The News

Missing Women memorial

There’s only one story in the world today, as far as my people are concerned.

Go to Hazel‘s to hear it.

I will tell you how I come into it later.

‘WILL THEY REMEMBER ME WHEN I’M GONE?’

MISSING

By Susan Musgrave

Missing’s a word that can’t begin to describe

the way I miss you more each day;

You left to chase the wind on high

and the rain rained down to stay.

Will they remember me when I’m gone, you said,

when I’ve kissed goodbye to pain;

Or will their lives just carry on

in the small hours of the rain.

You may be lost in the eyes of the world,

but how can I set you free;

When there’s a whole empty world in my aching heart,

you’re the missing part of me.

Ruby Anne Hardy, Jacqueline McDonell, Jennie Lynn Furminger,

Sarah de Vries

Heather Bottomley, Andrea Joesbury, Marcella Creison, Dawn Teresa Crey

Elaine Allenbach, Debra Lynne Jones, Angela Arseneault, Lillian O’Dare

Mona Wilson, Michelle Gurney, Cindy Beck, Laura Mah

Sheryl Donahue, Wendy Allen, Julie Young, Teresa Triff

CHORUS

How far from home is “missing”?

In our prayers you’re close beside us every

day;

When you left to chase the wind so high,

the rain moved in to stay.

Will they remember me when I’m gone,

you said,

when I’ve kissed goodbye to pain;

Or will their lives just carry on

in the small hours of the rain.

You may be an orphan in the eyes of the

world,

can we ever love anyone enough?

You’ll always have a home in our loving

hearts,

You’re the missing part of us.

Sheila Egan, Rebecca Guno, Angela Jardine, Brenda Ann Wolfe

Georgina Papin, Sherry Irving, Helen Hallmark, Tanya Holyk

Leigh Miner, Inga Hall, Patricia Johnson, Yvonne Boen, Tiffany Drew

Julie Young, Janet Henry, Dorothy Anne Spence, Ingrid Soet, Elaine Dumba, Sherry Lynn Rail

Jacqueline Murdock, Olivia Gale Williams, Catherine Gonzalez, Heather Chinnock

CHORUS

How far from home is “missing”?

In our prayers you’re close beside us every

day;

When you left to chase the wind so high,

the rain moved in to stay.

Will they remember me when I’m gone,

you said, when I’ve kissed goodbye to pain;

Or will their lives just carry on

in the small hours of the rain.

How can we believe in a merciful world

that could never believe in you enough?

Take what strength you need from our

fearless hearts,

You’re the missing part of us.

Taressa Williams, Diana Melnick, Kathleen

Dale Wattley, Catherine Maureen Knight

Wendy Crawford, Elsie Sebastien, Marnie Lee Frey, Stephanie Lane

Frances Young, Nancy Clark, Cindy Feliks, Dianne Rock

Kerry Lynn Koski, Sereena Abotsway, Andrea Borhaven, Maria Laliberte

Yvonne Abigosis, Verna Littlechief, Dawn Lynn Cooper, Linda Louise Grant

CHORUS

Missing means you’re gone, I can’t find you;

My dear one, I’ll never hold you again.

You left to chase the wind too high

and the rain can’t wash my tears away.

Will they remember me when I’m gone,

you said,

when I’ve kissed goodbye to pain;

Or will their lives just carry on

in the small hours of the rain.

You may have disappeared in the eyes of the

world,

but when I close my eyes I’ll always see

your name, they way you smile, inside my

wishful heart,

The missing part of me.

the Return of the Invasion of the Giant Jellyfish

Next year what will it be? Return of Under the Planet of Invasion of the Jellyfish?

Nomura Jellyfish

As our more protoplasmic readers will be aware, we at the ol’ raincoaster blog have long been fascinated by all things gigantic, digusting, potentially fatal, and aquatic. So we were on the Japanese Invasion of the Giant Jellyfish like deep fried on calamari.

Jellyfish invasion As the swallows return to Capistrano once per year, so too the Giant Nomura Jellyfish return to the teeming waters of the Sea of Japan each Autumn, welcomed by divers and attacked by fishing companies, much as the gentle harbour seal is persecuted from one end of the sea to the other. How petty! What are a few nets, a few spoiled, poisoned, and slimed catches, when compared to the awe-inspiring sight of these throbbing, pulsing masses of brainless protoplasm, lurching quietly through the ocean depths? As the great George Bernard Shaw said, great beauty justifies any sacrifice, and a true artist would slay his own grandmother to create it; the Ode on a Grecian Urn is worth any number of old ladies.

Manabu Nakamata, a 38-year-old diver from Nagoya and an admirer of the monster jellyfish, says, “They are surprisingly hard to the touch. They are big, and extremely impressive.” Big indeed — Echizen kurage can grow up to 2 meters (6 ft. 7 in.) in diameter and weigh up to 200 kilograms (440 lb.) each.

But what’s a Japanese giant misunderstood monster story without some doomed-to-fail, high-tech weaponry, the use of which teaches valuable, and humbling, lessons about science’s essential futility? Eh? I ask you that!

In the latest move in the war on jellyfish, Fukui prefecture is developing new and efficient weapons designed to pulverize those that threaten their shores.

Oh, this should end well.

add to del.icio.us :: Add to Blinkslist :: add to furl :: Digg it :: add to ma.gnolia :: Stumble It! :: add to simpy :: seed the vine :: :: :: TailRank

Natalie Portman wants you to marry your boyfriend (updated)

Natalie Portman, homophobeUPDATED: now that’ I’ve drunk my coffee, I see I completely misinterpreted things. All corrected!)

If Natalie Portman has ever put so much as a pinkie toe wrong since she began her career at, what, 12? I certainly never heard about it.

The accent in V for Vendetta notwithstanding.

And she doesn’t even come from some fringe Yahoos For Jesus cult: she’s a good, old-fashioned Jewish girl.

So it is with relief that we read the following quote attributed to Miss P:

“I’m not convinced about marriage. Divorce is so easy, and that fact that gay people are not allowed to marry takes much of the meaning out of it. … Committing yourself to one person is sacred.”

And the future Natalie Portman Broadway musical gets moved to the fast track!

LOLitics: Mannifest Destuny

Mannifest Destuny iz mannifestin

source

Now, it’s not the first time the Yanks have made a move on our land. The last time they pulled this my ancestors had to go down and loot and burn the White House to discourage this kind of thing, and as we know from recent example, the gene pool has bred true.

But this time they have gone too far.

Welcome: Portraits of America, a new seven-minute film produced by Disney, will be shown in airports and embassies to woo visitors with a sanitised take on US landmarks. There are no shots of highways clogged with cars bumper to bumper. Instead, the camera pans over the wonders of the Grand Canyon, New York’s Chrysler building and the awe-inspiring power of the Niagara Falls.

But wait a minute. What falls are these? They don’t seem to resemble the Bridal Veil Falls that stand on the US side of the border. They do, however, look distinctly like the Horseshoe Falls, the immense curtain of water shrouded in mist that is the stock image of Niagara and lies almost entirely inside Canada. The annexation of a Canadian natural wonder was spotted by the news agency Associated Press.”This is an insult,” said Paul Gromosiak, an expert on the waterfalls. “This is not the US, this is 100% Canada, shot from the Canadian side.

 

We have previously had our issues with the Guardian‘s coverage of Canada, but in this case we have little to add. Very little. Except: you don’t want to piss us off again.

That’s what Portraits of Americans are like.
This is what Portraits of Canadians are like.

via Bridlepath

Swords, baybee. We have swords. What do you have? A weak military force squandered in Iraq and a couple of dozen reserves out scouring the country side for escaped weasels. Tell them to look in Congress and the Senate.

Season of the Witch

The firecrackers have started in Chinatown and the first of the Skytrain costume parties is over. The stores are decked in a crazy clashing kaliedoscope of pumpkin orange, black, red, and green as Christmas tries to force its way through the doors before all passengers have disembarked, the passenger in question being Halloween.

Here is something to make the moments go a little faster. The moments until you can declare all the candy in your house “leftovers” and gobble those little Snickers bars as fast as your paws can peel them.

The Club Mix of Season of the Witch, by Eartha Kitt.
Fabulous visuals by Queerty (via Defamer)

Can you name them all?

Neopagan flames in the comment section, please. But be warned: I’ve actually read Margaret Murray’s The Witch Cult in Western Europe. Bring your game, people!