PR Living/Palermo Blues: Thursday, June 26th!

Our society must make it right and possible for old people not to fear the young or be deserted by them, for the test of a civilization is the way that it cares for its helpless members. -Pearl S. Buck, Nobelist novelist (1892-1973) 

Hello Time Traveller, et al!

I wouldn't mind borrowing your H G Wells Time Machine as I need to lose a few years myself. I see from your farewell missive that you arrived in Vancouver on July 4th, 2014! I suppose your time here has been more of a fourth dimension dream than anything else! If my calculations are correct you will leave city a day before you landed at YVR. Well done. This feat alone should guarantee that the Gods of Fortune will smile upon your bid for one of the EITB positions. Buona Fortuna!

Art: Leah Palmer Preiss

Thank you, of course, for your kind words about the NRBC. Your presence was much appreciated, certainly enjoyed and although we trust a new career opportunity comes your way, I'm sure I speak for everyone else when I say that we would welcome you back, at the drop of a hat, or of malt! That being said, I regret to inform you that the fine for non-attendance will still be levied. Have you read Mai Jia's Decoded? Additional NRBC revenue I suspect. You "haven't got ride of [NRBC] definitely!"

Eastward Ho, young man! Bravo! Hip Hip Hooray! For He's a Jolly Good Fellow!!! Travel safely and keep in touch as I think an NRBC meeting in Pamplona, to coincide with the running of the bulls, would be one way to ensure everyone reads the next selection! Fondestos from Cora Lee. Cheers, Patrizzio! 

PS: If you have a moment, before leaving on July 3rd, [2013!], give us a shout and please think about popping by for a quick visit and a farewell tipple!

Dear Jon: Good luck with the job application and with what follows...It was a real pleasure having you as part of the NRBC. Please keep in touch. Kind regards, --Kurt 

This is a rare moment when I find myself in agreement with both Kurt and Patrick. I agree with, and adopt as my own, the sentiments they have expressed about enjoying your presence in the NRBC, and the wishes for your great good fortune in the competition.
 

Please keep in touch, and continue to be frugal so that you can afford to pay the arbitrary and oppressive fines that the NRBC functionaries seem intent on levying against you. Guy

Dear Begrudging Guy, Gianni, et al! 

Had a lovely visit with friend, Isabelle, who lives in Powell River, this evening. (Lurch's sister, along with Alex, her 15 year old, and Paolo from Palermo, here on a Kiwanis exchange. Paolo's flight didn't arrive until 5:30 pm, too late for them to catch both ferries back to PR.  At any rate, it was touching to have him drop by.) Coincidentally, by a combination of chance and design, Jon, wanting to forestall legitimate NRBC levies, which according to Consigliere Guy are "arbitrary and oppressive fines", dropped over to say goodbye. In spite of his malice of forethought, it was more than touching to see him. Thought that rest of you might like to see a few snaps of him as doubt if any of us will have the opportunity to see him again before July 3rd. Bon Voyage! Buona Fortuna, Gianni! Cheers, Patrizzio!

PS: You can run but you cannot hide from the NRBC!

Pics: Gianni speed-reading Decoded in a desperate attempt to avoid fine! Drowning bitter-sweet sorry of parting!

thanks Patrick, for “drowning bitter-sweet sorry of parting” pics.  Did not realize you are a translator of Chinese poetry! Guy 

Hello Mr Nit-Picker! I must admit that yes, I find it rather difficult to move back and forth between Mandarin, Basque and English, especially when translating poetry, under the influence of malt! Cheers, Patrizzio!

Well thank the good lord then.  Though do feel free to open with 6 points if you are NOT my partner...really...it will be good for your soul!

Oh and Pat...just wondering since you don't eat with your meals; do you "drink with your cards" ? ...and yes, the Rav 4 with a "yellow" dent will "roll" up to Lamey's Mill on SATURDAY at 1620 :-) This is going to be soooooo much fun. J

Hi again, Dented RAV 4 Limo Driver! You will be pleased to learn that I will only open with 6 points when you are my partner. I have such faith in your abilities that I know you don't need any support from your deranged partner! I only "overindulge" with my cards, I'm sure you will be happy to know! Please ensure that the brandy decanter is full in the Yellow Rolls! Thanks and Cheers, Omar! 

Thanks for all the snapolas....we'll really enjoy having them as memories of our brief visit to Vancouver! On our drive home, I enjoyed looking through the Okanagan Wine Festival brochure which you kindly gave me and was trying to look on a map we had in the car to see how far that area is from your home and in which direction.

It appears to be a little north and to the east - ? I couldn't estimate how far it might take to get there though. So are you and Sarge staying in the area for a week before the babes - as you so call them - arrive? In the meantime, have a joyous Canada Day celebration and please don't be too loud. Perhaps you should invite all the neighbors in both buildings so as not to offend anyone's sensitive ears. Pat
 
PS I was showing Susie (our English major) the Vancouver Writers Fest brochure and saying wouldn't it be fun I flew up to Seattle in the fall and then she and I could drive up for the event and spend a few days in Vancouver. But, alas, we have other plans for October this year - maybe next year!  

Hi All, The round of 16 is now finalized, ergo your entry form for the knock-out phase. For those of you with more than one entry, your total score will be your best group phase entry + best k.o. entry.

As a reminder, this phase of the pool is to simply complete the draw. NOTE, do not modify the spreadsheet in any way other than to enter teams in the spaces provided.

*** IMPORTANT *** I *MUST* have your entries before the first game!!! Late entries will score 0 points for any games already played. Cheers & good luck! Branko Perić [*] World Cup 2014 [*] [*] El fútbol es vida. Todos lo demas son detalles [*] 

Met Robo Man at Point Grey, at 1:30 pm, and then out to UBC, Marine, Crown and then 37th to 39th and Yew where we waved goodbye, he to Kerrisdale Library, I back out to UBC and home. Stats for today's ride:

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/529672484#.U63bJE9sxQs.email 

From The Invention of News by Andrew Pettegree. In the wake of the invention of the printing press came printed news, first in the form of more lively news pamphlets, then in the form of more regular but less colorful newspapers.  From the very first newspaper published in 1605, the problems that still plague the industry were present. Real news was often dull so publishers were inclined to spice it up. Politicians and rulers had a vested interest in getting favorable coverage so they maneuvered to influence or own newspapers. And content was inclined toward advocacy rather than reporting:

"The real transformation of the news market [which prior to the printing press had been oral or laboriously hand-written] would come from the development of a news market in print. This would occur only haltingly after the first invention of printing in the mid-fifteenth century. For half a century or more thereafter printers would follow a very conservative strategy, concentrating on publishing editions of the books most familiar from the medieval manuscript tradition. But in the sixteenth century they would also begin to open up new markets -- and one of these was a market for news. News fitted ideally into the expanding market for cheap print, and it swiftly became an important commodity. 

This burgeoning wave of news reporting was of an entirely different order. It took its tone from the new genre of pamphlets that had preceded it: the passionate advocacy that had accompanied the Reformation. ... News also became, for the first time, part of the entertainment industry. What could be more entertaining than the tale of some catastrophe in a far-off place, or a grisly murder?
"Naturally the elites sought to control this new commercial market, to ensure that the messages delivered by these news books would show them in a good light. 

Printers who wanted their shops to remain open were careful to report only the local prince's victories and triumphs, not the battlefield reverses that undermined his reputation and authority. Those printers who co-operated willingly could rely on help in securing access to the right texts. ... From remarkably early in the age of the first printed books Europe's rulers invested considerable effort in putting their point of view, and explaining their policies, to their citizens.  ...

 
"The divisions within Europe brought about by the Reformation were a further complicating factor: the news vendors of Protestant and Catholic nations would increasingly reproduce only news that came from their side of the confessional divide. 

News therefore took on an increasingly sectarian character. All this led to distortions tending to obscure the true course of events. ... The purveyors of the news pamphlets had a clear incentive to make these accounts as lively as possible. This raised real questions as to their reliability. How could a news report possibly be trusted if the author exaggerated to increase its commercial appeal? 

"The emergence of the newspaper in the early seventeenth century represents an attempt to square this circle. As the apparatus of government grew in Europe's new nation states, the number of those who needed to keep abreast of the news also increased exponentially. 

In 1605 one enterprising German stationer thought he could meet this demand by mechanising his existing manuscript newsletter service. This was the birth of the newspaper: but its style -- the sober, detached recitation of news reports inherited from the manuscript newsletter -- had little in common with that of the more engaged and discursive news pamphlets.
"The newspaper, as it turned out, would have a difficult birth. Although it spread quickly, with newspapers founded in over twenty German towns in the next thirty years, other parts of Europe proved more resistant -- Italy for instance was late to adopt this form of news publication. Many of the first newspapers struggled to make money, and swiftly closed.
 

"The trouble with the newspapers was that they were not very enjoyable. ... The desiccated sequence of bare, undecorated facts made them difficult to follow -- sometimes, plainly baffling. ...
"News pamphlets offered a very different presentation of news, and one far better adapted to contemporary narrative conventions. Pamphlets concentrated on the most exciting events, battles, crimes and sensations; and they were generally published at the close of the events they described. They had a beginning, a middle and an end. Most of all, news pamphlets attempted an explanation of causes and consequences. By and large, this being a religious age, news pamphlets of this sort also drew a moral: that the king was mighty; that malefactors got their just deserts; that the unfortunate victims of natural catastrophe were being punished for their sins.
 

"The news reporting of the [first] newspapers was very different, and utterly unfamiliar to those who had not previously been subscribers to the manuscript service. Each report was no more than a couple of sentences long. It offered no explanation, comment or commentary. Unlike a news pamphlet the reader did not know where this fitted in the narrative -- or even whether what was reported would turn out to be important. This made for a very particular and quite demanding sort of news. The format offered inexperienced readers very little help. ...
 

"So it was by no means easy to persuade the inhabitants of seventeenth-century Europe that the purchase of news publications should be a regular commitment. It is not difficult to see why newspapers were so slow to catch on. Consumers had to be taught to want a regular fix of news, and they had to acquire the tools to understand it. This took time; the circle of those with an understanding of the world outside their own town or village expanded only slowly. For all of these reasons it would be well over a hundred years from the foundation of the first newspaper before it became an everyday part of life -- and only at the end of the eighteenth century would the newspaper become a major agent of opinion-forming."

The Invention of News: How the World Came to Know About Itself,  Andrew Pettegree, Yale University Press, 2014

[Title page of Carolus' Relation from 1609, the earliest newspaper, which was begun in 1605]