They’re going on a date that is going to confuse the hell out of André le glacier :)

(also these are future/current day designs)

Back to School

Literature Professor! Robert De Niro x Reader

Based on a weird dream I had! But I've developed it into a whole thing 😘

Word count: 2k

TW: none, it's all fluff--part 2, not so much

As you walk through the literature building on campus looking for your classroom, you check your schedule one last time to make sure you end up at the right classroom.

As you're looking at the schedule you can't help but feel like you're taking a chance with this course, because the professor is listed as TBD: To Be Determined. At the time of scheduling your classes, it's normal for the professor slot to say TBD, but normally, as summer was coming to an end, you knew who all of your professors would be.

At the end of the day, the class was only an elective, and you could drop it and work out the problems later if it was that bad.

Before you know it, your feet have carried you to your classroom and you pop your head in the door to peak at what's going on inside. There are a few students, most of them sitting in the front desks, probably hoping to do well in the class by sitting up front.

You walk in and take a seat by the professors desk--taking another chance,-- but you like to try to get to know your professors, especially in a small class like this. A few more people come in and find their seats, but there's still several minutes before class starts.

Just as you were pulling books out of your bag for class, Robert De Niro walks in and asks, "Is this is the Film Lit class?" All of your books hit the floor.

One of your classmates spoke up, "Yeah, this is your class. Nice to meet ya, Professor De Niro!"

"Nice to meet you, too," he says, shaking the kid's hand.

You tap the girl in front of you on the shoulder and ask, "That's the professor?!" She laughs a little and says, "Yeah, you didn't get the message? They're letting him teach a class on the books he's studied for roles."

You felt like you were in a dream. Everyone was so casual with this, but then again, they had all gotten some kind of notification about it.

Trying to pull it together, you reach down and scramble to pick all of your books up and set them on your desk. Suddenly, you hear your professor's voice coming from beside you, "Do you need any help with that?"

You look over to see him standing at his desk, giving you a concerned look.

His desk; the one you chose to sit near.

You now have a panicky feeling of regret about the seat you chose.

"Um, no, I can get it," you shoot back to him quickly before grabbing the last books from the floor.

You could feel his eyes on you though, and you tried to pretend you didn't and focus on writing something in your notebook, but it wasn't long before you gave in and looked at him. He was sat back in his chair, just watching you for the small moment it took to get your books. He gave you a charming smile.

"Do you need something, professor?" It came out of your mouth without thinking.

"Hmm, just your name," he replied smugly. Was he flirting with you?

"(Y/N)."

"Well, (Y/N), it's nice to meet you," he stands and reaches across his desk to shake your hand, "you can call me Robert."

Before you could get your thoughts straight, he had walked up to the front of the classroom and begun class.

He started class with the simple exercise of each person telling the class their name, which book was their favorite from the summer reading, and to read their favorite passage. This took up a majority of class, because he would ask each person questions and discuss the passage with them.

He wrapped class up early by telling everyone that the first week's homework was to finish the summer reading if they hadn't, and handing out the syllabus, which was small and very simple. You take note that his office hours work pretty well with your schedule.

The class was only about 15 people, but nearly everyone wanted to talk to the professor after class; he's Robert De Niro after all. You stayed in your desk to pull out your schedule and make sure about when your next class was; you have a big break before that class.

By the time you've shoved your books in your book bag, your professor has somehow gotten out of talking to ask the other students and he makes his way over to his desk. He looks at you with a big smile and says, "Aw, were you waiting to see me?"

The last few students leave. It's just you and him.

"Oh, uh, no, I was just looking at some papers. I'm sorry." You stand up and put your back pack on.

"Oh, well, that's sad because I was hoping to see you," he starts. When he sees you're not going to respond, he continues, "It seems like you're kind of shy, and you didn't want to interact as much as the other students. Class will be highly discussion based, so I want to make sure that you'll be okay with that structure. I'd really rather not grade papers, ya know?" he ends with a small chuckle.

"I'll be okay with class discussions. Truthfully, I was just a little caught off guard because I didn't know you were the professor."

"Oh no! You didn't get the memo that went out?! That won't do. Would you mind coming to my office to make sure I have all of your contact info correct?"

"Um, sure. I have time." Truthfully, you're still kind of reeling just from his presence, and now he wants you to go to his office.

"Come on!" he says, while coming around his desk, "Oh, and give me your back pack, it looks heavy."

"Oh no, it's okay."

"I insist. It's a long walk to my office, and I would be no gentleman if I let you carry that heavy bag all the way there."

He certainly didn't act like a professor. Especially not towards you, but maybe your mind was playing tricks on you there.

You hand over your back pack, and he puts it on, then gestures for you to leave the classroom before him. On the walk to his office, you insist on carrying his notebook, since he has your back pack. He was glad to see you open up to him a bit, and since he no longer has his notebook, this meant he was able to place his hand on your back... to make sure you walk the right way, no other reason, right? Why would he have another reason to do that?

You make light conversation all the way to his office, discussing your major and why he decided to teach a class here at the college. The walk to his office was over in no time, but maybe that was due to the good conversation. You enter the small office and see that there isn't much inside, but then again, he's only teaching for one semester. He has an L-shaped desk, a table, a couple of filing cabinets, a mini fridge, and a small couch for office guests.

He nods to the couch for you to sit, and he places your back pack by your feet. You place his notebook on his desk next to you. He opens a drawer on the filing cabinet; it's very empty except for a few manila folders. "(Y/N)! There you are!" he exclaims while whipping your file out, "There's not much in these files yet, but they'll be filled with your papers and grades by the end of the term." He gives you a warm smile before opening the file on his desk.

You go over your contact information with him; turns out he had it all wrong somehow, so he corrects the file and returns it to his cabinet.

"Well, I've run out of excuses to keep you in my company, but you're welcome to stay and hangout here if you'd like," he says as he takes one of your hands in his.

"Well, I have another class in about an hour, and I really should eat lunch, so unfortunately, I think I've got to go."

He jumps up and opens his mini fridge, "I brought PB and J's! And I have other little snacks if you want some, like fruit cups or... whatever..." He trails off and smiles awkwardly, realizing he may have gotten a little too excited.

You giggle at him, "Seems like you really want me to stick around... I'll stay as long as you don't mind sharing." You're doing your best to keep your cool, and it helps that Robert isn't keeping his very well, but you are a little nervous, nonetheless.

Without hesitation, he hands you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. "Do you want a fruit cup or pudding? Or both? I also have chips." His need to impress you elicits another giggle from you, and you ask for chips.

After getting his own sandwich and pulling out the chips, you enjoy lunch together. Him at his desk and you on the little couch.

This becomes your regular Tuesday/Thursday thing. After Robert's class, you go to his office for lunch; sometimes you bring food to share with him, too. Sometimes people stop in, students and other professors, because they all want to meet Robert De Niro. He's very good about meeting people and then getting them to leave without being rude.

Sometimes on Thursday's you pop back by his office after your other Tuesday/Thursday class, and technically his office hours have ended, but he has no problem with you being there. Typically you just see each other for a few minutes while he's packing up to leave campus, but one Thursday, you both sat on the little couch and talked for a while.

"Do you think I'm doing okay with this class? I mean I don't want it to be too easy, but I don't want to make it hard. It's an elective for most of you." He really did care about what he was teaching you from those biographies of boxers and mobsters.

"I think your discussions challenge us more than you think. I've never seen a class of students show up so prepared for every single lecture. Then again, I think we all know we'll never get a chance to take a class like this again."

"Yeah I know I don't have the normal professor experience, because I don't have any degrees and you guys all know who I am."

"You also get to pick favorites and don't get in trouble for it, because of who you are," you say giving him a side eye.

"Hey! Just because you're my favorite doesn't mean you get good grades..." He leans in a bit closer to you.

"Hmmm, so I am your favorite?"

"Of course, you are. You eat lunch with me in my office."

"Any other perks of being Mr. De Niro's favorite student?"

"Mmm, Mr. De Niro, huh? I thought I told you to call me Robert, young lady," he places a hand on your cheek with his thumb on your chin.

You give him a cheeky smile. "I'll call you Robert after you answer my question."

"Hmmm... Any other perks to being my favorite student? Besides hanging out with me and eating lunch with me..." His other arm snakes around your shoulders. "What about this?"

Before you can say anything, he pulls you close to him and lightly presses his lips to yours. You both stay like that for a long second before moving your lips together, kissing lightly over and over again.

Morph

For the “transformation” prompt, an Animorphs AU! I gave up on getting it all finished today, so part two will follow soon.

Charles and his friends had been through a lot of awful stuff, since the night they found a crashed spaceship and a dying alien. The night they learned their world was under attack, and received from the dying alien's hands their only weapon against the invaders—the power to morph. Morphing gave them the ability to take animal forms that were a thousand times more dangerous than their fragile human bodies, forms that hid their true identities from the Yeerks and let them absorb unbearable damage that would simply vanish when they de-morphed. Since that night, they had all endured amounts of pain, terror, guilt, and strain that probably should have killed them.

It hadn't killed them yet, but it had warped all of them—sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. Charles's sister Raven had once cared too much about having the best hair and the most fashionable clothes, about being pretty and popular; now she was a fierce, unstoppable fighter whose bloodthirst scared them all, even if they wouldn't say it. Erik, who had always been sharp and steely, was ruthless and pragmatic to a fault, now—except how could it be a fault if it kept them alive, kept the human race alive and free?

And Hank… poor Hank suffered more than any of them, trapped in morph as a gorilla. Barring a miracle, he would never be human again. If only he'd been in a smaller, less exotic morph, the day that he couldn't get to safety until long after the two-hour deadline, perhaps he could have still been among people in some way—someone's dog, a wild bird, something. Instead he had to remain entirely hidden, entirely dependent on the rest of them for everything. And any wounds he sustained in battle had to heal the hard way.

As for Charles himself, he had nightmares all the time now, flashbacks—not so much to the terrible things they'd endured, but the terrible things they'd done. All the bloodshed and suffering, the lies and secrets. Was it worth it, if they succeeded? What about if they failed?

All of which made it very easy to forget that morphing could also be fun.

Charles's claws clicked over the floor of the candy shop, a tiny noise to go with his tiny mouse body. Mice were nervous, hypervigilant little creatures, but Charles was an old hand at controlling the little rodent's instincts. Mouse morph had turned out to be almost as useful as his tiger battle-morph, if for very different situations.

It was also sort of neat. Charles couldn't say exactly why he enjoyed being so small, making his way through a world grown suddenly massive around him. Chairlegs like redwood trees, jellybean containers like granaries, expanses of black-and-white tile like the surface of an alien world. It made him think of a dollhouse, except that was exactly backwards. It was as if he was the doll.

Outside the shop, he knew Erik would be getting impatient. More accurately, he would be getting worried, and masking it with impatience. It had taken Charles longer than he expected to get into the building; he supposed he should have expected that a candy store would be fortified against mice. Mice with human intelligence, however, were not so easily stopped, and Charles had finally made it inside, tick-tick-ticking across the whimsical tiles toward the security system keypad on the wall.

Up, up the enormous furniture, claws scrabbling and nose twitching at the tantalizing scents of candied fruit, peanut butter and sugar, sugar, sugar—No, no time for a snack. Charles pulled his attention back to the keypad, which he could just barely reach by climbing the display of licorice behind the cash register. It had taken three weeks of surveillance to get the code, and Charles had repeated the numbers until he heard them in his dreams. Now he typed them in, throwing the weight of his entire body against the buttons.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. And—boop, the security system disengaged.

<You're clear,> he called to Erik.

Within a minute, the lock on the front door turned and the door opened. Erik was terrific at anything machinery-related, including lockpicking, and that had come in handy just as often as mouse morph.

"Took you long enough," Erik muttered as he crossed the shop. "Are you all right?"

<Of course I am.> Charles crawled into Erik's extended hand, snuffling instinctively at his fingers, which smelled like Cheet-os.

"Of course you are." Erik rolled his eyes. "Are you going to demorph?"

<No. I've still got an hour and a half, and I'll have to reset the alarm when we're done, and go out the same way I got in.>

Erik grunted and slipped Charles into the front pocket of his jacket, over his heart. Charles could feel it thudding gently behind him. It was silly for him to enjoy that so much, but he did.

They slipped into the shop's back office. Charles had wondered if they would need to look for false drawer-bottoms, hidden safes—but no, the candy shop owner kept the paperwork for his activities with The Sharing right in his normal file cabinet, in a folder marked The Sharing.

"My mother's gonna kill this guy if she ever realizes how careless he is," Erik said lightly, pulling out the folder and turning on the nearby lamp so they could see what it contained.

<Not your mother,> Charles corrected.

Erik didn't reply, and Charles didn't push it. The woman everyone thought of as Edie Lehnsherr was a high-ranking member of The Sharing, the "community engagement" organization the Yeerks used as a front to gather hosts. Erik's mother was a Controller, a prisoner somewhere inside her own brain while a Yeerk lived her life. Cooked in her kitchen. Volunteered at her synogogue. Kissed her son on the forehead. If joking about "Edie's" ruthlessness against her subordinates kept Erik from losing his mind, Charles wasn't going to stop him.

"Here," Erik said after a minute. "That's what we need, right there." He took out his phone and took pictures of the pages. The pictures would be deleted later, once the information on them was memorized; they'd all adjusted their phone settings to prevent anything entering 'the cloud.' They couldn't be too careful.

<Anything else interesting?>

Erik flipped through the rest of the folder, taking one or two more pictures, but there really wasn't much they didn't already know. The candy shop owner was pretty new to The Sharing, and his Yeerk wasn't especially high-ranking.

<He might have more later,> Charles said.

"I was just thinking that," Erik said, a hint of excitement in his voice. "The guy shouldn't be able to tell we were ever here. As long as he doesn't change the alarm code, we can come back…"

But on their way out of the office, that all went wrong. In the dark shop, glancing over his shoulder, Erik ran right into a display.

A dozen different kinds of candy cascaded to the floor with a sound like an avalanche. Jars shattered, shelves flipped, boxes tumbled, and Erik's foot slipped on a bag of gummy bears. He fell hard, managing to turn so as not to crush Charles in his pocket.

<Are you all right?>

"Are you all right?" Erik asked at the same time. He sat up, surveyed the damage, and started swearing. "Do you remember what all this looked like? Can we put it back together?"

Charles crawled from Erik's pocket onto his shoulder, and surveyed the damage with a mouse's superior night vision. <Too many things are broken. We could work all night and he'd still know someone was here.>

More swearing. "Fine. Fine. Okay, then. This is what we're doing."

Erik crouched down and began scooping candy into his jacket.

<Erik… are you stealing candy?>

"Yep. Gosh, this poor guy. Some idiot kids broke in and robbed his candy store. Stuff like that happens. No reason to think they went anywhere near his file cabinet, though, right? Idiot kids stealing candy don't care about The Sharing's secrets."

Charles couldn't help laughing. <I'll help. You need to take enough of a haul that no one will question the story.>

He hopped off Erik's shoulder onto the floor and demorphed. Only when he was standing barefoot on black-and-white tile did he remember that neither of them had brought any clothes for him. He had planned to stay a mouse.

"Well, you're not gonna be able to carry much," Erik said dryly, looking him up and down.

Charles knew he had to be blushing. This wasn't exactly the circumstances under which he'd imagined Erik would first see him naked. Not that it was appropriate to think about that anyway. Erik could never feel that way toward him.

"Chilly in here, isn't it," Erik said with a smirk, and Charles gasped in outrage and turned away, covering his chest.

Erik snickered, and returned to filling his pockets with taffy and gumballs. "Get that bucket over there, start filling it up."

Charles dashed over to the bucket of lollipops, pulled out the styrofoam filler that kept them upright, and started sweeping chocolates, gummies and packages of Pop Rocks into it. The display cases under the cash register were full of chocolate truffles—was it locked?

Another horrible avalanche crash, and Charles jumped out of his skin, whirling around.

Erik grinned at him from the wreckage of a second display. "Verisimilitude."

Charles rolled his eyes. "Come help me get the truffle case open. They're my favorite; if we're going to steal candy I want truffles."

Erik, cramming packs of jellybeans from the second display down his shirt, joined him at the truffle case. He poked thoughtfully at the lock, then reached for a huge novelty lollipop. "Stand back—"

"Don't you dare!" Charles swatted the lollipop out of his hand. "You'll get glass in the truffles!"

"Oh my gosh, say that again. Come on, say it again, you sound so adorable when you say 'truffles' with that accent—"

"Shut up! Just open the lock!"

Erik squeezed past him to the cash register and pulled a key off a nail. "There. All the truffles your heart could desire."

Charles opened the case, grabbed one of the cardboard boxes used by the cashiers, and filled it to the brim with every flavor of truffle, stopping to sample his favorites. "Mmm!"

"Hedonist. You have chocolate on your nose," Erik said, grinning, and stepped forward to wipe it with his thumb.

For a silent, inexplicable moment, they stood there together, Charles's pulse pounding and his mouth full of chocolate, Erik's sleeve brushing his bare shoulder.

"We should go," Erik said, turning away abruptly. "We'll have to set off the alarm, for ver—versim—what I said before. Idiot kids would only have time to grab so much before they ran for it."

"I've got to morph again," Charles said. "Can't run out there like this."

"Back in my pocket you go, then."

They re-armed the security system, put mouse-Charles in the hood of Erik's jacket—all his pockets were full—and Erik went out the door, carrying the bucket and truffle box. The alarm went off behind them as soon as the door opened.

Mission accomplished.

Tag!

Rules! Tag (numbers) people you want to get to know!

I was tagged by @heliodora97 while between PCs, made a note not to forget that shit, promptly forgot that shit, and just remembered that shit 8,D

This got long (of course)

Name: Del Terance-Theodore Scott

Gender: Trans guy

Star Sign: Scorpio

Height: 4′10″, 147.32cm, a smol, just a real smol boy

Sexuality: 5.9 on the Kinsey scale.  Like, maybe one woman in three hundred piques my interest, and that’s usually because they’re coded masculine.  The entire nonbinary spectrum is a case-by-case deal, although again, I’m more inclined toward masc coding.  Basically, I’m panromantic but with the BIGGEST FUCKING BIAS toward gay and 99.8% gay sexually, and since I’m in a monogamous relationship, identifying as gay is really just easier and more gender euphoric.

Also I wanna fuck the fish

What image do you have as your lock screen: 

This has been my lock screen, header, and PC background for two years now and I do not anticipate it changing, thank you @nooneandeveryone

Have you ever had a crush on a teacher: Two or three notable teachers in college and a little schoolboy crush on my high school teacher because he liked and understood me better than 90% of the kids in Crazy Fundie School (he liked MST3K!!!)

Where do you hope to see yourself in 10 years: Holding a big folder of fanfiction marked “DONE” with a big red rubber stamp

If you could go anywhere else right now where would it be?: France, my fiance is probably on their second cup of morning coffee by now

What was your coolest Halloween costume?: Since Halloween is my birthday and Mom was INCREDIBLY patient and skilled, I had some real bangers.  A few that stand out are Queen of the Butterflies and The Most Extra Grizabella the Glamour Cat Cosplay Ever because I am very very gay, plus a not-too-shabby DIY Pyramid Head costume for my last year ever going out.  I think I’m proudest of the year I decided I wasn’t too old for trick-or-treating at the VERY last second, though--I found a huge picture frame and Mom pinned some fabric to the top as a backdrop and bam, I was a portrait.  I taped a “plaque” made out of a post-it reading “(NAME), AUTHOR, AGE 9″ on the bottom because I had Aspirations.  My arms were killing me from carrying it by the end of the night but folks loved it.

What was your favorite 90’s TV show?: 

First fandom and one of the greatest.

Just don’t talk to me about the remake.  Don’t fukken do it.

Last kiss?: Last August, at the airport...I wanna go drink coffee wah

Favorite book?: 

BUT TO NAME A FEW

My love of Discworld and The Phantom Tollbooth should be very apparent, I adore short horror fiction, but one of my favorite unsung heroes is Bruce Coville.  He was one of my greatest influences growing up, both through his books and through his stubbornness in getting anthologies aimed at kids with REAL stories published.  Seriously, the Bruce Coville’s Book Of... series has To Serve Man, Zero Hour, It’s a Good Life, all these sci-fi classics that were in Real Adult Anthologies and the most fucking surreal shit I have ever read and I am counting my adult experiences.  I read Joe R. Lansdale’s The Fat Man at 9 because Bruce Coville thought I should have that right and bless him, I have never been the same.

When I was 10, Mom found out that Bruce was doing school presentations in Michigan and made some calls (I was still homeschooled at the time) and got me in not just to see the presentation, but meet him in person beforehand and talk to him one-on-one.  It was one of the greatest experiences of my life, but I spent a long time wondering if he’d still accept me if I met him as a trans gay adult, because part of being trans is having your fantasies cut short with “shit what if he misgendered me”.

So I wrote him a long letter about it and it turns out he’s progressive as fuck and totally accepts me and now we’re honest-to-God comment-on-each-other’s-posts Facebook friends.

No seriously.  Sometimes your idols actually turn out to be heroes.  Every time I see him lambast Trump my kokoro doki dokis and boy howdy that’s a lot of dokis.

Have you ever been stood up?: I dated all of two people before falling in love with Crow, so I didn’t really get the chance, which is probably a good thing?

Have you ever been to Las Vegas?: I lost two life’s savings on Neopets in one day when the slot machines came out, I spent everything I had and then sold one of my most expensive items and spent all of the proceeds from that, so I’m just gonna play the occasional quiet game of Poker Night 2 ok

Favorite pair of shoes: I have Achilles’ tendonitis so I can really only wear specific sneakers, but before we knew that, I used to beg Mom to let me buy boots at the Army Surplus store and I would wear them until the sides gave out (yes, the sides, my ankles are fucked up and weird).  Gender euphoria to the NINES.  I miss it augh.

Favorite fruit?: A L L OF T H E M

ok actually I’m not too much into citrus except for pomelos and kiwis are too sour and these things can fuck right off but buddy I avoid putting on stoner weight because I will just sit there slowly eating individual blueberries like a lizard for four hours, or crack open a can of jackfruit, or make myself positively ill on cherries, FRUIT IS AMAZING

I think if I absolutely HAD to choose, it’d be cherries.  Cherries are Michigan’s Thing and we used to pick them ourselves from tourist farms and oh God I am forever spoiled on cherry flavor because that shit does NOT compare.  It’s so good.  It’s so so good.

Casul is a fruit bat for a reason ok

Stupidest thing you have ever done?: 

Boy howdy that’s a long dark road to potentially go down so let’s have three lesser stupids instead of my sincere regrets:

--I got a virus when I was 15 and someone hacked my comp saying that if I didn’t give him my Neopets password he’d delete all my shit and I didn’t disconnect but instead made fun of him in whatever janky chat thing he installed because I didn’t think he could do it (he could) (funny in retrospect except I’m still pissed over losing all of my progress on the RM2K game I was making at the time) --When I was but an amateur stoner I didn’t realize my body would lie to me about how much it could actually eat and I ingested so, so many cashews and then staggered into the bathroom and de-ingested them violently while my dumbass brain went “haha whoops” --In Hawaii I fell on the sidewalk, completely erased the skin on my knee, terrified a family of Asian tourists by trying to patch up my profuse bleeding while the wind blew my hastily-bought medkit down the road, and spent two months nursing the two-inch-square wound it left behind.  I have related this before.  I have not related that the entire reason I tripped was I noticed a small dog on the other side of the street and got so excited I forgot how to walk.

I tag uhhhhh @thegrinningcrow, @qglas, @sugarburger, @machi-tobaye, @melancthe, @squid-ichorous, @panur, @i-like-too-many-boys, and @clumsyshark, but I would happily read responses from absolutely anyone, just tag me back please!

9/5/2020

BACKGROUND CHECK

NULL HQ was always busy, but today was considered an achievement for their hard work in researching the backgrounds of fifty rogues within fifty days in the form of an event where the research team went through hell to satisfy the needs of the Top 50. The 50/50/50 event, it was called, and it was held on a certain chairman's 7th 43rd birthday. If this work sounds weird, I made it while dehydrated, ok. And that chairman was none other than Satan herself, Karén Stéphane Alodie Basilie Blanche Capucine Odette Delphine-Aveline. And yes, her surname does indeed mean Dolphin Hazelnut Tree. Don't ask why.

Today, the fruit that formed by the water of companionship, the nutrients of underpaid employees, the sunlight and carbon dioxide of the terrible ventilation system of the office and the fertilizer of illegal sharing of confidential information had finally ripened and was ready to be plucked by Madame Delphine-Aveline.

The Top 50 had prepared a luxurious vacation for their hardworking employees situated at the tropical rainforest-slash-whatever of New York City Jungle. Yes, having your employees temporarily staying at a nice three-star abandoned hotel and at risk of being eaten by human-animal genetic abominations was quite inhumane, but so is simply letting them spend the day off returning home to their family that died of starvation at the hands of NULL. It's a complicated situation that was one of many developed by the fusion.

Karén hastily dashed to her three-storey private office that also had a swimming pool in it because she was rich, the sounds of her high heels clacking against the hardwood flooring of the 45th floor of the headquarters. Her white woman bracelet-strewn hand was tightly clutching dossiers of the peasants under her.

They had posed a great threat to them after they had exposed a great deal of evidence surrounding NULL’s harsh treatment of, well, everything, and while that was common sense among everyone, the Top 50 still felt hurt with the rogues' selfish actions. The dossiers were their way of striking back even harder towards the revolutionists of Eris-10, the very revolutionists that scatter across the globe, and particularly one group of them squatting in a town in the Crepitus section. Yes, those guys. The Hellspawns. The Wicked, Twisted, Rapidly-Changing-Number Evils of the World. T3G, The Three Thot Groups, the legendary…

Fifty Fighters.

Are they fifty individual fighters? Do they fight the Top 50? Or do they simply have a personal grudge against random numbers? Yes.

The tragedy that made them so important to NULL was uncertain.

Their group contains a family actively running away from NULL, three would-be NULL agents, an individual who gives intense neck therapy to NULL agents, multiple individuals who steal top-secret NULL engineering projects, an individual who worked as an exterminator for NULL and thusly has blueprints of NULL centres embedded into their head, a reprogrammed NULL spy robot, three individuals who were previously under the possession of NULL in environmental capsules, a genetic abomination made by NULL scientists as a PET, a cat, a triple agent responsible for several terrorist attacks on NULL centres who also happens to be a member of the most dangerous group of hitmen in the universe, THE RINGLEADERS, who also HAPPEN to be in good relations with the revolutionist group, because of said single father of two to four that's weirdly close with one of the three individuals who were would-be NULL agents.

Of course this group would be in NULL’s death list.

With that being said, leaving the team that actively worked to obtain information on the threatening individuals to die on a classified location while being observed by scientists might not be the best payment. But it's still a payment.

As the Frenchwoman sat in her £3,000 foldable spinny office chair that can also massage the user, she splayed out the dossier files across her £50,000 hardwood-base granite-surfaced countertops surrounding the area, hidden by rare plants that were watered with diamond-flavoured water. She sighed and leaned the chair back as she snapped her fingers, kindly reminding one of her personal assistants to bring her another large dose of caffeine to get her rusty gears running.

As she waited impatiently, she retrieved her $5,000,000,000 laptop from her Chanel x Gucci x Fendi x Apple x Louis Vuitton x Microsoft x Google x Hunter × Hunter x The Entire Country of Russia x Sonic X x Amazon purse. The laptop was said to be the one that the late Mark Zuckerberg was using as she strangled him to death for not responding sooner to her email on user information. Unfortunately, the email had went straight to the spam folder.

Her fingers were playing a dramatic symphony on the keyboard, her face stern and unchanging.

“good anniversary gifts for Her”

Her 50¢ sunglasses-covered orbs glared at her demand on Bing as she violently clicked the search button. As the ancient website loaded and the screen, white and static and dangerously bright because she doesn't know how to adjust the brightness, she wondered what sequence of surprises would bring joy to her wife currently stationed overseas. God, if only she could join her in creating genetic abominations. So romantic if she could.

Her curiosity was halted suddenly as the assistant rushed in, hands holding a tray. Situated on the tray was a jug of black coffee, a bottle of vodka, a bottle of liquoré, three stolen packets of sea salt, and a mug that read “#0 B0SS”, accompanied with a dagger with a fashioned concave end, resembling a spoon.

Of course, you could still stab someone with it. It's just that the lady's so dangerous she stirs coffee with a dagger, that's all.

The rich bitch glared as her assistant put the contents of the tray onto the coffee table at a glacial pace, also keeping an eye out for any spills made. “Here you are, madame,” the assistant nervously chuckled. Well, that was uncalled for. Her assistants were all given a strict order to not speak to her unless absolutely urgent or if needed to. This one must be new.

“How long have you been working in zis position for, exactly, mïéáæèy chérìè?” Dolphin-HazelnutTree asked with a thin, long smile across her face, eyeing a sea salt packet that was slightly teared.

“Two months, madame,” she smiled. A kind face, clearly inexperienced. “My name is Pauline,” she added, further breaking the rules.

The woman who has a herb for a middle name made an odd face to be observed, only to move towards the young lady who insulted her to hell and back. “Paulíne,” she gently whispered, “I’m glad to know those two months are over,” Pauline's face went pale.

“Faghewell,”

The last word Pauline had heard echoed in her head as Capucine stabbed her in the abdomen while staring down at her falling corpse.

With the dagger spoon. She stabbed her with the dagger spoon. Karén sat on her desk, crossing her legs stylishly.

“Why do I always have bad luck after my birthdays? First, ze bad fughe coat, now zis. I might as well just set zis whole thing on fighea tomorrow.” She uttered, uncaring about Pauline choking on her own blood.

“About ze blood, go call someone to clean it up, dear,” Basil Lady said while examining her perfectly manicured nails.

“You’ve brought too much eggs for ze baguette, now suffer under ze firm hands of it,” she taught nonchalantly. An old French proverb, unsuitable to be said by someone simply learning it on Duolingo such as Pauline.

Pauline was struggling to add even anything to their light feud other than death gargles, and soon, a light thump on the white fur rug, her blood painting it red.

The Baguette pursed her thin, dry lips and stared at the Wannabe Baguette. She lost her train of thought for a few seconds before realising the task at hand.

“Annivaghsaghy gifts! Rghight!”

She spun herself around the desk and sat back down to review the possible gifts. “Hmm…” she scrolled down the BuzzFeed article promoting various products. “Jewelghy? Too cheap. New dghess? Wardghobe's full. Potted plants? Not her thing. Floor cleaner…” she pondered. “Unfortunately, no.” She mumbled, sipping on her unusual beverage.

She stared out the window, thinking. Lists like this roaming around the Internet and made by simpletons didn't contain the spice her relationship had. Basil. Hazelnut. Karén had to think of something else, something more uniqué. Something more fitting for their… uniqué relationship that had a certain je ne sais quoi. A little la souris dans le film avec le gars des pâtes. To be specific, Je ne connais pas cette langue et je ne fais que copier et coller depuis Google Translate. Veuillez aider.

Her eyes fixated on the view outside, never constant, always having something new to be added. Buildings ranging from fallen skyscrapers turned into bridges to supermarkets hosting her greatest enemies. What would her wife like?

And then it clicked.

Homemade bread. Yes, bread wasn't really a topic they talked about often, but if they baked bread together, it would be quite nice. Karén was daydreaming into the distance, not paying attention to the hurricane of messages received on her computer.

It wasn't until her other personal assistants came in with cleaning supplies and a body bag that she stopped and continued to focus on like, eating, I guess, the fruit mentioned in Paragraph 2. She cleared her throat as she picked up the dossiers splayed out on the countertops in her office, arranging them neatly on her desk and preparing to read them.

The first file was thick, and full of information. Knowing it would consume the most of her precious time, she put it aside. Karén sighed as she sorted the files, knowing her wife would have loved gossiping about this with her. Her eyes went to the laptop screen, wondering if she could call her lover for a short while and have a nice conversation. However, a notification distracted her from her wants. An email addressing the rescheduling of the next meeting for the Top 50. She opened it with a frown.

It was from Lee. “HELLO ALL I WILL BE RESCHEDULIG OUR NEXT METTING TO TWO MONTHS ATTER” God, the man has such bad email etiquette. Maybe if he opted to switch out those horrid sunglasses for a good pair of glasses, he'd be able to type in something other than all uppercase letters and sudden typos.

“I AM SORRY FOR THIS SUDDDDEN CHGNE. INWILL BE FOING TO NYCJ FOR A BUSINES TRIP. I AM SORRY. BEST REGARDS STEVEN!”

The Frenchwoman gasped but then immediately retracted it due to fear of her assistants finding out that she has emotions. Really, Steven? The jungle? Out of all people, you? What the fuck, Steve?

This was the last straw. Karén baguetted hastily to the elevator, stabbing the button going down to the basement with an elegant dagger, sparkling with the various gemstones encrusted into its hilt. She angry white woman yelled in the elevator walls, but not before snatching the security camera so no one caught her.

As she was screaming out of dramatic French anger, the elevator halted at the third floor and opened its doors to an intern business agent. Curses. She was so blinded by her own anger that she accidentally took the peasants’ elevator instead of her usual one.

The intern awkwardly stepped into the corner of the elevator, driving his eyes to anywhere but the Frenchwoman. As the peasant transportation cage descended to the basement floor, she stormed towards NULL’s gas station. She wormed her way into the back and stole three jerry cans of gasoline, cradling them as if they were her arsonist-endorsing children. She also made sure to grab some fancy cigarettes, so that it would be a dramatic scene. What is ‘it’? You'll see.

Karén had just finished the finale of a Hulu original series following a woman struggling with motherhood and marriage. Apparently, all she got from the series was that kids are evil, and landlords aren't. Also, arson is always the best plan. Also also, Reese Witherspoon is an excellent actress who is also kind of pretty. But not as pretty as her wife. Oh, and she forgot about the whole Kerry Washington subplot. Probably wasn't that important.

She dashed into Steven's office, which was conveniently close to hers, as she was #23 and he was #24. Karén laughed maniacally as she doused the whole thing in gasoline, unaware of Drogomann sitting on the sofa watching her.

“Um, salutations.”

“WHAT ZE HELL!!?”

Drogomann stared at the struggling woman, judging her every move. Karén’s panicking had spilled the gasoline out of the other two jerry cans, the accelerant flowing down the hallway. The dragon lady noticed this but didn't pay it any care. “Yes! Hello there, my good friend! How are you doing now, Darlamean?” she asked, her voice cracking intermittently.

Darlamean. Really?

The hunter rolled her eyes as she picked up her pet dragon, Currents. It's the least she could do to prevent this crazy French lady from burning down her husband's office. “Doth thou needeth a handeth?” she asked mockingly, shoving Currents into her face. The action had backfired, since Karén had a primal urge to smack the dragon out of her face.

“DON'T SLAPPETH CURRENTS!” Currents was too young to use his wings, so this was bad. Stoorworm panicked as she tripped over one of Karén’s arms as she was trying to catch Currents. The young dragon had thankfully not learned how to use its powers yet, thankfully, and didn't burn down the building. Still, it made everyone in the room panic like hell, especially Karén, but it was for nothing…

However, Karén tends to smoke when she's panicking, and even though this was a situation where smoking was the last thing someone would do, her pattern of reacting to panic did not register the fact that doing so would cause the room, if not, the whole building to burn down, and also would cause her and many others to die, engulfed in flames.

Regardless of the situation, she still instinctively pulled out a cigarette and started to light it without even noticing what she was doing. Drogomann, on the other hand, was busy examining Currents’ current state, searching for any injuries.

The sound of the friction of the cigarette against the weird sandpaper thing on the box (I have not seen a cigarette box up close in years, if not never, so don't expect me to know how this whole thing works ok) had alerted Drogomann as she was, you know, paying attention to the task and hand and not, like, panicking. Considering she deals with herself constantly being on the brink of being set on fire by one of her pets, she's trained herself to, like, Really pay attention to fire and stuff so yeah.

“Ho, dumbass, stop that,” Drogomann shouted. “Doth thee wanteth to kill us?” “Thee baguette? Huh? Huh?” She added, stuffing her pet dragon into her pocket, running towards Karén. “Mérghèhdé!” The Frenchwoman panicked, still. Despite Drogomann’s warning, the flame had already been lit, and the fire grew.

“Merde! Merde! Merde!” Drogomann retrieved a fire extinguisher from behind Steven's desk. Karén was still screaming in French. “Runneth, wench!” Stoorworm politely advised as she started spraying the forbidden Kool-aid powder across the floor. “MERDE!!!” Karén yelled as she ran out of the room, crying. Drogomann sighed as she extinguished the flame successfully, disappointed at the foolishness of the dumbass.

“Ashes. Flames have been reduced. Thank God we didn't die, right? I was here, you know,” the medieval lady said. “Merci! Merci beaucoup, mon ami! You saved my la vie! If it wasn't for you I would be morte!!!” The modern day lady thanked her profusely, “Hi-hi, you are étourdissante, Dghogomann!” Oh, so that's all it takes to get Karén to remember her name. Saving her life. And also insulting her at the same time. Good to know.

“What will you be doing later, ma cherie?” Karén asked suggestively, playing with her twelve-foot-long hair, covered in dry ice(?). “Taking care of him. Touch Currents again, you'll die. Same goes for Steven,” Drogomann haiku’d. “What le fuque? Okay.” Karén nervously backed away.

“A married woman… should not make such offerings,” “Steven shall tell her.” She warned. “QUOI?!” She shouted in French. “Non, non, non, non, Dghogomann, please don't, s’il vous plaît, non, non,” She pleaded. “I’m kidding, Karén. But really, don't cheat on her,” Drogomann assured. “Geneticist, right?” she asked, a brow raisedth. “Y-Yes. Why?” Drogomann nodded intently.

“So she killeth stuff.”

“Huh?”

“Good to know. Watch out, Karén,”

“Don’t do stupid things.”

Drogomann walked out of the room, cradling Currents, avoiding the gasoline and kicking any jerry cans that dared to stand in her way. “Clean this mess up, please. Someone might trip over them. Or burn the building.” She advised. “Rghogergh that, huntergh,” Karén complied.

Now, all she has to do is to give her wife a call or two, get some anniversary gifts, maybe set up some surprise parties, and…

Oh God. Review multiple dossiers.

· fin ·

Women In History

I grew up believing that women had contributed nothing to the world until the 1960′s. So once I became a feminist I started collecting information on women in history, and here’s my collection so far, in no particular order. 

Lepa Svetozara Radić (1925–1943) was a partisan executed at the age of 17 for shooting at German soldiers during WW2. As her captors tied the noose around her neck, they offered her a way out of the gallows by revealing her comrades and leaders identities. She responded that she was not a traitor to her people and they would reveal themselves when they avenged her death. She was the youngest winner of the Order of the People’s Hero of Yugoslavia, awarded in 1951

23 year old Phyllis Latour Doyle was British spy who parachuted into occupied Normandy in 1944 on a reconnaissance mission in preparation for D-day. She relayed 135 secret messages before France was finally liberated. 

Catherine Leroy, War Photographer starting with the Vietnam war. She was taken a prisoner of war. When released she continued to be a war photographer until her death in 2006.

Lieutenant Pavlichenko was a Ukrainian sniper in WWII, with a total of 309 kills, including 36 enemy snipers. After being wounded, she toured the US to promote friendship between the two countries, and was called ‘fat’ by one of her interviewers, which she found rather amusing. 

Johanna Hannie “Jannetje” Schaft was born in Haarlem. She studied in Amsterdam had many Jewish friends. During WWII she aided many people who were hiding from the Germans and began working in resistance movements. She helped to assassinate two nazis. She was later captured and executed. Her last words were “I shoot better than you.”. 

Nancy wake was a resistance spy in WWII, and was so hated by the Germans that at one point she was their most wanted person with a price of 5 million francs on her head. During one of her missions, while parachuting into occupied France, her parachute became tangled in a tree. A french agent commented that he wished that all trees would bear such beautiful fruit, to which she replied “Don’t give me any of that French shit!”, and later that evening she killed a German sentry with her bare hands. 

After her husband was killed in WWII, Violette Szabo began working for the resistance. In her work, she helped to sabotage a railroad and passed along secret information. She was captured and executed at a concentration camp at age 23. 

Grace Hopper was a computer scientist who invented the first ever compiler. Her invention makes every single computer program you use possible. 

Mona Louise Parsons was a member of an informal resistance group in the Netherlands during WWII. After her resistance network was infiltrated, she was captured and was the first Canadian woman to be imprisoned by the Nazis. She was originally sentenced to death by firing squad, but the sentence was lowered to hard lard labor in a prison camp. She escaped. 

Simone Segouin was a Parisian rebel who killed an unknown number of Germans and captured 25 with the aid of her submachine gun. She was present at the liberation of Paris and was later awarded the ‘croix de guerre’. 

Mary Edwards Walker is the only woman to have ever won an American Medal of Honor. She earned it for her work as a surgeon during the Civil War. It was revoked in 1917, but she wore it until hear death two years later. It was restored posthumously. 

Italian neuroscientist won a Nobel Prize for her discovery of nerve growth factor. She died aged 103. 

EDIT

jinxedinks added: Her name was Rita Levi-Montalcini. She was jewish, and so from 1938 until the end of the fascist regime in Italy she was forbidden from working at university. She set up a makeshift lab in her bedroom and continued with her research throughout the war.  

A snapshot of the women of color in the woman’s army corps on Staten Island

This is an ongoing project of mine, and I’ll update this as much as I can (It’s not all WWII stuff, I’ve got separate folders for separate achievements). 

File this under: The History I Wish I’d Been Taught As A Little Girl

My name is Deborah Ann Waugh and I’m a Franco-American, currently residing in Lyon, France. I’ve never thought of myself as an artist, let alone a featured one! I am a complete novice who only started learning watercolour painting this spring, in mid-March to be precise.

And it’s at night, because I suffer from a disease that gives me regular insomnia, and a weekend occupation only and will remain so until I retire 15-20 years from now. I have a gripping scientific day job, which I really love too: discovery and development of novel mechanism of action antibiotics. I have hence begun to lead what is essentially a double life, actually triple if you count my mothering responsibilities to three kids aged 23, 17 and 10, and desire to also spend some time with my loving, screenplay-writing partner.

That’s also why I publicly use a pseudonym: Deborah A. Waugh, with Deborah Ann being the names of my [real] identical twin sister, although those active on Doodlewash will already know me by my real name. That’s why I was so touched and flattered by Charlie’s proposal to become a “featured artist”!

How I Became Such An Avid Watercolourist

I started painting essentially as a way to return, in spirit and fantasy, to my large flower, fruit and vegetable garden, which I lost when we sold our house of 10 years outside of Bristol (UK) in 2017-18 and moved in to a flat in central Lyon.

When I draw flowers, fruits, vegetables or small animals, I realise I draw (literally!) in my mind from a vast collection of visual memories derived from hours and hours of gardening at that location in all seasons. Indeed, in order to tend effectively to Nature, you have to observe, to study very carefully where and how it grows and grows best, and to memorise this information for future reference.

I am also inspired by three other locations I still often holiday in and return to in my mind when I paint: l’Ile d’Yeu, off the coast of Nantes in Brittany and the Val d’Hérens in the Swiss Alpes and a family home in Virieu-sur-Bourbre, now known as Val de Virieu, located between Lyon and Grenoble. After just a couple of first paintings, I was completely hooked. I now paint for at least one 2-3 hours sitting every day, watching online tutorials on my commute to and from work.

Focus And Sources Of Inspiration

I see myself as an “intimiste” painter. I paint individual plants or plant parts, objects, more rarely land or cityscapes, but almost always from/of places I have personally visited or lived in. I usually rely on photos I have taken on my phone or tablet, assembling them into mood boards using an application called Jux, if necessary alongside additional images (photos or watercolour paintings by others) taken from the Web via Google and Unsplash.

As I am still teaching myself to draw (for instance, via Brent Eviston’s fantastic classes on Skillshare), if I paint directly from an existing but complicated photo, I may use the Etchr mirror and its dedicated applications to transfer a first sketch onto watercolour paper.

For flowers and bouquets, I also use Instagram a lot as a source of inspirational reference photos, where I follow many specialised British nurseries, RHS and other prestigious gardens and famous gardeners for instance, as well as many individuals internationally posting their own marvellous pictures of nature.

Favourite Materials And Supplies

For landscapes and cityscapes I generally use my Winsor & Newton watercolour palettes which have rich earthy tones, complemented by some same brand tube paints. For flowers and other vegetation, I prefer my brighter Sennelier fine and extra fine tube paints as well as Dr Ph Martins liquid watercolours (from the Radiant, Hydrus or Bombay ink ranges, which I will review for this website soon), which are also less prone to fading.

All three types of paints can also be mixed together, often to great effects. What I also like to do is add/mix in iridescent paints, in liquid form from Dr Ph Martins and in solid form from Daniel Smith (tubes) or Kuretake (palettes). I find these paints, used subtly, really illuminate a painting. Finally, I like to enhance my paintings with white gouache, gel pens of different colours, including metallic ones, and dark ink markers of different thicknesses too.

In terms of paper, I’ll use anything good (Arches, Fabriano or Canson, 100% or high percentage cotton, cold pressed smooth for loose flowers, rough for landscapes and hot pressed very smooth for detailed, realistic pieces.

Also some handmade papers from Ruscombe Mill) but what I particularly like are free paper samples (sent to me regularly for instance by the great French watercolour supplies shop) since then I feel psychologically relieved of my blank paper fear of “wasting it”!

In terms of paint brushes my favourites are two pure petit gris Winsor & Newton ones, the Princeton Neptune Artist Brushes for Watercolor Series 4750, 4 Piece Professional Set 300 recently reviewed on the Doodlewash site, a surprisingly cheap, cheerful and very much used 8-piece Chinese calligraphy set, complemented by a few speciality Japanese brushes such as hake, surikomi etc.

My ongoing à la carte, self-selected and self-guided artistic education

As I am still very much learning to paint, I have taken several classes online and I am continuing to do so. I’ve clocked up around 100 hours of diverse fine arts classes on Skillshare and posted several dozen projects (under my real name). That’s where I first encountered the wonderfully inspirational loose botanical work of Anne Lafolette for instance, and that of several other great watercolour artists.

On Creativebug I mostly took the outstanding courses of Yao Cheng, which are again centred on loose florals. In addition, I have subscribed to several courses on the websites of individual artists such as Louise de Masi, first encountered on Skillshare, Kris Keys and Marie Boudon.

Another source of inspiration is artist Minyoung Ku, discovered on Instagram and who, I believe at my insistent request, has just started posting tutorials on YouTube.

To Conclude, The Future

What I enjoy most is painting real vegetables or bouquets sitting right in front of my eyes or better still painting outdoors using my Etchr satchel or field case and mini-palette. Finally, I don’t like my work to then get buried in my large portfolio folder so I spray a light, UV-protecting varnish on what my family and I agree are the better ones, mount them on cheap cardboard frames with masking tapes and hang them everywhere in our flat: hallways, bedrooms and even, of course, the loo!

Other than that, I still feel very much like I am at the start of my creative journey. Therefore, I strongly hope Doodlewash will give me the chance to update you on my progress again a few years from now.

Deborah Ann Waugh Instagram Doodlewash Etsy

GUEST ARTIST: "Aquarelles au Naturel" by Deborah Ann Waugh - #doodlewash #WorldWatercolorGroup #watercolor #watercolour My name is Deborah Ann Waugh and I'm a Franco-American, currently residing in Lyon, France. I’ve never thought of myself as an artist, let alone a featured one!

Based on a true story. The pay was standard. Room, board, and 150 euros per month. “Room” was a single on an 8th floor walk-up, with a communal bathroom in the hall. “Board” was lunch 6 days a week. The salary, less than $6 a day, largely went to the all the other meals I had mistakenly assumed would be included. But I wanted to stay in Paris for the summer, so I moved in the day after the interview. The room was a classic chambre de bonne, with a single bed and unobstructed view of Sacre Coeur. Bonne is short for bonne à tout faire, “good for doing everything.” As such, the advertised governess job was more housekeeping than babysitting. “We’ve never had an au pair,” Mrs. Dimas told me. “We are not rich. We can barely afford you.” She showed me how to vacuum the walls, which were covered in fabric. “My husband is a perfectionist,” she said, adding that it was he who insisted the bedsheets be ironed. The French word for perfectionist, when talking about cleanliness, is maniac. Pronounced “mahn-YAK.” She had a confidence, even when lying, that led me to double-check the driver’s license she’d sometime leave on the kitchen counter. Just 29? There were two children. Four-year-old Patrice, dark-complected and moody, and three-month-old Sidonie, blonde like her mother, and the subject of a christening in the works, with family coming from all over. I would arrive to clean up the breakfast table and get Patrice dressed for school while keeping an eye on Sidonie, who dozed off with a belly full of formula that we made with Volvic bottled water. (Madame herself drank Contrex, which was said to be slimming, while her husband, who owned a restaurant, preferred Badoit, the salty one that aids digestion. I found this very sophisticated, and was trying to decide which water brand best reflected the Parisian I was trying to become.) After dropping Patrice off at nursery school, I’d go back to the apartment where Rose-Annette, as Mrs. Dimas asked me to call her, would go over the housework to be done that day, ensuring I understood the words on the list. She would pull me a coffee from the noisy espresso machine, and then make a production of getting dressed and leaving. Rose-Annette returned for lunch most days around 1 or so, and we ate together. Usually Sidonie would be down for a nap. Rose-Annette showed me how to steam vegetables in the pressure cooker, and to bake clafoutis with fruit fresh she’d bring up from the market. “I can’t believe Americans buy mayonnaise,” she said one day, mixing a dab of mustard into her homemade mayo. I said, “I can’t believe you French eat horse meat.” I wasn’t sure if the playfulness I intended came across. “I adore horse meat,” Rose-Annette said. As a post-script, she added, “Vous.” She corrected me anytime I used the informal word for “you.” On Bastille Day I was “verifying” the laundry (no holiday for the help, so I was following instructions to check every button and zipper before ironing and hanging the clothes). Rose-Annette was picking out blue, white and red outfits for the girls when the phone rang. I guessed it was her mother, because she didn’t seem to have many friends. After confabbing on the christening, slated for September—something about how many pounds of candied almonds to order, the traditional accessory for baptisms—Rose-Annette took the phone into the kitchen and closed the door behind her. “What am going to do when she goes back to America?” I heard her say. “I won’t have any help! I don’t know. Maybe it’s good. It’s getting too cosy.” I was better off than the other au pairs that I met at the playground. Some would smoke, or vape, while our charges played, and we’d all wolf down snacks intended for the kids. I was the only one privileged to call madame by her given name, and to drink rosé with her at lunch. “We polished off a whole bottle,” I bragged to Birgitta, whose family used cloth diapers and made her serve dinner like a waitress. The families looked down upon us, and we upon them. “What kind of work is it that you do?” I asked Rose-Annette over lunch. “If only!” she said. In the ensuing sentences, she may or may not have told me. I missed a lot while pretending to understand. What did become clear, though, to my surprise, was that she wasn’t working. It was a full-time job to get her old position back, she said. First, she needed her papers. The word was similar to “husband” and “baptism gown.” Not in the way it sounded, but in that I heard it a lot, and was aware of its importance in this household, but never saw it. Of course, everyone in France talks about papers. It’s a bureaucratic country where one in five people works for the government, mainly shuffling documents. Everyone needed papers, no one had the papers they needed. Even I lacked papers. My visa had expired in May, not long after the final exam of the Sorbonne’s extension program. I was technically an “illegal,” as were most of the other au pairs at the playground. But none of us were concerned about it. We were white, and our host families were comfortable and connected. We had nothing in common with the bands of Afghans who would also congregate in parks, sitting in a circle, quietly passing around food. “I just purse my lips when I walk past a police station,” Birgitta said. We pulled French faces and imitated the high voices our madames used, especially when speaking to their husbands. Chasing papers, and the stamps to validate them—that was a whole separate task, conducted in separate offices or buildings–sent Rose-Annette out of the house most days of the week. The manila folder, where the papers were collected, migrated around the apartment like a mobile religious object. She took a day trip to Brittany to look through boxes in her parents’ house. All she found there was her old monthly metro pass. She made a cute embarassed face when she showed me the photo-booth image on it, of her flashing a peace sign, and wearing the skunk-stripe hairstyle popular in the aughts. “Awesome,” I said in English, and we slapped hands in an off-center high-five. “She’s meeting a lover!” Birgitta squealed. The love life of our madames was a big topic at the park. “No,” I said. “Not Rose-Annette.” For one thing, she primped more for her husband’s return from work than she did for her morning excursions. Rose-Annette was moony over Antonio, her Nino. She liked to stop in and hang out at the restaurant he owned, she confided to me, until he told her she’d have to put on an apron. “That, no!” she laughed. By August, the bottle of rosé was de rigueur at lunch. “My parents are being difficult about the christening,” Rose-Annette told me. “My father still cannot accept that I married a Portuguese man.” She shrugged her shoulders and lowered one eyelid in existential resignation. “Because of them, I couldn’t let Antonio gain nationality by marrying me. He had to be naturalized before I said yes.” I thought about this as I finished off a bowl of berries in sour cream. If Rose-Annette resented her parents’ disdain for Nino, why did she subject him to their requirements? That seemed so French to me. Rose-Annette loved to consider herself an outsider for having a foreign husband. She found it deliciously outrageous that they allowed Patrice to keep her hair cut in a short buzz. But, with their pastel candied almonds–”they’re expensive, butone must,” she had explained–they were as bourgeois as any of the other parents we dished about at the playground. Sometimes at lunch, after a couple glasses of wine, I got an urge to ask her about French traditions, specifically how she came to reject some and emulate others. But even if I’d had the language skills, I didn’t dare, and I would stand and pick up dishes. “Instead of attempting to change the country during your junior year abroad,” read a pamphlet handed to us at orientation at the Sorbonne, “try to understand and respect the cultural norms in France, even if you disagree with them.” I wrote home to my sister, “Rose-Annette doesn’t even buy baby food!” When the baby started eating solids, I spoon-fed her veal puree’d with butter. My last chore each evening was to wax and buff the girls’ navy leather shoes. A heatwave began. It was exhausting speaking staccato French all day. Going home to the States would be like taking off roller blades and walking without fear of wiping out. My au pair comrades started dropping out of sight, accompanying their host families on vacation to Normandy, Provence, the Riviera. Rose-Annette’s handful of friends also decamped, or so she said. The two of us took to watching a soap opera after lunch. “I’m different, she said during a commercial for a cut-rate airline. “I’d rather take a vacation in winter to someplace warm. Nino can’t leave the restaurant, and I prefer not to desert him.” I bought my return ticket online and, after bringing Patrice home from the crèche, slipped Rose-Annette a note across the kitchen table with the flight information. She gave me a “What am I going to do?” face that was endearing, even touching. She opened a bottle of Brouilly—a red served chilled—and invited me to stay for dinner: cervelles d’agneau. I wondered if I should go get my dictionary. Instead I walked to the living room, where Patrice had turned on the TV. I said, “We’re having lamb brains tonight.” She shot up her fists in the air and said, “Oui!” Back in the kitchen, Rose-Annette said, barely audibly, “My paper chase is coming to an end.” The manila folder, which I hadn’t seen in a couple of weeks, had materialized in her hands. “You’ll go back to university,” she said, curling the tab at the top, “and I’ll go back to work.” Now was my chance to get clear on her profession. Teacher? Secretary? One of France’s 13 million bureaucrats? She didn’t seem to have any passions beyond family and food. The theme music for a game show came on, and we both turned toward the TV. I raised my eyebrows. “Ah, oui!” Rose-Annette said, bringing over the bottle and two glasses. “Scoot over, Patrice.” As I walked down the stairs from my chambre de bonne the morning of the 31st, I wondered if Rose-Annette would give me a tip, or a gift, with my pay. Maybe we’d have a coffee together and she’d give me the day off to finish packing. She was dressed, with her cross-body satchel strapped on. “My mother is coming to stay for a week,” Rose-Annette said, clasping her hands to her head. “You think my husband is maniac? My mother is worse.” The list of chores began with vacuuming the walls. “I’ll drop Patrice at school so you have time for a top-to-bottom,” she said. I don’t know if I’ll be back for lunch because I’ve got one last stamp to beg for.” I blinked at the list. “Wow,” I said. “So you’re really going back to work.” She nodded yes, wild-eyed, and called for Patrice to put on her shoes. Sidonie was acting up. I couldn’t clean and entertain her at the same time, so I turned on the radio loud and let her wail. I sweated like crazy scrubbing mineral deposits off bathroom tiles. When I finished, I taped up the nozzle of the Cif, the white cleanser. I loved the smell. There wasn’t anything like it in the United States. As I was burying it in my purse, I heard the front door, and I froze. Rose-Annette appeared in the apartment hallway, looking alarmed. “She just started,” I said over the din, jumping up to turn off the radio. “I’ll go get her.” I calmed the baby by changing her diaper. I gave her a clean outfit, too. When I came back out from her bedroom, Rose-Annette was hunched over, opening a bottle of wine at the kitchen table. She looked up and said, “Are you OK?” “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “Sorry. Just a little frazzled about my flight tomorrow. I want to get everything done.” Rose-Annette reached out for Sidonie with one arm and pulled off her satchel with the other. She smelled the baby’s neck and rocked her. I heard sniffling. “I can’t believe it,” she said, her voice an octave lower than normal, and gravelly. I suspected something serious, something about Nino, maybe. She couldn’t be that worked up just because the baby had been yelling. Or even that I was leaving. I tried to think of an excuse about the Cif, which she may have seen me steal. But then the baby stopped crying, suddenly, and I thought about Rose-Annette’s confidence, which had impressed me when we’d first met. I took a step closer and put my hand on her shoulder, a barrier neither of us expected to be crossed. With a face that reminded me of our soap opera heroine, she closed her eyes and leaned into my hand. She mumbled, “I lost all my papers on the metro.” The post Short Story: The Paris Papers appeared first on .

http://www.theparisblog.com/short-story-paris-papers/

His final moment was for me, quarry is for him . HTAG 1 TTWatch Warners heartwarmingtribute to His Lord and Savior, and speak the full transcript of his powerful meaning below: HETAG 1 TT .embed-container berth: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; meridian: 0; overflow: obscured; max-width: 100%;. embed-container iframe,. embed-container object,. embed-container embed outlook: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; thicknes: 100%; stature: 100%; DTAG 8 TT DTAG 9 TTBut those people had it all wrong . DTAG 10 TT BTAG 2 TT DTAG 11 TTNow, adoration it or hate it, that opening scene captured the curiosity of the sports world, and the words grew the heart of my floor. The residual, as “theyre saying”, is biography. Wreaking us to this: the famous last words. And the only lieu this extraordinary journeying can intent. His final moment was for me, quarry is for him. Thank you Jesus . DTAG 14 TT Amsterdam’s solution to the obesity crisis: no fruit juice and enough sleep

The city is successfully campaigning fat in terms of promoting tap water in its institutions, together with healthy cooking grades and a ban on fast food sponsorship

The city of Amsterdam is leading the world in purposing the obesity epidemic, thanks to a revolutionary and wide-reaching curricula which is getting causes even among the poorest parishes that are hardest to reach.

Better knows we tulips and bicycles, Amsterdam has the highest rate of obesity in the Netherlands, with a fifth of its children overweight and at risk of future health problems.

The programme appears to be attain by making multiple targets at the same time from promoting tap water to after-school activities to the city repudiating sponsorship to happenings that take fund from Coca Cola or McDonalds.

It is led by a dynamic deputy mayor with the unanimous backing of the citys legislators. From 2012 to 2015, the number of overweight and obese babes has dropped by 12%. Even more impressive, Amsterdam did exactly what nobody else has managed, because the biggest sink has been amongst the lowest socio-economic groups.

It is in neighborhoods like the Bijlmer in the south-east that the programme of activities is changing lives. The Bijlmer is notorious, replies Wilbert Sawat, coordinator and PE teacher at De Achtsprong primary school, and thats why he wanted to work there. Other teaches do too, he announces. Here we are capable of make a difference.

The school is in the middle of a high-rise home estate that was experimental in the 1960 s, with heightened streets so parties would be free to path and round on the ground level. But the repetition commons are empty. In 1975, when the Dutch colony of Suriname in south America became independent, numerous migrated to Amsterdam and moved into the inexpensive flats. Cycling was not part of their culture.

Amsterdams agent mayor for healthcare, Eric van der Burg, who was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer district. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

The school, which in 2007 was in the top three in Amsterdam for overweight babes, is now one of 100 that are a key focus of the obesity program. Children are weighed and weighed every year. Some parents objected but now it is normal, reads Sawat. And so is tap water.

All brats have to bring liquid or milk to academy, he suggested. No juice. A fortune of mothers were really upset. We had really hard discussions with them. The mothers visualized juice or even squash was healthier, assuming they contained fruit. The schoolteachers told them about the carbohydrate. I told them we were doing them a promotion. They could have water at academy and then juice at home. Now its normal not a problem.

The ban on birthday feasts for the class too made ructions. It had become challenger. Soul drew cupcakes, so another bring cupcakes and juice and then cupcakes and juice and a toy. The institution made a folder of healthy considers, such as oranges or carrots embellished to look like faces.

A few years ago we had a son who stopped going to the bathroom. We find he had Mars and Snickers in his pockets. He was a really fat son and his mothers had put him on a diet but they didnt tell us, pronounced Sawat. Now the school is focused on health meat and even the nearby McDonalds has agreed that a child without a parent is simply buy an apple no fries. A European concede provisions one fruit or vegetable for all children for three days a week. The fridge is filled with carrots and radishes, which the children are told they must at least try.

Young infants are the focus of most obesity tries because it is easier to prevent them putting on load than try to sorting it out afterwards. But Dana Bijvoet, a nurse and family consultant working out of a secondary school in the field, picks up with the youngsters. There are about 2,000 morbidly obese children in Amsterdam who are the initial focus.

Children get their yearly fitness exams at the De Achtsprong school. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

She tells urgently heartbreaking floors. Romana, 14, had liver failure because of her weight and was suffering from feeling and low-pitched self-esteem. Bijvoet are talking about dysfunctional class where parents envisage “their childrens” can manage without improve, where there is no coin and constant crisis. I want to know how they are in “peoples lives” their mental health and their self-esteem, she supposed. She needs to help with the other difficulties, to get a bit of infinite in their foremen be addressed with the obesity.

Romanas mothers, from Suriname, are divorced and her father, who has detention, said the mother was possessed he told Bijvoet of a lot of black magic and voodoo. He was a cab driver, rarely home but would not permit his daughter got to go alone. Expected what she craved most, Romana supposed, I want to fit into my jeans and feel right about myself, enunciated Bijvoet.

In the east part of the city, where car horns and music announce a Moroccan wedding in the street, a cooking class takes home for childhood and mothers in their home communities centre. Every week they come together to cook healthily to change the conventional recipes, tells Amira El Ashkar, a voluntary whose lineage was from Egypt. Eight girls and a boy, some of whom are very overweight, are stirring what they call muffins, which seem more like quiche but are earn with only egg and oatmeal to bind courgettes, peppers and other vegetables.

El Ashkar has also introduced health different versions of tagine and couscous bowls. Pedigrees want to eat healthy nutrient they just did not know how, she says.

Eric van der Burg, the agent mayor for healthcare and boast who propelled the programme of activities, was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer and says he “d rather” live in those localities. I dont want to live in an area where everyone is prosperou and they all wear the same clothes and have the same hounds and hairdresser, he did.

Cooking class with parents and children at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Van der Burg, however, is the nearest Amsterdam has to a rightwinger, belonging to the conservative-liberal Peoples Party for Freedom and Democracy( VVD ). The residue of the citys legislators are to the left of him, so there are no the allegations of nanny-statism, although there are the programme is noticeably interventionist.

He has taken a tough line on advertising at sporting phenomena. The city is the primary patronize of a European basketball championship in July. We said to the organiser, you cant have Monster[ vigour boozing] or Burger King as co-sponsor, he read. The same no-compromise spate is being obligated with the European hockey and macrocosm ice-skating championships. They are talking to restaurants and boasts facilities about selling healthier meat and censoring cola adverts inside stadiums the city owns.

Another important part of the programme is sleep. It is very important to get enough sleep. Nobody knows that, articulates van der Burg.

Programme manager Karen den Hertog says that if you dont sleep, your hormones are messed up. You will be additional starving. It is your hormones talking to you, she suggested. They work to organise discussions with parents on childrens sleep blueprints through community leaders.

Children get their yearly fitness quiz at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Professor Corinna Hawkes, administrator of the center for meat plan at City University, who has reviewed and considered the Amsterdam model, is affected. They werent just saying gives have a soda excise they were thinking about how people connect with their milieu, she said.

They went to parents and understood their the behaviours and engaged in educational programmes to change them, Hawkes added. We have to understand why people are making their decisions and adapt accordingly, she said.

Some of the policies Amsterdam is using to crack obesity

A proscription on making juice to focus schools and investment in more water fountains around the city Cooking categorizes to learn healthy ranges of ethnic foods: pizzas with a broccoli basi, kebabs with lean chicken instead of pork, honey and years substituted for sugar City has refused to sponsor any event joint-funded by a fast food company Parents encouraged to set small children on motorcycles without pedals instead of pedaling them in buggies Focus on the first 1,000 days of a childs life, including lawyer for pregnant women and mothers Families encouraged to eat dinner together Sports core membership and activities subsidised for low-income houses

The post His final moment was for me, quarry is for him . HTAG 1 TTWatch Warners heartwarmingtribute to His Lord and Savior, and speak the full transcript of his powerful meaning below: HETAG 1 TT .embed-container berth: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; meridian: 0; overflow: obscured; max-width: 100%;. embed-container iframe,. embed-container object,. embed-container embed outlook: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; thicknes: 100%; stature: 100%; DTAG 8 TT DTAG 9 TTBut those people had it all wrong . DTAG 10 TT BTAG 2 TT DTAG 11 TTNow, adoration it or hate it, that opening scene captured the curiosity of the sports world, and the words grew the heart of my floor. The residual, as “theyre saying”, is biography. Wreaking us to this: the famous last words. And the only lieu this extraordinary journeying can intent. His final moment was for me, quarry is for him. Thank you Jesus . DTAG 14 TT Amsterdam’s solution to the obesity crisis: no fruit juice and enough sleep appeared first on apsbicepstraining.com.

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‘Kind Bars Are the Food of the Revolution’ added to Google Docs

‘Kind Bars Are the Food of the Revolution’

 Grabbing sustenance from the People’s Bodega | Jaya Saxena

The People’s Bodega is a traveling food and necessities pantry providing protesters with the fuel they need to keep going

Over the past month, mass protests calling for the abolition of police and a national reckoning with anti-Blackness have spread across the country. In that time, various volunteers and organizations have risen to the challenge of feeding those on the frontlines, like the Sikh gurdwaras serving dal to hospital workers and protesters, or the good samaritans, unaffiliated with any organization, handing out snacks at marches. And then there’s the People’s Bodega, a mutual aid organization that considers the needs of the community and packs them into a van.

The People’s Bodega is, essentially, a traveling food and necessities pantry. In New York and LA, it caters to protests, its vans driving to different parts of a march to make sure everyone is served. Though the People’s Bodega began in LA, the word “bodega” has a distinctly New York (specifically Nuyorican) feel. The bodega is your neighborhood spot where you know the person behind the counter; it’s the center of your community, even if that community is just your block. You can be fed there, yes, but also pick up first-aid supplies, housewares, phone cards, or any other small things you need to live your day-to-day life. The People’s Bodega takes that concept and brings it to the protests, supplying water, sports drinks, and snacks alongside hand sanitizer, sunscreen, condoms, and tampons (plus, if you feel like hopping in the back of the van, a place to change your tampon). But unlike your neighborhood convenience store, everything is free.

 Jaya Saxena One of the vans

On June 28, the 51st anniversary of the Stonewall riots, I rode with the People’s Bodega to serve New York’s Queer Liberation March. Organized by the Reclaim Pride Coalition, the march was “for Black lives and against police brutality.” Thousands gathered in glitter, leather, and shirts reading “BLACK TRANS LIVES MATTER.” The People’s Bodega set up two tables in Manhattan’s Foley Square, where the march began. It was 1 p.m. and people were hungry and thirsty, everyone aware of the fact that they’d need to be full and hydrated as they marched in the 88-degree heat. The provisions the People’s Bodega supplies are calibrated for a marcher’s needs — enough food and water to keep you going, but never too much to slow you down.

Making its way to Washington Square Park, the march took a slightly circuitous route to avoid police presence. The People’s Bodega volunteers packed into two vans and tracked the movement on their phones, weaving through the streets of downtown Manhattan to meet up with the march halfway through its route. In the back of the van, towers of water shifted and teetered with each turn. Chloe, one of the organizers, emphasized to me that all the supplies have been donated: Even though the volunteers put out calls for specific staples on Instagram, they’re not always in control of what they get.

That day, they estimated they’d give out about 1,600 bottles of water, as well as plenty of Nature Valley and Nutrigrain bars, but also fruit snacks, lollipops, a box of store-brand Graham crackers, and some coveted packets of Oreos and Nutter Butters. There were a few cases of day-camp favorite Little Hug, those neon-colored fruit drinks that come in barrel-shaped bottles. Sometimes, people drop off homemade sandwiches or whole pizzas, though that’s rare. Some items are always around: “Kind bars,” Chloe says, “are the food of the revolution.”

It was hard to convince people that the supplies were free. But on a sweltering day when people had already marched for a mile, the organizers at the People’s Bodega pushed cold water and sports drinks, granola bars and clementines and fruit snacks, repeating again and again that these items cost nothing until people were convinced. Yes, at least in this instance, these basic human needs cost nothing.

Once the confusion over cost (or lack thereof) is settled, the demonstrators are typically thrilled and grateful. Once the march caught up with us, the People’s Bodega volunteers ran in a constant loop from van to table, carrying pallets of water and Costco-brand sports drinks, which went so fast they never even made it into the cooler. Cries of “Thank you!” and “Oh my god, you’re angels!” emanated from the crowd, the humidity outside building to a storm that would erupt later that night. Everyone was drained, but at the sight of snacks, they turned giddy. Sugar and salt would keep them going.

 Jaya Saxena

Providing these essentials for free, whether it’s a single granola bar or dozens of breakfast sandwiches for the people occupying City Hall, is what Chloe believes mutual aid is all about: using what we have to make sure everyone gets what they need. “The point is avoiding the direct exchange of money for goods,” she said. When I ask if any of the food has come from restaurants or grocery stores to support the mission, she shakes her head. “All our donations come from people.” Sometimes the donations are food, and other times they’re in the form of monetary donations through PayPal.

The question hovering over the protests currently is: How long is this going to last? Right now, we’re in a perfect storm for public actions — mass unemployment and remote work allow more time for political organizing. The pandemic has kept people from most other social engagements while exposing many of the cracks in our society, from racism to the lack of a social safety net to the severe underfunding of public health and public education. But protest momentum is a hard thing to sustain, especially as states keep pushing the reopening of the economy. Will the People’s Bodega still be needed in a month?

Chloe emphasizes that it will remain in the struggle “until full abolition is achieved.” Currently, the group is planning for other forms of longevity as a mobile community center and food pantry. But part of their mission is to do everything they can to keep that protest momentum going. By providing food, water, and other necessities, the People’s Bodega is making the bar of entry to protesting as low as it can possibly be — you can show up without a mask, without sun protection, and hungry, and someone will take care of you. The food is fuel to keep you fighting.

Food media largely avoids the concept of “food as fuel.” I mean, is there anything so dreary? It evokes the unseasoned chicken breasts and steamed broccoli of gym rats, the calorie counting of diet culture, Soylent. In food media and “foodie” culture, food can and should be anything but fuel. It’s culture, it’s history, it’s a way to share tradition and heritage, it’s something to bond over, it’s a lens through which… well, you know the rest.

But for the People’s Bodega, food is fuel. That’s precisely its glory.

After the march passed, the van made its way to Washington Square Park. Later that day, police pepper-sprayed the crowd just as Mayor Bill de Blasio tweeted that the city “celebrates the Black, trans activists who built the movement and continue to lead today.” But before that, as the van arrived at the park, the marchers were still exuberant, many of them fortified by the sustenance provided by the People’s Bodega. A volunteer ran out for ice. Another offered to cart water around the park to those who may have missed the table. They apologized to marchers for running out of sports drinks, but displayed every Kind bar and box of raisins they had left. I watched as people bonded, sucking on Fruit by the Foot, comparing Dum Dum flavors, and feeding their friends and partners nuts and candy. The food may be fuel, but by the act of giving it away and the power of mutual aid, it is transformed. Here, a pack of peanuts is love. A Gatorade is solidarity. A free Kind bar is the sign that we’re all in this fight together.

In the following days, the People’s Bodega organizers restock and replan, coordinating donation pickups and Costco runs. They will be at the next march, electrolytes in hand, to fuel the revolution.

via Eater - All https://www.eater.com/2020/7/9/21308094/peoples-bodega-traveling-food-pantry-mutual-aid-protesters-fighting-police-brutality

Created July 10, 2020 at 12:26AM /huong sen View Google Doc Nhà hàng Hương Sen chuyên buffet hải sản cao cấp✅ Tổ chức tiệc cưới✅ Hội nghị, hội thảo✅ Tiệc lưu động✅ Sự kiện mang tầm cỡ quốc gia 52 Phố Miếu Đầm, Mễ Trì, Nam Từ Liêm, Hà Nội http://huongsen.vn/ 0904988999 http://huongsen.vn/to-chuc-tiec-hoi-nghi/ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1xa6sRugRZk4MDSyctcqusGYBv1lXYkrF

From the Strategist What Are the Best Subscription Coffee Clubs added to Google Docs

From the Strategist What Are the Best Subscription Coffee Clubs

 Photo: Bean Box

How to pick a coffee subscription from among the eight most popular online bean delivery services, from the Strategist

Coffee is like all forms of cooking — quality ingredients trump fancy equipment. Case in point: The pour-over method might be the best cup of coffee you can brew at home, and all it requires is a kettle, a grinder, and patience. And good coffee beans. The most important thing about your beans is that they’re freshly roasted. You want to use them within a few days after they came off of the heat. With many of us still limiting our trips out of the house because of the coronavirus, coffee bean subscriptions can be the perfect solution. Whether you’re looking for an upgrade over the supermarket stuff or single-origin beans from halfway around the world, subscription services make that simple to find. They even help you figure out what you want.

As a longtime journalist with stints at Serious Eats and Men’s Journal, I’ve tested dozens of different coffee beans and coffee makers. For this story, I found the eight most popular online bean delivery services, signed up and ordered samples. I tasted each brand’s beans using the pour-over method and with an automatic drip machine that is certified by the Specialty Coffee Association. Here’s what I learned about each.

 Trade Coffee

With more than 400 different coffees available (from 54 local roasters spread across 38 states), Trade is a smart option for java geeks who know what they like. But novices should shop here too: The site’s easy coffee quiz and algorithm helps any coffee drinker zero in on what roast profiles they’ll like — even if all you know you like is decaf with a little milk. And if you don’t like the bean you’re first matched with, call them and they’ll help you pick another, which they’ll send for free. I just wish it were possible to select more than one preferred brewing method. Maybe I like using a coffee machine during the week and doing pour-over on weekends.

 Driftaway Coffee

A subscription here starts with four, two-ounce bags of single-origin coffees to help you decide what you like. (It’s a quiz you can taste!) The coffees I tried covered a huge range of flavors, from an acidic Peru Cajamarca San Ignacio to a fruit-forward Burundi Bukeye Buhorwa. I found Driftaway’s service to be one of the most informative and customizable, teaching me about different beans and allowing for constant feedback to shape future shipments.

 Atlas Coffee Club

Although all of the beans from Atlas are roasted in Austin, they’re imported from nearly 20 different countries. This service is more about exploring different beans than selecting one based on your taste. You simply pick ground or whole beans, your bag size, delivery frequency, and one of three roast options. Wherever Atlas gets their beans that month determines the coffee that is shipped to you. One unexpected benefit is the bags the coffee comes in. Inspired by textiles local to each coffee grower, they’re attractive enough that you’ll want to leave them out on the counter.

 Blue Bottle Coffee Subscription

Blue Bottle churns out about 20 different coffees from locations in Sacramento and Brooklyn that reach subscribers two to three days after coming off the heat. The commitment-phobic will like the option to go with smaller six-ounce bags. The company also offers a subscriber hotline you can ring with questions, like how to dial in the pour-over method.

 Bean Box

Pick your preference among six roast levels, from light to espresso, and Bean Box will send you four relevant 1.8-ounce sample pouches from its collection of 35 Pacific Northwest roasters. If you love one of the samples, then you can buy it in a larger bag. You can always change your selection, or the company offers a more traditional coffee-of-the-month club with a different batch each month. My sampler included a delicious Velton’s Coffee’s Peru Flor de Selva, which had the fruitiest notes I tasted, with hints of lime and citrus.

 MistoBox

MistoBox offers 590 coffees from 52 domestic roasters. It’s hard to find a site with a wider selection. Unlike other coffee companies’ quizzes, this one goes pretty deep, asking whether you prefer blends or single origins, and if you prefer your coffee black, with cream, or with sugar. Based on your answer, Misto selects a coffee you might like and sends you a 12-ounce bag, along with the email address of a curator who can help you refine your choice for the following month.

 Craft Coffee

If you usually pick up beans at the supermarket, Craft Coffee has a simple process to determine the right blend for you: Just tell them what you typically buy, whether it’s Dunkin’ Donuts, Green Mountain, or something else. From that single bit of information, Craft selects a blend for you. If you don’t like it, they’ll help you find an alternative. All of my bags had roasting dates stamped on them, which were typically within 72 hours of their delivery.

 Crema

The website uses a simple photo system to indicate the main flavors of the coffees, which is helpful for newbies. It also lets aficionados filter coffee by production process. If you don’t already know what you’d like to try from their catalog of 40 U.S. roasters, Crema will send you a free three-bag sampler to taste and rate. Based on that information, the company creates your coffee “playlist,” automatically adding recommended beans based on your input. The more feedback you give with each bag, the more specific your recommendations become.

via Eater - All https://www.eater.com/21294633/best-online-coffee-subscription-coffee-club

Created June 19, 2020 at 01:26AM /huong sen View Google Doc Nhà hàng Hương Sen chuyên buffet hải sản cao cấp✅ Tổ chức tiệc cưới✅ Hội nghị, hội thảo✅ Tiệc lưu động✅ Sự kiện mang tầm cỡ quốc gia 52 Phố Miếu Đầm, Mễ Trì, Nam Từ Liêm, Hà Nội http://huongsen.vn/ 0904988999 http://huongsen.vn/to-chuc-tiec-hoi-nghi/ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1xa6sRugRZk4MDSyctcqusGYBv1lXYkrF

The Atlanta Breakfast Delivery & Takeout Guide added to Google Docs

The Atlanta Breakfast Delivery & Takeout Guide

After your 15th time trying to cook the perfect “over easy” egg, you’re done over-exuding yourself for breakfast. Time to call in reinforcements. Restaurants across the city have stepped up to the plate and are offering all sorts of breakfast and brunch options for delivery and takeout. Whether you’re in the mood for pastries and coffee, a giant stack of pancakes, or a five-egg scramble to help you cure your ten-whiskey hangover, this list has what you’re looking for.

All restaurants featured on The Infatuation are selected by our editorial team. The Atlanta Breakfast Delivery & Takeout Guide is presented by Uber Eats. In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, supporting our local restaurant community has never been more important. Uber Eats customers can now give directly to the restaurants they love at checkout. 100% will go to the restaurant. Order now to support. See app for details.

The Spots  The General Muir $ $ $ $ American  in  Toco Hills $$$$ 1540 Avenue Pl NE Ste B-230 8.0 /10

The General Muir is the closest thing you’ll find to a true Jewish deli in the south. And right now they’re offering pickup and delivery of their full menu - order a pastrami and egg sandwich, a bagel with lox, or even a spread of latkes and chopped liver. Check out their website for more information.

The Poncey Highland Coffee House $$$$ 640 North Highland Avenue Northeast

Usually, you can rely on The Poncey Highland for some excellent scones, toasts, and coffee. But currently, they’re doing a family-style menu from Wednesday through Sunday. Just place your order 24 hours ahead of time from a menu of things like quarts of tomato soup, huge loaves of bread, turkey clubs, and a vodka soda cocktail that serves four if you want to recreate a boozy brunch at home.

Corner Cafe & Buckhead Bread Company $$$$ 3070 Piedmont Rd NE

A pretzel croissant is something that we would eat for breakfast any day of the week. Add on smoked salmon and avocado as Corner Cafe does, and this is now a breakfast that we’d start looking forward to the night before - probably right after we finished dinner. Get that sandwich along with a bunch of other options for curbside pickup or delivery by visiting their website.

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INFATUATION NEWSLETTER Get our newest guides & reviews first,

plus more restaurant intel you won't find anywhere else. TRVL ATL ATX BOS CHI LDN LA MIA NYC PHL SF SEA DC Subscribe Smart move. Excellent information will arrive in your inbox soon. Do you have friends and family who also eat food? Enter their emails below and we’ll make sure they’re eating well. (Don’t worry, we won’t subscribe them to our newsletter - they can do that themselves.) Help Your Friends No Thanks Well done. You’re a good person. All good. We still like you. Want to quickly find restaurants on the go? Download The Infatuation app.    Sun In My Belly $ $ $ $ American  in  Kirkwood $$$$ 2161 College Ave NE

If you’ve been watching famous french chefs on YouTube make omelets but still can’t get one to turn out right, open a new tab and place an order from Sun In My Belly. They’re serving a special omelet every day (call the restaurant at 404-370-1088 to find out what kind), along with other egg dishes like huevos rancheros, a scrambled egg panini with bacon, and even a daily quiche. Click here to place an order.

B-Side $$$$ 155 Sycamore St

If you’re feeling kind of hungover from a virtual Happy Hour, get something from B-Side. Order a New York-style egg sandwich, some of their great coffee, and a scone or pastry to round things out. Call the restaurant at 404-748-4617 to place your order.

 Callie's Hot Little Biscuit $ $ $ $ American  in  Virginia Highland $$$$ 1004 North Highland Ave. 7.5 /10

Callie’s has seven different types of biscuits, each of which you can turn into a sandwich or cover in gravy, along with other great breakfast items like pimento grilled cheese, grits, and even whipped butter. Order for pickup or delivery through Uber Eats.

 Order delivery  Emerald City Bagels $$$$ 1257A Glenwood Ave SE

The Tooth Fairy was lame, all we got for our precious baby teeth was one lousy dollar. But now that we know about The Bagel Fairy from Emerald City Bagels, we’re ready to put the Tooth Fairy behind us for good. The Bagel Fairy, which is what they’re calling their current $41.99 special, will drop off thirteen bagels and two tubs of cream cheese to your house. Check out their website to learn more.

Alon's Bakery & Market $$$$ 1394 N Highland Ave NE

Alon’s is offering a bunch of different pastries for delivery and pickup right now. Think almond croissants, Danishes, baguettes, and loaves of bread. Along with those options, you can order from their larger breakfast menu and get fruit salad, frittata, breakfast burritos, and more. See the full menu on their website.

 Root Baking Co $ $ $ $ Sandwiches ,  Cafe/Bakery  in  Old Fourth Ward $$$$ 675 Ponce de Leon Ave NE #224 Not

Rated

Yet

If you’re looking for bread, Root Baking Co is where you want to get it from. They mill all of their flour onsite, which makes for some incredible loaves - sourdough, multigrain, sesame semolina, and olive sourdough just to name a few. Get some incredible pastries, like their morning buns, coffee cake, and croissants, while you’re at it as well. Check out their website for ordering information.

 Order delivery  Waffle House $ $ $ $ American  in  Grant Park $$$$ 860 Glenwood Ave SE Not

Rated

Yet

When all else fails, there’s always Waffle House. Order as much as you want because it’s impossible to spend more than $15 (and that’s a stretch), and at a minimum make sure to smother and cover your hash browns.

via The Infatuation Feed https://www.theinfatuation.com/atlanta/guides/breakfast-brunch-delivery-takeout-atlanta Nhà hàng Hương Sen chuyên buffet hải sản cao cấp✅ Tổ chức tiệc cưới✅ Hội nghị, hội thảo✅ Tiệc lưu động✅ Sự kiện mang tầm cỡ quốc gia 52 Phố Miếu Đầm, Mễ Trì, Nam Từ Liêm, Hà Nội http://huongsen.vn/ 0904988999 http://huongsen.vn/to-chuc-tiec-hoi-nghi/ https://trello.com/userhuongsen

Created May 29, 2020 at 10:43PM /huong sen View Google Doc Nhà hàng Hương Sen chuyên buffet hải sản cao cấp✅ Tổ chức tiệc cưới✅ Hội nghị, hội thảo✅ Tiệc lưu động✅ Sự kiện mang tầm cỡ quốc gia 52 Phố Miếu Đầm, Mễ Trì, Nam Từ Liêm, Hà Nội http://huongsen.vn/ 0904988999 http://huongsen.vn/to-chuc-tiec-hoi-nghi/ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1xa6sRugRZk4MDSyctcqusGYBv1lXYkrF

Life in a Paris Without Restaurants added to Google Docs

Life in a Paris Without Restaurants

 A general view of an empty Rue de Rivoli on the first day of confinement due to an outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on March 17, 2020 in Paris, France | Aurelien Meunier / Getty Images

In a city synonymous with dining out and drinking, a new lockdown to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus is disrupting the restaurant industry—and threatening the social fabric.

In 2015, Parisians were called courageous. Within 48 hours of the November 13 terrorist attacks, locals returned to their neighborhood cafés and bars, resisting any infringement upon their way of life. It was a beautiful example of solidarity and cultural conviction that helped to lift us out of grief. Today, the stringent measures being enforced to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 are sorely testing that same insouciance — as well as the restaurants and bars that are such an intrinsic and vital part of Parisian life.

At noon on Tuesday, March 17, the city began at least 15 days of forced confinement. The only outings permitted are for essentials, and anyone leaving their home must have a signed and dated document attesting to the purpose of being outdoors. Observing the streets from our windows feels equal parts apocalyptic and peaceful. But the shuttered storefronts and silence are a reminder of the long, difficult road ahead, specifically for the food industry. Weary bakers and supermarket staff must continue to soldier through the crisis, while restaurant owners remain mired in uncertainty about the level of government aid they can expect, let alone their chances of ever opening their doors again.

Monday’s announcement of the impending lockdown was preceded by days marked at first by defiance, then creeping dread. The warnings issued by President Emmanuel Macron’s administration were as clear as they had been in Italy: The only way to curb the virus would be through strict physical and social distancing and medical-grade hygiene practices: The customary la bise (kiss) used to greet friends needed to stop; sitting elbow-to-elbow at coffee shops and café terraces was strongly discouraged; and before long, the very prospect of dining out was eradicated. But in the absence of forced confinement, Parisians rebelled: Whether it was out of blithe indifference or a general distrust of government recommendations, few heeded the calls to stay home.

“On ne peut pas nous empêcher de vivre!” This can’t prevent us from living! I’ve heard that said countless times. In most circumstances, it’s true: One of the admirable qualities of French people as a whole is their willingness to see the necessity for celebration in everyday life. And because food and wine are an inevitable part of celebration, there is equally intrinsic support for restaurant and bar owners, many of whom become like family. Before the virus, stopping in for a quick coffee or a glass of wine and a snack had become little gestures to help the business owners who had barely survived the previous 18 months of weekly gilets jaunes demonstrations and the pension reform strikes at the end of 2019. So as the reality of the virus descended, locals wondered what to do: Was it right to let restaurants and bars languish?

In the hours following Prime Minister Edouard Philippe’s announcement on Saturday, March 14, that all nonessential establishments—everything except for pharmacies, banks, supermarkets, tobacco shops, and bakeries—would close until further notice, many Parisians raced out for a final pre-confinement hurrah. “One last drink!” I heard passersby yell on my street as they ventured to any number of densely packed bars and all-day cafés. Some sat close together outdoors, clinking glasses and digging into shared plates of charcuterie and cheese, throwing their heads back in laughter as if it were their very last meal. Others gathered indoors, oblivious to (or simply ignoring) the fact that convening in their favorite hangouts was putting everyone at risk.

The first day under the new orders was only vaguely less buzzy than most Sundays: The brunch and coffee shop crowds had vanished, but weekly shoppers still swarmed open-air markets with little apparent concern for gathering in tight quarters. Bakeries, essential as they are to Parisian life, did brisk business. The most cautious of them allowed only a handful of people to enter at a time. Inside, strips of tape placed one meter apart on the ground indicated the necessary distance to respect and, for the most part, customers followed the rules.

But hints of the shutdown’s potentially catastrophic impact on the food industry could be seen on Instagram, where restaurants announced they were organizing pickups for leftover stock and ingredients. The abrupt closures gave chefs and owners little time to prepare for next steps: In his Instagram stories, Nicolas Alary of Holybelly described feeling torn between avoiding food waste and wanting to protect clients and staff from congregating outside his restaurant. “We had prepped for 600 covers, which is what we normally do between our two restaurants on a Sunday,” he said. “We don’t have the storage space for this and can only take home so much. If we had 48 hours’ notice, we would have been fine. Restaurants are big machines with lots of moving parts and inertia; it’s impossible to flick the switch off like that without consequences.”

Ultimately, Alary and his partner, chef Sarah Mouchot, decided to offload one ton of ingredients — worth approximately 10,000 euros — to clients willing to bring their own bags and containers for pickup. In exchange, they requested a small donation. Other establishments followed suit: Daroco, an Italian restaurant, carefully orchestrated a collection for the perishable products it wouldn’t be able to store; Marc Grossman of Bob’s Bake Shop left perishables and fruit outside his restaurants for passersby to take home; and Ten Belles Bread gave away sourdough starter to aspiring home breadmakers. Some establishments will be able to move to delivery to keep business running even at half-mast, but many aren’t equipped to make such a transition. Even if they were, delivery is not a long-term solution—a grim realization that restaurants in the U.S. are also facing.

By nightfall on Sunday, March 15, the frenzy in the streets had faded and neighborhoods across Paris took on an eerie, Christmas Day quiet. On Monday, the encroaching fear of a protracted ban on social outings assumed more concrete form as corner cafés, all-day brasseries, and bustling bars—the lifeblood of every arrondissement—remained shuttered. Bistro chairs and marble tables, usually set up on the sidewalk, were stacked indoors like Tetris blocks. Signs on windows indicated the sanitary precautions being taken—themselves holdovers from the pre-shutdown measures that will remain in place until the worst is over.

The shuttering of Paris’s food and wine landscape is unsettling not merely because these establishments are a source of constant, reassuring activity, but also because it is without historic precedent: Even during the Nazi occupation of Paris, the city’s restaurants didn’t go dark entirely. This is only the second time that Au Pied du Cochon, a 24/7 brasserie and a favorite among chefs for late-night meals, has closed since opening in 1947 (the first was for renovations in 1989).

In his address to the nation on Monday night, Macron insisted that no business, big or small, would be allowed to fail; labor charges and tax payments would be delayed, and other support (which is still to be defined) would be announced in the coming days. But as it stands, a health crisis of this nature isn’t covered by the insurance policies that restaurant owners have signed. Stéphane Jégo, the chef-owner of L’Ami Jean, is leading the charge to pressure the government to insist that the insurance company lobbies account for such unprecedented circumstances. “So many businesses, small and large, will be wiped off the map if nothing is done,” the chef told L’Hôtellerie Restauration. “Do we accept to die or do we fight to survive?”

Paris, much like New York, feels radically different without the bars, restaurants, and coffee shops that make it come alive. The brief, daily exchanges with bartenders and baristas are an integral part of the social fabric of our lives, and without them, we feel incomplete. But if Parisians truly care about protecting our access to such pleasures, pleasures we consider our natural rights, then we must ready ourselves for the inevitable fight to keep the industry from going under.

In a city in which dining and drinking are fundamental to the experience of both living and visiting, the fact that many beloved restaurants and cafés won’t reopen should give us pause. It should force us to consider what life in Paris would look like without its dynamic chefs and entrepreneurs, coffee roasters and bartenders. It should force us to consider our role in reviving the industry once the pandemic is firmly behind us. Because it is going to take all of us, consumers included, to rebuild the moments around the table that we hold so dear.

Lindsey Tramuta is a Paris-based writer and the author of The New Paris and The New Parisienne: The Women & Ideas Shaping Paris.

via Eater - All https://www.eater.com/2020/3/17/21183882/life-in-a-paris-without-restaurants

Created March 18, 2020 at 04:12AM /huong sen View Google Doc Nhà hàng Hương Sen chuyên buffet hải sản cao cấp✅ Tổ chức tiệc cưới✅ Hội nghị, hội thảo✅ Tiệc lưu động✅ Sự kiện mang tầm cỡ quốc gia 52 Phố Miếu Đầm, Mễ Trì, Nam Từ Liêm, Hà Nội http://huongsen.vn/ 0904988999 http://huongsen.vn/to-chuc-tiec-hoi-nghi/ https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1xa6sRugRZk4MDSyctcqusGYBv1lXYkrF

His final moment was for me, quarry is for him . HTAG 1 TTWatch Warners heartwarmingtribute to His Lord and Savior, and speak the full transcript of his powerful meaning below: HETAG 1 TT .embed-container berth: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; meridian: 0; overflow: obscured; max-width: 100%;. embed-container iframe,. embed-container object,. embed-container embed outlook: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; thicknes: 100%; stature: 100%; DTAG 8 TT DTAG 9 TTBut those people had it all wrong . DTAG 10 TT BTAG 2 TT DTAG 11 TTNow, adoration it or hate it, that opening scene captured the curiosity of the sports world, and the words grew the heart of my floor. The residual, as “theyre saying”, is biography. Wreaking us to this: the famous last words. And the only lieu this extraordinary journeying can intent. His final moment was for me, quarry is for him. Thank you Jesus . DTAG 14 TT Amsterdam’s solution to the obesity crisis: no fruit juice and enough sleep

The city is successfully campaigning fat in terms of promoting tap water in its institutions, together with healthy cooking grades and a ban on fast food sponsorship

The city of Amsterdam is leading the world in purposing the obesity epidemic, thanks to a revolutionary and wide-reaching curricula which is getting causes even among the poorest parishes that are hardest to reach.

Better knows we tulips and bicycles, Amsterdam has the highest rate of obesity in the Netherlands, with a fifth of its children overweight and at risk of future health problems.

The programme appears to be attain by making multiple targets at the same time from promoting tap water to after-school activities to the city repudiating sponsorship to happenings that take fund from Coca Cola or McDonalds.

It is led by a dynamic deputy mayor with the unanimous backing of the citys legislators. From 2012 to 2015, the number of overweight and obese babes has dropped by 12%. Even more impressive, Amsterdam did exactly what nobody else has managed, because the biggest sink has been amongst the lowest socio-economic groups.

It is in neighborhoods like the Bijlmer in the south-east that the programme of activities is changing lives. The Bijlmer is notorious, replies Wilbert Sawat, coordinator and PE teacher at De Achtsprong primary school, and thats why he wanted to work there. Other teaches do too, he announces. Here we are capable of make a difference.

The school is in the middle of a high-rise home estate that was experimental in the 1960 s, with heightened streets so parties would be free to path and round on the ground level. But the repetition commons are empty. In 1975, when the Dutch colony of Suriname in south America became independent, numerous migrated to Amsterdam and moved into the inexpensive flats. Cycling was not part of their culture.

Amsterdams agent mayor for healthcare, Eric van der Burg, who was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer district. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

The school, which in 2007 was in the top three in Amsterdam for overweight babes, is now one of 100 that are a key focus of the obesity program. Children are weighed and weighed every year. Some parents objected but now it is normal, reads Sawat. And so is tap water.

All brats have to bring liquid or milk to academy, he suggested. No juice. A fortune of mothers were really upset. We had really hard discussions with them. The mothers visualized juice or even squash was healthier, assuming they contained fruit. The schoolteachers told them about the carbohydrate. I told them we were doing them a promotion. They could have water at academy and then juice at home. Now its normal not a problem.

The ban on birthday feasts for the class too made ructions. It had become challenger. Soul drew cupcakes, so another bring cupcakes and juice and then cupcakes and juice and a toy. The institution made a folder of healthy considers, such as oranges or carrots embellished to look like faces.

A few years ago we had a son who stopped going to the bathroom. We find he had Mars and Snickers in his pockets. He was a really fat son and his mothers had put him on a diet but they didnt tell us, pronounced Sawat. Now the school is focused on health meat and even the nearby McDonalds has agreed that a child without a parent is simply buy an apple no fries. A European concede provisions one fruit or vegetable for all children for three days a week. The fridge is filled with carrots and radishes, which the children are told they must at least try.

Young infants are the focus of most obesity tries because it is easier to prevent them putting on load than try to sorting it out afterwards. But Dana Bijvoet, a nurse and family consultant working out of a secondary school in the field, picks up with the youngsters. There are about 2,000 morbidly obese children in Amsterdam who are the initial focus.

Children get their yearly fitness exams at the De Achtsprong school. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

She tells urgently heartbreaking floors. Romana, 14, had liver failure because of her weight and was suffering from feeling and low-pitched self-esteem. Bijvoet are talking about dysfunctional class where parents envisage “their childrens” can manage without improve, where there is no coin and constant crisis. I want to know how they are in “peoples lives” their mental health and their self-esteem, she supposed. She needs to help with the other difficulties, to get a bit of infinite in their foremen be addressed with the obesity.

Romanas mothers, from Suriname, are divorced and her father, who has detention, said the mother was possessed he told Bijvoet of a lot of black magic and voodoo. He was a cab driver, rarely home but would not permit his daughter got to go alone. Expected what she craved most, Romana supposed, I want to fit into my jeans and feel right about myself, enunciated Bijvoet.

In the east part of the city, where car horns and music announce a Moroccan wedding in the street, a cooking class takes home for childhood and mothers in their home communities centre. Every week they come together to cook healthily to change the conventional recipes, tells Amira El Ashkar, a voluntary whose lineage was from Egypt. Eight girls and a boy, some of whom are very overweight, are stirring what they call muffins, which seem more like quiche but are earn with only egg and oatmeal to bind courgettes, peppers and other vegetables.

El Ashkar has also introduced health different versions of tagine and couscous bowls. Pedigrees want to eat healthy nutrient they just did not know how, she says.

Eric van der Burg, the agent mayor for healthcare and boast who propelled the programme of activities, was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer and says he “d rather” live in those localities. I dont want to live in an area where everyone is prosperou and they all wear the same clothes and have the same hounds and hairdresser, he did.

Cooking class with parents and children at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Van der Burg, however, is the nearest Amsterdam has to a rightwinger, belonging to the conservative-liberal Peoples Party for Freedom and Democracy( VVD ). The residue of the citys legislators are to the left of him, so there are no the allegations of nanny-statism, although there are the programme is noticeably interventionist.

He has taken a tough line on advertising at sporting phenomena. The city is the primary patronize of a European basketball championship in July. We said to the organiser, you cant have Monster[ vigour boozing] or Burger King as co-sponsor, he read. The same no-compromise spate is being obligated with the European hockey and macrocosm ice-skating championships. They are talking to restaurants and boasts facilities about selling healthier meat and censoring cola adverts inside stadiums the city owns.

Another important part of the programme is sleep. It is very important to get enough sleep. Nobody knows that, articulates van der Burg.

Programme manager Karen den Hertog says that if you dont sleep, your hormones are messed up. You will be additional starving. It is your hormones talking to you, she suggested. They work to organise discussions with parents on childrens sleep blueprints through community leaders.

Children get their yearly fitness quiz at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Professor Corinna Hawkes, administrator of the center for meat plan at City University, who has reviewed and considered the Amsterdam model, is affected. They werent just saying gives have a soda excise they were thinking about how people connect with their milieu, she said.

They went to parents and understood their the behaviours and engaged in educational programmes to change them, Hawkes added. We have to understand why people are making their decisions and adapt accordingly, she said.

Some of the policies Amsterdam is using to crack obesity

A proscription on making juice to focus schools and investment in more water fountains around the city Cooking categorizes to learn healthy ranges of ethnic foods: pizzas with a broccoli basi, kebabs with lean chicken instead of pork, honey and years substituted for sugar City has refused to sponsor any event joint-funded by a fast food company Parents encouraged to set small children on motorcycles without pedals instead of pedaling them in buggies Focus on the first 1,000 days of a childs life, including lawyer for pregnant women and mothers Families encouraged to eat dinner together Sports core membership and activities subsidised for low-income houses

The post His final moment was for me, quarry is for him . HTAG 1 TTWatch Warners heartwarmingtribute to His Lord and Savior, and speak the full transcript of his powerful meaning below: HETAG 1 TT .embed-container berth: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; meridian: 0; overflow: obscured; max-width: 100%;. embed-container iframe,. embed-container object,. embed-container embed outlook: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; thicknes: 100%; stature: 100%; DTAG 8 TT DTAG 9 TTBut those people had it all wrong . DTAG 10 TT BTAG 2 TT DTAG 11 TTNow, adoration it or hate it, that opening scene captured the curiosity of the sports world, and the words grew the heart of my floor. The residual, as “theyre saying”, is biography. Wreaking us to this: the famous last words. And the only lieu this extraordinary journeying can intent. His final moment was for me, quarry is for him. Thank you Jesus . DTAG 14 TT Amsterdam’s solution to the obesity crisis: no fruit juice and enough sleep appeared first on apsbicepstraining.com.

from WordPress http://ift.tt/2vU5qVI via IFTTT

His final moment was for me, quarry is for him . HTAG 1 TTWatch Warners heartwarmingtribute to His Lord and Savior, and speak the full transcript of his powerful meaning below: HETAG 1 TT .embed-container berth: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; meridian: 0; overflow: obscured; max-width: 100%;. embed-container iframe,. embed-container object,. embed-container embed outlook: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; thicknes: 100%; stature: 100%; DTAG 8 TT DTAG 9 TTBut those people had it all wrong . DTAG 10 TT BTAG 2 TT DTAG 11 TTNow, adoration it or hate it, that opening scene captured the curiosity of the sports world, and the words grew the heart of my floor. The residual, as “theyre saying”, is biography. Wreaking us to this: the famous last words. And the only lieu this extraordinary journeying can intent. His final moment was for me, quarry is for him. Thank you Jesus . DTAG 14 TT Amsterdam’s solution to the obesity crisis: no fruit juice and enough sleep

The city is successfully campaigning fat in terms of promoting tap water in its institutions, together with healthy cooking grades and a ban on fast food sponsorship

The city of Amsterdam is leading the world in purposing the obesity epidemic, thanks to a revolutionary and wide-reaching curricula which is getting causes even among the poorest parishes that are hardest to reach.

Better knows we tulips and bicycles, Amsterdam has the highest rate of obesity in the Netherlands, with a fifth of its children overweight and at risk of future health problems.

The programme appears to be attain by making multiple targets at the same time from promoting tap water to after-school activities to the city repudiating sponsorship to happenings that take fund from Coca Cola or McDonalds.

It is led by a dynamic deputy mayor with the unanimous backing of the citys legislators. From 2012 to 2015, the number of overweight and obese babes has dropped by 12%. Even more impressive, Amsterdam did exactly what nobody else has managed, because the biggest sink has been amongst the lowest socio-economic groups.

It is in neighborhoods like the Bijlmer in the south-east that the programme of activities is changing lives. The Bijlmer is notorious, replies Wilbert Sawat, coordinator and PE teacher at De Achtsprong primary school, and thats why he wanted to work there. Other teaches do too, he announces. Here we are capable of make a difference.

The school is in the middle of a high-rise home estate that was experimental in the 1960 s, with heightened streets so parties would be free to path and round on the ground level. But the repetition commons are empty. In 1975, when the Dutch colony of Suriname in south America became independent, numerous migrated to Amsterdam and moved into the inexpensive flats. Cycling was not part of their culture.

Amsterdams agent mayor for healthcare, Eric van der Burg, who was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer district. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

The school, which in 2007 was in the top three in Amsterdam for overweight babes, is now one of 100 that are a key focus of the obesity program. Children are weighed and weighed every year. Some parents objected but now it is normal, reads Sawat. And so is tap water.

All brats have to bring liquid or milk to academy, he suggested. No juice. A fortune of mothers were really upset. We had really hard discussions with them. The mothers visualized juice or even squash was healthier, assuming they contained fruit. The schoolteachers told them about the carbohydrate. I told them we were doing them a promotion. They could have water at academy and then juice at home. Now its normal not a problem.

The ban on birthday feasts for the class too made ructions. It had become challenger. Soul drew cupcakes, so another bring cupcakes and juice and then cupcakes and juice and a toy. The institution made a folder of healthy considers, such as oranges or carrots embellished to look like faces.

A few years ago we had a son who stopped going to the bathroom. We find he had Mars and Snickers in his pockets. He was a really fat son and his mothers had put him on a diet but they didnt tell us, pronounced Sawat. Now the school is focused on health meat and even the nearby McDonalds has agreed that a child without a parent is simply buy an apple no fries. A European concede provisions one fruit or vegetable for all children for three days a week. The fridge is filled with carrots and radishes, which the children are told they must at least try.

Young infants are the focus of most obesity tries because it is easier to prevent them putting on load than try to sorting it out afterwards. But Dana Bijvoet, a nurse and family consultant working out of a secondary school in the field, picks up with the youngsters. There are about 2,000 morbidly obese children in Amsterdam who are the initial focus.

Children get their yearly fitness exams at the De Achtsprong school. Picture: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

She tells urgently heartbreaking floors. Romana, 14, had liver failure because of her weight and was suffering from feeling and low-pitched self-esteem. Bijvoet are talking about dysfunctional class where parents envisage “their childrens” can manage without improve, where there is no coin and constant crisis. I want to know how they are in “peoples lives” their mental health and their self-esteem, she supposed. She needs to help with the other difficulties, to get a bit of infinite in their foremen be addressed with the obesity.

Romanas mothers, from Suriname, are divorced and her father, who has detention, said the mother was possessed he told Bijvoet of a lot of black magic and voodoo. He was a cab driver, rarely home but would not permit his daughter got to go alone. Expected what she craved most, Romana supposed, I want to fit into my jeans and feel right about myself, enunciated Bijvoet.

In the east part of the city, where car horns and music announce a Moroccan wedding in the street, a cooking class takes home for childhood and mothers in their home communities centre. Every week they come together to cook healthily to change the conventional recipes, tells Amira El Ashkar, a voluntary whose lineage was from Egypt. Eight girls and a boy, some of whom are very overweight, are stirring what they call muffins, which seem more like quiche but are earn with only egg and oatmeal to bind courgettes, peppers and other vegetables.

El Ashkar has also introduced health different versions of tagine and couscous bowls. Pedigrees want to eat healthy nutrient they just did not know how, she says.

Eric van der Burg, the agent mayor for healthcare and boast who propelled the programme of activities, was brought up for eight years in the Bijlmer and says he “d rather” live in those localities. I dont want to live in an area where everyone is prosperou and they all wear the same clothes and have the same hounds and hairdresser, he did.

Cooking class with parents and children at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Van der Burg, however, is the nearest Amsterdam has to a rightwinger, belonging to the conservative-liberal Peoples Party for Freedom and Democracy( VVD ). The residue of the citys legislators are to the left of him, so there are no the allegations of nanny-statism, although there are the programme is noticeably interventionist.

He has taken a tough line on advertising at sporting phenomena. The city is the primary patronize of a European basketball championship in July. We said to the organiser, you cant have Monster[ vigour boozing] or Burger King as co-sponsor, he read. The same no-compromise spate is being obligated with the European hockey and macrocosm ice-skating championships. They are talking to restaurants and boasts facilities about selling healthier meat and censoring cola adverts inside stadiums the city owns.

Another important part of the programme is sleep. It is very important to get enough sleep. Nobody knows that, articulates van der Burg.

Programme manager Karen den Hertog says that if you dont sleep, your hormones are messed up. You will be additional starving. It is your hormones talking to you, she suggested. They work to organise discussions with parents on childrens sleep blueprints through community leaders.

Children get their yearly fitness quiz at local schools in Amsterdam. Image: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian

Professor Corinna Hawkes, administrator of the center for meat plan at City University, who has reviewed and considered the Amsterdam model, is affected. They werent just saying gives have a soda excise they were thinking about how people connect with their milieu, she said.

They went to parents and understood their the behaviours and engaged in educational programmes to change them, Hawkes added. We have to understand why people are making their decisions and adapt accordingly, she said.

Some of the policies Amsterdam is using to crack obesity

A proscription on making juice to focus schools and investment in more water fountains around the city Cooking categorizes to learn healthy ranges of ethnic foods: pizzas with a broccoli basi, kebabs with lean chicken instead of pork, honey and years substituted for sugar City has refused to sponsor any event joint-funded by a fast food company Parents encouraged to set small children on motorcycles without pedals instead of pedaling them in buggies Focus on the first 1,000 days of a childs life, including lawyer for pregnant women and mothers Families encouraged to eat dinner together Sports core membership and activities subsidised for low-income houses

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