Dinner For One

The Mystery of Dinner for One

How an obscure British skit has become Germany's most popular New Year's tradition.

By Jude StewartPosted Friday, Dec. 30, 2005, at 12:13 PM ET

Listen to this story on NPR's Day to Day.

"The same procedure as every year, James."Every New Year's Eve, half of all Germans plunk down in front of their televisions to watch a 1963 English comedy sketch called Dinner for One. Walk into any bar in Bavaria and shout the film's refrain: "The same procedure as last year, madam?" The whole crowd will shout back in automatic, if stilted, English: "The same procedure as every year, James." Even though Dinner for One is, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, the most frequently repeated TV program ever, it has never been aired in the United Kingdom or the United States, and most of the English-speaking world is ignorant of its existence. When Der Spiegel probed the mystery last New Year's, it found that the BBC had not only never contemplated broadcasting this veddy British nugget in the United Kingdom, the BBC's spokesperson had never even heard of it.

Dinner for One, also known as Der 90 Geburtstag (The 90th Birthday), has rattled around the cabaret circuit for decades. Written by British author Lauri Wylie in the 1920s, it presents a morbidly funny story in miniature—(just 11 minutes on TV): Elderly Miss Sophie throws her birthday party every year, setting the table for her friends Sir Toby, Mr. Pommeroy, Mr. Winterbottom, and Adm. von Schneider, while conveniently ignoring the fact that they've all been dead for a quarter-century. (You can watch all of Dinner for One here or read the English script here.) Her butler James manfully takes up the slack by playacting all of them. He serves both drinks and food while quaffing toasts on behalf of each "guest," a bevy of soused British noblemen and von Schneider, who toasts Miss Sophie with a heel-click and a throaty "Skål!" (Watch a sample of Mr. Winterbottom's patois here.) James waddles to and fro, trips repeatedly over the head of a tiger-pelt rug, declaims each guest's pleasantries boozily, spray-fires the table with mispoured drinks, and downs a little water from a flower vase. Each course begins with the signature refrain: "The same procedure as last year, madam?" "The same procedure as every year, James." The sketch ends with James' final "procedure": bedding the old lady himself.

The Problem With Human Compassion

Human Compassion Surprisingly Limited, Study Finds
By Sara Goudarzi, LiveScience Staff Writer
posted: 16 February 2007 08:23 am ET

SAN FRANCISCO—While a person's accidental death reported on the evening news can bring viewers to tears, mass killings reported as statistics fail to tickle human emotions, a new study finds.

The Internet and other modern communications bring atrocities such as killings in Darfur, Sudan into homes and office cubicles. But knowledge of these events fails to motivate most to take action, said Paul Slovic, a University of Oregon researcher.

People typically react very strongly to one death but their emotions fade as the number of victims increase, Slovic reported here yesterday at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"We go all out to save a single identified victim, be it a person or an animal, but as the numbers increase, we level off," Slovic said. "We don't feel any different to say 88 people dying than we do to 87. This is a disturbing model, because it means that lives are not equal, and that as problems become bigger we become insensitive to the prospect of additional deaths."
Human insensitivity to large-scale human suffering has been observed in the past century with genocides in Armenia, the Ukraine, Nazi Germany and Rwanda, among others.

"We have to understand what it is in our makeup—psychologically, socially, politically and institutionally—that has allowed genocide to go unabated for a century," Slovic said. "If we don't answer that question and use the answer to change things, we will see another century of horrible atrocities around the world."

Slovic previously studied this phenomenon by presenting photographs to a group of subjects. In the first photograph eight children needed $300,000 to receive medical attention in order to save their lives. In the next photograph, one child needed $300,000 for medical bills.
Most subjects were willing to donate to the one and not the group of children.

In his latest research, Slovic and colleagues showed three photos to participants: a starving African girl, a starving African boy and a photo of both of them together.
Participants felt equivalent amounts of sympathy for each child when viewed separately, but compassion levels declined when the children were viewed together.

"The studies ... suggest a disturbing psychological tendency," Slovic said. "Our capacity to feel is limited. Even at two, people start to lose it.”

The Story of An Hour

Irony in "The Story of the Hour"

Summary: Dark irony plays a major role in "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin. A long-suffering wife who celebrates her husbands' death dies from the shock of discovering he is still alive.

In "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin, there are many moments when Chopin's craft of writing feeds the irony of the story. One perfect example, "assure himself of its truth by a second telegram" (772). This sentence subdued me into believing that Mrs. Mallard's husband was dead, when in fact, we learn that he never died. In addition, Mrs. Mallard is a woman with a strong sense of passion and detest. In the end, she dies by the nature of story.

Chopin brings a style of writing that has irony. In the beginning of the story, Chopin's introduces you to the heart trouble that afflicts Mrs. Mallard. Her condition is significant later because this ailment drives the story. However, the notion of this heart condition can be overlooked as being meaningless. Many readers could argue that this heart condition foreshadowed the climax of the story instantaneously but it does not. In the end of the story, we realize the significance of her sickness. It was a clever way to secretly introduce the weakness that ends Mrs. Mallard's life. Another, well deceptive measure used by Chopin's was to suggest that Mr. Mallard had died. In paragraph 2, Mr. Mallard's friend, Richards, confirmed twice that such allegations were in fact true (772). At that moment, I conceived that Mr. Mallard was dead. There was no other clue to believe otherwise and it was one of the strongest signs delivered in the story, because it left you unprepared for what was to come in the end.


When Chopin wrote, "She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms", I felt her sense of passion and emotional attachment to her husband (772).
Mrs. Mallard also opposed her husband as much as she cared for him. For a women being ill, and just being notified of her husbands death, it's awkward to read how she describes the surroundings while in her room. She describes the tops of trees being, "all aquiver with the new spring life", and the air being filled with, "delicious breath of rain" (772). What all this symbolizes is a new beginning for Mrs. Mallard. At this particular moment in the story, it is a little elusive to make that judgment, however, in paragraph 11 it is very easy to ascertain. When Mrs. Mallard says, "Free, free, free!", it is very clear that Mrs. Mallard has come to an understanding that she's free from her unhappy marriage (772); "But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome." (772-773).

There is also evidence provided in the text that tells us Mrs. Mallard was living a Victorian life giving me a reason to understand why she did not remorse like I would expect. "There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence." (773). In the Victorian era, women were seen as weak, helpless and incapable of making decision. Their focus was to tend to the house and care for the children. Mrs. Mallard was living that lifestyle which was the cause of her negative outlook on life and her joy for her husband's death.

Sadly, Mrs. Mallard was destined to die. Throughout the story, Mrs. Mallard resentment for life is made clear. "It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long" and "And yet she had loved him-sometimes. Often she had not." (773). All of this attest to the conclusion that Mrs. Mallard dreaded her life. She did not love her husband and she look down on the possibility of a long life. It all movies the bad guy never comes out victorious and Chopin's was not going to let that happen in this story. Mrs. Mallard's death only made sense.
What is amusing about this story is what is stated in the last line of the story, "When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease-of joy that kills" (773). Mrs. Mallard, who was joyful of being liberated, has a heart attack after the shocking realization that her husband was alive. Mrs. Mallard's death was inevitable by the course of the story but its ironic knowing that her enjoyment of her husband's death lead to the fatal reaction to him being alive.

Works Cited
Chopin, Kate. "The Story of an Hour." Arguing Through Literature: A Thematic Anthology and Guide to Academic Writing. Comp. and ed. Judith Ferster. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2005. 772-773

Hating Love

by PunkrockPrincezz

Who doesnt desire to find love

The one who is afraid

From the angels above

Not to be hurt

But just to be found,

To have something to live for or

who's love is engraved to a mound!

To be married has most definitely

got to be great!

But for me Just More Words To hate!

Seen So many hurtand Never Overcome,

Even The Lies they have heard,

From the ones They believed to love!

Though just a Friend,

That you want more then more,

Who's mind cant comprehend

Cause you totally adore.

Believe in no love just tears,

Someone who withholds your most greatest fears,

A guy or Girl that makes you blue,

Then u know your love is true

Love Poems & William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (1609)

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

What's Goin On???

What's Going On is the tenth studio album by soul musician Marvin Gaye, released May 21, 1971 on the Motown-subsidiary label Tamla Records.[1] Recording sessions for the album took place in June 1970 and March–May 1971 at Hitsville U.S.A., Golden World and United Sound Studios in Detroit, Michigan and at The Sound Factory in West Hollywood, California.

The first Marvin Gaye album credited as produced solely by the artist himself, What's Going On is a unified concept album consisting of nine songs, most of which lead into the next. It has also been categorized as a song cycle, since the album ends on a reprise to the album's opening theme. The album is told from the point of view of a Vietnam War veteran returning to the country he had been fighting for, and seeing nothing but injustice, suffering and hatred.

What's Going On was the first album on which Motown Records' main studio band, the group of session musicians known as the Funk Brothers, received an official credit. Featuring introspective lyrics about drug abuse, poverty and the Vietnam War, the album was also the first to reflect the beginning of a new trend in soul music. What's Going On was both an immediate commercial and critical success and has endured as a classic of early-1970s soul. A deluxe edition set of the album was released on February 27, 2001 and featured a rare live concert shot at Washington, D.C.'s Kennedy Center where the singer was given the key to the city.

The Shakta tradition glorifies Devi, the consort of Shiva, as the World Mother who, as Shakti, is the energy giving power behind all creation. Shakti is shown in many forms. As Uma or Parvati, she is the gentle consort of Shiva. As Kamakshi or Rajarajeshwari she is the Great Mother. In the form of Durga she rides a tiger, the ego and arrogance that man must subdue. In her angry form she is Kali.

The earliest term applied to the divine feminine, which still retains its popular usage, is Shakti. The word Shakti is used in a variety of ways ranging from its use as a way to illustrate the ultimate primordial creative power, to expressing the capacity or power of words to convey meaning. The word 'Shakti' is derived from the root 'shak,' meaning potency or the potential to produce, an assertion of Her inherent creative aptitude.

All interpretations of the word 'Shakti' hold common one parameter, Power. Specifically, Shakti means Power, Force and Feminine Energy. She represents the fundamental creative instinct underlying the cosmos, and is the energizing force of all divinity, of every being and every thing. Devotees believe the whole universe to be a manifestation of Shakti, who is also known by her general name Devi, from the Sanskrit root 'div' which means to shine.

I did not know much about the goddess Shakti, so i did some research and this is what i found. I now have an understanding of the goddess

HiHo Crackers

Until the late 1800s, the biscuit/cracker industry was made up of small independent local bakeries preparing products and selling them in bulk. The barrels and crates of biscuits were delivered by horse and wagon, set out in the grocery store and sold to the consumer by the measure. Since most of the products were dispensed in bulk, the smell of kerosene, meat, medicines/chemicals, smoke etc. as well as all kinds of pests permeated the exposed crackers.
In 1890, a group of thirty-three mid-west and western bakers combined to form the American Biscuit & Manufacturing Company. This consolidation was done primarily to compete with United States Baking Company, another mid-west group and the New York Biscuit Company, an east coast conglomerate. Soon the American Biscuit and New York Biscuit groups were opening bakeries and lowering prices in each other’s area in an attempt to eliminate the competition. Finally in February 1898 the competing groups combined 114 factories and formed the National Biscuit Company (Nabisco).
Although Joseph Loose was a member of the Nabisco’s Board of Directors, in 1902 along with his brother Jacob and John H Wiles, he liquidated his holdings in National Biscuit Company and formed the Loose-Wiles Biscuit Company in Kansas City. They envisioned a factory which would be filled with sunlight and so they adopted the name SUNSHINE for their products. Soon they began expanding and opened new plants in Boston and then New York. In 1912 Loose-Wiles opened their ‘Thousand Window” bakery on Long Island, which remained the largest bakery building in the world until 1955.
An interesting side note is that Loose-Wiles never registered their ‘Sunshine’ brand name and therefore spend much effort in the first forty years trying to dissuade other companies from using the word ‘sunshine’ or any related word on their product or in their advertising. Since Loose-Wiles claim was not based on a registered mark, they often had to investigate when and where the other company first used the word in order to determine which company had first claim so as not to lose their right to the name ‘Sunshine’ for their own products. Finally in 1946, the Loose-Wiles Company officially changed its name to Sunshine Biscuit, Inc.
The early part of the company’s history was dominated by developing new items and acquiring established brands from other smaller companies. Many of the products and their names are similar to those of their largest competitor, the National Biscuit Company. For example, Nabisco’s first individually packaged cracker was named 'Uneeda'. Loose-Wile’s cracker was ‘Takhoma.’ Loose-Wiles made ‘Trumps Cookies.’ Nabisco produced "Aces." Sunshine Biscuit had ‘Animal Crackers’ and ‘Toy Cookies.’ Nabisco produced ‘Barnum’s Animals.’
American Tobacco Company purchased the company in 1966. It was then sold to G. F. Industries, a privately held California company, and finally merged with Keebler Company in 1996.
Sunshine Biscuits made the Hydrox chocolate sandwich cream cookie, before it was discontinued in 1999. They were reintroduced in August 2008, and retain the Sunshine branding.[1] Today, Sunshine is probably best known for producing the Cheez-It brand of snack crackers, which are still made under the Sunshine label, as are Krispy Crackers saltines. However, five well-known Sunshine brands were discontinued after the merger with Keebler: Chip-A-Roos, Hi-Ho Crackers, Chocolate Nugget cookies, Lemon Coolers and Golden Fruit Biscuits. Sunshine originated Vienna Fingers cookies, which are now sold under the Keebler brand.