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Okanagan Feast of Fields
We are thrilled to participate in the 7th Annual Okanagan Feast of Fields on Sunday, August 16th at Meadow Vista Artisan Farm Winery in Kelowna. This Feast will mark the 17th Feast of Fields that Chef Butters has attended and presented food – all in support of FarmFolk CityFolk. FarmFolk CityFolk is a not for profit society working to cultivate a local, sustainable food system. Our projects provide access to and protection of farmland; support local growers and producers; and engage communities in the celebration of local food.
For more information about the event, or to purchase tickets visit www.feastoffields.com
Below is the media release from FarmFolk CityFolk about the annual Okanagan Feast of Fields.
Described as a wandering harvest festival, FarmFolk CityFolk's Okanagan Feast of Fields is the culinary event of the summer season. With almost 60 restaurants, wineries, distilleries and breweries scattered over the property of our host farm, Meadow Vista Artisan Farm Winery in southeast Kelowna, guests are free to wander, taste, sip and enjoy the experience. This 7th annual Okanagan Feast of Fields, on Sunday, August 16th from 1 – 4 pm showcases the very best of the region and highlights the connections between farmer and chef, field to table and farm folks and city folks.
Our 2015 host farm, Meadow Vista is a modern artisan farm winery driven by passionate eco-foodies. Founded in 2009 by wellness and wine expert Judie Barta, Meadow Vista Honey Wines is Kelowna's premier meadery and artisan farm, producing Canada's first organic sparkling honey wine. Meadow Vista Artisan Farm Winery is located at 3975 June Springs Road in Kelowna.
This edition of Okanagan Feast of Fields marks the 20th feast that Chef Butters of RauDZ Regional Table has participated in with attendance at both the lower mainland and island Feast of Fields before moving to the Okanagan Valley. This year, RauDZ Regional Table/micro bar bites Executive Chef Brock Bowes and Butters are working together on a creative dish involving Old Meadows Farm Carrot 'Hot Dog' with rabbit pico de gallo paired with wine from Wild Goose Vineyards. Fellow downtown Kelowna eatery Salted Brick is serving up Bison Meat Pie paired with wine from the newest West Kelowna winery, The Hatch. The Okanagan Chefs Association is serving up two taste treats – Okanagan fruit infused chocolate lollipops and a pressed vegetable, goat cheese terrine with apricot chutney that pair perfectly with wines from Church & State. Chef de Montreuil from Bonfire Restaurant has raided his own impressive restaurant culinary garden for his dish to pair with wine from Sumac Ridge. Our host farm, Meadow Vista will be pouring a wine created for the occasion, Field White, a blend of honey and pinot gris as a refreshing note with the honey cured Char from the fishmonger team at Codfathers Seafood Market and The Table at Codfathers. You'll be able to purchase a bottle of Field White at the Meadow Vista Wine Shop on the property during the event with a portion of the proceeds going directly to FarmFolk CityFolk.
FarmFolk CityFolk is pleased to announce their lineup of sponsors who help make this fundraiser successful and memorable. Choices Markets is our Gold Plate sponsor and Edible Vancouver, Nature's Fare, Canadian Linen and Uniform Service our Bronze sponsors. With the assistance of Kelowna InstaPrint, Interior Portable Rentals, Avalon Event Rentals, Sysco and BC Food & Wine Trails, Okanagan Feast of Fields is a sell out year after year.
Tickets are available at Choices Markets in Kelowna, the Penticton and Wine Country Tourism Centre or online at www.feastoffields.com If you are traveling from the South Okanagan, you can hop on our Feast bus that will take you directly to the farm and return home and new this year we also have a bus from downtown Kelowna to the event. Tickets for the bus are available at both ticket locations and online.
About FarmFolk CityFolk
For over two decades FarmFolk CityFolk has worked with communities across BC to celebrate local food and support sustainable agriculture. Being one of BC's major food growing regions in the Okanagan has been an important part of our work to cultivate a local more sustainable system.
The work of FarmFolk CityFolk in the Okanagan includes:
Ensuring Seed Security – FarmFolk City Folk's BC Seeds project began with Patrick Steiner of Stellar Seeds in Sorrento. Working with Patrick, we expanded our seed producers network building a database of BC's organic seed producers, and writing a best practices and organic seed growing workbook for seed growers. More recently, we filmed a series of online seed saving videos at Sunshine Farm in Kelowna.
Helping Communities and Farmers – Supporting the existing and developing network of Community Farms, our Farm Program Manager, Heather Pritchard, has been working with a variety of farms in and around the Okanagan. Providing mentorship as they convert their farm to a community farm, thus removing the land from speculation, and providing training and housing for the next generation of farmers on their land.
Engaging the Community – Beginning in 2015 FarmFolk CityFolk launched a film series to encourage discussion on local food and agriculture.
Building a Local Food Economy – Since 2012 FarmFolk CityFolk has hosted Meet Your Maker (MYM), the Okanagan's annual local food business networking event, helping small-scale, regional food businesses grow and generate sales.
Working with Young Farmers – In partnership with Young Agrarians FarmFolk CityFolk is supporting and encouraging newcomers to farming. Providing educational gatherings on a regular basis uniting new and young farmers to network, learn and discuss the challenges of modern day farming.
For more information visit our website at www.farmfolkcityfolk.ca and for more details on Okanagan Feast of Fields visit www.feastoffields.com


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SMALL BUSINESS GROWTH | 3 minute read
Education and building a team culture are critical facets of any successful business initiative – and building a data strategy is no exception.
Providing the right tools and training enables a new way of thinking, which in turn leads to a more successful data strategy execution. Here's why.
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It's a quote from Peter Drucker, one of the most influential thinkers in management, and what it boils down to is this: no matter what business strategy you try to implement with your team, its success and efficacy are going to be informed by organizational culture.
If the people driving the strategy aren't passionate about culture building or the business, the plan is doomed from the outset. This is because any new initiative – data strategy included – is made or broken by people in the organization. Without the right foundation, teams will lack the knowledge and/or motivation to see a strategy come to life and develop a well-oiled operational machine.
For data-informed or data-driven initiatives to be successful, proper change management practices and plans should be put in place before the strategy is rolled out to the team. This means:
With these points in mind, change management and cultural shifts should be just as much a part of your plan as the data-informed or data-driven strategy itself. Arming your staff with the right incentives, tools, support, and knowledge gives you the best chance of implementing a successful long-term strategy with data and sound decision-making at the heart of your business.
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Can You Burn Fat Fast
The problem a lot of people face is the need to do things fats. I know the need and want to burn fat fast. Believe me I fell into that trap too. This time of year especially it seem like everyone is gung ho to ramp up their weight loss for the new year. First you need to realize that it is going to be a marathon. All hope is not lost though. If you follow the right plan you can get the most from all your fat burning work.
Free Fast Fat Burning Workouts
Free fast fat burning workouts will really help your efforts to burn fat fast. All workouts can be done free or low cost if you know the right techniques. You would be surprised at the quality of the videos on YouTube that feature fat burning workouts. Check out this channel for some great ones.
Fast Fat Burning Cardio Workouts
One tip that I will give is fasting cardio. For me I find my best result first thing in the morning. I will do cardio first thing in the morning either truly fasting or I may eat a bit of protein before my workout. The workout can either be a bit of jogging or going to town on a stationary bike.
Fast Fat Burning Supplements
I no longer recommend fast fat burning supplements. You will find a post I wrote about the best fat burners I used to use. They did show me some results, but I gave up on them for a more natural approach. The choice is up to you. It is all about risk verse reward. Are fat burners really safe? I don't know.
Fast Fat Burning Secrets
Are these really fat burning secrets? I don't know. Fat loss is not really a secret. It takes hard work and the correct approach. A couple of tips on burning fat fast I can share. Eat more protein. This is really important and obvious. I don't recommend a true no-carb diet. Personally I think they suck. Carb cycling on the other hand can work wonders for you.
Drink more water, another easy one. Should it be eight glasses a day? The answer is maybe. The amount of water needed can vary by individual greatly. One thing to take into account is that carbohydrates contain water. If you are reducing your carbohydrate intake, you should probably up you fluid intake.
Fast Fat Burning Food
What are foods that burn fat fast? From the research I have read I do not believe in negative calorie foods. Those supposed foods that will burn more calories than they are worth. I feel that this is a myth. That being noted I feel that lean proteins can advance your fat loss goals in a major way. The old standbys like chicken breast, egg whites and the like are all great.
Burn belly fat fast
Are you looking to burn stomach fat fast? You may be taking the wrong approach. I'm not sure that it is possible to spot burn fat. While exercises can target certain parts of the body, it is important to reduce overall body fat. Increase lean mass do cardio and other things to keep you metabolism burning.
Burn Fat Build Muscle Fast
An important aspect to weight loss is to burn fat and build muscle. Lean mass helps to keep your body fat burning. Many people shy away from weight training. There is some sort of fear that they will start looking like a bodybuilder. The work involved in a physique like that is incredible, genetics also factor into that equation. Do not let this push you away from weight training.
Follow a good routine of weight training or better yet circuit training to maximize fat loss. You can get a set of nice resistance bands for pretty cheap. Use those resistance bands in your circuit training workout and you can see great results. I personally own the Bodylastics system and I think they are fantastic. Check out fat burning workouts. That page also details a kettle bell workout that you may find beneficial.
Burn Fat Fast the Bottom Line.
As I said previously fast is not the key. First of all fast is a pretty relative term. Obviously what is fast to me may not be fast enough to you. Steady is a much better word than fast. Get the most from your workouts and eating plan. If you set your goals to high you will be repeatedly disappointed. As these disappointments set in you motivation will wane and it will be difficult to keep going.
I am not an expert about anyone's fat loss other than my own. As you can see from the pictures, I have been very successful in losing a great deal of weight. This is my fat burning diet. It is what has worked for me. Will it work for you I have no idea.
So forget the burn fat fast. Learn to stay motivated and keep focused on steady progression and you will reach your goals in the amount of time it takes you.


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Two years ago we went to Italy for a family vacation and it was awesome. For almost a year Nancy's family has been planning a trip to France. Greg and Maggie got a chateau in Mercurey for a week and invited everyone to come along. An offer like that is hard to refuse so Nancy and I were in. We left on Friday July 1st for Paris, direct flight of course. Wheels up at 5:25pm and landed at Charles de Gaul airport at 6:55am the following morning. We attempted to sleep on the flight but on a flight like this it was near impossible. We managed a few hours of broken sleep before we landed, went through customs and got the rental car.
Before heading to the chateau with the family we stopped at the Palace of Versailles to walk around. It took a while getting in because of security but it was pretty amazing once we got through. The tourists from China were pretty bad, just like at the Vatican. Always on their phone taken stupid pictures, videos and selfies plus just pushing everyone out of their way. The palace was pretty amazing despite all the people in it. It reminds me of the Vatican in fact. Lots of people, narrow hallways, just a cattle call getting people through the rooms. We finished in the Hall of Mirrors and shortly after that we found an exit. It might have been nice to see the rest of Versailles but we had had enough of the crowds and wanted some fresh air. Thankfully the gardens are HUGE and provided plenty of room for everyone. Since we arrived when it opened the gardens where still pretty empty. I was a little disappointed that none of the fountains where on but by the time we left, someone had flipped the switch. Very impressive fountain displays considering how old they are. We even found a water display timed to music which was really cool.
We could have spent all day here, just relaxing in the gardens but we had to drive ahead of us to Mercurey and Château de Mercurey. This part of the journey was certainly an adventure. You just take the A6 out of Paris so it was pretty straight forward. We wanted some drinks at one point and got off the highway, mistake. Not only did we not find a gas station to get drinks but we couldn't get back on the A6 towards Lyon. Once we got that outta the way it was another 2 hours before we got off the highway. The in-car GPS took us off the highway pretty early but it ended up being for the better. The rest of the way to the chateau was all through the country side and small villages. The scenery was amazing. It might have taken a little longer but it was certainly worth the extra time.
While excited to arrive at the chateau we were dog ass tired when we did arrive. That first night we kept it pretty low key. The family had dinner already prepared and we didn't even have to help with cleanup. Everyone was very understanding of us being up for about 30 hours at that point. Being the troopers we are, and wanting to acclimate ourselves as quickly as possible to the local timezone, we stayed up for several more hours relaxing by the pool smoking cigars. I made it to about 10:30 before I had to call it and Nancy was not far behind me. That first nights rest was pretty amazing I must say. The temps are very low at night so we slept with all the windows open. The next morning it was great to wake up in the Chateau. In this part of France we are at a much higher latitude so it is cooler then home, chilly almost. We left the balcony doors open all the time, at night it gets to the 60's, perfect sleeping weather. We also had a balcony so I often smoked a little cigar with some coffee while over looking the vineyards as the sun rose casting the perfect light onto the village. Amazing.
The long travel day on Saturday meant it was a lazy chateau day on Sunday. We only got out of the house to visit the market in Chalon-sur-Saõne which was cool. The market is right in the town square near the river and main church. Nancy and I decided to cook dinner for everyone Sunday night and managed to get everything we needed from the market. We got pork chops, fresh vegetables and some amazing fruit. Even found some strawberries like I did while in Mirano, Italy. For me the coolest thing we found in the market was a local craft beer maker. He was offering three kinds, Ambeer IPA, Blonde, and an English Brown Ale. Talking to him he was certainly passionate about his craft. He kept wanting to tell us about the different beers and their flavor profile but Nancy and I didn't really care. It wasn't a question of which one we were getting, we were getting all three. That night Nancy and I cooked a great meal on the grill for the entire family. It was a great meal and it was wonderful to cook for everyone as a thank you for inviting us along.
Tuesday was all about wine. The owner of the chateau, Christophe, is a wine nut and offers a tasting to guests that stay at one of his four chateaus. Greg signed us up for the extended tasting and I must say it was pretty damn amazing. We have been to many tastings before, we live in Loudoun County after all. This was something completely different. In his chateau he built a wine cellar in the basement and it currently has almost 9000 bottles. We started in the cellar and he must have talked for an hour about the wine in his collection. Going over how to store it properly, how he built the cellar and how his collection started. He then went into some of the specifics of his collection. When you hear him talk its some pretty amazing bottles he has collected. I can't remember the local vineyard but it took him 20 years to get on the list and even then the allotment is under 12 bottles a year. This year he has been notified he is only getting 6.
After the tour of the cellar, we went to the tasting room. The tasting ended up being six bottles of some very old wines. We tasted a 1960 Champagne, 2001 white, one red that was from 2003, another red from 2011, some late '80's sweet wine from the west coast of France and finally a port from Portugal barreled in 1967 and then bottled in 2012. All of the wine were fantastic and we ended up buying four bottles, two reds and two whites. I am not a fan of whites but the one we tasted was really good. I certainly have a better appreciation for vintage wines after this tasting. Christophe explained the whole process of what happens when you age a wine and why it is so much better after several years. The big thing for reds was the tannin. The aging process lowers them significantly, making the wine taste better. You also reduce the levels of sulfites which are there to preserver the wine. This experience was the highly of Mercurey for me.
The following day started early with a balloon ride over the country side and local villages. 6am came early but worth it once we lifted off. I even helped in getting the balloon ready for launch by holding it open while it filled with air. The early morning start in the calm cool air allowed for a magical lift off. The wind was very kind to us and our pilot, Pierre, said we lucked out by going over so many villages. We eventually landed in a far flung village in a farmers hay field. After we packed the balloon up we headed to the local church, Église Saint-Maurice, on the top of the hill to celebrate our successful trip in typical French fashion with champagne. We even got a certificate of our trip which was really cool.
Later that night we had a four course meal prepared by a Michelin rated chef, Thomas who is a local caterer that Christophe recommends. We got to pick the meal and I was very impressed with everything he cooked. It was plated well and served by wait staff which was a nice touch. For this evening we drank a red from 1985 which was in the pre-pack Greg got on our arrival to the chateau. After the tasting early, I had a much better appreciate for this vintage red.
Wednesday was a real excursion day for us. We split from the family and headed to Dijon on our own adventure. Here Nancy wanted to see an owl on a church and rub it with her left hand which is good luck. We parked in the city center and started our hunt. We had a spot on the map but this ended up being the end of the trail which we didn't know at the time. We realized quickly that this was not the spot so we followed the markers on the street. This was a great walking tour of the city. We eventually got lost when a square the trail led us to was completely demolished and the trail went cold. After an exhaustive search was just decided to get lunch at La Comedie and continue the hunt later. Lunch was great sitting at the outdoor cafe watching the people. Both our meals where fantastic and because this is France, Nancy smoked after the meal. Thankfully Dijon has an official app with the Owl walking trail marked on it. Come to find out, the trail picked up about a half block directly behind us which was nice. We eventually did find the owl and rubbed it for good luck like so many travelers before us.
With that accomplished we continued to just walk around the city and explore. Eventually we decided on heading back to a small square we walked past earlier. It was just after two when we arrived so all the restaurants where closing up. We just wanted a drink and found a guy that was helpful. He kept telling us that all the restaurants are closed and there was a fast food place just down the road that would be opened. We had to explain we just wanted drinks and he said "oh wet bar, right there" and pointed to the next restaurant over. Here at O'zaviat we drank a couple local beers and did some people watching. It was great just hanging out in the square watching the city around us. We had the times so I was able to smoke a cigar. The bar tender even brought us some olives and garlic in lemon oil which paired perfectly with the beers. So far most of the beers have been blonde, farmhouse and Belgium styles, not my favorites but decent.
That night we headed back to Chalon-sur-Saône for dinner with the family. It was our job to find a place on the small island which is known as restaurant island because on one small street it is just jammed packed with restaurants. It was a mess trying to find parking but once we did we strolled down the street looking for a placed for the entire family. One lady literally laughed in our face when we wanted a table for 11. That place wasn't busy all night so their loss for not wanting to seat us. We found Chez Jules which was accommodating and ended up being fantastic. Nancy and I both got the four course fixed menu which was great. We finally got to taste the famous Bresse chicken for the entree, it tastes like chicken. To me it was nothing specially but still a good meal. Getting back to the house that night was an adventure as the garaged closed at 8pm and we didn't know it. Thankfully someone let us in and we were able to get out.
Thursday was another chill day at the chateau. Nancy and I tried to hit a winery but by the time we got ready it was noon and that means everything was closed. Getting use to the schedule of things was proving difficult. At this point we just decided to stay pool side for the day. This allowed me to catch up on my writing and smoke cigars all afternoon. I eventually did go for a walk around the village. I wanted to check out the small cemetery next to the chateau and find my way to a statue of the Virgin Mary I spotted at the top of the hill. What I eventually found was a small trail that actually lead me to summit. The top of the hill had some great views overlooking the village below. It was a good walk before the boys dinner later that night.
Dinner tonight was going to be extra special. On Sunday when Nancy and I cooked I proposed the idea that the boys cook a meal and I must say they delivered. They had to shop for and prepare the meal themselves and it was fantastic. Joey said they had no problem at the grocery, only weird thing was the butcher looked at them funny when he explained how much steak they wanted. To our surprise the meal was plated. The entire family was blown away by the food. It was probably the best home cooked meal we had all trip.
Friday no one went anywhere. For the Free's it was the last full day in France before they set off for home. They where going to spend Saturday at the airport hotel for their Sunday flight home while Nancy and I would continue onto Paris for several days. As such, everyone just wanted to relax and not do much. Greg wanted to go out to Chalon-sur-Saône for dinner but no one was buying it. That night I believe was the first night all 11 of us were sitting down by the pool. Most nights everyone would spread out and do their own thing but this night, everyone gathered around and talked as a family. We really didn't go out with a bang that night, didn't even stay up that late. Saturday we had to be out of the house by 10am and it was a 3 hour drive to Paris for everyone. Being responsible sucks sometimes.
Saturday morning came faster then we wanted. We had already packed but since I am not a morning person, it took some time to get going. It was a quick breakfast, packed the car and we were off to Paris for several days on our own mini vacation within the over all vacation. We started driving and talking about what to do first and a plan quickly formed. Nancy wanted to visit the Champagne region of France so I found Troyes. It is a Medieval city and famous for it's exposed half wood building….and the champagne. When we arrived it was before noon so the city was dead, even for a Saturday. The bistro we found online didn't actually sell wine by the glass so we moved on and found another placed to grab some lunch and a drink. We couldn't spend more time here but it was a nice detour on our way to Paris.
Once in Paris we checked into the hotel and I was off to drop the rental car off. Now I don't drive stick, in fact the most I have ever driven stick was while in Italy on our last European vacation. Let me tell you it was interesting navigating the city. I stalled numerous times in the middle of an intersection to the annoyance of those behind me. I would take a deep breath and just try again. Eventually I made it out of town and onto the highway towards Charles de Gaulle Airport. From the airport it was a quick train ride to Châtelet-les-Halles Station and a leisurely walk to the Paris Marriott Opera Ambassador Hotel.
Our time in Paris was a mix of planned events and just hanging out. Nancy wanted to see Jim Morrison's grave so Sunday we went to Père Lachaise Cemetery to check it out. They actually had it blocked off with a guard posted. Nancy was telling me that over the years they have had a lot of vandalism. In fact the headstone was removed because of graffiti. We also saw Oscar Wilde's grave and the "Aux Morts de la Commune, 21-28 Mai, 1871" To the Dead of the Commune which is a tragic store. The place is a little creepy, it is a cemetery after all, but it was fascinating walking through the place. This is a very old cemetery so you have some graves sites that are dilapidated and old next to brand newer ones. Lots of family tombs and in one area they have a huge section for cremations. There must be tens of thousands of people cremated and interned and barred at Père Lachaise Cemetery. There is a small church in the middle with two smoke stacks, looking at them they will cremate the remains right there before internment.
No trip to Paris would be complete without a stop by the Louvre. This is a giant museum with thousands of items on exhibit. Everything we read said to have a plan of attack and to do your research before going and I must agree with that. The collections are so vast it is impossible to walk the entire museum in one day and really enjoy it. We had two major objectives while at the museum, to see the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo. Both were pretty easy to find thanks to our map and for the Mona Lisa, there are signs on the walls pointing you to the exhibit hall right from the main entrance. Supposedly if you stair at her long enough, she will talk to you. Both Nancy and I tried this but eventually gave up. The crowd of rude people was just to much so we gave up. Another cool thing we found was the original foundation of the Louvre which started off original as a castle. They didn't find this section till recently and it's pretty cool. You get to walk through what was the moat of the castle. The walls must be 40 feet high and who knows how thick. We spent several hours in the museum and eventually got tired and decided to head out. I could certainly go back and spend another day or three here. We didn't even hit the Medieval or Egyptian sections and only scratched the surface of the Greek/Roman areas. Simply an amazing place and total worth your time for a visit.
The Eiffel Tower, probably the single best icon of architecture in the city was Tuesday. I didn't schedule this to early so we had plenty of time to walk up before we had to be at the tower. It took a while to get to the top but it was a worthy journey once we made it. Paris reminds of Washington DC in that there are very few tall buildings. It seems like most cap out around 8 or ten stories which isn't high at all. I believe up until early this century the Eiffel Tower was the worlds tallest building in fact. Needless to say, it has some spectacular panoramic views of the city skyline. Just like in Seattle at the Space Needle, I got a little woozy when I would walk towards the edge. It's hard to explain, I don't feel sick and I know I won't fall off but my head just starts going funky. Let me tell you it was weird taking pictures from the edge. Up at the top they have a small champagne bar so of course we got a couple glasses and made a toast. Totally over priced but is pretty high up on the coolness scale.
Later that afternoon we went to the catacombs just down the street. We missed going to the ones in Rome so this was my first opportunity to see such a thing. I was shocked at the number of bodies buried in the catacombs. My French is not very good but it appeared there are different sections for different churches and different years. Many of the sections are artfully stacked making the design of a cross, a building and one was even of a heart. It was very somber walking through the narrow passageways. We noticed that many of the sections are blocked off and I guess you have to be on a special tour to see those. Without the lite path and some closed gates, it would be very easy to get lost down there.
The rest of the time in the city we would spend walking around visiting all the cool cafes and bistros that dot every street corner. There is certainly no lack of places to eat and drink. I feel we drank, smoke and ate our way across the city. It was so much fun just sitting at the small tables watching the Parisians do their thing. While you can't smoke in doors, it is expected that people outside will be smoking. Ashtrays are on most tables and if not, the wait staff would immediately bring one over when they see the pack of cigarettes. I was also able to smoke my cigars without anyone giving me grief. In the States, you would get a lot of dirty looks from people but not here in Paris. As for the food it was all fabulous. Some of the meals where different but none of them where bad. It's a foreign country after all. If I wanted to eat American food I would have stayed home.
The coolest place we found we didn't actually eat anything at, The Cricketer. Earlier while walking around I found a stationary store that happened to be closed, surprised, so we headed back towards it. We also wanted to stop by The Cricketer, a place that is closed on Sunday's by the way, which is an English pub. I got my pen and some kick ass stationary while Nancy went to the pub. When I walked in we were the only ones in the place and I thought they where going to close, it was just after 2pm after all. The cook, Ross, said they are open but that it's just quite. Ross and Teabou the bar manager where awesome. We hung out at this place for hours just chatting with them, drinking beer. The selection they had was the best beer in all of France, the Tiny Rebel Hadouken was best over the whole trip. It was a true IPA and the first bitter beer I found in the whole country. We also found Brooklyn East IPA which was another rare find. In general conversation we found that George Clinton and P-Funk was playing Monday night at a local venue. It took a little arm twisting but I managed to get Nancy on board for seeing the show, it's George Mother Fucking Clinton! The show was not sold out but pretty packed for being Paris. Total random find of the whole trip seeing George Clinton at Le Trianon.
Almost as quickly as it began it was time to pack up and head home. Our last night was pretty low key, I think the entire trip was finally catching up to us. Paris was a great city and offers lots of things to do. Over our four days I feel we only scratched the surface of what is possible. We will definitely come back for a second visit. I could just spend days walking the city and hitting all the cafes; eating, smoking and drinking my way through different neighborhoods. Then there is another day at the Louvre, the aquarium, going up and down the Seine River, hitting one of the other dozen museums, the cathedral of Notra Dome….I could go on and on. France was great, a beautiful country with friendly people. The city is very walkable and the metro system is top notch, the perfect way to get around. It was clean, prompt and easy to navigate. The food is spectacular, history, culture and let's not forget about the wine. I see why France is the number tourist destination in the world. Till next time Paris…..


text: In the next twist on using science to find true love, AMC is bringing to television a new limited anthology series–AMC's first. Soulmates explores a new invention that reveals your true love and viewers get to watch how it all unfolds for six couples, each in a separate episode. But it's not the fun and games we saw in TiMER, the Emma Caulfield rom-com with a similar plot. The first trailer for Soulmates is more dread than utopia. Nope, this series looks like the stuff of sci-fi horror. The Twilight Zone, Ray Bradbury Theater, The Outer Limits, and Black Mirror all had their share of dabbles in romance turned wrong. The victims, err… participants in this latest experiment in love are played a few of our favorite young genre actors.


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May 9, 2007 (San Diego) -- An experimental treatment for menopause-related hot flashes and night sweats that doesn't use hormones generally works well, researchers report.
The new medication, called Pristiq, is under review by the FDA, according to the manufacturer, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals.
"Pristiq is going to fill a needed void," says David Archer, MD, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk.
He's referring to the void left when legions of women gave up hormone replacement therapy after a federally funded trial in 2002 showed that long-term hormone therapy boosts risks of heart attack, breast cancer, and other problems. Archer led clinical trials of Pristiq and has worked as a consultant for Wyeth.
But another expert not involved in the research cautions that the studies are preliminary and the exact role the new medication will have in relief of menopausal symptoms is yet to be determined.
Researchers presented the studies at the 55th Annual Clinical Meeting of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in San Diego.
About Pristiq
Pristiq is a modified version of Wyeth's antidepressant Effexor, Archer says. Effexor and Pristiq belong to a class of drugs known as serotonin/norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, or SNRIs.
When a woman is going through menopause, fluctuations in estrogen may diminish both brain chemicals serotonin and norepinephrine, according to Wyeth. Pristiq is thought to work by making more of both substances available, improving mood and menopausal symptoms in the process.
Mixed Results
In five studies presented Tuesday and Wednesday at the meeting, Pristiq was evaluated for its value in relieving hot flashes and night sweats, reducing nighttime awakenings from night sweats, and improving mood. Because sexual problems have been associated with the use of some antidepressants, another study looked at whether Pristiq affected women's sex lives.
The results were mixed:
Hot flashes. In a study of 541 women with 50 or more moderate to severe hot flashes weekly, the 100-milligram dose of Pristiq reduced hot flashes by nearly 60% at week 12, and the 150-milligram dose reduced them by 66%. In comparison, placebo reduced them by 47%, says Archer, an author of that study.
In a 12-month study of the drug, women who had 50 or more moderate to severe hot flashes weekly were assigned to placebo or Pristiq (50, 100, 150, or 200 milligrams), says Margery Gass, MD, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Cincinnati and an author of the study. She found a 60% to 64% reduction in the hot flashes as well as fewer nighttime awakenings due to night sweats. "Overall, the 100-milligram dose worked best," she tells WebMD.
But in another study of 465 women, conducted by James Pickar, MD, of Wyeth, Pristiq did not work much better than placebo and was inferior to tibolone, a hot-flash-relieving drug not available in the U.S. At week 12, placebo reduced hot flashes by 57.5%, Pristiq by 57.7%, and tibolone by 81%.
Night sweats, awakenings, mood. In another study of 843 women, led by Archer, Pristiq increased the minutes slept without waking up from 29 on placebo to 42 on 100 milligrams of Pristiq and 40 minutes on 150 milligrams of Pristiq. Women on Pristiq reported better moods than those on placebo and had fewer awakenings during the night.
Sexual problems. Gass also asked the 689 women in her study to complete a questionnaire about any sexual problems. Of the 467 women who did, there were no differences in sexual problems among groups, whether on placebo or the various Pristiq doses. But among the entire group of 689, a higher number of those on Pristiq (4.2%) reported sexual problems such as decrease in desire compared with those on placebo (1.3%). This difference, however, was not significant, she says.
"I think these are preliminary studies," says William Parker, MD, staff gynecologist at Santa Monica-UCLA and Orthopaedic Hospital in Santa Monica, Calif. "I'd like to see a head-to-head comparison study with SSRIs." Many doctors prescribe the SSRI antidepressants to help relieve hot flashes and other symptoms of menopause.
Parker points out, too, that nausea is one of the side effects reported with Pristiq use. Researchers say the nausea subsides. According to Wyeth spokeswoman Danielle Halstrom, a new technique of increasing the dose over three days is expected to remedy the nausea problem.
Parker, like many other gynecologists, still prescribes hormone replacement therapy for some women for short periods of time, if they determine the benefits outweigh the risks, while reassessing their needs often.
"Hormone therapy is probably still the best for hot flashes," Archer concedes. But Pristiq, when approved, will simply give women another option, he says.


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Every boy has given himself a mangina at least once. In the locker room, at summer camp, in front of the full-length mirror in your parents' bedroom when you thought they'd already left for the store—whatever the setting, the urge to hide your junk between your legs, leaving only a soft tuft of pubes in view, is universal and ineluctable. It's a healthy practice that yields great pictures, but for some men, the thrill of not having a dick never ends. And for transsexuals and drag queens, whose job it is to not have a dick, tucking is less a boyhood larf than an essential trick of the trade.
Since luscious, heterosexuality-challenging trannies are Brazil's third-largest export (after Havaianas and Seu Jorge), we felt the burden was on us to explore the technical minutiae of this beloved national institution. So with help from our favorite queen, Lohren Beauty, we present a step-by-step guide on how to hide your hose.
PENIS PREPARATION: A hairless mangine is many things—aesthetically pleasing, hygienic, and easy to maneuver. So wax or shave as much as possible, from your belly button to the start of your spine, being sure to hit the dick, balls, asshole, and gooch. A word of warning, though: Avoid using adhesive tape if you're freshly shaven because it's easy to end up with a crotch rash that could be mistaken for the clap.
The next step is to hide your balls. This is essential for all methods of dick tucking, so it's important to get your technique nailed down. Stretch your wang forward as far as you can and gingerly push your testicles up one at a time, back into that cavity where they were hiding before puberty. This usually isn't painful, so if you feel like you're about to barf while fainting, you're doing something wrong. A tip: This is easiest to do while lying on your back, delicately finessing your testes like a pair of Chinese meditation balls until they sloonk right up in. Getting into a bathtub full of cold water immediately beforehand can also help. Now you're ready for the most important step: hiding your tube steak. Depending on your size and preference, there are three ways to do this, which have been passed down from tranny fathers to ladyboy sons for generations. We've summarized them below.
Necessary material: a thong two sizes too small
Recommended dick size: longer than six inches
This is the half-Windsor knot of penis tucking, i.e., the one novices should master before moving on to other methods. First, stretch your schlong forward and then down, join it with your balls, and pull both of them back between your legs, toward your butt. Tug it as hard as you can; the tighter it gets, the more even and beautiful your fake pussy will appear. Next, put on some panties. They're the secret to keeping your dick in the right position (and also to being a classy woman). We recommend Lycra underwear, which isn't super-pretty but combines comfort and flexibility. If you must use lace panties, we recommend wearing a pair of skin-colored Lycra tights underneath. One drawback to consider: If you get an erection, your "pussy" will expand, and it may look like you're wearing a soaked maxi pad. Gross.
Necessary material: adhesive tape
Recommended dick size: nonspecific, you just need to have one
First off—do NOT use Scotch tape. It'll slide off your junk the minute you start sweating. Stay away from duct tape, too—unless you want to rip your dick off. Parcel tape seems to work well, the wider the better. Once you've got the tape ready, pull your dong out and wrap it from base to tip. Without cutting the tape, pull it down and back so that it runs between your nuts and through your ass crack. Tape your package around the right side of your hips. Make one more pass around your left hip, then run it over your unit again, and finally cut the tape so it sticks right at the tip of your coccyx. If you're sweating, pat it dry. Then put on some panties and do a little dance.
Variation 1: Wrap your shaft with tape but leave the tip uncovered. Your fake pussy will be a little bit bigger, but you can now pee sitting down—a major plus for drunken queens!
Variation 2: Skip the step where you wrap the tape around your hips (because there will be nothing there to cover it) and instead double it up across your tailbone. This is a trick used by transvestites who dance the samba and drag queens who prefer to perform in a cache-sexe. It'll keep them guessing all night.
Necessary material: adhesive tape and superglue
Recommended dick size: Japanese and uncut
Even among the most enlightened circles of queens and pre-oppers, this technique is still spoken of in hushed whispers. No one we know has ever met someone who's done it, only a guy who knows some people who met a man who heard about it once.
This method only works with smaller salamis. It's actually one of the rare cases where having a big cock is a bummer, because, if you do, the final result will be an asshole that shits and pees. First—before you've undropped your balls—tie your foreskin closed with some sort of tape or string. Try to cover as much of the tip as possible, so that it resembles a dehydrated jasmine flower. (Note: Don't tie it so tight that liquid won't be able to pass through.) When it's done, hide your nuts as usual, pull your dick down and back as described in the previous methods, and then discreetly tape it starting from the tip, as tight as possible, all the way to your butt crack.
Here's where the famed Japanese ingenuity comes into play: With your dick tight between your legs and just a bit of foreskin hanging out, grab loose bits of scrotum on either side of the penis using your fingers as pincers. The objective here is to wrap the whole shaft with that skin, which, if you do it right, will look like the outer labia of a vagina. Glue the whole mess together with superglue (we're serious) and, to make extra-double-sure it's not going to open up and ruin your fun, put tape on top of the whole enchilada. Once you've got the front ready, use a larger piece of tape to cover your entire taint. In Japan they have specific adhesive tape made for this very purpose (obviously), but if it's unavailable in your town you can stick with clear packing tape. Finally, pinch a hole on the part of the tape that goes over the foreskin, leaving the leftovers outside the package so you can pee freely. Congratulations, man. You now have the prettiest pussy of all!
Photos By Bobby Doherty


text:
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text:
Gnosticism Revisited
Yesterday I called attention to Bruce Chilton's remarks about gnosticism, particularly the way neo-gnostics cherry-pick ancient sources, with which I am largely in agreement. A gnostic pastor named Father Jordan feels very differently. Meanwhile, Jim Davila writes as follows:
"Many, perhaps most, religions can be accused of misconstruing and selectively reading their own scriptures to suit later agendas. Some go as far as falsifying history (for example, Christian fundamentalist creationists and Muslims who deny that a Jewish Temple stood on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem). If people today want to be Gnostics (and it's not for me to tell them whether they should be or shouldn't), I would rather they be Gnostics who support women's rights and the prudent use of the earth's resources and who aren't anti-Semitic. If any of that is untrue to ancient Gnostic scriptures or doctrines, so be it. (But if they want to claim that these are the actual values of ancient Gnostics, I will, as usual, call them on any historical inaccuracies.)"I agree with what Jim says here, but I do think neo-gnostics tend to cherry-pick with more abandon than most, without realizing they're doing so. This is how I responded to Father Jordan in comments on his blog:
Father JordanAs a secular-minded Unitarian, I have nothing against gnosticism per se. People should believe as they want, though with Jim Davila, I prefer that those beliefs not conflict with basic human decency (i.e. respect for Jews, women, gays, the earth and its natural resources, etc.). But history matters too -- especially to those of us who love it -- and it irks when adherents like the neo-gnostics believe their sources to be purer than those against which they are often reacting.
Contemporary Christianity too must cherry-pick in order to be a coherent functioning religion... Are not "neo-Christians" unlike their ancient counterparts? Doesn't ancient Christianity have a history of anti-Semitism, misogyny, elitism, and dualism?
Yes, but this isn't exactly news. Neo-gnosticism often comes as an antidote to a traditional Christianity weighed down precisely by the above baggage. It's a mystery to many that the sources of that antidote have just as much (if not more) baggage. There's more ignorance and misperceptions about gnosticism than about traditional Christianity, and reports like this don't exactly reinforce one's faith in any discerning ability of the laity.
Father Jordan
What really bothers Chilton (a scholar for whom I have a great deal of respect) is that "Neo-Gnostics" (us, presumably) accept The Secret Mark as a genuine text. The thrust of his article here isn't really about how dishonest "Neo-Gnostics" are, but how Secret Mark is an obvious forgery. So we're really guilty by association.
I hate to break the nightly news, but scholars who like the gnostic gospels tend to be the same ones who defend the authenticity of Secret Mark.
Father Jordan
Here's the thing: I don't know of a single Gnostic who identifies with Secret Mark, or considers it to be a legitimate or authentic Gnostic text. Not one. At best it's a peripheral curiosity. Gnostics are not standing up in churches or the PTG saying "this proves Jesus was gay!". Gnosticdom (!) as a general rule is just not interested in Secret Mark, and every Gnostic I know familiar with the text rejects it as a total forgery.
Neo-gnostics I know either (a) prefer to give Secret Mark the benefit of the doubt without knowing quite what to make of it, (b) accept and identify with it as gnostic, or (c) have never heard of it before. I haven't run into a single neo-gnostic who rejects it as a forgery/hoax. We mix with different breeds, obviously.
Father Jordan
What scholars like Chilton so often fail to grasp is that the role of history is simply not as important to us as it is to Christians... Most Christians keep trying to wring "what really happened" out of their Gospels, whereas we've never been about that. We're more interested in what is happening, our own alchemical reaction to these catalytic texts.
And there's certainly nothing wrong with that, so long as one is upfront about it. But as I'm sure you know, many people who read (say) Elaine Pagels walk away convinced that gnosticism is really what Jesus was about, and claim accordingly.


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I've been working on this project for Lamentations of the Flame Princess for some time, and it's finally jumped to the front of my working goals. Briefly, it shifts the location of the game to the Ottoman Empire, during the same canonical year, 1630.
Our scenario concerns the ruins of the House of Wisdom, a jewel of culture for centuries before it was destroyed by Mongol occupiers in the 13th century CE (400 years before our period). It also happens to be in Safavid-occupied Baghdad, which is an unstable and dangerous location just right for our purposes.
You see, historical Ottoman fantasy (literature, occult) is D&D. Ancient treasures that will be appreciated by people you return them to, a wide variety of politically-tolerated and not-tolerated religions, coinage that actually operates as money, magic that involves demon-binding and paper bursting into flame, not to mention charging-up through receiving the divine. And if you want to know where the dragon was that St. George killed a thousand years ago, why, that was historical Syria, and he was a Turk.
Seeing the D&D tropes make actual historical, literary, and in-fiction justified sense is an incredible treat. All you have to take out are the Disney Middle Ages and Tolkien, and Jim got rid of both of those already. For this project, for the highly pragmatic, rationalist culture, his emphasis on non-naturalistic, reality-disruptive magic suits perfectly.
Here are the player handouts I used: one in general, one for the adventure. They're both pretty sketchy and rough, not developed text or pre-publication draft. For the ruins themselves, I used a mentally-edited version of Raven Downs Keep. I didn't have the image I used here for the lead at the time of play, but I wish I had, because it is perfect for the scenario and actually matches the map I used! (it is a Bosnian madrassah).
In this session, we did not get to see any player-character magic flying, which is too bad because I am really looking forward to my tentative rules tweaks hitting their limits, i.e., not working and providing me with the next design step. I've already seen the first stages in other sessions with other people, and my current rules now have a chance to work if they're any good, so I'm hoping to see if-and-how they aren't. As you'll see, the situation at the end of the session definitely begs for a couple spells and prayers, so here's my fingers crossed for it.
As with many, or even most Adept Play recordings, we're looking at an international range, from the locations Toronto, Atlanta, Brussels, (close to) Milan, Frankfurt, Istanbul, and me here in Norrköping. Combined with a couple of breaks due to dropped connections, that led to a number of comparisons of history and culture which I reluctantly edited out. I also snipped one bit about God & stuff and edited it for posting in the comments if anyone's interested.
I also have a number of "about play and players" notes that I'm reserving, and some of them are derived from material I edited out for time's sake. I plan to follow up with the group alone about them after we're done with the adventures, and since all the players are patrons, that might be a special post-play Lab.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 05:37
Against the Clash of Civilizations paradigm
I'm Greg who plays the Cleric! This is a small wrap-up of some topics we talked about in our informal discussions after this session. Maybe this is not a really helpful about game design, but more about what this game evokes. This will be two comments, one about an important issue in my eyes, the other about the session itself.
I started playing RPGs in the end of the 80s/beginning of the 90s, and never been a DND player. We were young 10 years old fans of "you are the hero" books, played one time the adventure in the black box (I played "the cleric", which looked like a monk), then played AD&D.. for one, maybe two sessions, before kicking our 8-hours weekly sessions during years after buying call of Cthulhu. I only played two times at DND, once in a RPG club in a very bad one shot of ADD one year later, (which leds us to flee every RPG community after this), and another one of 3rd edition a few years later. I did not touch DND until this year, where I played a oneshot on a one-on-one GM/player session. Nothing in my gaming history leads me to nostalgia, to find a specific experience of play, to "play dnd right", to "do osr", or anything My only assumption about DND is that it is boring, because "fights are too long".
I have so much more to say but let's cut the biographical babbling. Lamentations stands out and got my interest because of the following features: the "people wandering for lost treasures has something sociopathic in them" assumption, the xp-as-gold system, the summon spell, the alternate magic system seen in Vaginas are Magic and Eldritch Cock, the definition of the attributes, the way alignment is described, the absence of tolkienesque species, the root in the historical "real world" at interesting moment for this kind, and the uniqueness of each magical object or weird "monster", and the interesting design of the "Tales of the scarecrow" adventure (put the characters in this shit, and just see what happens without planning events). I've never gmed a dnd game before that, and I'm not into medieval fantasy stuffs, but here I wanted to give it a try. So, when Ron said he was designing an Ottoman Empire Lamentation supplement, I was hooked!
I think one of the most important issue in the actual world is the predominance of the Clash of Civilization paradigm. It's easy to contribute to what Edward Saïd's defined as Orientalism (a representation of the Orient whose function is to assess the cultural superiority of the "Occident", supporting its political imperialism) when playing RPG, and it is not easy to deconstruct it. I think it is a task of cultural and political importance to address non occidental cultures, and more importantly Arabic cultures without reproducing dominant misconceptions about it. Most of the dominant occidental propaganda that sustains war, either directly (Iraq, Mali), either by the instrumentation of local conflicts (Libya, Syria), is focused on a representation of Islam or the "Arabs" as an alien civilization with whom cohabitation on the planet will never be possible. We didn't address those issues before playing, but I'm very attentive of these issues, as 80% of my life is dedicated to counter this Clash of Civilization paradigm, which is an inaccurate lie. When I talk about "the paradigm", I just don't mean Samuel Huntington's book, but any potential unconscious discourse or policy that share the same assumptions. For instance, one of the main philosopher of the medieval 13th century comes from my region, Siger of Brabant, and was as widely known as Thomas Aquinas – but not even you never heard about him anywhere except very narrow historical scientific seminar of this story, but he is not even translated in any of the three national languages of the country of its own university, Leuven in Belgium (which was one of the biggest at that time). You can't even hope to find funds to do a PhD who will translate its works. In fact, I've heard about him by my Arabic philosopher friends, who knew him because he wrote in Arabic. Against the clash of civilization paradigm, Siger of Brabant was a defender of Averroesian thesis, and an strong hypothesis about his murder is that he was killed for that (after being expelled from the country). I could talk a lot about it, but I'll summarize my view. Today, we can find three paradigms in international diplomacy: the irreducible enemies paradigm (Robert Spencer, John Hagee, Oriana Fallaci) who insult Islam and treat it as Nazism, the clash of civilization paradigm (Samuel Huntington, Bernard Lewis, Niall Ferguson) who influences deeply the occidental international policies, and the "dialogue of civilizations" paradigm (Karen Armstrong, John Louis Esposito, Edward Saïd, Kishore Mahbubani, Lord Lothian). The influence of the two first is dominant and did not help to improve the pacification of the world.
Of course, a RPG supplement should not be a PhD about geopolitics. But as a cultural product, I do not want to play occidental clichés of existing cultures. For instance, I was tempted to play Coriolis, but could not give it a try after reading it, even if I am pretty sure that the orientalist content of the game is totally unconscious by the author. Ron has done an excellent job with Shahida and, even if I don't agree with every thesis or assumption of the game, I was reassured that he could treat a culture, a specific context difficult in the paradigm of the dialogue.
We did not talk about that before the game, but I felt safe about this issue when I have read the players handouts.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 07:49
I do think this is an
I do think this is an important part of game design. Making assumptions about culture and being lazy in research leads not only to boring repitition but also continues long held and incorrect assumptions. Our games can get better if we seek out more authentic sources.
A quick aside for Coriolis, I am looking at the various bits of Orientalism and doing removing what I see in terms of adventure design. We should discuss (off-list) as I am happy to hear your opinion on that.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 05:52
Letality and interpretating failures
I am baffled to see how Ottoman Empire works so well with Lamentations, so well that I could believe the game was made specifically for this context.
More about the game itself. Lamentations has a reputation of a high mortality rate of player characters. In fact, all the "OSR movement" is taking this high mortality rate as a prominent feature of the game experience they design. I gmed 6 sessions of Lamentations and did not see any death. Once it is said, the players are cautious and clever, and it generally did not happen. On the 5 first minutes of the first game in Tales of the scarecrow, one of my player was not cautious and started to do something that could have led to a ST vs Poison, and maybe a death, but another one understood it, and wisely told him. I think this high mortality rate is a myth who functions as an idealized separation between "seasoned OSR players" who are clever and cautious with incautious "non OSR players" who expects "plot shield"
In my case, this discourse about mortality had an impact in how I played this game. I choose a cleric for three reasons: first, the attributes tended to show a Cleric, second, I'm eager to try the divination spell!, third, I hate clerics and do not allow them in my own Lamentation games, but I wanted how Ron use the Lawful alignment as a GM Device and I wanted a revenge against my dislike of the Cleric I played in my first session of DND using the black box!
How this "lethality culture" impacted my playing? First, I took Cure as a prepared Cleric spell, where I was eager to take and try divination spell right at the beginning! Actually, this Cure spell will be useful, as two fighters are already badly injured, and we didn't even pass the introduction. But also, I was overtly cautious, entering the "House of Wisdom", but also entering the "adventure" by expecting treacherous traps or I don't know what, during the first seconds of the game. I do not know if it's "good" or "bad", I think it paced us into going further, but also created a climate of anxious danger.
Why did I shoot those arrows? I felt focused on a goal. I did not have the opportunity to say it, but once Ron described the premises, I thought "I'm a Cleric, I'm a Sufi, and we are in the House of Wisdom… So I'll check for Wisdom, whatever it takes". And for some reasons, "Wisdom" could not appear as human, so I took humans as adversity, in doubt. I shot and I missed, and my reflex (it was not very explicit in my mind), is to take this miss for a sign as a sign of my god. That's why I push the group to accelerate to the screams after this. Interestingly, the fact that the fighters slain the people felt weird to me, I was like "hmm those guys are crazy", and I felt my relationship to them as clearly instrumental, "let's seek this wisdom or what".
I was afraid when the big guy calling me to wear the prophecy of following the "path of Mary". That's why I shot again. But the second miss was too obvious, I could not take it as a real sign right now, that's why I totally shift after this. Ok we are in the house of wisdom, I'm looking for wisdom, I'm protecting myself, and this guy is claiming this thing but I know my God is everwhere. So for the moment, my reactions are results of how I interpret the dices.
I did not make a mental rule about "I interpret every rolls as signs of God" that I will not deviate, it just came up for these ones, and I'm really pleased about the dynamics of the group.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 08:39
Nostalgia is interesting. I
Nostalgia is interesting. I Will talk more about my own experiences in a different comment but wanted to respond to the idea of the Lethalisty Culture. And from my experience it comes in two flavors.
But first I always like to talk about "the old days" when they come up. There is a notion among the rpg sphere that back in the day, players were tougher. We never complained about rolls or rules. We loved falling fifty feet to our deaths from traps that were impossible to see coming. That every game of D&D or Tunnels & Trolls or other, ended in a hail of steel much like the ending in The Wild Bunch. And that by compariosn, today's players were "whimps".
And this is simply not true. I know because I was there (from '81 on) and I can tell you that they whined, and complained, and wanted house rules for everything because no one likes to die. Yes it can be fun if everyone at the table buys into the paradigm of lethality, but over the years that paradigm of lethality, which I would say is more a paradigm of testing the player more than the character, has become a Cult of Lethality. And that cult maintains that high art = high lethality. Which is nonsense of course and it always was. I like Tomb of Horrors, but not because of its lethality, but because of the paranoia that sets in when playing it.
The second, and in my mind more positive aspect of Lethality Culture is all about that paranoia and expectation. And to be fair it can work both ways; it can turn people off who do not want to live that paradigm. But for those who enjoy the idea of being careful during play, of thinking hard about the challenges ahead, of not just making assumptions and expecting the GM to save your hide. And letting the dice fall where they may. Not pulling punches as a player or GM.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 08:45
A few words more about
A few words more about alignement.
I was very surprised that my name was not mumbled by the silhouettes at the entrance. I was baffled when I've seen the main NPC near the pit saying only my name.
I think it was a very good adaptation of the alignement system to the specific composition of our group! The only cleric being specifically targeted by the "prophecy". Here, alignment did not feel as the boring constraints of behavior it generally is take as, but it helped to create a sense of connectedness to the adventure. "What, me, My flesh? Gizzz". Also, the fact that the cleric is lawful does a jonction between "I have a set of belief" and "the universe has a plan for me", which are two different features (something I realize right now), which endorsed my own sens of connectivness to the story.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 08:45
I did not make a mental rule
I did not make a mental rule about "I interpret every rolls as signs of God" that I will not deviate, it just came up for these ones, and I'm really pleased about the dynamics of the group.
This was one of the best parts of the game; watching everyone react to the situation with our own interpretations of what was going on. I felt like there was a lot of genuine reaction, which makes games more pleasant for the player.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 08:55
I'm answering to you Sean. I
I'm answering to you Sean. I remember this particular session of Rogue Trader. I joined a campaign that was going on for 2 years. We were four players (the precedent gaming group was dissolved), and the Rogue Trader was my friend's character who started as a minion in a Dark Heresy campaign. He was now almost invincible. Immortal stuff etc.
I really liked the GM, who was a master of adapting the rules to the story. Let me explain how and why it's relevant.
I was playing an archmilitant leading the spaceship's army. After a few sessions, we are getting boarded by a rival ship. Rolls are made and the GM is fair to the results of the dice. We get so screwed. I got very crappy rolled in all my damage rolls in the space battle, leading to successes with not so much consequences.
The cockpit is being invaded by the elite troops, we are there, my Rogue trader friend is annoyed but confident, then they shoot with plasma, target its face.. and my friend's face melted as much as his character's face. "This is the only way I can die". The best is never, never I felt the GM made it up.. it was an internal logic building through the rolls. I roll to shoot them and miss, and my friends shout at me, not roleplaying at all, "WTF ARE YOU DOING". I look at him, look at the dice, tell him "hey dude fuck off", then we laughed so much (but we are really good friends, and we understood right on the moment that he understood his own real tension when I answered). We really felt the tension of the possibility to die, just right now, because our characters were took in this spiraling process of bad decision and bad lucks. And I felt really connected to the game because of this tension, I really liked it.
Sun, 07/12/2020 - 11:10
The sweet spot between these
The sweet spot between these for Advanced D&D (published 1977-1999) is placed quite firmly at 4th level, possibly a couple of levels beyond that. The game is not playable at all before that point, and it is a very different game afterward.
This is so interesting! Here what I remember in the local rpg culture of my region (Charleroi in Belgium) when I was a RPG teenager, from people playing around me :
- Nobody played at low level. Generaly, you would do a character level 4 or 5. Gaining a level was very rare, and was not an expectations. You could gain one or two levels, maybe 3, but not much more.
- The only time I heard a campaign based on level 1 characters, it was meant to be a "long campaign", and the first levels were totally not about dungeons, or monsters, or combats, but about "living your life" or doing easy quests to gain levels.
- Sometimes, campaign started directly at level 10, maybe 15. It was totally different campaigns, as you said, and even presented like another game. "We're going to play DND, but not as we know it, we'll play higher levels".
I don't think anybody analyzed it theoritecally at that time (I don't remember anybody doing this), but it was presented as "common sense".
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 10:09
Chaos, Magic, and Poetry.
I play the magic user Ismael (Ismael-Carlos Luigov). This was my first time really playing Lamentations of the Flame Princess, although I started with the D&D Basic (Moldvay) as my first RPG. So I am familiar with the lineage of LotFP. There are rule differences between the two and I like what LotFP has to offer as a system. I rolled the dice and let the dice decide what sort of character was going to play. In this case the dice said magic-user pretty clearly. I have always enjoyed the "play what is in front fof you" style.
In Ron's documents it is mentioned that magic-users are chaotic in terms of alignment. In this, chaos is not evil, but it embraces the otherworldy and as it says in the material,
you draw otherworldly and anti-matter forces toward you
I knew I wanted to lean into this. Ismael has bounced around in his life, has experiences that would suggest his character is not the best, and finally found something close to passion when he learned about his ability with real magic. He keeps his spells in a copy of Nasimi's Persian Diwan and is writing his own book of laments (see what I did there) about his travels and journey.
Doing Magic
One of the interesting things about the system is that it limits the number of spells a MU can use in the beginning. By a significant amount. And by that I mean, it lets you prepare 1 spell at 1st level. The spell I picked was Bookspeak. It allows Ismael to ask a book 1 question about the contents of the book (at 1st level; other levels he can sk more).
And as you can see I did not choose to cast a spell in the combat against the lepers. Even though I think that was the expectation. In a game of D&D Basic, I never would have memorized a spell like that. But in LotFP, my character can use more weapons. I have more choices in combat than casting spells. OF course I am not nearly ass effective as a fighter would be, but I can hit stuff with my stick. In the video you will notice Ismael taking up a defensive position and reciting some poetry to try and drown out the words of the oncoming strangers. Did it do anything? No, but I did nto expect it to either. It seemed like the right move for Ismael though.
Currently I am considering how I can use Bookspeak to our advantage in the current situation.
Sat, 07/11/2020 - 10:15
A little about Now.
A little about Now.
We are dropped right into the situation with little actual preamble. We discuss the situation and a great deal of cultural reflection, which was important I think. and very relevant. It gave some context as to why we were there.
But the action opened up very quickly. We walked into a situation that was not a typical adventure and our decisions now have to be about what is there in front of us, whether to engage with it, go against it, or try and escape it. It feels more like a battle of wits and we, the players, are waking up to that idea. Don't get me wrong, I do not think this is is a player vs. GM situation; instead our assumptions and habits as players are being tested and the abilities of the characters themselves need to come into play to help us get out of this.
If it is not evident, I am having a great time.
Thu, 07/16/2020 - 10:59
It does feel like a paradigm
It does feel like a paradigm shift in a way. Traditionally the arcane magics, unfettered by the will of God, are seens are more powerful and more flexible. But the Divination alters.. reality? Is that too big a phrase? Maybe it reveals more reality or more connections than we thought. It puts the cleric in a position to be able to play the role of fate, at least for the other lawful characters.
And so far we have seen only minor magic and an abomination. Chaos may have its moment.
Fri, 07/17/2020 - 17:35
Alignment Matters
One of the most talked about concepts of the D&D lineage is alignment. I am a fan of the Law - Neutral - Chaos version, but the nine-grid is fine too. But I think it is safe to say the alignment has hardly every mattered, really, in terms of design. In terms of individual Play, sure, it might be part of the group paradigm. But for the system, it was window dressing.
What Ron is doing in Lamentations is making alignment matter. A lot. To the point where one might choose to be Neutral, at least so far, just as a way to keep out of sight of the divine and chaotic. And I have to say it improves play. At least for me.
Sun, 07/19/2020 - 09:00
I observed too that you seemed to induce the "chaotic" alignement into your character's subjectivity. I took it as an opportunity to reflect as how I play my own character. It's always difficult because generally, we tend to justify the way we act by posterious theories that we ourselves believes to be the original meaning of our actions (as ethmethodology has shown). I'll try anyway and being aware of this limit.
I was tempted to play "a character who's following the universe's plan". I avoided to make a plan before play (my only idea was: "let's play a character who is looking for signs of gods in weird patterns and in the weirdest places", in fact when you Sean talked about how your character was attracted to chaotic things, I felt "oh cool that's my way too!"), so I think this came during play, when I've heard the big plague NPC makings is call about me. During the sessions, I reflected and noted a few answers I would want from it (and phrased them as questions, the one I ask in the beginning of the session). I took great importance into this guy at the last session and was absolutly going to protect him and know more. When I realized he wouldn't have or share any answers, I discarded him from this plan, because he would not show me any sign I expected to see. I thought about the assumptions, "you're a socially dysfunctional character who can't make a living through a proper profession", and thought about pushing the guy out of my way. Didn't think about pushing into the well until Ron asked me "Do you push him in a specific direction". In fact it's a bit trickier: I misunderstood Ron's question, what I thought Ron told me was "In which direction are you going?", and I said "the well", then when Ron asked me for a roll, I understood that I misunderstood, but I thought the option of pushing the guy in the well was cooler, because it was spiking my idea of totally discarding him as non functional to my own plan.
Not a lesson or anything here, I'm just thinking loudly how I made my choices!
Sun, 07/19/2020 - 09:08
The adventure of the week?
Something I wonder when I gm Lamentations. In some way, I feel it's "the GM adventure of the week". I was wondering how to make something where players could have a bit more of agency. Sometimes, I give players play for "downtime" and so they can think about what their next move. Giving them a region map with a few locations, such as the Better than Any Man do, is interesting, but needs a lot of prep if we want to have "sandbox".
The divination spell striked me as an interesting way to give player agency on that, by having a choice of telling more about a next adventure, within its our narrow framework (ie. you must succeed the roll, & you must choose the cosmic hint, and it only depends on one player - again no critic, just description here).
I wonder about this "the adventure of the week" possibility : is it a problem at all? how to give the players agency to choose the next game without having to say "I didn't prep" this? Etc.
Sun, 07/19/2020 - 14:08
Ok! Thank you for unpacking
Ok! Thank you for unpacking my simplistic phrasing. Not sure if I understanding everything and answering everything, but I'm humbly trying to adress the first phase of your answer, so please stay kind with me :
What sort of actual play phenomena are you talking about? What real variables are at work here: what procedures, what real-life metrics, what aesthetic goals, and what demonstrable experiences of play?
What I was meaning the blurry phrasing "adventure of the week", involved those two things (all of them, not just one).
- once the adventure is over, we step into the next one.
- The next one has nothing to do with any of the previous one, it's just the new one the DM has prepared, downloaded, bought, anything, without any connexion with the previous one. For instance, playing different modules of LotFP (Hey Guys Let's play Better than any man, ok it's over, now everybody begins "tales from the scarecrow").
What I tried to mean by "sandbox" (let's read of those terms, but I started with them so let's deconstruct them), was not so much "let's play what's between two dungeons", but : could/should an adventure have a link with a previous one, with some fictionnal continuity, or not totally dependant from the DM choice (for instance: the next module he bought). Let's forget the idea of "in between adventures" as possible moments of play for the moment.
I like that in the Divinity spell, the cleric have the authority to say something about elements of the next adventure (even at a cost). Nothing stops him to give to these elements a continuity, but there's a step beyond "the dm bought a new module and will dm next time".
I'm not adressing any of this as a problem, just really reflecting on it. Does it adresses what just you asked, or should I try deeper?
Jon Hastings
Mon, 07/20/2020 - 06:42
A fraught moment?
I haven't watched/listened to the second session yet, but I found the first session to be very interesting and I'm looking forward to watching more. One moment did jump out at me as perhaps a point for discussion (some of the comments above have already alluded to it):
The second time that Greg had his character almost immediately let loose with an arrow on encountering the leper struck me as a moment that was particularly tense, from a social point of view, and potentially a problem. My read on it from an outside perspective, and please correct and clarify me as needed: (1) Greg announces his action to fire an arrow at the leper; (2) some of the other players do not think this is an optimal move; (3) Greg rolls and misses; (4) everyone else is relieved at the miss; (5) the fiction continues for a moment as if the miss represents the action not having happened at all, the attempt to kill the leper is not, at first, integrated into the fiction (i.e., there is no mention of the leper continuing on with his interaction with the party DESPITE having just had an arrow shot at him), which is to say that the missed roll is initially interpreted as "this didn't happen at all"; (6) Greg makes a point to pull that action into the fiction, specifically using it as way to express something about his character.
I may be reading into this or projecting my own biases/issues, so, again, please correct me if I have misread this in any way, but I think this was a fascinating bit of play. There are a lot of potential questions/issues for discussion raised. A couple that come to mind:
-Are there differences among the payers in understanding of the goals here (playing to express character vs. playing as a squad to greatest tactical advantage)?
-There is no IIEE Gatekeeper here, i.e., someone (usually the GM, but often a player with a lot of social status -- sometimes the role is formalized as "the caller") saying "wait, are you sure you want to do that?" to keep rogue actions out of the fiction. Ron seems to be consciously NOT doing this in his GMing, and I wonder if it is unsettling to be playing without that kind of safety net.
-The phenomenon of a "miss" of an action that no one really wanted being interpreted as "nothing happened at all" vs. being interpreted as an action that has consequences regardless of missing. (I just started running Legendary Lives now, and one of the interesting things is that the results on the table strongly integrated misses/failures into the fiction in a way that makes them harder to ignore than in a game like LotFP with a binary hit/miss mechanic).
Jon Hastings
Mon, 07/20/2020 - 11:32
Thanks for the clarification.
Thanks for the clarification. I will eagerly await further discussion after the game wraps.
"Briefly, however: this strangeness isn't really theirs or unique to them, far from it. I've been observing it more and more carefully when playing anything associated with D&D, TSR-published or otherwise, starting six or seven years ago when I played a session of Holmes '77 at Forge Midwest and saw people I knew well as players behave ... differently. I've realized that it's not any single person or single group, but a constant "drizzle" of odd actions or words, which are now taking shape only because I've been attentive across so many people and sessions."
And this makes complete sense to me. I think I noticed it this time in part because it IS something I've seen before.
Sat, 08/08/2020 - 04:19
Hi ! A few answers from my
Hi ! A few answers from my point of view.
- I did not interpret that the arrow shooting had never happened. It missed. Two things happens : (1) I miss for the second time and (2) nobody reacts to it. But also, internally, I started the game by seeing my character as a person looking for interpretations of weird signs, and going into the house of wisdom, "to find wisdom". Thus, Hesna interprets the failure as a sign, whatever the consequences. In fact, the non reaction of the leper was an important thing for me: the assurance of the guy itself was kind of something.
- I did not think any "team squad" strategy, I just played my character. But it was not always easy to not think about this tactical team squad thing. I mean, you know you're not crazy, you want to survive
Jon Hastings
Tue, 08/04/2020 - 11:04
I really enjoyed watching
I really enjoyed watching this and am definitely interested in seeing what you end up with (especially with regard to playing around with the cleric rules).
I'm also interested in what comes out of any discussion examining the "I'm playing D&D" concept. Currently, I'm finding myself in the mood to play a couple of different games where the general concept is "explore weird fantasy locations, face challenges, and defeat/run away from monsters", from Tunnels & Trolls to Lamentations to D&D4E, and, yet, am not at all in the mood to deal with the baggage that seems to come from "playing D&D". Meanwhile, the people I regularly game with aren't interested in "playing D&D" either, and do not believe me when I tell them that that's not what I'm suggesting when I'm suggesting we play, for instance, Lamentations.
Jon Hastings
Tue, 08/04/2020 - 15:46
The Finding D&D series is
The Finding D&D series is terrific. I just recommended them to a friend of mine, and then started rewatching them myself.
A I reflected back on my prior comment, I realize I left out the question (maybe rhetorical) or the concern (genuine), which is that I'm struggling with communicating to two separate groups of people (and not theoretical groups, but two groups who I'd potentially be playing these games with). On the one hand, trying to figure out how to explain to people who don't want to "play D&D" (usually for good reasons) that games like Lamentations and D&D4E offer their own specific pleasures, such that lumping them together under the category of "D&D" is meaningless at best (and more likely is a violent distortion). And on the other, trying to figure out how to diplomatically explain the same thing to people who say they WANT to "play D&D" (with most of their sense of what that means coming from contemporary actual play podcasts of the "playing to the audience" sort).
The best way would be to have them all watch the Finding D&D series, of course, but that also falls into the category of being too high of an expectation.
Jon Hastings
Wed, 08/05/2020 - 06:32
I would definitely be up for
I would definitely be up for talking more. I was going to say "agony" is too strong a word, but, on reflection, may be closer than I'd like it to be.
Sun, 08/23/2020 - 08:15
You may also see that I ended
You may also see that I ended the scenario by giving everyone the solution and finishing it off. The good reason for doing so is that we were playtesting and had accomplished what I needed from it, but I was also exhausted.
The play seemed what I would expect from a Lamentations game. Taking alignments into account I have not seen so often, but this quoted part is what most struck me.
The way I see is that the players were stuck, had no idea about what to do (and hence tried finding secret doors and such; why not when you have no idea?). Some of them were dying, so there was significant time pressure. This is the moment of truth. Do the players make it out or not? And then you tell tell them the answer. We never know.
The way I see this is that you cheated the players out of the challenge. You were not the neutral, uncaring referee of Lamentations (as explained at least in 2012 edition and Grindhouse referee book). This reaction of mine comes from seeing the game as ultimately one of facing challenges, of course; I suppose you were more focused on other things.
My reaction (though of course here as a viewer, not as a participant) was similar to when some game master has cheated my character out of consequences. The oldest example was when I was playing Runequest, a con scenario in the basement of some temple, and my character had been strangled and thrown into a pit with no ill consequences. The most recent was when I was playing Gurps dungeon fantasy (a club game at the local club with several tables and rotating players and such), we were in narrow and low crypt tunnels, met a ghost as a random encounter, and may barbarian caught its attention to have the others escape, which they did. The game master came up with some excuse for my character to not die, even though they were in a completely hopeless situation. I lost my faith in the game at that point; it was figure chess and dungeon exploration to see how well we do, but rather how well the game master wants us to fare. Luckily I was about to stop going to the club anyways due to unrelated issues, so it was not a big loss.
Wed, 08/05/2020 - 11:01
How well did things go? Very
How well did things go? Very well from my perspective (Ismael). I even had to go silent during the second round of combat and came back in with very little disruption. We worked our way through a few rules (stances, holding actions, and firing into melee) and the actions of the wolves, to us, were not entirely clear. That is, we knew they were going to attack but how and in what fashion was a mystery. I feel Ron did a fantastic job of creating tension in the situation.
Near the end of the video Ron talks about narration vs. outcome. In my experience, even though I know when I am designing or playing a game, that narration and outcome are different animals, I will sometimes conflate or confuse the two when speaking or when designing. Its a great point, IMHO, and one to really pay attention to.
I do have questions about the nature of the wolves, but that may be outside the scope of this video. Likely better asked when we do a roundup.
Sat, 08/08/2020 - 04:22
God's plan
Questions for Ron: what would have happened if Hesna accepted the cosmic force's plan for her (this flesh thing)? What was this fusion of the flesh thing? Also, I feel like I resisted to the universe's plan for me, would those kind of behaviour have consequences later?
Sat, 08/08/2020 - 10:36
Yes, I was asking those two
Yes, I was asking those two questions, and the answers make sense. For the first one, I was wondering "If a character misses his Saving Throw, here what happens", and as I understand you didn't think about something specific and weird prior to the game, but you let yourself rooms to decide this at the moment it comes.
For "God's plan", the answer makes totally sense, in fact I can't see any other way to do it. God's plan is realized, and we know it because we played it, so there's no punishment of behavior or anything like this. I'm curious about the potential it creates in a long term play.
In fact, I'm starting to get the feeling of those answers but can't articulate my questions or answer it by myself, but it makes sense.
Another question related about how the GM deal with alignement. We said the Chaotic alignement is a "chaos magnet". But the giant snake with limbs slithering to the pit totally ignored the Magic User. I would have thought that the Magic User would have been the main focus/target of the creature (meaning: I would have played it like this as a GM, given this definition of Chaotic). But I remember clearly a moment when you targeted Sean's Character, then revised your decision when thinking about alignement, like "oh no" and the creature focused on something else. What had you in mind at that moment?


text:
Our View: Honoring our valiant war dead
Every now and then, someone suggests changing the day Memorial Day is observed back to the traditional date of May 30 — it was pegged in 1968 to the last Monday in May to create a three-day weekend.
Ironically, May 30 was chosen as the date in 1866 to celebrate Decoration Day, when the graves of Civil War soldiers were to be adorned with flowers, precisely because that date had no prior significance. The idea was simply to celebrate those who had died in service to their country.
Insofar as Memorial Day is seen by many as the unofficial start of summer, perhaps there's little harm in observing it with (for most of us) three consecutive days off from work. But it is still appropriate to pause to consider the sacrifices of our fellow Americans.
For any commander in chief, ordering young men and women into harm's way is a solemn undertaking. Volunteering to be one of those who could be sent is, if anything, even more solemn. That's why it is so important to be sure that conflicts abroad really do involve the core interests of the United States, that they are not undertaken for transient or ephemeral reasons.
There are reasons to doubt that the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan fit those criteria. But there is no reason to doubt the bravery and devotion of those sent to fight, or the sacrifices of those who will not return to their loved ones.
Bravery and devotion are not to be taken lightly; nor are they to be taken for granted.
When Russian troops seized the Crimean peninsula earlier this year and began massing on the border of eastern Ukraine, some U.S. politicians forgot — or chose to ignore — that no core U.S. interests were threatened. They urged the White House to send arms, to send American troops, to send the message that we'll go to war over a country that's not even an ally.
Those politicians, like far too many before them, would trade long-term security for short-term theatrics.
Celebration of Memorial Day was sporadic until after the two devastating world wars of the 20th century, which took the lives of so many people from so many countries. The death tolls in recent wars have been much lower than in those great conflicts. But each human life is precious, and each young person who makes the ultimate sacrifice deserves respect and honor, however wise or foolish the decisions of his or her superiors.


text:
An outreach eye camp will screen between 200 and 500 patients and restore sight to approximately 20 to 50 people in Ghana through cataract surgery.
Available statistics indicate that 200,000 Ghanaians are completely blind while an additional 600,000 are visually impaired. Seventy-five percent of this blindness is avoidable. (Source: Ghana Eye Foundation, December 2005). An outreach eye camp will restore sight to approximately 50 people in the Ashanti region of Ghana. Since 2009 the HCP has sponsored 35 remote outreach eye camps in Ghana.
A team from Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital in Kumasi, Ghana will travel to a remote site, screen patients for cataracts and perform free surgery to those who need it.
Blindness is debilitating, particularly in the developing world. This project will help restore sight to 1500 individuals in the Ashanti region of Ghana. With their sight regained, they will return to work and contribute to their families income.


text:
First the basic info. The entire package seems to consist of 4 parts:
#1 a RAM rail-base with a U-bolt which clips on/around the handlebar, and a round attachment ball
#2 a double-socket Arm, which connects the rail-base to the actual X-Grip
#3 the X-Grip itself (correctly sized for my phone, doh)
#4 a safety Tether, to keep the phone attached to the Grip instead of flying free in the event of any equipment failure
My specific questions are -
With regards to #2, the connecting Arm, in comes in 2 sizes - longer (3.7"), and shorter (2.4"). The shorter version is slightly pricier (who knows why).
I've attached photos of both so you can see what they look like. Which size do you think would work better with the GTV's handlebars?
With regards to #1 (the rail-base), it comes in either Zinc-coated metal or Stainless steel - the Zinc a little cheaper, the Stainless a little pricier - they look identical --- are there any long-term downsides to the Zinc?
What are your thoughts on this, fellow GTVisti?
the longer double-socket connecting arm
the shorter double-socket connecting arm


text:
Faced with huge day-to-day challenges, whether we are talking about the migration at the Russian border or SAR missions at sea, the Finnish Border Guard needs high performance helicopters to work flawlessly. They are proud of their modern fleet that already includes H215 helicopters, ideal for such missions. Soon, the Finns will send two Super Puma aircrafts to Airbus Helicopters plant in Ghimbav, Romania, to be transformed into the new H215.
Below you can see a Finnish crew aboard the Airbus H215 on a mission in Helsinki.
Source: digi24.ro