Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Movie : The Expendables I [2010]

why? Expendables I? A CIA operative hires a team of mercenaries to eliminate a Latin dictator and a renegade CIA agent. 
Expendables trailer HD

Barney Ross leads the "Expendables", a band of highly skilled mercenaries including knife enthusiast Lee Christmas, martial arts expert Yin Yang, heavy weapons specialist Hale Caesar, demolitionist Toll Road and loose-cannon sniper Gunner Jensen. When the group is commissioned by the mysterious Mr. Church to assassinate the merciless dictator of a small South American island, Barney and Lee head to the remote locale to scout out their opposition. Once there, they meet with local rebel Sandra and discover the true nature of the conflict engulfing the city. When they escape the island and Sandra stays behind, Ross must choose to either walk away and save his own life - or attempt a suicidal rescue mission that might just save his soul. Written by The Massie Twins.

Movie Info

An all-star cast of action-movie icons headline Sylvester Stallone's explosive action thriller about a group of hard-nosed mercenaries who are double-crossed during a treacherous mission. Approached by the shadowy Church (Bruce Willis) to overthrow tyrannical South American dictator General Gaza (David Zayas) and restore order to the troubled island country of Vilena, stoic soldier of fortune Barney Ross (Stallone) rounds up an unstoppable team that includes former SAS soldier and blade  

American Prom on The 21st Century


We had this vague idea that we would have to take someone. That was how the prom registered to the 500 kids in my high-school graduating class as we entered our senior year. For better or worse, I didn’t attend a school that featured a homecoming dance or junior prom or any all-American John Hughes-type of event. Our one and only foray into bow ties and blowouts was the senior prom—the spot of black tie in a sea of otherwise disaffected grunge.

I’d managed to go through one round of prom already. I had gone with a senior boy, a friend of a friend, when I was a sophomore. Nothing scarring occurred, but I remember being bored for a sustained period of time. To be fair, I was also an ungrateful pain of a date, annoyed that this otherwise lovely gentleman had forgotten to purchase a corsage beforehand and didn’t want to go “into the city” afterward. I can now see, with reasonable clarity, why I had such a disproportionately sharp reaction to this lackluster evening. I wanted to experience all that tradition and cheesiness on someone else’s emotional and chronological dime, to be scratched by the flowers on my wrist and the taffeta under my dress, to run barefoot on a football field at some point. I thought if I did these things, when my prom came along, I could sidestep the pressure. Basically I wanted to avoid the kind of naked and fearful expressions on display in so many of Mary Ellen Mark’s stunning photographs.

Whether you attended a private school in Beverly Hills or a public school in rural West Virginia, the very idea of the prom brings with it its own culture and language. When I go to a fancy event now, I never “get asked,” nor do I offer the name of the person I am “taking.” One “takes” a person to prom the way one “takes” one’s most valuable possessions when one’s house is on fire. The prom is a giant selection process...and you’d best choose wisely because there will be photographic evidence.





The photographic evidence is everything. I doubt most American teenagers would be anxious about the politics of limo seating if they didn’t have a sense that “right now” would morph into “back then.” Mary Ellen Mark’s photos demand their subjects be placed on the timeline of their lives. There are even hints of their imminent selves, looking like actors and agents, criminals and lawyers, bankers and schoolteachers already. It’s daunting for subject and viewer alike. Perhaps that explains why so many of them are holding hands, gripping onto each other for dear life.

Regardless of their varied tone and dress, all of these photos are eerie. I have been trying to put my finger on it. Stand two young people next to each other and have them face the camera and instantly I am going to conjure up Diane Arbus’ famous photo, Identical Twins, Roselle, New Jersey, 1967. But what’s going on in Marks’ prom pictures has more subdued whimsy, more sly knowing. When I look at these pictures, I see the strange mixture of maturity and naïveté that comes with being 17 or 18. As grown-ups, we tend to forget that being a teenager is an art. It’s the art of trying on the future. Sometimes this art comes in the form of elaborate pageant-style dresses and matching sateen handbags/attitudes, other times in bed-head chic hair and an “I was over this yesterday” expression. Either way, it takes a good deal of curation. The prom is the artist’s museum retrospective.

Sexiest [MOM] Woman of the Century : Why Beyoncé??


Congratulations are in order for renaissance woman Beyoncé, who, according to GQ, is the sexiest woman of the 21st century. She’ll grace the cover of the magazine’s February issue—sans pants—to make it official.
Now that Bey’s earned herself the title of sexiest woman of the century, some might guess that she’d get complacent and just take a breather. But as we all know, she’s a survivor, she’s not gon’ give up, she’s not gon’ stop, she’s just gon’ work harder.
Now, it should be noted that 87 years of this century still remain, so it’s sort of presumptuous to declare anybody the anything of the century. But then again, she’s Beyoncé, and she’s pretty unstoppable, so it’s probably fine. Plus, 2012 was quite a year for Bey. The year started, of course, when she gave birth to her daughter, Blue Ivy, on Jan. 7.


She appeared just a few months later at the 2012 Met Gala, working hard to earn her “sexiest woman” title in barely-there Givenchy.

 The star also got political, netting $4 million for Barack Obama in a September fundraiser she co-hosted with husband Jay-Z. And in a move that really set the masses atwitter, she joined Tumblr in 2012 as well, providing fans with visual insight into her life and career.
And as 2013 begins to take shape, it looks like Beyoncé’s momentum is only growing stronger. She’s set to sing the national anthem at President Obama’s inauguration on Jan. 21, recently joined Instagram, is planning a new Destiny’s Child track with former bandmates Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams, and will direct an HBO documentary (about herself). Perhaps she’ll draw from her official temperature-controlled Beyoncé archive, which contains nearly every photo, video, interview and diary entry she’s ever done, for the latter?

About Silver Materials


Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag (Latin: argentum) and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal. The metal occurs naturally in its pure, free form , as an alloy with gold and other metals, and in minerals such as argentite and chlorargyrite. Most silver is produced as a byproduct of copper, gold, lead, and zinc refining.

Silver has long been valued as a precious metal, and is used as an investment, to make ornaments, jewelry, high-value tableware, utensils , and currency coins. Today, silver metal is also used in electrical contacts and conductors, in mirrors and in catalysis of chemical reactions. Its compounds are used in photographic film, and dilute silver nitrate solutions and other silver compounds are used as disinfectants and microbiocides (oligodynamic effect). While many medical antimicrobial uses of silver have been supplanted by antibiotics, further research into clinical potential continues.
Silver, like other precious metals, may be used as an investment. For more than four thousand years, silver has been regarded as a form of money and store of value. However, since the end of the silver standard, silver has lost its role as a popular legal tender in many developed countries such as the United States. In 2009, the main demand for silver was for industrial applications (40%), jewellery, bullion coins and exchange-traded products.

Millions of Canadian Silver Maple Leaf coins and American Silver Eagle are purchased as investments each year. The silver maple leaf is legal tender, at $5 per ounce, and there are many other silver coins with higher legal tender values. There are some Canadian silver $20 dollar coins.

About Magazines


Magazines are publications that are printed with ink on paper, and generally published on a regular schedule and containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three. At its root the word magazine refers to a collection or storage location. In the case of written publication, it is a collection of written articles.

Distribution
Magazines can be distributed through the mail; through sales by newsstands, bookstores, or other vendors; or through free distribution at selected pick-up locations. Sales models for distribution fall into three main categories.

Paid circulation
In this model, the magazine is sold to readers for a price, either on a per-issue basis or by subscription, where an annual fee or monthly price is paid and issues are sent by post to readers. Examples from the UK include Private Eye and PC Pro.

Non-Paid Circulation
This means that there is no cover price and issues are given away, for example in street dispensers, airline in-flight magazines, or included with other products or publications. An example from the UK and Australia is TNT Magazine.

Controlled circulation
This is the model used by "insider magazines" or industry-based publications distributed only to qualifying readers, often for free and determined by some form of survey. This latter model was widely used before the rise of the World Wide Web and is still employed by some titles. For example, in the United Kingdom, a number of computer-industry magazines, including Computer Weekly and Computing, and in finance, Waters Magazine. 

Technical definition
In the library technical sense a "magazine" paginates with each issue starting at page one. Academic or professional publications that are not peer-reviewed are generally professional magazines.