading fiction is learning how people live in, adapt to and make use of their where and when as we do with ours.
HAROLD ROBBINS It was a tribute to Robbins's staying power and adaptability that he was as much a titan in 1988 as he was forty years earlier, when he published 1948's Never Love a Stranger.
Robbins's publishers once announced that every minute someone bought a Robbins novel-another tribute to his never having let his public down. Not bad for a poor kid from New York who started his career as a grocery clerk, short-order cook, cashier, errand boy and bookies' runner.
Robbins has been praised most for the authenticity of the world in which he sets his novels. Never Love a Stranger drew heavily from Robbins's experience growing up in New York, and so vividly depicted that world of hustlers and racketeers that one critic called it "a Les Misérables of New York."
Technique #6: Make Background a Character In 79 Park Avenue, in which heroine Marja starts out a poor kid from Second Avenue and winds up a Park Avenue call girl, Robbins describes the seamy beachfront world of prostitution as he no doubt observed it growing up:
She walked into the hotel lobby and chose a seat in a discreet out-of-the-way corner. Opening a copy of Vogue that she had carried with her, she glanced through it idly. . . .
A few minutes passed. Then a bellboy stopped in front of her. "Room three-eleven," he said in a low voice.
"Three-eleven," she repeated, a smile on her lips.
He nodded. "Right. He's waiting there now."
"Thank you." She smiled, holding out her hand.
"You're welcome, miss," the bellboy answered, taking the two bills from her. He walked away quickly.
Slowly she closed the magazine, glancing around the lobby as she stood up. It was normal. The house dick was looking the other way, the desk clerks were busy with check-ins, the other people in the lobby were all guests. Satisfied with her quick check, she sauntered toward the elevators. She had nothing to worry about. Everyone was taken care of. Mac, the landlord of the rooming house, had put her wise to that.
"Pick a place to operate from," he had said knowingly. "Then before you do anything, make sure that everybody who might be interested is paid off. They'll leave you alone then, even help you."
Obviously, Robbins would not have undertaken a novel with a background of prostitution if the hadn't felt he could do so convincingly. But his use of detail and ambiance is what sets this and his other novels apart, makes them as memorable for their depiction of world and place as for their characters.
When deciding on the world in which to place your novel, consider the worlds you know so well that you may be overlooking them entirely. Writers have found these worlds, literally right in front of their noses, to be the richest and to work most authentically. What, after all, does a writer-or anyone-know better than his or her own life and the lives of those he or she has observed firsthand?
Technique #1: Put Your Story Front and Center Story was literally everything to Gardner. Characterization and background were of secondary, if any, importance. To Gardner, the novel was simply the most effective means of presenting his detective puzzles. Like Agatha Christie, Gardner relied heavily on dialogue, so that his books often read like scripts.
Here's the no-nonsense beginning of The Case of the Screaming Woman, an example of how Gardner hooks us immediately with the first bizarre aspect of his story:
Della Street, Perry Mason's confidential secretary, entered Mason's private office, walked over to the lawyer's desk and said, "You always like something out of the ordinary, Chief. This time I have a lulu!"
"Unusual?" Mason asked, looking up from the papers on his desk.
"Unique," she said.
"Give," Mason told her.
"A Mrs. John Kirby telephoned," Della Street said, "and wanted to retain you to cross-examine her husband."
"A divorce case?" Mason asked.
"No, she and her husband are good friends."
"Yet she wants me to cross-examine him?"
"That's right."
"About what?"
"About where he was last night."
Mason frowned. "Della, I'm not a lie detector. I'm not a psychoanalyst. I don't handle cases involving domestic relations."
"That's what I told Mrs. Kirby," Della Street said. "She told me she only wanted her husband's interests protected. She said she wanted you to listen to his story, puncture his self-assurance, and rip him to pieces."
Though few would be tempted to call Gardner a stylist, there's no arguing that he could arrest us with a wildly unlikely premise at the start of each of his books. It was this ability to build a novel on strength of story, rather than on how he told that story, that made him the favorite of millions.
Sometimes this kind of get-to-the-point storytelling is exactly what readers crave-for example, when what they really want is a challenging puzzle in novel form.
If you share Gardner's gift for ingenious plotting, why embellish your book with unnecessary detail or description? You might be doing yourself, and your book, a disservice. Bare-bones, plot-oriented writing may be the perfect approach for your novel of mystery or suspense.
ERSKINE CALDWELL
"From the day of my birth until I reached the age of twenty years, I rarely lived longer than six years in the same place," wrote this red-haired, Georgia-born son of a Presbyterian minister, who at eighteen was running guns for a revolt in Central America. He also worked as a plowboy, poolroom attendant, cotton picker, lumbermill hand, professional football player, taxi driver, stagehand in a burlesque theater, stonemason, soda jerk, cook and waiter, book reviewer and journalist.
Caldwell is best known, however, as the author of sometimes scandalous novels about the Southern poor, most notably 1933's God's Little Acre, among the most popular novels of all time. Not far behind is Tobacco Road, written the year before.
Technique #2: Paint Characters With Heart Caldwell's novels about "American primitives" have enjoyed their phenomenal success largely because Caldwell (like Mark Twain and Bret Harte, to whom he is frequently compared) truly loved the people he wrote about. This love for these people at their best and worst would not have existed if he had not known them so well, and it was this knowledge that allowed him to show them in all their humor, eccentricity and pathos-qualities that make these people irresistible to readers.
In this excerpt from Tobacco Road, Ellie May Lester shows her feelings for Lov Bensey. Lov is married to Ellie May's younger sister Pearl, who refuses to sleep with Lov. Ellie May, though harelipped, is all too willing to give Lov what he wants.
[Lov] was looking at Ellie May now. She had at last got him to give her some attention.
Ellie May was edging closer and closer to Lov. She was moving across the yard by raising her weight on her hands and sliding herself over the hard white sand. She was smiling at Lov, and trying to make him take more notice of her. She could not wait any longer for him to come to her, so she was going to him. Her harelip was spread open across her upper teeth, making her mouth appear as though she had no upper lip at all. Men usually would have nothing to do with Ellie May; but she was eighteen now, and she was beginning to discover that it should be possible for her to get a man in spite of her appearance.
"Ellie May's acting like your old hound used to do when he got the itch," Dude said to Jeeter. "Look at her scrape her bottom on the sand. That old hound used to make the same kind of sound Ellie May's making, too. It sounds just like a little pig squealing, don't it?"
Chances are these are not like the people you encounter daily, but to Erskine Caldwell they might as well have been, and he painted them exactly as he saw them, with a brush full of color, and broad, lively strokes.
In most novels it is vital that the author give us characters we can know and like as much as we find ourselves knowing and liking those in Caldwell's. To create such supersympathetic characters in your novels, look directly to the people you know and love better than any others. Only by knowing and loving your characters can you make us do the same.
IAN FLEMING
Drawing on his experience with British Naval Intelligence, Fleming created James Bond 007, and indeed Fleming and Bond often became confused in the public mind. Though Fleming called his work "trivial piffle," his espionage adventures had been phenomenally successful around the world, with John F. Kennedy among his most avid fans.
Technique #3: Appeal to Our Wildest Fantasies The success of Fleming's books has been attributed to the way they appeal to our wildest dreams. James Bond, more than any other fictional hero, lived many people's fantasy of a life of total self-sufficiency and self-indulgence.
At the climax of You Only Live Twice, Bond is a prisoner of his old nemesis, Ernst Blofeld, in the cliff-top Castle of Death. Bond manages to escape the deadly volcanic mud of the Question Room, save his neck from Blofeld's massive samurai sword, and ultimately overpower and strangle Blofeld. He even sets the Castle to self-destruct-only to climb out a window and find himself trapped on a narrow balustrade.
. . . He looked over the side. A sheer hundred-foot drop to the gravel. A soft fluted whistle above him caught his ear. He looked up. Only a breath of a wind in the moorings of that bloody balloon! But then a lunatic idea came to him, a flashback to one of the old Douglas Fairbanks films when the hero had swung across the wide hall by taking a flying leap at the chandelier. This helium balloon was strong enough to hold taut fifty feet of framed cotton strip bearing the warning sign! Why shouldn't it be powerful enough to bear the weight of a man?
Bond ran to the corner of the balustrade to which the mooring line was attached. He tested it. It was taut as a wire! From somewhere behind him there came a great clamour in the castle . . . Holding onto the straining rope, he climbed onto the railing, cut a foothold for himself in the cotton banner, and, grasping the mooring rope with his right hand, chopped downwards below him with Blofeld's sword and threw himself into space.
It worked! There was a light night breeze, and he felt himself wafted gently away over the moonlit park, over the glittering, steaming lake, towards the sea. But he was rising, not falling! The helium sphere was not in the least worried by his weight! Then blue-and-yellow fire fluttered from the upper storey of the castle, and an occasional angry wasp zipped past him. . . . Now the whole black silhouette of the castle swayed in the moonlight and seemed to jig upwards and sideways and then slowly dissolve like an ice cream cone in the sunshine. The top storey crumbled first, then the next, and the next, and then, after a moment, a huge jet of orange fire shot up from hell towards the moon. A buffet of hot wind, followed by an echoing crack of thunder, hit Bond and made his balloon sway violently.
. . . Punctured by a bullet, the balloon was fast losing height. Below, the softly swelling sea offered a bed. . . .
It seems clear that Fleming never forgot that most people who read for pleasure read to escape, and that these readers want as much escape as they can get for their time and money.
Are your own characters humdrum and mundane, doing humdrum and mundane things, when they would be so much for interesting being and doing things we've only dreamed of? Fleming knew-and every novelist should remember-that one of the greatest joys of writing is that the impossible can be made possible. Give your readers a run for their money. Let them find true, wonderful escape in the worlds you create for them.
MICKEY SPILLANE
His mystery-detective novels have been called nasty and sadistic, but they've won Spillane millions of fans just the same. The Brooklyn-born son of an Irish bartender began his writing career selling stories to the "slicks" and the "pulps," then writing comic books. His novels, most of them starring rough, tough Mike Hammer (said to resemble his creator), landed Spillane on the all-time best-seller list again and again, from 1947's I, The Jury to the fifties' My Gun is Quick, The Big Kill, One Lonely Night, The Long Wait and Kiss Me, Deadly, to 1961's The Deep.
Technique #4: Torture the Reader to the End Of his method of creating suspense, Spillane said: "You don't read a book to get to the middle. You read a book to get to the end. You deliberately torture yourself all the way through, hoping that after all the garbage the end will be worth all the time you spent in the reading thereof. True? It's got to be totally satisfactory in the last line.
A superb example of how Spillane puts his words into action is the ending of I, The Jury (I've used a few dashes so as not to give anything away):
"No, ----, I'm the jury now, and the judge, and I have a promise to keep. Beautiful as you are, as much as I almost loved you, I sentence you to death." . . .
The roar of the .45 shook the room. ---- staggered back a step. Her eyes were a symphony of incredulity, an unbelieving witness to truth. Slowly, she looked down to the ugly swelling in her naked belly where the bullet went in. A thin trickle of blood welled out.
I stood up in front of her and shoved the gun into my pocket. I turned and looked at the rubber plant behind me. There on the table was the gun, with the safety catch off and the silencer still attached. Those loving arms would have reached it nicely. A face that was waiting to be kissed was really waiting to be splattered with blood when she blew my head off. My blood. When I heard her fall I turned around. Her eyes had pain in them now, the pain preceding death. Pain and unbelief.
"How c-could you?" she gasped.
I only had a moment before talking to a corpse, but I got it in.
"It was easy," I said.
Remember how we all love being surprised, and hold some things back as you write your novel, whatever sort of novel it is. It's a wonderful feeling to read a book and realize that a truly skillful novelist has gotten the best of us. Be careful to play fair with your surprises, however; make them believable and be sure to plant any necessary precedents or clues.
FRANK YERBY
Georgia-born Yerby is best known for his vivid and complex Southern tales, the most successful of which are 1946's The Foxes of Harrow, 1947's The Vixens, and 1949's Pride's Castle. A critic once wrote that "Mr. Yerby could be a pretty good novelist if he ever got his mind off the neckline and the cash register," but the world always welcomed a new Yerby novel unconditionally.
Technique #5: Evoke the Magic of the Moment Yerby is famous for his vivid language, for his multiplicity of characters and for writing, in the words of Arna Bontemps, with "a flair for color, an air of easy abandon, the ability to live in the moment and to create characters that live in the moment, a touch of very elementary magic."
Devilseed is Yerby's story of Mireille Duclos, who, like many women of her time, sails penniless into gold-crazed San Francisco in the 1850s and there climbs to riches and respectability. In this scene we see Mireille riding into town as the new wife of Judge Alain Curtwright.
Mireille's imposing mahogany-and-rosewood-paneled landau swept eastward down Clay Street toward Portsmouth Square, drawn at a spanking trot behind her pair of night-black, imported Australian horses. Perched high on the driver's seat before her, the Swithers brothers, James and John, her coachman and footman, sat, clad in livery every bit as imposing as the landau, their faces, under their tall silk hats, blacker than the hides of her splendid five-gaited pair, set in frowns of stern self-importance.
"Mammy" Pleasant had sent the Blacks to Mireille with a note suggesting that she hire them, which Mireille had been pleased to do, even knowing that Mary Ellen Pleasant had surely placed them in her employ to spy on her. Now, staring at their sturdy backs straining against the frock coats of their livery, she had the wickedly delighted feeling that she had "turned" them both: that they now were, if not wholly on her side, at last double agents. For, by awarding them a treatment involving so much kindness, real consideration, even, at times, an easy, affectionate familiarity that no Black menservants in the 1850s could dream of receiving from a young, stunningly beautiful white woman, she got as much information about Mary Ellen Pleasant's weird, devious, and plain evil doings out of them as they carried back to the house on Washington Street about hers.
As she rolled along, with the rear calash top folded back and the breeze stirring her raven hair under her smart little bonnet, all the men on the sidewalks took off their hats and waved them in her direction. More than one of them grandly bowed. The women-what few there were-glared, and ostentatiously turned their backs. Mireille smiled with quiet satisfaction at that sight. Ever since the fabulous Lola Montez, mistress of the immortal pianist-composer Franz Liszt, mistress of the ex-King Ludwig of Bavaria, mistress of-the list was endless!-whose Spider Dance drove men of the cloth, not to mention mere miners and businessmen, out of their minds, had left San Francisco that preceding fall to settle-permanently, she swore-in the pleasant little California mountain town of Grass Valley, Mireille had inherited, by default, Lola's crown as the most celebrated demimondaine in the city. . . .
Yerby uses details of place and time as tools to evoke character, making Mireille and Mary Ellen functions of where and when they live, and vice versa. The Swithers brothers, coachman and footman, very much a sign of affluence at this time, are the device by which Mary Ellen spies of Mireille, who in turn uses them for the same purpose. We see the people on Clay Street showing their feelings for Mireille through social customs of the place and time-grand bows and waves of the hat from the men, exaggerated turns of the back from the women. Note the use of a real and colorful figure, Lola Montez, to bring Mireille and her role in San Francisco into even sharper focus.
Use these techniques to make the characters in your novel virtually an extension of their place and time. Have them use, abuse and react to objects and customs distinctly of their world, so that we cannot recall these characters without recalling how they were dressed, how they spoke, what they ate and all the other ways they interacted with their world.
Not a person has been born who has not been shaped to some degree by where and when he or she lived. The magic of moment in reading fiction is learning how people live in, adapt to and make use of their where and when as we do with ours.
HAROLD ROBBINS It was a tribute to Robbins's staying power and adaptability that he was as much a titan in 1988 as he was forty years earlier, when he published 1948's Never Love a Stranger.
Robbins's publishers once announced that every minute someone bought a Robbins novel-another tribute to his never having let his public down. Not bad for a poor kid from New York who started his career as a grocery clerk, short-order cook, cashier, errand boy and bookies' runner.
Robbins has been praised most for the authenticity of the world in which he sets his novels. Never Love a Stranger drew heavily from Robbins's experience growing up in New York, and so vividly depicted that world of hustlers and racketeers that one critic called it "a Les Misérables of New York."
Technique #6: Make Background a Character In 79 Park Avenue, in which heroine Marja starts out a poor kid from Second Avenue and winds up a Park Avenue call girl, Robbins describes the seamy beachfront world of prostitution as he no doubt observed it growing up:
She walked into the hotel lobby and chose a seat in a discreet out-of-the-way corner. Opening a copy of Vogue that she had carried with her, she glanced through it idly. . . .
A few minutes passed. Then a bellboy stopped in front of her. "Room three-eleven," he said in a low voice.
"Three-eleven," she repeated, a smile on her lips.
He nodded. "Right. He's waiting there now."
"Thank you." She smiled, holding out her hand.
"You're welcome, miss," the bellboy answered, taking the two bills from her. He walked away quickly.
Slowly she closed the magazine, glancing around the lobby as she stood up. It was normal. The house dick was looking the other way, the desk clerks were busy with check-ins, the other people in the lobby were all guests. Satisfied with her quick check, she sauntered toward the elevators. She had nothing to worry about. Everyone was taken care of. Mac, the landlord of the rooming house, had put her wise to that.
"Pick a place to operate from," he had said knowingly. "Then before you do anything, make sure that everybody who might be interested is paid off. They'll leave you alone then, even help you."
Obviously, Robbins would not have undertaken a novel with a background of prostitution if the hadn't felt he could do so convincingly. But his use of detail and ambiance is what sets this and his other novels apart, makes them as memorable for their depiction of world and place as for their characters.
When deciding on the world in which to place your novel, consider the worlds you know so well that you may be overlooking them entirely. Writers have found these worlds, literally right in front of their noses, to be the richest and to work most authentically. What, after all, does a writer-or anyone-know better than his or her own life and the lives of those he or she has observed firsthand?
Thursday, April 21, 2011
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12:22 AM
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A fat samurai out to kill one thin american....
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Samurai
Friday, April 15, 2011
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11:09 PM
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American re-release trailer for Akira Kurosawa's RASHOMON, now playing in a new 35mm restoration from Janus Films. Visit www.janusfilms.com for more information.
Sunday, April 10, 2011
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8:03 PM
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The Elevens, an anime, jpop and American cover band, performs at Con-Nichiwa in Tucson, Arizona. The band has performed with Toybox and The Slants, and will have another show soon! Mailorder on Vocals Gackto on Bass Jesus on Guitar Wes on Drums (but not in video because he was sick)
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
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12:20 PM
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Stupidity schemes when swallowed by the cursed Epic. Song List: What The Fuck Is That?! - Full Metal Jacket Black Fire - Dragonforce Steel Samurai - Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney King K.Rool's Ship - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Flame of Youth - Dragonforce Ghost Love Score - Nightwish Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger - Daft Punk I Am Your Brother - American Idol Pirate Song - Lazytown Sonic the Hedgehog 3 Title Screen - Snappleman Fallen Angels - Ra Loituma - Levin's Polka Murloc - World of Warcraft EXCUUUUSE Me - Legend of Zelda cartoon Shiilol - ???? Falcon Punch Song - F-Zero (with edits) Together Forever - Rick Astley You're The Best Around - Karate Kid Flower Field - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Gay Bar - Electric Six Soldiers of the Wasteland - Dragonforce First Samurai - Disgaea 2 Planet Colors - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen Master of Shadow - Persona 3 Yoshi's Island - Super Smash Bros. Brawl Explosion Noise - ???? What U Need - Sonic Rush Terrorist's Win - Counterstrike WRYYYY - Jojo's Bizarre Adventure Solid Snake Victory - Super Smash Bros. Brawl
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Machinations
Thursday, March 31, 2011
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10:59 AM
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Get the Complete DVD Boxset: www.importedinventions.com FREE SHIPPING in the USA! An entire world exists unseen, a world that can be accessed only by the mind: the Wired World. A place of freedom - and, occasionally, a place of death. Souma Toru knows the land of the logged-in well, for he and his fearless gang of hackers once had the run of the place. But as tragedy came to call and the group disbanded, he was forced to join the ranks of FLAK: a military organization charged with protecting the hidden data paradise deep within the vast network of servers. Indentured into service and out for revenge, Toru cannot let go of the dead of the past even as a ghost of the present takes shape. Torn with the loneliness and confusion of being trapped between two worlds, there is only one question: what is reality?
Friday, March 25, 2011
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5:50 PM
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Episode 20 My Virus Ate My Homework. Sam's report for school is destroyed by Elizabeth, and Sam feels he's about to face impending doom at school because of this. But that is the least of his worries when Kilokahn, against Malcolm's wishes, releases a mega-virus monster to sound off an alarm system which will apparently trigger warheads throughout the globe. Credit goes to Dic & Cookie Jar Entertainment, Source Footage from Denkou Choujin Gridman
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episode,
Samurai,
Superhuman,
SyberSquad
Sunday, March 20, 2011
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4:03 PM
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who do you call when you want some pepperoni? thats right its the samurai pizza cats a classic 1990's cartoon / anime the one key thing that made this show well its debatable by anime fanatics and that was the dubbing was more of a parody. thats right they had no script fromt he original japanese version to work with they decided to then just change the entire series into a much more comical and hilarious series that constanly broke the fourth wall and also had taken the liberty of adding the narrator who is by my opinion the main reason to watch this show. i give it a 3 out of 5 stars enjoyable sometimes annoying and campy but alot of fun for all ages and a true classic to both american and japanese audiences
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
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2:34 PM
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by Lia Chang/ wp.me "I have the best job in the world!" says Thom Sesma, who is currently starring as the deliciously evil Scar in Disney's The LION KING Las Vegas at Mandalay Bay. I caught Thom's thrilling turn as Scar last year and he is perfectly suited to the villainous role. I was struck by Thom's resemblance to a Samurai, no doubt a nod to Taymor's vast body of work with Asian theatrical art forms. It takes a village to transform Thom, who has starred on Broadway in The Times They Are A-Changin', The Man of La Mancha and La Cage Aux Folles. Disney's THE LION KING celebrated its first anniversary on the Las Vegas Strip at Mandalay Bay on Saturday, May 15, 2010, and this production is Thom's LION KING debut. More than 500000 people have seen the world-renowned show in its debut year. Within nine weeks of its Las Vegas opening, Disney's THE LION KING broke the Mandalay Bay box office record previously held by MAMMA MIA! and then went on to break its own record four more times throughout the year. Las Vegas Magazine said THE LION KING "... transcends cultural boundaries and the limits of the imagination," while CityLife called it "...flat-out brilliant." THE LION KING also was recently named the city's "Best Show" by the staff of the Las Vegas Review-Journal in its annual "Best of Las Vegas" awards. I had a backstage pass to document Thom's remarkable transformation for my newly created Lia Chang Asian Pacific American Theater Photography Portfolio for the Library of ...
Posted by
Tyasia
Labels:
Disneys,
Makeup,
Sesmas,
Transformation,
Vegas
Thursday, March 10, 2011
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12:46 PM
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Um jovem norte-americano torna-se um dos maiores mestre do Ninjitsu, Joe Armstrong (Michael Dudikoff) a mais mortal arte do Oriente. Guerreiro Americano é uma diversão tão certeira quanto a rápida lâmina da espada de um samurai! Servindo nas Filipinas, o soldado americano Joe Armstrong (Michael Dudikoff) participa da escolta de um comboio de suprimentos quando este é emboscado por rebeldes. Ao reconhecer um destes rebeldes como um guerreiro ninja negro. Instintivamente, Joe se defende utilizando a esotérica arte marcial do Ninjitsu, uma habilidade que o torna suspeito do ponto de vista de seu comandante e de seus colegas soldados. Sozinho em sua luta contra a corrupção, o rapaz finalmente descobre o segredo de seu misterioso passado. Um segredo que o coloca frente a frente com o terrível Ninja Estrela Negra, na mais decisiva das batalhas das artes marciais.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
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11:32 AM
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WWII AMERICAN WARRIOR GOES TO WAR Battlestations Pacific
Monday, February 28, 2011
at
10:29 AM
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DESCARGAR (DOWNLOAD) www.4shared.com Otra Song mas de jenny rom muy popular, remasterizada por ¨y aquella XD¨ Ide:El Re: y aquella XD Vid: y aquella XD Lyrics: y aquella XD (Letra, Lyrics) La la la la la la la...... American lover Tattooed with flowers Man strongly muscled, steely heart But lovely lovely baby Wanna be your lady Indiana lover So sweet and sour Man so mysterious, lonely heart So lovely lovely, black and white When I feel blue I wanna be with you "Americano" love me twice But when I see the "Indian of my life" So lovely lovely lovely and you're my man Hey you! ...Not you!!! Who wanna be my lover?? Oh baby don't be glower I'll make you feel so right!!! Hey you! ...Not you!!! Who wanna feel the fever?? It's growing my desire To make you feel so nice!!! La la la la la la la...... Italian lover Spaghetti fever Romantic man with sexy heart So lovely lovely baby I wanna be you lady Japanese lover Oriental flavour Man without liar, noble heart So lovely lovely samurai!!! When I feel blue I wanna be with you "Man Italiano" love me twice But when I see you "Japan Samurai" So lovely lovely lovely and you're my man
Posted by
Tyasia
Labels:
RadioMix
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
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8:06 PM
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American bladesmith Walter Sorrells shows how he forges a wakizashi or Japanese short sword. This short video is excerpted from the smith's three hour intructional DVD "Forging Japanese Swords."
Thursday, February 17, 2011
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2:45 PM
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Japanese Samurai Swords Series - 39 Inch Green Jintachi Review
Japanese Samurai Swords Series - 39 Inch Green Jintachi Overview
Jin Tachi refers to the way the sword attaches to an Obi (worn sash). Two hangers are used attach the sword to the obi, and the blade is hung edge down. This sword is equipped with a stylish 26 inch stainless steel blade. The handle is a cord wrap, which goes well with the partial wrap of the saya (scabbard). The rest of the saya has a bright metallic gold lacquered finish with etched metal accents. The tsuba (guard) is finely detailed with a floral pattern and has an antiqued finish.
Features Include:
- Brilliant antiqued metal accents
- Bright metallic gold lacquered saya
- 26 inch steel blade
- 9.5 inch handle
- 36.5 inches overall without saya, 39 inches with saya
- 39 x 3.5 x 3.25 complete dimension with saya on
Available at Amazon Check Price Now!
*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Feb 18, 2011 05:34:11
Saturday, February 12, 2011
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1:58 PM
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Here's a look at a fun and crazy DVD launch party for American Pie; Book of Love!
Posted by
Tyasia
Labels:
American
Monday, February 7, 2011
at
9:04 AM
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「American Made Samurai Japan Tour 2010」 w/Four Minutes Til Midnight (USA) /fade(東京) /LOTO(東京) /SHIDARE セットリスト1新世界(新曲) 2極楽浄土コミュニケーション3カタルシス4プリズム5Devil's Walk 6WORLD END(新曲) 脚本/グルーヴシネマ極・演出/濱崎 貞嘉サポートベース/濱崎 貞嘉
Posted by
Tyasia
Labels:
20100910
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
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4:27 AM
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TRACTER FABRIQUER ,MOTEUR RENAULT 5,4X4 HOUSING DE SUZUKI SAMURAI,HYDROSTATIC ,tractor.
Posted by
Tyasia
Labels:
TRACTEUR
Friday, January 28, 2011
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2:13 AM
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Part 2 of 3: American Hard Style Boulder Creek Fest Demo 052408
Sunday, January 23, 2011
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1:55 AM
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Another one I made with my seven year old cousin, again me doing all the work. I didn't work to hard on it, but like I seen to need to put in my description, I have the right to have everything in my video. The song is by - All American Rejects Animes I used...(Not many, 'cause I made it on my sisters account, so I don't have all my good clips and junk.) Final Fantesy X-2, Kingdom Hearts II, Naruto, Yogurting, Shugo Chara, Samurai Champloo
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Tyasia
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
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1:36 AM
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There are many symbols of anarchism including cats that have been used over the years to identify and rally supporters for a cause. The cause is usually a protest or political movement against current conditions. With the increase in anti-globalization recently, the symbols of anarchy are starting to reappear.
The black cat was designed by Ralph Chaplin, a prominent figure of the IWW, also known as the Wobblies. The movement started in 1905 and continued through the early 1920's until it was suppressed by the Justice Department under J. Edgar Hoover. It signified wildcat strikes and radical unionism. The symbol has also been associated with witchcraft, bad omens and death.
The black flag has been a symbol of anarchy since the 1880s. It symbolizes defiance and opposition to surrender. The flag has been used by groups opposed to representation. The black flag has also been used in many protests against oppression. It was used by pirates to indicate the lives of a crew would be spared if they surrendered. It was also used during the French and Russian Revolutions by certain protest groups. It is still used today by anarchical movements.
The circled A, where the A stands for anarchy, is one of the best known present day symbols. It was developed by Giuseppe Fanelli, a Freemason, in 1868 and later adopted as a symbol of anarchy. The symbol became a part of the punk rock movement in the 1970's. It was used by the band, Sex Pistols, to signify the punk rock style of music. Although used as a marketing ploy, it increased the awareness of anarchy.
The black cross is a symbol representing a movement to eliminate all prisons. The symbol originated in Russia to support political prisoners. It was adopted by anarchists to signify unity of purpose. The cross was modified from the symbol for the Red Cross to avoid confusion with the Red Cross. It has been associated with black power, women's lib, youth power and the American Indian Movement.
Known as a symbol of piracy, the jolly roger or the skull and cross bones has gained popularity as a symbol of anarchy. Originally used by the Libertatain pirates, it signifies a pirate's way of life free from repressive societies. It has gained popularity with many anarchical movements.
The anarchist symbol, circled A, with a V represents the political philosophy of animal liberation. The philosophy also known as veganism excludes the use of animals for food, clothing or other uses. It was popularized in 1995 by Brian Dominick and is used by animal rights groups. People who actively support this movement are against killing any animal and have strict vegetarian diets.
Other symbols of anarchy not shown above are the wooden shoe, black rose and bisected flags and stars. Each symbol has been used to represent a political movement or protest throughout the world. Depending on the cause, an organization will adapt or create a symbol that best represents it's philosophy.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
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1:34 AM
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Thomas Cole was born in Lancashire, England in 1801, and his family emigrated to America when he was seventeen years of age. He trained first as an engraver of woodblocks that were used in printing calico. He learned the basic of art from John Stein, and then attended Pennsylvania School of Fine Arts. He also spent a year engraving woodblocks in Phildelphia. In 1823 he went joined his family in Pittsbough, where he drew many cityscapes. He then moved to New York.
He traveled to Europe on a number of occasions to study the masters and his paintings in New York became more saleble as they depicted American scenes painted in the European style.
Thomas painted a number of landscapes and offered them for sale and George W Bruen purchased many of them and then financed a trip up the Hudson River. An area that many painters used often for inspiration in their work and they become known as the Hudson River School. The Hudson River School consisted of a group of artists who could see the uniqueness of the American landscape, and tried to capture it. America was a new country at that time with little tradition and not a lot of political power in the world. Some reasoned that the way to "move up" was to exploit the beauty of America's scenery in paintings or landscapes. The waterfalls, mountains, deserts and forests were different to the ones in Europe.
Thomas became a writer of these "things American", extolling the virtues of the new continent. He was scathing on modern society as it was becoming too complicated. He also painted landscapes with figures, but to enhance the position of nature in the order of things, he painted the figures smaller.
He married Maria Bartow, whose father owned a studio that Cole rented. They were both deeply religious people and were active members of the Episcopal Church.
Thomas Cole died on 1848 in New York after a few months of poor health.
He left many works that have truly brought the unique America landscapes to the attention of people all over the world. It is a good thing to own a Thomas Cole painting.
Monday, January 3, 2011
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1:29 AM
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Get the Complete DVD Boxset with FREE SHIPPING in the USA: www.importedinventions.com At the beginning of the Edo Era, when people enjoyed a time of peace, Lord Tokugawa Tadanaga holds a fighting tournament. In the past, matches were fought with wooden swords. This time, real swords will be used. One-armed Fujiki Gennosuke and blind Irako Seigen will fight each other in this match. Both are disciples of Iwamoto Kogan, who is known as Japan's greatest swordsman. Each of them are determined to prove himself the successor of Iwamoto's school. However, there can only be one champion. So begins a story of intertwining fates, conflict, and strange destinies. Two damaged warriors wear the scars of a twisted and violent past. Bitter rivals for the secrets of their master's sword and the right to his daughter, these samurai inflict wounds on each other that would destroy lesser men. The final chapter of their saga unfolds within a brutal samurai tournament, a gruesome contest arranged to satisfy the bloodlust of a cruel tyrant overlord. The disfigured legends of the blade must summon the strength for one last battle - a final lesson in the artistry of violence where nothing is more beautiful than the kill. Special Features: Marathon Play, Actor and Director Episode Commentaries, Production Artwork Galleries, Textless Songs.
