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Category ArchiveMiscellaneous

We are with Ukraine

We Stand with Ukraine

We Stand with Ukraine

Click here to download a “We Are With Ukraine” image to put in your window or post online.
And then dig deep to donate whatever you can directly to World Central Kitchen, which is serving fresh meals to people forced to flee the invasion, inside Ukraine and in neighboring countries.

Want to help?

Read the story about people booking Airbnb homes and rooms in Kiev, but don’t plan to go there. The funds go to Ukrainian Airbnb hosts and are used for the bombed-out residents for food, medicine and other essentials.

Stories about the Ukraine

See the video on bombed residential areas in Ukraine that have no military significance.
CNN, March 6, 2022

1. “Attack on Ukraine brings rare sight in Russia: Protests in cities against Putin and invasion,” The Washington Post, February 24, 2022
2. “European Parliament Backs Ukraine’s EU Application, But Long Road Ahead,” Newsweek, March 1, 2022
3. “As over 100,000 rally for Ukraine, Germany announces vast defense spending increase that may upend European security policy,” The Washington Post, February 27, 2022
4. “Munich Philharmonic drops star conductor Valery Gergiev over Putin ties,” DW Akademie, March 1, 2022
5. “EU says expects millions of displaced Ukrainians,” Reuters, February 27, 2022
6. “Ukraine’s Kharkiv struck by cluster bombs, experts say,” Reuters, March 1, 2022
7. “What are cluster and vacuum weapons, and how has Russia used them in the past?,” The Washington Post, March 2, 2022
8. “Russian Troop Deaths Expose a Potential Weakness of Putin’s Strategy,” The New York Times, March 2, 2022

Happy New Year 2019!



WHEREVER THE TIDE OF LIFE TAKES YOU AND YOUR LOVED ONES

The Origin of New Year’s Day

From the History Channel

The first New Year’s Day was celebrated on January 1 in the year 45 B.C. for the first time in history as the Julian calendar took effect.

Soon after becoming Roman dictator, Julius Caesar decided that the traditional Roman calendar was in dire need of reform.

Introduced around the seventh century B.C., the Roman calendar attempted to follow the lunar cycle but frequently fell out of phase with the seasons and had to be corrected. In addition, the pontifices, the Roman body charged with overseeing the calendar, often abused its authority by adding days to extend political terms or interfere with elections.

In designing his new calendar, Caesar enlisted the aid of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, who advised him to do away with the lunar cycle entirely and follow the solar year, as did the Egyptians.

The year was calculated to be 365 and 1/4 days, and Caesar added 67 days to 45 B.C., making 46 B.C. begin on January 1, rather than in March. He also decreed that every four years a day be added to February, thus theoretically keeping his calendar from falling out of step.

Shortly before his assassination in 44 B.C., he changed the name of the month Quintilis to Julius (July) after himself. Later, the month of Sextilis was renamed Augustus (August) after his successor.

Celebration of New Year’s Day in January fell out of practice during the Middle Ages, and even those who strictly adhered to the Julian calendar did not observe the New Year exactly on January 1. The reason for the latter was that Caesar and Sosigenes failed to calculate the correct value for the solar year as 365.242199 days, not 365.25 days. Thus, an 11-minute-a-year error added seven days by the year 1000, and 10 days by the mid-15th century.

The Roman church became aware of this problem, and in the 1570s Pope Gregory XIII commissioned Jesuit astronomer Christopher Clavius to come up with a new calendar. In 1582, the Gregorian calendar was implemented, omitting 10 days for that year and establishing the new rule that only one of every four centennial years should be a leap year. Since then, people around the world have gathered en masse on January 1 to celebrate the precise arrival of the New Year.

Halloween at the Outer Banks

The Ancient Origins of Halloween

By The History Channel

Did you know Halloween’s origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in). The Celts, who lived 2,000 years ago in the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France, celebrated their new year on November 1.

This day marked the end of summer and the harvest and the beginning of the dark, cold winter, a time of year that was often associated with human death. Celts believed that on the night before the new year, the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became blurred. On the night of October 31 they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth.

Jack-o-lanterns 2018In addition to causing trouble and damaging crops, Celts thought that the presence of the otherworldly spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to make predictions about the future. For a people entirely dependent on the volatile natural world, these prophecies were an important source of comfort and direction during the long, dark winter.

To commemorate the event, Druids built huge sacred bonfires, where the people gathered to burn crops and animals as sacrifices to the Celtic deities. During the celebration, the Celts wore costumes, typically consisting of animal heads and skins to ward off ghosts.

In the eighth century, Pope Gregory III designated November 1 as a time to honor all saints; soon, All Saints Day incorporated some of the traditions of Samhain. The evening before was known as All Hallows Eve, and later Halloween. Over time, Halloween evolved into a day of activities like trick-or-treating, carving jack-o-lanterns, festive gatherings, donning costumes and eating sweet treats.

 

Outer Banks Publishing Group Happy New Year 2018

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day of the year

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

Happy New Year 2018 from Outer Banks Publishing Group

 

 

OBXPG Logo Wreath

Happy Holidays from Outer Banks Publishing Group

Enjoy this phenomenal performance by Pentatonic and their version of God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen this holiday season.

Bizarro by Dan Piraro

In Jail for Self-publishing?

By DAN PIRARO

If you have ever seen Dan Piraro’s critically acclaimed comic Bizarro (and you have: it is published daily in over 360 papers), you know that he doesn’t see the world like the rest of us do. His single panel gems are a unique concoction of surrealistic imagery, social commentary, and witty plays on words. Indeed, if Salvador Dali, Garry Trudeau and Oscar Wilde had an illegitimate child, that child would be Dan Piraro.

 

Be Happy

Enjoy this Holiday Season

with one of our favorite songs by Pentatonix

May your holiday be blessed with joy and happiness from our family to yours.
Anthony & Family

Pray for the people of France

Open_book_nae_French_flag

We stand with France

Wishing you and your family much happiness & success

Capture

 

 

 

 

 

Writing Retreats

Inspire your writing in romantic France, Italy or the Outer Banks

Writeaways founder John Yewell tells about the writer’s retreats he and business partner Mimi Herman provide in France, Italy and the Outer Banks and how they inspire writers to find their muse.

By John Yewell

Mimi & John in Paris

Mimi & John in Paris

Go to our Writeaways web site, with its pictures of a centuries-old French chateau and an Italian villa, and your initial reaction is likely to be: What a great vacation! And it is, of a sort. But it is so much more than that.

We created our writing getaways in exotic places to get you as far from your daily life as possible, to set you free from care while giving you the guidance you need to unlock, or unblock, the writer within. We welcome writers of all levels and genres, and now have programs in the Loire Valley, Tuscany, and North Carolina’s Outer Banks.

“I didn’t know until I got busy how essential to the process being removed from my regular life would be. John and Mimi took care of all the necessities, creating a space for us to write and indulging us along the way. The food was amazing!” – Charity, North Carolina

 

We take care of everything. Each morning in France, you are greeted with a complete breakfast, including fresh croissants purchased before sunrise at the local boulangerie. In Italy, our hosts Patrizia and Paolo serve you continental style.

Afterwards, we engage in our specially designed workshop and private consultations for two hours. Whatever your level of experience, you’ll find the constructive help you need to produce your best work in a cooperative, but rigorous, atmosphere.

“I first met Mimi and John at their writing retreat at Chateau du Pin. While I had a very interesting story I’d thought about writing for years, I did not think of myself as a writer. Thanks to their thoughtful guidance, I finally began writing that story–and I’m still at it. John and Mimi made me believe I could do it, and gave me the tools I needed. I can’t thank them enough.” – Regina, North Carolina

 

After lunch – buffet-style in France, Tuscan-style in Italy – you are free to write or explore. In France, the chateau is surrounded by 300 acres of topiary, rose gardens, meadows and vineyards. In Italy, you can wander in the olive orchards, sit by the pool, or explore Tuscany as widely as you like. In both locales, we offer tours of the surrounding region, including tastings at local wineries. All of this is included in the program.

In the evening we reconvene for cocktails and wine, then sit down to a spectacular dinner prepared by professional chefs. Afterwards, relax with a digestif or cocktail of your choice in relaxed reflection, surrounded by five-hundred year old walls.

Writers enjoying a great meal during a writeaway.

Writers enjoying a great meal during a writeaway.

Our program in Southern Shores, on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, is a weekend intensive class designed to jumpstart a dormant writing project or launch a new one.

After people began coming to us and asking if they could put together their own groups of friends and families, we began organizing self-organized getaways. We expect to make the first such trips a reality in France and Italy in the spring of 2015.

We are also developing a Master Class intensive program, which would be limited to two students for a week in Beaufort, NC.

Writeaways is based in Durham, North Carolina, although our students have come from all over: Texas, Wyoming, Virginia, Canada. Our long-term plan is to create writing getaways in the kinds of places people dream about going, so that we can pair that dream with their own desire to become better writers.

Mimi and I are both writing professionals with complementary backgrounds. Mimi Herman has taught over 20,000 students to fall in love with writing, especially their own. A Warren Wilson MFA graduate, her teaching style captures students’ imagination and creates a supportive learning environment. As one student said of her time with Mimi, “It is an experience that I will hold with me throughout my whole life.”

I am a writer and editor with an MFA in fiction from San Francisco State University and twenty years of experience in journalism. I teach a memoir class in Durham and consult as a private editor and writing coach.

For more information, please go to www.writeaways.com, or write to us at writeawaysinfo@gmail.com.

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