Here and Now...What's Happening?

[Bluegreen]

Posted by Iloveyou (here)

Posted by dan33 (here)
Sharing wonderful pictures. Art is Earth.

here is one more

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=0feNVUwQA8U

images of such elegance, sweetness and spirit can only be found in Paris, France
(but I might be wrong)

* * * *

[eaglespirit]

...and so it is : ) Love, Love, Love!!!

https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...l=1#post981112

[dan33]

Hi ILOVEYOU.
I'm in Paris Now. Was you who chose this beautiful tall woman for tonight's party? .......I feel.... we'll talk tomorrow.

[araucaria]

Here in France we are in the final third week of the Tour de France, a cycle race that has a huge publicity caravan preceding the racers and millions of campers and holiday-makers joining cycling enthusiasts along the 3,000 km circuit. It is also a big TV soap for several hours each afternoon, combining the sport with stunning pictures of the beautiful regions and landmarks of France, so there’s something for everyone, granny included. So not only is there big money in all this, it is also a good way of pushing in people’s faces that the circus they are witnessing is not all it appears. Doping is so firmly established, and detection is so consistently lagging behind, that all the leaders are being prejudged by the public at large on the basis of the past sins of their predecessors. Deniability is still in place, but it is no longer very plausible. When accusations are made, they fall on the riders, who are (with the one major exception of Lance Armstrong) mostly nice fellows grinding out a living, i.e. deflected away from the team sponsors, most notably Sky, which as a sports TV channel has several fingers in this pie. Not only do they control how images come into people’s living-rooms, they have turned it into a campaign of self-promotion, with their advertisement on the yellow jersey of the winner, whose identity has never been in doubt almost from the get-go.

Cycling is a team sport and this is the level at which any doping takes place. It has become institutionalized, and since money is involved, it is not only a breach of sporting ethics, it is a crime. And since several individuals are involved, that makes it a conspiracy. Hence the disconnect, the loophole, is between the presumption of innocence that is rightly a cornerstone of our legal system, and the presumption of guilt that assails anyone who is not totally naïve. And clearly there are large numbers of people who once bitten are now twice shy: the technical and tactical aspects of the event have pretty well disappeared from media stories and online comments sections.

Team Sky has been building its image of cleanness in comparison with what went on before. Many former Tour de France winners have been stripped of their titles, most notably seven-time winner Lance Armstrong; but there has been a lack of clean riders in the top twenty to name a real winner. So dope testing is working, albeit too late for realtime bans. You can build a clean image by rejecting anyone remotely connected with doping bans. But if winning means making the classic climbs at similar speeds to the proven dopers, then you can be expected to come under suspicion, not of anything provable at this time, but of being both literally and metaphorically one step ahead.

However, during the last twenty years, a new method has been being tested, which shows that the belated bans hit 62.5% of those who failed this new test, which is itself not foolproof.
http://www.lemonde.fr/tour-de-france...7_1616918.html

The interesting part of this new test lies in the different method – no longer screening for known substances while unknown ones are being missed, but defining what is humanly possible in the toughest situations on steep mountains, and then measuring actual performances with a radar-type technique, classing the inhuman ones into suspects, miracle-men and mutants. The threshold is set at an output of 410 watts (more precisely 7W/kg); although some proven cheats would have been missed, beyond that threshold there is reportedly no way you are not cheating somehow. Half of the 30 suspects (up to 430 watts) have been caught, ditto 73% of the 15 miracle-men (up to 450 watts), and all 3 mutants (over 450 watts). These are average values. While what I have to say is not dependent on these figures being correct, they sound about right in confirming that current testing is pretty good (but not good enough), but mostly too slow.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/oth...s-rage-on.html

Of course, any presumption of cheating is predicated on the assumption that we are dealing with humans. We can question this basic assumption in two ways. We may be dealing with clean humans on a doped bike – for example, a miniaturized motor would give you an extra edge at certain crucial moments (accelerating past the opposition), and there is evidence to suggest this is something that is going on. There are the guys who can effortlessly leave the field standing, and another guy who falls off his bike and his rear wheel carried on spinning.
http://www.lequipe.fr/Cyclisme-sur-r...soupcon/547773
http://www.lequipe.fr/Cyclisme-sur-r...efiance/574244

These are things that the ‘radar’ check will test positive, since it doesn’t matter whether the free energy is coming from – the man or the bike. By far the likelier cause of outrageous performances is a doped bicycle, which is a problem because the only way to test the bike specifically would be to make the tubular frame out of some transparent material.

If it is not the bike, then the other way we can question this basic assumption that we are dealing with humans is by taking seriously the not entirely serious comments that are becoming increasingly frequent – seriously enough to want to test the idea of a new kind of doping on an altogether novel, inhuman level; namely that some of these guys are either literally “extraterrestrials”, “aliens”, “from another planet” – no traditional doping required on straight non-humans. “Sky’s the limit” is another phrase being bandied about.



Or failing that, we could be dealing with “mutants”, “miracle-men”, i.e. humans that have somehow been modified to enhance their performance beyond the normally expected levels. But of course you would definitely need a man with pretty exceptional physical abilities anyway. Team Sky’s main rider is Christopher Froome, a Kenya-born Brit with an unusually high forehead and currently the comfortable Tour de France leader.

Froome appears to have a physiology superior to fellow athletes. His resting heart rate is as low as 29 beats per minute, while his 30-minute power output in the peak form before winning the 2013 Tour de France was 459 watts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Froome#Physiology

Another element in the controversy has been the leaking of videos with Froome’s personal physiological data; at one point he is caught accelerating to a peak of 1028 watts!
http://www.eurosport.fr/cyclisme/tou...22/story.shtml
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/oth...ing-storm.html
http://www.theguardian.com/sport/201...ng-allegations

Team Sky is apparently happy to provide personal physiological data of this kind and dispute the analysis made of them. This I would say is because the issue does not lie there at all. Providing figures is merely a way of saying tautologically they can do this because they are physically equipped to do so. It does not explain how the goalposts have been moved to make previously impossible performances possible. No doubt some genetic analysis would be required to distinguish between individuals with new abilities and the rest of us. If this is not done now, then later will be too late: the moving goalposts will be validated unwittingly and tacitly, once and for all. Alternatively, if it were to be done, then a new division would be needed between humans and non-humans/mutants, on similar lines to junior/senior, lightweight/heavyweight, men/women divisions in other sports. Quite obviously, you only have to look at the gender issue to understand that this is a distinction that is nowhere near happening.

Given that a) it is a fact of life that sportswomen’s performances are way below men’s, and b) in sports such as tennis, women’s prize money has risen to parity or near parity (the rightness of which is not in question), and c) cheating is rife in sport, then the logical conclusions are that d) it would be rather amazing if no one was trying to take advantage of the situation, and e) there would be efforts to make the real rationale of the situation taboo, behind the shield of irrelevant political incorrectness, including race. Hence in the case of tennis, any real debate would have no place for the ‘femininity police’ mentioned in the article below.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentis...ininity-police

Counter-intuitively, as we have moved away from the simple male/female dichotomy towards a more varied landscape, gender issues have become increasingly touchy. Gender testing used to exist in the old days of East Germany simply because some athletes were liable to fail the test – not because they personally were cheating, but because they were part of a federation that placed winning over any other concern. Similarly the delightful Williams sisters can be safely removed altogether from our discussion of this issue, since they would actually be major victims of this scam. One thing that is well established in tennis is the prevalence of pushy parents and over-ambitious coaches and trainers, and additionally, in the case of girls, sexually abusive males in positions of authority. In France, we recently had the case of the father who ended up in jail for lacing his kid’s opponents’ drinks bottles with a tranquillizer: one opponent was a young adult, who got killed driving home from the match. And we have had allegations of sexual abuse from top female professionals. You also have Patty Schnyder, who reached world n°7, and whose ex-husband, trainer and guru is apparently in trouble with the law for dilapidating her 8 million+ prize money. So this is very much not conspiracy theory but mainstream news.

I would make two points: a) while the Williams’ huge success in the women’s game may or may not be due to some degree to a dose of masculinity, to put it clumsily, this particular instance masks a wider issue: in the absence of regulations to the contrary, anyone possessing ID marked “F” is rightfully entitled to enter women’s competitions, which nowadays could have the unfortunate effect of taking certain levels of competition outside of most women’s physical range; b) with regard specifically to the Williams case, the only aspect of this situation that deserves, but is unlikely to get, investigation would be the scenario whereby their father and coach, who admits to having pushed them from too early an age and indeed planned their careers before they were born (legal forms of abuse), maybe abused them in this altogether more serious way for obvious motives of financial gain.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richar...ennis_coach%29
http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/will...laugh-1.319173

So once again, we have, beneath the layer of misguided, misdirected suspicions of the corruption now rampant in most areas of society, more of these other suspicions that are not unprovable, merely politically untestable. This has reached such a pitch that the armchair sportsman aka couch potato is disturbed by being no longer sure if he is watching men or mutants, cycling or motor cycling, women’s tennis or men’s. Beyond the merits or demerits of any particular instance, what can be said with a fair degree of certainty is that, as with politics, for large numbers of ordinary people the age of innocence is well and truly over.

[dan33]

"Hi ILOVEYOU! I do not feel good at this table. What awaits me tomorrow?"
Call me please.
(Previously in ILOVEYOU-DAN33 TV SERIES. ILoveYou invites Dan33 to Paris. IloveYou can not be with Dan33, so she organizes dinners and events for Dan not to feel alone.)

[Iloveyou]

Dan, I love your creativity and your excellent humor. At other times and in other places we would have shot 1735 episodes of that series, the plot seems highly promising. But Iloveyou feels the need to hide in the woods of Brittany for a while.

You see, in Paris you're never to be alone.

“The facades of the houses are worn and faded, but they are not intimidating. In the concierge's loge the canaries are already singing or taking a bath. The sidewalks are lined with trees and the birds are chirping madly. The aroma of fresh-baked bread greets the nostrils, the stalls are full of fruit, the butcher has set out his most attractive cuts. People are carrying their groceries home in their two arms. The stationer is selling the morning papers. It is a quiet humdrum routine, soothing to the nerves. The day does not begin with a bang; it sneaks in like a young girl who has been up all night. I go from shop to shop selecting what I need. I do this for each meal. Occasionally I have lunch at a nearby restaurant. On the way home I stop sometimes to pay my respects to the stationer; I buy a book which he recommands just for the pleasure of chatting with him a little longer. At the corner I sit down to have a black coffee with a dash of rum. At the tobacconist's I stop to buy a pack of cigarettes and have another drink. No hurrying. The day is interminable.”

Leave those strange partys and go strolling along the streets, I'll join you when I'm back.

[PurpleLama]

Posted by thunder24 (here)

Posted by PurpleLama (here)
I got me a gorilla cart, for hauling around all these straw bales I got. I'm going to be trying out bale gardening in the woods, where the soil is basically sand and clay with a thin layer of humus on top (carrots are the only thing that ever grew). The new wagon will also be one heck of a toy.

Sure wish we were seeing Flash around these parts.

pictures???????

Dusk is coming on right now as I was waiting for the upload, and I heard a ruckus as Ishtar got chased out of the chicken shed.

[RunningDeer]

Lots of folks rushing around today. Is it because it’s Friday? At least five people went through stop signs. All before lunch time.

I saw lots of babies and toddlers that were filled with giggles and smiles. One of their missions is to remind us of here and now. They're the keepers of purity and freedom. And they open up spaces for us to see who or what we’ve allow to be joy-stealers.

♡

[Selkie]

Posted by PurpleLama (here)

Posted by thunder24 (here)

Posted by PurpleLama (here)
I got me a gorilla cart, for hauling around all these straw bales I got. I'm going to be trying out bale gardening in the woods, where the soil is basically sand and clay with a thin layer of humus on top (carrots are the only thing that ever grew). The new wagon will also be one heck of a toy.

Sure wish we were seeing Flash around these parts.

pictures???????

Attachment 30644

Dusk is coming on right now as I was waiting for the upload, and I heard a ruckus as Ishtar got chased out of the chicken shed.

I have to tell you...I love chickens. I love that purring-like sound they make.

[mo mo]

Here it is, 3:06p.m. in my neck of the woods. Here? Owensboro, KY. USA. Just a podunk little town but it's nice. Anyhoo, I am sitting at my desk and reading these little blurbs about daily life snags and I start thinking about my routine for today. Well I went to bed at 8: 15 a.m. this morning finally tired and I remember thinking, man I cannot go to sleep, but I have to I am so tired! I finally managed to dose off. When I woke up it was to find all the pets in my bed sleeping with me. I wondered why they were? Oh well. Mine is not to reason why but just know, they love me and find their comfort by being near me. It's as simple as that. I get up as I can't tary long in bed when I awake as my bladder let's me know, I have to get up and go relieve myself. I then go to the kitchen and fix my breakfast, whatever I can assemble. I can't do much as I am disabled and it can be a hastle. My lower back feels like it's gonna break. That's the first pain of the day whenever I get around; my back starts to protest, my right hip is another. So goes my days. I am caught up in these snares after having 3 strokes and heart failure brought on by Diabetes no doubt. If I had, had any inkling the diabetes would lead to these problems would it have made a difference or just be postponed? Just postponed I think. I am chained to a walker now and feel like I need a wheel chair but my Doc says he won't prescribe one for me. I might surprise him and get one anyway. It's gonna cost without medical insurance but I have need of it. He does not understand that.
Anyway, about breakfast, I fix what I am able to and then go back to my bedroom to eat it and peruse the internet. Sometimes I get a wild hair and decide to suffer through fixing eggs and toast and bacon or so if I have it. I like my eggs see. I like my coffee too. Sometimes I fix some as my son comes wandering in to see if I am setting things on fire or not. lol! Oh geez! I get a phone call, it's one of home health workers saying she' coming in 10 minutes for my bath. Routine on Fridays. I call her back to tell her I got the message abnd I'll be ready for her arrival. About the internet, I have specific things I do like FARMERAMA, Friendly Farmers Forum, and FACEBOOK games like CRIMINAL CASE, etc. I don't play too many games but I like to occupy my mind a little bit each day. I like to play solitaire when I can too. Otherwise I like to go outside in my backyard and sit and swing. I can't garden anymore as I can't bend down to do it. So I enjoy the fruits of my plantings from the past. At least I have those. I reconcile myself to bygone days of when I could do things and could walk without aid and do for myself, an independent spirit. Heck, I could even play the guitar and sing; those were the days my friends, I thought they'd never end, we'd sing and dance forever and again. We'd pick the life we'd choose, we'd fight and never lose, those were the days, oh yes those were the days. And so my saga comes to an end sorta. I don't wanna relinquish my grasp entirely. I ain't ready to give up. I am still here, living and breathing and when I need to, I protest my helplessness. I am still fighting my existence. I am. I got my rest , now I am ready to do battle with life as I know it.

p.s. oh! I noticed somebody has the same name as my real name; Jean Marie! Funny I hardly ever run across that name. I am nonplussed. Hi. Nice to meet somebody with the same name. That's a trip! I must be in the right place then!
Boy, I had a lot to say. Holy smokes! Anyway I hope y'all will read what I said and can understand where I am coming from. I opened myself to you. It's as if I feel the caring already in your midst. That's good ain't it?

Take care and ttyl. taa taa!
3:19 p.m. now here.

[RunningDeer]

Posted by mo mo (here)
I got my rest , now I am ready to do battle with life as I know it.

p.s. oh! I noticed somebody has the same name as my real name; Jean Marie! Funny I hardly ever run across that name. I am nonplussed. Hi. Nice to meet somebody with the same name. That's a trip! I must be in the right place then!
Boy, I had a lot to say. Holy smokes! Anyway I hope y'all will read what I said and can understand where I am coming from. I opened myself to you. It's as if I feel the caring already in your midst. That's good ain't it?

Take care and ttyl. taa taa!
3:19 p.m. now here.

Hello mo mo,

Welcome to Avalon and to the Village. Thank you for sharing your story. You’ll catch bits and piece of ours over time.

I’ll share one thing about me. It’s important to hear what I tell myself. The brain is like a computer. What I feed it/program it, it’ll put out in kind. So for me, life is not a battle. It’s an opportunity to work out the kinks in a beliefs that no longer serve me and to discover the greater picture of why I’m here. Those alone keep me busy.

There’s more, but instead I wanted to bring up your name sake….Jean-Marie. She’ll be back soon. Here’s her post that explains her adventure. And if you're unable to check out the YouTube videos, I’ll add my response to her and add them here:

“Jean-Marie, enjoy the 30 days change-up at 'Napowan Adventure Base'. No doubt it’s a great place for new challenges and treasured memories for everyone. It never ceases to amaze me how many diverse skills you participate in on an on-going basis, including an instructor at the rifle and shotgun range.”

Two highlights: shooting sports @ 2:20 & COPE - Challenging Outdoor Personal Experience @ 5:33

Napowan Adventure Base

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=NlOZy4WuwcU

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Tndquzv_yQI

RunningDeer <3

[ulli]

Hello Mo Mo
Welcome to the Village, a place where healing can take place.
All sorts of ailments have disappeared, here...simply vanished.
And each time you posts and someone reads it,
you will get the benefits of these surging waves of energetic remedies.
Be well. Blessings.

[Playdo of Ataraxas]

Posted by PurpleLama (here)

Posted by thunder24 (here)

Posted by PurpleLama (here)
I got me a gorilla cart, for hauling around all these straw bales I got. I'm going to be trying out bale gardening in the woods, where the soil is basically sand and clay with a thin layer of humus on top (carrots are the only thing that ever grew). The new wagon will also be one heck of a toy.

Sure wish we were seeing Flash around these parts.

pictures???????

Attachment 30644

Dusk is coming on right now as I was waiting for the upload, and I heard a ruckus as Ishtar got chased out of the chicken shed.

That looks great PL! Nice and homey. Are they laying yet?

[mo mo]

Hiya, wow this is awesome! My son and I went to Camp Roy C. Manchester for his boyscouting. I attended Camp Shantituck in Sheperdsville, KY. as I am a former girlscout. That is so wild!!

P.S. Running Deer heya! man, oh man where'd that avatar come from? When I saw that I was trippin as it looks like me for real . Like I have a twin somewhere or so. lol! I need an avatar but I dunno how to get one. Maybe somebody will help with that?

Mo Mo

[RunningDeer]

Posted by mo mo (here)
Hiya, wow this is awesome! My son and I went to Camp Roy C. Manchester for his boyscouting. I attended Camp Shantituck in Sheperdsville, KY. as I am a former girlscout. That is so wild!!

P.S. Running Deer heya! man, oh man where'd that avatar come from? When I saw that I was trippin as it looks like me for real . Like I have a twin somewhere or so. lol! I need an avatar but I dunno how to get one. Maybe somebody will help with that?

Mo Mo

The avatar is me and I turned it into a cartoon. If you want to PM me a picture, I can cartoon you. Some other choices are go to the top of menu to ‘Settings’, then the left side to ‘Edit Avatar’ for your own or one of the ‘General Avatars’ there or a favorite picture off the web.

RunningDeer <3

[Ernie Nemeth]

Hi mo mo. What a coincidence. I am currently doing a job for a customer. The name of their establishment is: Mo Mo Hair Salon!

Welcome to Avalon

[RunningDeer]

My nephew had his high school graduation party. I added design to the front and back of the money envelop. ♡

Here are a couple more:

[Selkie]

Greetings, mo mo, and welcome to Avalon

[Billy]

Posted by Jean-Marie (here)
Hello village!

I wanted to share what I have been working on. It is no where as near beautiful as Ulli's gardens! So many of you have shared such beautiful picture of your work. Dennis, I love your guitars! Silkie, your painting of the lioness was so inspiring!

This is a blanket that I am working on for a friends grandchild that is coming in June! Lots of healing loving intent is being poured into this blanket that I am crocheting.

I will post another update as I finish the blanket and hat and embellish with tiny blue little roses!

Thank you Jean. And here is blanket and grandson united from across the world.

[dan33]

I'm reading GOOD FELLAS Script. Wonderful.

HENRY (V.O)
There was James and Tommy and me.
And there was Anthony Stabile,
Franky Carbone, Fat Andy, Frankie
the Wop, Freddy No Nose, Pete the
Killer, Johnny Bianco, Mikey
Franzese, and Jimmy Two Times, who
got that nickname because he said
everything twice. Like, 'You
wanna get the papers, get the
papers. '


Until 0:46

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ZAaTpMQ5alw

The song "Il cielo in una stanza" Scorsese used later on Dolce&Gabbana's spot.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CjGilRnXLAk