Tag: reblog

PIETY, PRANKS, AND PARTIES: EASTER MEDIEVAL STYLE – Reblog – Alli Templeton

Easter in the very olden days of yore.
Plus, there were eggs.

In medieval times, life revolved around the church, and the year was marked out by a series of religious festivals, customs and holidays of which Christmas and Easter were the main events. But contrary to many a modern perception, people in the Middle Ages had more time off than we do today. And although there was a good deal of attending church and religious rituals and processions, these did bring the community together, and they also knew how to kick back and have fun.

The Easter period would start with Shrove Tuesday, a secular holiday involving boisterous games and sports. After this, the fun gave way to the fasting period of Lent, when churches were hung with veils and crosses shrouded. Little observed today, if anything we brace ourselves to give up chocolate or booze for the requisite 40 days, but they took it much more seriously in the Middle…

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THE WOUNDED HEART OF PARIS – Sue Vincent (Reblog)

Many people wonder if we, as humans, will survive as long as Notre Dame stood. Maybe we can gain hope as Notre Dame is reborn.

 

Sue Vincent's Daily Echo

Notre Dame de Paris.
The three images of the Cathedral are photographs of postcards in my Parisian diaries.

The white dome of the Sacré-Cœur, floating like some fairy tale castle against the blackness was my very first glimpse of Paris. It was a school trip, we were no more than children… and I fell in love with the city there and then. My eyes filled with tears, my heart with memories and emotions that should not have been mine, I felt that I had come home.

We stayed at the Lycée Henri-IV, just behind the Pantheon. Sneaking out, illicitly, before breakfast, very early next morning, I found myself wandering down the Rue Mouffetard. A tramp was curled around his wine bottle in a doorway. Market stalls were being set up. Everything smelled of coffee and new bread… and I determined that one day, when I was old enough, I would…

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The Mystery Of The World’s Greatest Butterfly Migration – Reblog – Science!

MONARCH BUTTERFLIES AND THEIR TRAVELS!

ScienceSwitch

Every winter, tens of millions of butterflies travel up to 4,500 km from all over North America to spend the winter hanging from oyamel fir trees in central Mexico’s mountain forests. But how does an animal with a brain the size of a poppy seed travel safely through to this one special place?

Via – It’s Okay To Be Smart

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EDWARD AND ELEANOR: A ROYAL LOVE STORY SET IN STONE – Alli Templeton – Reblog

A love story out of olden times. Love lives on.

A royal wedding in medieval times was all about sealing alliances and striking political deals, so emotional entanglements didn’t usually enter the equation. Consequently, it was common for husbands in royal and elite circles to play the field, often enjoying a string of dalliances or even find lasting extra-marital love. But occasionally there was a true success story, and in 1254 a diplomatic marriage between two teenagers began a lifelong devotion between one of our most powerful warrior kings and his Spanish queen that has left its mark on our landscape to this day.

It started with a squabble over Gascony, England’s last remnant of its former Angevin lands. A new and ambitious Spanish king, Alfonso X, was laying claim to this territory of the English King Henry III and the stage was set for a fight. Alfonso backed a Gascon rebellion, and the province began to fall to the…

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Meet William Barr, The Man You Never Got To Know

Read and learn!

THE SHINBONE STAR

William Barr during his 1991 confirmation hearing before the Senate

Editor’s Note:First of two parts on U.S. Attorney General William Barr and his secret life with the CIA leading up to his first time in the position under President George H. W. Bush, with Part Two coming soon. Stay tuned.

To tell the complete story of William Barr’s intrigues requires a book. This two-part story merely reveals a few monumental examples.

Barr is the spawn of the last Cold Warriors, an infinitely powerful group of affluent white men who dominated the U.S. intelligence apparatus for four decades. He was assigned to the China Desk, a rookie working for America’s greatest spooks who were busy running numerous “black” Southeast Asian operations.

The China Desk’s biggest job in the early 1970s was the Vietnam War’s “Phoenix” program, an effort to murder South Vietnamese who ran afoul of the U.S.-installed regime. Another…

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Whatever else he may be, Trump at least is not an ostrich – REBLOG – The Shinbone Star

I find it so much easier to let other people say what I’m thinking. It’s a lot less exhausting than writing these things myself. And you know the WORST thing (personally) about all this mess? It has ruined my retirement. It has taken the relaxation and dredged it with dirt and horror stories. After a lifetime of horror stories, I thought I might get a little time off.

I guess not.

THE SHINBONE STAR

Ostriches don’t bury their heads in the sand like Trump often does — they wouldn’t be able to breathe! That exonerates Donald Trump from being an ostrich. Greater flamingos however do. They bury their bills and often their entire heads in wet sand to suck up muddy water looking for bottom feeders they thrive on.

That’s where Trump apparently feeds every day, feasting on the offal left at the bottom of the White House swamp by his Cabinet to fortify his ego. This is important because it helps explain why Trump is up to his ass in alligators and can still pretend that all is well in Mudville.

Monday Mr. Trump tweeted:

“Now that the long awaited Mueller Report conclusions have been released, most Democrats and others have gone back to the pre-Witch Hunt phase of their lives before Collusion Delusion took over. Others are pretending that their former hero…

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After whitewashing of the Mueller Report, a hard rain is gonna fall

It’s pretty much what we expected, isn’t it?

THE SHINBONE STAR

— Norman Rockwell

Why should we be surprised that Special Counsel Robert Mueller allegedly found that President Donald Trump did not collude with Russia to win the 2016 presidential election? And for the record, instead of “collusion” why don’t we just say “collaboration?”

During World War II, citizens who fraternized with Nazis were accused, convicted, and often put to death for collaborating.

There’s a sharp difference between the two words.

People shouldn’t be discouraged that after two years and several convictions of his henchmen, Donald J. Trump has apparently emerged unscathed in Mueller’s report, at least as Attorney General William Barr would have us believe.

And Trump is already beginning to reap his revenge. Just hours after the report and his crowing twits, he announced the attempt to totally repeal the Affordable Healthcare Act, a Barack Obama signature victory.

Never mind that thousands of Americans will lose their healthcare, many of…

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