Immortality – Tolkien Gateway

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The concept of immortality in Arda is very complex, because it differs in nature between the races. Usually, however, it refers to the type of life possessed by the Elves, who do not have the inability to be slain, but rather the inability to age and die of disease (but see below).

The only truly immortal beings (in the sense that death or any loss of their being cannot be brought upon them) in Arda are the Ainur. Because they originally came from beyond E, nothing within its boundaries can hurt them. One reason for this is because their spirits do not need a body to be complete, unlike the Incarnates. The Ainur take visible form at will, and this form was said to be more like clothing than actual incarnation. Forcible removal of this "raiment" (such as that which befell Sauron during the Downfall of Nmenor) was indeed devastating for an Ainu, but could not happen unless either the spirit of the Ainu had already been weakened (see below), or Eru directly intervened.

The most powerful rebellious spirits, Melkor and Sauron, did suffer a loss of their being, but only because they allowed part of it to pass into the materials of Arda. This weakening of their original nature allowed them to be injured by others.

Some among the Ainur did actually incarnate themselves, most notably Morgoth and Gandalf. While in these bodies, they could be forcibly disincarnated or "killed" (though they did not die of old age); but they would suffer no loss of their true being unless previously weakened.

However, upon entering E, the Ainur became bound with it, and thus their fate after its end seems uncertain. This fact brings their ultimate immortality into question.

The Elves did not suffer death from old age or disease, as do Men, but they could be slain by injuries and their own grief. Unlike the Valar, experiencing death (which is the separation of their fa and hra) violates the Elves' nature, since they were made to live as incarnate beings. The Elves were not free from change and aging, either, but they aged in a different sense than Men: the Elves became ever more weary of the world and burdened by its sorrows, and lived more in the past. In Middle-earth, their bodies would slowly be consumed by their spirits until they were little more than wraiths, in the Unseen. Yet, the Elves could escape this fate by traveling west to Aman.

The Elves are also bound to Arda and cannot escape it as long as it lasts, and can thus be reincarnated after their hra is destroyed. When their fa and hra are separated, the fa could travel to the Halls of Mandos. There they can either stay or be reincarnated with a new body identical to the previous hra, after being released by Nmo, and judged by Manwe and Varda to be absolved of any sins or regrets from their previous life. Once they were reincarnated they generally remain in Aman. There are only two Elves known to have left Aman after reincarnation, Glorfindel who was sent back to Middle-earth and Lthien Tinviel who was also sent back to Middle-earth as a mortal.

However, this same fact of their nature means that their fate after Arda's end is unknown; it seems that the Elves must die when Arda ends. They must rely on estel to give them hope that this will not be the case. For this reason, the envy often felt by mortals of the Elves' lifespans comes from ignorance of the nature of these lifespans.

Because the Elves can reincarnate, and because their fate after Arda's end is undiscernable, the life of the Elves is "serial longevity", not "immortality".

The race of Men was made mortal, and no Man (save perhaps Tuor) can truly be called immortal in any sense (but see below). However, mortals can have their lifespans extended by the effects of the Rings of Power and other dark arts. The most infamous example is that of the Nazgl, whose lives were extended by nearly 5,000 years because of their Rings, and the Hobbit Gollum lived 500 years because of his possession of the One Ring. However, because such long life is against the biological and spiritual nature of mortals, it becomes a nearly unendurable torment to them. They also lose their identity and independence; both the Nazgl and Gollum had become utterly enslaved by the power of the Rings.

Andreth told Finrod about a legend that Men were immortal, not different from the Elves.

However, unlike the Valar and Elves, the ultimate future of Men seems much more assured: it is said that they will participate in the Second Music of the Ainur after the end of days.

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Immortality - Tolkien Gateway

Nanoparticles-mediated drug delivery approaches for cancer …

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the next decade (www.immortalitymedicine.tv). This review will primary addresses on latest develop-ment of different targeting strategies for nanoparticles drug delivery systems with a focus on formulations that specifically target to tumor cells. Passive cancer targeting This type of targeting uses drug carrier complex that

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Why We Cant Tell the Truth About Aging – The New Yorker

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In days of old, when most people didnt live to be old, there were very few notable works about old age, and those were penned by writers who were themselves not very old. Chaucer was around fifty when The Merchants Tale was conceived; Shakespeare either forty-one or forty-two when he wrote King Lear, Swift fifty-five or so when gleefully depicting the immortal but ailing Struldbruggs, and Tennyson a mere twenty-four when he began Tithonus and completed Ulysses, his great anthem to an aging but hungry heart.

One might think that forty was not so young in Shakespeares day, but if you survived birth, infections, wars, and pestilence you stood a decent chance of reaching an advanced age no matter when you were born. Average life expectancy was indeed a sorry number for the greater part of history (for Americans born as late as 1900, it wasnt even fifty), which may be one reason that people didnt write books about aging: there werent enough old folks around to sample them. But now that more people on the planet are over sixty-five than under five, an army of readers stands waiting to learn what old age has in store.

Reading through a recent spate of books that deal with aging, one might forget that, half a century ago, the elderly were, as V.S. Pritchett noted in his 1964 introduction to Muriel Sparks novel Memento Mori, the great suppressed and censored subject of contemporary society, the one we do not care to face. Not only are we facing it today; were also putting the best face on it that we possibly can. Our senior years are evidently a time to celebrate ourselves and the wonderful things to come: travelling, volunteering, canoodling, acquiring new skills, and so on. No one, it seems, wants to disparage old age. Nora Ephrons I Feel Bad About My Neck tries, but is too wittily mournful to have real angst. Instead, we get such cheerful tidings as Mary Piphers Women Rowing North: Navigating Lifes Currents and Flourishing as We Age, MarcE. Agronins The End of Old Age: Living a Longer, More Purposeful Life, AlanD. Castels Better with Age: The Psychology of Successful Aging, Ashton Applewhites This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism, and Carl Honors Bolder: Making the Most of Our Longer Livesfive chatty accounts meant to reassure us that getting old just means that we have to work harder at staying young.

Pipher is a clinical psychologist who is attentive to women over sixty, whose minds and bodies, she asserts, are steadily being devalued. She is sometimes tiresomely trite, urging women to conceptualize all experiences in positive ways, but invariably sympathetic. Agronin, described perhaps confusingly as a geriatric psychiatrist (hes in his mid-fifties), believes that aging not only brings strength but is also the most profound thing we accomplish in life. Castel, a professor of psychology at U.C.L.A., believes in successful aging and seeks to show us how it can be achieved. And Applewhite, who calls herself an author and activist, doesnt just inveigh against stereotypes; she wants to nuke them, replacing terms like seniors and the elderly with olders. Olders, she believes, can get down with the best of them. Retirement homes are hotbeds of lust and romance, she writes. Sex and arousal do change, but often for the better. Could be, though Ive never heard anyone testify to this. Perhaps the epicurean philosopher Rodney Dangerfield (who died a month short of his eighty-third birthday), having studied the relationship between sexuality and longevity, said it best: Im at the age where food has taken the place of sex in my life. In fact, Ive just had a mirror put over my kitchen table.

Applewhite makes an appearance in Honors book. She tells Honor, a Canadian journalist who is now fifty-one, that aging is like falling in love or motherhood. Honor reminds us that history is full of folks smashing it in later life. Smashers include Sophocles, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Bach, and Edison, who filed patents into his eighties. Perhaps because Honor isnt an American, he omits Satchel Paige, who pitched in the majors until he was fifty-nine. Like Applewhite, who claims that the older brain works in a more synchronized way, Honor contends that aging may alter the structure of the brain in ways that boost creativity.

These authors arent blind to the perils of aging; they just prefer to see the upside. All maintain that seniors are more comfortable in their own skins, experiencing, Applewhite says, less social anxiety, and fewer social phobias. Theres some evidence for this. The connection between happiness and agingfollowing the success of books like Jonathan Rauchs The Happiness Curve: Why Life Gets Better After 50 and John Lelands Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from a Year Among the Oldest Old, both published last yearhas very nearly come to be accepted as fact. According to a 2011 Gallup survey, happiness follows the U-shaped curve first proposed in a 2008 study by the economists David Blanchflower and Andrew Oswald. They found that peoples sense of well-being was highest in childhood and old age, with a perceptible dip around midlife.

Lately, however, the curve has invited skepticism. Apparently, its trajectory holds true mainly in countries where the median wage is high and people tend to live longer or, alternatively, where the poor feel resentment more keenly during middle age and dont mind saying so. But there may be a simpler explanation: perhaps the people who participate in such surveys are those whose lives tend to follow the curve, while people who feel miserable at seventy or eighty, whose ennui is offset only by brooding over unrealized expectations, dont even bother to open such questionnaires.

One strategy of these books is to emphasize that aging is natural and therefore good, an idea that harks back to Plato, who lived to be around eighty and thought philosophy best suited to men of more mature years (women, no matter their age, could not think metaphysically). His most famous student, Aristotle, had a different opinion; his Ars Rhetorica contains long passages denouncing old men as miserly, cowardly, cynical, loquacious, and temperamentally chilly. (Aristotle thought that the body lost heat as it aged.) These gruff views were formed during the first part of Aristotles life, and we dont know if they changed before he died, at the age of sixty-two. The nature-is-always-right argument found its most eloquent spokesperson in the Roman statesman Cicero, who was sixty-two when he wrote De Senectute, liberally translated as How to Grow Old, a valiant performance that both John Adams (dead at ninety) and Benjamin Franklin (dead at eighty-four) thought highly of.

Montaigne took a more measured view. Writing around 1580, he considered the end of a long life to be rare, extraordinary, and singular... tis the last and extremest sort of dying: and the more remote, the less to be hoped for. Montaigne, who never reached sixty, might have changed his mind upon learning that, in the twenty-first century, people routinely live into their seventies and eighties. But I suspect that hed still say, Whoever saw old age, that did not applaud the past, and condemn the present times? No happiness curve for him.

There is, of course, a chance that you may be happier at eighty than you were at twenty or forty, but youre going to feel much worse. I know this because two recent books provide a sobering look at what happens to the human body as the years pile up. Elizabeth Blackburn and Elissa Epels The Telomere Effect: Living Younger, Healthier, Longer and Sue Armstrongs Borrowed Time: The Science of How and Why We Age describe what is essentially a messy business. Armstrong, a British science and health writer, presents, in crack Michael Lewis style, the high points of aging research along with capsule biographies of the main players, while Blackburn, one of three recipients of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology, focusses on the shortening of telomeres, those tiny aglets of DNA attached to our chromosomes, whose length is a measure of cellular health. Basically, most cells divide and replicate some fifty-plus times before becoming senescent. Not nearly as inactive as the name suggests, senescent cells contribute to chronic inflammation and interfere with protective collagens. Meanwhile, telomeres shorten with each cell division, even as life style affects the degree of shrinkagedata now suggest that married people, or people living with a partner, have longer telomeres.

Walt Whitman, who never married, made it to seventy-two, and offered a lyric case for aging. YOUTH, large, lusty, lovingyouth full of grace, force, fascination, he intoned. Do you know that Old Age may come after you with equal grace,force, fascination? Its pretty to think so, but the biology suggests otherwise. The so-called epigenetic clock shows our DNA getting gummed up, age-related mitochondrial mutations reducing the cells ability to generate energy, and our immune system slowly growing less efficient. Bones weaken, eyes strain, hearts flag. Bladders empty too often, bowels not often enough, and toxic proteins build up in the brain to form the plaque and the spaghetti-like tangles that are associated with Alzheimers disease. Not surprisingly, sixty-eight per cent of Medicare beneficiaries today have multiple chronic conditions. Not a lot of grace, force, or fascination in that.

In short, the optimistic narrative of pro-aging writers doesnt line up with the dark story told by the human body. But maybe that's not the point. There is only one solution if old age is not to be an absurd parody of our former life, Simone de Beauvoir wrote in her expansive 1970 study The Coming of Age, and that is to go on pursuing ends that give our existence a meaningdevotion to individuals, to groups, or to causessocial, political, intellectual, or creative work. But such meaning is not easily gained. In 1975, Robert Neil Butler, who had previously coined the term ageism, published Why Survive? Being Old in America, a Pulitzer Prize-winning study of societys dereliction toward the nations aging population. For many elderly Americans old age is a tragedy, a period of quiet despair, deprivation, desolation and muted rage, he concluded.

Four years later, the British journalist Ronald Blythe, who must be one of the few living writers to have spoken to the last Victorians (hes now just shy of ninety-seven), had a more sanguine perspective. His The View in Winter, containing oral histories of men and women at the end of their lives, is a lovely, sometimes personal, sometimes scholarly testament that reaches no single conclusion.... Old age is full of death and full of life. It is a tolerable achievement and it is a disaster. It transcends desire and it taunts it. It is long enough and it is far from being long enough. Some years after that, the great Chicago radio host Studs Terkel, who died at ninety-six, issued an American version of Blythes wintry landscape; in Coming of Age (1995), Terkel interrogated seventy-four graybeards (men and women over the age of seventy) for their thoughts on aging, politics, and the American way of life.

Now that were living longer, we have the time to write books about living longerso many, in fact, that the Canadian critic Constance Rooke, in 1992, coined the term Vollendungsroman, a somewhat awkward complement to Bildungsroman, to describe novels about the end of life, such as Barbara Pyms Quartet in Autumn, Kingsley Amiss The Old Devils, and Wallace Stegners The Spectator Bird. Since then, plenty of elderly protagonists have shown up in novels by Louis Begley (About Schmidt), Sue Miller (The Distinguished Guest), Saul Bellow (Ravelstein), Philip Roth (Everyman), and Margaret Drabble (The Dark Flood Rises). The realm of nonfiction has more than kept pace. Today, theres a Web site that lists the top fifty books on aging, which, alas, omits William Ian Millers eccentric Losing It: In Which an Aging Professor Laments His Shrinking Brain(2011); Lynne Segals judicious but tough-minded Out of Time: The Pleasures and the Perils of Ageing (2013); and MarthaC. Nussbaum and Saul Levmores smart, provocative Aging Thoughtfully: Conversations About Retirement, Romance, Wrinkles, & Regret (2017), in which a philosopher and a law professor discuss everything from Lear to the transmission of assets. And, as was bound to happen, gerontology meets the Internet in Aging and the Digital Life Course, a collection of essays edited by David Prendergast and Chiara Garattini (2017). The library on old age has grown so voluminous that the fifty million Americans over the age of sixty-five could spend the rest of their lives reading such books, even as lusty retirees and power-lifting septuagenarians turn out new ones.

The most recent grand philosophical overview of aging is also by a woman, and lighting upon Helen Smalls The Long Life (2007) is like entering the University of Old Age after matriculating at a perfectly good college. Small, an Oxford don (and just forty-two when the book came out), wants to integrate old age into how we think about life. Pondering what it means to be someone who has completed a life cycle that Montaigne thought unnatural, she considers old age to be connected into larger philosophical considerations, whose depiction, whether literary or scientific, both drives and reflects emotional and ethical attitudes. And, echoing the philosopher Bernard Williams, she suggests that our lives accrue meaning over time, and therefore the story of the self is not complete until it experiences old agethe stage of life that helps us grasp who we are and what our life has meant.

Not everyone wants to find out if Smalls equation between old age and self-knowledge holds up. In 2014, The Atlantic ran an essay by the oncologist and bioethicist EzekielJ. Emanuel, then fifty-seven, whose title alone, Why I Hope to Die at 75, caused uneasy shuffling among seventy-year-olds. Emanuel believes that, by the time he hits this milestone, he will have lived a full life. He argues that by seventy-five creativity, originality, and productivity are pretty much gone for the vast, vast majority of us. Unlike Honor and Applewhite, Emanuel thinks that it is difficult, if not impossible, to generate new, creative thoughts, because we dont develop a new set of neural connections that can supersede the existing network. Although he doesnt plan on suicide, he wont actively prolong his life: no more cancer-screening tests (colonoscopies and the like); no pacemaker or stents. He wants to get out while the getting is good.

Its an unselfish outlook, but not quite credible to unevolved people like me. Having entered my seventies, I dont care that I may not have much to contribute after Im seventy-five. Im not sure Ill have had that much to contribute before turning seventy-five. Also, Emanuel seems to be talking about artists, intellectuals, and scientists who will be pained by the prospect that their brain power and creativity may ebb in their twilight years, and not about your average working stiff who, after years of toiling in factories or offices, may want to spend more time golfing or reading books about golf. A grudging admiration for the good doctor ultimately gives way to disappointment when he reserves the right to change his mind, thereby confirming Montaignes gloomy projection that our desires incessantly grow young again; we are always re-beginning to live.

Lets grant that there are as many ways to grow old as there are people going about it, especially since more of us keep chugging along despite our aches and ailments. If Id known I was going to live this long, said Mickey Mantle (or possibly Mae West or Eubie Blake), I would have taken better care of myself. Mantle was only sixty-three when he died, but the truth is that many of us are going to be physically better off at eighty than Shakespeares Jaques could have imaginedavec teeth, avec sight, and avec hearing (which is to say: dental implants, glasses, and hearing aids). A long life is a gift. But Im not sure were going to be grateful for it.

Normal aging is bad enough, but things become dire if dementia develops, the chances of which double every five years past the age of sixty-five. Applewhite, however, citing recent research, no longer thinks that dementia is inevitable, or even likely. May she live long and prosper, but, for those of us who have cared for spouses or parents with dementia, its not always a simple matter to know on whom the burden falls the heaviest. (One in three caregivers is sixty-five or older.)

Obviously, Im not a candidate for the Old Persons Hall of Fame. In fact, I plan to be a tattered coat upon a stick, nervously awaiting the second oblivion, which Im reasonably certain will not have the same outcome as the first. Nonetheless, I like to think that I have some objectivity about what its like to grow old. My father lived to be almost a hundred and three, and most of my friends are now in their seventies. It may be risky to impugn the worthiness of old age, but Ill take my cane to anyone who tries to stop me. At the moment, we seem to be compensating for past transgressions: far from devaluing old age, we assign it value it may not possess. Yes, we should live as long as possible, barring illness and infirmity, but, when it comes to the depredations of age, lets not lose candor along with muscle tone. The goal, you could say, is to live long enough to think: Ive lived long enough.

One would, of course, like to approach old age with grace and fortitude, but old age makes it difficult. Those who feel that its a welcome respite from the passions, anxieties, and troubles of youth or middle age are either very lucky or toweringly reasonable. Why rail against the inevitablewhat good will it do? None at all. Complaining is both pointless and unseemly. Existence itself may be pointless and unseemly. No wonder we wonder at the meaning of it all. At first we want life to be romantic; later, to be bearable; finally, to be understandable, Louise Bogan wrote. Professor Small would agree, and though I am a fan of her book, I have my doubts about whether the piling on of years really does add to our understanding of life. Doesnt Regan say of her raging royal father, Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself? The years may broaden experience and tint perspective, but is wisdom or contentment certain to follow?

A contented old age probably depends on what we were like before we became old. Vain, self-centered people will likely find aging less tolerable than those who seek meaning in life by helping others. And those fortunate enough to have lived a full and productive life may exit without undue regret. But if youre someone whooh, for the sake of argumentis unpleasantly surprised that people in their forties or fifties give you a seat on the bus, or that your doctors are forty years younger than you are, you just might resent times insistent drumbeat. Sure, theres life in the old boy yet, but certain restrictions apply. The bodytired, aching, shrinkingnow quite often embarrasses us. Many older men have to pee right after they pee, and many older women pee whenever they sneeze. Pipher and company might simply say Gesundheit and urge us on. Life, they insist, doesnt necessarily get worse after seventy or eighty. But it does, you know. I dont care how many seniors are loosening their bedsprings every night; something is missing.

Its not just energy or sexual prowess but the thrill of anticipation. Even if youre single, can you ever feel again the rush of excitement that comes with the first brush of the lips, the first moment when clothes drop to the floor? Who the hell wants to tear his or her clothes off at seventy-five? Now we dim the lights and fold our slacks and hope we dont look too soft, too wrinkled, too old. Yes, mature love allows for physical imperfections, but wouldnt we rather be desired for our beauty than forgiven for our flaws? These may seem like shallow regrets, and yet the loss of pleasure in ones own body, the loss of pleasure in knowing that ones body pleases others, is a real one.

I can already hear the objections: If my children are grown and happy; if my grandchildren light up when they see me; if Im healthy and financially secure; if Im reasonably satisfied with what Ive accomplished; if I feel more comfortable now that I no longer have to prove myselfwhy, then, the loss of youth is a fair trade-off. Those are a lot of ifs, but never mind. We should all make peace with aging. And so my hat is off to Dr. Oliver Sacks, who chose to regard old age as a time of leisure and freedom, freed from the factitious urgencies of earlier days, free to explore whatever I wish, and to bind the thoughts and feelings of a lifetime together. At eighty-two, he rediscovered the joy of gefilte fish, which, as he noted, would usher him out of life as it had ushered him into it.

No wise man ever wished to be younger, Swift asserted, never having met me. But this doesnt mean that we have to see old age as something other than what it is. It may complete us, but in doing so it defeats us. Life is slow dying, Philip Larkin wrote before he stopped dying, at sixty-threea truth that young people, who are too busy living, cavalierly ignore. Should it give them pause, theyll discover that just about every book on the subject advocates a positive attitude toward aging in order to maintain a sense of satisfaction and to achieve a measure of wisdom. And yet it seems to me that a person can be both wise and unhappy, wise and regretful, and even wise and dubious about the wisdom of growing old.

When Socrates declared that philosophy is the practice of dying, he was saying that thought itself is shaped by mortality, and its because our existence is limited that were able to think past those limits. Time has us in its grip, and so we devise stories of an afterlife in which we exist unshackled by days and years and the decay they represent. But where does that get us, beyond the vague suspicion that immortalityat least in the shape of the vengeful Yahweh or the spiteful Greek and Roman godsis no guarantee of wisdom? Then again, if youre the sort of person who sees the glass as one-eighth full rather than seven-eighths empty, you might not worry about such matters. Instead, youll greet each new day with gratitude, despite coughing up phlegm and tossing down a dozen pills.

But what do I know? Im just one person, who at seventy-one doesnt feel as good as he did at sixty-one, and who is fairly certain that hes going to feel even worse at eighty-one. I simply know what men and women have always known: One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth forever. If only the writer had stopped there. Unfortunately, he went on to add, In much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.... The fate of the fool will overtake me also. What then do I gain by being wise? This too is meaningless. No young person could have written that.

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Why We Cant Tell the Truth About Aging - The New Yorker

Immortality | CharacterRealms Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia

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Introduction

Immortalitycan be simply deducted as the term of individuals who cannot die from natural means whether it'd be through having a long life span or just simply being able to resist anything correlated to death or harmful injury, the character can logically be granted immortality. Keep note that this shouldn't be extrapolated to a degree as this ability can be easily highballed thus we've differentiated it into different categories for individuals to have a better understanding of the type of immortality a character has.

1: Longevity

This goes more hand in hand with the original definition of immortality, that being the ability to live forever and have eternal life. However don't be mistaken, these characters can be killed through unnatural causes, its only natural cause that seemingly have no sort of detrimental effect on these characters. These causes range from old age and illness.

2: Immortality without regeneration

Characters within this category can survive a great deal of damage without the need of regeneration. To put this into further perspective, you can give a great amount of damage to the individual however due to being so resilient he can bypass it. However it should be noted that this is akin to injuries and damage that can be lethal to regular human beings, so take that into consideration before trying to extrapolate this type.

3: Immortality via regeneration

Characters that have this immortality rely on regeneration as opposed to type 2. However to reiterate this is heavily dependent on what the characters can regenerate from and how effective it can be seen when used as a defense factor.

4: Immortality via godhood, or protection from a deityA character that was either granted immortality by a god, or is immortal because of its hierarchical position due to godhood, so that its divine immortality is less a power, and more treated as a consequence of its state of being as a deity.

5: Objective Immortality

Complete and utter inability to ever die. This is typically reserved for questionable omnipotents, or nigh omnipotents. This is essentially true immortality by definition.

6: Parasitic

The person attains a sort of immortality by bodyhopping, transferring their soul to another body.

7: Undead

The undead generally double up with other types of immortality, often being impossible to kill through conventional means.

8: Reliant Immortality

The power to be immortal so long as a certain object, person, concept etc. exists. Some factors would include

9: Transcendental Immortality:Characters whose true selves exist independently from the plane where they can be killed. For example, a conceptual being doesn't die even if its body, soul, etc will be erased from existence.

10: Meta-Immortality:Entities that are not alive or dead in a conventional sense, standing outside the ordinary laws of reality, temporality, and dimensionality (of any number). If it is possible to destroy such a character, it can only be accomplished by a being of a similar or higher existence.

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The latest news and rumors from around the NHL – The Union Journal

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Inside and no sporting activities, obtaining utilized to the brand-new regular; Austin Matthews quest of Leafs Immortality; the Leafs ought to bring P.K. residence to Toronto; recalling at the Phil Kessel and Owen Nolan professions; exactly how this years relocates job from a CBA point ofview; ought to the Leafs re-sign Malgin; whats Dubas claiming and much more in this weeks Leafsnation Roundup.

Austin Matthews quest of Leafs eternal life (Cam Lewis)

Takeaways from the Dubas meeting (Scott Maxwell)

Throwback Thursday: The day the Leafs gotten Owen Nolan (Zach Laing)

A collection of CBA ideas on the Leafs relocates this year (Earl Schwartz)

Revisiting the Phil Kessel professions (Zach Laing)

Its time to send out Rasmus Sandin down (Jon Steitzer)

To re-sign or otherwise re-sign Dennis Malgin? (Jon Steitzer)

Inside and no sporting activities: Adjusting to the brand-new regular (Jason Gregor)

Top 40 monents: Wayne Gretzky ratings 5 objectives to get to 50 in 39 video games (Cam Lewis Oilersnation)

Report: Flames front jogger for university celebrity Colton Poolman (Ryan Pike Flamesnation)

Players recommend summertime NHL playoffs style (Zach Laing)

Breaking down each RFA on the Wings and what the future might hold (Cameron Kuom Wingsnation)

Jets come a cropper to take care of their very own (Art Middleton Jetsnation)

Jets do the ideal point and pay informal and component timers (Art Middleton Jetsnation)

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The latest news and rumors from around the NHL - The Union Journal

The 10 Most Useful Sims 4 Cheats, Ranked | TheGamer – TheGamer

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The Sims 4 is a life simulation game where the player creates a character and controls their life, going through various personalities and seeing how the game plays out. Most of the challenges in the game are caused by the player, like trying to make a Sims family last for 10 generations.

Since its launch in 2014, the game has received a multitude of expansions that have lengthened its lifespan. They have included everything from career-related expansions to introducing cats and dogs.

RELATED:Sims 4 Cats & Dogs: 15 Best Mods For The Game

With the sheer amount of content and things to donot to mention challengesThe Sims 4 is not a stranger to cheating. But the game doesnt frown on this. In fact, it allows players to cheat their way to wealth, popularity, immortality, love, and more. After a regular playthrough, these cheats help to give the game a measure of replayabilityother than the expansion packs, of course. So, weve taken a look at the 10 most useful cheats in the game.

Like in real life, money in The Sims 4 is something players need to manage. At the start of the game, in particular, most of the available money is needed for basic things like paying the bills and buying groceries. And in some cases, the Sims might hardly have enough money left over to buy luxuries.

RELATED:The Sims 4: 10 Tiny Living Hacks For The Ultimate Micro-Home

For players who want their Sims to live large from the get-go, there are plenty of accommodating cheat codes. They include kaching to get 1,000 simoleons, motherlode to get 50,000 simoleons, and household.autopay_bills [true/false] to turn household bills off or on.

The Sims 4 has designated areas for players to build objects. However, there are still a number of areas that are inaccessible to the player. They might be locked lots or somewhere else. For players who want to build structures anywhere they see, these locked areas might be an inconvenience. So, the game accommodates them by allowing them to enter a cheat code or two and they can gain access to these areas.

The cheats include modebb.moveobjects which lets players put objects wherever they want; bb.enablefreebuild which lets players build anywhere they see; and bb.showhiddenobjects, which lets players buy hidden objects.

Not every Sim is sociable and finds it easy to make friends. In fact, some Sims find it as hard to socialize as some of us might have in real life. This might be intentional from the player, but if its not, theres an easy way to overcome this social awkwardness.

RELATED:Sims 4: All The Worlds, Ranked

The player can simply enter the relationship.introduce_sim_to_all_others cheat code. This will instantly introduce their Sim to all of their neighbors, breaking the ice between them. Another friendship cheat is relationships.create_friends_for_sim. This one spawns a new character who is already friends with the players Sim.

Similar to friendship, romance options in The Sims 4 are not straightforward, and not every player is successful in finding a spouse for their Sim. To help out their sim, they can just use a few cheat codes. One of the best cheats is LTR_Romance_Main. This allows their Sim to have a relationship with another one. Another cheat that players can try is modifyrelationship 'entire Sim name 1' 'entire Sim name 2' 100 ltr_romance_main. This one targets two specific Sims, and it turns the romance level between them to 100% positive.

A players Sim might be in love, in a relationship, or even married. However, they could be taking some time to make a baby. Fortunately, in the world of the Sims, this is hardly a problem. The player can simply enter a series of cheat codes that make a simor even a Ghostpregnant, and in various stages of pregnancy. For instance, sims.add_buff buff_pregnancy_trimester1 makes a Sim or a Ghost pregnant and in their first trimester. However, if a player wants to see a baby right now, sims.add_buff buff_pregnancy_inlabor makes a Ghost or Sim pregnant at term.

There are numerous ways in which a players Sim might die, and some of them are sudden and unexpected. If the player is invested in a certain Sim but they pass away, this doesnt have to remain the case. They can revive their Sim with a simple cheat code. Death.toggle [true/false] is a cheat code that prevents ones Sim from dying throughout their playthrough.

RELATED:Sims 4: 10 Best Packs For Legacy & Family Players, Ranked

But the player can also have some fun with their Sim. For instance, one can turn their Sim into a ghost for a brief period4 in-game hours. The cheat code for this is sims.add_buff Ghostly.

Death is a constant occurrence in The Sims 4, but with the above revival cheats, it doesnt necessarily have to happen. On the flip side, however, the player might wish for the demise of their Sim. And they might be looking for a creative way to die. The game caters even to these players.

The game has a series of cheats that creatively kill ones Sim, like sims.add_buff buff_death_electrocution_warning, which causes a Sim to die while repairing an electrical item. Another creative cheat is sims.add_buff buff_mortified, which causes a Sim to die from embarrassment in a mere five hours.

Sims typically have needs and wants. However, they cannot achieve all their motives at the same time. In fact, some Sims might never fully get all their motives. A simple workaround to this is the cheat code sims.fill_all_commodities. This fills all of their motives. Other cheats worth considering are fillmotive motive_hunger, fillmotive motive_fun, fillmotive motive_energy and fillmotive motive_hygiene, all of which fill specific motives like hunger, fun, energy and hygiene respectively.

RELATED:Sims 4: Secret Cheat Codes for Playstation 4 (& How To Use Them)

To complete the aspirational goal of a Sim, one can also use aspirations.complete_current_milestone. And, for more control over the level of satisfaction their Sim has, the player can decide on the satisfaction points to give them through sims.give_satisfaction_points X.

Not every cheat code is meant to give the Sim an unfair advantage. In fact, some cheat codes are quite helpful if the Sim is stuck somewhere. One such cheat code is resetsim [SimFirstName] [SimLastName]. Another one is Reset Stuck Sim. When a Sim is stuck, both of these cheat codes send them to a location they are able to move freely.

RELATED:Sims 4: 15 Completely Functional Tiny Homes (That Use No Custom Content)

Other cheats include Dirty Object, which makes an object clean; Object, which resets an object; Ground, which teleports the players Sim to a certain location; and Mailbox, which resets the mailbox.

Not every item is visible to the player, and especially not early on in the game. Some players dont mind this because they want a sense of accomplishment as they slowly unlock things in the game. But if its a replay, others might not be so patient. Thats where the Debug Cheats come in.

When TestingCheats is enabled, these are codes that show nearly every object available in the game, whether or not they are functional. For instance, the player might unlock non-functional objects like background houses and undrivable cars. They can also unlock functional objects like public toilets.

NEXT:The Sims 4: 15 Must-Have Mods For Better Gameplay

Next15 Best Armor Sets In Assassins Creed Origins, Ranked

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Emmanuelle Alt’s top 10 film recommendations of the moment – VOGUE Paris

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Including cult science fiction films and irresistible French comedies, Emmanuelle Alt, editor-in-chief of Vogue Paris, gives us her film recommendations for this period of confinement. In all, 10 good films to watch, day after day, alone or with your family.

In this vampire film by Tony Scott, Catherine Deneuve, dressed in Yves Saint Laurent, plays Miriam, a female vampire who has acquired the gift of eternal youth. She herself has offered immortality to her husband John, portrayed by David Bowie. But one day he suddenly grows old. So she does everything in her power to stop this process.

COLLECTION CHRISTOPHEL / RnB Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer PicturesMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures / Collection ChristopheL

With all the allure of a Hitchcock thriller, Body Double is one of Brian de Palma's best films, which combines style, sex, manipulation and violence. It follows the tumultuous journey of an agoraphobic actor who has taken refuge in a magnificent villa (the famous Chemosphere) perched on the heights of Hollywood and witnessed the murder of his beautiful neighbor.

Collection Christophel / RnB Columbia Pictures

After his shocking film about AIDS, Mauvais Sang (Bad Blood) in 1986, Leos Carax offered one of the most beautiful roles to Juliette Binoche, his girlfriend at the time, in Les Amants du Pont-Neuf, the incredible love story between two vagabonds who dance, thrive and live under the lights of the bicentenary commemorations of the French Revolution.

Films A2 / Collection ChristopheL via AFP

In a dystopian universe, Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is a Blade Runner, in charge of tracking down the replicants that have been declared illegal. But he will gradually fall under the spell of Rachel (Sean Young), a replicant with a fictitious emotional memory, assistant and product of Eldon Tyrell.

Warner Bros./Archive Photos/Getty Images

In the Bubunne People's Democratic Republic, women run the country and go to war, while men wear the veil and look after the household. But the young Jacky (Vincent Lacoste) secretly dreams of marrying the Colonelle, who is played by Charlotte Gainsbourg. A zany comedy that ironically and humorously denounces the inequalities between men and women.

Jacky au royaume des filles

Les Films des Tournelles

Winner of the Palme d'Or and four Oscars, All That Jazz captures the glories and setbacks of a dying director and choreographer who remembers his life in his hospital bed. A cult musical comedy that has marked several generations, lulled by its unforgettable soundtrack, charismatic actors (Roy Scheider, Jessica Lange and Leland Palmer in the lead) and flamboyant choreography.

Collection Christophel

In seventeenth-century Spain, Don Salluste, the greedy finance minister of the king relieved of his duties, wants at all costs to regain his rank, and the gold that goes with it, using the charms of his valet Blaze. A (very) funny French comedy, freely adapted from Victor Hugo's Ruy Blas, carried by the facetious duo formed by Louis de Funs and Yves Montand.

Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images

Badly struggling with his fall of popularity, Michael Dorsay (Dustin Hoffman), a self-centered actor, decides to create a new opposite character: that of Dorothy Michaels, a whimsical woman who quickly becomes the star of a hospital soap, adored by all. An irresistible comedy for an unforgettable acting performance.

Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman), freshly graduated, spends his vacation at his parents' house in Los Angeles. At a reception, he succumbs to the charms of an older woman, the fatal Mrs. Robinson. He becomes her lover before falling in love with another, younger woman...

Photo United Artists/Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images

Winner of six Oscars, this cult film shines with the unforgettable performance of Bette Davis in the role of Margo Channing, a Broadway star threatened by a young ingenue played by Anne Baxter.

John Springer Collection/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images

Translated by Freya Doggett

Also on Vogue.fr:

12 feel-good films to rewatch

16 cult films to watch on Netflix

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Time is Still a Mystery to Einsteins Dreams Author – The New York Times

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As he tells it, he began worrying about getting old long ago, while he was still a young graduate student at Caltech. When he talked to other graduate students there, I could see that they wanted to do physics, come hell or high water, for the rest of their life, he said. And I didnt quite feel that way.

He ran in a fast crowd. Alan was one of the amazing cadre of Kip Thorne relativity students in the 70s, said Michael Turner, a cosmologist and former Caltech student now retired from the University of Chicago. (In 2017, Dr. Thorne, with Barry Barish and Rainer Weiss, won the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of gravitational waves.) Richard Feynman, Caltechs resident eccentric genius, would drop by and dazzle them with impromptu blackboard calculations.

I could see their minds working and just see that they just had a very, very high capacity and ability to see things, Dr. Lightman said.

Dr. Lightman would go on to have his own moments. He described one such incident in a memoir, Searching for the Stars from an Island in Maine, when, early in his research career, a difficult calculation fell suddenly into place: My head was floating off my shoulders. I felt weightless. I was floating. And I had no sense of my self, where I was, or who I was. I did have a feel of rightness.

Many scientists will tell you these are the most precious moments in their lives. Dr. Lightman said that it had happened to him five or six times in his scientific career. But he believes most theorists dry up by the age of 40 or so. You just seem to have more of what it takes at a young age, he said. Its kind of like athletic limberness.

In 1989, at age 41, he joined M.I.T. with a rare joint appointment in physics and humanities.

I love physics, but what was even more important to me was leading a creative life, Dr. Lightman said. And I knew that writers could continue doing their best work later in life.

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Time is Still a Mystery to Einsteins Dreams Author - The New York Times

Andy Warhol’s ‘fright wigs’ go on display in UK for first time – The Guardian

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Andy Warhol

Tate Modern show features the late pop artists hairpieces along with 100 works

Tue 10 Mar 2020 11.22 EDT

Three precisely coiffured wigs Andy Warhol probably glued to his head because he feared they would fly off are to go on display in the UK for the first time.

Tate Modern will this week open its first big Warhol show for almost 20 years, featuring more than 100 works from his career.

Gregor Muir, the co-curator, said the London gallery wanted to display the wigs because they shone a unique light on the artist.

They are incredible objects, which he would have had a say in, in terms of their design the way they are dark at the back and blonde at the front, he said. The wigs are part of Warhols persona, and Warhol himself was an artwork.

Muir recalled seeing the wigs for the first time at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh and thinking they had to be part of the Tate show. It was a little eerie, it has to be said but at the same time it is him.

Warhol was bald from his 20s and his early wigs were quite conservative. They are a man who wants to blend in, Muir said. As Warhol got older they became wilder, more silvery and, in some ways, scarier.

He used strong glues and lots of product, Muir said. He was so fearful of the idea it would fly off.

Next to the wigs is one of Warhols instantly recognisable fright wig self portrait, created in 1986.

Muir said: You have to ask yourself, what has given him the fright? It is as if he has seen a ghost. I get very poetic here but perhaps he is his own ghost.

The show includes a number of artworks that will go on display in the UK for the first time. They include Sixty Last Suppers, a 10-metre wide canvas created months before Warhol died.

The work is a meditation on death, immortality and the afterlife and has been hung in the exhibitions final room, which is dark and feels more like a chapel.

Another is a large screen print of dozens of Marilyn Monroes lips from his Marilyn series, made months after she was found dead after a drugs overdose in 1962.

Warhol will be all over Tate Modern for the duration of the show, including a homage to his sweet tooth with a Death by Cheesecake pale ale available on draft and in cans. In the kitchen and bar there will be frozen hot chocolate, a nod to New Yorks Serendipity Cafe, where it was the signature dessert.

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Andy Warhol's 'fright wigs' go on display in UK for first time - The Guardian

Shayne Looper: Grief and hope in the face of Kobes death – Leavenworth Times

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I watched a video clip of Shaquille ONeal sitting with his sports show co-hosts, talking about the sudden, tragic loss of Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna, and seven others in a helicopter crash on Sunday, Jan. 26. At several points in Shaqs monologue, he was forced to pause, overcome with emotion.

Shaqs grief is understandable: Kobe was a teammate, friend and, in times past, an opponent in a very public feud. Shaqs complicated friendship with Kobe would undoubtedly bring a deep and profound grief. But millions of people who never met Kobe, even people who never saw Kobe play, were deeply affected by the superstars death.

What accounts for this outpouring of grief? How is it that so many people experienced shock and disbelief when they learned that Kobe died? Most of us who have reached adulthood, certainly those who are middle-aged or older, are well acquainted with grief. Weve all lost someone - perhaps many someones - we have loved. So why should the death of a celebrity we never met touch us so deeply?

Kobes passing brings the reality of death home to us. If a handsome, healthy young man like Kobe Bryant - a competitor, a victorious warrior - could be vanquished, then none of us is safe. Unlike other celebrities who died young, Kobe was not courting death. He wasnt living a devil-may-care kind of life. If this could happen to him

Kobe was not only relatively young; he was enormously valued. He was not a throw-away commodity. His ability amazed us and we couldnt help but respect his indomitable spirit. Watching him, even if one was (like me) rooting against his Lakers, was just plain fun. His death, as John Donne put it, diminishes us all. We understand, with Donne, that when the bell tolled for Kobe, it tolled for us too.

Word of Kobes death left many people in despair. Thousands brought flowers and pinned notes to makeshift memorials all over Southern California. Some took off work to process their grief. Others could not get out of bed. The pain of loss was real.

Grief is like crossing a deep river on a swinging bridge. Anyone who has done it knows that when someone steps onto the bridge or advances toward you, everything shakes. Grief is like that. When we are in the midst of it, everything we encounter, even common things like meeting old friends or paying bills or going to church, can shake us. But a swinging bridge has two cables, one on each side, stretched across its entire length. If we grip one with each hand, we can maintain our balance as we cross. Theres something similar in grief, where the two supports are memory and hope.

Too many people make the mistake of holding on to memory but not to hope, lose their emotional balance, and fall into despair. But hold on to memory and hope, to the past and the future, and one can maintain balance in the present. We must grab the future with one hand - setting our hope, as St. Peter says, firmly on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed - and with the other hold the memories of the past.

If you are grieving Kobes death, take time to remember him. Review his highlights. (Bring popcorn and make it a big bowl - the highlight reel goes on and on.) Celebrate the love he had for his family. Dont hide his sins - not even the devastating rape accusation or the vulgar abuse he showered on a referee, which earned him a $100,000 fine from the NBA. Remember also his confession of wrongdoing in both cases and the apologies he made. Be encouraged by Kobes faith in Jesus Christ. He had returned to the church. In fact, its been reported that on the morning of the tragic accident, Kobe was at church to pray before early mass. While holding onto to those memories, reach out and take hold of hope: The hope that Kobe and his family will be reunited one day; that Gods love will triumph over his sins (and ours); and that the victorious warrior, Jesus Christ, has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light.

Shayne Looper is the pastor of Lockwood Community Church in Coldwater, Michigan. His blog, The Way Home, is at shaynelooper.com.

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Shayne Looper: Grief and hope in the face of Kobes death - Leavenworth Times

Near Dark Is a Better 1980s Vampire Movie Than The Lost Boys – Screen Rant

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1987 vampire movies Near Dark and The Lost Boys are both great in different ways, but the former tends to get brushed aside in favor of the latter. Outside of perhaps the ghost, demon, and zombie, vampires are the monster with the most movies and TV shows made about them. There's something naturally alluring about vampirism, with its ability for those turned to live forever, perform inhuman physical feats, and often possess supernatural powers that allow for easy mental manipulation. Some vampires can even shape-shift at will.

Of course, there are certain downsides to vampirism, with the most obvious being the need to consume blood to survive, presumably via the killing of humans. Immortality can also kind of be a drag, especially if one opts to fall in love with or become friends with a mortal person they will one day have to watch die. Being a vampire is a bit of a double-edged sword, and Near Dark and The Lost Boys both alternately represent opposite sides of that coin, displaying both the seductive power and freedom offered by the condition, and its not-so-pleasant side effects.

Related: Stephen King's Salems Lot Changed Vampire Movies

Since they came out in the same year, it's common for horror fans to end up discussing both Near Dark and The Lost Boys when talking about the vampire movies of the 1980s. Unfortunately, Near Dark doesn't seem to get nearly the level of respect as The Lost Boys, and that's not fair.

To be clear, Near Dark being better than The Lost Boys doesn't make the latter a bad film. It's a lot of fun, and has a rocking, 1980s party atmosphere. At the same time, the story is kind of superficial, and the movie is often more concerned with being visually arresting than delving into its characters. The vampire group in Lost Boys is also a bit too large, with everyone not played by Keifer Sutherland or Jami Gertz basically blending together. The makeshift vampire family in Near Dark is much more memorable on an individual basis, with the wild and unpredictable big brother Severen (Bill Paxton), the wise but vicious father figure Jesse Hooker (Lance Henriksen) and mother figure Diamondback (Jeanette Goldstein), the unwilling child Homer (Joshua John Miller), and the sweet but forlorn Mae (Jenny Wright).

There's also the protagonist that finds themselves becoming a vampire after falling for a beautiful female bloodsucker in both films. The Lost Boys' Michael, as played by Jason Patric, really isn't given much to do outside of brood and be scared. Near Dark's Caleb, as played by Adrian Pasdar, actually begins to care for and about his new family, and for a while, accepts that his new lot in life is to be part of their ranks.

Finally, as a horror film, Near Dark is much more effective. Lost Boys often diffuses its best horror bits with laughs, while Near Dark takes things quite seriously, and doesn't hesitate to get gory and harsh. The score by Tangerine Dream is also excellent, providing a moody, dreamlike feeling to the proceedings. Near Dark also features a novel cure for vampirism, involving a blood transfusion, while The Lost Boys mostly sticks to normal lore. The Lost Boys is and was a blast, but when it comes to the better 1980s vampire film, Near Dark wins.

More: Where Are They Now? The Cast Of The Lost Boys

Saw: Amanda Young Became The Main Killer In Dead By Daylight

Michael Kennedy is an avid movie and TV fan that's been working for Screen Rant in various capacities since 2014. In that time, Michael has written over 2000 articles for the site, first working solely as a news writer, then later as a senior writer and associate news editor. Most recently, Michael helped launch Screen Rant's new horror section, and is now the lead staff writer when it comes to all things frightening. A FL native, Michael is passionate about pop culture, and earned an AS degree in film production in 2012. He also loves both Marvel and DC movies, and wishes every superhero fan could just get along. When not writing, Michael enjoys going to concerts, taking in live professional wrestling, and debating pop culture. A long-term member of the Screen Rant family, Michael looks forward to continuing on creating new content for the site for many more years to come.

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Near Dark Is a Better 1980s Vampire Movie Than The Lost Boys - Screen Rant

WIN a Copy of ‘Doctor Sleep’ with the Director’s Cut on Blu-ray + Digital! – Bloody Disgusting

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Easily one of the best horror movies of last year,Mike FlanagansDoctor Sleepis now available on VOD platforms, as well as 4K Ultra HD and Blu-ray. The release includes the highly anticipated extended Directors Cut, which is 3-hours long (180-minutes), compared to the 152-minute theatrical cut.

Bloody Disgusting has (2) Blu-ray copies +Digital for some lucky readers to enter and win. All you have to do is fill out the below form. Winners will be chosen at random. No PO boxes. U.S. only.

Doctor Sleep is an adaptation of Stephen Kings same-titled novel as well as a sequel to Stanley Kubricks The Shining. Ewan McGregorleads the cast as an adult Danny Torrance, withRebecca Fergusonas Rose the Hat,Kyliegh Curranas Abra Stone, andAlex Essoeas Wendy Torrance.

InDoctor Sleep, still irrevocably scarred by the trauma he endured as a child at the Overlook, Dan Torrance has fought to find some semblance of peace. But that peace is shattered when he encounters Abra, a courageous teenager with her own powerful extrasensory gift, known as the shine. Instinctively recognizing that Dan shares her power, Abra has sought him out, desperate for his help against the merciless Rose the Hat and her followers, The True Knot, who feed off the shine of innocents in their quest for immortality.

Forming an unlikely alliance, Dan and Abra engage in a brutal life-or-death battle with Rose. Abras innocence and fearless embrace of her shine compel Dan to call upon his own powers as never beforeat once facing his fears and reawakening the ghosts of the past.

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Duchess Kates New Gold Necklace Pays Tribute To Her ChildrenWas She Inspired By Duchess Meghan? – Parade

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It looks like the Duchess of Cambridge has been taking some style inspiration from her sister-in-law!

Last week, she was pictured wearing a gold disc on a chain around her neck, which is engraved with the initials of her three children.

Kates Gold Midnight Moon necklace by Daniella Draper ($1400) has been specially personalized to feature a tiny G for Prince George, a C for Princess Charlotte and an L for Prince Louis.

The 9-karat yellow gold disc is also embedded with a diamond. The designers website describes the piece as being inspired by the phases of the moon, which symbolize immortality, eternity and enlightenment.

Duchess Meghan is a well-known fan of delicate jewelry that honors her family.

Related:Duchess Kate Dazzles Buckingham Palace Reception in a Sparkly Red Dress and Ruby Earrings

Back in June, she was spotted at Wimbledonwearing a tiny gold A around her neck (A for Archie, of couse.)

Shes also rocked her own jewel-accented engraved gold pieces like Kates version: her ones, in the shape of miniature dog tags, are embedded with tiny diamonds and each engraved with an A (again for Archie) and an H (for Prince Harry.)

Meghan wore the 14-karat gold dog tags by Mini Mini Jewels while cheering on her friend and tennis superstar Serena Williamsat the U.S. Open in September.

But Duchess Meghan doesnt just always pay tribute to her husband and son through their initialsshes also showcased pieces with a more hidden meaning.

For example, in November she wore two delicate gold charm necklaces each of which were stamped with the zodiac symbols that represent Harry and Archies respective star signs.

Related:Will We Ever See Duchess Meghan Wearing a Tiara Again?

The discs, by Canadian brand Suetables, feature a maiden for Harrys star sign (Virgo) and a bull for Archie (Taurus.)

And who can forget the secret birthstones embedded in Meghans gorgeous eternity ring?

The ring, which was a gift from Harry on their first wedding anniversary, is a loop of diamonds in a delicate pav setting.

Celebrity interviews, recipes and health tips delivered to yourinbox.

But Harry also had three tiny gemstones set in the ring, each of which represents the birthstones of the months in which each of the Sussexes were born.

Theres a olive-green peridot is for Meghan (August); a green emerald for Archie (May); and a sapphire for Harry (September.)

Were loving the royals new favorite trend of personalized jewelry: more, please!

Next up,royal baby no. 4? Not so fastDuchess Kate says Prince William doesnt want any more children!

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Duchess Kates New Gold Necklace Pays Tribute To Her ChildrenWas She Inspired By Duchess Meghan? - Parade

Kobe Bryant lived without fear of death – SB Nation

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When Kobe Bryant died, as with any iconic persons death, people said the tragedy should be a reminder of lifes fragility. That it should be a memento mori, a sign we could be gone at any second. A warning to push us to cherish the important things in life our family, friends, passions, and beauty of the world and not to waste energy on inconsequential things. The constant knowledge of how sudden life can end is a tool to energize us into living a better and more clear life.

This reminder is effective because it comes in flashes, often when public icons die. Its only in those flashes we can truly wrangle with death. We periodically look up at the sword of Damocles to remind us that its there, but we cant live while staring and thinking of it falling. Its not that we forget our mortality, but that keeping it present in our minds is an impossible task while living.

In the movie Troy, Brad Pitts Achilles says, The gods envy us. They envy us because were mortal, because any moment may be our last. Everything is more beautiful because were doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.

The idea that the doomed state of life makes the beauty of it more profound is a beautiful statement, but if the gods envy us for our mortality, I think we also envy them for their immortality. If not for ourselves, then at least for the ones we love.

In The Iliad, it wasnt Achilles who knew the burden of his own mortality, but his mother Thetis, a goddess of the sea. She was immortal and he wasnt. She knew from a prophecy that when he chose to go to war, his life would be brief. She spends her time trying to please and soothe her son, making each moment as sweet as possible before his doom, but also trying, as she did when she first dipped him in the river Styx, to save him.

When he begged her to plead with Zeus on his behalf to cause misery to the Trojans after Agamemnon dishonored him, she accepted his request after saying:

My child, why did I rear you, cursed in my child-bearing? Would that it had been your lot to remain by your ships without tears and without grief, since your span of life is brief and endures no long time; but now you are doomed to a speedy death and are laden with sorrow above all men; therefore to an evil fate I bore you in our halls.

Thetis is anguished by Achilles mortality more than Achilles could ever be. Their moments together are sweet because she loves him, but she is also bitter from the knowledge that there wont be many more.

Of course Achilles had to know he would eventually die. He was human and a warrior, he had killed people. He had seen and caused death. But he is most human in that he is only aware of death in the abstract.

Unless it has a set time and place, death is impossible to grasp. It is both near and far. It could come at anytime, and we know that, but the potential suddenness and finality of it is against life, which is full of second chances and change. Random, sudden death is so antithetical to the way humans see their lives, with death as the closing of the book, that the thought I could die in the next minute is repulsive.

The potential of sudden death can be considered only for a brief moment, before being pushed away. Otherwise, the terror of the thought would be paralyzing. Achilles could go out and fight, pout and rejoice, love and live, cherish and waste moments, because he saw himself alive in that immediate moment and the next. He eventually does die, but when Odysseus praises him in the underworld, Achilles doesnt opine on the beauty of his doomed time in the world. He rebukes his friend:

Glorious Odysseus: dont try to reconcile me to my dying. Id rather serve as another mans labourer, as a poor peasant without land, and be alive on Earth, than be lord of all the lifeless dead.

We wake up everyday and make plans for the future, and not just for what is immediate and urgent plans that are often inconsequential, as if our lives are not doomed. We continuously project ourselves into the future, as Achilles must have. Helene Cixious writes in Stigmata that we feign immortality, and we have to:

Outside, I know, but fundamentally I dont believe, everything we think we dont think, thats because were alive, we inhabit the country of the living; that which is beyond, outsidewe dont have the heart to believe. We cant believe in death in advance, it remains inadmissible. Our immortality is: not-believing-in-death.

This disbelief makes itself apparent when someone who we care about does suddenly die. We think there must be a mistake, that its a hoax. Its all a bad dream, and when we wake up, things will return to what they should be. A person we love couldnt possibly be gone, it must be another. We keep hoping that by denying the event, we can make it unreal. It takes a long time for reality to settle in.

When I first read the news of Bryants death, I looked at the headlines reading Kobe Bryant has died in a helicopter crash and thought that it was an absurd statement. The more I read it, the more nonsensical it seemed. It was a thing that was possible, but didnt feel tangible.

When we accept the truth, we go on to celebrate everything our loved one did in their short time. And there is an intensity to their time that get colored in postmortem because of how short it was, but I think thats how we have to reconcile with death, as Odysseus tried to do. Beauty is not a quality that potential disaster adds to life; its what were left with when the physical presence of the person who we miss is gone. If Bryant had lived to be 100 and continued to try to do well, his life would have been even more beautiful. If he had been immortal, even more so. At least for us. The way it would have been for Thetis with her son.

Bryants stature added another layer of disbelief to his death. Bryant is someone who is seen as an icon to millions. Though we can never be immortal, we do create gods all the time. We turn people like Bryant into superheroes, into beings who are transcendent of humanity. Great athletes like him are rarely ever just athletes, they become symbols, ideas, myths. Theyre as immortal as we could possibly be. For these people, a sudden death seems beneath them. Bryant, who was larger than life, dying from a negligible accident. It is incomprehensible. If he, of all people, is vulnerable to that possibility, then the rest of us are even more so.

Yet Bryants death doesnt really bring the concept of sudden death any closer. It is still only possibly, but not entirely, real. Bryant died in a helicopter crash. Not many of us will ever find ourselves in that situation. We may walk outside, get in cars, cross the street during traffic, and toy with our mortality in more familiar ways than getting into a helicopter, but while we know the potential of sudden death, its hardly ever in the forefront of our minds.

Willful ignorance of fatal danger is the only way we can go through each day and imagine ourselves in the next one. And when we do lose people we care about suddenly, the celebration of their lives is followed immediately by the greater grief of their extinguished presence. Celebration is only a small comfort. What we are often left with is a deep helplessness and sadness.

What then? What can save us from this omnipresent and terrifying possibility of death? Im not sure there is an answer, but I like the idea of feigning immortality. Not living with the constant knowledge that any moment could be our last, but that death, until it comes, doesnt matter at all it has nothing to do with life.

I think of how Bryant trained and played, how he wasnt afraid of the big moments or failure. And how that attitude came from a defiance of finality rather than an acceptance of it.

My colleague, Tom Ziller, wrote that Bryant played as if there was no tomorrow, but I think he has it backwards. Bryant behaved as if there were infinite tomorrows. While he played basketball, he did so obsessively, but then he moved on to other pursuits, and imagined himself doing even more in the future. When asked why he wasnt afraid of taking the last shot, he said: Theres an infinite groove. Whether you make the shot or miss it is inconsequential.

Its not the potential of an end that creates beauty or urgency, its the possibility of a future. Life is all about tomorrows, about growth, continuance, and change, about dreams. Death is repulsive because it is not life. It can never get closer than its abstract form, and it shouldnt. It is true we are powerless before it, but until the event of death, it is also powerless before us.

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Kobe Bryant lived without fear of death - SB Nation

Jim Carrey Interested in The Mask Sequel Under One Condition – ComingSoon.net

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Jim Carrey interested in The Mask sequel under one condition

One of Jim Carreys most iconic roles came in the form of the 1994 fantasy comedyThe Mask, for which he earned a Golden Globe nomination in the leading role, and though a spin-off sequelSon of the Mask came out to no fanfare, audiences have been clamoring for a proper follow-up to the acclaimed original and the 58-year-old comedian has not closed the door on the possibility.

RELATED:10 Best Jim Carrey Movies

While promotingSonic the Hedgehog, Carrey revealed in an interview with ComicBook.com that though he doesnt normally keep his mind on future installments of his films while making them, he could be persuaded to return to the Dark Horse Comics world ofThe Mask.

I dont think in terms of sequels and stuff like that, I mean, this one [Sonic The Hedgehog] is kind of right for it because we have not evolved the character [Dr. Eggman] fully yet, Carrey said. The MaskI think, myself, you know, it would depend on a filmmaker. It depends on a filmmaker really. I dont want to do it just to do it.But I would only do it if it was some crazy visionary filmmaker. Sure.

The original film, released in July 94, followed lowly bank clerk Stanley Ipkiss who comes across a magical mask that allows him to transform into a zoot-suited gangster with cartoonish powers and seeming immortality and uses them to rid his town of crime and win the heart of a singer connected to the local crime lord.

RELATED:Sonic the Hedgehog on a Road Trip With James Marsden in New Clip

The adaptation of the Dark Horse Comic created by John Arcudi, Chris Warner and Doug Mahnke proved to be a smash, earning rave reviews from critics and audiences alike, landing Carrey a Golden Globe nomination and establishing Diaz as a viable leading lady, while also grossing over $351 million worldwide on a $23 million budget. It was followed by the 2005 standalone sequelSon of the Maskled by Jamie Kennedy (Scream) and Alan Cumming (Goldeneye), which was widely panned by critics and audiences alike and was a box office failure.

Talks of a proper revival or sequel have been underway for years now, with co-creator Mike Richardson stating hed like to see a female-led reboot of the film, while also desiring to see Carrey return as Ipkiss, but always coming to a standstill in a search for a proper creative path.

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Jim Carrey Interested in The Mask Sequel Under One Condition - ComingSoon.net

The Perfect Season: An Achievement Unlikely to Ever Occur Again – The Phinsider

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This year as the Super Bowl comes to Hard Rock Stadium, Dolphins fans would have loved to have their team in the big game, but that is something that has not occurred since 1983. However, Dolphins fan have one achievement that no other team to date has been able to achieve, the perfect season.

In 1972 under the tutelage of head coach Don Shula the Dolphins had a regular season record of 14-0. There were nail bitters during the season for sure, the week 3 game against the Minnesota Vikings which the Dolphins won by a score of 16-14, and the week 6 game against the Buffalo Bills with a score of 24-23. As the playoffs started the Dolphins looked to make history knowing that with three wins a Super Bowl championship would come to Miami by the only undefeated team in history.

In the first game of the playoffs the Dolphins went up against the 10-4 Cleveland Browns. In front of a crowd of 80,010 at the Orange Bowl, the Dolphins defense would cause Browns quarterback Mike Phipps to throw five interceptions and only have nine completions through the entire game. In the first quarter Charlie Babb blocked the punt from Garo Yepremian for a touchdown giving the Dolphins a 7-0 lead. From this point on in the game the Dolphins would not score another touchdown until the fourth quarter on an eight-yard rush by Jim Kiick. The Dolphins would scratch and claw through the entire game to advance to the Conference Championship game with a score of 20-14.

The following week the Dolphins would come into Three Rivers Stadium to go against the 12-3 Pittsburgh Steelers The Steelers would strike first when their quarterback Terry Bradshaw fumbled the ball but it was recovered by Steelers offensive lineman Gerry Mullins and illrun in for a touchdown giving the Steelers an early 7-0 lead. The Dolphins would tie the game in the second quarter on pass from Earl Morrall to Larry Csonka, knotting the game up at 7 a piece. After halftime, Shula replaced Morrall with returning quarterback Bob Griese. Griese had not played a game since week five when he broke his leg and dislocated his ankle. The Dolphins would not have a passing touchdown for the rest of the game. In the third quarter Jim Kiick would rush for a touchdown, followed by another touchdown in the fourth quarter. These two touchdowns would give the Dolphins just enough to squeak by the Steelers and advance to the Super Bowl.

The Dolphins were on the brink of immortality with one win left to become the first undefeated team to win the Super Bowl. The Dolphins would come into Super Bowl VII in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum against the 13-3 Washington Redskins. Even with the Dolphins being the undefeated team coming into this game the Redskins were favored by one point before the game. The Dolphins would start the game with Griese throwing a 28-yard touchdown to Howard Twilley for a 7-0 lead in the first quarter. Jim Kiick would continue his running excellence in the playoffs by rushing for a 1-yard touchdown in the second quarter to give the Dolphins a 14-0 lead. This would be enough to hold off the Redskins to secure the Dolphins their first Super Bowl, as well as becoming the first team to ever have an undefeated team win the Super Bowl.

This feat has not been able to be matched since the 1972 season, the closest being the 2007 New England Patriots who entered Super Bowl XLII with an 18-0 record against the 10-6 New York Giants. The Patriots would lose to the Giants leading to the Dolphins remaining the only undefeated team to win a Super Bowl. Part of the reason this feat is so difficult to match is because the NFL regular season expanded to 16 games in 1978. Since this occurred the Patriots were the only team to complete an undefeated regular season. This makes it easier for a team to lose during the regular season causing them to not be able to match the feat. At this point in history the likelihood that another team will ever match the 1972 Dolphins is slim to none. This is because of the extended regular season and the unpredictability of the playoffs. This shows just how special the 1972 Dolphins were as a team and how talented of a coach Don Shula was during his career.

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The Perfect Season: An Achievement Unlikely to Ever Occur Again - The Phinsider

Newly renovated Memorial Student Center unveiled during Grand Re-Opening – MU The Parthenon

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Marshall University unveiled the newly renovated Memorial Student Center Dec. 5.

Students, faculty and community members gathered to unveil the newly renovated Marshall University Memorial Student Center Thursday morning.

Opened in 1971, the building had not had a facelift since the 1990s. As the center of student life, the MSC was ready for some updates, according to William Tootie Carter, the MSC director of business operations.

The Student Center serves as a hub of campus; we like to call it the living room sometimes, and as you all know when you have a living room, you got to update it, Carter said. And it needed it. The last time we actually did a renovation, if you want to call it that, (was) back in the 90s. It was basically new flooring, light fixtures and that kind of thing.

Carter walked attendees at the unveiling through the space while sharing the new pieces of the room, including a new memorial piece.

Several updates from the stairs, the glass banisters, the flex space, the new flooring, the fireplace, you name it, Carter said. The football team memorial. A student came up with the idea to make it more interactive. Kyle Powers is a student and came up with a great idea to make it interactive. Its a touch screen. For instance, you can touch a player, a coach and it gives a little bio about them.

Along with the renovations to the student center, Carter spoke of the updates made to the bookstore and food court.

Marshall President Jerry Gilbert expressed thanks and recognition to all involved in the renovations to the building, as well as his feelings about the transformation.

This is a truly beautiful renovation, Gilbert said. Its so bright and modern. It is all that I had hoped it would be. We went from the Flintstones to the Jetsons.

Gilbert also included the meaning behind the MSC and the impact it has on not only those connected with Marshall, but to the community as well. He explained that the building serves as a memorial to those who died in the Nov. 14, 1970 plane crash, just like the fountain, and has similar meaning.

Harry Bertoia, the designer of the fountain, wanted to commemorate the waters of life. Rising, renewing, reaching to express upward growth, immortality and eternality, Gilbert said. On any given day, the student center does the exact same things. It is full of life and activity, and it is the main hub for students, staff and faculty on this campus. For the surrounding community, this building holds celebrations, banquets, parties, reunions and weddings. The Memorial Student Center has been the heart of many wonderful memories of Marshall sons and daughters for the past 48 years.

Following the ribbon cutting, a reception took place for guests to mingle and explore the new MSC.

Special thanks were given to all of those who worked to make the remodeling possible, including the Marshall University Board of Governors, Ed Tucker Architects Inc., E.P. Leach & Sons Inc., Follett Higher Education Group, Sodexo Inc., RossTarrant Architects and SWOPE Construction Co.

Brittany Hively can be contacted at [emailprotected].

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Newly renovated Memorial Student Center unveiled during Grand Re-Opening - MU The Parthenon

Sealed for Your Protections – North Bay Bohemian

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Shrink-wrapped, used paperback books. It's a thing. I spotted a rack of them in a Calistoga drugstore.

Among the titles were the usual suspects like Sue Grafton's "infinite alphabet" series (Z is for Zomebody Please Kill Me) and the no-doubt scintillating Her Ideal Man. Because they trapped the book inside form-fitting plastic, I couldn't thumb through itbut I suspect it's about a man who is ideal and, maybe, Fabio.

This kind of literary sleuthing is what an English degree is forI bet. Whether or not a melted, transparent film appreciably increases the resale value of these titles, I cannot say. But if it does, I'm going to insist the Bohemian get the plastic treatment. Will it up the newstand value? Trick questionthe Bohemian is free. Besides, you can't put a price on the freedom of the press, can you? Don't answer that.

Shrink-wrapping is a lens through which we can perceive something exquisitely on its own tattered terms. If we could shrink-wrap the perfect imperfections of our souls, we'd probably be better for it. And not because we'd all suffocate. Though I have to admit to a Sylvia Plathlike, by-way-of-polyvinyl-chloride-compulsion to stick my head in a shrink-wrap machine.

Perhaps I'd become like those saints whose bodies don't decompose, the so-called "incorruptibles," who no matter how green and leathery they look, are somehow in an everlasting state of beatification. At this point, that's about as close to literary immortality I'm going to getso crank up the machine.

Speaking of plastics, Buck Henry, the screenwriter behind one of the most iconic lines from The Graduate, died. As a refresher, the line went like this:

Older family friend, Mr. McGuire, corners recent grad Benjamin, played by Dustin Hoffman.

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

That, and an Oscar nomination, will keep you working in the biz for half a century. Henry was 89.

No word if they'll preserve Henry via plastination, the technique for preserving biological tissues pioneered by German anatomist Gunther von Hagens.

The results are life-sized Visible Man anatomy models. Hagens tours a show called "Body Worlds" that features dozens of plastinized cadavers, splayed and filleted in a variety of ways. It's like walking into Nirvana's In Utero album cover but without having to endure the '90s.

When performing his anatomical dissections, von Hagens insists on wearing a black fedora as a sort of sartorial reference to a hat depicted in Rembrandt's The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp. It's also sinister as hell when he's pumping corpses full of plastic.

I'll stick with paperbacks.

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Sealed for Your Protections - North Bay Bohemian

Weekend Watch: Dont Sleep on Doctor Sleep But Last Christmas is a Snooze – Eurweb.com

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Abra Stone (Kyliegh Curran) and Dan Torrance (Ewan McGregor) a Doctor Sleep scene. 2019 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

*Stephen Kings Doctor Sleep starts off slow and creepy. Hey, Stephen, what do you have against kids? The initial gruesome scenes of a boys death in Doctor Sleep are a downer.

Once you get past those scenes, the movie picks up steamno pun intendedsince the premise is based on steam snatching.

There are flashbacks at the Overlook Hotel where Dick Hallorann (Carl Lumbry) explains to young Torrance what it means to shine. [Scatman Crothers played Hallorann in The Shining]

To shine is to have a special supernatural gift. A ghoulish group of menacing monsters mission is to extract the shine steam from those who possess it. The fiendish clan True Knot, headed by Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson), extricates the steam as the victims die so that the demons can gain immortality. The most powerful shiner is the courageous teenager Abra Stone, played by talented newcomer Kyliegh Curran. Stones strong extrasensory perception gets wind of shiner Dan Torrance (Ewan McGregor). Instinctively recognizing that Dan shares her power, Abra seeks his help against the deadly predator Rose.

Do you see what I see? (L-r) Kyleigh Curran (Abra Stone) and Zachary Momoh (David Stone) in Doctor Sleep. 2019 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

Still irrevocably scarred by the trauma he endured as a child at the Overlook, Dan picks up the gauntlet. Forming an unlikely alliance, Abra and Dan engage in a brutal life-or-death battle with Rose. Abras innocence and fearless embrace of her shine compels Dan to call upon his own powers as never before and faces his fears.

Directed by Mike Flanagan, the supernatural thriller also stars Zahn McClarnon, Emily Alyn Lind, Bruce, Greenwood, Jocelin Donahue, Alex Essoe, Cliff Curtis, and Zackary Momoh.

Last Christmas

Last Christmas could be marketed as a sleep aid, and no offense to the cast. Too bad they didnt have a feasible script to work with. Neither Emilia Clarkes GOT dragons, Henry Goldings Crazy Rich Asians, Michelle Yeohs Star Trek: Discovery combat experience, or George Michael and Wham!s music can save this one. No doubt Last Christmas was aiming at the Love Actually holiday appeal and steadfast sustainability. Nor does Last Christmas tug at the heart like the 2000 David Duchovy similarly themed movie, Return to Me or joggle the senses like Sixth Sense.

Kate (Emilia Clarke) is the movies major downfall. Her atrocious behavior and diatribe leaves a bad taste in the mouths of those she slights. Whats so disturbing is that she has no clue. By the time Kate has an epiphany, no one cares. Her mother Petra (Emma Thompson) also doesnt have much to be desired. Petras off-colored lesbian jab is not funny, as are most of the so-called jokes.

Tom (Henry Golding) and Kate (Emilia Clarke) in Last Christmas. Photo: Jonathan Prime/Universal Pictures 2019 Universal Studios

Although basically living out of her suitcase, Kate would prefer to shack up with just about anyone rather than stay with her parents. Her job as an elf in a year-round London Christmas shop brings her no cheer. When Tom (Henry Golding) comes into Kates life one fateful day during the most wonderful time of the year, she gets a reprieve on life. But will a tragic turn of events be a boon or burden? No spoilers here.

Directed by Paul Feig, Last Christmas also stars Lydia Leonard, Margaret Clunie, Patti LuPone, Ansu Kabia, Boris Isakovic, Michael Addo, and Bilal Zafar.

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Weekend Watch: Dont Sleep on Doctor Sleep But Last Christmas is a Snooze - Eurweb.com