Jennka

Here is the section from The Last Unicorn, Cult Icon written by Peter S. Beagle.

Mummy Fortuna (a witch) captured the last unicorn while she was asleep and caged her in her carnival. And as people no longer believed in unicorns, she had to put a false magic horn to her, so people could see she was a unicorn. Schmendrick is a magician who is trying to free her.

Schmendrick came back a little before dawn, slipping between cages as silently as water. Only the harpy made a sound as he went by.

"I couldn´t get away any sooner," he told the unicorn. "She´s set Rukh to watching me, and he hardly ever sleeps. But I asked him a riddle, and it always takes him all night to solve riddles. Next time, I´ll tell him a joke and keep him busy for a week."

The unicorn was gray and still. "There is magic on me," she said. "Why did you not tell me?"

"I thought you knew," the magician answered gently. "After all, didn´t you wonder how it could be that they recognized you?" Then he smiled, which made him look a little older. "No, of course not. You never would wonder about that."

"There has never been a spell on me before," the unicorn said. She shivered long and deep. "There has never been a world in which I was not known."

"I know exactly how you feel," Schmendrick said eagerly. The unicorn looked at him out of dark, endless eyes, and he smiled nervously and looked at his hands. "It´s a rare man who is taken for what he trully is," he said. "There is much misjudgement in the world. Now I knew you for a unicorn when I first saw you, and I know that I am your friend. Yet you take me for a clown, or a clod, or a betrayer, and so must I be if you see me so. The magic on you is only magic and will vanish as soon as you are free, but the enchantment of error that you put on me I must wear forever in your eyes. We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream. Still I have read, or heard t sung, that unicorns when time was young, could tell the difference ´twixt the two - the false shining and the true, the lips´ laugh and the heart´s rue." His quiet voice lifted as the sky grew lighter, and for a moment the unicorn could not hear the bars whining, or the soft ringing of the harpy´s wings.

"I think you are my friend," she said. "Will you help me?"

I love the whole book. It´s full of... this wonderful heart´s magic

other answers later

oh, how nice

It´s harder, that´s right... but not impossible. I´m fighting my Spanish - contrary to how easy was it to learn English when I was much younger

Do you practice spanish everyday, Jennka?

Yes, this happened in Slovakia, Czech Republic, and other countries too. Imagine you have a factory on boots, your family owns it for generations, you are the one who gives work to many people around you, and then come the communists, take it from you, and make your work in your own (previously your own) factory not even like a regular worker, but they give you the dirtiest job possibe.

]There were many suicides those days, could you imagine going through something like this? Actors, painters, businessmen, regular people - everyone who did not follow the regime was damned to a poor life, they took everything from them. Their children were not allowed to study on universities, they were not allowed to find a proper work. And they were also not allowed to leave the country.

Suicides, depression, bankruptcy and poverty rates shoot up after every recession in social democracies, too. People lose their life long careers, become redundant, and a wave of troubles set in until new enterprises and activities are created. When they get fired, many end up working awful minimum wage-ish jobs in retail or low paying paper-pushing in offices as they attempt to put their professional lives back together.

"the incompetent elements of the super-rich, the degenerate aristocracy & the assets of the dead and their unworthy children" - what exactly does this mean?

We have 311 million people, and the top 400 individuals own 10% of America's net worth. We are back to the "Gilded Age & the Roaring 1920s" as far as asset & income distribution goes. Along with these concentrations, there is also a concurrent rise of charities and foundations, which can be a benchmark indicator for the declining quality of the American economic system.

There has been constant attempts to enhance the idle wealth of the super-rich since I was born. I dislike nepotism and the degeneracy ( excessive conspicuous consumption) of the idle & incompetent rich. I reject them in principal. My distaste is heighten by the fact that I help manage their money.

One should live the happiness, not pursuit it - right point in there

I wish I knew this since I was born, but it took me about 23 years to really figure that out.

^Nor should you care. And no need to apologise either - you know I'm only being ornery (and in that I don't really mean it! )? Hell, passions are passions and who are we to judge...

You haven't converted me to the cult of the unicorn yet though. But maybe, in an attempt at rapprochement, this'll be my Hallowe'en costume:

Now that would be the biggest honour for me! What a costume indeed!!

I don´t want to convert you, I like people the way they are - or I don´t, and it´s useless to try to change them but I will stand for unicorns because I don´t like the silly fluffy way in which they are mostly described, with people losing respect all around

Do you have something like this, B? Some kind of silly love you would never give up?

well Jenks, at least maybe in a place only WE know about

We, and Alice and all the lunatics around oh, it´s Friday Teri! Fridaaaay yahoo

Anybody remember this?

Me no, but me like it

oh, how nice

It is and I like this one too:

"When I was alive, I believed — as you do — that time was at least as real and solid as myself, and probably more so. I said 'one o'clock' as though I could see it, and 'Monday' as though I could find it on the map; and I let myself be hurried along from minute to minute, day to day, year to year, as though I were actually moving from one place to another. Like everyone else, I lived in a house bricked up with seconds and minutes, weekends and New Year's Days, and I never went outside until I died, because there was no other door. Now I know that I could have walked through the walls. (...) You can strike your own time, and start the count anywhere. When you understand that — then any time at all will be the right time for you."

and this one too

"There are honest people in the world, but only because the devil considers their asking prices ridiculous."

— Peter S. Beagle (A Fine and Private Place)

Do you practice spanish everyday, Jennka?

ehm... no don´t tell my teacher I should be But I´m lazy as hell

Suicides, depression, bankruptcy and poverty rates shoot up after every recession in social democracies, too. People lose their life long careers, become redundant, and a wave of troubles set in until new enterprises and activities are created. When they get fired, many end up working awful minimum wage-ish jobs in retail or low paying paper-pushing in offices as they attempt to put their professional lives back together.

The people I was talking about were not even allowed to put their professional lives back together - the communists just made sure. It was not only you - it touched the whole family (including your grandparents, your kids, your cousins and THEIR families too) and sometimes, your friends too. You were socially doomed to live a poor life, the worst they could make for you. It was insane.

We have 311 million people, and the top 400 individuals own 10% of America's net worth. We are back to the "Gilded Age & the Roaring 1920s" as far as asset & income distribution goes. Along with these concentrations, there is also a concurrent rise of charities and foundations, which can be a benchmark indicator for the declining quality of the American economic system.

There has been constant attempts to enhance the idle wealth of the super-rich since I was born. I dislike nepotism and the degeneracy ( excessive conspicuous consumption) of the idle & incompetent rich. I reject them in principal. My distaste is heighten by the fact that I help manage their money.

Is there any way to change it?? I mean, real way? Isn´t it a little bit contradictory to you, to help manage their money?

I wish I knew this since I was born, but it took me about 23 years to really figure that out.

Better late than never

well Jenks, at least maybe in a place only WE know about

We, and Alice and all the lunatics around oh, it´s Friday Teri! Fridaaaay yahoo

for YOU sweets, all its missing is a horn for the horse and you'd have TO of your fave things

I don´t want to convert you, I like people the way they are - or I don´t, and it´s useless to try to change them but I will stand for unicorns because I don´t like the silly fluffy way in which they are mostly described, with people losing respect all around

Do you have something like this, B? Some kind of silly love you would never give up?

And I like a bit of vociferousness in a lady, passion is sexy. So you stand up for the proper representation of fictional beings!

^I agree, I'm still learning now - currently attempting Japanese, and have just had a crash-course in musical theatre!

However, I remember arguing with a professor once about the relative merits of professional versus non-professional people and their "worth" to society. Whilst it's certainly true all should be respected on a personal basis, I (and this was my argument) would rather have a medical doctor clean my windows than a window cleaner operate on me.

I always say that some professions DO need serious studying - medicine is one of the most important of these. That is logical. But to study "management" (e.g.) for five years? Wtf?

I also think that this society needs all professions - doctors, singers, actors, painters, bakers, masons, builders... we should not look down on any of it. All should be valued the same... I´m just saying title is not everything and it doesn´t automatically mean wisdom, experience or intelligence.

aha:)

I have a lot of contact with university/MBA trained business types, and I myself am a business school graduate from a "prestigious" program. My program shared a lot of commonality with programs from the UK and France. I've also taken some courses from a liberal arts college. From experience...I just think that there are a lot of dismal cracks in the system. It's a for-profit business, and the costs are out of control. Worse, the materials, internships, and activities that we did were not structured well enough to secure long term theoretical knowledge and professional character. They were structured to keep a lot of university employees employed, though..

I have a dim view of the MBA system overall..it needs a lot of reform as do liberal arts colleges. University costs are capped in some nations (as to keep the structure leaner and more efficient) but in the US it's a real money sucker.

Today, we do have a crisis though: In the United States, perhaps 2/3rds of the workforce (and growing ) has college degrees. Not only that, but those who have college degrees typically have one to four. How much more can we stand? Will the next generation need doctorates in order to get an entry level job! ! Also, the job market is getting more and more specialized and dynamic: What you learned in college and in many jobs will become redundant in 10 years. How much of this expensive system can people take?

...

There's more, I was also referring to how Universities create many nonsense majors and attempt to market them as "degree packages".

There are degrees that really do mean something: ie. Accounting, Law, Medicine, Nursing, Dental, Engineering, Computer Science, etc. But there's a ton of degrees that are kind of superfluous. ( There is also the problem of bad for profit universities with no entry standards except $$$. ) For instance, in business schools, there is a major called "International Business" that is so superficial as to be literally worthless. When I see a resume with "International Business" I scratch my head: I know what courses this person has taken and I know that they haven't really learned all that much..

I am a member of the New York Society of Security Analysts (NYSSA) and the charters offered for various business related professions (engineering, accounting, finance) beat the pants out of most university programs in terms of imparting useful academic based skills. These low cost test-based programs (ie. 18 hours of testing..) give you all the material a professional needs and they can get to it. A lot of stuff can be learned with standardized testing: Build a core curriculum, let the student do all the studying on his own time, then process them through testing...that would save a lot of time and $$. Educators can design a much expanded system for this sort of thing: It would help society. But then again, they want to keep their jobs and their cash flow..

Is there any way to change it?? I mean, real way?

This type of change requires a significant change in society as well as in the political economy and governance- public and private- itself. It can't happen overnight. What you see in the pie is the result of policies that took forty years of gradual accumulation. In some ways, it is self inflicted- for instance regardless of stagnant wages, middle class Americans have still..willfully.. spent way too much money and they have done so for far too long.

There have been benefits to neo-liberalism though- it mainly accrues to the customer in the form of easy money and low, competitive prices for goods and services at the expense of wages, steady employment, and employees. But this has gone too far.

^Absolutely - I've met plenty of 'professionals' who are complete arses personally. But they do know their field.

I worked with a man in my last job...he was burdened with a special combination of considerable analytic intelligence and at the same time, certain types of ignorance. It all combined to make him incredibly single-minded and slightly... "Evil".

...

There are way too many inhumane individuals that still exist in all nations... and it's usually because liberal arts and certain essential practical thinking skills are not taught enough at the secondary-post secondary level ....everywhere. I'm talking about civics and instilling a conception of history....teaching basic sociology, economics, political science & propaganda, basic psychology, basic neuroscience, basic philosophy, and other arts. .....all essential to character development and many important critical thinking skills.

^Indeed. I'm currently in the UK, and it's exam results season. I'm not pretending to be completely au fait with the educational system here, but I saw a business analyst complaining that British students aren't being taught enough to prepare them for the workplace. Whilst that's obviously some kind of failing, I found myself questioning his reasoning: "education" (and school/college life certainly) isn't just about creating workforce drones, it should also allow one to understand society and appreciate the arts. Perhaps certain subjects serves no monetarily useful purpose, but I'd argue they are essential for a child to learn their time and place in the world...

all essential to character development and many important critical thinking skills.

Very nice, cool and elegant. These polas ARE amazing.

Glad you like them how about this one? Her name is Ymre Stiekema and she is just... whow

Very nice. I don't like the pola though, she seems a little uncomfortable and self conscious. Funny how some models never seem at ease in that situation and others, like Karolina Mrozkova (or Marina Laswick ), really seem to shine in their polas.

P. S. Haven't had time to post much lately. Hope you're well and happy Monday (well as happy as any Monday can be ).

happy MONDAY, Jenks HOPE your doing WELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

Me no, but me like it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_Girl

"Movie

Hollywood management and production company Benderspink is shopping the film rights to the title. Milla Jovovich, Kate Beckinsale and Sofia Vergara are attached to play the leads, as of August 22, 2011.[3"

Jennka, I think it's Campbell's best work- It's about a trio of "spy girls".

I seem to keep stumbling upon reinterpretations of Disney princesses at the moment. I do like this one though.

'Ariel and Flounder' in case you hadn't worked it out. Other princesses can be found on the artists deviantART page.

I think it's interesting to see how blog's seem to feed off each other these days. I follow a blog called Design You Trust where I saw this post which linked to this post on a German design blog called thaeger. This in turn linked to this post on a blog called Art-Spire which itself links to the deviantART page above. Not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand it means that interesting stuff does get known about quite quickly but on the other it shows a degree of lack of originality on the part of the blog writers. Of course, I guess, I can now add this post to that long chain!

The people I was talking about were not even allowed to put their professional lives back together - the communists just made sure. It was not only you - it touched the whole family (including your grandparents, your kids, your cousins and THEIR families too) and sometimes, your friends too. You were socially doomed to live a poor life, the worst they could make for you. It was insane.

Better late than never

This happened everywhere with Marxist governments- with the biggest and worst being Mao's cultural revolution. The Marxists' sociological view is that human beings can be psychologically re-engineered and with that, the elimination of classes. This is only partially true..- ie. re-indoctrination can be done more easily with children and very young people. The communists take social engineering to extremist levels.

How was the German or the Soviet occupation of Slovakia compare during WW2? Which is regarded worse in Slovakia? (I'm guessing the Germans) To my understanding, a couple of Slovakian divisions were procured by the Germans for the 1942 attacks towards Stalingrad. The Germans would use anti-communist/anti-Soviet propaganda in Eastern Europe and the Baltic countries as a means to recruit some men to their cause. It is quite shocking that a sizable amount- if I remember correctly, well over half a million... did in fact join the Germans after their countries were overrun ( either forced politically or through volunteerism).

^Indeed. I'm currently in the UK, and it's exam results season. I'm not pretending to be completely au fait with the educational system here, but I saw a business analyst complaining that British students aren't being taught enough to prepare them for the workplace. Whilst that's obviously some kind of failing, I found myself questioning his reasoning: "education" (and school/college life certainly) isn't just about creating workforce drones, it should also allow one to understand society and appreciate the arts. Perhaps certain subjects serves no monetarily useful purpose, but I'd argue they are essential for a child to learn their time and place in the world...

all essential to character development and many important critical thinking skills.

(Y)

I really think that an liberal arts curriculum should be taught maybe during secondary. ie. We should lengthen secondary from 4 years to 6. (like the Germans and Canadians do)

Large/medium sized firms generally recruit out of universities and provide their own proprietary training for whatever specialized skill they need. However, this is "compartmentalization"- the drone's you're talking about...is often "hyperspecialization" in business units and so forth. Many people that go through the system are pretty ignorant outside of their first entry level job.

And almost nothing is taught about basic entrepreneurship, which is basic skill that all should have.

Business education- with its myriad specialties- is a very complex topic, and I do enjoy talking about it & I have a lot of ideas about it. I would like to see the MBA system re-designed. While the Master's programs like ie. Master's in marketing, operations, accounting etc. are better, the MBA is very sloppy- educationally it's basically "a kilometer long and a meter deep, so to speak. It's just an expensive job- hunting tool. A buddy of mine joked that the (essentially, 14 month) MBA just teaches people how to use fancy business terminology and the false confidence of actually using it in action. And of course, MBA's are seen as a bunch of mouth-breathers- everywhere-..that need to be basically trained virtually from scratch in most places where they're inserted into.

For example one problem: when people take years off to do a degree, they should leave grad school with a 1. theoretical & academic understanding of the field 2. empirical understanding 3. historical understanding. 4. Some grasp of scaling (how it works in a small business to a large corporation) 5. Technical understanding, etc.etc.

Business schools have gotten their hands forced by the human resource requirements of the various firms and corporations that they're affiliated with and only manage to do 5, and not even a good job of that, either. #5. without 1-4 is pretty much unacceptable.

gosh, i could go on and on about this..

regardless, I am pretty much "anti-teacher" so to speak. Too inefficient, too expensive. The more standardized testing, the better.

Me no, but me like it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danger_Girl

"Movie

Hollywood management and production company Benderspink is shopping the film rights to the title. Milla Jovovich, Kate Beckinsale and Sofia Vergara are attached to play the leads, as of August 22, 2011.[3"

Jennka, I think it's Campbell's best work- It's about a trio of "spy girls".

Danger Girl

I'd be really skeptical about a movie of that being any good at all though.. it would be quite a challenge to nail that tongue in cheek humour at the right level. Kind of a weird choice in Milla too.. is she supposed to be Abbey?

I guess in the right hands it could be a load of fun. Someone like Robert Rodriguez = I'm there.