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Phil Anselmo cumple 43 años

El ex-vocalista de Pantera cumple hoy 43 años.
Philip Hansen Anselmo nació el 30 de junio de 1968 en New Orleans, Luisiana. Se hizo mundialmente conocido por ser el cantante del famoso grupo Pantera.
Tras la desaparición de Pantera, Anselmo ha estado embarcado en varios grupos y actualmente su principal proyecto es Down, pero también está en Arson Anthem.
Posee el sello discográfico The Housecore Records.

The Honored Dead by Joseph Braude (Plus Giveaway)

Part of Synopsis From Tour Site:

Joseph Braude is the first Western journalist ever to secure embed status with an Arab security force, assigned to a hardened unit of detectives in Casablanca who handle everything from busting al-Qaeda cells to solving homicides. One day he’s given the file for a seemingly commonplace murder: a young guard at a warehouse killed in what appears to be a robbery gone wrong. Braude is intrigued by the details of the case: the sheer brutality of the murder, the identities of the accused—a soldier—and the victim, a shadowy migrant with links to a radical cleric, and the odd location: a warehouse owned by a wealthy member of one of the few thriving Jewish communities in the Arab world. After interviewing the victim’s best friend, who tearfully insists that the true story of the murder has been covered up by powerful interests, Braude commits to getting to the bottom of it.


This will probably sound a little strange coming from a mystery fan, but I have never really enjoyed reading about real crime.  I have tended to stay away from true crime books, I think mainly because they seem sensationalized to me.  I've always gotten the impression that the author cares more about making money than telling an accurate and fair story.  Because of that bias, I almost passed on this book.  I wasn't sure it would be something I could really enjoy or get into.  I was somewhat familiar with the author's work in journalism, so I was hoping for a little bit more of a story, less "pizazz."  


I was also intrigued by the setting of this book, Morocco.  I'll be the first to admit I know almost nothing about that region of the world other than what I see in the news.  It wasn't a region we really ever studied in school, which I still think the Middle East, Africa, and Asia should get more attention but that's another thought for a different post.  The book itself takes place in the country's largest city, Casablanca.  Now this may sound dumb, but I've never even thought of Casablanca outside the movie, which I've never seen.  So the idea of reading a book set in a country in Northern Africa that I'm not at all familiar with, hooked me.  That was all I needed to set my hesitations aside and dig in.


The book opens after the author has already embedded with the 5th precinct in Casablanca.  He has already witnessed both sides of the way the police force deal with crime and suspects.  Sometimes the heavy hand of violence comes out and others an almost strange emphasis on human rights.  I almost felt as if the police force was schizophrenic in it's approach to the populace of the city.  They can't quite make up their minds on what direction the country should go in.  I will also say that their definition and my definition of human rights probably don't compare very well.


It's not longer after that he is handed a file on the murder of a homeless
Berber man on the property of a Jewish owned warehouse.  The author, who's mother was an Iraqi Jew knows how sensitive of a subject, Judaism and Jews can be in a Muslim country.  The file states that the killer, a member of the military, has already been detained and confessed.  Mr. Braude quickly becomes interested in the case as it deals with cultural, ethnic, religious, and society issues all rolled up into one.  He takes it upon himself to delve into the case further and once he meets the best friend of the murdered man, the author finds himself agreeing to help the friend prove the police are lying about what happened.


The investigation takes them into the shanty towns of Casablanca and rural villages miles away from the city.  They discover that not only are the authorities lying about what happened. but that their are larger motives at work.  It just so happens that they authorities feel that if the truth comes out it will damage societal structures as a whole, so they see it as their duty to hide the truth.


I actually find that concept fairly interesting.  I find the idea of a government or government official covering up the truth of a crime to be rather abhorrent and against what I instinctively feel would happen in this country.  Then I start to think a little more and realize that governments, including ours, constantly try to hide or blur the truth in order to protect "the common good."  What that common good is, I have no idea, but I do know people are always talking about it.  All you have to do is look at the Pat Tillman case and realize that no country is clean of this behavior.


I really got into this book and found myself caring about the case.  I wanted to know what happened to this man and why he had to die.  I found myself sympathizing with him when certain aspects of his life came out.  I would think, but for the fact of where I was born, I could have found myself living the same life.


I even liked the way this book forced me to dust off my sociology degree and delve into the cultural aspects of a country that has so many ethnic and religious layers to it.  It was an insightful look into a way of life and thinking that I'm not at all familiar with, and I thank the author for that.


I would like to also express my thanks to Lisa of TLC Book Tours for the opportunity to read and review this book.  You can read so more insightful (and better written) reviews by visiting the tour page.


Now for the GIVEAWAY!


You will have a chance to win a copy of this book for yourself.  All you have to do is leave a comment with your email address, that's it.  I would love for you to start following the blog as well, but you don't have to.  The giveaway is only open for the US and Canada.


The contest will be open until 11:59 CST on 7/13/11.  After the deadline I will pick a winner using random.org.  I will then email the winner who will have 48 hours to contact me with their shipping info.  If they do not, a new winner will be picked.

Cenários: "A Vingança do Lobo" parte 1

Sem entrar em spoilers, gostaria de partilhar convosco alguns dos locais reais usados nos livros e contos de "Crónicas Obscuras", a começar pelo Parque Nacional de Olympic, localizando na Península de Olympic, no canto noroeste do estado de Washington, EUA.

Favorite Fictional Character --- Kissyfur

I'm of two minds on this weeks FFC post.  First of all, I've really enjoyed this month's theme and all the bear characters I've been able to highlight.  Characters that I love and am so grateful for the opportunity to revisit them.  I'm also a little sad because will this not only be the last post of the month, it will be the last post I write for the next two months.  During July and August there will be 9 different guest bloggers letting us in on some of their favorite fictional characters.  So with no further ado, I'll present you to Kissyfur, the cutest darn bear cub to ever grace Paddlecab County.

Kissyfur, who's  pictured with Beehonie, was a bear cub who started off life with tragedy.  At a young age, Kissyfur's mother passed away leaving him ans his father, Gus, all alone.  They were a circus family and after her death, neither one of them felt like performing anymore.  When their circus train is derailed into a swamp, they use the opportunity, and escape into Paddlecab County.

Kissyfur and his dad settle down and start a new life.  Kissyfur goes to school with other kids who live in the swamp.  He quickly becomes friends with Beehonie, an adorable little beaver named Toot, a fussy pig named Duane, and Stucky the porcupine.  Unfortunately Kissyfur's life isn't without a bully, a pudgy little warthog named Lennie loves to call him sissy face.  Lennie's dad isn't much better, he tries to make Gus' life harder as well.  Gus has started a paddle boat taxi service for residents of the swamp, and Lennie's dad doesn't want it to succeed.  

The best part of this cartoon, other than Kissyfur himself, were the alligators who were always trying to eat them.  Floyd and Jolene, thankfully aren't the sharpest tools in the shed, and they are always bungling their attempts to get a hold of Kissyfur.  They were hilarious spoilers for the young hero and I never got tired of him and his dad outsmarting them.

What I loved about Kissyfur and this show, and not something I really appreciated until years later, was what it taught me about life.  No matter what tragedies happen in your life, you still have a life to lead.  The pain and loss will always be with you, but you have to move on and start a new life.  It's not always the best life you could have had, but you can still be happy and live a full life.

Movie Review: Midnight in Paris

Midnight in Paris is a pleasant talkie film. By that, I mean the characters meander the streets of Paris conversing. Nothing blows up (well, maybe a relationship or two), no one is killed, and at the end of the ninety minutes, you realize you want to sit in a cafe, drink some wine, and watch the world go by. Owen Wilson plays Gil, a successful Hollywood screenwriter. He's working on a book and wants to chuck the L.A. scene to live in Paris. He romanticizes the 1920s when so many American artists lived abroad. His fiancee, played by Rachel McAdams, thinks he's crazy. On this trip with her parents, he's the outsider.

Owen shambles along in his low key charming way and slowly realizes the engagment is all wrong. Every midnight, he strolls a certain cobblestone street and the atmosphere transforms into the 20s. He meets F.Scott Fitzgerald and wife Zelda, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Cole Porter, et al - they are all living the bohemian dream. He falls for a French girl, played by the lovely Marion Cotillard. She the latest muse of Pablo Picasso, but she and Gil light a spark.

They discuss the times. He rhapsodizes over the 1920s, and she shrugs it off as boring. She desires to visit La Belle Epoque. Gil's time travel skill allows them to visit that era, and that's where she wants to remain. Alas, Gil's heartbreak and return to current day living does give him the oomph to say, "I'm giving Paris a try, and I'm finishing my book." (aaah, any writer's dream)

All in all, Midnight in Paris has snappy dialogue (written and directed by Woody Allen) and it is a writer/artist movie. Lots of fun meeting famous people before they really became famous. Owen Wilson's manner has us believe and enjoy his adventure. It's also amusing to witness Rachel McAdams play a total snot. You root for Owen to recognize her shallowness.

Say bonjour, buy your ticket, and fall in love with Paris via this film.

Corey Taylor publicará un libro

El vocalista de las bandas de Des Moines Stone Sour y Slipknot sacará a la venta un libro.
Será una especie de memorias escrito por él y saldrá a la venta el 12 de julio en Estados Unidos y el 14 de julio en el Reino Unido.
El libro llevará el título "Seven Deadly Sins". En lo referente a él, Corey dijo que no sería una simple autobiografía sino que hablará bastante sobre el "pecado". Comentó también que en la escritura tendría bases similares a las de su música, no quiere hacer lo mismo que hacen los demás.

Cub Scouts & Skink Bites

Today is the last day of my vacation and knowing myself as well as I do, I will be complaining about going to work tomorrow and bored to tears with not having gone to work for 5 whole days.  I love time off.  Actually I need time off, but right around the 5th day, I start going a little wonky.  I'll probably be cleaning up a storm today, doing laundry, and getting back into work mode.  On my last day off the computer, Heather of Age 30+ ...A Lifetime of Books has graciously agreed to tell us all about her week last week.  After reading her post, I wish I was 8 years old again.  Heather is one of the nicest bloggers I have met and one that has always made me feel welcome.  She has a terrific blog and even though, as she will point out, we don't read all the same type of books, I'm always adding to my wish list after reading her reviews.  Besides, anyone that loves The Wheel of Time series as much as she does is purely fantastic.

When Ryan asked me to contribute a summer-themed guest post I immediately said yes.  See, I love Ryan’s blog. We don’t read ALL the same kinds of books but there is some overlap in our reading tastes and I enjoy reading his posts.  Plus our sons are about the same age, so that’s something else we have in common.   The problem is that I didn’t know exactly what to write about – “summer-themed” is a rather broad topic.  After much thought I decided to share with you what I’ve been doing during this past week, because it has been rather interesting!

Kiddo is going into the 4^th grade this year and he is a Webelos (level 1) in Cub Scouts.  For the first time since he joined Scouts our vacation schedule allowed him to attend Cub Scout Camp.  I decided to volunteer for the entire week because I’d get a huge discount on Kiddo’s registration fee.  I wasn’t particularly excited about spending 9 hours each day for 5 days in the 90 degree heat with 300 elementary aged boys, but hey, you do what you’ve gotta do, right? Turns out, this has been a FANTASTIC week for me!

Monday: All 300 boys made their way to my station during one of 8 sessions to create a themed flag for their Den.  I loved seeing how creative each group was.  Some kept up our dinosaur theme by choosing names such as “Killer Raptors” and “Mighty Megalodons” while others chose names like “The Gummies” and the “Killer Teddy Bears.” One obnoxious 7-year-old wrote “sex” on his flag not once but twice, but other than that the boys were all pretty good.

Tuesday: I helped a wildlife rescue group teach the boys about reptiles.  The highlight of my day was holding the critters: an 8’ long red-tailed boa constrictor, a 2’ long corn snake, a very smelly savannah monitor, and a rather large monkey-tailed skink (he’s the one eating from the spoon).  Apparently I smelled a lot like the salad I had for lunch because that lovely skink bit me!  It didn’t really hurt, and it only bled in one spot – I’m kind of proud of my wound.  I texted my husband to let him know about the bite but apparently auto-correct doesn’t like “skink” and changed it to “skunk.” My husband frantically called me to see if I had to go to the hospital to get a rabies shot for my “skunk” bite.  Too funny!

 Wednesday & Thursday: I assisted a deaf woman in teaching all the boys basic sign language.  The first day her daughter translated since we were doing some complicated signs but the second day I was on my own (and I don’t know sign language).  I learned my ABCs in finger-spelling and also learned about 50 signs.  By the end of the second day I was able to have brief but understandable conversations with this woman. It was so much fun!

Friday: That’s tomorrow, and I have no idea what I’m doing.  Maybe I’ll be cooking, maybe I’ll be cleaning, maybe I’ll be manning the store.  It doesn’t matter what they assign me to do; I’ll do it with a smile and I’ll sure learn something new.  I really wasn’t looking forward to this week but I went in with the best attitude I could muster and I am having a blast.  Hot temperatures, high humidity, and the ever-present chance of severe thunderstorms do have me melting a bit (as you can see in the photos) but they haven’t dampened my mood.  It’s hard work and I’m exhausted at the end of the day, but this is a GREAT way to start summer. I just hope Kiddo is having as much fun at Cub Scout Camp as I am!

A Taste For Summer Mysteries

Well it's now Monday and I only have two days left of my vacation.  I'm sure, knowing myself as well as I do, I may end up doing some housework today.  I will probably be cleaning the kitchen and maybe even my bedroom.  Hopefully I will have bought the 4th bookcase I need to get and I'll be rearranging my books. It's amazing how quickly books end up taking up so much room.  Luckily for me, one thing I won't be doing is posting a blog post.  Today, I'm pleased to say that the lovely Tasha at Truth, Beauty, Freedom, and Books has agreed to do that for me.  If ever I want to read a review on a book that isn't something everybody else is reading, Tasha is one of the bloggers I look towards.  I can't even tell you how many books she has added to my TBR pile.  Today she did it again.  She will be discussing a book by an author I've read, but never this one.  I hope after reading this post, you will be adding it as well.

For me, there's something about summer that makes me want to read mysteries.  I wouldn't call myself a mystery fan, but when I was younger (i.e., elementary and middle school) that was all I read.  I even wrote and illustrated my own mysteries, like "The Body Buried on Boot Hill."

The summer between fifth and sixth grad was big for me.  I'd always spent summers reading, but that was the summer where I was like, "OMG, books are my LIFE."  Except I didn't use OMG because that totally wasn't in the vernacular back then.  Anyway, I read two books that became my straight-up favorite books ever:  The Vampire Diaries by LJ Smith and Night Train to Memphis by Barbara Michaels (a.k.a. as Elizabeth Peters.)

Night Train to Memphis is about an art historian (hmmmm...) named Vicky Bliss.  It's actually the fifth in a series of mysteries about Vicky, but it's the one I read first.  Vicky is asked by the German police and Interpol to go on a luxury archaeology cruise up the Nile as a lecturer--despite the fact that she's a medieval art historian and doesn't know anything about Egyptian art.  Vicky knows there can be only on explanation for this:  her sometimes-boyfriend and professional are thief, Sir John Smythe, is going to be on that cruise, and they want her to identify him before he steals something.  Vicky hasn't heard form John in a while and is worried about his, so she agrees--though with no intention of cooperating with authorities until she figures out what John is up to.

Vicky sees John on the cruise, just as she expects to; but what she doesn't expect is to be introduced to his mother... and his wife.

Michaels had me from that point on.  Even today, reading the book, I'm all like, "Whaaaaaat?  He's married??"  What's John up to?  What is hi in Egypt to steal?  And did he ever really love Vicky?

During the year after I first read Night Train to Memphis, I reread it at least 4 times.  It might have been as many as eleven.  I began rereading it as soon as I finished it.  I LOVE it--I love how it transports you to Egypt and how nothing as as it seems.  I also love the Agatha Christie-ish feel of solving a mystery on a luxury cruise.  It's by far my favorite book in the Vicky Bliss series.

Here's the thing about the book though:  It doesn't work if you've already read the series.  If you have read the other books, then John's actions and motivations don't seem so mysterious, and it's easy to be impatient with Vicky, who thinks she's pretty smart but who can't figure out what's so obvious to the reader.  It took me about five rereads before I was like, "Hey!  This book isn't the greatest."

But it sill kinda is.  It's the only book in the series that I've reread, and I still reread it.  Not every summer of course, but I do think about it.  It's a book that defines what I want in my summer reading.

What books did you read during the summer as a kid?


Have you ever read a book in the middle or at the end of a series that was better because you didn't know what was going on?

Ai Takahashi Wallpaper and Pictures Gallery

Singer Ai Takahashi Wallpaper 1600 x 1200 Normal

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Japanese Pop Singer Ai Takahashi 1280 x 960 Wallpaper

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Ai Takahashi Images

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Ai Takahashi Photos

Ai Takahashi leader of Morning Musume

Cute Ai Takahashi

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Ai Takahashi Swimming Picture  

Soundtrack - Kate Midwaay

Na minha opinião, "Utopia" dos Within Temptation é uma opção perfeitamente viável para reflectir a personalidade e percurso de Kate Midwaay, todavia, a opinião do autor não é o único ponto de vista válido, longe disso. Como escritor sei o que pretendia transmitir quando criei esta personagem, mas não aquilo que vocês percepcionaram ao lê-la.

Assim sendo, digam-me, acham esta música apropriada para ela?   

Pain - The Great Pretender

hoy os ofrezco un vídeo que Pain hizo público hace unos días. Se trata del segundo videoclip correspondiente a su nuevo trabajo You Only Live Twice.
La canción escogida es "The Great Pretender". El vídeo es algo confuso a la par que dificil de comprender. Inicia con un gorila zurrándole la badana a un conejo. Se van juntos atracar un banco, al final abren sus bolsas y el conejo ve que está llena de zanahorias y el gorila de plátanos. Empiezan otra vez a darse de leches mientras una vaca propietaria de un interesante vehículo es testigo de la escena tranquilamente.
Sin duda, Peter Tägtgren siempre nos sorprende con sus vídeos, como por ejemplo el clásico de "Shout Your Mouth".

Selma Blair Wallpapers & Pictures Free Download