Sure is, margo! The greeks here have gone crazy with joy. 20 000 of them crammed into the Greek precinct in the wee small hours of this (very chilly) morning. I was very touched by one elderly Greek man's reaction on the ABC this morning: "We've won! I can't believe it! Greeks never win anything!"
Good news? Well, the Mrs and I joined our friends for a trek to San Francisco's Stern Grove for some Chinese and Jazz music, then came back to Sunnyvale and had dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Our friends visited for a short while, and left about six pm. At about 8:30, the Mrs wanted to go watch fireworks at the Santa Clara central park, so we drove the two miles to Kaiser where they permitted people to park for the evening's fireworks in the park. It started out very slow, but ended with a resounding big bang - that went on for about 4-5 minutes of colorful explosions in the sky. Everybody clapped after the show. It was a wonderful July 4 celebration.
A sign of real progress? Dare one hope?
Last Update: Sunday, January 30, 2005. 5:29pm (AEDT)
Mahmoud Abbas and Arial Sharon are due to meet in coming weeks. (Reuters)
Israel ready to hand back West Bank towns
By Middle East correspondent Matt Brown
Palestinian and Israeli officials have made another breakthrough on security in the occupied territories.
Israel's Defence Minister, Shaul Mofaz, says his Government is ready to give Palestinian forces control of security in several key towns in the West Bank.
He was speaking after talks with Palestinian officials to prepare for a summit within the next two weeks between the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, the the new Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas.
"The transfer of control of some towns in the West Bank should take place in the next few days," Mr Mofaz told Israeli radio.
They will probably include Ramallah, where the Palestinian Authority has its headquarters.
The move is part of a thaw in relations between the two sides.
Palestinian forces have already taken over security in the Gaza Strip.
Mr Sharon is due to meet Mr Abbas in the coming weeks. It will be the first time Israeli and Palestinian leaders have met in more than four years.
Mr Abbas has been President of the Palestinian Authority for a very short time but the change in mood between the Israelis and Palestinians is striking.
Both sides said real progress was being made and that they would meet again in coming days. But there are plenty of differences still to be reconciled.
Israel wants Palestinian militants to be disbanded while Mr Abbas favours drawing them into the political process.
~
Re: Send some good news stories here! (please, pretty please
msolga wrote:
So, as a bit of light relief from all the horror, let's hear some of it!
Do your community service & send those feel good stories here. But keep 'em brief, OK?
A laugh, a smile, even a snigger would be very, very nice!
`
Hello all,
I found your forum from a Google Alert received this morning
for the expression "feel good stories".
As it happens to be my favorite subject I right away
came to your place.
I have a site and a blog about this topic.
If you would like tthe URL please let me know
PM.
Glad to be here.
Marie
Marie, we aren't allowed to put our own sites in our posts here - that is listed as part of the Terms of Service we accept when we sign in. But welcome to a2k anyway!
Hi and sorry for my mistake
Hi
So sorry for my previous mistake.
I'll edit my post and remove them.
thanks,
Marie
Re: Re Websites . . .
Charli wrote:boxxies - Re websites - There is a place in your profile to list a website. Then, it will show up as "www" at the bottom of every one of your posts on A2K.
For example, check my post here. However, this particular "www" goes to my most favorite website. If you read my profile, you will see the URL for my own website - which you can type into your browser to open it.
I'll mention that there is - and always has been - a couple of pages of "Good News" on it - which change from time to time. That is, whenever I have time.
[/color]
Hi,
Im sorry but I don't see "profile" anywhere, where is it located?
thanks,
Marie
In your "signature" . . .
boxxies - Get rid of the URL in your signature - on your Profile page. Go back to your Profile to do this.
While you are there, you can see a place in the "Profile" to type in a "Website." That will make you a "Profile tab." (See my Profile tab?)
profile
Hi Charli,
I think I did right this time,
thanks for your help.
Marie
So, any good news, anyone?
G'day, Msolga. How about this:
news
Drop your guns
and hear the news
The war is won
and we've called a truce
The key is found
and the circle complete
And the higher ground
is beneath our feet
Like the turn of a page
or a change of gear
A brand new age
is already here
And even while
men pursue their doom
A magical child
is kicking in the womb
I'm preparing for birth
I'm not the only one
I'm a part of the Earth
I'm a drop of the Sun
I'm in step with the stars
I'm in a league with the land
I'm a functioning part of the Master's Plan!
KILLER BISCUITS WANTED FOR ATTEMPTED MURDER (The actual AP
headline) Linda Burnett, 23, a resident of San Diego, went
to a nearby supermarket to pick up some groceries. Several
people noticed her sitting in her car with the windows
rolled up and with her eyes closed, with both hands behind
the back of her head.
One customer who had been at the store for a while became
concerned and walked over to her car. He noticed that Linda's
eyes were now open, and she looked very strange. He asked her
if she was okay. Linda replied that she'd been shot in the
back of the head, and had been holding her brains in for over
an hour. The man called the paramedics, who broke into the car
because the doors were locked and Linda refused to remove her
hands from her head. When they finally got in, they found that
Linda had a wad of bread dough on the back of her head. A
Pillsbury biscuit canister had exploded from the heat, making a
loud noise that sounded like a gun shot and the wad of dough hit
her in the back of her head. When she reached back to find out
what it was, she felt the dough and thought it was her brains.
She had initially passed out, but quickly re-covered and tried
to hold her brains in for over an hour until someone noticed
and came to her aid.
And yes, Linda is a blonde.
That's funny, bobsmythhawk! But I have some sympathy for poor Linda, though. Attempting to hold your brains in, while sitting in your car in a carpark, is no small challenge!
Thank you for responding to my desperate call. Much appreciated!
Any more good news out there, folks? We need a break from all this grim stuff!
This, in the opinion section of today's NYTimes, in memory of Miss Gould -
APPRECIATIONS
The Point of Miss Gould's Pencil
By VERLYN KLINKENBORG
Published: February 16, 2005
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never met Miss Gould. But deep in a box at home are the proofs of articles I once wrote for The New Yorker, and in the margins is the handwriting of Eleanor Gould Packard - the magazine's venerable arbiter of style, who died on Sunday at 87. I thought I knew a lot about the English language at the time. I had a Ph.D. in English literature from Princeton, an old-fashioned kind of doctorate with an emphasis on literary history and textual editing. So it came as a surprise to see those proofs. Broader questions had been settled. But it was clear from Miss Gould's annotations - her very direct strictures - that a few details of syntax, usage and logic still needed to be fixed.
I reacted the way I suppose many writers did when they first saw a Gould proof - with disbelief and dismissal. But a writer soon learns to welcome anyone who can offer real insight into the nature of prose, and that Miss Gould could certainly do. I learned from her neatly inscribed comments that even though I was writing correctly - no syntactical flat tires, no grammatical fender-benders - I was often not really listening to what I was saying. That may seem impossible to a reader who isn't a writer. But Miss Gould's great gift wasn't taking writers seriously. It was taking their words seriously. No writer, at first, is quite prepared for that.
Miss Gould managed to seem larger than life without ever leaving the margins of the unpublished page. To some people, I suspect, she came to embody the negative image of the copy editor: punctilious, schoolmarmish and blue-stockinged. But the grasp she had on the written word, on the inner springs and impulses of the language, made grammar and syntax and diction resemble the laws of physics. From one angle, those laws mark the limits of nature. From another angle, they define the very energies that shape the universe and make it intelligible. VERLYN KLINKENBORG
Lovely, osso!
And Ms Gould would be proud!
There's something very satisfying about reading a tribute like this for one whose normally unsung, unseen & unacknowledged. Well said, Verlyn Klinkenborg!
