text:
Interstate Bakeries

Old HB, Inc., known as Hostess Brands from 2009 to 2013 and established in 1930 as Interstate Bakeries Corporation, was a wholesale baker and distributor of bakery products in the United States. Before its 2012 closure and liquidation, it owned the Hostess, Wonder Bread, Nature's Pride, Dolly Madison, Butternut Breads, and Drake's brands.

For many years the company was called Interstate Bakeries and based at 12 East Armour Boulevard, Kansas City, Missouri. In 2009, after it emerged from a 2004 bankruptcy, its name was changed to Hostess Brands and its headquarters moved to Irving, Texas. Hostess Brands sought bankruptcy protection again in January 2012.

On November 16, 2012, the company filed a motion in United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York in White Plains to close its business and sell its assets. On November 21, the motion was accepted and a judge agreed to sell the Hostess brands. The Hostess and Dolly Madison brands are now produced by Hostess Brands, itself acquired by The J.M. Smucker Company.

Interstate Bakeries and Interstate Brands
The company has its roots in Nafziger Bakeries, founded by Ralph Leroy Nafziger in a church basement at 6th and Prospect Avenue in Kansas City in 1905. Nafziger expanded the bakeries and bought out competitors. In 1925 he sold Nafziger to Purity Bakeries (which became American Bakeries) and acquired a controlling interest in Schulze Baking Company and its Butternut Breads brand.

In 1930 Nafziger announced the formation of the Interstate Bakeries Corporation (IBC) with the merger of Schulze Bakery and the seven bakers of Western Bakeries of Los Angeles to become the fifth largest baker in the United States. The company sold Butternut bread, wrapped in gingham, to grocery stores.

Schulze and Western continued to operate separately under the Interstate umbrella until 1937, when they merged with Interstate Bakeries. In 1943 Interstate acquired the Supreme Baking Company of Los Angeles, and in 1950 it bought the O'Rourke Baking Company of Buffalo, New York. Acquisitions during the 1950s and early 1960s included the Ambrosia, Remar, Butter Cream, Campbell-Sell and Schall Tasty baking companies, the Kingston Cake and Cobb's Sunlit bakeries, Sweetheart Bread Company and Hart's Bakeries. In the late 1960s IBC acquired Millbrook Bread, Shawano Farms and the Baker and Shawano canning companies. In 1969 IBC changed its name to Interstate Brands, with its signature brands Butternut and Blue Seal breads and Dolly Madison cakes; Butternut Breads had been in business since 1902.

DPF (1975)
In 1975 Interstate was acquired by the Data Processing Financial and General Corporation (DPF), a computer-leasing company that had encountered difficulties during the IBM antitrust battles which changed the pricing of IBM hardware. To change its business model, DPF used its cash to buy a low-tech company. The merged company, headquartered in Hartsdale, New York, kept the DPF acronym while continuing to divest its remaining technology assets. Investing heavily in its plants, it acquired the Silver Loaf Baking Company, Eddy Bakeries and Mrs. Cubbison's Foods.

Interstate Bakeries and IBC Holdings
In 1981 DPF completed the sale of its remaining computer systems and changed the company name back to the original Interstate Bakeries, moving its headquarters back to Kansas City. In 1986 Interstate acquired Purity Baking Company and Stewart Sandwiches, followed in 1987 by Landshire Food Products. The following year Interstate became a privately held company, and its name changed to IBC Holdings. IBC bought the Merita-Cotton's Bakeries division of the American Bakeries Company. In 1991, IBC again became a public company and changed its name back to Interstate Bakeries.

Continental Baking merger (1995)
In January 1995, Interstate acquired the Continental Baking Company from Ralston Purina for $330 million and 16.9 million shares of Interstate stock. Continental had acquired Taggart Bakeries of Indianapolis in 1925, and the deal brought Taggart's creations (including Wonder Bread and the Hostess brand) to Interstate. Taggart had created Hostess in 1921, and the brand focused on cakes like Twinkies, CupCakes, Ding Dongs and Ho Hos (created during Continental's ownership). At this time, the merged company also bought the San Francisco French Bread Company, John J. Nissen Baking Company, Drake's and My Bread Company.

With the merger, Interstate held two national bread divisions: Butternut and Wonder Bread. The divisions had different cultures: Butternut was unregimented, with each bakery a self-contained profit center, and Wonder Bread was structured; this caused early problems. In both divisions, snack cakes were more profitable due to economy of scale and logistics. When extended-shelf-life enzymes were developed for bread, it was hoped to convert small, less-efficient bakeries into a network of large bakeries like their snack-cakes operations. The new enzymes gave the bread a different taste and texture, and market forces reduced prices and sales.

Bankruptcy (2004)
On September 22, 2004, Interstate Bakeries filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The company named a new chief executive, Tony Alvarez. Interstate Bakery's stock, which had been $34 per share, fell to $2.05 with the bankruptcy. During the bankruptcy proceedings (at the time, the longest-running in U.S. history), Interstate fought a 2007 bid from Mexican baker Grupo Bimbo and Ron Burkle of the Yucaipa Companies.

Under Craig Jung, Interstate Bakeries emerged from bankruptcy as a private company on February 3, 2009. The plan included a 50-percent equity stake by Ripplewood Holdings and credit lines from General Electric Capital and GE Capital Markets, Silver Point Finance and Monarch Master Funding. Interstate's unionized workers made contract concessions in exchange for equity in the company.

During the 2004–2009 bankruptcy period Interstate closed nine of its 54 bakeries and more than 300 outlet stores, and its workforce declined from 32,000 to 22,000. The company dropped regional brands and operating agreements, such as an agreement to produce Sunbeam Bread for the northeastern U.S.

Hostess Brands (2009)
On November 2, 2009, IBC became Hostess Brands, named for its Twinkies-and-cupcakes cake division. Hostess Brands continued its bread lines, including Wonder Bread. The company's subsidiaries, such as Interstate Brands Corporation and IBC Sales Corporation, continued displaying their name and logo on Hostess Brands products.

Bankruptcy and liquidation
In December 2011, it was reported that Hostess Brands was on the verge of filing for bankruptcy a second time. The company stopped paying future pension benefits after August, breaking its union contracts. According to a Hostess employee, "We understand that, should we pursue some form of legal action to require the company to live up to the terms of the contract, they may close, but we have come to believe that they will close anyway. We believe the company is poorly managed and the only hope is a complete change in management".

On January 10, 2012, Hostess Brands filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the second time. In its filing, the company said it "is not competitive, primarily due to legacy pension and medical benefit obligations and restrictive work rules". According to Hostess, it employed 19,000 people and was more than $860 million in debt. The company said it would continue to operate with $75 million of debtor-in-possession financing from Monarch Alternative Capital, Silver Point Capital and other investors.

In March Brian Driscoll resigned as CEO and was replaced by Gregory F. Rayburn, who had been hired as chief restructuring officer nine days earlier. Fortune reported that unions in the company were unhappy with Driscoll's proposed compensation package of $1.5 million, plus cash incentives and $1.95 million in long-term compensation. The court had discovered that Hostess executives received raises of up to 80 percent the previous year. Rayburn cut the salaries of the four top Hostess executives to $1, to be restored by January 1 of the following year or earlier.

In July 2012, the New York Post reported that negotiations with the Teamsters Union, led by Silver Point Capital, were close to an agreement allowing Hostess Brands to cut employee pay and benefits if the company continued funding its pension plans. In May, as required by the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, the company's 19,000 workers were warned of a possible layoff. In an email to the Marysville, California Appeal-Democrat, Hostess spokesman Erik Halvorson wrote that the May notices were to alert employees to a possible sale of the company but "our goal is still to emerge from bankruptcy as a growing company with a strong future". Although the layoff notices listed July 7–21 as dates, on July 5 another company spokesman told the Financial News & Daily Record that there were no immediate plans to lay off Hostess employees.

In November 2012, Hostess employees nationwide went on strike. The Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (BCTGM), representing 6,600 Hostess employees, took action after a contract proposal from Hostess Brands was rejected by 92 percent of its members.

On November 16, Hostess announced that it was ceasing its plant operations and laying off most of its 18,500 employees. The company said that it intended to sell off its assets (including its well-known brand names) and liquidate. According to CEO Gregory Rayburn, "Hostess Brands will move promptly to lay off most of its 18,500-member workforce and focus on selling its assets to the highest bidders." A BCTGM press release issued that day read in part, "When a highly-respected financial consultant, hired by Hostess, determined earlier this year that the company's business plan to exit bankruptcy was guaranteed to fail because it left the company with unsustainable debt levels, our members knew that the massive wage and benefit concessions the company was demanding would go straight to Wall Street investors and not back into the company."

According to Rayburn, potential buyers expressed interest in acquiring the Hostess brand. On November 21, Judge Robert Drain cleared Hostess to close. In approving the plan, Drain ruled against U.S. Trustee for the Southern District Tracy Hope Davis' motion to convert the bankruptcy to a Chapter 7 bankruptcy with an appointed trustee to oversee liquidation. Davis criticized the plan's provisions, which would grant bonuses to insiders' and 'cherry-pick' which administrative claims get paid". Drain left Rayburn in charge of the liquidation; Hostess had argued that its assets would devalue if the company had to wait for a trustee to get up to speed on the company. Hostess Brands' liquidation plan was finalized by a federal bankruptcy judge on November 29. In January 2013, the company asked a judge to set a March 21 deadline for workers to file back-pay claims. On February 11, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge in New York approved stalking horse bidders for Hostess Brands.

The company received bids for assets from Walmart, Target, Kroger, Flowers Foods and Grupo Bimbo,   and was expected to sell its snack-cake and bread brands during 2013. On January 8, 2013, Hostess Brands hired Hilco to sell its equipment, machinery and real estate. Three days later the company announced a $390 million stalking-horse bid by Flowers Foods for six of its bread brands (including Wonder Bread), and court approval was received for a February 28 auction of the brands.

On January 15, 2013, Hostess Brands began searching for a stalking-horse bidder for its snack cakes; four companies (Grupo Bimbo, a partnership of Apollo Global Management and C. Dean Metropoulos and Company, Hurst Capital and McKee Foods) were negotiating. Two weeks later the company picked Apollo Global Management and C. Dean Metropoulos and Company as lead bidder for its snack cakes,  with the bid deadlines for all Hostess brands March 11 and 12.

Buyers
It was announced on January 28, 2013 that United States Bakery was the leading bidder for Hostess' Sweetheart, Eddy's, Standish Farms and Grandma Emilie's brands and McKee Foods was the leading bidder for its Drake's brand, which included Ring Dings, Yodels and Drake's Devil Dogs. On March 11 Apollo Global Management made the sole bid ($410 million) for the company's snack business, which included Twinkies; this company later went public under the name Hostess Brands and trade on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker TWNK. On 11 September 2023, The J.M. Smucker Company announced it would buy Hostess for $5.6 billion in a cash and stock deal.

Hostess Brands
On June 6, 2013, the new Hostess Brands reopened the Emporia, Kansas plant. Hostess announced ten days later that production would resume the following month, and on June 23 said that its brands would be back on store shelves on July 15. although the company would sell fewer products than before, new president Rich Seban said that it might produce innovative pastries and snacks. "We can have some fun with that mixture," Seban said, suggesting that Hostess might experiment with gluten-free, higher-fiber and lower-sugar and -sodium products.

Sold to Apollo and Metropoulos, later J.M. Smucker
In January 2013, a joint venture by Apollo Global Management and C. Dean Metropoulos and Company became the leading bidder to purchase Dolly Madison and the Hostess brand of snacks. Silver Point Capital, Grupo Bimbo and Hurst Capital also placed bids for both brands. On March 12, Apollo and Metropoulos won the bid to buy the brands from Hostess for $410 million. The deal was approved by a bankruptcy court, and C. Dean Metropoulos and Company principal Daren Metropoulos announced that Hostess products would be sold again on July 15.

This division eventually went public as the second incarnation of Hostess Brands, and announced it would be acquired by J.M. Smucker on September 11, 2023.

Sold to Bimbo Bakeries USA
Bimbo Bakeries USA outbid Flowers Foods for the rights to Beefsteak on February 28, 2013, and the deal was approved by a bankruptcy court on March 20. In August, the trademarks of J. J. Nissen and the web domain jjnissenbreads.com were transferred to Bimbo Bakeries, which later purchased other regional Hostess bread brands: Colombo, Cotton's, Emperor Norton, Fisherman's Wharf, Parisian and Toscana.

Sold to Flowers Foods
In January 2013 it was announced that Flowers Foods had offered to buy six of Hostess' bread brands, including Wonder Bread. The deal, initially structured at $360 million, involved 20 bakeries and 38 depots. Flowers Foods won the bid to purchase five of the six bread brands (except Beefsteak, purchased by Grupo Bimbo) on February 28. The deal went through a bankruptcy court in March and was completed on July 22, 2013. The five brands are Butternut Bread, Home Pride, Merita Breads, Nature's Pride and Wonder Bread.

Sold to Lewis Brothers Bakeries
The rights to the following Hostess brands were sold to Lewis Brothers Bakeries in December 2013:

 * Blue Ribbon
 * Braun's
 * Bread du Jour
 * Continental
 * Countess
 * County Fair
 * D'Agostino's
 * Daffodil Farm
 * Di Carlo
 * Millbrook
 * Nancy Martin
 * Old World
 * Ozark Mill
 * Pantry Pride
 * Sap's
 * Weber's

Sold to McKee Foods
McKee Foods, owner of Hostess competitor Little Debbie, purchased the Drake's snack cakes on March 14, 2013 for $27.5 million. After the deal passed a bankruptcy court, McKee began selling the snacks on September 23.

Sold to United States Bakery
United States Bakery won the auction for four northwestern Hostess bakeries on March 15, 2013 for a reported $30.85 million, and the deal was approved by a bankruptcy court that month. The brands were Eddy's, Grandma Emile's, Standish Farms and Sweetheart Bakery. , the rights to the Baker's Inn and Dutch Hearth brands remain unsold.

title: Interstate Bakeries


text:
530 BC

The year 530 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as year 224  Ab urbe condita. The denomination 530 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Asia

 * Cyrus II is killed in battle against unknown tribes and succeeded by Cambyses II.

Chronology

 * Royal Arch Masons use this year for dating their documents Anno Inventionis, after the beginning of the Second Temple by Zerubbabel.

Art and architecture

 * The Temple of Apollo at Delphi is built (approximate date).
 * Peplos Kore, from the Acropolis in Athens, is made. It is now at Acropolis Museum, Athens (approximate date).
 * Kroisos Kouros, from a cemetery at Anavysos near Athens, is made. It is now at the National Archaeological Museum, Athens (approximate date).
 * The Siphnian Treasury in Delphi is begun (approximate date).
 * Battle between the Gods and the Giants, fragments of the north frieze of the Siphnian Treasury, from the Sanctuary of Apollo, Delphi, is begun (approximate date). It is now at the Delphi Archaeological Museum.
 * Ennigaldi-Nanna's Museum at Ur is established, the earliest known public museum with the oldest known museum labels (approximate date).

Births

 * Aristides, Athenian statesman (d. 468 BC)
 * Onomacritus, Greek compiler of oracles (approximate date) (d. 480 BC)
 * Pheidippides, Greek runner (approximate date) (d. c. 490 BC)

Deaths

 * December — Cyrus the Great, ruler of Persia (b. 576 or 600 BC)
 * Battus III of Cyrene, Greek king of Cyrenaica
 * Spargapises, Massagetae general

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: 530 BC


text:
I My Me! Strawberry Eggs

I My Me! Strawberry Eggs (あぃまぃみぃ! ストロベリー・エッグ), occasionally shortened to Strawberry Eggs, is a Japanese anime television series conceptualized by YOM. Produced by Pioneer LDC, Toshiba Digital Frontiers Inc., Pioneer Entertainment (USA) LP., TNK and Tokyo Broadcasting System Television, the series is directed by Yūji Yamaguchi, with Yasuko Kobayashi handling series composition, Maki Fujii designing the characters and Masara Nishida composing the music. The anime aired in Japan from July 4 to September 26, 2001, on Wowow and was licensed by Geneon Entertainment in August 2002.

Plot
Hibiki Amawa is an enthusiastic young man whose dream career is to be a professional teacher, having graduated from college with a certificate in athletics. When he is unable to pay his landlady, Lulu Sanjo, the monthly rent for his apartment, he rushes off to the nearby Seitō Sannomiya Private School to apply for a position that is open, but is summarily denied employment because of his gender, as they only hire women. Offended, and more determined than ever to have his way, Hibiki vows to demonstrate the merits of his educational philosophy to his detractors, and with offered help from Lulu, agrees to disguise himself by cross-dressing in order to deceive the school's female-only administration. With assistance from some gadgets Lulu engineered for this purpose, he disguises himself very convincingly. Following an initial demonstration of his merits as an educator, he is hired.

Unfortunately for Hibiki, however, life as a gym teacher at this school does not go completely smoothly. With interpersonal conflicts among students causing fights and occasional mild missteps endangering his disguise, Hibiki must not only mediate his class, but also keep up appearances and navigate life in disguise.

Primary characters
Some of the characters' surnames and the school's name are derived from train station names in the Kinki area. In addition, most of the surnames of the characters of the Seitō Sannomiya Private School, except for Fūko Kuzuha, are adopted from the names of stations on the Hanshin Main Line.

 * Hibiki Amawa (天和 響)
 * (male-Japanese), Yuki Masuda (female-Japanese), Crispin Freeman (male-English), Sally Dana (female-English)
 * The central protagonist of the series, Hibiki Amawa is a fairly typical college graduate whose goal is to become a professional school teacher. His life takes an unexpected turn in the process when, in order to pay off his apartment rent, he is forced to cross-dress in order to gain employment at the female-favouring Seitō Sannomiya Private School. His situation only gets more complicated when the school board grows suspicious of him, students take to fighting with each other, and one of the girls of his class (Fūko) develops romantic feelings for him.

 * Lulu Sanjō (三条 るる)
 * Lulu Sanjō, more often referred to as "Granny" by her tenants, is the midget-size tough-as-nails, pistol-packing landlady of the Gochisō apartments, which also doubles as a school supply store that she also owns. Impressed by Hibiki's strong determination, she offers to help him in his mission, helping him disguise himself as a woman and maintain the disguise throughout his time on campus. She rides a Harley-Davidson FXSTS softail springer motorcycle with a twin cam engine. It is heavily implied that Lulu is a crossdresser as well.
 * Lulu Sanjō, more often referred to as "Granny" by her tenants, is the midget-size tough-as-nails, pistol-packing landlady of the Gochisō apartments, which also doubles as a school supply store that she also owns. Impressed by Hibiki's strong determination, she offers to help him in his mission, helping him disguise himself as a woman and maintain the disguise throughout his time on campus. She rides a Harley-Davidson FXSTS softail springer motorcycle with a twin cam engine. It is heavily implied that Lulu is a crossdresser as well.

 * Fūko Kuzuha (樟葉 楓子)
 * Clumsy but selfless, Fūko Kuzuha is a student at Seitō Sannomiya. Despite being accident prone, mild-mannered, and easily flustered, Fūko is a very strong-willed girl. Much to her personal anxiety, she starts admiring Hibiki's personality, and this admiration develops into a powerful romantic attraction, bringing her considerable confusion and feelings of shame. Her mother died when she was six years old and her widower father is a traveling businessman. Fūko resides at the school dormitories. She also speaks up for Hibiki in the final episode, changing everyone's negative opinion of him when Hibiki's true gender is exposed.
 * Clumsy but selfless, Fūko Kuzuha is a student at Seitō Sannomiya. Despite being accident prone, mild-mannered, and easily flustered, Fūko is a very strong-willed girl. Much to her personal anxiety, she starts admiring Hibiki's personality, and this admiration develops into a powerful romantic attraction, bringing her considerable confusion and feelings of shame. Her mother died when she was six years old and her widower father is a traveling businessman. Fūko resides at the school dormitories. She also speaks up for Hibiki in the final episode, changing everyone's negative opinion of him when Hibiki's true gender is exposed.

Secondary characters

 * Kōji Mori (森 小路)
 * A salaryman who is a tenant at the Gochisō apartments; room 101. He is a pervert with a fascination with photographing female uniforms with his camera and unusually large mirror; frequently strapped on his back. He is good friends with Tofu Tofukuji.
 * A salaryman who is a tenant at the Gochisō apartments; room 101. He is a pervert with a fascination with photographing female uniforms with his camera and unusually large mirror; frequently strapped on his back. He is good friends with Tofu Tofukuji.

 * Tōfū "Kochi" Tōfukuji (東福寺 東風)
 * A retired, elderly man lodging at the Gochisō apartments.
 * A retired, elderly man lodging at the Gochisō apartments.

 * Kura Ge (クラ・ゲ)
 * Hibiki's pet dog. Lulu often uses Kura Ge as motivational collateral for the unpaid rent. While the breed of Kura Ge is never mentioned, he seems to resemble a Bichon.
 * Hibiki's pet dog. Lulu often uses Kura Ge as motivational collateral for the unpaid rent. While the breed of Kura Ge is never mentioned, he seems to resemble a Bichon.

 * Chieko Sannomiya (三ノ宮 千恵子)
 * The eponymous principal of Seitō Sannomiya. She was appointed office a decade prior to the story and carries herself in a conceited, yet formal, aristocratic manner. At the conclusion of the series, it is revealed that her sexism behavior was stemmed from a man who abandoned her in her younger years, who was the former gym teacher at the school; this reveals that she is an alumna of Seito Sannomiya.
 * The eponymous principal of Seitō Sannomiya. She was appointed office a decade prior to the story and carries herself in a conceited, yet formal, aristocratic manner. At the conclusion of the series, it is revealed that her sexism behavior was stemmed from a man who abandoned her in her younger years, who was the former gym teacher at the school; this reveals that she is an alumna of Seito Sannomiya.

 * Reiko Mukogawa (武庫川 玲子)
 * Vice-principal of Seitō Sannomiya. She works closely with Chieko Sannomiya, and like her, is a stern man-hater, resulting from a failed marriage. Reiko grows suspicious of Hibiki early into his career and tries debunking his identity several times. Reiko was successful in exposing Hibiki's true gender in the end, but her plan in turning Seitō into an all-girls school was tarnished by Fūko's defensive speech for Hibiki.
 * Vice-principal of Seitō Sannomiya. She works closely with Chieko Sannomiya, and like her, is a stern man-hater, resulting from a failed marriage. Reiko grows suspicious of Hibiki early into his career and tries debunking his identity several times. Reiko was successful in exposing Hibiki's true gender in the end, but her plan in turning Seitō into an all-girls school was tarnished by Fūko's defensive speech for Hibiki.

 * Fujio Himejima (姫島 藤緒)
 * An aggressive tomboy, Fujio Himejima is a student at Seitō Sannomiya. She wears her hair in two loose pigtails, tied by her signature green bows. She has a black belt in Aikido and develops a crush on fellow student Akira Fukae, who unfortunately does not reciprocate. Fujio resides in the dormitories.
 * An aggressive tomboy, Fujio Himejima is a student at Seitō Sannomiya. She wears her hair in two loose pigtails, tied by her signature green bows. She has a black belt in Aikido and develops a crush on fellow student Akira Fukae, who unfortunately does not reciprocate. Fujio resides in the dormitories.

 * Miho Umeda (梅田 美保)
 * Miho Umeda is a student at the school and is Fujio's closest friend. Her maturity is considerably more developed than her friends and this at times makes her behave in an arrogant manner; especially when it comes to her past and current experiences with boys. As a result, the other girls tend to look up to her and this prompts her to act like a role model for them. Miho resides in the dormitories. She is a foil to Seiko Kasuganomichi.
 * Miho Umeda is a student at the school and is Fujio's closest friend. Her maturity is considerably more developed than her friends and this at times makes her behave in an arrogant manner; especially when it comes to her past and current experiences with boys. As a result, the other girls tend to look up to her and this prompts her to act like a role model for them. Miho resides in the dormitories. She is a foil to Seiko Kasuganomichi.

 * Seiko Kasuganomichi (春日野道 聖子)
 * Seiko Kasuganomichi is a fairly quiet student. Her family is wealthy and she is often seen sheltered. She gets uncomfortable at the sight of naked men, in photographs or in the flesh.
 * Seiko Kasuganomichi is a fairly quiet student. Her family is wealthy and she is often seen sheltered. She gets uncomfortable at the sight of naked men, in photographs or in the flesh.

 * Akira Fukae (深江 晃)
 * Quiet and composed, Akira Fukae is one of the primary male students on campus. Even though he usually tends to be level-headed, Akira is not afraid to speak his mind or take a stand for what he believes he is fair and just. His father is a private investigator.
 * Quiet and composed, Akira Fukae is one of the primary male students on campus. Even though he usually tends to be level-headed, Akira is not afraid to speak his mind or take a stand for what he believes he is fair and just. His father is a private investigator.

 * Kyōsuke Aoki (青木 恭佑)
 * Kyosuke Aoki is another one of the few male students at the school, arguably the most energetic and is also the tallest; comparable to Miho Umeda to the girls. He takes the biggest interest in Hibiki's drag and frequently proclaims it to her and the others. Kyosuke is good friends with Akira Fukae and Shoichi.
 * Kyosuke Aoki is another one of the few male students at the school, arguably the most energetic and is also the tallest; comparable to Miho Umeda to the girls. He takes the biggest interest in Hibiki's drag and frequently proclaims it to her and the others. Kyosuke is good friends with Akira Fukae and Shoichi.

 * Shōichi Iwaya (岩屋 祥一)
 * Another enrolled male student at the school and a close friend of Kyōsuke Aoki.
 * Another enrolled male student at the school and a close friend of Kyōsuke Aoki.

 * Yachio Tokugawa (徳川 八千男)
 * The board chairman of Seitō Sannomiya.
 * The board chairman of Seitō Sannomiya.

 * Shirō Naruo (鳴尾 志朗)
 * Another of the few male students. He is a gentle and quiet boy who appears in Episode 8. He stole Reiko Mukogawa's salary when he is asked by Hibiki to visit the teacher's lounge and retrieve his grade book. Shiro has a girlfriend named Makoto Uozaki.
 * Another of the few male students. He is a gentle and quiet boy who appears in Episode 8. He stole Reiko Mukogawa's salary when he is asked by Hibiki to visit the teacher's lounge and retrieve his grade book. Shiro has a girlfriend named Makoto Uozaki.

Episode list
The anime series is animated by TNK and directed by Yūji Yamaguchi. It first aired in Japan on Wowow between July 4 and September 26, 2001, running for 13 episodes. As of December 2007, the series is out of print.

Two pieces of theme music were used for the anime; one opening theme and one ending theme. The opening theme is "Dearest," a modified version of Shoko Sawada's "Shin'ai naru Hitoe," performed by Hitomi Mieno and arranged by Masara Nishida. The ending theme is "White Station" by Ace File composed of Mae Yoshikawa, Marina Kushi, Asagi Kudo, Saori Nara, with lyrics by Rei Yoshii, and arrangement by Masala Nishida. Other music was provided by Masala Nishida.

Manga
A manga adaptation illustrated by the anime's character designer Maki Fujii was serialized in MediaWorks' Dengeki Daioh magazine between December 21, 2001, and February 25, 2002. A total of 3 chapters have been published.

title: I My Me! Strawberry Eggs


text:
554 BC

The year 554 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as year 200 Ab urbe condita. The denomination 554 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Deaths

 * Duke Ling of Qi, ruler of the State of Qi

title: 554 BC


text:
Princess Irene of the Netherlands

Princess Irene of the Netherlands (Irene Emma Elisabeth; born 5 August 1939) is the second child of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and Prince Bernhard.

In 1964, she converted to Catholicism and married the then-Prince Carlos Hugo of Bourbon-Parma in a Catholic ceremony in Rome, thus forfeiting her place in the royal succession. Since their 1981 divorce, she has espoused left-wing causes, including anti-nuclear campaigns, and has developed a pantheistic philosophy about the relationship between man and nature.

Childhood and family
The princess was born on 5 August 1939 at Soestdijk Palace. At the time of her birth, war was a distinct possibility but, because her parents hoped for a peaceful solution, they chose to name their new daughter for Eirene, the Greek goddess of peace. She has three sisters, the eldest of whom is the former queen of the Netherlands, Princess Beatrix of the Netherlands; the two younger ones are Princess Margriet and the late Princess Christina.

Because of the invasion of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany during World War II the Dutch royal family first fled to the United Kingdom. Irene was not yet a year old when the family was forced to leave the Netherlands; she was christened in the Chapel-Royal of Buckingham Palace in London, with the wife of King George VI, Queen Elizabeth, being one of her godparents. When the family was leaving the Netherlands, the port where they boarded the British warship was attacked by a German air raid; one of the German bombs exploded within 200 yards of the family. Irene was placed in a gasproof carrier to protect her from chemical warfare.

Princess Juliana and her daughters again took flight when the London Blitz began, this time to exile in Ottawa, Canada, where her younger sister, Margriet, was born and where Irene attended Rockcliffe Park Public School. As a teenager, she was dubbed by the Dutch press "the glamorous Princess of the Netherlands." During the war, the Royal Dutch Brigade (the formation of Free Dutch soldiers that fought alongside the Allies) was named for Princess Irene. This was continued after the war as the Regiment Prinses Irene.

Always an independent person, Irene was thrilled to receive a sports car from her father, one of the gifts he had been presented with. Irene's happiness was short-lived; when she opened the hood of the automobile, she noticed that the vehicle only looked like a sports car but had an ordinary car's engine. She asked her father for permission to turn the vehicle into a true racing-type auto, which Prince Bernhard refused to allow.

She was a bridesmaid at the 1962 wedding of Prince Juan Carlos of Spain and Princess Sophia of Greece and Denmark.

Princess Irene studied at the University of Utrecht, then went to Madrid to learn the Spanish language and became proficient enough to become an official interpreter.

Conversion to Catholicism
While studying Spanish in Madrid, Irene met then Prince Carlos Hugo of Bourbon-Parma, the eldest son of Carlist claimant to the Spanish throne, Xavier, Duke of Parma and Head of the House of Bourbon-Parma. In the summer of 1963, Princess Irene secretly converted from Protestantism to Roman Catholicism. The first time the public or the royal family knew about the conversion was when a photograph appeared on the front page of an Amsterdam newspaper showing the Princess kneeling to receive communion at a Mass in the Roman Catholic Church of the Hieronymites (Los Jerónimos) in Madrid. Irene's conversion took place a year before her engagement announcement, but the royal family did not officially announce the news until January 1964. When news leaked out that she was engaged to Prince Carlos Hugo (born 1930), it provoked a Protestant outcry and a constitutional crisis.

Although Dutch law did not forbid a Catholic to reign over the Netherlands, Protestant succession was traditional, born out of the 16th-century Eighty Years' War with Spain and the assassination of William of Orange by a supporter of Philip II of Spain who believed William had betrayed both the Spanish monarch and the Catholic Church. By the middle of the 20th century religious attitudes had begun to change, but only very slowly. While members of the Roman Catholic Church accounted for approximately 34 percent of the Dutch population, and Catholic political parties had been in coalition governments since 1918, the high fertility rate of the Catholics was a matter of some concern for all non-Catholics.

Fresh memories of Francisco Franco's association with fascism amplified the crisis over a royal conversion to Catholicism and a marriage without approval of the Dutch States-General. For the second in line to the throne to not only convert to Roman Catholicism, but to also associate with an alleged Franco sympathizer, caused shock and consternation in the Netherlands. When Princess Irene left the Netherlands to join Prince Carlos in Paris after the announcement of their engagement, a threat was telephoned to KLM Royal Dutch Airways by an anonymous caller saying, "you should investigate the plane". The telephone call was construed to be a bomb threat and the airliner was searched, causing more than an hour's delay for the flight. It was the first instance of any threat involving the royal family and their air travel.

Queen Juliana attempted to stop the marriage, first by sending a member of her staff to Madrid to persuade the Princess not to go ahead with a marriage that would be a political disaster for the monarchy in the Netherlands. It seemed to work and the Queen went on Dutch radio to tell the citizens that Princess Irene had agreed to cancel her engagement and was returning to the Netherlands. When the airplane arrived at Schiphol Airport, the Princess was not on it, and Queen Juliana and her husband, Prince Bernhard were supplied with a Dutch military plane to go to Spain to retrieve their daughter. However, a message was delivered to the Queen from the Dutch government warning that it would resign en masse if she set foot in Spain. It was suggested that Princess Irene was a pawn of General Francisco Franco who tried to maximize the event to his benefit.

Given the ramifications and the fact that a monarch from the House of Orange had never visited Spain, the Queen had no choice but to turn back. Prince Bernhard then traveled to Madrid to meet with his daughter and her fiancé, who both accompanied him back to the Netherlands, where an immediate meeting took place with the couple, the Queen, Prime Minister Marijnen, himself a Roman Catholic, and three top cabinet ministers. When the meeting ended in the early hours of the morning on Sunday, 9 February 1964, Dutch radio broke its traditional Sabbath day silence to announce that Princess Irene would give up any rights of succession to the throne so she could marry Carlos Hugo. The princess further stated that she did not want the government to create a bill which would grant official consent to her marriage. In an attempt to gain public favour for her proposed marriage, Princess Irene publicly stated that her marriage was intended to help end religious intolerance. This caused a division in public opinion, as less than 40 percent of the country ruled by the Protestant House of Orange was Roman Catholic. Over the ensuing weeks, things deteriorated further when Pope Paul VI granted an audience requested by the couple in Rome. The Vatican believed the meeting was being held with the consent of the Dutch royal family. The Queen at first denied such a meeting had taken place, but it was later verified. Because the constitution prohibits members of the royal family from any involvement in foreign politics, Irene alienated herself from almost every Dutch citizen when a photo appeared in a Dutch paper showing her at a Carlist rally in Spain and she declared that she supported her fiancé's political goals. The Dutch government officially announced that it had no responsibility for either the words or actions of Princess Irene in the future on 10 April 1964. It was done in response to Irene's declaration of joining Carlos Hugo's political campaign to regain the throne of Spain on 8 April 1964.

Marriage
No one from the Dutch royal family or any Dutch diplomatic representative attended the marriage of Princess Irene and Prince Carlos Hugo in the Borghese Chapel at the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, Italy, on 29 April 1964. There were also no representatives of Spain's Franco government at the ceremony; the couple chose Rome as the site of their nuptials because of its neutrality. Dutch television provided coverage of the marriage and Irene's family was among those who watched the ceremonies, although fate conspired in the form of a power failure which made them unable to see the last part of the rite. The Dutch royal family gathered at the home of Prince Bernhard's mother, Armgard of Sierstorpff-Cramm, for the television coverage. Princess Armgard had also converted to Roman Catholicism like her granddaughter, but decided against attending the wedding. Irene and her mother spoke on the telephone before she left for the Basilica. Governmental fears that attendance at the wedding by the Dutch royal family might be construed as approval of Spanish politics made it impossible for the family to do anything else. The Dutch government had also vetoed the possibility of the wedding being held in the Netherlands. While it is said that Pope Paul VI had been asked to officiate at the wedding and declined, he did send the couple his special blessing before the ceremony. He received the newlyweds at a private Vatican audience after their wedding. Because she had failed to obtain the approval of the States-General to marry, Irene lost her right of succession to the Dutch throne. She agreed that she would live outside of the Netherlands.

In 1968, Princess Irene was libeled by the West German "rainbow press". The publications operated similarly to movie and television gossip magazines, with the exception being that instead of stories about film or television stars, the rainbow press wrote about royalty and their supposed secret lives. One of the publications printed a story that Irene had undergone an abortion with parental consent before she was married. Irene's father, Prince Bernhard, took the paper to court to clear his daughter's name. The court found in favor of father and daughter, ordering the newspaper to pay them both damages and to print a public apology.

After the wedding, Irene was very active in her husband's right-wing political cause, but over time they drifted away from right-wing extremism to left-wing sympathies and became a part of the international jet-set crowd. On 9 May 1977 Irene was expelled from Spain on the day after the death in Switzerland of her father-in-law, the Carlist claimant Xavier, Duke of Parma. Her husband Carlos Hugo, now the new Duke of Parma, Head of the House and Carlist claimant to the throne and an opponent of King Juan Carlos I, was also barred from the country for the same reason. Prince Carlos Hugo was allowed to return in late 1977, but Princess Irene was not permitted back in the country until April 1978. The prince, head of the Royal House of Bourbon-Parma, became a naturalized Spanish citizen in 1979. The couple had four children, but the marriage ended in divorce in 1981.

Having been married to the Duke of Parma, she is the only one of her sisters whose husband was of royal status. Her youngest sister, Princess Christina, later waived her rights to the throne when she married Jorge Guillermo, a United States citizen born in Cuba and a Roman Catholic.

Since divorce
In 1980, Irene and her children returned to live in the Netherlands, initially moving back into Soestdijk Palace. She became involved in various personal development workshops. By 1981, she and her children had moved to their own home across the street from the palace, where Irene did traditional household chores like grocery shopping. In 1983 and 1985, she publicly spoke out against the additional deployment of NATO missiles at a large anti-nuclear rally in The Hague and with a letter to the newspaper De Volkskrant. Her connection with nature, that she says she had felt since childhood, intensified, and in 1995 she published her book Dialogue with Nature. The book outlined her philosophy that human beings are alienated from the natural world, but the Dutch media seized upon passages that recounted conversations she said she had with the trees and dolphins.

In 1999 Princess Irene purchased a farm near Nieu-Bethesda in South Africa, turning it into a sanctuary. In 2001, she helped establish the NatuurCollege in the Netherlands. She is also the founder of NatureWise, an organization that brings elementary school children in the Netherlands directly in touch with nature. The Princess is an honorary member of the Club of Budapest.

Children
Carlos Hugo and Princess Irene had four children:

Titles
Her official style is Her Royal Highness Princess Irene of the Netherlands, Princess of Orange-Nassau, Princess of Lippe-Biesterfeld The Princess used the following names since her divorce:
 * Princess Irene of Lippe-Biesterfeld
 * Mrs (Mevrouw) van Lippe-Biesterfeld.

title: Princess Irene of the Netherlands