text:
Conservatory of Flowers

The Conservatory of Flowers is a greenhouse and botanical garden that houses a collection of rare and exotic plants in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California. With construction having been completed in 1879, it is the oldest building in the park. It was one of the first municipal conservatories constructed in the United States and is the oldest remaining municipal wooden conservatory in the country. For these distinctions and for its associated historical, architectural, and engineering merits, the Conservatory of Flowers is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the California Register of Historical Places. It is a California Historical Landmark and a San Francisco Designated Landmark.

The Conservatory of Flowers is now one of the three locations of the Gardens of Golden Gate Park, along with the Japanese Tea Garden and the San Francisco Botanical Garden.

Architectural description

The Conservatory of Flowers is an elaborate Victorian greenhouse with a central dome rising nearly 60 ft high and arch-shaped wings extending from it for an overall length of 240 ft. The building sits atop a gentle slope overlooking Conservatory Valley. The structural members are articulated through one predominant form, a four-centered or Tudor arch.

The Conservatory of Flowers consists of a wood structural skeleton with glass walls set on a raised masonry foundation. The entire structure has a shallow E-shaped plan that is oriented along an east–west axis. The central 60 ft high pavilion is entered through a one-story, glassed-in vestibule with a gable roof on the south side of the pavilion. Flanking the rotunda to the east and west are one-story, symmetrical wings framed by wood arches. Each wing is L-shaped in plan, with cupolas adorning the intersection of the two segments.

The octagonal pavilion supports an arched roof that is, in turn, surmounted by a clerestory and dome. The clerestory is supported by eight free-standing, wood-clad, cast-iron columns located within the rotunda and grouped in pairs. Projecting from the pavilion roof on the east, west, and south elevations are dormer windows with peak roofs. Between major arched structural framing members are wood muntins that hold the glass lights on their sides. The lights lap one over one another like shingles and follow the curve of the arches.

The construction of each arch is aesthetically appealing in its simplicity, but also structurally clever in that it takes maximum advantage of wood as a building material while overcoming its inherent structural shortcomings. From a structural perspective, the arch design uses the mechanical properties of the material. Wood is strongest along the length of the grain and weakest along the end grain. The use of short arch components with shallow radii minimized the amount of weaker-end grain exposed to structural forces. The assembly of the arch with several small pieces of wood, the shapes of which are identical from arch to arch, was efficient. It allowed the fabricator to set machines with guides and templates so that cutting the multiple-arch components was a simple task. Furthermore, the design required little material, since each individual arch component has only a shallow radius. Moreover, by using relatively narrow widths of lumber, the chance of warping was minimized. Finally, there was an efficiency realized in transportation, as the small size of the arch components allowed them to be easily stored and shipped.

The structural wood arches and their method of construction, along with the decorative woodwork and unique lapped glazing, define the character of the conservatory. The major character-defining elements consist of ornamental and structural woodwork, including the method of fabrication used for the arches, the lapped glazing system, the ventilation system, and the building's siting and exterior landscaping.

Rooms within the conservatory

 * Potted Plants Gallery: The Potted Plant room holds various unusual plants. The pots and urns that hold the plants were created by various artists from around the world. This room is maintained at hotter temperatures to accommodate the needs of the plants. The Potted Plant Gallery follows Victorian architecture and the 19th century idea of displaying tropical plants in non-tropical parts of the world.
 * Lowlands Gallery: The Lowlands Gallery contains plants from the tropics of South America (near the equator). This room also contains plants that produce more well-known products such as bananas, coffee, and cinnamon. The room is usually kept around 70 °F with a very high level of humidity through the use of a frequent system of misters, as the Lowland Tropics typically get 100–400 inches of rain each year and are located in elevations from 3,000 feet to sea level.
 * Highlands Gallery: The Highlands Gallery contains native plants from South to Central America. Its plants collect moisture from the air, and from water that drips from the trees above. Due to its drastically higher elevation (3,000–10,000 feet), this room is kept cooler than the Lowlands Gallery (around 65 °F) and is kept at a very high level of humidity through the use of a misting system, as the Highland Tropics typically receive 200 inches of rain per year.
 * Aquatics Gallery: The Aquatic Plants room is similar in conditions as those near the Amazon River. As such, many carnivorous plants that thrive in hot, humid environments grow throughout the room. The soil is mostly lacking in nutrients and the carnivorous plants are kept very moist by condensation of the water in the extremely humid air. The room also contains two large ponds, one holding 9,000 gallons of water, and the other holding half as much. Both ponds are kept at 83 °F and are maintained using beneficial bacteria, filters, water heaters, and solutions to prevent algae buildup.

Historical context
In both Europe and America, the 19th century brought increased urbanization and industrialization. In response, city governments began providing open spaces and natural settings for public use. The profession of Landscape Architecture expanded during the later part of the 19th century, and park design became a large part of this new profession's repertoire. In addition, a significant outgrowth of the need for natural surroundings in urban contexts was an increase in the study of plant sciences during this period, both by professionals and amateurs. A building type called the glasshouse or conservatory took shape, in which the city-dweller could view masterpieces of the plant world otherwise unavailable in urban environments. Municipalities and individuals spent a great deal of time and money to construct these building types, which became known as "theaters of nature."

The 19th-century glasshouse grew out of the city-dweller's desire to bring nature and the natural into urban life. These structures became popular in urban, public, and semi-public settings. As these structures gained popularity in Europe, greenhouses began to be constructed on larger scales and of stronger materials. One engineer, Joseph Paxton (1803–1865), had an enormous effect on the development of the conservatory building type. His structures called for a system of glass and metal roof construction, whereas past structures had typically been constructed of wood and glass. His choice of materials allowed designs for glasshouses of substantially larger scales. His best known example is the Crystal Palace at the world's first International Exhibition in 1851. Elsewhere in Europe, Hector Horeau designed several conservatories of glass and iron, such as the Lyons Conservatory in France of 1847. In Germany, August von Voit designed the Great Palm House in the Old Botanical Gardens in Munich in 1860. Another prominent example is the Palm House in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in London.

The increased use of glass and iron as building materials also impacted the development of the glasshouse. The decades following the construction of the Crystal Palace saw a decline in the use of wood structural members for the construction of large European greenhouses or conservatories. Many manufacturers had found that the humid heat necessary to successfully propagate numerous plant varieties often destroyed wood structural members in short periods of time.

Following European fashions, wealthy Americans began to construct conservatories in the mid-19th century on private estates.

These structures were enjoyed by a broad cross-section of the public and were popular throughout California's early history. Structures of various shapes and sizes were built in Victorian California, ranging from an attached and glassed-in wing for a residence, to a great domed or compartmentalized, detached glasshouse. Examples of wealthy Californians who built conservatories in their private estates include: A.K.P. (Albion Keith Paris) Harmon, for his Oakland Lake Merritt Estate (which later became Lakeside Park); Frederick Delger; Frank M. Smith; Darius Ogden Mills (Millbrae); and Luther Burbank, for his own experiments with plant germination (Santa Rosa). These examples all used wood as structural members.

The conservatory
The material for two 12000 sqft conservatories modeled after Kew Gardens in London was originally bought in 1876 by James Lick, an eccentric businessman, piano maker, and successful real estate investor who was a patron of the sciences. It is believed that Lick purchased the materials from Lord & Burnham, a manufacturer of greenhouses located in upstate New York, and these were sent in kit form, to be assembled on site. The order is said to have been the company's first big sale. The 33 tons of glass were sent by boat – most probably one chartered by Lick – from New York, around Cape Horn to San Francisco Bay.

The conservatories were intended for the City of San Jose, where Lick had built a mansion surrounded by exotic plants imported from South America and around the world. Lick died in 1876 before constructing the conservatory on his estate, and it was put up for sale by his trustees. The material ended up in the possession of various beneficiaries of Lick's will, the California Academy of Sciences, and the Society of California Pioneers. In 1877, the Society sold it to "a group of 27 prominent San Franciscans and local philanthropists", which included Leland Stanford, Charles Crocker, Claus Spreckels and former mayor William Alvord, who offered it as a gift to the City of San Francisco for use in Golden Gate Park, which was then under construction. The Parks Commission accepted the gift and in 1878 hired Lord & Burnham to supervise the erection of the structure. It is believed that the glass for the second conservatory may have been used in other structures in the park. Records indicate the construction costs were roughly $30,000.

The specific architect of the greenhouse is not known for certain. The San Francisco Public Library holds a document entitled Information about Samuel Charles Bugbee, written by a relative, Arthur S. Bugbee, in 1957. It indicates that the architect Samual Charles Bugbee, whose works included the homes of Leland Stanford and Charles Crocker and the Mendocino Presbyterian Church, may also have designed the Conservatory of Flowers.

Once open in April 1879, the Conservatory contained a large variety of rare and tropical plants, including a giant water lily (Victoria regia), which at the time was the only known specimen in the United States.

Wood vs. iron
The Conservatory of Flowers was constructed of wood rather than iron, as was common in the later part of the 19th century, because wood was plentiful in the west. Cast-iron greenhouses do not appear to have been widely manufactured in America until the 1880s. Materials analysis suggests that the structural wooden members of the Conservatory greenhouse were constructed of indigenous California Coast Redwood.

Other known American wood conservatories of this period included Lyndhurst in Tarrytown, New York. The Lyndhurst Conservatory, constructed in 1869 of wood by the estate's first owner George Merritt, was destroyed by fire in 1880. The estate's second owner, Jay Gould, rebuilt the conservatory in 1881, hiring the local firm of Lord & Burnham – which had moved from upstate New York to Irvington, New York to be closer to its Hudson Valley clientele, to manufacture his greenhouse. The 1881 Lord & Burnham structure was composed primarily of cast iron and glass. The Gould Conservatory at Lyndhurst is credited with being the first conservatory of iron in the United States and with inspiring subsequent structures of the same material. After their success with the Gould Conservatory of 1881, Lord & Burnham and other conservatory manufacturers apparently produced few large conservatories of wood.

The Conservatory is now the oldest wood-and-glass conservatory in North America open to the public.

Statistics
The conservatory has 16,800 window panes. The upper dome of the conservatory weighs 14.5 tonnes.

Langley's San Francisco Directory for the Year Commencing April 1879 discussed the construction of the Conservatory of Flowers:

"The whole building required in its construction twenty-six thousand square feet of glass weighing twenty-five tons, and two tones of putty. It is a marvel of architectural beauty, surpassing in this respect any similar construction in the United States, and is only equaled in size by the Government Conservatory of in the Horticultural Gardens at Washington."

Repair campaigns

Through its life, the Conservatory of Flowers has undergone several repair campaigns. The Palm Room, located in the center of the building, was seriously damaged in a fire in 1883. Its dome was completely reconstructed at this time. It sustained little damage following the 1906 earthquake. After a second fire damaged the structure in 1918, repairs were made as needed but were not thoroughly documented. No significant documented repairs to the building took place again until sometime after World War II, when certain portions of the wood work, including structural elements, were replaced. In 1959, wood windows at the base of the glazed walls at the building's perimeter were infilled with concrete panels that were cast to match the profiles of the original construction. In 1964–65, the clerestory of the Palm Room underwent reconstruction. The columns, lintels, and sills in this area were replaced by pressure-treated redwood. Five hundred lineal feet of the exterior cap molding, which covers the arches, was replaced at this time as well. Between 1978 and 1982, major repairs were performed on deteriorated woodwork. The areas that were repaired during this time did not overlap the 1960s' repairs to the clerestory.

In general, it appears that after 1914 most maintenance work was undertaken only when conditions presented a safety hazard, mechanical systems were in need of repair, or the building became extremely unsightly. Lack of scheduled maintenance affects the performance of building materials. Wood, in particular, requires proper maintenance of paint coatings to control the development of rot. In this building, it is important to maintain the condition of the interior, as well as exterior, coatings because of the humid indoor environment. Also necessary is the maintenance of waterproofing details, such as flashing, to prevent water from accumulating in concealed areas. It is therefore not surprising that rot developed in the building, and significant repairs to the wood elements of the building were necessary over time, given its somewhat irregular maintenance history.

Early years
In the first years after the conservatory was constructed, ongoing maintenance was necessary for both the structure and its collection. This included repairing the boilers in the furnace room, the installation of ventilators, and the installation of a cement floor. At this point, the conservatory held over 9,000 plants of various kinds.

1883 fire

In January 1883, the conservatory caught fire, with the main dome sustaining the heaviest damage. Evidence suggests the fire started as the result of intense heat generated by the furnace. Charles Crocker donated $10,000 toward the repair fund. The reconstructed dome included the addition of a clerestory. The original dome was saucer-shaped, while the replacement dome was more classically domical in its appearance, and was raised by 6 ft. The other major change was the finial, which prior to the fire consisted of an eagle figure, whereas the replacement feature is a traditional turned finial of wood. This has been the only major change in the overall form of the building during its lifetime.

The remainder of the nineteenth century
Records indicate ongoing maintenance included painting in 1887-1889 and repainting again in 1890. In 1894, the conservatory's surrounding landscaping saw numerous transformations in preparations for the California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894. Another fire struck the building in 1895.

The conservatory again was repainted in 1899 and received new floors of grooved concrete. At this point, the old floors, some of wood and some of concrete, were replaced by new grooved concrete. The grooves in the floor were intended to carry off the surplus water and make a visit to the conservatory more comfortable and pleasant. Several wooden plant benches that had rotted out were replaced by benches made of concrete wire netting to stand the constant change of temperature better than wood.

The 1906 earthquake
The San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906 did little damage to the Conservatory of Flowers. The structure is visible in a number of photographs of refugees living in Golden Gate Park after the disaster. However, records indicate that reconstruction costs ensued to the surrounding landscape from refugees living in the park.

Early twentieth-century repairs
Minor repairs were made to the Conservatory of Flowers in 1912 and 1913, including carpentry, cement setting for plant benches, and other small repairs. In 1918 a fire, commencing in the furnace room, caused damage to the conservatory's Potting Room and adjacent Dome Room. Repairs were made as needed. Another fire struck the Conservatory in 1918, causing the roof to partially collapse.

Depression Era decline
During the Depression, the Conservatory of Flowers, due to apparent lack of maintenance, was in poor condition. The Park commissioners instructed the superintendent of Parks to close the Conservatory of Flowers in 1933 and construct proper barricades to prevent possible injury to citizens. The woodwork, foundations, girders, posts, and various structural members became rotted and decayed to such an extent that certain portions of the conservatory were reported to be in danger of falling and potentially causing great injury.

Post-War era
In August 1946, the Conservatory of Flowers was painted and reglazed. A new electrical system, which allowed automatic control of the heating system for all of the conservatory, was installed in 1948. New piping was installed in 1949. A new water supply was installed in 1956.

In 1959, the original doors at the wing entrances were replaced with plate-glass windows and concrete panels. That same year, the lower ventilators at the building's perimeter were removed, and concrete panels, cast in the profile of the ventilators, were installed. This unfortunately seriously compromised the building's natural ventilation system. A few minor repairs were made in 1962 and 1965.

The Conservatory of Flowers was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 14, 1971. It had previously been named a California Historic Landmark on September 1, 1970, and would be designated a San Francisco Landmark on December 4, 1972.

A major rehabilitation project took place between 1978 and 1981. Work included the removal of all interior and exterior caps of the arches for visual inspection and probing, in order to detect pockets of wood rot. The portions of arches showing surface wood rot were treated with 'Git-Rot', a wood preservative. The caps that remained in good condition were salvaged and reinstalled.

Building evidence suggests that the exterior surfaces of the arches were originally fitted with copper flashing. The flashing was secured onto the arches and covered by the wood caps. In most locations that were inspected, the flashing had been removed, leaving only short remnants at random locations. The flashing was rolled up and taken away during the 1982 restoration effort. The flashing was an effective method of preventing moisture from entering the joints in the arch assembly, and its removal hastened deterioration. During this restoration as well, various deteriorated wood elements were replaced with pressure-treated, glue-laminated members.

Millennium rehabilitation
During the winter of 1995–1996, a series of large storms exacerbated the ongoing deterioration of the wood structure. The 100 mph (160 km/h) winds blew out 30,000 fogged white glass panes in the conservatory, shattered the white glass dome, and weakened the structure. In addition, 15 percent of the plant collection was lost due to exposure to the cold, wintry air and flying glass. After covering the holes with tarp and plywood and bringing in heaters, the conservatory contemplated farming out hundreds of plants to other institutions while the building was repaired. Some specimens however were too big or too old to move. The most challenging plant was the 112-year-old Brazilian philodendron that inhabited the shattered dome. A greenhouse was built to house the philodendron and other plants during renovation and afterwards used for expansion and keeping more exotic plants.

The conservatory was placed on the 1996 World Monuments Watch by the World Monuments Fund. The Fund aimed to encourage repair rather replacement of the original fabric, and provided funding from financial services company American Express. Additional funding came from the Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund. In 1998, the National Trust for Historic Preservation adopted the conservatory into its Save America's Treasures program, launched as part of First Lady Hillary Clinton's Millennium Council projects. The publicity from these efforts eventually led to a fundraising campaign organized by what would become the San Francisco Parks Alliance to raise the money needed for rehabilitation, restoration, and stabilization of the conservatory.

The construction lasted from 1999 until 2003. Initially estimated to cost $10 million, the actual final cost was $25 million. On September 20, 2003, the restored conservatory was once again opened to the public.

Repair methodology
Between November 1996 and January 1997, on-site surveys were conducted by a project team consisting of Tennebaum-Manheim Engineers and Architectural Resources Group. Surveyors included architects, materials conservators, architectural historians, structural engineers, mechanical engineers, and electrical engineers. The architectural and materials condition survey included a close-range visual inspection of all of the wood members in the building to determine locations of deteriorated wood, an analysis of the types of wood species occurring in the building, a study of the building's construction details, glazing, and a photographic survey. The structural survey included measuring the deflection of each of the arches and studying the probable lateral and vertical load paths to determine areas of weakness.

Survey findings
The deterioration of wood occurred at typically vulnerable areas, such as the exposed end grain of arches and muntins and where wood members intersect. The humidity in the building was a contributing factor to wood deterioration. The level of moisture in the building was exacerbated by two conditions. First, the building's natural ventilation system had been removed in a past repair. The ventilators, which were originally located in the low wall area, had been filled in, and some ridge ventilators were inoperable. The air flow through the ventilators, which would have assisted in the evaporation of water, was not occurring. Second, the penetration of rain water from the exterior of the building, because of inadequate or deteriorated waterproofing, had increased the level of moisture in the wood. The copper sheathing that had originally capped the arch exteriors, in addition to acting as a moisture barrier, may have been acting as a biocide through copper oxides inhibiting wood rot.

Repair process
Due to the level of deterioration and concerns relating to the building's long-term maintenance, a scheme was used to restore the wood structure. This involved disassembling the structure, repairing salvageable materials, and replacing materials deteriorated beyond repair with old-growth redwood that had fallen naturally or had been left behind by loggers. This was possible due to the original method used to fabricate the structure.

The construction sequence was as follows. First, temporary protection for those plants that could not be moved was provided. Then, the glass was carefully removed from the building, and historic glazing was salvaged. Structural wood elements of the building (arches), as well as muntins that held the glazing, were disassembled. The location of each element was recorded for reinstallation. The lead-based coatings were stripped from the wood members. Each wooden piece was then tested for its strength and determined if repair or replacement was appropriate.

Contemporary status
In January 2022, legislation was proposed by Mayor London Breed that would put the Conservatory under the oversight of the San Francisco Botanical Garden Society, along with the Japanese Tea Garden and the Botanical Garden itself, under the name "The Gardens of Golden Gate Park". Under the proposal, admission to the gardens would be free for San Francisco Residents.

Appearances in film

 * Vertigo directed by Alfred Hitchcock (1958);
 * One on Top of the Other directed by Lucio Fulci (1969);
 * Innerspace directed by Joe Dante (1987);
 * Heart and Souls directed by Ron Underwood (1993);
 * Playing Mona Lisa directed by Matthew Huffman (2000)

title: Conservatory of Flowers


text:
The Cream of Eric Clapton

The Cream of Eric Clapton is a greatest hits album by English guitar player Eric Clapton. It includes work from two of his bands, Cream, and Derek and the Dominos as well as his solo work. It was released in 1987 in the UK.

In 1989 a Polygram released a video compilation, under the same title and using similar artwork.

Track listing

 * 1) Derek and the Dominos – "Layla" (Eric Clapton, Jim Gordon)
 * 2) Cream – "Badge" (Clapton, George Harrison)
 * 3) Cream – "I Feel Free" (Pete Brown, Jack Bruce)
 * 4) Cream – "Sunshine of Your Love" (Brown, Bruce, Clapton)
 * 5) Cream – "Crossroads" (Robert Johnson) (CD only bonus track)
 * 6) Cream – "Strange Brew" (Clapton, Gail Collins Pappalardi, Felix Pappalardi)
 * 7) Cream – "White Room" (Brown, Bruce)
 * 8) Eric Clapton – "Cocaine" (J. J. Cale)
 * 9) Eric Clapton – "I Shot the Sheriff" (Bob Marley)
 * 10) Eric Clapton – "Behind the Mask" (Chris Mosdell, Ryuichi Sakamoto)
 * 11) Eric Clapton – "Forever Man" (Jerry Lynn Williams)
 * 12) Eric Clapton – "Lay Down Sally" (Clapton, Marcy Levy, George Terry)
 * 13) Eric Clapton – "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" (Bob Dylan)
 * 14) Eric Clapton – "Wonderful Tonight" (Clapton)
 * 15) Eric Clapton – "Let It Grow" (Clapton)
 * 16) Eric Clapton – "Promises" (Richard Feldman, Roger Linn)
 * 17) Eric Clapton – "I've Got a Rock 'n' Roll Heart" (Steve Diamond, Tony Seals, Troy Seals, Eddie Setser)

Japanese edition
The Japanese compilation of that title has a slightly different track listing, it includes the full version of "After Midnight", which was re-recorded in 1987 and released as a single in 1988.

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

title: The Cream of Eric Clapton


text:
SBI Shinsei Bank

SBI Shinsei Bank, Limited (株式会社SBI新生銀行) is a leading diversified Japanese financial institution that provides a full range of financial products and services to both institutional and individual customers. It is owned by SBI Group and headquartered in Chuo, Tokyo.

History
SBI Shinsei Bank is the successor of the Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, which had a government monopoly on the issuance of many long-term debt securities. Following the collapse of the Japanese asset price bubble in 1989, the bank was riddled with bad debts: the government nationalized it in 1998, and it was delisted from the Tokyo Stock Exchange. After several proposed mergers with domestic banks, LTCB was sold to an international group led by US-based Ripplewood Holdings in March 2000 for ¥121 billion ($1.2 billion U.S.), the first time in history that a Japanese bank came under foreign control. Investor Christopher Flowers also played a major role in the buyout syndicate and remained a key shareholder of the company until August 2019, when the Japanese government acquired the shares held by his fund.

As part of the deal, the Japanese government insisted that LTCB maintain existing loan accounts for at least three years. The final purchase agreement included a "defect warranty provision" (瑕疵担保条項) to the effect that Shinsei could demand within the next three years that the government purchase any claims which had fallen by twenty percent or more from book value. A similar provision was afforded Aozora Bank, the successor of LTCB's similarly beleaguered sister company Nippon Credit Bank.

LTCB was relaunched as "Shinsei Bank" (literally "Newborn" or "New Life" Bank) in June 2000, with new management and services. Many of Shinsei's managers had previous experience working for foreign financial institutions in Japan, such as CEO Thierry Porte (formerly of Morgan Stanley) and CIO Jay Dvivedi (formerly of Citibank). Shinsei continued to use the Long-Term Credit Bank SWIFT code (LTCBJPJT).

SBI Shinsei used the defect warranty provision to dispose of all the worst debts owed to the bank. Several companies which had used LTCB as their primary bank went bankrupt as a result, including Sogo (July, 2000) and the Dai-Ichi Hotel. This created a furor in Japan: politicians especially criticized Goldman Sachs, which advised on the sale of LTCB, for not warning the government of the risks inherent in the defect security provision.

SBI Shinsei then raised ¥230 billion in an IPO on February 20, 2004. The purchase of Shinsei thus turned a profit of over ¥100 billion within four years. The success of the IPO intensified criticism of Shinsei, however: the government was estimated to have lost ¥4-5 trillion on the deal between lost investments and forced purchases of bad debt, and the profits from the deal even escaped Japanese taxation through the use of a foreign investment partnership. In April 2004, the bank exchanged its long-term credit banking license for a standard commercial banking license.

The Financial Services Agency issued an improvement order to Shinsei on June 29, 2007, after the revenues of the company fell dramatically below targets.

On April 25, 2009, it was announced that Shinsei Bank and Aozora Bank have entered into negotiations to integrate their operations in the summer of 2010, with an eye toward an eventual merger, however the talks collapsed in May 2010 amid disputes over capitalization and business strategy, as well as the abatement of the 2008 financial crisis.

In 2010, the bank sold its headquarters building near Hibiya Park and its operations center in Meguro in order to avoid falling below targets again due to investment writedowns during the subprime crisis in the United States. Shinsei moved its headquarters to the Nihombashi area of Chuo City in January 2011.

Services
Shinsei Bank divides its business into three components: retail banking, institutional banking and consumer/commercial finance.

Retail banking
Shinsei offers a number of unique services as part of its basic "PowerFlex" savings account, including:

 * "Cash back" for any ATM fees incurred when making withdrawals overseas.
 * Banking office hours until 7 PM in many locations (most Japanese banks close much earlier, often as early as 3 PM).
 * Foreign currency deposits as part of the standard account package (unique to Shinsei and Tokyo Star Bank and Jibun Bank).
 * Instant cash card issuance for customers opening new accounts in person with photo ID.

The Shinsei banking system is based on the FLEXCUBE software developed by Oracle Financial Services Software Ltd. Formerly i-flex solutions.

Shinsei also gears many of its services toward resident foreigners in Japan, with English-language online banking and telephone support, as well as no requirement for a personal seal in order to open an account.

Institutional banking
Shinsei combines its commercial and investment banking operations into an "Institutional Banking" division which engages in a broad range of commercial lending and equity investment. The IB division is affiliated with four subsidiary companies: Shinsei Investment Management, Shinsei Securities, Shinsei Servicer and Shinsei Trust and Banking. Shinsei also does considerable investment business in Europe through subsidiaries in London and Frankfurt.

Consumer and commercial finance
Shinsei operates many of its services in this field through its subsidiaries APLUS (consumer finance), Shinki (owner of the NoLoan consumer finance company), Showa Leasing (commercial and consumer leasing), Shinsei Business Finance (unsecured lending) and Shinsei Property Finance (mortgages).

title: SBI Shinsei Bank


text:
User:2005-Fan/Piklopedia

In the Nintendo game Pikmin 2, all enemy types Captain Olimar kills in the game are added to the Piklopedia, an encyclopedia of all the creatures encountered. These not only include animals, but plants and robot-like things as well.

Grub-Dogs
The most common type of enemy in Pikmin 2, Grub - Dogs are in every level of the game and many caves. The Water Dumple is indeed a relative of the bulborb.

Red Bulborb

Oculus kageyamii russus

Looks like a ladybug, but it never flies. This fearsome creature has large mandibles used to eat your Pikmin. If you wake it up, it will start to chase you, you but will fall asleep if it can't see you anymore. Sometimes this bulborb will lunge. If it misses, it will fall into the dirt, giving you time to escape.

Hairy Bulborb

Oculus kageyamii folliculus

A hairy lady-bug like creature, but it never flies. This creature will lose all of its hair when woken up from its slumber. If you leave it alone, the hair will grow back. This bulborb has the lowest amount of HP for any bulborb.

Orange Bulborb

Oculus kageyamii orangium

A lady-bug like creature, but it never flies. This bulborb can sense Olimar when he is far away. It has bloodshot eyes and has a orange skin with black spots. This is probably the most fearoscious of all bulborbs. It is very qiuck, hard to escape.

 * Spotty Bulbear

Oculus terribilis dotticum

A lady-bug like creature with black skin and red dots. It walks along a predetermined path, looking for Pikmin. It will chase you, and it will regenerate health when it faints/dies, so it should be returned to the onion qiuckly. Dwarf Bulbears are usually following it around.

 *  Dwarf Bulbear

Oculus terribilis

Young Bulbears that follow an adult bulbear around.

 * Bulborb Larva

Oculus bambinii

Slug-like creatures that can eat eat Pikmin very quickly. Are born by Empress Bublax.

 * Emperor Bulblax

Oculus supremus

A large frog-like creature with a hard shell. It uses a long sticky tongue to eat, and also will crush your Pikmin by hopping on them.

 * Empress Bulblax

Oculus matriarcha

A Bulborb with an oversized body. Unlike other bulborbs, its weak point is its face.

 * Fiery Bulblax

Oculus vulcanus

A bulborb that is on fire. If you lure it into water, though, the fire on its back will dissapear.

 * Water Dumple

Ichthyosa felinis

A blue slug-like creature that is usually found in shoals of 2-3.

Breadbugs
The three more common breadbugs are disguised by nature as traditional bulborbs.

Dwarf Red Bulborb

Pansarus pseudoculii russus

"olimers notes from pikmin 2" Although initially identified as a juvinile red bulborb, groundbreaking new research indicates that this creature is in fact a member of the breadbug family. A close reletive of the vanilla breadbug, it escapes predation through mimicry. Unique adapion ofthe red bulborb's crimson colouration allows the species o safely commingle. Such effective adaption and obfuscation by a prey species is rare, indicating this clever creature is a master of mimicry.

Snow Bulborb

Pansarus pseudooculii frosticus

"olimers notes" Like the dwarf red bulborb, the snow bulborb is a member of the breadbug family that seeks to survive hrough imitating the appearance and behavior of a bulborb. Its pale coloration and blue spots make for easy identification. In particular, this organism mimics the hairybulborb, but it is of course unable to grow the hair that gives the hairy bulborb its name. However as the hairy bulborb has been known to lose its hair in certain circumstaces, the snow bulborb is an effective mimic that is often misaken for a member of the same species.

 * Dwarf Orange Bulborb

Pansarus pseudooculii orangium

"olimers notes" Just as dwarf red bulborbs mimic the appearance of red bulborbs, it was theorized that an orange bulborb-mimicking variant must also exist. Recent fieldwork has confirmed this theory

 * Breadbug

Pansarus gluttonae

"olimers notes" The adult breadbug competes for many of the same food sources as pikmin, but its thick-skinned hide allows it ti withstand most pikmin group arracks. However, some researchers claim to have observed breadbugs being overwhelmed by massive numbers of pikmin and reduced to food.

 * Giant Breadbug

Pansarus gigantus

Chrysanthemum family
This family of creatures is different in that some, like Creeping Chrysanthemums, are carnivores that eat pikmin. Others, like the Margaret, are merely plants.

Creeping Chrysanthemum

Taraxacum rovinia

 * Margaret

Luminosus croceus

Snagrets
A group in the "Snavian" family, these large predators are half snake, half bird.

 * Burrowing Snagret

Shiropedes anacondii

A large, one footed creature with a long, snake like body and a bird head.

 * Pileated Snagret

Shiropedes ambulatria

Blowhogs

 * Fiery Blowhog

Sus draconus

A gray, pig like animal capable of spewing a highly combustable liquid (fire).

 * Watery Blowhog

Sus loogiens

Similar to the Fiery Blowhog, although it makes water instead.

 * Puffy Blowhog

Sus inflata

 * Withering Blowhog

Sus decrepitia

Arachnorbs
Beady Long Legs''']

Pseudoarachnia armoralis

Raging Long Legs]

Pseudoarachnia furiendis

Man-at-Legs

Pseudoarachnia navaronia

Dweevils
Members of the "Mandarachnia" genus have a tendancy to imitate objects scattered around the environment.

 * Fiery Dweevil

Mandarachnia napalmens

 * Caustic Dweevil

Mandarachnia sulfurnid

 * Anode Dweevil

Mandarachnia volticula

 * Munge Dweevil

Mandarachnia pungetis

 * Volatite Dweevil

Mandarachnia explodus

 * Titan Dweevil

Mandarachnia gargantium

title: User:2005-Fan/Piklopedia


text:
Blue Hills

Blue Hills may refer to:

Places

 * Blue Hills, Queensland, a locality in the City of Townsville, Australia
 * Sinimäed Hills (or "Blue Hills"), Estonia
 * Blue Hills, Gauteng, a suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa
 * Blue Hills, Turks and Caicos Islands, the highest point of the islands

United States

 * Blue Hills (Washington), a range of hills
 * Blue Hills, Connecticut, a suburb of Hartford
 * Blue Hills, Kansas City, Missouri
 * Blue Hills Reservation, Massachusetts, a state park
 * Blue Hills Ski Area
 * Great Blue Hill, the highest point in the reservation

Other uses

 * The Blue Hills (Estonian: Sinimäed), a 2006 Estonian film
 * Blue Hills (radio serial), an Australian radio serial, run from 1949 until 1976, formerly named The Lawsons
 * "Blue Hills of Massachusetts", the official poem of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by Katherine E. Mullen
 * Battle of Blue Hills, a 1944 battle between the German Army and the Soviet Leningrad Front

title: Blue Hills


text:
Château de Courson

The Château de Courson was built in 1676 in Courson-Monteloup, on the south-west outskirts of Paris, France. It is in the Essonne département of the Île-de-France région.

Originally the home of the Lamoignon family, the château has been in the family of de Nervaux-Loys since the 18th century. Its historic park was laid out in formal style by a pupil of André Le Nôtre in the 18th century. During the 19th century the gardens were twice remodelled, first around 1820 for the Duc de Padoue by the landscaper Berthault, then again around 1860 by the Bülhers, who laid out many French parks and gardens, including those of Rennes, Lyon and Bordeaux.

The documentary film Bring On the Night about rock musician Sting's first solo tour was filmed at the château in 1985.

It is now most famous as the venue for the Journées des Plantes de Courson. These extremely popular plant fairs were held in the grounds of the château in October from 1983 and also, from 1987, a spring plant fair was held in mid-May, until 2015, when the whole event transferred to the Domaine de Chantilly.

The château and park are still open for tours and other events.

title: Château de Courson


text:
List of Ecuadorian painters

Notable Ecuadorian painters include:

 * Alfredo Palacio Moreno (1912-1998)
 * Aníbal Villacís (1927–2012)
 * Araceli Gilbert (1913-1993)
 * Bolívar Mena Franco (1913–1993)
 * Brenda Gonzalez
 * Caesar Andrade Faini (1913–?)
 * Camilo Egas (1889-1962)
 * Edgar Carrasco Arteaga (1946–present)
 * Eduardo Kingman (1913-1998)
 * Eduardo X Arroyo (1953–present)
 * Enrique Tábara (1930–present)
 * Estuardo Maldonado (1930–present)
 * Félix Aráuz (1935–2024)
 * Galo Galecio
 * Gilberto Almeida
 * Gonzalo Endara Crow (1936-1996)
 * Humberto Moré (1929-1984)
 * Jaime F. Bautista (1955-present)
 * Jaime Valencia (1915–present)
 * Jorge Velarde (1960–present)
 * Jose Carreño (1947–present)
 * Jovan Karlo Villalba (1977–present)
 * Juan Villafuerte (1945-1977)
 * Judith Gutierrez (1927-2003)
 * Luis Miranda (1932-2016)
 * Luis Molinari-Flores (1929–present)
 * Manuel Rendón (1894-1982)
 * Marcos Restrepo (1961–present)
 * Miguel Betancourt (1958–present)
 * Oswaldo Guayasamín (1919-1999)
 * Oswaldo Moncayo (1923-1984)
 * Oswaldo Moreno (1929-2011)
 * Oswaldo Viteri (1931–present)
 * Patricio Cueva Jaramillo (1928–present)
 * Rafael Salas (1824-1906)
 * Theo Constanté (1934–present)
 * Trude Sojka (1909-2007)
 * Víctor Mideros Almeida (1888-1967)
 * Washington Iza (1947–present)
 * Xavier Blum Pinto (1957–present)

title: List of Ecuadorian painters


text:
Mandela Way T-34 Tank

The Mandela Way T-34 Tank, nicknamed Stompie, is a decommissioned Soviet-built T-34-85 medium tank, formerly located on the corner of Mandela Way and Page's Walk in Bermondsey, London, England. The tank was regularly repainted in a wide variety of colour schemes, often by graffiti artists. In January 2022 it was removed for restoration, and its owner stated in April 2023 that it may not return to its former location due to concerns that the graffiti may affect its historical preservation.

History
The tank is a former Czechoslovak People's Army tank that is rumoured to have taken part in the suppression of the Prague Spring uprising in 1968. Following the "Velvet Revolution" and the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, it was decommissioned and sold, and was used as a prop in the making of the 1995 film Richard III in London. On completion of the film, it was bought in 1995 by Russell Gray, a local scrap dealer, for £7,000 as a present for his son. He had previously failed to secure planning permission from Southwark Council to redevelop a vacant plot of land that he owned; and so, in an act of humorous protest, he placed the tank on the site, with its gun turret turned towards the council offices. He had previously allegedly obtained permission for the installation of a "tank" there, assumed by council officials to mean a septic tank.

The tank is nicknamed after the South African anti-apartheid activist James "Stompie" Seipei.

It was removed for restoration by its owner, on 4 January 2022, who said that "it might be a week, it might be two years". In an interview the next year, the owner said he was unsure if the tank would ever be returned to the corner, as the graffiti did not respect "its value as a piece of military history".

Repainting
The tank was regularly repainted, and its colour scheme changed, often by local graffiti artists. In 2002 it was painted pink by Cubitt Artists and Aleksandra Mir. In April 2017 it was temporarily repainted by artist Charlotte Meldon to its authentic military olive drab. In April 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic, it was painted sky blue in support of the National Health Service. Remembrance poppies were added in November 2020. In July 2021, it was repainted light green with dark green letters reading "Go Go Green".

Similar graffitied tanks
There are also T-62 and T-80UD tanks that have been graffitied in a hippie manner at the National Museum of the History of Ukraine in the Second World War, Kyiv, Ukraine.

The Monument to Soviet tank crews was a memorial located in Prague, Czech Republic, made up of an IS-2m tank on a pedestal. In 1991, the artist David Cerny painted the tank pink and hoisted a large middle finger over the turret in protest against the controversial monument. The monument was later removed and the tank is now displayed at Military Museum Lešany, painted pink.

title: Mandela Way T-34 Tank


text:
Careless Whisper

"Careless Whisper" is a song recorded by English singer-songwriter George Michael. Released as the second single from Wham!'s second studio album Make It Big (1984), it was written by Michael and Andrew Ridgeley, with Michael producing the song. Although the song was released as part of Make It Big, the single release is credited to either Wham! featuring George Michael (in North America and several other countries) or solely to George Michael (in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and some nations in Europe).

The song has been covered by a number of artists since its release, including Brian McKnight, Seether, Roger Williams, Kenny G and Julio Iglesias, among others. A contemporary pop song with R&B and soul influences, it features a prominent saxophone riff composed by Michael and played by Steve Gregory. It became a commercial success, topping record charts in at least ten countries and selling about 6 million copies worldwide—2 million of them in the United States. The song later achieved popularity on social media, mainly due to the saxophone riff being used in many movies and as a popular internet meme.

Composition and writing
In 1981, Michael was working as a DJ at the Bel Air Restaurant  in Northwood, London near Bushey, Hertfordshire. Michael explained in his autobiography, Bare, that he conceptualised "Careless Whisper" based on events from his childhood. Michael wrote, "I was on my way to DJ at the Bel Air when I wrote 'Careless Whisper'. I have always written on buses, trains and in cars. It always happens on journeys... With 'Careless Whisper' I remember exactly where it first came to me, where I came up with the sax line... I remember I was handing the money over to the guy on the bus and I got this line, the sax line... I wrote it totally in my head. I worked on it for about three months in my head." Sheet music for "Careless Whisper" sets the key of D minor.

"When I was twelve, thirteen, I used to have to chaperone my sister, who was two years older, to an ice rink at Queensway in London," he explained. "There was a girl there with long blonde hair whose name was Jane. I was a fat boy in glasses and I had a big crush on her—though I didn't stand a chance. My sister used to go and do what she wanted when we got to the skating rink and I would spend the afternoon swooning over this girl Jane."

"A few years later, when I was sixteen, I had my first relationship with a girl called Helen," Michael continued.

"It had just started to cool off a bit when I discovered that the blonde girl from Queensway had moved in just around the corner from my school. She had moved in right next to where I used to stand and wait for my next-door neighbour, who used to give me a lift home from school. And one day I saw her walk down the path next to me and I thought – now where did SHE come from? She didn't know it was me. It was a few years later and I looked a lot different. Then we played a school disco with the Executive and she saw me singing and decided she fancied me. By this time she was that much older and a big buxom thing – and eventually I started seeing her. She invited me in one day when I was waiting for my lift and I was... in heaven."

Michael observed that after he stopped wearing glasses, he began getting invited to parties. "And the girl who didn't even see me when I was twelve invited me in," he noted.

"So I went out with her for a couple of months but I didn't stop seeing Helen. I thought I was being smart – I had gone from being a total loser to being a two-timer. And I remember my sisters used to give me a hard time because they found out and they really liked the first girl. The whole idea of 'Careless Whisper' was the first girl finding out about the second – which she never did. But I started another relationship with a girl called Alexis without finishing the one with Jane. It all got a bit complicated. Jane found out about her and got rid of me... The whole time I thought I was being cool, being this two-timer, but there really wasn't that much emotion involved. I did feel guilty about the first girl – and I have seen her since – and the idea of the song was about her. 'Careless Whisper' was us dancing, because we danced a lot, and the idea was – we are dancing... but she knows... and it's finished."

Andrew Ridgeley came up with the chord sequence on his Fender Telecaster he had received for his 18th birthday. They continued to work together on the music and lyrics both at Michael's house in Radlett, and Shirlie Holliman's aunt's basement flat in Peckham, where Ridgeley was living.

Demoing
The original demo was recorded by local music producer Paul Mex, at the end of 1981 alongside "Wham Rap! (Enjoy What You Do)" in the front room of Ridgeley's home (his parents' lounge turned into a makeshift studio) with Mex's TEAC 4-track Portastudio. Because most of the day was spent on "Wham Rap!" and Ridgeley's mother had returned home by that point, "Careless Whisper" had to be recorded in one take very quickly. It featured a Doctor Rhythm drum machine, an acoustic guitar (played by Ridgeley) and a bass guitar (played by Dave West), with Michael's vocal (recorded with a microphone attached to a broom handle). The overall cost of the recording was £20 (largely due to the rental cost of the Portastudio) and the duo landed a deal with Innervision by Mark Dean on the strength of the demos.

A more complete and fully realised second demo was recorded on 24 March 1982 at Halligan Band Centre, Holloway, London with a backing band and a saxophone riff. This second demo also included the songs "Club Tropicana" and "Wham Rap!". However, on the same day, Michael and Ridgeley were called over by Dean to sign a contract in addition to the record deal, which they did at a nearby greasy spoon café. Michael recalls of that day: "'One of the most incredible moments of my life was hearing 'Careless Whisper' demoed properly, with a band, a sax and everything. It was ironic that we signed the contract with Mark [Dean] that day, the day I finally believed we had number-one material. That same day we signed it all away. But you can never really know what you are capable of, you can never really have that foresight.'"

Production
The song went through at least two rounds of production. The first was during a trip Michael made to Sheffield, Alabama, where he went to work with producer Jerry Wexler at Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in 1983. Michael was unhappy with the original version produced by Wexler, and decided to re-record and produce the song himself; the second version was the one ultimately released as a single.

After the backing track and Michael's vocal had been recorded, Wexler had booked the top saxophone player from Los Angeles to fly in and do the solo. "He arrived at eleven and should have been gone by twelve", recalled Wham! manager Simon Napier-Bell. "Instead, after two hours, he was still there while everyone in the studio shuddered with embarrassment. He just couldn't play the opening riff the way George wanted it, the way it had been on the demo. But that had been made two years earlier by a friend of George's who lived round the corner and played sax for fun in the pub."

While the saxophonist appeared to be playing the part perfectly, Michael told him, "No, it's still not right, you see..." and he would lower his head to the talkback microphone and patiently hum the part to him yet again. "It has to twitch upwards a little just there! See...? And not too much."

Napier-Bell consulted with Wexler over Michael's dispute with the sax sound. "Is there really something George wants that's different from what the sax player is playing?" Napier-Bell asked. "Definitely!" replied Wexler.

"I've seen things like this before. There's some tiny nuance that the sax player is somehow not getting right. Although you and I can't hear what it is, it may be the very thing that will make the record a hit. The success of pop records is so ephemeral, so unbelievably unpredictable, we just can't take the risk of being impatient. But this sax player's not going to get it, is he!"

The version Wexler produced was released later in the year, as a (4:41) B-side "special version" on 12″ in the UK and Japan.

The record label Innervision was going to put out the Wexler version of "Careless Whisper" after the "Club Fantastic Megamix" as early as 1983. Song publisher Dick Leahy said that while he could not stop the release of the "Club Fantastic Megamix", he could stop the release of this single on the basis that as a publisher they "have the right to grant the first license of the recording of a tune of which he controls the copyright". He was unable to do anything about the "Club Fantastic Megamix" because it was already released material. He said: "We knew how big that song could be, so it was necessary to upset a few people to stop it." Towards the end of 1983, Michael was also committed to touring with Wham! to promote Fantastic, so according to him it would not have made sense to release "Careless Whisper" as a solo single in the middle of the tour, despite it being part of the setlist.

Michael later went back to London's Sarm West Studio 2 to re-record the track, the backbone of which was done with a live rhythm section in one take, with "loads of stuff bunged on [overdubbed] later" as Michael added, although the feel of it was basically live.

Michael elaborated on the song's production and how it turned out in the end:

"Jerry Wexler did one recording of 'Careless Whisper' with me. Then we re-mixed that, which meant re-shooting the video and then we completely re-did the track about four weeks before it was due to be released. When we originally made it I was totally in awe of Jerry Wexler and it was the first time that I had ever felt like that about anybody that I'd worked with. Usually I have trouble convincing myself that people know what they're doing. In this case I had to get drunk in order to sing, I was so nervous. Anyway, my publisher [Dick Leahy] and I had loads of discussions about whether the record was good enough for the song and whether there was enough of me in it because it just did not sound like me. I said 'it's great. Jerry's done a great job on it', and for the first time since we'd started I was blind to what was going on because the song was already two and a half years old and I just did not have a clue about where else I could take it. Eventually I just thought, 'sod this. I'm going to go in and do it as if it had never been done before with the musicians we normally use and see what happens.' The track was much better because I was relaxed and I think that our musicians did a much better job than the Muscle Shoals section."

After hiring and firing several other sax players, for which the BBC characterized as struggling to play all the notes with "the right amount of fluidity and still breathe," Michael eventually heard what he was looking for from Steve Gregory.

During an interview with DJ Danny Sun, Gregory said he was the 9th sax player to attempt the riff. Gregory said Michael's secretary had phoned him up midday and asked him to give the solo a try.

"'When I got there, it was about getting on to midnight, and there was another saxophone player in the studio, Ray Warleigh, who I knew quite well, and he said 'what are you doing here?' And George hadn't showed up. So Ray was a bit fed up. He said 'Well I'm going, you can do it. I've had enough of waiting.' So he left and it was just myself, and (record producer) Chris Porter. So I said I've had quite a long day, I'm going to do a better job now than I will at 3 o'clock in the morning, so can we try and do something? So we went into the control room and George had already recorded it in LA with Jerry Wexler producing it and Tom Scott playing the saxophone line...he said this is what you got to do and he played this and I thought 'That is fantastic, why on Earth does he want to do it again? I can't play it as well as that!' And (Porter) said 'Oh, it's a new version, he's done his own production, it's a new track, it's got to be re-done, he just needs that on the new track,' so I went in the studio I tried to do it and my saxophone is an old Selmer (tenor sax) from about 1954 or something and I didn't have that top note. I didn't have a proper note on my saxophone, I had what we call a fake fingering I had to do to play it. So it didn't really sound that smooth. It didn't sound that great. And so having been around for a while, having had a bit of experience, I suggested to him, I said, 'look, if you took it down by a semitone, a very small amount, I'd have all the proper notes on my horn and we could see how it sounds. So that's what he did, he sort of did his calculations and took it down a semitone, so I went out again and I played it in a lower key and when after I finished it I went back into the control room and he played it back and he put it back up to the proper speed, and as he was playing it back, George walked into the studio, and he said 'Oh, I think we got it!' Then he pointed at me and said, 'You are number 9!''"

The officially released single was issued in August 1984, entering the UK Singles Chart at number 12. Within two weeks it was at number one, ending a nine-week run at the top for "Two Tribes" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood. It stayed at number one for three weeks, going on to become the fifth best-selling single of 1984 in the United Kingdom; outsold only by the two Frankie Goes to Hollywood tracks, "Two Tribes" and "Relax", Stevie Wonder with "I Just Called to Say I Love You", and Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas?". The song also topped the charts in 25 other countries, including the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States in February 1985 under the credit "Wham! featuring George Michael". Spending three weeks at the top in America, the song was later named Billboard's number-one song of 1985.

Despite its success, Michael stated repeatedly in interviews that he was not fond of the song. He said in 1991 that it "was not an integral part of my emotional development [...] it disappoints me that you can write a lyric very flippantly—and not a particularly good lyric—and it can mean so much to so many people. That's disillusioning for a writer."

Critical reception
"Careless Whisper" received mainly positive reception upon its release. Music critic Alexis Petridis of The Guardian ranked the song number five of George Michael's 30 greatest songs, stating, "it’s a brilliant pop song regardless, and, in 'guilty feet have got no rhythm', it boasts one of the great once-heard-never-forgotten lyrics". Billboard referred to the track as a "polished-pop approach", stating, "[the] saxy ballad will tug at many a heartstring". Rolling Stone placed the song as George Michael's 2nd best song, describing it as "a soulful, saxophone-laden ballad" with "infidelity-themed lyrics".

Cash Box said the song illustrates Wham!'s "versatility and range" when compared to the previous single "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go", calling this song "soft, beguiling and memorable" and saying that it features "a highly romantic instrumental arrangement as well as an extremely well-written melody and lyric". Amy Hanson of AllMusic described the song as "perfect for dance floor canoodling", stating, "built around a simmering Latin-lite tempo, sultry sax and Michael’s own impassioned delivery, 'Careless Whisper' touched fans and passive listeners alike to become one of, if not the only, love songs of 1985".

Music video
The official music video (which uses the shorter single version instead of the full album version) was directed by Duncan Gibbins (who previously directed "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go") shows the guilt felt by a man (portrayed by Michael) over an affair, and his acknowledgement that his partner (Lisa Stahl) is going to find out. Madeline Andrews-Hodge plays the woman who lures George away. It was filmed on location in Miami, Florida, in February 1984 and features such locales as Coconut Grove and Watson Island. The final part of the video shows Michael leaning out of a top floor balcony of Miami's Grove Towers.

A first original version of the video was edited with the Jerry Wexler 1983 version, and featured Ridgeley as a cameo, handing over a letter to a dark-haired Michael. This version had a more detailed storyline, but was then re-edited later.

According to producer Jon Roseman, production of the video was "a fucking disaster". According to Michael's co-star Lisa Stahl, "They lost footage of our kissing scene so we had to reshoot it, which I didn't complain about ... Then George decided he didn't like his hair so he flew his sister over from England to cut it and we had to reshoot more scenes."

As the band felt they had "screwed up" the video, further footage of Michael singing the song onstage was later shot at the Lyceum Theatre, London. The video performance (1984 version) was officially uploaded to the George Michael YouTube channel on 24 October 2009. On March 25, 2023, it surpassed 1 billion views on YouTube.

Track listing

 * Note: the "extended mix" is identical to the album version from Make It Big.

Personnel
Credits adapted from the Extended Mix's liner notes.
 * George Michael – lead and backing vocals
 * Andrew Ridgeley – acoustic guitar (uncredited)
 * Steve Gregory – saxophone
 * Deon Estus – bass
 * Trevor Murrell – drums
 * Chris Parren – keyboards
 * Andy Richards – keyboards
 * Anne Dudley – keyboards
 * Hugh Burns – electric guitar
 * Danny Cummings – percussion

Cover versions
"Careless Whisper" has been covered by many other artists. Among the most notable versions are:
 * A dance version by Sarah Washington that peaked at number 45 on the UK Singles Chart in 1993.
 * Saxophonist Dave Koz recorded a version for his 1999 album The Dance, featuring Montell Jordan on lead vocals. It was released in 2000 as the second single from the album and peaked at number 30 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart.
 * 2Play produced a dancehall version in 2004 featuring Thomas Jules and Jucxi D. It charted at number 29 in the UK.
 * South African rock band Seether covered the song on their 2007 album Finding Beauty in Negative Spaces. It was released in March 2009 as the fourth single from the album and charted at number 63 in the US. It was certified gold by the RIAA.
 * Singer Miguel covered the song live as a tribute to George Michael following the induction of Michael into the 2023 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

title: Careless Whisper


text:
Keydrick Vincent

Kendrick Trepell Vincent (born April 13, 1978) is a former American football guard. He was originally signed by the Pittsburgh Steelers as an undrafted free agent in 2001. He played college football at Mississippi. He last played for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

Vincent has also played for the Carolina Panthers, Arizona Cardinals, Baltimore Ravens, and Pittsburgh Steelers in his career. Vincent was a starting guard for the Steelers in 2003 and 2004 and also for the Panthers in 2008 and 2009.

Vincent began the 2010 season as the starting left guard but was waived by the Buccaneers, who had signed him as a free agent in July 2010, in mid-season.

College career
Vincent attended the University of Mississippi and started most of the games for four years.

title: Keydrick Vincent


text:
User:Kevindarling

I'm a 50-ish software engineer, with interests in electronics, aviation, and navigation history.

I have worked on embedded systems, gaming systems, and field force devices. I have designed for touchscreen systems since 1990.

As a hobby, I have spent several years slowly working on a book on the history and design of manual flight computers. I have collected hundreds of items, over five hundred patents, four hundred books, and countless articles, manuals and advertisements dating back to before 1900. I have also been in contact with the families of some of the most famous designers, in order to gain important background information. One small piece of this information is now in the history section of the E6B entry.

title: User:Kevindarling


text:
Wikipedia talk:Peer review/Porgy and Bess/archive2

Peer review/Porgy and Bess/archive1


text:
User:Angie Y./Augustus Gloop

Augustus Gloop is a character from Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and its subsequent films, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

A enormously fat but kind boy, Augustus' parents give him too much to eat and don't limit him on what foods he can or can't eat, for fear of making him think he's unloved. He was drinking up the chocolate river in the factory's nerve center when he fell in and got sucked up through one of the pipes leading to the Fudge Room.

 * He was played by German child actor Michael Bollner in the 1971 movie adaption.
 * He is played by German child actor Phillip Wiegratz in the 2005 movie adaption of the book.

Category: Willy Wonka characters

title: User:Angie Y./Augustus Gloop


text:
The Boys in the Band (play)

The Boys in the Band is a 1968 American play by Mart Crowley. The play premiered Off-Broadway, and was revived on Broadway for its 50th anniversary in 2018. The play revolves around a group of gay men who gather for a birthday party in New York City, and was groundbreaking for its portrayal of gay life. It was adapted into two feature films in 1970 and 2020.

A sequel, The Men from the Boys, premiered in 2002.

Synopsis
The play is set in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, "a smartly appointed duplex apartment in the East Fifties", and the backgrounds of characters are revealed in the course of a birthday party.

 * Harold celebrates his birthday. In the character's own words an "ugly, pock-marked Jew fairy", he becomes increasingly morose about losing his youthful looks and claims that he no longer can attract cute young men. In the dramatis personae, he is described as being "dark" with an "unusual Semitic face".
 * "Cowboy", an attractive blond hustler who is "not too bright" and "too pretty", is one of Harold's birthday presents.
 * Alan McCarthy, Michael's married college friend and roommate, is an unexpected party guest. He is visiting New York and anxious to tell Michael something, but hesitant to do so in front of the others. It is suggested that he once had homosexual affairs while in college, but his sexual orientation is never explicitly stated, leaving it to audience interpretation. The dramatis personae describes him as "aristocratic" and "Anglo-Saxon".

The party is given by Harold's six closest friends:
 * Michael is Harold's "smartly groomed" "frenemy", the host, and a lapsed Catholic as well as an alcoholic. He is the catalyst for most of the drama of the play.
 * Donald is Michael's ex-boyfriend, current friend (though the exact nature of their relationship is ambiguous) who has moved from the city to the Hamptons to spurn the homosexual "lifestyle", and is undergoing psychoanalysis. He has "wholesome American good looks".
 * Bernard is an African-American librarian who still pines for the wealthy white boy in whose house his mother worked as a maid. In the dramatis personae, he is "Twenty-eight, Negro, nice-looking".
 * Emory is a flamboyant and effeminate interior decorator. He is often campy in his sense of humor, which serves to irritate others.
 * Larry is a commercial artist who prefers multiple sex partners and is "extremely handsome".
 * Hank is Larry's live-in boyfriend who has been married to a woman from whom he is separated and is divorcing. He "passes" as straight and disagrees with Larry on the issue of monogamy. Physically, he is described as "solid, athletic, attractive".

During the party, the humor takes a nasty turn, as the nine men become increasingly inebriated. The party culminates in a "game", where each man must call someone whom he has loved and tell them about it. Michael, believing that Alan has finally "outed" himself when he makes his call, grabs the phone from him and discovers Alan has called his wife. The audience never learns what Alan intended to discuss with Michael in the end.

Title and creation
The Boys in the Band was written by American playwright Mart Crowley. In 1957, Crowley started working for a number of television production companies, before meeting Natalie Wood on the set of her film Splendor in the Grass while working as a production assistant. Wood hired him as her assistant, primarily to give him ample free time to work on his gay-themed play. Wood, Crowley's close friend, inspired him to move from New York to Hollywood. According to Crowley's friend Gavin Lambert, Wood sympathized with Hollywood's gay scene, and financially supported Crowley so he would be free to write his play. Crowley worked as an assistant for Wood and her husband Robert Wagner for many years.

After several Hollywood film productions he was helping on were canceled, his wealthy friend Diana Lynn hired him to housesit. He lived in the Hollywood Georgian mansion where he only had to "throw dinner parties and drink myself into oblivion." He began writing instead of drinking, and began working on The Boys in the Band.

Crowley told Dominick Dunne about the title: "It's that line in A Star Is Born when James Mason tells a distraught Judy Garland 'You're singing for yourself and the boys in the band.'"

According to Crowley, his motivation in writing the play was not activism, but anger that "had partially to do with myself and my career, but it also had to do with the social attitude of people around me, and the laws of the day". He says he "wanted the injustice of it all — to all those characters — known". Crowley has also stated, "I was not an activist, then or now. I didn't know what hit me. I just wrote the truth."

Crowley made no secret that all characters were based on real people in his life, with Michael reminding him of himself, describing the character as "a complex person who is aware of what is politically correct but has a sort of contempt for it". He called Donald "a foil for Michael" and inspired by a droll friend he would periodically take wry comments from. In the 1995 documentary The Celluloid Closet, Crowley explained, "The self-deprecating humor was born out of a low self-esteem, from a sense of what the times told you about yourself." In The Boys in the Band: Something Personal, a short documentary accompanying Netflix's release of the 2020 film adaptation, Crowley clarified that Donald was based on Douglas Murray, to whom the play was dedicated. Harold, the character whose birthday was being celebrated, is a cipher for dancer/choreographer Howard Jeffrey, who died in 1988 of AIDS, to whom the play was also dedicated. Crowley took one of the key lines of the play, "I try to show a little affection; it keeps me from feeling like such a whore", from a hustler he danced with on Fire Island, telling, "I couldn't write anything that good!".

Off-Broadway premiere, 1968
While Crowley was pitching the script, early agents stayed away from the project, and it was championed by playwright Edward Albee and Richard Barr, who at the time was head of the Playwrights Units in New York. For the production, it proved "nearly impossible to find" actors willing to play gay characters. An old college friend of Crowley's, 33-year-old Laurence Luckinbill, agreed to play Hank despite warnings from his agent that it would end his career, even though the agent was herself a lesbian. It proved hard for Crowley to find producers and theater owners who were interested.

The play premiered Off-Broadway on April 14, 1968, at Theater Four, and closed on September 6, 1970, after 1,001 performances. Directed by Robert Moore, the cast included Kenneth Nelson as Michael, Peter White as Alan McCarthy, Leonard Frey as Harold, Cliff Gorman as Emory, Frederick Combs as Donald, Laurence Luckinbill as Hank, Keith Prentice as Larry, Robert La Tourneaux as Cowboy, and Reuben Greene as Bernard. The play was one of the early works to present a story centered on homosexuals. In 1968, although only originally scheduled to run for five performances at a small venue off Broadway, it was a fast success and was moved to a larger theater. It went on to have a run in London as well. The premiere's actors such as Laurence Luckinbill drilled a hole in the set so they could spy on whoever was in the house's best seats, and in the initial weeks, saw Jackie Kennedy, Marlene Dietrich, Groucho Marx, Rudolf Nureyev, and New York mayor John Lindsay. Despite the success of the play, all the gay members of the original company stayed in the closet after the premiere. Between 1984 and 1993, five of the gay men in the original production (as well as director Robert Moore and producer Richard Barr) died in the ensuing AIDS epidemic.

Off-Broadway and London revivals
The play was revived Off-Broadway at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in 1996, running from August 6 to October 20, after its initial sold-out run at the WPA Theater. The Boys in the Band was presented by the Transport Group Theater Company, New York City, from February 2010 to March 14, 2010, directed by Jack Cummings III.

A London staging in October 2016 at Park Theatre was the first revival there in two decades. It subsequently transferred to the Vaudeville Theatre in the West End. Positively reviewed, including in The Observer, the production starred Mark Gatiss as Harold and Ian Hallard as Michael, with Daniel Boys, Jack Derges, James Holmes, John Hopkins, Greg Lockett, Ben Mansfield, and Nathan Nolan. The production was nominated for four awards in the 2017 WhatsOnStage Awards: Best Play Revival and Best Off-West End Production, with Hallard nominated as Best Actor in a Play and Jack Weir for Best Lighting Design.

Broadway production, 2018
A Broadway production of The Boys in the Band, directed by Joe Mantello, opened in previews at the Booth Theatre on April 30, 2018, officially on May 31, and ran until August 11, 2018. This production, staged for the 50th anniversary of the play's original premiere, starred Matt Bomer, Jim Parsons, Zachary Quinto and Andrew Rannells, as well as Charlie Carver, Brian Hutchison, Michael Benjamin Washington, Robin de Jesús, and Tuc Watkins. Quinto portrayed Harold, whose birthday sets the premise. All of the actors who were in the 2018 production are out gay actors.

This production won the 2019 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play, and Robin de Jesús was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play.

Reception and impact
When The Boys in the Band premiered in 1968, mainstream audiences were shocked. The play was profiled in the William Goldman book The Season: A Candid Look at Broadway, an account of the 1967–1968 season. In the same year, a two-disc, vinyl LP set was released, containing the full dialogue of the play voiced by the original actors. Crowley wrote the 2002 sequel The Men from the Boys.

In 2002, Peter Filichia from Theater Mania contended that the play's original production helped inspire the 1969 Stonewall riots and gay rights movement. "After gays saw The Boys in the Band, they no longer would settle for thinking of themselves as pathetic and wouldn't be perceived as such any longer. Now that [characters] had brought their feelings out of the closet, this new generation would dare to be different. And, just as some whites' view of blacks changed after seeing A Raisin in the Sun, so too did the outlook of many straights after they caught The Boys in the Band. Some whom I personally know felt terrible and–I saw this happen!–actually changed the way they treated gays."

In 2004, David Anthony Fox from Philadelphia City Paper praised this play, its one-liners, and its live performance in Philadelphia. He rebutted criticism that the play portrayed "urban gay men as narcissistic, bitter, shallow".

In 2010, Elyse Summer in her review for CurtainUp called it a "smart gimmick" full of dated "self-homophobic, low self-esteem characters". In the same year, Steve Weinstein from the Edge website called it "Shakespearean".

Sequel
In 2002, Crowley wrote The Men from the Boys, a sequel to the play, which takes place 30 years after the original. It premiered in San Francisco in 2002, directed by Ed Decker, and was produced in Los Angeles in 2003.

Film adaptations
The play was adapted into a feature film by Cinema Center Films in 1970, directed by William Friedkin.

Ryan Murphy produced a second film adaptation for Netflix with the 2018 Broadway revival cast and Joe Mantello directing.

title: The Boys in the Band (play)


text:
Colin Bateman

Colin Bateman (known mononymously as Bateman) is a novelist, screenwriter and former journalist from Bangor, County Down, Northern Ireland.

Biography
Born on 13 June 1962, Bateman attended Bangor Grammar School leaving at 16 when he was hired by Annie Roycroft to join the County Down Spectator as a "cub" reporter, then columnist and deputy editor. A collection of his columns was published as Bar Stool Boy in 1989.

Bateman has been writing novels since his debut, Divorcing Jack, in 1994. Divorcing Jack won a Betty Trask Award in the same year and was adapted into a 1998 film starring David Thewlis. Several of Bateman's novels featured the semi-autobiographical Belfast journalist, Dan Starkey.

His book Murphy's Law was adapted from the BBC television series Murphy's Law (2001–2007), featuring James Nesbitt. Bateman explains on his website that "Murphy's Law was written specifically for James Nesbitt, a local actor who became a big TV star through Cold Feet. The ninety-minute pilot for Murphy's Law on BBC 1 was seen by more than seven million people, and led to three TV series, on which I was the chief writer."

His 8 part series Scúp was written in English and translated into Irish. It was produced by Sterling Films & BBC Northern Ireland. A second series has since been commissioned.

His children's book Titanic 2020 was shortlisted for the 2008 Salford Children's Book Award.

Much of his work is produced under the name "Bateman" (rather than his full name); his 2007 novel I Predict a Riot bears (among others) the dedication: "For my Christian name, gone but not forgotten". Since 2016 Bateman has moved increasingly into film, writing the screenplays for 'The Journey', starring Timothy Spall and Colm Meaney, and 'Driven' starring Jason Sudeikis and Lee Pace. Both films were premiered at the Venice Film Festival and selected for the Toronto Film Festival. He is currently writing films about Fidel Castro in New York, 'The Hotel Theresa' and the British double agent George Blake.

For children
Eddie & the Gang with No Name
 * Reservoir Pups (2003)
 * Bring Me the Head of Oliver Plunkett (2004)
 * The Seagulls Have Landed (2005)

Titanic 2020
 * Titanic 2020 (2007)
 * Titanic 2020: Cannibal City (2008)

SOS Adventures
 * Ice Quake (2010)
 * Fire Storm (2010)
 * Tusk (2011)

For adults
Dan Starkey
 * Divorcing Jack (1995)
 * Of Wee Sweetie Mice and Men (1996)
 * Turbulent Priests (1999)
 * Shooting Sean (2001)
 * The Horse with My Name (2002)
 * Driving Big Davie (2004)
 * Belfast Confidential (2005)
 * Nine Inches (2011)
 * Fire and Brimstone (2013)
 * The Dead Pass (2014)

Martin Murphy
 * Murphy's Law (2002)
 * Murphy's Revenge (2005)

Mystery Man
 * Mystery Man (2009)
 * The Day of the Jack Russell (2009)
 * Dr. Yes (2010)
 * The Prisoner of Brenda (2012)

Non-Series
 * Cycle of Violence (1995)
 * Empire State (1997)
 * Maid of the Mist (1999)
 * Mohammed Maguire (2001)
 * Wild About Harry (2001)
 * Chapter and Verse (2003)
 * I Predict A Riot (2007)
 * Orpheus Rising (2008)
 * Paper Cuts (2016)

Film and TV

 * Divorcing Jack (1998)
 * Crossmaheart (1998)
 * Wild About Harry (2000)
 * Turbulent Priests (Unproduced – Bateman having written the screenplay) (2000)
 * Watermelon (2003)
 * Scúp (TV, 2013–14)
 * The Journey (2016)
 * Driven (2018)

title: Colin Bateman


text:
Saginaw Gears (IHL)

The Saginaw Gears were a minor-league ice hockey franchise based in Saginaw, Michigan, that played in the defunct International Hockey League (IHL). The Gears existed from 1972 to 1983 and played their home games at Wendler Arena in the Saginaw Civic Center (now known as The Dow Event Center).

IHL hockey would later return to the Tri-Cities when the Flint Generals were moved to Saginaw to become the Saginaw Generals for the 1985–1986 season.

Championships
The Gears made the playoffs for nine straight seasons, from 1973 to 1982. The Gears reached the Turner Cup Finals five times in that stretch, and won the following championships:

Trivia
The Turner Cup replica at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto has Saginaw misspelled as "Sagimaw" for the 1976-77 championship.

Notable players
The Gears sent several players to the National Hockey League in their 11-year existence. The biggest names include:
 * John Gibson
 * Lou Franceschetti
 * Bob Froese
 * Greg Hotham, whose sons Scott and Andrew played for the Saginaw Spirit
 * Mario Lessard
 * Mike Palmateer
 * In 1974–75, longtime NHL forward/defenceman Reg Fleming joined the Gears in time for the 1975 playoffs.
 * Head Coach Don Perry also made it to the NHL, coaching the Los Angeles Kings from 1981 to 1984.
 * Marcel Comeau, 1980–81 IHL's top scorer and most valuable player
 * Dennis Desrosiers 10 year veteran of the Gears. High scoring right wing / tough guy.  Color commentator of Saginaw Spirit  Decades long career as a coach

title: Saginaw Gears (IHL)


text: User talk:70.58.213.143

title: User talk:70.58.213.143