Early life and career.

Zhang Miao was from Shouzhang County (), Dongping Commandery (), which is in present-day Yanggu County, Shandong. He was known for being chivalrous as a youth, and he often helped the poor and the needy. He earned much respect from the scholar-gentry for his deeds. He was also a friend of Cao Cao and Yuan Shao.  Zhang Miao was later recruited into the civil service and was commissioned as a Cavalry Commandant () after achieving excellent results in the imperial examination. He was subsequently promoted to be the Administrator () of Chenliu Commandery (陳留郡; around present-day Kaifeng, Henan).

Campaign against Dong Zhuo.

In 190, Zhang Miao and Cao Cao were among the first to take up arms against Dong Zhuo, leading to the formation of a coalition and the launching of a campaign against Dong. During a battle at Bianshui (), Zhang Miao sent his subordinate Wei Zi () to lead troops to assist Cao Cao. At the time, Yuan Shao, who was the coalition chief, behaved arrogantly and elicited strong criticism from Zhang Miao. Yuan Shao was furious and he told Cao Cao to kill Zhang Miao, but Cao refused and said, "Mengzhuo is our friend so we should be tolerate him. Now, the Empire has yet to be pacified, so we shouldn't start an internal conflict." Zhang Miao was very grateful to Cao Cao when he heard about it, but he also felt uneasy.

In Yan Province.

Later, before Cao Cao embarked on a campaign against Tao Qian in Xu Province, he instructed his family, "If I don't return, you must take shelter under Mengzhuo." After returning from the campaign, Cao Cao met Zhang Miao and they shed tears of joy. They were such close friends.  When Lü Bu left Yuan Shao to join Zhang Yang in Henei (河內; in present-day Henan), he passed by Chenliu and met Zhang Miao. Zhang Miao treated him generously and made a pledge of friendship with him when he saw him off. Yuan Shao was angry when he heard that Zhang Miao had befriended Lü Bu. Zhang Miao also feared that Cao Cao might ally with Yuan Shao to attack him so he felt very uncomfortable. Besides, his jurisdiction, Chenliu, was in Yan Province, which was under Cao Cao's control.

Betraying Cao Cao.

In 194, when Cao Cao was away on another campaign against Tao Qian, Zhang Miao's younger brother Zhang Chao (), along with Cao's subordinates Chen Gong, Xu Si () and Wang Kai (), started a rebellion against Cao in Yan Province. Chen Gong successfully persuaded Zhang Miao to rebel against Cao Cao as well and invite Lü Bu into Yan Province. Chen Gong led his men from Dong Commandery (東郡; around present-day Liaocheng, Shandong) eastward to meet Lü Bu and they occupied Puyang (濮陽; in present-day Puyang, Henan). Lü Bu was declared Governor of Yan Province (). The various commanderies and counties in Yan Province responded to Lü Bu's call and defected to his side, except for Juancheng, Dong'e and Fan counties, which still remained under Cao Cao's control.  Upon receiving news of the revolt and Lü Bu's intrusion, Cao Cao aborted the Xu Province campaign and headed back to Yan Province, where the forces of Lü Bu and Cao Cao clashed in Puyang. Cao Cao was unable to overcome Lü Bu and both sides were locked in a stalemate for over 100 days. Around the time, the area was plagued by locusts and droughts so the people suffered from famine and many had resorted to cannibalism to survive. Lü Bu moved his base further east to Shanyang (山陽; in present-day southern Shandong). Within two years, Cao Cao managed to take back all his territories in Yan Province and he defeated Lü Bu in a battle at Juye County. Lü Bu fled to Xu Province and took refuge under Liu Bei.

Death.

Zhang Miao followed Lü Bu after they were defeated by Cao Cao in Yan Province. He left his brother Zhang Chao and their family behind in Yongqiu (雍丘; present-day Qi County, Henan). Zhang Miao went to seek help from Yuan Shu but was killed by his own men before he reached his destination. Cao Cao besieged Yongqiu for some months and eventually conquered it, after which he executed Zhang Miao's clan.  The "Xiandi Chunqiu" () recorded that Yuan Shu once discussed with Zhang Miao and others about proclaiming himself emperor – which he did in early 197. Zhang Miao dissuaded Yuan Shu from doing so. Pei Songzhi, who annotated Zhang Miao's biography in the "Sanguozhi", commented that there was some ambiguity in the "Xiandi Chunqiu" account because Zhang Miao's biography stated that he was killed by his own men before he arrived at Yuan Shu's place even though it was possible that he met Yuan earlier.

Zhang Miao (died 195), courtesy name Mengzhuo, was an official who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty of China.


Geography.

Location.

The Michelsberg rises on the northwestern edge of the Ahr Hills in the High Fens-Eifel Nature Park. Its summit lies 1.2 km east-northeast of the centre of Mahlberg, which extends to the southwestern flank of the hill, and 1.5 km west-northwest of Reckerscheid. Some distance away to the south is the village of Esch with its hamlet of Wasserscheide. All these villages belong to the borough of Bad Münstereifel.

Natural regional classification.

The Michelsberg lies within the natural regional major unit group of East Eifel ("Osteifel", no. 27) on the boundary of its southern subdivision, the Northern Ahr Hill Country ("Nördliches Ahrbergland", 272.1) which belongs to the Ahr Eifel ("Ahreifel", 272), with its northern subdivision, the Münstereifel Forest ("Münstereifeler Wald", 274.1), which belongs to the major unit of Münstereifel Forest and Northeastern Foot of the Eifel ("Münstereifeler Wald und Nordöstlicher Eifelfuß", 274). The western slopes of the hill drop into the subunit of the Münstereifel Valley ("Münstereifeler Tal", 274.0).

Height and upland location.

According to a trig point marked on the German base map, the Michelsberg is 586.1 m. Its summit, whose height is also given as 588 m, is located on the middle of three tops or "kuppen". From the main top, the countryside runs via a saddle at 564.6 m to the Michelsberg North Top, also called the "Hohberg" (574.5 m). To the southwest is another top, 573.5 m. In topographic maps of the Bundesamt für Naturschutz the summit region is also given a height of 566.1 m.

Rivers and watershed.

The watershed between the rivers Ahr and Erft runs over the Michelsberg. Among the rivers and streams that rise on or near the hill are: in the west the Schußbach, whose waters reach the Erft via the Waldbach which rises northwest of the hill. Flowing directly into the Erft in the same direction is the Krumesbach whose source lies to the south. Near its origin rises the Buchholzbach ("Trinkpützsiefen", "Escher Bach", "Lamersbach") which sends its waters down the Armuthsbach south-southeastwards into the Ahr. The Liersbach "(Rosensiefen)" rises north of the hill and also flows southeastwards.

History.

Hunters and gatherers settled on and around the Michelsberg in early times, as evinced by numerous artefact finds (microliths etc.). Archaeologists date them to the Middle Stone Age (9,600 to 5,500/4,500 B. C.). Most of these artefacts are displayed in the Hürten Museum in Bad Münstereifel. In Celtic, Roman and Germanic times the hill was a pagan cultic and juridical site as its former name "Mahlberg" testifies. Until about 800 A.D. there were sacrificial fires ("Opferfeuer") here. After the people adopted Christianity the pagan name was transferred to the nearby village of Mahlberg, while the hill was now consecrated to the Archangel Michael, the guardian of Christianity.  On the southwest flank of the hill is a transmission mast/-tower and, nearby, a water tank.

Pilgrimage.

The Michelsberg has been a destination for pilgrims for centuries as the make their traditional pilgrimage annually on 29 September. They make their way along a Way of Sorrows to the Roman Catholic Chapel of St. Michael at the summit.

Reserves.

Parts of the protected landscape (LSG) of the Mutscheid Upland ("Mutscheider Hochfläche", CDDA no. 555558861; established 2008; 48.9083 km2 in area) lie on the Michelsberg. Another one, the LSG "Fließgewässer, Auen und Hangbereiche im Bad Münstereifeler Tal" (CDDA no. 555558740; 2008; 3.5523 km2) reaches up to its hillsides.

Hiking, transport, leisure.

The Michelsberg is often a destination for hikers and, is popular even when it snows because the grass-covered slopes are ideal for tobogganing and the paths in the vicinity of the hill are suitable for langlauf skiing. Running past the hill to the west is the "Landesstraße" 113 from Mahlberg to Scheuerheck) and, to the southeast, is the "Kreisstraße" 50 from Mahlberg to Reckerscheid.  From the viewing platform of the chapel tower there is an all-round view that reaches to the Siebengebirge hills, the basalt "kuppen" of the Hohe Acht, the Hochthürmerberg and Aremberg hills as well as the Schneifel and Rur Eifel regions. In good visibility even the towers on Cologne Cathedral, about 50 kilometres away, may be visible.

The Michelsberg, at, is the highest point in the borough of Bad Münstereifel in the county of Euskirchen in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The hill, which rises near the village of Mahlberg belongs to that part of the Eifel mountains known as the Ahr Hills "(Ahreifel)", and is the second highest point in the range.


Plot.

The film tells the story of a family in crisis. The mother, Leona (Quinlan), escapes to Jamaica to grieve the loss of her baby daughter, Edith, who died of sudden infant death syndrome. While there she meets kindly housekeeper Clara Mayfield (Goldberg). Clara pulls Leona out of her depression with a blunt, no-nonsense style. Leona is so taken with her that she brings Clara back to their home in Baltimore to be housekeeper and nanny to young son David (Harris). At first he is resistant and sees her as an intruder, but as the parents are completely wrapped up in their own grief and dissolving marriage, David comes to trust Clara and to depend on her. Clara harbors her own dark secret, which when revealed, serves to firm the bond between these two very different, but loving, characters.

Production.

The film marked a return to the director's chair for industry veteran Robert Mulligan, who had not made a film in six years after the critical and commercial failure of "Kiss Me Goodbye". Film editor Sid Levin describes Mulligan as being "a bit aloof" during their first meeting but coming across as "a caring, sensitive, decent man." Mulligan was tense during the shooting period, however, and grew angry when Levin expressed his concerns over the scenes involving actor Spalding Gray. Not until principal photography was finished was Mulligan willing to discuss alternative ideas with Levin in the editing room. They wound up finding common ground over one of the crucial scenes towards the end of the film, in which Clara confesses to David the truth about her son. When Mulligan realized that actress Whoopi Goldberg had improvised the sequence too negatively, Levin was able to edit the sequence in such a way to make it feel less dark.  Filming included several locations in Talbot County, Maryland. The opening scene, a funeral, was filmed at the historic Oxford Cemetery in Oxford, Maryland. The mansion home of Bill (Michael Ontkean) and Leona Hart (Kathleen Quinlan), and her young son, David (Neil Patrick Harris) is found on Old Country Club Road, adjacent to Maryland State Route 33 near Easton, Maryland. Other locations included Saint Michaels, Maryland, Baltimore, Maryland, New York and Port Antonio, Jamaica.  This was the third and final theatrical production made by MTM Enterprises.

Reception.

The film had a chilly reception with critics. Roger Ebert, In a 1 1/2-star review for the "Chicago Sun Times", praised Whoopi Goldberg's performance but panned the film itself, writing, "Goldberg is magnificent. The character belongs in a different film, even a different universe, from the rest of the ludicrous plot." Recent praise for the film has appeared in an online article by film professor Robert Keser, who writes, "Almost two decades after the release of "Clara’s Heart", the film looks dated only in its virtues. As commercial cinema, it represents a classical control and modulation of storytelling, spinning its emotional threads patiently with no hammering close-ups and little pandering to the decoratively picturesque. Equally, the film seems sweetly unconscious of consumer culture that seeks to define us by acquisition and consumption: no brand names are touted, no recreational shopping montages display products to suggest meaning."

Clara's Heart is a 1988 American drama film, based on Joseph Olshan's novel of the same name, directed by Robert Mulligan, written by Mark Medoff and is also Neil Patrick Harris' debut role.


History.

Formation and debut.

The band formed in 1996 in Southern California with Crisci and Pillar joining bassist Jason Wickersheim and drummer Louie Ruiz under the name December's Tragic Drive (derived from lyrics of the song "Seven" by Sunny Day Real Estate). In 1998, the band – now billed as The Appleseed Cast - signed to Deep Elm Records out of New York — before relocating to North Carolina — and released its debut album, "The End of the Ring Wars." The album was met with considerable approval from the emo and underground scenes.

Mare Vitalis.

In 1999, the band relocated to Lawrence, Kansas without Ruiz, recruiting new drummer Josh "Cobra" Baruth. Later that same year the group entered the Red House studio in Eudora, Kansas, with producer Ed Rose, who would go on to produce the next four Appleseed Cast records. The end result was "Mare Vitalis", the band's second full-length album. The album showed progression from the dynamics-heavy rock of "The End of the Ring Wars." Essentially a concept album on the movements of the sea – encapsulated in such song titles as "Mare Mortis," "Poseidon" and "Kilgore Trout" (also an allusion to the recurring Kurt Vonnegut character of the same name) —, the album is a fan favorite, heavy on atmosphere, crescendo, subtly undulating guitar arpeggios and the intricate drumming of Baruth, who clearly brought a new dimension to the band's sonic palette.  The band completed "Mare Vitalis" in late 1999, but tensions were developing between the band and Wickersheim. In January 2000, Pillar asked his roommate, St. Joseph, Missouri-native Marc Young, if he would be interested in playing bass one show for the band. Young agreed, though the show they spoke of and agreed upon never materialized. Regardless, Wickersheim officially departed the group that same month with Young replacing him on bass.

"Low Level Owl" and "Lost Songs".

After the "Mare Vitalis" tours, the Appleseed Cast once again entered the studio in late 2000 to begin work on its most ambitious project to date. Eager to fulfill their five-record deal with Deep Elm, the band embarked on a double LP, with Ed Rose once again recording. "Low Level Owl Volume One" was released on August 21, 2001, with "Volume Two" following on October 23.  The tracks were woven together into a seamless album-length soundscape with a noticeable post-rock influence. The complex vocal arrangements and enigmatic lyrics were buried in the mix underneath simple, repeated guitar riffs, keyboards, found sounds and Baruth's intricate drum patterns. The non-instrumental pieces containing were connected by ambient-influenced instrumentals. Both "Low Level Owl" albums were a progression from the more song-oriented "Mare Vitalis" "and" a complete shock, the previously disparaging Pitchforkmedia website gave the albums a glowing review. Some critics were put off by the intentionally repetitive nature of the guitar playing and the ambient instrumental interludes.  The band followed "Low Level Owl" with the release of "Lost Songs" the following year. The album was a collection of previously unfinished songs recorded shortly after the release of "The End of the Ring Wars". In 2002 vocals and overdubs were added and issued as the Appleseed Cast's final release on the Deep Elm label.

"Two Conversations".

The Appleseed Cast signed with the New York-based indie label Tiger Style Records in 2003 and released "Two Conversations" shortly afterward. Touring keyboardist Jordan Geiger was officially credited as a band member on the album. "Two Conversations" was met with mixed reviews.  Some viewed the album with dismay, regarding the more conventional song structures, the less diverse sonic palette and the personal, relationship-driven lyrics as a blatant retreat after the no-holds-barred experimentation, depth and complexity of "Low Level Owl". However, others saw the album as an assured combination of the driving emo-rock of their early work subtly embellished with elements of "Low Level Owl"'s sound.  During the recording of the album and the subsequent tour, tensions mounted once again. Rumors began to surface in the spring of 2004 that drummer Baruth was no longer a part of the group and were confirmed on the band's website later that year.  Following the confirmation, the band went on hiatus. Crisci began working with his folk-influenced side-project Old Canes and Geiger returned to his band Minus Story. In the meantime Tiger Style faced financial difficulties and dropped their entire roster, including The Appleseed Cast after just one album.

Rebirth and "Peregrine".

Throughout late 2004 and much of 2005 little-to-no word travelled on the band's situation. This began to change later in the year as news of drummer auditions began to spread. The band auditioned with many drummers including part-time Old Canes drummer Aaron Coker who later went on to tour with Reggie & The Full Effect. The position eventually went to the Casket Lottery drummer, Nathan "Nate Jr." Richardson.  With a new drummer in place, the band was signed by the Militia Group in 2005 and announced they were returning to the studio in October.  The recording sessions for "Peregrine", the Appleseed Cast's sixth full-length album, were held in Cannon Falls, Minnesota, at Pachyderm Studio. The sessions were produced by John Congleton, the band's first in years without their regular producer Ed Rose.  Crisci stated on the band's website "...I don't know if I've felt better about a record this early since "Mare Vitalis"." The album is arguably more eclectic than any previous release in the band's catalogue, the "Low Level Owl" indebted instrumental "An Orange and a Blue" sitting alongside the more conventional, guitar-driven "February" and the stark, electronica of "Mountain Halo."  "Peregrine" was released on March 21, 2006.  Richardson left the band in the summer of 2006 and was replaced by Coker.

"Sagarmatha".

When asked about the next album (previously discussed as an entirely instrumental EP) in an interview, Crisci had said, "...the idea is still there, although it has morphed into a mostly instrumental full length.". Recording sessions were held at Black Lodge Recording in Eudora, Kansas, with Ed Rose after unsuccessful attempts to arrange John Congleton to helm the recording. Three demos, "Road West", "A Bright Light" and "Summer Before", were released as previews on the band's MySpace. Prior to the album's release, Coker left the band and Young followed shortly thereafter in order to return to school. They were replaced by John Momberg and Nate Whitman, respectively. "Sagarmatha" was released on February 17, 2009, and reached No. 25 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart.

Low Level Owl Live and documentary.

On November 23, 2009, it was announced that the group has signed to Graveface Records. On the same day, the site announced that The Appleseed Cast would be touring with labelmates Dreamend in spring 2010, "playing their two classic albums, "Low Level Owl Volume I" and "II" back-to-back, each in its entirety". The announcement also mentioned that the band would have a live album for sale on the tour. The band was to be the subject of a documentary to be produced by 7446 films in cooperation with Graveface Records. The film will document the band revisiting its seminal work, while also focusing on the creation of "Low Level Owl Volume I" and "II" and the journey the band has taken to this point. The film was scheduled for a 2012 release.

"Middle States" EP and "Illumination Ritual".

In July 2010 Momberg mentioned in a blog post on the band's Myspace page that new material was being demoed. On February 26, 2011, Graveface Records uploaded a video via YouTube that gives current updates of the bands on their label, including The Appleseed Cast. The description of the video stated that a new EP, entitled "Middle States", was slated to be released physically June 7, 2011. The video also contained a sound clip demo of the title track.  As of May 2012, the Appleseed Cast were in the process of recording their eighth full-length studio album. According to the band on its Facebook page, "It's definitely on the energetic side, but moody at the same time." Performances of one song are available on both their Facebook page and on YouTube.  "Illumination Ritual" came out on April 23, 2013. The band toured extensively throughout the year in support of the album.

"The Fleeting Light of Impermanence" and current news.

The band supported Caspian on a North American tour that ran from October 19 to November 19 2016.  They released a new song titled "Asking The Fire For Medicine" in early January 2019 and announced they would head to the studio and begin recording a new album on January 20, 2019.  Their new album "The Fleeting Light of Impermanence" was announced May 23, 2019 for a June 28, 2019 release on Graveface Records. The single "Time The Destroyer" was simultaneously released via Bandcamp.

The Appleseed Cast is an American rock band from Lawrence, Kansas. The band was founded in the early days of emo by singer-guitarist Christopher Crisci and guitarist Aaron Pillar, and quickly grew to fame. The Appleseed Cast has steadily evolved over the release of eight full-length albums with Crisci at the songwriting helm, changing lineups but never breaking up, continuing to hone the TAC sound. The band’s current lineup includes Crisci, Ben Kimball, Nick Fredrickson, and Sean Bergman.


Before Big Bang theories.

The book takes up how the inaccuracies of the theories of Copernicus and Galileo lead them to be dismissed. Copernicus and Galileo used false arguments to persuade people that the earth went in circles around the Sun, and that the Sun was the center of the universe. Both these statements were alien to the public at the time, and are still alien to a modern public. Only the finally mathematically correct interpretation of Johannes Kepler made the theories accepted, within a single generation. As Singh points out, the old generation must die before a new theory can be accepted.

The Big Bang theory evolves.

In parallel to the evolution of the Big Bang theory, the book tells the personal stories of the people who played a part in advancing it, both by hypothesis and by experiment. These include Albert Einstein, for his General Relativity, Alexander Alexandrovich Friedman for first discovering that this theory led to an expanding universe, Georges Lemaître who concluded independently of Friedman discovered an expanding universe, and then that the theory must lead to an initial event of creation, which is the Big Bang theory we know today, Edwin Hubble for observing that the universe expanded, thereby confirming Friedman and Lemaître, George Gamow, Ralph Asher Alpher, Robert Herman, Martin Ryle, Arno Allan Penzias and Robert Woodrow Wilson, among many others.  Another theme of the book is the scientific method itself: how serendipity, curiosity, theory and observation come together to expand our understanding of the world.  One of the most interesting points in the book is how Einstein initially dismissed the theory out of hand. Such was his authority in the scientific community that none dared oppose him, thereby stifling research in this area for many years. However, when Hubble confirmed the theory, Einstein was quick to endorse both Lemaître and his theories.

Big Bang: The most important scientific discovery of all time and why you need to know about it is a book written by Simon Singh and published in 2004 by Fourth Estate.


Examples.

In the United States Army, the SEA for a battalion or larger-sized unit is usually a Command Sergeant Major. For Marine battalions and larger, Sergeant Major typically takes the role. Navy ships and other commands will usually have a Command, Fleet, or Force Master Chief Petty Officer (known as the Chief of the Boat on a submarine), while an Air Force Command Chief Master Sergeant serves at Wing, Numbered Air Force, Field Operating Agency (FOA), Major Command or at "Joint," DoD Agency levels.  In the United States Army and the United States Marine Corps, the senior enlisted advisor at the company or battery level (or other unit at similar echelon) is a First Sergeant. In the Air Force, the senior enlisted member of units smaller than those listed above for Command Chief Master Sergeant is either a Chief Master Sergeant or a Senior Master Sergeant and may also include a separate First Sergeant authorization. In the Air Force a First Sergeant can be an E7, E8 or E9, depending on size and mission of the unit, and is a temporary, special duty assignment.

International equivalents.

Australia.

In Australia the equivalent positions within the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), Australian Army and Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) are Warrant Officer of the Navy (WO-N), Regimental Sergeant Major-Army (RSM-A) and Warrant Officer of the Air Force (WOFF-AF) respectively.

Canada.

The Senior Enlisted advisor of the Canadian Forces is the Canadian Forces Chief Warrant Officer. The Army, Navy and Air Force each have their own Warrant Officer acting as Senior Enlisted advisor

NATO.

NATO also has a number of Senior Enlisted Advisors taken from NATO members for various posts, including Senior Enlisted Advisor - NATO Allied Command Transformation

New Zealand.

In New Zealand the equivalent positions within the Royal New Zealand Navy (RNZN), New Zealand Army and Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) are Warrant officer of the Navy (New Zealand) (WON), Sergeant Major-Army (SMA) and Warrant Officer of the Air Force (WOAF) respectively. there is also the Senior position within HQNZDF of the Warrant Officer of the Defence Force (WODF)

South Africa.

South Africa has a Warrant officer of the Defence Force, as well as Sergeant Majors of the Army, Air Force and Medical Services. The Navy equivalent is the Master at Arms of the Navy

United Kingdom.

The Royal Navy has the Warrant Officer of the Naval Service, the British Army has the Army Sergeant Major, the Royal Air Force has the Chief of the Air Staff's Warrant Officer and the Royal Marines the Corps Regimental Sergeant Major. In 2018, the Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chiefs of Staff Committee was introduced.

A Senior Enlisted Adviser (SEA) in the United States Armed Forces is the most senior enlisted service member in a unit, and acts as an advisor to the commanding officer. Formally, E-9 billets for the senior enlisted advisor are established at Service unit (e.g., battalion, wing, or higher), command, major command, force, or fleet levels to the SEAs/CSELs of DoD Agencies and the Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. SEAs are also known as Command Senior Enlisted Leaders (CSEL). Always a non-commissioned officer, the SEA is the main link between the commanding officer and the enlisted service members under his or her charge.


Biology.

Some species of goose barnacles such as "Lepas anatifera" are pelagic and are most frequently found on tidewrack on oceanic coasts. Unlike most other types of barnacles, intertidal goose barnacles (e.g. "Pollicipes pollicipes" and "Pollicipes polymerus") depend on water motion rather than the movement of their cirri for feeding, and are therefore found only on exposed or moderately exposed coasts.

Spontaneous generation.

In the days before it was realised that birds migrate, it was thought that barnacle geese, "Branta leucopsis", developed from this crustacean, since they were never seen to nest in temperate Europe, hence the English names "goose barnacle", "barnacle goose" and the scientific name "Lepas anserifera" (, "goose"). The confusion was prompted by the similarities in colour and shape. Because they were often found on driftwood, it was assumed that the barnacles were attached to branches before they fell in the water. The archdeacon of Brecon, Gerald of Wales, made this claim in his "Topographia Hiberniae".  Since barnacle geese were thought to be "neither flesh, nor born of flesh", they were allowed to be eaten on days when eating meat was forbidden by Christianity, though it was not universally accepted. The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II examined barnacles and noted no evidence of any bird-like embryo in them, and the secretary of Leo of Rozmital wrote a very skeptical account of his reaction to being served the goose at a fast-day dinner in 1456.

Taxonomy.

The order Pedunculata is divided into the following suborders and families:

As food.

In Portugal and Spain, the species "Pollicipes pollicipes" is a widely consumed and expensive delicacy known as "percebes". "Percebes" are harvested commercially in the Iberian northern coast, mainly in Galicia and Asturias, but also in the Southwestern Portuguese coast (Alentejo) and are also imported from other countries within its range of distribution, particularly from Morocco. A larger but less palatable species ("Pollicipes polymerus") was also imported to Spain from Canada until 1999, when the Canadian government ceased exports due to depletion of stocks.  In Spain, percebes are lightly boiled in brine and served whole and hot under a napkin. To eat percebes, the diamond shaped foot is pinched between thumb and finger and the inner tube pulled out of the scaly case. The claw is removed and the remaining flesh is swallowed. Historically, the indigenous peoples of California used to eat the stem after cooking it in hot ashes.

Goose barnacles (order Pedunculata), also called stalked barnacles or gooseneck barnacles, are filter-feeding crustaceans that live attached to hard surfaces of rocks and flotsam in the ocean intertidal zone.


History.

For its first decade after opening the park centered on water attractions and performance spaces. Numerous variety artists from the Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany appeared there. Following the advice of Phantasialand owner Gottlieb Löffelhard, Bobbejaanland evolved from 1975 onwards into a theme park, with rides becoming more important than music shows. It grew to fifty attractions with four hundred employees and received visitors from the Benelux countries, France, and Germany. As an independent family concern, it also supported educational and cultural projects. By the end of the seventies, Bob's wife Josée (a former opera singer and model) opened a museum with works of art from the Hopi and Navajo cultures, forming an extensive private collection of Native American art.  From the 1990s, three of his five children worked for the park. It added a high windmill that provides the region with energy, and an adjoining museum of alternative energy generation.

Attractions.

Bobbejaanland contains about 50 attractions, such as the Waterslide (1980), the Giant wheel (1976), Indiana River (indoor waterslide, 1991), the Revolution (a dark Rollercoaster, 1989), the Speedy Bob (roller coaster, 1998), the Air Race (suspended roller coaster, 1987, now named Dreamcatcher), the longest junior roller coaster in the world, 'Okidoki' (i.e. 'that's all right', 2003/04), and the world's second Gerstlauer Euro-Fighter roller coaster, "Typhoon" (2003/04), with a drop angle of over 97°(a roller coaster with a fourfold loop and a free fall) and a Splash Battle, "Banana Battle", (2007) made by Preston & Barbieri. The giant Sledgehammer (a Giant Frisbee) reaches a speed of 110 km/h). In 1995 'Kinderland' (English: Kids' Country) was opened as an area for young children.  In 1979 Bobbejaanland opened the Looping Star roller coaster (Schwarzkopf GmbH). Although the ride had a security bar placed over the hip, it was more the centrifugal force which held the passengers in the vehicle when it looped the loop. The coaster was dismantled in 2003.  Bobbejaanland also has Revolution: a fully enclosed tubular steel roller coaster manufactured by Vekoma, with world's largest train where two passengers can sit bobsled style per car. In 2016 the attraction was equipped with Samsung Gear VR. In the morning, the original ride is active. In the afternoon, passengers have the option to wear the virtual glasses and the ride is about an escape from the erupting volcano "Mount Mara". Due to this concept only one passenger per car can wear the glasses. Physical limitations prohibit children to wear the glasses as they don't fit on their head.  Because Bobbejaan Schoepen was primarily a folk and country singer, the park is still partly themed as a western village (for example the El Rio White Water Rapids and the El Paso Dark ride). In the Star Theater, Las Vegas style shows are performed. Bobbejaan bought Zorro's horse from stuntman Casey Tibbs, but the animal was accidentally electrocuted by an exposed cable. He also acquired an ornate white Pontiac Nudie mobile decorated with American coins.

Changes.

In the winter of 2003 the park invested 12 million dollars in two new rides named the Typhoon and the Sledge Hammer. In a 2004 survey of 13 European amusement parks by Belgian consumer organisation "Test-Aankoop" Bobbejaanland was rated second after Phantasialand.  In the early 2000s the founder was diagnosed with cancer and he sold Bobbejaanland to the Spanish-American Parques Reunidos group in April 2004.

Bobbejaanland is a theme park in Lichtaart, Belgium. The park was founded by Bobbejaan Schoepen, a Flemish singer, guitarist, and entertainer who enjoyed international popularity in the fifties and early sixties. In 1959 he bought a 30 hectare marsh, had it drained and built a 1000 capacity venue that opened in December 1961 as Bobbejaanland. This developed into an amusement park and remained in his possession until he sold it in 2004.


Biography.

Knoblauch has a degree in Sociology from the University of Konstanz where he also did his PhD. He did research and taught among others at the University of California at Berkeley, King’s College London, the Universities of Konstanz, Zurich, Bern and Vienna. From 1996 he was a Heisenberg scholar of the German Research Association (DFG). In 2000 he became Professor in Religious Studies at the Theological Faculty of the University of Zurich. Since 2002 he is Professor of General Sociology/Theories of Modern Societies at the Technical University of Berlin.

Works.

His texts are published in 10 languages and cover the sociology of knowledge, communication, contemporary religion, death and dying and video analysis. He is member of the Council of the DGS (German Society for Sociology) and had many positions within the ESA, e.g. Chair of the RN Sociology of Culture.

Research methodology and theoretical orientation.

In his research Knoblauch focusses on various fields within theoretical and empirical sociology. He developed his own approach to the investigation of social interaction called focused ethnography. In contrast to “classic” ethnography this does not include prolonged stays in foreign cultures, but relies on video recordings of specialized fields within the researchers own society. The combination between video analysis and focused ethnography was elaborated as “videography”. Another major field of his work is the sociology of religion, where he advocates for a broad understanding of the role of religion in modern society. Building on Luckmann’s “invisible religion”, he was one of the first to analyse the new forms of spirituality and developed the idea of a mediatized, event- and experience based “popular religion”. Next to his contribion in re-establishing the sociology of knowledge in German speaking sociology, communication was a crucial reference point for his work. While he analysed communication processes already in his dissertation on dowsing and divination, in his habilitation thesis “Kommunikationskultur: Die kommunikative Konstrutkion kultureller Kontexte” (translation: Communication Culture: The Communicative Construction of Cultural Contexts) he elaborated a theoretical framework which came to be known as “Communicative Constructivism”. Based on “The Social Construction of Reality” by Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, this approach includes bodily performances and material “objectivations” as “the missing analytical link which allows one to turn social into communicative action”. Without being reduced to speech acts, “communicative action" becomes “the basic process in the social construction of reality”.

Hubert Knoblauch (born March 21, 1959) is a German sociologist, he is known for his work on Sociology of knowledge, Sociology of Religion, Qualitative research and Videography.


Biography.

Early years.

Grove was born in Clapham, the eighth of the eleven children of Thomas Grove (1774–1852), fishmonger and venison dealer, and his wife, Mary (1784–1856), "née" Blades. He went to a preparatory school, on Clapham Common, where one of his schoolfellows was George Granville Bradley, later Dean of Westminster, whose sister Grove subsequently married. He next entered Stockwell (later known as Clapham) Grammar School, run by Charles Pritchard, the astronomer, who was inspired by the progressive principles of King's College, London. The educational curriculum was based on classics, divinity, mathematics and natural philosophy, and rigorously tested by annual examination. Pritchard also encouraged his pupils to develop interests in literature and music. Grove was a regular worshipper at Holy Trinity church, Clapham, where he heard the music of Bach and Handel. By the age of sixteen, he was competent in classics and mathematics; he left the school in 1836 and was apprenticed to Alexander Gordon, a well-known civil engineer in Westminster. In his free time, he immersed himself in music, attending concerts and studying scores. After completing his apprenticeship, Grove was admitted as a graduate of the Institution of Civil Engineers, in 1839. A year later he went to Glasgow, gaining further experience in the factory of Robert Napier. In 1841 Grove had an affair with a woman called Elizabeth Blackwell, who gave birth to his illegitimate son, George Grove Blackwell, in March 1842. Between 1841 and 1846, Grove spent most of his time in the West Indies, as resident engineer during the building of cast-iron lighthouses. After this he joined the staff of the Chester and Holyhead Railway and then became assistant to Edwin Clark, working on the Britannia Bridge across the Menai Strait. An account of the first floating of the tubes of the bridge is recorded in "The Spectator" of 23 June 1849, which was Grove's first appearance in print. During this period, he lived in Chester, hearing music in the cathedral and also becoming familiar with Welsh folksong.

Music and biblical scholarship.

While working on the Britannia Bridge Grove came into contact with Robert Stephenson, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Sir Charles Barry and other eminent visitors to the works. "These distinguished men", Grove later recalled, "noticed me and were as good as gold to me. They counselled me to go to London and forced me into the secretaryship of the Society of Arts, then vacant by the retirement of Mr. Scott Russell." This was in 1849, when the Great Exhibition of 1851 was in preparation. Grove was the society's secretary for the duration of the exhibition. On 23 December 1851, he married Harriet Bradley, the sister of his old school friend George Bradley. After the Great Exhibition closed in 1852, its principal building, known as "the Crystal Palace", was dismantled and rebuilt in the south London suburb of Sydenham as a centre for education, the arts and leisure. Grove was appointed secretary of the Crystal Palace. He engaged a wind band and a conductor, Heinrich Schallehn. The latter was found to be unsatisfactory, and was replaced by August Manns, who, with Grove's encouragement, developed the band into a full-sized symphony orchestra. With programmes chosen by Grove and Manns, the Crystal Palace concerts became a central feature of London's musical scene and remained so until the end of the century. Grove wrote the programme notes for the concerts. In 1901, a biographer wrote:  Grove's musical analyses avoided all hint of technical jargon and tried to make clear to everyone who read them what, in Grove's opinion, listeners should be aware of in each piece. In a note on Mozart's Symphony No. 39, after referring to Mozart's extraordinary productivity in the year 1788, Grove wrote:  Grove's Crystal Palace programme notes did not concentrate solely on his favourite Austro-German composers. He embraced a representative selection of composers, notably the Frenchmen Berlioz, Bizet, Delibes, Gounod, Massenet and Saint-Saëns, and the rising generations of British composers – Arthur Sullivan, Hubert Parry, Charles Villiers Stanford, Hamish MacCunn, Edward German and Granville Bantock. Among the composers whom Grove sought to popularise was Schubert, whose music was largely neglected in England. Grove and Manns presented the first performance in England of the "Great" C major Symphony. Together with his friend Arthur Sullivan, Grove went to Vienna in 1867 in search of Schubert manuscripts. They found several of Schubert's symphonies and much other music, some of which they copied. They were particularly excited about their final discovery, which Grove described thus: "I found, at the bottom of the cupboard, and in its farthest corner, a bundle of music-books two feet high, carefully tied round, and black with the undisturbed dust of nearly half-a-century.... These were the part-books of the whole of the music in "Rosamunde", tied up after the second performance in December, 1823, and probably never disturbed since. Dr. Schneider [Schubert's nephew] must have been amused at our excitement; but let us hope that he recollected his own days of rapture; at any rate, he kindly overlooked it, and gave us permission to take away with us and copy what we wanted."  In the early years of the Crystal Palace, Grove devoted much of his leisure time to Biblical scholarship. Discovering that there was no full concordance of the proper names in the Bible, Grove, helped by his wife, began work in 1853 making a complete index of each occurrence of every proper name in the Bible, including the Apocrypha. Between 1860 and 1863, Grove was assistant editor to Sir William Smith in a comprehensive Bible dictionary, contributing more than a thousand pages. Some entries written by Grove, such as that on the prophet Elijah, were equivalent almost to book-length. He visited the Holy Land in 1859 and 1861, and helped to found the Palestine Exploration Fund, of which he became honorary secretary, labouring incessantly on its behalf. The Archbishop of York said that Grove was "virtually the founder and institutor of the Society, and has done wonders for it throughout." Grove later observed, "People will insist on thinking of me as a musician, which I really am not in the very least degree. I took quite as much interest in my investigations into the natural features and the little towns of Palestine which I did for "Smith's Dictionary of the Bible" or for Arthur Stanley's "Sinai and Palestine," as I did for Beethoven and Mendelssohn, indeed perhaps more so."

Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians.

After nearly twenty years of service at the Crystal Palace, Grove resigned the secretaryship at the end of 1873 and accepted an offer from the publishers Macmillan and Co. to join their staff and become a director of the firm. He edited "Macmillan's Magazine" and wrote a primer of geography for Macmillan's "History Primers". By far the most important outcome of his connection with Macmillan was "A Dictionary of Music and Musicians", for which his name is best remembered. The idea of the dictionary was entirely his own. He stated, in the prospectus of the dictionary, in March 1874, that "The want of English works on the history, theory, or practice of Music, or the biographies of musicians accessible to the non-professional reader, has long been a subject of remark."  Grove conceived of a work to fill the gap he had identified; he originally proposed two volumes of about 600 pages each, but by the time of its first publication, it ran to four volumes containing a total of 3,125 pages. It was issued by Macmillan in alphabetical volumes over a 12-year period ending in 1889. Grove criticised Parry, a leading contributor, for being "inclined to be wordy and diffuse", but articles by Grove on his own particular interests, Beethoven, Mendelssohn and Schubert, were even longer. "The Musical Times" wrote of the work, "His masterly biographies of Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and Schubert are models of biographical literature, and are written in a most fascinating style. He made two special journeys to Germany to obtain materials for his Mendelssohn article, and more than two to Vienna in connection with Schubert and Beethoven."

Royal College of Music.

In the 1880s, London's musical academies were in poor shape. The Royal Academy of Music was moribund, and the National Training School for Music, of which Sullivan was the reluctant and ineffectual head, was in financial and administrative difficulties. There was a proposal to merge the two bodies to create a single effective conservatoire, but the Royal Academy insisted on retaining its independence and later revitalised itself under the leadership of Alexander Mackenzie. The National Training School was re-formed as the Royal College of Music in 1882, and Grove was appointed its first director. Throughout 1882 he led a successful fund-raising campaign that ensured the official opening of the new college by the Prince of Wales on 7 May 1883. Grove received a knighthood on the same day. The teaching staff, whom he appointed, were led by Parry and Stanford, and, as a biographer of Grove says, "carried the college with distinction into the twentieth century."  Grove focused the College's attention on two main activities: practical training and examining. He was determined to raise the general standard of orchestral playing by replacing the existing "ad hoc" methods of apprentice-based training, private lessons, or study abroad. His second focus, examination, followed the Victorian trend to form professional bodies regulating and standardising the activity of members of each profession. An example is the Institution of Civil Engineers to which Grove had been admitted in 1839. When the Royal Charter establishing the College was being drawn up, Grove ensured that, unlike the Royal Academy, the College should have degree-awarding powers. Mackenzie, seeing the prospect that the new institution would overshadow the Academy, successfully proposed that both bodies should award qualifications jointly. Grove agreed, realising that this course would do much to dispel the damaging hostility that existed between the Academy and the College. The new Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music thus formed offered musical qualifications to external candidates from anywhere in the British Empire who could meet its rigorous standards. 1,141 candidates entered for the first examinations in 1890, despite the high entry fee of two guineas. The income helped both institutions to keep their own student fees at an affordable level, which enabled the College to make a full three-year course of study its basic standard. Because of the thorough training thus offered, the high standard of playing of the College's students quickly became known. Leading musicians willingly appeared with the College orchestra, including Joseph Joachim and Hans Richter. Manns, Eugène Ysaÿe and Bernard Shaw praised it strongly. The historian David Wright says of Grove's legacy: "The founding of the RCM in 1883 clearly represents the major turning point for musical training in Britain. The new attitudes it espoused stemmed directly from the professionalizing ethos that modernized and transformed Victorian society."

Retirement and last years.

Grove retired at Christmas 1894, when he was succeeded by Parry. By this time, a new building had been constructed for the College. In 1896 Grove's "Beethoven and his Nine Symphonies", "addressed to the amateurs of this country", appeared. Early in 1899, Grove's health began to fail, and he died, aged 79, on 28 May 1900, in the house at Sydenham in which he had lived for nearly 40 years. He was buried in the Brockley and Ladywell Cemeteries.

Sir George Grove (13 August 1820 – 28 May 1900) was an English writer on music, known as the founding editor of "Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians".


History.

Founded in 1952, the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum interprets the complete natural history of a single region—the Sonoran Desert and adjacent ecosystems—with plants and animals from the region featured together in its exhibits.  William H. Carr inspired and founded the Desert Museum with the support of his friend, Arthur Pack, a conservationist, son of Charles Lathrop Pack, and editor of "Nature Magazine". Carr had earlier founded the Bear Mountain Trailside Museum in New York, which was affiliated with the American Museum of Natural History. There he had developed a similar approach to displays, working with native plants and animals to create a regionally focused collection.  Pack, through his foundation, had provided $200,000 to open the museum and pay its operating cost, so the museum initially charged no admission. Although an admission charge was instituted in 1953, the museum is still supported only by admission fees, memberships, and donations, and receives no direct support from public taxes.  From 1953 to 1985, a local television series, "Desert Trails", featured the museum. “It was an informal show, almost always having live animals and human guests, and focusing on the natural history of the desert as well as happenings at the museum.” In 1991 the museum partnered to develop a national television series known as "Desert Speaks.” It was produced in cooperation with the local PBS affiliate (KUAT), and with The Nature Conservancy of Arizona. This television series was broadcast in 200 markets and ran for 19 seasons.  TripAdvisor rated the Museum as Tucson's #2 attraction for 2018. It was ranked number 18 on their "Top 25 Museums - United States" and a top five public gardens to visit in the United States for 2018, and ranked number nine in the world on their "Traveler’s Choice" of top museums for 2013 and 2014. Condé Nast Traveler's "The Daily Traveler" included in their list of five museums in the United States for children interested in dinosaurs.

Exhibits and interpretation.

The Warden Aquarium opened in January 2013. The aquarium highlights the roles of the Colorado and other life-giving rivers in the region, as well as the Gulf of California, from which the water brought by the monsoon is essential to life in the Sonoran Desert. The “Rivers to the Sea” exhibit includes a touch tank with marine invertebrates.  The Desert Museum has exhibited lower vertebrates and invertebrates since its early days. Though this hall has been modified over the years, the building dates back to 1937 and many of the painted dioramas were created in the early to mid-1950s. On exhibit is a wide variety of native reptiles, including many species of rattlesnakes. Many amphibians and other invertebrates, ranging from spiders and scorpions to beetles, walking sticks, and grasshoppers, are also showcased.  At Cat Canyon visitors can view small cats, like bobcats and an ocelot, in naturalistic grotto settings. This exhibit area also includes a gray fox and porcupine. The animals can be viewed from overhead and at eye level..  The Desert Grassland exhibit area recreates a desert grassland habitat featuring soap tree yuccas, desert scrub, grasses and succulents. Visitors here can observe prairie dogs and learn the region's history through a replica of a mammoth kill site.  Life on the Rocks is a multi-species exhibit focusing on the habitat and species most often encountered amid the region's rocky slopes. Some enclosures are mesh-topped with natural soils and vegetation; others are glass-fronted crevices or cutaway burrows in simulated soil banks. The “homes” of individual species are embedded in the rocks – many with burrows that can be exposed by visitors.  The Life Underground exhibit highlights creatures that make their homes underground. Visitors enter a tunnel and walk below ground into a dimly lit corridor where various creatures, such as kit fox, kangaroo rat, and ringtail, are featured. Here visitors learn where animals go when the desert heats up.  Currently on exhibit in the Riparian Corridor area are a river otter, bighorn sheep, coatis (also known as coatimundis), beavers, native fish and aquatic invertebrates (i.e., dragonflies and snails). There is also a desert toad life-cycle installation.  The Desert Loop Trail is an unpaved desert trail one-half mile long, passing through areas where javelinas, coyotes and lizards are on display. The fiber fencing there are designed to be almost invisible to the eye, aiming to make the enclosure feel like naturally open space. Agaves and various legume trees, native to the region, are identified on this trail.  The "Mountain Woodland" exhibit is a Mexican Pine-Oak Woodland habitat recreating similar habitats in nearby mountain ranges. Native species include a cougar, white-tailed deer, Merriam's turkeys and a brown bear. Mexican wolves and thick-billed parrots also showcased in this area are no longer present in the Sonoran Desert.  There is a walk-in aviary with northern cardinals, Gambel's quail, ducks, doves, and many other species of native birds. Several benches are located throughout the aviary for observation. A small stream runs through the middle of the enclosure.  The Earth Sciences Center-Cave is an artificial cave constructed with arches, side chambers and a tunnel for visitors to explore its 75-foot length. Along the entry passage, organisms and residents are displayed. Further in, a glistening mass of cave formations are lit from beneath the surface of a pool. In the grand rooms, fossils, geologic gems and minerals, and the history of the earth is interpreted.  Desert Garden was built as a partnership between "Sunset" magazine and the Desert Museum. Three different levels of demonstration gardens display various species of plants that can be used in landscaping for homes in the Sonoran Desert region. There are two water features and seating. Attracted by water and flowers, wild native birds and butterflies frequently visit here.  The Hummingbird Aviary allows observation of hummingbirds hovering so closely that visitors can feel the air disturbed by their wings. In breeding season, nests are near enough to allow viewing of the babies. The aviary houses four species that nest annually. The museum's Hummingbird Propagation Program is the only one of its kind in the world for North American hummingbirds.  Due to its bi-seasonal rainfall, the Sonoran Desert region is known as the “lushest desert on earth” and is home to over 2,000 species of plants. The museum's gardens display this ecosystem and represent a variety of biotic communities found within the Sonoran Desert region. There are 1,200 different species of plants with 56,000 individual specimens planted on the grounds. The following gardens are available for viewing throughout the year:

Live presentations.

Live & (sort of) on the Loose.

This presentation features often misunderstood venomous reptiles. Each program presents two species, which could be any combination of the following:

Raptor free-flight.

This birds-of-prey demonstration is held in the open desert and spectators watch from the flight path. The birds fly so close visitors often feel the brush of feathers. Weather permitting, the museum hosts two demonstrations daily from mid-October through mid-April. The birds fly completely untethered, without any jesses (leg straps) and most often without leg rings. Only birds native to the Sonoran Desert Region are flown. A featured species is Harris's hawks, the only raptor species in the world to hunt as a family using strategy, like wolves. The morning and afternoon demonstrations showcase different species, so each is unique. Species include: Harris's hawk, peregrine falcons, barn owls, red-tailed hawks, ferruginous hawk, great horned owl, gray hawk, prairie falcon, and chihuahuan raven.

Docent stations.

Docent Stations, with trained volunteer naturalists, are located throughout the museum grounds. At these stations, docents offer presentations with live reptiles, birds, or mammals, or with animal skulls, skeletons, or fossil remains. Some stations interpret the geology of the Sonoran Desert region including rock formations and semi-precious stones.  Tours are available through advanced reservations via the museum's website. Topics include: Zookeeper for a Day, Winged Wonders (Hummingbird Tour), Warden Aquarium Private Tour, Walk on the Wild Side, and the Reptiles, Amphibians, and Invertebrates Tour.

Conservation education and science.

For many years, the Museum has been involved in scientific investigations, including botanical field investigations, especially in Mexico, with population studies of Ironwood, and a major bi-national research program on migratory pollinators. Current work includes studies of pollination and seed dispersal (how plants survive and get around), and the effects of climate change on regional ecological communities. The Living Collections staff of the museum, are involved in collaborative species survival projects, working with outside agencies and scientists. These include salvage and recovery efforts on a variety of lower vertebrates, including the Tarahumara frog, Chiricahua leopard frog, Mexican garter snake, Sonoyta mud turtle, and a wide range of desert fishes.

Community outreach – the Desert Ark van and live animals.

Desert Ark Community Programs feature live Sonoran Desert animals and may include interactive lectures, slide shows or activities. Museum staff members travel throughout Southern Arizona as well as areas within an 8-hour round-trip drive from the museum, although live animals are unable to travel outside the state of Arizona. For in-state programs, live animals may be used, and may include reptiles, birds, mammals and insects, although the particular animals vary by program.

Digital library.

The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum has a digital library containing thousands of photographs of plants and animals. The digital library is an interactive site that has a kid's page with videos, animal sounds, and games. Another interactive feature is the plant phenology section. Visitors can look at a specific species of plant or compare two plant species. In addition, the “Time of Year” feature allows users to select a date on the calendar to view what species are in flower or are expected to be in flower. Past dates will also provide temperature and precipitation data, whereas future dates will give average temperatures and chance of precipitation.

Art Institute.

The Art Institute opened in 2001 to promote conservation of the Sonoran Desert through art education including classes, art exhibits, and stewardship of the Museum art. The Art Institute offers a certificate program in nature illustration. Over 80 art classes offered throughout the year. The Institute offers art workshops focusing on specific areas, such as “Sonoran Desert Birds” and “Drawn to the Desert: Focus on the Sea of Cortez.” The Art Institute also offers classes for in photography, ranging from “Photography Basics for Adjustable Cameras” to “Intermediate Nature Photography.”

Ironwood gallery.

The Ironwood Gallery hosts temporary exhibits by accomplished artists from southern Arizona, regional artists from throughout the Southwest and Mexico. It also hosts nationally recognized artists, both individually and through traveling exhibits, by the Society of Conservation Artists and (others).

Desert Museum Press.

Since 1995, the ASDM Press (Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum Press) has published more than 40 books or guides, including 22 popular books on the natural history of the Sonoran Desert Region. It has published 6 picture books for children in both English and Spanish and several pocket guides to hummingbirds and other birds, plants, lizards, snakes, beetles, etc. In 2000, ASDM Press co-published the 628-page “bible” of the Sonoran Desert, “A Natural History of the Sonoran Desert” with the University of California Press. In collaboration with the University of Arizona Press, the division has co-published several technical books in the Studies in Natural History Series, featuring research on topics from pollinators, to water in the desert, to the Sea of Cortez. In the first few years publications were mainly small paperback books. But since 2000, more substantial volumes are common, including the recent field guides to mountain wildflowers and mountain trees, as well as the full-color, 232-page Natural History of the Santa Catalina Mountains, with an Introduction to the Madrean Sky Islands (2013).

Operations and support.

The museum is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3) institution. Its primary source of revenue is from the sale of admission tickets and memberships. Revenue from grants, major donors, bequests and planned gifts, special events, sponsorships, and an annual fund also contribute to the museum's funding.

Docents and volunteers.

The Desert Museum benefits from the service of approximately 500 volunteers, who assist the approximately 120 paid staff. Collectively, Desert Museum volunteers contribute about 130,000 hours per year.  Since its inception in 1972, the Docent Program has become a hallmark of the museum and is recognized by the industry as one of the finest docent corps in existence today. Each of the nearly 200 docents undergoes a rigorous 15-week training program in natural history education.  Another 300 volunteers support the museum in a variety of departmental assignments. The ASDM Internship Program offers a few unpaid, educational appointments for college students.

Hal Gras and the Desert Ark program.

One of the most influential staff members in the history of the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum was Harold W. “Hal” Gras Jr., more commonly known as Hal Gras. According to David Leighton, historian for the Arizona Daily Star newspaper, Gras was born in New Jersey, in 1919. After serving in World War II and getting married, he relocated to El Paso, Texas where he received his college degree in broadcasting. In 1950, he moved to Tucson, Arizona where he worked in radio and then television.  In 1952, when the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum opened its doors, Hal Gras and his wife Natie attended its opening and, as a result Gras began hosting the museum's TV show, “Desert Trails” (renamed The Desert Speaks, when it moved to KUAT around 1990). The show first aired in 1953, and would run for 32 years, with Gras hosting 1,551 shows. From 1955 to 1972, Gras was the public relations director for the museum. He visited local clubs and talked about the museum. Though he had little or no experience with animals, he started bringing some along with him for his appearances. Soon the popularity of his talks increased and he started bringing creatures from the museum to schools, hospitals, county fairs, etc. The program and the car that Gras brought the animals in both came to be called "The Desert Ark".  When Gras retired in 1985, he had presented a total of 5,382 Desert Ark programs. A few years after his retirement, a small street south of the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, along Kinney Road, was named Hal Gras Road in his honor. He would die in 1999.

The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is a 98-acre (40 ha) zoo, aquarium, botanical garden, natural history museum, publisher, and art gallery founded in 1952. Located just west of Tucson, Arizona, it features two miles (3.2 km) of walking paths traversing 21 acres (8.5 ha) of desert landscape. It is one of the most visited attractions in Southern Arizona.


Early life and education.

Müller was born in Biel, Switzerland, where he also went to school. He studied medicine at the universities of Neuchâtel, Berne, and Lausanne and received his M.D. from the University of Zürich in 1946. In 1944, he was visited by a patient who had a bone fracture treated in World War II by the German surgeon Gerhard Küntscher, who had fixed the fracture using an implanted nail. This and another visit by a patient who had a hip implant made in Paris determined Müller to specialize in this area.

Career.

After having worked in Jimma in Ethiopia, in Liestal, in Fribourg, and in Zürich, Müller habilitated in orthopedic surgery in 1957. From 1960 on he led the department of orthopedics and traumatology at the hospital of St. Gallen. From 1963 to 1980 he was professor at the University of Berne and head of orthopedic surgery at the Inselspital in Berne.  In 1958, Müller co-founded the Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Osteosynthesefragen. Inspired by the work of Belgian surgeon Robert Danis, Müller developed within two years new tools and fixation implants for orthopedic surgery, marketed by two Swiss companies and from the mid-1970 on also by Synthes USA. Since 2004, all three companies are part of the Synthes Holding AG.  In 1967, Müller founded another company, Protek AG, to market his hip prostheses, which he had developed in the early 1960s, inspired by the work of John Charnley. From 1974 on, profits went to the Maurice E. Müller foundation, the first of several foundations Müller founded to advance the education and research in orthopedic surgery. In 1990, the company was sold to Sulzer Medica (which since then has become an independent spin-off from the Sulzer mother company and which later became part of Zimmer, Inc. under the name of Centerpulse).

Zentrum Paul Klee.

Müller was also the patron who founded the Zentrum Paul Klee in Berne, Switzerland. He developed the initial ideas for the museum, contacted architect Renzo Piano for its realization, and donated through a foundation formed for this purpose 70 million Swiss francs (more than half of the total cost of CHF 125 million) for the construction of the museum.  Müller died on 10 May 2009 in Berne.

Maurice Edmond Müller (28 March 1918 – 10 May 2009) was a Swiss orthopedic surgeon who was instrumental in the development of internal fixation techniques to treat bone fractures and who also significantly advanced the development of the hip prostheses. For his work in these areas he has been honored with numerous awards. On 24 August 2002, the International Society of Orthopaedic Surgery and Traumatology (SICOT) named him the "Orthopedic Surgeon of the Century" at a congress in San Diego.


History.

The company was founded in 1993 in Munich by Jürgen Jaron Dieter Rein and Erhard Rein. In 1998 two software developers from Dresden, Tilman Herberger and Titus Tost, joined the company. The headquarters was moved to Berlin in the same year. In 2001 the company changed its business type from a GmbH ("Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung", English: company with limited liability) to Magix AG ("Aktiengesellschaft", English: stock corporation). Magix AG went public on April 6, 2006. Its stocks were listed on the official market and the Prime Standard of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. After switching to the Entry Standard in 2012, Magix AG filed an application in May 2014 to have the license to trade its shares on the unofficial market revoked and its stocks delisted on November 30, 2014. In 2015 the company changed its business type to MAGIX GmbH & Co. KGaA. In 2016 the name of the company was changed to Bellevue Investments.

Subsidiaries of Bellevue Investments GmbH & Co. KGaA.

Magix Software GmbH.

Magix Software GmbH, an international software publisher with a focus on multimedia software and services, is the largest subsidiary of Magix GmbH & Co. KGaA. The company is headquartered in Berlin, Germany with additional locations in Dresden and Lübbecke in Germany, Bologna in Italy, Boulogne in France, Huizen in The Netherlands, Hemel Hempstead in the United Kingdom, Markham in Canada, and Reno in the United States.

Magix Online Services GmbH.

The subsidiary Magix Online Services GmbH has been offering online services, such as Magix Online Album and Magix Website Maker, since 2004. Magix Web Designer, a program for creating websites, was introduced in 2009.  Products

Xara Group Ltd..

Bellevue Investments acquired the English company Xara Group Ltd, headquartered in Hemel Hempstead, in 2007. Xara produces graphics software and Web design programs. The company is first and foremost known for Xara Designer Pro, which is available in its 10th version (as of September 2014).  The company was founded in 1981 and began developing for various systems, such as the Atari ST, BBC Micro and Acorn Archimedes, and also developed "ArtWorks", the predecessor to "Xara Xtreme". In 1996 Xara began developing for Windows, leading to the development of "Xara 3D", "Xara X" and "Xara Xtreme", the predecessors to the Magix products "Xara 3D Maker", "Xara Photo & Graphic Designer" and "Xara Designer Pro".  Xara Web Designer, a program for creating websites, was first released in 2009. In 2013 Xara Page & Layout Designer, a DTP program, was added to the product range.

mufin GmbH.

mufin (pronounced muffin) stands for "music finder". Bellevue Investments acquired full ownership of mufin GmbH in 2007. In 2005 Bellevue Investments acquired 66% of m2any GmbH in Garching. The company changed its name to mufin GmbH and moved its headquarters to Berlin following full acquisition by Bellevue Investments. m2any GmbH is the result of a research project run by the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, the inventor of the MP3 format.  mufin technology is based on AudioID, an acoustic fingerprint, which enables the quick recognition of music and audio signals. AudioID is an element of the MPEG-7 standard.  In addition to music recognition, mufin is also active in the area of "automatic content recognition", which can be built into second screen applications as a service.

Catooh Corp./Appic Labs Corp..

Bellevue Investments founded the limited company Catooh Corp. in Las Vegas, Nevada in 2007. The company was registered in the commercial register on April 5, 2007. Catooh Corp. served to handle all transactions from the online digital media marketplace, "Catooh". In 2013 the company was renamed Appic Labs Corp. All transactions through the online service "Catooh" are now handled by Magix Computer Products International Corp., whereas Appic Labs is responsible for the development and marketing of mobile camera and photo applications.

JAM just add musicExpert Systems GmbH.

The company was founded as Open Seminar GmbH in 2011. The company operates the online portal provenexpert.com, a platform for word of mouth marketing and customer satisfaction analysis.

simplitec GmbH.

simplitec GmbH is an international provider of utility software. The current simplitec product range includes simplifast, simpliclean and simplisafe, all of which are contained in a yearly subscription to the simplitec Power Suite.

Bellevue Property GmbH.

Bellevue Property GmbH is a real estate development company with assets located in Dresden and Berlin.

Overview of subsidiaries.

The following entities are full subsidiaries of the MAGIX Group (as of September 30, 2013):

Bellevue Investments GmbH & Co. KGaA is a German holding company that controls numerous subsidiaries and investments domestically and abroad. The subsidiaries have different business models and are active in the fields of software, online services, entertainment and digital content, as well as real estate. The subsidiaries currently employ approximately 350 people.


Formal definition and terminology.

An incidence structure is a triple () where is a set whose elements are called "points", is a distinct set whose elements are called "lines" and is the incidence relation. The elements of are called flags. If () is in then one may say that point "lies on" line or that the line "passes through" point. A more "symmetric" terminology, to reflect the symmetric nature of this relation, is that " is "incident" with " or that " is incident with " and uses the notation synonymously with.  In some common situations may be a set of subsets of in which case incidence will be containment ( if and only if is a member of ). Incidence structures of this type are called "set-theoretic". This is not always the case, for example, if is a set of vectors and a set of square matrices, we may define vector is an eigenvector of matrix }. This example also shows that while the geometric language of points and lines is used, the object types need not be these geometric objects.

Examples.

An incidence structure is "uniform" if each line is incident with the same number of points. Each of these examples, except the second, is uniform with three points per line.

Graphs.

Any graph (which need not be simple, loops and multiple edges are allowed) is a uniform incidence structure with two points per line. For these examples, the vertices of the graph form the point set, the edges of the graph form the line set, and incidence means that a vertex is an endpoint of an edge.

Linear spaces.

Incidence structures are seldom studied in their full generality; it is typical to study incidence structures that satisfy some additional axioms. For instance, a "partial linear space" is an incidence structure that satisfies: If the first axiom above is replaced by the stronger: the incidence structure is called a "linear space".

Nets.

A more specialized example is a "k"-net. This is an incidence structure in which the lines fall into "k" parallel classes, so that two lines in the same parallel class have no common points, but two lines in different classes have exactly one common point, and each point belongs to exactly one line from each parallel class. An example of a "k"-net is the set of points of an affine plane together with "k" parallel classes of affine lines.

Dual structure.

If we interchange the role of "points" and "lines" in  we obtain the "dual structure",  where is the converse relation of. It follows immediately from the definition that:  This is an abstract version of projective duality.  A structure that is isomorphic to its dual is called "self-dual". The Fano plane above is a self-dual incidence structure.

Other terminology.

The concept of an incidence structure is very simple and has arisen in several disciplines, each introducing its own vocabulary and specifying the types of questions that are typically asked about these structures. Incidence structures use a geometric terminology, but in graph theoretic terms they are called hypergraphs and in design theoretic terms they are called block designs. They are also known as a "set system" or family of sets in a general context.

Hypergraphs.

Each hypergraph or set system can be regarded as an incidence structure in which the universal set plays the role of "points", the corresponding family of sets plays the role of "lines" and the incidence relation is set membership "∈". Conversely, every incidence structure can be viewed as a hypergraph by identifying the lines with the sets of points that are incident with them.

Block designs.

A (general) block design is a set together with a family of subsets of (repeated subsets are allowed). Normally a block design is required to satisfy numerical regularity conditions. As an incidence structure, is the set of points and is the set of lines, usually called "blocks" in this context (repeated blocks must have distinct names, so is actually a set and not a multiset). If all the subsets in have the same size, the block design is called "uniform". If each element of appears in the same number of subsets, the block design is said to be "regular". The dual of a uniform design is a regular design and vice versa.

Example: Fano plane.

Consider the block design/hypergraph given by:  This incidence structure is called the Fano plane. As a block design it is both uniform and regular.  In the labeling given, the lines are precisely the subsets of the points that consist of three points whose labels add up to zero using nim addition. Alternatively, each number, when written in binary, can be identified with a non-zero vector of length three over the binary field. Three vectors that generate a subspace form a line; in this case, that is equivalent to their vector sum being the zero vector.

Representations.

Incidence structures may be represented in many ways. If the sets and are finite these representations can compactly encode all the relevant information concerning the structure.

Incidence matrix.

The incidence matrix of a (finite) incidence structure is a (0,1) matrix that has its rows indexed by the points } and columns indexed by the lines } where the ij-th entry is a 1 if and 0 otherwise. An incidence matrix is not uniquely determined since it depends upon the arbitrary ordering of the points and the lines.  The non-uniform incidence structure pictured above (#2 of the examples) is given by:  An incidence matrix for this structure is : which corresponds to the incidence table:  If an incidence structure has an incidence matrix, then the dual structure has the transpose matrix as its incidence matrix (and is defined by that matrix).  An incidence structure is self-dual if there exists an ordering of the points and lines so that the incidence matrix constructed with that ordering is a symmetric matrix.  With the labels as given in example #1 above and with points ordered and lines ordered, the Fano plane has the incidence matrix: Since this is a symmetric matrix, the Fano plane is a self-dual incidence structure.

Pictorial representations.

An incidence figure (that is, a depiction of an incidence structure), is constructed by representing the points by dots in a plane and having some visual means of joining the dots to correspond to lines. The dots may be placed in any manner, there are no restrictions on distances between points or any relationships between points. In an incidence structure there is no concept of a point being between two other points; the order of points on a line is undefined. Compare this with ordered geometry, which does have a notion of betweenness. The same statements can be made about the depictions of the lines. In particular, lines need not be depicted by "straight line segments" (see examples 1, 3 and 4 above). As with the pictorial representation of graphs, the crossing of two "lines" at anyplace other than a dot, has no meaning in terms of the incidence structure, it is only an accident of the representation. These incidence figures may at times resemble graphs, but they aren't graphs unless the incidence structure is a graph.

Realizability.

Incidence structures can be modelled by points and curves in the Euclidean plane with the usual geometric meaning of incidence. Some incidence structures admit representation by points and (straight) lines. Structures that can be are called "realizable". If no ambient space is mentioned then the Euclidean plane is assumed. The Fano plane (#1 above) is not realizable since it needs at least one curve. The Möbius-Kantor configuration (#4 above) is not realizable in the Euclidean plane, but it is realizable in the complex plane. On the other hand, examples #2 and #5 above are realizable and the incidence figures given there demonstrate this. Steinitz (1894) has shown that (incidence structures with points and lines, three points per line and three lines through each point) are either realizable or require the use of only one curved line in their representations. The Fano plane is the unique () and the Möbius-Kantor configuration is the unique ().

Incidence graph (Levi graph).

Each incidence structure "C" corresponds to a bipartite graph called the Levi graph or incidence graph of the structure. As any bipartite graph is two colorable, the Levi graph can be given a black and white vertex coloring, where black vertices correspond to points and white vertices correspond to lines of "C". The edges of this graph correspond to the flags (incident point/line pairs) of the incidence structure. The original Levi graph was the incidence graph of the generalized quadrangle of order two (example #3 above), but the term has been extended by H.S.M. Coxeter to refer to an incidence graph of any incidence structure.

Levi graph examples.

The Levi graph of the Fano plane is the Heawood graph. Since the Heawood graph is connected and vertex-transitive, there exists an automorphism (such as the one defined by a reflection about the vertical axis in the figure of the Heawood graph) interchanging black and white vertices. This, in turn, implies that the Fano plane is self-dual.  The specific representation, on the left, of the Levi graph of the Möbius-Kantor configuration (example #4 above) illustrates that a rotation of about the center (either clockwise or counterclockwise) of the diagram interchanges the blue and red vertices and maps edges to edges. That is to say that there exists a color interchanging automorphism of this graph. Consequently, the incidence structure known as the Möbius-Kantor configuration is self-dual.

Generalization.

It is possible to generalize the notion of an incidence structure to include more than two types of objects. A structure with types of objects is called an "incidence structure of rank" or a "rank" "geometry". Formally these are defined as tuples with and  The Levi graph for these structures is defined as a multipartite graph with vertices corresponding to each type being colored the same.

In mathematics, an abstract system consisting of two types of objects and a single relationship between these types of objects is called an incidence structure. Consider the points and lines of the Euclidean plane as the two types of objects and ignore all the properties of this geometry except for the relation of which points are on which lines for all points and lines. What is left is the incidence structure of the Euclidean plane.


Plot.

John Beckwith and Jeremy Grey are Washington D.C. divorce mediators who crash weddings to meet and have sex with women. At the end of a season of successful crashes, Jeremy takes John to a wedding for the daughter of the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, William Cleary. Once inside, the pair set their sights on Cleary's other daughters, Gloria and Claire. Jeremy ends up having sex with Gloria on a nearby beach during the reception. Gloria is possessive and quickly becomes obsessed with Jeremy, and Jeremy urges John to escape the reception with him. Meanwhile, John attempts to court Claire, the maid of honor, but is interrupted by her hotheaded boyfriend, Sack Lodge, who is unfaithful and disrespectful behind her back. When Gloria invites Jeremy and John to an extended weekend party at their family compound, John overrules Jeremy to accept and get closer to Claire.  John and Jeremy become acquainted with the Clearys: the Secretary's wife sexually harasses John; Gloria's brother, Todd, tries to seduce Jeremy during the night; Gloria continues to lavish unwanted sexual attention on Jeremy; and Sack repeatedly injures Jeremy during a game of touch football. At dinner, John spikes Sack's wine with eye-drops to make him sick and get more time to connect with Claire.  John and Claire continue to bond the next day on a sailing trip. The suspicious Sack takes the men on a hunting trip and pranks them, resulting in Jeremy getting shot in the buttocks. While Jeremy recovers, John and Claire go on a bike ride to a secluded beach. Claire finally admits she is not sure how she feels about Sack and ends up kissing John passionately. Meanwhile, Gloria tends Jeremy's wounds and reveals to him she is not as inexperienced as she initially let on. Jeremy realizes that he himself has been played and that he may be in love with Gloria.  While John is confessing his attraction to Claire, they are interrupted by Jeremy being chased out of the house. Sack has investigated (and then exposes) John and Jeremy's identities to the family. Betrayed, Claire turns on John and the Secretary tells them to leave.  Over the following months, John attempts to reach Claire but she refuses to see him. He attempts to sneak into her and Sack's engagement party, but is caught and beaten by Sack. Confronting Jeremy about abandoning him, he learns that Jeremy has secretly continued his relationship with Gloria. Betrayed and brokenhearted, John spirals into depression, crashing weddings alone and becoming nihilistic. Meanwhile, as Claire and Sack plan their wedding, Claire's doubts grow. Jeremy proposes to Gloria and tries to ask John to be his best man, but John turns him away.  John visits Jeremy's former wedding crashing mentor, Chazz Reinhold, who convinces John to crash a funeral with him. At the funeral, John reconsiders his belief in love and marriage after seeing the grieving widow. He rushes to Jeremy's wedding and joins the wedding mid-ceremony to Jeremy's delight. But, Claire is upset by his appearance, prompting John to express regret for his past behavior and profess his love for her in front of the congregation. Sack interrupts, but Claire finally tells him that she cannot marry him. Sack tries to attack John, but Jeremy intervenes and knocks him out, and John and Claire kiss. After the wedding, the two couples drive away from the ceremony together and discuss crashing another wedding together.

Cast.

Arizona Senator and 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain and Democratic strategist and CNN contributor James Carville both make a brief cameo appearance, they are shown congratulating the secretary and his wife on their daughter's wedding. McCain was criticized for his appearance in the film, having previously called out Hollywood for marketing R-Rated films to teenagers.

Production.

Andrew Panay, co-producer of "Wedding Crashers", had the idea for the film based on his own experience as a wedding crasher in his youth. Panay then consulted the screenwriting team of Steve Faber and Bob Fisher to come up with a story based on this premise. The screenwriters had doubts it could be sustained into a feature-length film, so they decided to add female love interests born from a political family, inspired by their dream of marrying a girl from the Kennedy family when they were youngsters. It was also Panay's desire "to explore male friendship through this crazy idea of crashing weddings."  Director David Dobkin said they had discussed the possibility of releasing a version of the film that was not R-rated, but the idea was abandoned after a consultant provided a long list of the many R-Rated elements in the film, and Dobkin realized "The two funniest scenes in the movie would have had to go."  Dobkin insisted on three and a half weeks of rehearsals before filming began, based on his background working in theater.

Filming.

Principal photography began on March 22, 2004, in Washington, D.C. The movie had a 52-day shooting schedule.  The main Cleary wedding reception scene was filmed at the Inn at Perry Cabin in Saint Michaels, Maryland. Ellenborough Estate in Easton, MD is the setting of the Cleary family house, where most of the movie takes place.

Release.

Critical response.

On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 75% based on 187 reviews, with an average rating of 6.72/10. The website's critical consensus states, ""Wedding Crashers" is both raunchy and sweet, and features top-notch comic performances from Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 64 out of 100 based on reviews from 39 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade A-.  Carina Chocano of the "Los Angeles Times" wrote a favorable review, and in particular praised Vaughan's performance: "Jeremy is the soul of the movie. There's something about Vaughn — the deadpan eyes; the sublimated, misdirected intelligence — that recalls Bill Murray in his "Caddyshack" years." Chocano was critical of Will Ferrell's "hyper-active bonehead routine" and called the interlude awful. She added that the film was "really just a love story about a couple of buddies who live happily ever after. And it couldn't have happened to a nicer, more charming couple". Manohla Dargis of the "New York Times" wrote, "It's crude, yes, but also funny; too bad these lost boys can't stay lost. Like clockwork, the film soon mutates from a guy-oriented sex comedy into a wish-fulfillment chick flick". Brian Lowry of "Variety" described the film as "fairly amusing, fitfully over the top and [...] occasionally a touch homophobic". He praised McAdams as she manages to "fill in narrative gaps and actually creates a real character", said Vaughan's dialog had most of the comedic highlights, and wrote that Walken was underused. Lowry concluded, "While neither a full-throated R-rated romp a la "There's Something About Mary" nor a fully realized romantic comedy, "Wedding Crashers" contains enough appealing elements of both to catch the bouquet in what's been a relatively humor-deprived summer.  Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times" gave the film two stars out of four; although he wrote that "there are individual moments that are very funny", he added that the director, David Dobkin, "has too much else on his mind". British Movie magazine "Empire" awarded it three out of five stars and were complimentary to Vaughn and Wilson, saying "Sharing an easy chemistry and free of the usual joker/straight-guy dynamic, Wilson and Vaughn quip, riff and banter to hilarious effect. And both get their fair share of money moments, the latter’s muggings are particularly hysterical in a raunchy dinner-party sequence. The laidback stars are funny and sweet, but they’re let down by a patchy script which squanders some potentially priceless set-ups." Kimberley Jones of "The Austin Chronicle" wrote that the film "will no doubt make buckets of money, but it’ll do so without half the wit, compassion, or inspired madness of Mary". Jones complained that the plot was "mostly cookie-cutter stuff", and was offended by the portrayal of minorities, writing "gays and blacks are represented, respectively, by a squirrelly psychotic and a Jamaican house servant". Jones concluded, "A stiff drink or maybe some pharmaceutical assistance might have made me overlook the film's sour tone, or the unremarkableness of its direction."  In a 2018 review, Scott Meslow of "GQ" reexamined the film, writing "the gender and sexual dynamics that have aged rather poorly, Wedding Crashers feels awfully uneven today." He noted a date-rape joke in the opening minutes, complained about the lack of developed female characters, objected to the sassy racist grandmother trope, called the predatory gay man trope "inexcusably unfunny", felt that the film trivializes rape, and called Will Ferrell's cameo lazy. Meslow conceded that "For all its faults, it does have an extremely strong pair of leads", but ultimately concluded that the film does not hold up.

Box office.

The film was released in North America on July 15, 2005, and became an immediate hit, grossing $33,900,720 in its first weekend, opening at #2 in the box office, behind "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory". Exit polling indicated that 60% of audiences were over 25 years old, and almost evenly split between men and women. Considering its budget of $40 million and competition with heavily advertised blockbusters during the summer season, and the R-Rating limiting their potential audience, the studio did not expect the movie's level of success. New Line head of distribution, David Tuckerman said "We would have been happy with $25 million this weekend." The film eventually grossed over $209,255,921 domestically, narrowly outgrossing "Charlie". It grossed $75,920,820 in other territories, totaling $285,176,741 worldwide.

Accolades.

On April 24, 2006, "Wedding Crashers" topped the nominations for the year's MTV Movie Awards with five including Best Movie. It won Best Movie, On-Screen Team (Vaughn and Wilson), and Breakthrough Performance (Isla Fisher). The financial success of the film has been credited along with "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" for reviving the popularity of adult-aimed R-rated comedies.  Bradley Cooper was mentioned in the August 2006 issue of "GQ" as one of "The Top Twelve Movie Dicks".

Home media.

The DVD was released in the United States on January 3, 2006, and a Blu-ray was released on December 30, 2008. It is available in an unrated version ("Uncorked Edition") and in an R-rated version (the Blu-ray has both versions on one disc). It features eight new minutes integrated into the film and DVD-ROM bonuses. Also included are two audio commentaries (one by the stars, one by the director), four deleted scenes, two featurettes, a "Rules of Wedding Crashing" text gallery, trailers, Budweiser "Wedding Crashers" commercials, a track listing for the official soundtrack on 20th Century Fox Records, a music video by The Sights, and a jump-to-a-song sample feature. The film earned an estimated $145 million from home media sales.

In other media.

The music video for the 2014 Maroon 5 song "Sugar" showed the band crashing real-life weddings, inspired by "Wedding Crashers"; it was directed by David Dobkin.

Television version.

The creators of the film made a reality TV version, called "The Real Wedding Crashers" and shown on NBC in April and May 2007. NBC only showed four episodes.

Discussed sequel.

In a 2014 post on the website Quora, "Wedding Crashers" director David Dobkin said that he, Vaughn and Wilson once came up with an idea for a sequel in which John and Jeremy find themselves competing with a superior wedding crasher, played by Daniel Craig; but that this idea never went beyond the discussion phase.  The 2013 film "The Internship", which also starred Vaughn and Wilson, was described by critic A.A. Dowd as an unofficial sequel to "Wedding Crashers".  In a November 2016 interview, Fisher stated that Vaughn had told her that there were ongoing talks about a sequel.

Wedding Crashers is a 2005 American romantic comedy film directed by David Dobkin, written by Steve Faber and Bob Fisher, and starring Owen Wilson, Vince Vaughn, Christopher Walken, Rachel McAdams, Isla Fisher, Bradley Cooper, and Jane Seymour. The film follows two divorce mediators (Wilson and Vaughn) who crash weddings in an attempt to meet and seduce bridesmaids.