Daily Archives: February 12, 2017

Steps to Financial Freedom

A free seminar titled Managing Personal Finances will take place on Mondays starting Feb. 13 at Mount Bethel United Methodist Church, 3239 70th St. E., Inver Grove Heights.

Attendees will learn how to set up their own financial plan and stick to it.

The four-week seminar will take place from 6:30 to 8 p.m., and use materials from Dave Ramsey, a popular national radio talk show host and author of New York Times bestsellers The Total Money Makeover, Financial Peace Revisited and More than Enough.

Facilitators will be Dan and Marsha Schauer. There is no charge, but pre-registration is required. The seminar is sponsored by New Heights Community Church and Mount Bethel United Methodist Church.

Free childcare is available during the seminar with pre-registration, although space is limited.

For more information or to register for the seminar, call 651-451-3636 or email: danschauer004@gmail.com.

Community band concert

The Inver Hills Community Band will be performing a free concert on Monday, Feb. 13, at 7:30 p.m. in the Simley High School auditorium, 2920 80th St. E., Inver Grove Heights.

The band will be performing The Flight of the Bumble Bee; a Carmen Suite; the classic Ragtime Fluffy Ruffles, and more.

Dr. Andrew Martin will be a guest soloist featured on the xylophone for a couple selections.

For location directions and other information, visit the bands web site at http://www.inverband.org.

Dance together

On Monday, Feb. 6, preschoolers will use movement to explore imagination, stories and music in a class where caregivers and children dance together.

Taking place on Monday, Feb. 13, from 6:15 to 7 p.m. at the South St. Paul Library, 106 Third Ave. N., this is presented by Young Dance and open to children age 3 and younger.

Registration is required for each child. Call 651-554-3240 for more information.

Playing it Close to Home

St. Paul-based new music ensemble Zeitgeist will bring its annual Playing it Close to Home concert to Inver Hills Community College Black Box Theater, 2500 80th St. E., Inver Grove Heights, on Thursday, Feb. 16, at 930 a.m.

The free coffee concert will feature music by award-winning local composer Mary Ellen Childs.

The program includes the world premiere of music composed by Childs for Zeitgeist, plus several other works from her catalog, including excerpts from her opera Propeller, visual percussion pieces, and music for prepared piano.

Dino Dig

On Tuesday, Feb. 14, from 1 to 2 p.m., uncover the mysteries of dinosaurs by examining fossil replicas and asking questions that will help kids ages 3 to 7 understand the life and habitats of dinosaurs before they went extinct.

Taking place at the West St. Paul Library, 199 Wentworth Ave. E., this event is presented by the Minnesota Childrens Museum.

Call 651-554-6800 for more information

British history

From Roman sacred sights to the places of destruction during the British Reformation, a British history program will look at ancient religious sites in England. Taking place on Tuesday, Feb. 14, from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m., this event will be at Thompson Park Activity Center, 1200 Stassen Lane, West St. Paul.

Cost is $8. Call 651-403-8300 to register.

i-Pad basics

Participants will use the iPads at the Inver Grove Heights Library, 8098 Blaine Ave. E., to learn about basic controls, settings, web browsing, apps and uses of this popular tablet.

Registration is required for this class on Wednesday, Feb. 15, from 2 to 4 p.m. Call 651-554-6840 for more information.

Frozen Pond Romp

Theres fun to be had exploring on top and underneath pond ice. On Friday, Feb. 17, preschoolers will peek through the ice to see what might be moving around down there.

Afterwards theyll slide around on kick-sleds for some slip-sliding fun. This is a sensory early childhood experience.

All children must be accompanied by an adult. The event runs from 10 to 11:15 a.m. at the Dodge Nature Center Farm Education Entrance 3, 1701 Charlton St., West St. Paul.

Cost is $7 per child. Call 651-455-4531 or visit dodgenaturecenter.org to register.

Splash Dance at the Grove Water Park

Join others at The Grove Water Park, 8055 Barbara Ave. E., on Friday, Feb. 17, from noon to 3 p.m. for some splashing and dancing fun. Dance music will be playing during the event.

Cost is $8 per person or $25 per family (four people)

For further information and to register, visit http://www.invergroveheights.org/register.

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South-West Review bulletin board February 12, 2017 | Lillie ... - Lillie News

Forty years ago, four Brits in a band called the Sex Pistols outraged and angered the British political establishment. Now in 2017 another Brit has done the same thing to the U.S. establishment.

1977 was the year that punk exploded onto the cultural landscape and shook up the status quo of hippy music biz complacency and smug liberal assumptions. Were not into music, were into chaos, sneered the Sex Pistols as they shocked and awed the British public and challenged the old order.

The Pistols, The Clash, The Ramones and all those three-chord wonders with ripped jeans and spiked hair galvanized a generation. Not only rebelling against the stadium rock perpetuated by the likes of Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles and Pink Floyd, but also by criticizing their self-satisfied, Lear Jet lifestyles and their conventional viewpoints.

Led by their manager Malcolm McLaren, the Pistols used outrage and a Situationist agenda to confront the establishment, attack sacred idols and provoke all the right people. As McLaren once said, If it doesnt threaten the status quo, its not worth doing. The punk class of 77 angrily sang about the stupefying dullness of life in mid-70s Britain, the absurdity of pop stars and the conceits of the eras prevailing culture.

For many kids who felt disconnected from the mainstream, punk was a welcome reaction against the post-hippie and cultural malaise that had seeped into all aspects of 1970s society. But the punks also faced a backlash that was both widespread and violent, consisting of demonization from the media, gigs canceled or banned, assaults on punks by reactionary Teddy Boys, and low-key police harassment.

As a former punk myself, I remember being yelled at, spat on and punched in the face just for wearing a Sex Pistols God Save the Queen T-shirt.

Now, nearly four decades later, another establishment is being shaken up, but this time around its the cultural gatekeepers of liberal America who are finding their cosmopolitan we-know-best pieties challenged.

Another crucial difference from 77, of course, is that todays rebellion is more an overtly political one than a musical revolution. But the anti-authoritarian instincts of the original punks also fuel this current generation of free-thinkers.

Somewhat lazily dubbed by critics and some friends alike as the alt-right, this broad movement against liberal orthodoxy has as its unlikely figurehead the flamboyant British export Milo Yiannopoulos, a controversial punk provocateur par excellence.

Yiannopoulos, with his calculated outrageousness and refusal to back down, seems well aware of the similarities between todays culture wars and the spirit of 77. During the 2016 presidential election he proclaimed, to cheers from his supporters, that we should vote for Donald Trump because he was the new punk.

In hindsight, it looks like he may have beenright in that comparison. After all, in a mainstream media world where it was assumed that no right-thinking person in America could ever vote for Trump, the actions of Yiannopoulos and his growing band of followers in backing such a controversial Republican candidate could only be seen as a Sid Vicious-style F**k You to political correctness and the established order.

Using social media instead of three-minute songs, Yiannopoulos has revolutionized the fight against political orthodoxy by using the same shock tactics that the punks used to take on the entertainment industry.

It should be noted that the American genesis of this new breed of conservative provocateurs that Milo seems to have galvanized actually has its roots in the South Park Conservatives generation, which moved from left to right after 9/11 as the left became increasingly politically correct and authoritarian.

Like the punks of 77, Milo and his merry band are also demonized by the media and also face assault from reactionary elementsas the recent riot that led to a cancelation of a Yiannopoulos event at the University of California-Berkeley goes to show.

In much the same way as the punk-bashing British Teddy Boys of 40years ago sided with the status quo, so the antifa have allied themselves with the American status quo against the new rebels on the block.

In fact, by being on the same side of the anti-Milo debate as the establishment liberal bastions of the New York Times, California hi-tech billionairesand pampered Hollywood one percenters, the antifa have only confirmed Yiannopoulos and the new anti-authoritarians as underdogs and the real inheritors of the rebellious punk mantle.

And just as the British media lambasted Johnny Rotten for his supposed attacks against the Queen and all common decency, so the American media has run endless critical stories on how Milo is slaughtering the sacred cows of open borders, feminism and the Black Lives Matter movement.

What happens next is anybodys guess. Will Milo and this new movement implode as the Sex Pistols did? Will the opposition to them prove too strong to overcome? Will they be absorbed into a new political mainstream?

Anything is possible but right now, just as in the halcyon days of punk, and whether one agrees with him or not, theres no denying that Milo, like the Sex Pistols before him, is riding the wave of the new zeitgeist.

God Save the Queen!

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How Milo and the Free Speech Libertarian Movement Resemble the ... - Heat Street

By Killenard based award winning garden designer Brian Burke.

Were all busy. Check. We all want a nice living environment. Check.

That nice living environment would include a garden as well as the soapstone worktop sourced in Nepal. Check.

We all want a nice garden but nobody wants to do any maintenance. Hmm, Id love a car that never needed to be serviced. Where could I get such a thing? They dont exist mate.

So, busy, busy, busy. The garden for the busy family; year-round immersion and stimulation for the kids, something to show off and throw the odd summer soire for the adults.

How do you it? How do you balance everyones requirements, incorporate the practical needs, create something unique, original and eye catching and something that is not going to consume every available weekend in drudge maintenance and upkeep? How do you do it? With great deliberation is the answer.

Anyone can design a house, anyone can design a garden. Give a six-year old a pencil and a piece of A4 paper and they will divide up the rectangular space that they see into a series of smaller spaces.

Thats the grass, thats the deck, thats the path and this triangle left over here, well, lets call that the flower bed. Anyone can do that.

As in most walks of life, its harder to do something good. So, what do you have to bear in mind, to what do you have to keep referring if you are to produce anything worthwhile?

The occupants and their schedules and priorities. The choice of materials; natural materials promote longer periods of engagement for children. Are there pets in the household?

What features can be incorporated to keep them stimulated and prevent them from eating your furniture and plants? Whats your worldview vis a vis neighbours; seclusion or inclusion?

This is Ireland so remember how the garden will look from the inside, through the inevitable glass double door, as the rain teems down 335 days of the year.

Im big on pan generational design right now, futureproofing is never a bad thing. Can you incorporate versatile elements which could be redeployed and adapted over time?

How do you feel about water? Whats the essence, the vibe, the ambience, the theme?

The garden needs to have an identity which all the elements and plants then work towards reinforcing. Is the space small enough to create a courtyard feel, is it expansive enough to embody a rural theme or is it somewhere in between?

Have you ever seen the American TV show, Extreme Makeover Home Edition? Well on that show the designers really like to zone in on a slice of a persons personality and squeeze it for all its worth.

A kid who likes Egyptology ended up with a bedroom not unlike the tomb of Tutankhamun. Being too literal will strangle everything.

Whats your planting palette? We are all about the herbaceous now. Because we know that herbaceous planting lends itself more to the evocation of mood and atmosphere and can subtly provide those suggested paths of movement and flow. Remember your theme and plant to reinforce it.

Dont forget about height and bringing the eye upwards. Often, we step into a space and our gaze never deviates from eye level, we need something to entice us upwards to consider the infinite space above.

And what about the vernacular, how much do you know about it or how interested are you in it?

The vernacular is making a comeback thanks to the auld zeitgeist and new found concerns about the provenance and footprint of materials we consume. Wheres all that Celtic Tiger Indian Sandstone gone?

Turns out we have stone every bit as good in Clare, Meath, Wicklow, Donegal and Roscommon. I will be delivering a talk on everything garden and design related at the upcycled and recycled interiors store of fellow Newbridgian Edward Donnelly, Home Street Home, on Harolds Cross Road in Dublin on April 13th at 7.30 pm. Please come if you can. There will be cake.

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The busy busy family's garden - Leinster Express