April Reign

Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

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Sam Roberts Saturday

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Sam Roberts Band playing Lollapalooza in 2007

Image via Wikipedia

I love this song and Sam Roberts isn’t bad either 😉

A lament for times when music was made by artists not record execs passing off soft focus soft porn muzak as real music.

Lyrics

No one feels more alone than the children of a dying breed
You never feel at home when you’re just another mouth to feed
I want to live in geological times
Because I’m still in my biological tribe

If nobody listens
then who’s gonna hear?
If nobody listens
will we disappear?

Fake a man on the corner playing songs on his guitar
Yeah on a street corner feeling like a patron of the arts
And now the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll
I said the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll

If nobody listens
then who’s gonna hear?
If nobody listens
will we disappear?

I just don’t understand
Why the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll
I said the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll

They’re always on the phone and they always gotta have control
And now the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll
Golden years are under attack
Taking it back, taking it back
The golden years are under attack
Taking it back, taking it back
Looking for an original voice
But the beaten path leaves you no choice
The melody that you thought you found
These achievements sleeping around

We were Apostles, they were the high priests
We lived the hustle, the keepers of the back beat
We’re under pressure to reconcile
our point of view with contemporary style
It used to be that the kids were the ones who knew how to get off
It was a year for the swan now it’s only coming out as a cough
I can’t sell my songs so I’m gonna have to give ‘em away
I can’t sell myself since my hair started turning to gray

If nobody listens
then who’s gonna hear?
If nobody listens
will we disappear?

I just don’t understand
Why the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll
I said the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll

The high priests are calling
All disciples back in the fold
Because the kids don’t know how to dance to rock and roll

Shameless Promotion

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April Reign is now the proud owner of two new blogs.

Fat Cat Designs: Building and designing on wordpress.

Fat Cat Designs does everything from full site design to adding some graphics or tweaking code.

Mousetales: Is a place to discuss all things tech. Blogging platforms to the latest games.

New so short on content but new content will be added constantly and we are accepting authors or articles if you are interested. (at this point just for the glory,not for pay. 😉 )

Hope you will stop by and check us out!

Just because you’re paranoid

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doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you!

Image via WikipediaAfter much thought and many articles (one example) I have decided to delete my Facebook account.

Coincidently I came across this article today

[..]I hear of a new Facebook Application: GMP Updates. The application, also known as “The Greater Manchester Police Updates,” gives you a feed of crime updates and links to a form for reporting crimes, according to the article. It’s the first time I’ve seen a law enforcement based Facebook application.

Image via Wikipediathese are the types of things applications have access to

The Facebook Site Information may include, without limitation, the following information, to the extent visible on the Facebook Site: your name, your profile picture, your gender, your birthday, your hometown location (city/state/country), your current location (city/state/country), your political view, your activities, your interests, your musical preferences, television shows in which you are interested, movies in which you are interested, books in which you are interested, your favorite quotes, the text of your “About Me” section, your relationship status, your dating interests, your relationship interests, your summer plans, your Facebook user network affiliations, your education history, your work history, your course information, copies of photos in your Facebook Site photo albums, metadata associated with your Facebook Site photo albums (e.g., time of upload, album name, comments on your photos, etc.), the total number of messages sent and/or received by you, the total number of unread messages in your Facebook in-box, the total number of “pokes” you have sent and/or received, the total number of wall posts on your Wall™, a list of user IDs mapped to your Facebook friends, your social timeline, and events associated with your Facebook profile.

[snip]

That’s not all that is happening. When you add an application, by default it can see what you can see on Facebook. So you’re also sharing your friends’ information with law enforcement. Your friends may opt-out of this sharing, but until they do you’ll be the eyes and ears of law enforcement by adding a law enforcement-based Facebook app.

Facebook headquarters in downtown Palo Alto, California.Image via WikipediaNow the author of this particular article has faith that the system of justice will protect their rights. I personally have less faith in the justice system world wide.

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8 Year old asks for divorce

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Nojoud Muhammed Nasser arrived at court by herself on Wednesday, April 2, looking for a judge to handle her case against her father, Muhammed Nasser, who forced her two months ago to marry Faez Ali Thamer, a man 22 years her senior. The child also asked for a divorce, accusing her husband of sexual and domestic abuse.

According to Yemeni law, Nojoud cannot prosecute, as she is underage. However, court judge Muhammed Al-Qathi heard her complaint and subsequently ordered the arrests of both her father and husband.

Link

Now there will be some who will see this as an excuse to loose racist nonsense, just one glaring example from a yahoo thread;

These people are uncouth savages. Always have been…always will.

Human rights and the rights of women are virtually non-existant in this place and others that surround it. And yet you have imbicilic females from the U.S. and Europe that marry these men and are shocked to their roots when the first time they want to go out in public they’re beaten sensless by their husbands because it’s ‘custom’ for you to hold a position in his and the other male family members lives that is no better than a goat or a piece of furniture. Property…that’s all.

Stay on your side of the world. And we should be staying on ours as well.

My one would almost think that these sorts gave a rats ass about women and girls. Never fear the National Pestulance comes along to dispell that notion in no uncertain terms.

Seems like this is a cause Canada’s feminists should get behind — assuming they’re not too busy protesting laws that would protect unborn children from murder.

This is a heartrending story of a an 8 year old subjected to rape, to multiple beatings to things no child should ever have to bear. It is also a story of bravery and survival. An example of the power of just one voice. Yet the right wing radicals over at NP are climbing on this brave girls back to shout anti-feminist and anti-abortion slogans. The headline on Jonathan Kay’s story dubs her “world’s bravest 8-year-old feminist” , we all know how the NP and their rabid readers feel about feminists, so they appear to be actively attacking this girl. Of course appearances can be deceiving and one hopes that is the case here.

As for young Nojoud Muhammed Nasser;

“We are planning to put her in Dar Al-Rahama [an non-governmental organization that works with children], where she can have a better life and education. We do not want her family to pay her expenses, as they are poor.”

I believe this girl could have a very bright future ahead of her.

Well I Never!!

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Taking up CC’s Challenge I will refrain from using perfectly good swear words in this post. Reminding myself that there may be people with the brains of six year olds reading my blog.

I’ve always wondered at people who complain about “dirty” words and then go on in perfectly polite language to prove they are beyond dirty inside. George Carlin makes a good point on the ‘softening’ of language in this video

What do you find more offensive, saying people are f***ing starving or that they are food insecure? Personally I find such dehumanizing language far more offensive than an expletive or two. I find the use of tatics such as these far more reprehensible than potty mouth.

    Pretending there is a connection between abortion and breast cancer
    Killing doctors
    lobbying against child care and then expecting single mothers to work
    lobbying against decent welfare payments
    lobbying for personhood for foetuses from conception .
    Cutting funding for advocacy and shelters and other programs that help women and then pretending to care about pregnant women with anti abortion bills like C-484
    Supporting governments who want to take away basic human, justice and privacy rights from all but a few
    Supporting governments who believe rich corporations should pay no taxes and then blame the citizens for having needs such as for health care and social programs

However, to comply with this day I did some research on things I should avoid saying. I put my research here so you too can recognize those words that must not be named.

WordPress 2.5 and so on

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alternate title “Sunday Self Indulgence”

The last few weeks have been very busy, not so much with front end blogging but with back end tweaking (file that under things that sound dirty but aren’t)

After the very busy and lengthy Bread and Roses forum overhaul, I did the forums over again completely using Brian Gardner’s beautiful forum templates. They are much smaller, easier on download and well built. Brian also designed the Revolution template that AR runs on. Again a well designed, well coded template makes all the difference. How could a leftist not love a template called Revolution?

I’ve been trying the various trial versions of 2.5 and I’m quite impressed. The image handling might prove interesting for those on older computers, but it is certainly an improvement on the old style. For anyone who likes to show off their digital pics the gallery abilities will be welcome. Spent yesterday uploading the new version to all the Bread and Roses sites and updating and fixing plugins to make sure they were compatible.

I added this theme Massive News Mobile and a theme switcher. Don’t know how much use it will be but it seemed interesting.

I redid a site for a client on a template that seemed simple enough but was a PITA, came out well though. Sadly this was strictly gratis. Sigh.

Coding skills and graphic abilities are getting a workout.

pogge posted this great video over at BnR the other day. Enjoy!