Top 10 Activities Seldom Seen Outside Gym Class

Gym class can be both a beautiful and dreadful thing: beautiful in its celebration of health, competition and physical fitness, dreadful in its Darwinian grading system, embarrassing requirements (come on, even real gym locker rooms are outfitted with private shower stalls), and failure to inform you correctly. Yes, gym class is prone to frequent misinformation, such as the fact it’s okay for a real teacher to be hungover on the job, or that a majority of the sports, games and activities that are played in gym class don’t really have a place outside of grade school. At least in any conventional sense.

For instance, there is no jump rope league, and the closest thing to lacrosse having a place in our day-today lives is using a pooper scooper to pick up some dog crap, followed by a wrist-guided flick into a trash bag. Sure there are informal organizations and such but there are only a handful of major sports that are given any serious or passionate consideration, and they are so for being national past times. Here we’ll take a look at some past times that never end up being carried into the present, the top ten activities that don’t REALLY exist outside of gym class:

10

Jump Rope

There’s no knocking that jumping rope is great cardio, and there’s always those champions at the gym who like to exhibit this fact, as if we don’t immediately think of “double dutch” and hot pink nylon chords with frilly handles, at the prospect of “jumping rope.” It is, after all, the activity of choice for little girls. Good thing, though, they do make them in baby boy blue. Gender equality indeed.

9

Handball

AKA “gatorball,” “Z-Ball,” etc. This game went by many names, depending on your gym teacher, which shows the games lack of universality. Handball, was essentially soccer, but with the ability to kick the the ball up into your own hands, or someone else’s, and pass the ball around as if basketball rules applied. It was fun at the time, but dangerous indoors, what with the ability to kick the ball directly into the girl with glasses in the bleachers. It probably didn’t catch on in any grander sense because the game is so unoriginal, kind of a hodge-podge of already-established sports (including dodgeball).

8

Obstacle Course

The real only other place an obstacle course applies is military boot camp (which gym class felt the need to prepare timid middle schoolers for). There was the infamous rope climb, which always beckoned the temptation of swinging from the rope like Tarzan before the gym teacher turned purple with anger. There was that box where you would stretch to see how far you could push the knob, a flexibility test. There was the pull up bar that separated the scrawny boys from the puberty-ready men. And there was the step box. Come to think of it, there was a lot of weird little doodads that seemed to have no other purpose but to “size you up for the pick’n's.” These don’t exist anywhere else (except for the pull-up bar), but they might prove more showing if they did, say for people old enough to make health a priority. Otherwise, it was the worst week of gym class, just after the scoliosis screenings.

7

Water Polo

Think regular polo, except with a volleyball and an open palm instead of a golf club, and with a drowned horse and you have a gratuitous definition of Water Polo. A better definition would be swimming meets handball, handball, again, being soccer meets hands. This game is very rigorous, and requires a level of fitness and lung capacity that can only exist in high school. As such, the game has its place mostly in extra-curriculars (apparently this was where the line was drawn at which grading on ability become cruel).

6

Badminton

While it’s not fair to say this game doesn’t exist outside of gym class, its only other apparent refuge is in a yuppie’s backyard lawn, or at a company barbecue. It is a whole lot of fun to play, largely in how it defies gravity and makes a plummeting object a little less threatening. Definitely more fun to play than watch (likely why it’s never televised).

5

Crab Soccer

Just like it sounds, this game required you to take an obscene, Exorcist-inspired position and carry on an otherwise regular game of soccer. As if soccer needed another way to make scoring impossible (what with tallies that rarely exceed a third). It was a blast though, and was at least as much fun to watch as it was to play.

4

Pickle Ball

Essentially, this was table tennis on a large scale. The components were a plastic paddle, a wiffle ball and a low net. This was a way to take a game room staple and make it somewhat athletic, though it should be obvious why it hasn’t come to replace actual tennis. Partly for the fact that plastic on plastic offers little trajectory. Next we’ll see large scale fooseball, with huge plastic spinny-dudes and actual soccer goals.

3

Tumbling

This is what gym teachers called “Gymnastics for Men.” Here gender norm-defying boys would “tumble,” do handstands, cartwheels and a bunch of other things that would be the juiciest insult bait, if it weren’t for the fact that EVERYONE was required to participate. Only good aspect: leotards weren’t mandatory. While it may have its place, as men very much participate in Olympic gymnastic competitions, there aren’t very many recreational clubs catering to this activity, partly for its lack of team-orientedness.

2

Ultimate Frisbee

Good news: Football has been officially made accessible for stoners, otherwise unmotivated by competition. Ultimate frisbee is, after all, really just Football with a disc, a disk that’s a whole helluva lot easier to catch than a ball (you know, that thing that’s scary when it decides to come right to you). A frisbee at least hovers passively before landing safely in some outstretched arms. Not surprisingly, this “sport” can’t seem to find a place further than college campuses. Now maybe if it had a better work ethic…

1

Dodgeball

AKA “Find-and-Eliminate Fatty.” This game is the rawest form of determining who in a select group is fit to survive and procreate (all those genital shots help decide this as well). The game requires coordination, reflexes, and other things that a computer game can’t teach. When a gym teacher allows this game to go on, all rules of a fair and decent society quickly disappear to be replaced by basics instincts of the lowest, id-guided order. Now imagine if, instead of job interviews, a game of dodgeball took its place; there’d be no chance of success in this world for the weak. Also, the world would be a very beautiful and largely unintelligent place.

by Ryan Thomas - http://listverse.com

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More sick, dead, in European E. coli outbreak

Two new deaths linked to a mysterious bacterial outbreak in Europe blamed on tainted vegetables were reported Tuesday, including the first outside Germany, as the number of reported cases continued to rise.

The deaths brought to 16 the total number of fatalities linked to the E. coli outbreak, with northwestern Germany the hardest-hit region.

Hospital officials in Boras, Sweden, announced the death of woman in her 50s who was admitted on May 29 after a trip to Germany. In Paderborn, Germany, the local council said an 87-year-old woman who also suffered from other ailments had died.

In Germany, the national disease control center said 373 people were sick with the most serious form of the outbreak - hemolytic uremic syndrome, or HUS, a rare complication arising from an infection most commonly associated with E. coli. That figure was up from the 329 reported Monday.

Susanne Glasmacher, a spokeswoman for the Robert Koch Institute, said another 796 people have been affected by the enterohaemorrhagic E.coli, also known as EHEC, bacteria - making a total of more than 1,150 people infected.

Hundreds of people also have been sickened in other European countries, but until Tuesday Germany had seen the only deaths.

The same strain of E.coli now in Europe hit the U.S. state of Montana in 1994, leaving 11 people sick, including four who were hospitalized. A year earlier, a related strain of E.coli killed four children in the western United States and sickened about 500 people after they ate contaminated hamburgers at a fast-food chain, Jack in the Box. Unlike those limited outbreaks, however, the European one is much larger, deadlier, and predominantly striking adults.

In Sweden, hospital medical chief Jerker Isacson said Tuesday that the Swedish woman who died had been ill for a few days before she arrived at the hospital on Sunday and died early Tuesday.

"She developed serious complications, among other things on the kidneys," he said.

The Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control on Monday said 39 Swedes have been infected with EHEC so far, including 15 with the severe HUS.

Britt Akerlind, spokeswoman at the institute, said it is unclear why so many Swedes had been infected, but said it could be that efficient reporting mechanism in the Nordic country means more cases have been discovered here.

Other cases have been reported in Denmark, France, the U.K., the Netherlands and Switzerland.

Germany's Federal Institute for Risk Assessment is still warning consumers to avoid all cucumbers, lettuces and raw tomatoes as the outbreak is investigated. Although the number of officially reported cases has shot up since late last week, regional officials have said this week that they are seeing a sharp drop-off in the number of new cases.

European Union officials have said that German authorities identified cucumbers from the Spanish regions of Almeria and Malaga as possible sources of contamination and that a third suspect batch, originating either in the Netherlands or in Denmark and traded in Germany, is also under investigation.

They have also noted, however, that the transport chain is long, and the cucumbers from Spain could have been contaminated at any point along the route.

The Danish Veterinary and Food Administration said Tuesday that no traces of EHEC acteria were found in tests conducted over the weekend.

"There is therefore nothing that indicates that Danish cucumbers are the source of the serious E.coli outbreak that has infected several patients in Germany, Denmark and Sweden," the agency said.

In the meantime, Russia's chief sanitary agency o Monday banned the imports of cucumbers, tomatoes and fresh salad from Spain and Germany pending further notice.

It said that it may even ban the imports of fresh vegetables from all European Union member states due to the lack of information about the source of infection.

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Phase: The wounds of change

Waves of change: Maria Bernadeth (left) and Davit (right) perform in the dance titled Padusi, choreographed by Jefri Andi Usman. Photo courtesy of Bodi CH

Silence swept through a stage dotted with dead trees, until monotonous low-key sounds could be discerned. 

Some movements accompanied the continuous sounds, bathed in illumination on the right-hand corner at the back of the stage.

The movements and sounds were a reminder of oil refining machines endlessly draining our earth’s resources. A body later appeared, crawling slowly like a caterpillar coming out of a “time machine”, looking wobbly. Another body also emerged. They were seemingly part of the dead vegetation around. 

Other monotonous sounds followed, mimicking the drone of chainsaws in forests along with sawmills. The silence came to an end. The bodies were wriggling, trying to rise, only to fall headlong to the ground. The earth was wounded. The sounds of woodcutting machines never ceased, humming all the time and creating inconceivable agony. 

This portrayal of a wounded and aging earth of life caused by neglect from the modern men was featured in Tanah Merah (Red Soil), the first part of Tabusai Dance co.’s PHASE presented by choreographer Jefri Andi Usman, 39, at Gedung Kesenian Jakarta (GKJ) this month. 

Of Minang (West Sumatra) origin, Jefri has toured various countries and collaborated with world choreographers like Henrietta Horn, Juan Cruz (Germany, Yukio Waguri, Kota Yamazaki (Japan) and Peter Chin (Canada). 

Change has given rise to countless wounds. This situation was portrayed with a murky sense of poetry. 

Red soil: Choreographer and dancer Jefri Andi Usman performs in his choreographic work Tanah Merah. Photo courtesy of Bodi CH

The entire imagination put across on stage stemmed from human tragedy. 

Normal life is something indistinct, only to be longed for, which was articulated by the sounds of sampelong and puput labu (traditional Minang wind instruments) and digirudu (aboriginal instrument), wailing vaguely, as if coming from a far-off cave. 

Jefri, with his awareness and experience, has freed himself from the temptation or desire of presenting neatly composed and beautifully designed works for spectators to feast their eyes on, which would ruin the artistic quality of his choreography.

Padusi (Minang for women), was the second part of the PHASE show. The stage was cleared of the dead trees. The entire space was left open to depict the existence of women under the matrilineal system currently battered by the waves of changing times, which Jefri has been obsessed with. 

Bodi CH: Photo courtesy of Bodi CH

In Minang society, women as the pillars of family life or clans and whose position is guarded by a social system based on religious culture, today have to face the inevitable waves of transformation.

Padusi was not staged in a realistic manner. Songs, percussions and wind instruments offered richer artistic energy to convey the reality of change taking place at present. Today’s Minang women freely go beyond the confines of gender, causing them to be alienated from traditional life. 

Removed from traditional frames of the past, they appear to be modern, yet without having created a new identity for themselves. They may be enjoying their freedom, but they have lost their identity in the course of the change, which is still not well understood. 

They are more concerned with deriving pleasure from freedom rather than with the honor and moral superiority of padusi as implied by their tradition and culture. 

The ancestral songs belted out by golden-voice singer Piterman, a touring vocalist and graduate from the Indonesian Art College of Padangpanjang, sounded like mantras. He produced humming, groaning and even howling tones for the sake of recreating the lost air of tranquility of bygone times, now overwhelmed by the waste of change.

Along with Risdul and Desmal Hendri, also alumni of the same college, he built varying moods by presenting several acts without music while maintaining the musical atmosphere of the stage. 

The jerky body language of Maria Bernadeth and Davit with padusi being carried on male shoulders was the most down-to-earth expression of the wild transformation as perceived by Jefri. 

With Jefri’s artistic and lighting direction that remained open to various possibilities, the stage was like two paintings of PHASE that still left unfilled spaces on the canvases. The trees also assumed a minimal function. More extensive and profound exploration is needed for high quality artistic achievements. 

Jefri was capable of communicating it all as proven in his previous work, Akan Jadi Malam (It’s going to be night). Davit and Maria as dancers in Padusi were not adequately challenged to demonstrate their best quality as they had done in Akan Jadi Malam, though. 

Finally, with the potential they all have developed so far, the future of Tabusai Dance co. will depend highly on their management competence.

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LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game Reviews

Traveller's Tales' Lego action series may have been skirting the risk of oversaturation for a while now, but it's hard to fault the company's prodigious output when it keeps upping its own quality bar.Lego Pirates of the Caribbean is already the second Lego game in the first five months of this year, so it's no surprise how closely it hews to the specific formula these games have been using since the very beginning. But Pirates advances the look and feel of the Lego series in enough meaningful ways that it's mostly a genuine pleasure to play, provided you haven't had your fill of Lego action already.

This package covers all four Pirates of the Caribbean movies, including the new not-quite-yet-released-at-the-time-of-this-writing flick On Stranger Tides. You get five lengthy levels per movie that all spawn from an island hub area, which is itself bursting with scores of unlockable characters, cheat code-enabling pickups, and sundry other collectibles. This series has always been about amassing as much of its collectible riches as possible, and I still found myself getting sucked into the feedback loop of collecting Lego studs to buy new characters and cheats so I could go back to previous levels and access new areas so I could get even more studs so I could buy more... well, you get the picture, but the point is, the formula still works.

The puzzle design has gotten a bit more sensible.

At least it works when it's supported by well-designed gameplay and a subject matter that lends itself to the irreverent Lego treatment, and Pirates succeeds on both of those fronts better than some past Lego games. The movie franchise itself is already pretty silly, so Captain Sparrowand friends slide right into the ridiculous, mute cinematic style Traveller's Tales has polished to a high sheen over the last few years. There are plenty of great little touches spread throughout the game, like Lego Sparrow's ostentatious walk animation or the way the cursed crew of the Black Pearl seamlessly turns skeletal when they step into moonlight. The game does a great job of recreating the feel of the movies and eliciting a good number of chuckles.

Trial and error has traditionally ruled the experience of playing these Lego games. In this one you'll still spend plenty of time busting up every piece of scenery you can until you figure out what it is you need to do--which still has a simple charm to it, don't get me wrong--but at least Pirates is a little better about directing your attention via floating button prompts and other onscreen iconography than previous Lego games like Batman and Harry Potter. In this relative absence of head-scratching "what the hell do I do now?" moments, the game peppers some more thoughtful environmental puzzles here and there, as well as some neat action setpiece moments that have you sword fighting up on catwalks or riding giant water wheels through the jungle. The game isn't without its frustrations: any sort of platforming or jumping-based puzzle usually ends in gritted teeth, and the dynamic split-screen that comes into effect in co-op isn't as intelligent as it should be. (Put those two specific things together and you may end up throwing a controller.) But these levels are more varied and rewarding to play through than I remember those old Lego games being.

Lego Mortal Kombat, coming soon.

It's kind of shocking how much the graphics and presentation of the Lego series have matured over time, culminating in this game with a visual style that doesn't just look fantastic for a Lego game, but for any game. The developers have added so many little cinematic tricks to the game's repertoire--things like high-contrast lighting and reflections, motion blur, and depth of field--that it looks way, way better than you would expect a kid-friendly game like this to look. Graphics don't make the game, of course, but they sure make it a whole more pleasant to look at.

That's the biggest success of the Lego franchise to date, and specifically of Lego Pirates: it's a game for kids that adults can have fun with too (and one they shouldn't be ashamed of enjoying). It's nice to see this series mature and evolve over time, and while Traveller's Tales will need to continue upping the ante if it intends to keep putting out new Lego games at such a rapid clip, for the moment Lego Pirates offers plenty of reasons to jump back in and mash a few plastic bricks together again.

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Games L.A. Noire Reviews

Before you approach Rockstar's vintage crime opus L.A. Noire, you should set your expectations and be clear that it is, at its core, an adventure game. LikeGrand Theft Auto and its legion of imitators, this game has a sprawling, open city environment for you to explore, but don't expect to grab a Tommy gun and wreak havoc in that city whenever you feel like it. This just isn't that kind of game. Instead, the focus is squarely on good, clean police work: scouring crime scenes for evidence, extracting information from persons of interest whether they're willing to talk or not, building a case, making an arrest. It's a hard-nosed and methodical experience that's not quite like anything else I've played in a game of this scale.

The game's 1947 Los Angeles presents a booming urban jungle full of post-war opportunities for both triumph and tragedy. Like the canon of film noir this game borrows heavily from, it's a world where anyone and everyone is harboring secrets, and even the good guys are more concerned with extracting confessions and generating headlines than with petty trifles like due process. (And that's assuming they truly are good guys in the first place.) Your straight-laced LAPD detective Cole Phelps is a far cry from the anti-heroes and scoundrels that anchor most of Rockstar's games, and a great contrast to this atmosphere of corruption, paranoia, and opportunism. He's a war hero and do-gooder who believes, perhaps naively, that he can actually help clean up his city--though, like almost everyone else in the game, even Phelps has secrets to hide.

Real-world figures like gangster Mickey Cohen make the game feel authentic.

Rockstar usually works exclusively with winking facsimiles of actual places, people, and history, but L.A. Noire's ripped-from-the-headlines Los Angeles is the real deal. The city itself is modeled to a degree of detail that will make its layout and famous landmarks feel familiar to anyone who's spent any time around the modern-day version. You'll regularly find yourself cruising down Hollywood Boulevard, responding to a call for backup at 5th and Figueroa, or investigating a crime scene at the city's classic Egyptian Theater. Likewise, L.A. Noire's storyline concerns itself directly with mid-century Los Angeles artifacts like the Black Dahlia murder, West Coast crime bossMickey Cohen, and the construction of the city's now-infamous freeway system. The game's atmosphere and tone benefit tremendously from the inclusion of these historical elements and the decades of cultural mystique that have built up around them, giving a great sense of authenticity to the whole sordid affair.

As lovingly rendered as L.A. Noire's open world is, it's incidental to the way the game unfolds. You don't follow one seamless timeline from beginning to end, roaming around the city and picking up missions at will from people with exclamation marks over their heads or something. Instead the game is broken up into 17 lengthy vignettes, each focusing on a single case file and each one feeding directly into the next, often with time passing in between. Phelps will work different desks like arson, homicide, and vice as he ascends the LAPD ladder, and the multiple cases you investigate on each desk contribute to individual story arcs that themselves serve as single acts within the greater plot. You'll get to know new cops and crooks at each desk, but important characters tend to pop up again and again throughout the game, creating a cohesive storyline that goes to some dark places and becomes tense as all hell as it builds toward its climax. The writing is among the best in the business, creating some really memorable and often despicable characters who speak with just the sort of antiquated speech necessary to make the dialog feel appropriate to the setting.

Steely Capt. Donnelly here wants you to bring back a confession--at any cost.

The game's episodic structure is effective preicsely because you're playing by police rules, and Phelps is such a by-the-book kind of guy. It would be entirely out of character and context for you to blow up a block full of cars or wantonly go on a shooting spree in the middle of MacArthur Park, and in fact, you can't even draw your gun unless you're placed in a situation where you reasonably need to use it. Repeat: no random acts of violence allowed. I can respect the limits the game places on your open-world freedom; these limits are there in service of the story and maintaining your immersion within it. There seems to be an awareness of those limits in the design, too, since you're not actually required to drive to each new destination; you can set a map waypoint and have your partner drive, effectively fast-travelling you directly there if you just want to get on with the detective stuff. Since you're never in the car for more than a few minutes at once, I found myself doing almost all the driving myself just to take in the city's sights, and because the game does a good job of masking its load times with the driving sequences, making for a more seamless experience. Driving around during a case also gives you the chance to unlock new Los Angeles landmarks and respond to petty street crimes called out over police dispatch, both of which carry peripheral benefits in addition to giving you a break from the case at hand, but I'll get to those in a bit. (There's a lot going on in this game.)

That's all side stuff, anyway. You play L.A. Noire primarily to solve crimes, and your investigations are broken down into a few specific mechanical components that all feed into each other to generate new leads for you to follow. Your first step is almost always to visit the crime scene itself and gather clues, and the game does a great job of letting you get up close and hands-on with the evidence, letting you manipulate suspicious objects, documents, and even corpses directly. The detail on this stuff is fine enough that you can extract really specific information, like a gun's serial number, and add it to the list of people, places, and clues that you manage in an in-game notebook. There are some neat puzzles scattered here and there that have you piecing objects back together or solving clockwork locks and things of that nature, so it's not all just eyeballing an insurance policy for incriminating information (though there is that, too).

You can't build a case without gathering the right evidence...

Then there's the game's most talked-about--and what I suspect will be its most divisive--feature, the conversation system. This is where you ask questions (or demand answers) from suspects or other people of interest, then have to determine whether they're telling you the truth or not, and if necessary, present some kind of evidence to disprove their statements. Yes, it's not unlike Phoenix Wright. In the absence of the right evidence, you have to look at their faces and body language, and also try to get inside their heads and think about their motives, to get the right "answer." There is only one right answer to each question, which will probably put some people off, and I'd agree this would be a damnable offense if failing to catch a suspect in a lie triggered some kind of failure or restart. But instead you'll merely miss out on some piece of information and be required to make up for it in some other way, which changes the course of your investigation and gives the flow of each case a dynamic feel. If you, like me, are the sort of person who exhausted every single dialog choice in Mass Effect, you'll eat this stuff up and wish there were more of it.

The chance of missing information isn't unique to the conversations. The most important thing to know about the investigations in L.A. Noire is that there's a relatively high degree of variability in the way a case plays out. You can't "fail" a case, per se; you'll always conclude it by nabbing someone--again, making an arrest is more important to most of these cops than discovering the truth--even if that someone isn't actually the right person. But the route you take to get there depends on all kinds of factors, like whether you noticed a crucial piece of evidence or not, or what order you chose to visit a list of locations on your agenda. I went back and played several cases again (the game lets you do this easily from a cases menu) and found several clues I had missed earlier, which allowed me to construct a stronger line of questioning and solve the cases more expeditiously than the first time around. A couple of times, I completed cases without even visiting every location or talking to every suspect, since I'd already gathered enough evidence to go after the perpetrator. It's ironic that the worse you perform, the more content you'll potentially see, but this flexibility helped me feel like I was doing my own casework instead of following a single, rigid "correct" path through each case.

...but sometimes you can just let your piece do the talking.

How thoroughly you run your investigation feeds into a five-star rating presented at the end of a case, and this rating directly informs the praise or dressing-down you get from your current superior. (You really don't want to raise the ire of the Irish captain of the homicide squad, with all his righteous sword-of-justice blarney.) More importantly, the rating feeds into a thin RPG layer where you rank up and earn "intuition" points that you can cash in to ease the interrogation and evidence-gathering aspects. You can also unlock new suits for Phelps and a number of fast, fancy cars by ranking up. Doing other side activities like discovering the LA landmarks and completing the street crime missions also generate experience points, so there's a feedback mechanism in place to encourage you to get into the side activities. There are 40 of those petty crime missions, which are usually only a few minutes long and culminate in some kind of quick action sequence after a short cinematic setup explaining what's going on. Expect bank heists, peeping toms, and other undesirable elements of society that need addressing.

Those types of action sequences also punctuate the story-driven cases when the situation becomes dire enough to call for them. You'll end up chasing a lot of suspects on foot, and you can stop them in their tracks with a warning shot if you can hold your aim on them long enough. Otherwise you'll usually end up getting into a fistfight with them, or gunning them down if they take a hostage. The game does have occasional full-on shooting sequences, operating on a perfectly competent cover-based model, though it should tell you something that there's an achievement for gunning down 100 bad guys and I didn't get it until the last case of the game. The car chases are my favorite aspect of the game's action sequences; the loose, arcade-like handling lets you skid around corners and deftly evade traffic as you try to get close enough for your partner to shoot out a suspect's tire from the passenger side. Then you ram the guy off the road or flip him over. All of this action is relatively basic but hard-hitting enough to be quite entertaining, and these sequences pop up just often enough to provide a nice contrast to the more sedate investigative work.

The noir stylings really help sell the experience.

The game comes by its title honestly, doing just about everything it can to evoke the noir classics from the period that inspired it. That ranges from the typeface used to present each case's title to the fact that you can play the entire game in black and white, which enables the sort of harsh contrast you would expect from the genre. The big-orchestra score feels completely appropriate for the setting and subject matter, and there's a great musical aspect to the investigations as well. When you're out looking for clues you'll get single notes from the piano and stand-up bass indicating there's more evidence to be found, and sustained strings add some discomfort to the interrogations when the tension starts to build between Phelps and his subject. And the game pulls no punches at all. The seedy underside of Los Angeles is an ugly, ugly place: racism, misogyny, rape, pedophilia, mutilation, infidelity, betrayal, and a truckload of grisly corpses (that you'll get up close and personal with) are just some of the elements that underpin the game's cases. It definitely earns its mature rating.

Talking about the presentation, a review of this game would be remiss without discussing the performances, because all the ballyhoo about L.A. Noire's facial animation is not for nothing. Judged purely by their faces, these are simply the most impressively believable characters I've ever seen in a game. It doesn't hurt that the performances range from good to stellar (you'll recognize a ton of character actors from all over the place), but the technology is what enables those performances to really show in every furrowed brow and widened eye. The sheer malleability of these faces--the wrinkles and expressions and nuances that can appear and then disappear before you even process them--is almost unnerving. There are some cases where the body movements look stilted or unnatural in contrast to the startling quality of the faces, but on the whole the believability of these characters plays a huge part of making L.A. Noire what it is. The game wouldn't work nearly as well without them.

The quality of the performances and facial animation is second to none.

Having spent a lot of time with both versions of L.A. Noire, the PlayStation 3 game is the clear-cut winner. Both versions of the game look fantastic, but there were a few instances of painful frame rate drops and objects drawing in too slowly on the Xbox that didn't exist on the PS3. Also, the shadows look a bit more jagged. This is splitting hairs, since both games look good enough that you should just get the one on the platform you prefer, though the PS3 also has the added benefit of being on a single disc to the Xbox's three, and includes an exclusive downloadable case (which I didn't get to try, and you probably won't be able to play either until the PlayStation Store is back online).

L.A. Noire is a bold release, because it defies the expectations not just for the type of game Rockstar usually releases, but also for the type of game that receives this degree of care and proficiency in its execution. The world already has enough open-world action games, but a game which marries that open world to such a methodical style of gameplay, with a budget this big, is a rare thing indeed.

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This review is for the X360 release of Dirt 3

I was a little worried when I first started playing Dirt 3. It seemed, in those first few hours, pretty similar to Dirt 2. Not that that’s a bad thing, of course, but if it’s just more of the same, why buy it? But after thoroughly exploring all the game has to offer, I can assure you it's much more than a simple rehash of 2009's offering.

Triangles!

The first thing you notice about any Dirt game, Dirt 3 included, is its interface. The Dirt series has developed a reputation for flashy menus and strong tone, most recently in Dirt 2, which maintained an almost overwhelming “totally rad Mountain Dew bro” attitude throughout the game. Dirt 3 sheds all this and instead opts for something more like “hanging out at the bar in a trendy Berlin hotel,” with its artsy triangular motifs and chill electronic music. While I personally preferred the stronger, more cohesive tone of the previous game, others may find this to be a welcome change. In any event, the menus are much faster and easier to navigate than Dirt 2’s immersive but somewhat cumbersome RV interface.

Selecting Dirt Tour will take you to the campaign, where you’ll see familiar modes like rally (point-to-point races), rallycross (motocross with cars), landrush (like rallycross but with trucks or buggies), trailblazer (like rally but with super fast cars), and head-2-head (one-on-one circuit races). Dirt 3 has also added a new mode, gymkhana, to the mix, but more on that later. Each mode is featured in a number of multi-race series that are spread throughout the campaign. Series of differing modes are grouped together in events, which unlock as the player earns points by doing well in each series. At the same time, the player earns “rep” points that can be used to unlock more cars. Rep points are earned by placing well, completing optional missions such as reaching a certain top speed, and by conserving flashbacks, the Dirt series’ name for its rewind feature.

Nighttime cockpit mode in the snow will put hair on your chest.

Unlike Dirt 2, which grouped series by locale, Dirt 3 jumps around between eight environments: Aspen (snow!), Finland, Kenya, the L.A. Coliseum, Michigan, Monaco, Norway, and the Smelter industrial site. That’s one fewer locale than Dirt 2, but Dirt 3 makes up for it with an increased number of tracks (double that of Dirt 2) and the inclusion of weather and time-of-day options. A wet track plays significantly differently from a dry one, as does one at night that you’ve previously only seen during the day. Some circuit tracks are so dark that you’ll find yourself having to memorize where turns are, turning blindly into blackness, hoping that your headlights will reveal some familiar section of wall. Nighttime rally courses are similarly intense, requiring you to rely almost exclusively on your co-driver for directions. Night races are, in short, awesome.

If that sounds crazy to you, don’t worry. Dirt 3 has made things easier on newer players by including optional throttle, brake, and steering assists. The game won’t quite play itself, but it can come pretty darn close. A dynamic racing line is also included. Like pretty much every other modern racing game, the line shows the best way around the track and changes color when it’s time to brake. As mentioned before, flashbacks are back, except now you get five of them per race, regardless of difficulty. Some may consider this feature a “dumbing down” of the game, but in my experience, having that safety nets encourages you to try riskier moves and ultimately become a better driver. Also, as far as I could tell, difficulty barely matters. Playing on a harder setting, while much more difficult in terms of how good your opponents are, does not affect the amount of points you get at the end of the series, nor does it affect your rep points. Really, the only thing holding you back from blasting through the game on easy is shame.

Uploading a clip to YouTube is as easy as watching a progress bar.

For those worried that the game may be losing its hardcore roots, fear not. Dirt 3 retains the series’ signature physics-regulated handling system, and even improves it a bit by adding independent suspension so cars rock realistically with changes in direction. It’s hardly a noticeable improvement until you go back to Dirt 2 and try to play without it. The graphics are similarly improved, with many minor upgrades conspiring to create some truly beautiful environments, and at no cost to a steady framerate.

But Dirt 3 isn’t all about improvements to existing features. It’s got some new ones as well, like YouTube integration. At any point during a flashback or after-race replay, one button takes you into the YouTube clip editing mode. Simply set an “in” and “out” point (the clips are limited to 30 seconds) and start uploading. The tools are fairly easy to use and require nothing more than a YouTube user name and password. Your uploaded videos aren’t HD quality, and they take a while to render and upload (about 10 minutes for a 30 second clip with my 3Mbps upstream connection), but it’s a great way to preserve and share any crazy moments you have.

In addition to the standard racing modes in the campaign, players will also run across gymkhana events. Gymkhana events are trick-based, taking place in open areas stuffed with obstacles for you to drift through, jump over, and do donuts around. There are a few different types, namely sprint (do these tricks in this order), smash attack (smack cardboard cutouts of robots with your car), speed run (make it through these gates in time), and attack (do these tricks in any order). This sort of Project Gotham Kudos-meets-Tony Hawk's Pro Skaterstyle of gameplay is lots of fun, but it can get pretty challenging. Fortunately, Dirt 3 features a free-roam area known as the Battersea Compound where players can practice their drifting skills without the pressure of a time limit. Collectibles and missions unique to this open area, like drifting around a backhoe, make Battersea a pretty cool spot to hang out in.

Gymkhana! Split-screen!

Gymkhana, as well as the rest of the racing modes from the campaign, also makes an appearance in multiplayer. Players can test their skills against each other in point-based matches, but the real action is in the party games. These modes, available as team or solo ranked and unranked matches, eschew most of the racing pretext and become full-blown minigames. They range from Outbreak, which takes place on a gymkhana course and is sort of a free-for-all capture the flag-meets-tag, to Cat ‘n’ Mouse, where two teams of rally cars have to escort their team’s underpowered “mouse” car to the finish while blocking the other team. These modes are a ton of fun. The game also supports local split-screen multiplayer for two people, a first for the series.

In order to play online, however, players are required to enter a code for the game’s “VIP Pass” (included in the game case), which also unlocks five additional cars and the ability to upload YouTube clips. As of this writing, the PlayStation Store is offline, making it impossible for PS3 players to redeem this code and consequently take part in any of the VIP Pass benefits, including online play.

The Dirt series has carved out a nice little niche in the racing game genre, one between the who-needs-the-brake-button-anyway madness of games likeMotorstorm and Burnout, and clinical, it’s-fun-because-it’s-real simulations likeGran Turismo and Forza. Dirt splits the difference, offering crazy mud-covered tracks and approachable yet nuanced controls, which combine to create the perfect blend of fun and challenge. Dirt 3, the latest installment, is no exception, and everything fans of the series have come to love in past games has been tuned and upgraded, making it feel an awful lot like the definitive off-road racing game.

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What We Know (And What I've Heard) About the Very Real PlayStation Vita

I probably spent too much of lazy BBQ with friends yesterday afternoon poking around on my phone about PlayStation Vita, allegedly the final name for the ugly-sounding Next-Generation Portable (NGP), but it all sounded like a bunch of nonsense.

Vita? Really? But I can tell you there's reason to suspect it's the final name.

The rumors started when Games Pundit cited an anonymous source telling them Sony would announce NGP's final name at E3 next week: Vita. Most shrugged their shoulders, but some legitimate-looking presentation images leaked on another blog, Mega Rock. That blog's since taken itself down. Too late, though.

There's more circumstantial evidence. Try pointing your browser towards vita.scedev.net, which leads you to Sony's developer portal--ngp.scedev.net works, too. psp2.scedev.net leads to a browser error, however, which means the subdomains were made legitimate by Sony.

Someone also registered playstationvita.com and psvita.com on April 19, long before rumors.

I've talked to several developer sources, all of whom asked to remain anonymous, as E3 is so close. But each confirmed Vita was definitely the codename for the project when Sony was first showing the hardware to developers. One developer said his company has stopped referring to the machine as Vita, preferring NGP or PSP2, but was unclear if Vita had been dropped.

When Sony revealed its next portable in January, it was not supposed to have "NGP" attached, I'm told. Sony was unable to find internal consensus on a final name, so the event grudgingly went ahead with something temporary. At the time, however, it was being referred to internally as Vita.

None of my sources were able to say with complete certainty whether Vita has stuck and that's the name that'll appear at Sony's press conference next week. But don't be surprised if it does.

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To: Congress, From: Sony--We Still Don't Know Who Hacked Us, Don't Believe Credit Card Data Taken

It feels like ages ago PlayStation Networkwas compromised, but despite weeks of investigation into the matter, Sony still doesn't have conclusive evidence on a number of key factors about the intrusion.

These updates come from the latest answers submitted by PlayStation executive Kaz Hirai, responding to the House Energy and Commerce Committee's subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade. Hirai and this subcommittee last discussed PSN through letter writing in early May, not long after the attack took place, PSN went down, accounts were exposed and Congress started questioning.

This comes in advance of Sony Network Entertainment president Tim Schaff appearing before the same subcommittee next Tuesday to answer in person. Hirai started by apologizing for that.

The letter is addressed for yesterday, May 26.

"I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to the committee for its appreciation of the gravity of the situation that Sony faced and, accordingly, allowing Sony to defer an appearance before the Committee," said Hirai. "Sony was unable to appear before the Committee due to exigent circumstancesSony was under attack and it was critically important that our key personnel remain available and ready to address critical issues as our network and game service operations were preparing to come back on line."

As it stands, Sony cannot conclusively say who was behind the attack. It does believe the same hacker or hackers was also behind Sony Online Entertainment's intrusion. The company continues to investigate, calling it an "ongoing criminal investigation," but the individuals remain elusive.

"We have not yet identified the individual or individuals responsible for the actual intrusion and breach into our systems," said Hirai. "We are continuing to work with the FBI to apprehend those responsible."

One day, it'll be all better, ya'll.

Some same auora of mystery also hangs around the data itself, with Sony unable to confidently say what or how much data was accessed. That said, it hasn't seen "forensic or circumstantial" evidence that credit card information was taken. Nonetheless, it still cannot entirely rule out the possibility.

"We have information that suggests what the hacker was accessing and what the hacker may have downloaded, but we are unable to determine conclusively whether information was actually taken from all orjust a portion of the user accounts," said Hirai. "Unfortunately we cannot confirm whether the hacker was completely successful in taking all of that information off the servers, or just a subset of it; in an abundance of caution, Sony advised all of its customers that it believed that the data had been obtained."

One final point the subcomittee was concerned about related to comments made by Sony CEO Howard Stringer about how it's impossible to "guarantee" a network will ever be totally safe.

"Mr. Stringer sought to emphasize that no individual, corporation, or government entity, standing alone, can truly guarantee security in a world of very sophisticated hackers, cyber attacks, and cyberterrorism," said Hirai. "Sony is implementing betterand more robust security measures to protect our customers. But just as individuals and businesses have come to rely on multiple law enforcement agencies for physical protection, we believe the private sector will need the assistance and support of government and law enforcement to help secure e-commerce and lT systems to stay ahead of and curtail the activity of cyber criminals and cyber terrorists."

Perhaps we'll learn more on Tuesday.

Want to read the whole letter from Hirai? I've attached it below.

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10 More Roads That Will Scare You Stupid

As if your IQ weren’t low enough from driving down the last ten roads, strap on your helmets because there are even more of these things! The last list featured selections by myself and Mr. Frater, but this list is primarily roads that the readers mentioned in the comments. So sit back, read on, and be prepared to get some more frights put up you!

10

Ghormley Road

Fayette County, Ohio

This one is at the number 10 spot for many reasons, but the most prominent reason is, perhaps, my bias towards it. I visited this road the night before I wrote this list and it was definitely a strange place to be. I saw nothing clear, so I dare not say it’s haunted (of course, I am almost entirely a skeptic). The road has an S curve with a bridge over a very fast moving creek. This is far and away the creepiest bridge I have ever set foot on! But, that’s my paranoia talking again, I suppose. Anyway, many cars met a foul end when taking the unexpected S curve too fast, and many ghosts are said to roam the area. On my visit, I saw strange movements and my friend heard whispering. Fellow Ohioans, I would recommend a trip to Ghormley next time you want to be spooked. Unfortunately, there are no good photos of the road or bridge so I have had to use a stock image.

9

Pali Highway

Honolulu, Hawaii

I’m uncertain if cops patrol this highway because, according to legend, your car will break down if you travel the thoroughfare with pork in your possession. But, I will leave this inquiry up to greater minds than mine. However, if you dare to travel the highway, do not bring pork, unless you want the angry and hungry spirits to break down your car. Or it could be Pele, but who’s keeping track? And while you are in the area, look up Old Pali Road so you can say “hey” to the ghost girl with half of her face missing. Ah, paradise!

8

Reformatory Road

Mansfield, Ohio

Ok, calm down. Two Ohio roads, Ian? Really? Well, yes, really. And that’s all, I promise. We’ve all heard of the movie The Shawshank Redemption, filmed at the Mansfield Reformatory, in Mansfield, Ohio (pictured above). But the building can’t hog ALL the attention. Phoebe Wise was an eccentric hermit. She lived alone, was unmarried and was just generally odd. As the youngest of 8 children, she inherited the house after her parents died, along with a few thousand dollars (a pretty good sum, if not filthy stinking rich). She also sold some land, for undisclosed amounts of money. Long story short, rumors spread of a hidden fortune. Some men broke in, tied her up, tortured her for her loot, and got very little to show for it (turns out, no treasure). They threatened to kill her if she left her house, and then booked it. She had a hard time dragging herself out to telegraph the police, considering the burglars had scorched her feet with a torch.

Phoebe survived and continued to live alone, until 1933. Now, she is said to walk the road, patrolling to keep an eye out for unwary burglars trying to ransack her home for lost treasure.

7

Mary Angela Road

Memphis, Tennessee

Landocommando would smack me if I didn’t include this and, fortunately, it actually turned out to be interesting! Mary Angela Road is a lonely, backwoods road that leads to the source of it’s legends: Voodoo Village. A small compound that is said to host many weird rituals and animal sacrifices, Voodoo Village is certainly an unsettling place to be. How haunted or evil this place is is disputed, and many rumors probably spawn from local residents’ ignorance, but between the weird, colorful paintings and the numerous, unexplainable statues, it isn’t hard to see why! The local inhabitants despise the name Voodoo Village, and will definitely get pissed off if you take pictures! Walsh Harris, founder of the establishment, used to belong to the Masonic Lodge, and much of the artwork there pertains to Masonic symbols and Scripture. A weird place for sure, and don’t expect be greeted with a smile. And don’t be too surprised if they block you in with a truck so you can’t leave…

6

Pacheco Pass

California

This road is notorious for numerous accidents, along with its ghosts! Many a sleepy driver has met an untimely end on the road, but many of its ghost stories aren’t even related to the accidents. A “time warp” of sorts is said to occur on the road, accounting for many reports of “lost time” (a phenomena detailed elsewhere on this very website), strange lights illuminate the sky, and men in Old West garb and a stagecoach make the occasional appearance. And, if that wasn’t enough, the San Luis Reservoir is said to host a mysterious light beneath the water. Side effects of driving on the road may include: Overwhelming feelings of dread/impending doom, inexplicable sadness, extreme apprehension or diarrhea. One of those is a joke, try to guess which.

5

Balete Drive

Philippines

Listverse’s many Filipino visitors were quite upset at the exclusion of their beloved Balete Drive. I did some research, and now I see why they were! According to legend, Balete trees (which are numerous along the road) attract ghosts and other paranormal entities. You would be wise to keep your eyes up front. A glance in your rear-view mirror may make your stomach turn with a truly disturbing surprise. A lady in a white dress will have hitched a ride, with long, flowing hair, and… No face. The last thing you want to do is check for cars behind you and be greeted with the silent likes of THAT. And if No-Face gives you the pass, you can still admire the road’s three haunted mansions. The previous owners were simply too attached to let them go.

4

Sweet Hollow Road

Melville, New York

The woods surrounding this road, and the road itself, are rumored to be quite heavily haunted. A few pictures from the local ghost hunters have turned up some very odd images. It isn’t hard to see why! Three teenagers, who were apparently in some kind of bad way in their lives, decided to end their lives by hanging themselves from the overpass. Some say you can still see their bodies swaying in the breeze on a cool, dark night. Mary, a nurse from the nearby hospital, wanders the road, perhaps to try and resuscitate the deceased teenagers. And if that isn’t all bad enough, don’t get pulled over. No, not because you were doing anything illegal (were you?), but because he who routinely patrols the area isn’t exactly… alive. The good news is that he won’t write you a citation, he’ll just silently stare at you with blood running down his shoulders. After he feels you get the point, he’ll turn around, exposing the gaping exit wound in the back off his head, where the fatal bullet exited his skull.

3

Lawler Ford Road

St. Louis, Missouri

Despite the name, this road has a slim chance of making you LOL (think about it…). More likely, it may make you PYP (Pee Your Pants). In fact, why don’t we just refer to it by it’s far more popular nickname, Zombie Road. This incredibly narrow road carves a lonely path through two miles of woods, only to dead end at what used to be a rock quarry. The road soon became all but abandoned, and the road sign has been replaced by a chained gate. Among the resident freaks are: A young boy who plummeted to his death from the nearby bluffs, and man struck and killed by a train, a crazy old lady who yells at you from her house at the end of the road, Native American spirits roaming the woods and plenty of Satan worshipers. Boy, do those Satanists love themselves some urban legends! The name of the road, however, wasn’t derived from these weirdos. Credit for the spooky nickname goes to a mysterious killer known as The Zombie. He would wait in his old shack for lovers and party goers to show up, and would attack them. Perhaps he isn’t gone… Reports of visitors disappearing aren’t uncommon.

2

El Camino de la Muerte

Bolivia

The only road on this list where its ghosts take a backseat to the road itself! And yes, the name translates to “The Road of Death.” Appropriate. The road is an incredibly dangerous winding highway that cuts through the mountains of Bolivia. Think 900 meter drop off with no guardrail, passing buses and trucks, despite the road being littered with debris and rock from the hillside. It has its fair share of ghosts, but if I were you, I’d be keeping my eyes on the road ahead, rather than scanning for spirits.

1

Shades of Death Road

New Jersey

If this list was solely based on names, Shades of Death would surely still be number one. Shades of Death can’t be too bad, it runs right by… Ghost Lake? Seriously? Somebody was just demanding this place be haunted! And haunted it is, according to most. Between a murderer (or murderers?), a violent gang of criminals, and a mysterious plague, this road has been no stranger to death. Some say that at times, the population of Malaria-carrying insects was so large, that victims would have to be laid out on the roadside in the hopes a traveling doctor would happen by and cure them. Ghost Lake, home to mysterious columns of mist and a haunted cabin, is the most popular stop on the drive. If you are lucky (or unlucky) enough, you may just catch a faint glimpse of a murder victim out for a stroll in the fog. Yes, New Jersey wins it again, I know. But Bolivia wasn’t in it to win it because it wasn’t so much the scary ghosts as much as the scary road planning! And let’s be honest, between the stories, the lake, the name and the history, Shades of Death was a worthy contender.

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Château de Fontainebleau: A True Home of Emperors

A corner of Château de Fontainebleau. JP/Triwik Kurniasari

This home of French kings and queens offers a glimpse of French history, art and magnificent architecture. 

“Don’t forget to go to Château de Fontainebleau. It’s a must-see,” my French-trained fashion designer friend Priyo Oktaviano said on learning of my plans to travel to France. Château de Fontainebleau — literally Fontainebleau castle situated around 70 kilometers southeast of Paris, is a palace of kings and emperors from François Ier (Francis I) to Napoléon III. 

The imperial Château has more than 1,500 rooms and sits on a 130-acre plot of land that has been continuously inhabited for seven centuries. Members of French ruling dynasties including the Capétiens, Valois, Bourbons, Bonaparte and Orléans families used to live within these palace walls. 

Based on Priyo’s suggestion and some research I did on the Internet, without hesitation I included the spot in my European tour itinerary. 

Jardin de Diane, an English-style formal garden which was ornamented with a statue of goddess Diana. JP/Triwik Kurniasari

It was a bright, sunny yet chilly day in Paris when I first arrived at the city’s Gare du Nord train station. I had decided that Château de Fontainebleau would be my first destination on my three-day visit to France. 

“Château de Fontainebleau was closed yesterday because of bad weather. I’m not sure if it’s already reopened. Please wait a minute. Let me check,” a man at the tourist information booth said in fluent English, picking up a phone to call the management of the castle. 

Around two days prior to my arrival in France, heavy snowfalls hit the capital and had forced the closure of Charles de Gaulle International Airport as well as several tourist destinations including the Eiffel Tower. A few minutes later, the man got back to me. “You’re in luck. Château de Fontainebleau is open. But Château de Versailles is still closed.” 

After buying train ticket and getting a few hints from the “information guy”, I was ready to set off for Fontainebleau. I was instructed to head to Gare de Lyon to take a train to Fontainebleau, but the station was so confusing that I found it difficult to find the platform. 

A view of the heart of Fontainebleau. JP/Triwik Kurniasari 

Fortunately, I met a local college girl who happened to be taking the same train as me. She led me to the train heading to Montereau, and we sat together in the carriage. Since I spoke only a little French, and she did not speak English, we hardly spoke during the journey. Apparently her station was before mine and just before she got off, she reminded me to take the bus A from Fontainebleau-Avon station. A few minutes later, I arrived at the station and took the A bus to Les Lilas, before getting off at the Château.

The grandeur of the castle is evident even before you go in the front gate, where you can see the castle’s horseshoe-shaped staircases that date back to the reign of Louis XIII in the 17th century. 

After depositing my belongings and paying an admission fee, ¤8, I finally began my castle adventure. Along the corridor heading toward the sovereign Grand Apartements on the first floor are several white statues of former emperors including Philippe de France and Charles IV le Bel. 

At the front of the Grand Apartements are a myriad beautiful paintings from past centuries. Then comes la Galerie des Assiettes (Plate Gallery) where painted plates are displayed on the wall. It is said that in the 19th century, King Louis-Philippe had 128 plates in Sèvres porcelain fitted into the woodwork, the Historical Service of Fontainebleau, which represents Fontainebleau, the Château, the forest and other royal houses, as well as other sites he visited. The cabinet, also in Sèvres porcelain, illustrates the marriage of his son in Fontainebleau in 1837. 

The front part of the château where we can see the horseshoe-shaped staircase dated back from the reign of Louis XIII in the 17th century. JP/Triwik Kurniasari

Later I came to the vestibule of the chapel, which is one of the principle entrances to the castle. The entrance has fine doors of sculpted oak surrounded by a rich encasement of stones. The furniture, also from oak, was made during the Second Empire. 

I later entered the Francis I Gallery, and as walked through it in my black boots, I felt as if I had just got out of a time machine and had traveled back to the time when emperors and empresses ruled France. 

The gallery was developed by Francis I in the 16th century to link the royal apartment to the chapel of the Trinity. Attracted by the Italian renaissance, during his reign, the king called upon Italian artists trained in the latest fashions, including Rosso Florentino (a disciple of Michelangelo) and Francesco Primaticcio (a painter at the court of Mantua). The “F” letter of Francis I, his emblem (the salamander) and the royal coat of arms can be seen here. 

Then there is the guard room, the first of the king’s apartments, which used to be occupied by the soldiers of the guard. Next is the ballroom, the construction of which started under Francis I and finished during the reign of his son, Henri II. The paneled ceiling and the monumental fireplace are the work of Philibert Delorme, while the rostrum above the entrance was intended for musicians. 

There is also the Louis XIII salon where the king was born in 1601, which has paintings, chandeliers, wooden chairs, sofas and china. Another gallery is la Galerie de Diane or Diana Gallery, which is an 80-meter-long and 7-meter wide, happens to be the longest room in the castle. 

Built by Henri IV, its decorations recount the story of the goddess Diana. By the 18th century, the room was dilapidated and then restored under Napoleon I and Louis XVIII, before it was later converted into a library under Napoléon III. The big globe at one end of the room was made for Napoléon I. 

The Château also features the marvelous chambers of kings and queens. The empress’ chamber, for example, was used by all the queens of France from queen Marie de Médicis (wife of Henri IV) to Empress Eugénie de Montijo. The silk hanging on its walls and covering the furniture was rewoven in Lyon, based on the original models of the 18th century. 

Also not to be missed are the two Marie Antoinette’s boudoirs, Turkish-style dressing rooms that were gifts from Louis XVI to his wife. While admiring the opulent décor and enchanting furniture, it seemed like I was watching the empresses spending their time in the room, sitting on cozy chairs, combing their hair and dressing themselves in beautiful royal gowns. 

The bright light of the gift shop’s lamps at the end of my long trip around the castle “awoke” me from the historical journey. I stopped there for a while to buy some postcards with lovely paintings of Fontainebleau on them.

When you visit the Château, don’t forget to take a stroll around its four main courtyards and three gardens. Among the gardens is the Cour de la Fontaine, which overlooks the Carp Lake. From the side of the courtyard, we can see the flying birds and swimming swans. Also drop by at the Grand Parterre, the largest formal garden in Europe, which was created between 1660 and 1664 by André Le Nôtre and Louis Le Vau. 

Not far from the entrance gate is the Jardin de Diane, an English-style formal garden, built during the reign of Henry IV, which contains a statue of goddess Diana. Here are plants including ginkgo biloba, bluebeard, and sweet gum. Several birds, including pigeons and peacock-like creatures, were also in the gardens that day. 

The sun was beginning to set and it was beginning to get cold as I left the Jardin de Diane. It seemed like one day was not enough to tour the whole castle and see its gardens. As I walked through the streets of Fontainebleau to the nearest bus shelter, I told myself I wanted to visit this town again some day in the future during spring or summer. 

Travel tips

•You can reach Fontainebleau simply by train. From Gare de Lyon station, take a train heading to either Montargis Sens or Montereau, get off at Fontainebleau-Avon station then take the “Ligne A” bus destined for Les Lilas and get off at the Château stop.

•If you are eager for adventure, you could also reach the castle on foot, which takes around 30 minutes from the Fontainebleau-Avon train station.

•If you plan to travel around the outskirts of Paris, including to Fontainebleau, you can buy a 1-6 zone pass which is also valid for airport links and travel to Disneyland Resort Paris and Versailles. With this Paris Visite pass, you can also get a discount on the entrance fee to several travel spots. 

•If you don’t have a 1-6 zone pass, you can buy a regular ticket directly from the ticket counter. Also, bring some small change to pay for bus tickets while on board. 

•The Château also provides an audio guide for paying visitors.

http://www.thejakartapost.com

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Top 10 Drugs and their Effects

Drug abuse is a very common problem in most countries so it seemed like a good topic for a list. This is a list of ten of the most abused drugs and the effects they have on people.

1. Heroin

Heroin is an opiate processed directly from the extracts of the opium poppy. It was originally created to help cure people of addiction to morphine. Upon crossing the blood-brain barrier, which occurs soon after introduction of the drug into the bloodstream, heroin is converted into morphine, which mimics the action of endorphins, creating a sense of well-being; the characteristic euphoria has been described as an “orgasm” centered in the gut. One of the most common methods of heroin use is via intravenous injection.

For the last 4 months, my partner and I have been recreationally using heroin. H became our weekend ritual. Lighting candles, playing music, brie and wine and grapes, reading tarot and finally fucking… for hours on end,the most intense beautiful technicolor sex. Each time we did it we got closer to each other. And each time we did it, we wanted to do it again, and again. We tried saying we’d only do it once every two weeks, but that lasted 6 days. We have rules about how much we do in one night, how late we stay up and so on. So far the rules have kept us safe from addiction. Unless you consider the nagging i-don’t-wanna-go-a-weekend-or-have-sex-without-it feelings. We’ve never run out, although, once we were down to our last little bit and I left the vial open on the night stand. I was reaching for the lube when I heardthe most sickening sound, the vial falling over. Turns out, I was mistaken, I had remembered to put the cap back on. But in those few seconds of uncertainty, my girl and I shot each other a look we had never seen before.. Fear.

2. Cocaine

Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. It is both a stimulant of the central nervous system and an appetite suppressant, giving rise to what has been described as a euphoric sense of happiness and increased energy. It is most often used recreationally for this effect. Cocaine is a potentcentral nervous system stimulant. Its effects can last from 20 minutes to several hours, depending upon the dosage of cocaine taken, purity, and method of administration. The initial signs of stimulation are hyperactivity, restlessness, increased blood pressure, increased heart rate and euphoria. The euphoria is sometimes followed by feelings of discomfort and depression and a craving to experience the drug again. Sexual interest and pleasure can be amplified. Side effects can include twitching, paranoia, and impotence, which usually increases with frequent usage.

The cocaine arrived and we agreed to use it at a time that translated to three and a half hours after I arrived. It cost $60 for what I was told was an eighth of a gram. This seemed rather expensive, but I was assured that it was ‘high quality product.’ I took the line up my left nostril. After about ninety seconds, I felt my heartbeat increase. It was definitely kicking in. I began to worry a bit, as I could feel my heart pounding and my pulse increasing. I finally felt as if it had reached a plateau. My heartbeat became level, albeit still very high. Many people say that one feelseuphoria – being invincible and/or the desire to clean the house. I did not feel either of these (and I did remember to think about these things). For me, the positive effects of cocaine came directly from knowing that I had reached a plateau and I was going to be fine. I felt invigorated, yet also very comfortable.

One of the best treatment for drug addiction is to consult with cocaine rehab centersfor recovery.

3. Methamphetamine

Methamphetamime, popularly shortened to meth or ice, is a psychostimulant and sympathomimetic drug. Methamphetamine enters the brain and triggers a cascading release of norepinephrine, dopamine and serotonin. Since it stimulates the mesolimbic reward pathway, causingeuphoria and excitement, it is prone to abuse and addiction. Users may become obsessed or perform repetitive tasks such as cleaning, hand-washing, or assembling and disassembling objects. Withdrawal is characterized by excessive sleeping, eating and depression-like symptoms, often accompanied by anxiety and drug-craving.

We first smoked meth on New Year’s Eve because we heard it was great for sex. I had to work the next day and so saved some to smokebefore work in the morning. When I got home another g was waiting for me and I smoked every day but one until I finally quit three months later. For three weeks we smoked meth with little consequence, then my skin became fragile and in addition to breaking out, started to swell. I was really worried because I was constantly thirsty and drinking water, but I rarely urinated. Then my kidneys started hurting. I had lost twenty pounds in two months and my husband had lost thirty, and we’d read somewhere that rapid weight loss can cause kidney failure. I slept every three or four days for an hour or so and woke feeling rested. I was an hour late for work everyday. My husband wrecked the truck three times. One day I forgot to feed my son. Everything was either the highest of highs or the lowest of lows, no in between existed anymore. We were bannedfrom the sauna at our apartment complex because no one else could use it. Our sweat smelled so strongly of ammonia it burned the eyes, it was caustic, and it burned our skin too. My husband and I haven’t done any drugs at all for four weeks, and things are slowly going back to normal. But I still want it. I can’t sleep tonight because I want it. I wrote this in all honesty mostly to help myself, to remind myself why I don’t want it. And still I want it.

4. Crack Cocaine

Crack cocaine, often nicknamed “crack”, is believed to have been created and made popular during the early 1980s . Because of the dangers for manufacturers of using ether to produce pure freebase cocaine, producers began to omit the step of removing the freebase precipitatefrom the ammonia mixture. Typically, filtration processes are also omitted. Baking soda is now most often used as a base rather than ammonia for reasons of lowered odor and toxicity; however, any weak base can be used to make crack cocaine. When commonly “cooked” the ratio is 1:1 to 2:3 parts cocaine/bicarbonate.

As I held the smoke in for a ten count and exhaled, I thought I felt nothing except a little excitement that was neither bad nor pleasurable. The complete rush some writers have called a ‘whole-body orgasm’ hit me shortly after and I distinctly remember demanding ‘more’ as soon as the realization of heaven-on-earth came. Some people say that the effects of smoking crack lasts 10-15 minutes. For me, it was just a shortest instant of gratification. Everything afterwards was just a great increase in energy and confidence geared towards obtaining more of the drug.

5. LSD

Lysergic acid diethylamide, LSD, LSD-25, or acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the tryptamine family. Arguably the most regarded of all psychedelics, it is considered mainly as a recreational drug, an entheogen, and a tool in use to supplement various types of exercises for transcendence including in meditation, psychonautics, and illegal psychedelic psychotherapy whether self administered or not. LSD’s psychological effects (colloquially called a “trip”) vary greatly from person to person, depending on factors such as previous experiences, state of mind and environment, as well as dose strength. They also vary from one trip to another, and even as time passes during a single trip. An LSD trip can have long term psychoemotional effects; some users cite the LSD experience as causing significant changes in their personality and life perspective. Widely different effects emerge based on what Leary called set and setting; the “set” being the general mindset of the user, and the “setting” being the physical and social environment in which the drug’s effects are experienced.

About ten years ago I bought my third trip from a guy in my home town Norwich (UK) It was a ‘Strawberry’ and I was told it had been double dipped. The guy had a reputation for selling good acid so I happily gave him my cash. I took the single LSD tab in the late morning in a positive state of mind with no worries or anxieties. I began to come up on the acid towards the lunch time. It was to be the first and last time I’d ever trip alone. Outside it was a glorious sunny day but I was happy enough in my temporary sanctuary to even think about going outside. The LSD rush started blazing up my spine and racing through my guts, I felt a little uneasy with it but had enough mind to allow myself to just go with it and wait until the rush plateaued. I was having a wonderful time, watching floral Escher type patterns breathing over my skin. I vaguely recall deciding to go downstairs again for some reason then the next thing I recall was awakening on the floor of the dining room alone. The first thing I noticed was that there were blowflies buzzing around a bowl of catfood on the kitchen floor. I remember feeling perplexed as to why both flies had two bright neon after images in red and blue. Somehow I navigated myself through Norwich during the busy lunchtime shoppers and begun to head in the direction of the city’s central park ‘Chapelfield gardens’. If you could imagine for a moment being surrounded by people in a busy place where their heads had been removed and replaced by Squids and Octopus you might begin to accurately picture the scene confronting me in the park. Everyone had tentacles smothering their faces and dangling down their necks like fleshy snake beards, even the women and children were not exempt from this disfiguration. In retrospect, it was the worst day of my entire life, It was the closest I can imagine to having full blown psychosis.

6. Ecstasy

Ecstasy (MDMA) is a semisynthetic psychedelic entactogen of the phenethylamine family that is much less visual with more stimulant like effects than most all other common “trip” producing psychedelics. It is considered mainly a recreational drug that’s often used with sex and associated with club drugs, as an entheogen, and a tool in use to supplement various types of practices for transcendence including in meditation, psychonautics, and illicit psychedelic psychotherapy whether self administered or not. The primary effects of MDMA include an increased awareness of the senses, feelings of openness, euphoria, empathy, love,happiness, heightened self-awareness, feeling of mental clarity and an increased appreciation of music and movement. Tactile sensations are enhanced for some users, making physical contact with others more pleasurable. Other side effects, such as jaw clenching and elevated pulse, are common.

Sitting comfortably in our cosy living room, Café del Mar and similar CDs playing in the background, we began at 8 pm. I swallowed one white tablet with water. Over the next hour nothing much happened except that I found myself talking quite openly and confidently with the others, moving very easily into interesting conversations. This was a little unusual for me as I am normally quite shy and overly self-conscious in social situations and it takes me a while to loosen up. The next thing I experienced was a striking shift in my visual perception. I don’t mean a hallucination or a distortion, but a wonderful step up in the aesthetic quality. For a moment it was like being in one of those nostalgic TV ads where the world looks all gold and sepia. ‘Everything’s gone amber!’ I blurted. But then I found that my vision was becoming beautifully enhanced. It made my normal visual experience seem like cheap, fuzzy CCTV footage in comparison. Now I was seeing the world anew in sharp, lush, top-quality Technicolor! I also began to move in time to the music. The music! Oh, the music! Wow! It sounded so good, so organic! The uplifted state stayed with me and took a long time to fade — at least a couple of weeks. It had unleashed in me a rush of joy that was still accessible when I focused on it weeks later.

7. Opium

Opium is a resinous narcotic formed from the latex released by lacerating (or “scoring”) the immature seed pods of opium poppies (Papaver somniferum). It contains up to 16% morphine, an opiate alkaloid, which is most frequently processed chemically to produce heroin for the illegal drug trade. Opium has gradually been superseded by a variety of purified, semi-synthetic, and synthetic opioids with progressively stronger effect, and by other general anesthesia. This process began in 1817, when Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner reported the isolation of pure morphine from opium after at least thirteen years of research and a nearly disastrous trial on himself and three boys.

I remember that what I smoked was much easier to smoke than marijuana. There was no burning in my throat nor in my lungs. I took a very large, smooth hit. Smoking it like marijuana, I held it in for about 10 or 15 seconds and let it out. It didn’t taste like marijuana, I remember the taste being rather faint. It actually tasted and smelled like incense. I was very surprised to suddenly find myself on the floor, in the dark, with a crowd of people surrounding me. Apparently I had fainted and fallen to the ground, but I hadn’t noticed. The high itself is rather hard to describe. It was much more intense than marijuana. It felt heavy, like my whole body was being impacted… but it also felt very clear and refined at the same time. As I made my way towards the bathroom the drug began to kick in again. My steps kind of faded away and it felt like I was just floating over to the bathroom. The scary thing was though, that I was having trouble seeing. My vision was fading. Distinct figures melted into shadows and everything had a sparkle to it. All of a sudden, everything felt really good. I couldn’t stop smiling. Everything was profound in a very positive way, especially the music since it resonated everywhere. It was a very abstruse experience. I imagine that I was coming down at this point, an hour had surely past by because the band was building a climax to end their first set. I went along with the crowd and made my way outside. The fresh air was wonderful. The cool air seemed to wrap around my body. A slight breeze on the back of my neck sent chills that rapidly multiplied throughout my body.

8. Marijuana

Cannabis, known as marijuana in its herbal form, is a psychoactive product of the plant Cannabis sativa. Humans have been consuming cannabis since prehistory, although in the 20th century there was a rise in its use for recreational, religious or spiritual, and medicinal purposes. It is estimated that about four percent of the world’s adult population use cannabis annually. It has psychoactive and physiological effects when consumed, usually by smoking or ingestion. The minimum amount of THC required to have a perceptible psychoactive effect is about 10 micrograms per kilogram of body weight. The state of intoxication due to cannabis consumption is colloquially known as a “high”; it is the state where mental and physical facilities are noticeably altered due to the consumption of cannabis. Each user experiences a different high, and the nature of it may vary upon factors such as potency, dose, chemical composition, method of consumption and set and setting.

After taking that first hit, and not feeling the effects within a minute (holding it in for a minute, and then waiting a little bit after exhaling) I decided, well I better hit this again, harder if I can. I took just as large of a hit, and again held it in for longer than a minute. I let my brother know I was really starting to feel something now and I don’t think I liked it all. It snuck up on me really bad, and I still had no idea what to expect. I wanted him to be quiet. Laying down was not helping, so I got back up. I went back to the garage and tried to explain to everyone ‘I am totally fucked up. This is scary!’ I was rationalizing everything tremendously, but it was SO intense! And it was only getting more intense faster! I didn’t know what to expect, I was sinking within myself, accelerating downward like into the depths of my own oblivion. I was a novice, I had no idea what to expect, and the world had become out of synch, the talking of my brothers, his friend, all ridiculous and extremely annoying. I became amazingly irritable and wanted them to leave me alone or not talk in my presence. They did not understand or appreciate my fear, and they began to get loud again. I ran upstairs to my parents bed and laid down with some wistful hope that I could wait out this storm.

9. Psilocybin Mushrooms

Psilocybin mushrooms (also called psilocybian mushrooms) are fungi that contain the psychedelic substances psilocybin and psilocin, and occasionally other psychoactive tryptamines. There are multiple colloquial terms for psilocybin mushrooms, the most common being magic mushrooms or ’shrooms. When psilocybin is ingested, it is broken down to produce psilocin, which is responsible for the hallucinogenic effects. The intoxicating effects of psilocybin-containing mushrooms typically last anywhere from 3 to 7 hours depending on dosage, preparation method and personal metabolism. The experience is typically inwardly oriented, with strong visual and auditory components. Visions and revelations may be experienced, and the effect can range from exhilarating to distressing. There can be also a total absence of effects, even with large doses.

I had acquired about 8 grams of dried mushrooms and some liquid psilocybin equivalent to another 5 grams of powdered mushrooms. I swallowed the liquid first, on an empty stomach of course. I could feel a slight sensation after about 10-15 minutes. Then I added the powder to some water in a mug and swallowed that also. I then sat by the camp fire, listening to the wind in the trees while I contemplated what was about to happen. After about 45-50 minutes I heard a ‘voice’ calling to me. It wasn’t audible in the normal sense – it came from inside my own mind! Then I was gone – out of this world. I escaped into what I perceived to be the outer boundaries of my mind or my imagination. This placed presented itself as a natural forest with low light. Here I met the owner of the aforementioned voice – the Mushroom Goddess. She took the form of a white, strapless, ankle-length dress, standing side-on from me. For about the next two hours I dialoged with her, becoming totally bewitched by her charm, her wit, her intelligence, her knowledge, her unconditional affection for me and her seemingly infinite perspective. I have come to think of her as my other-worldly girlfriend.

10. PCP

PCP (Phencyclidine) is a dissociative drug formerly used as an anesthetic agent, exhibiting hallucinogenic and neurotoxic effects. It is commonly known as Angel Dust, but is also known as Wet, Sherm, Sherman Hemsley, Rocket Fuel, Ashy Larry, Shermans Tank, Wack, Halk Hogan, Ozone, HannaH, Hog, Manitoba Shlimbo, and Embalming Fluid, among other names. Although the primary psychoactive effects of the drug only last hours, total elimination from the body is prolonged, typically extending over weeks. PCP is consumed in a recreational manner by drug users, mainly in the United States, where the demand is met by illegal production. It comes in both powder and liquid forms (PCP base dissolved most often in ether), but typically it is sprayed onto leafy material such as marijuana, mint, oregano, parsley or Ginger Leaves, and smoked. PCP has potent effects on the nervous system altering perceptual functions (hallucinations, delusional ideas, delirium or confused thinking), motor functions (unsteady gait, loss of coordination, and disrupted eye movement or nystagmus), and autonomic nervous system regulation (rapid heart rate, altered temperature regulation). The drug has been known to alter mood states in an unpredictable fashion causing some individuals to become detached and others to become animated.

When I was taking the drug, I used very small amounts. The effect was incredibly pleasant and social, so much so that me and my friends all used it instead of booze for almost a year. I couldn’t dance for shit on the stuff (I’d get stumbly and actually fell on my ass on the dancefloor once) but the physical sensations and mental pictures were really fun. It is quite different from any psychedelic visuals or even Ketamine visuals…more like rolling through old film footage. To be honest, I liked it more than my experiences on Ketamine. PCP can make one nearly impervious to pain at high doses. Because of this, PCP can make things seem like a good idea that otherwise wouldn’t (leading to the stories of people leaping out of windows, etc.) I experienced very confusing physical reality when really high on it, like being unable to discern the difference between walking up stairs and down them, or standing still and walking. This could lead to very unusual behaviour.

Sources: http://listverse.com

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