Happy Monday, Everyone! Today’s featured artist is SHANNON & Lis Lisa & Cult Jam.
Shannon Brenda Greene (born May 2, 1958), better known by the mononym Shannon, is an American recording artist and singer of Freestyle music and dance-pop music and songwriter. She is best known for her million-selling record single “Let the Music Play”. Often she is considered the “International Queen of Freestyle.”
Her albums include Let the Music Play, released in 1984, followed by Do You Wanna Get Away in 1985 and Love Goes All the Way in 1986. In 1999, Shannon appeared in a segment of VH1’s One-Hit Wonders, and returned to music with her fourth album, The Best is Yet to Come, which was released in 2000. The album was followed by a compilation album released in 2004, Let The Music Play: The Best of Shannon. Shannon’s most recent album is A Beauty Returns, released in 2007.
In 1983, Shannon was enrolled at York College and toured with the New York Jazz Ensemble. Quintin Hicks, an associate of the production team of Mark Liggett and Chris Barbosa, later saw Shannon singing with a live band in her cousin’s recording studio. Shannon auditioned for Liggett and Barbosa with the song “She Can’t Love You Like I Do”. They introduced her to the selection “Fire and Ice,” which would later evolve into Shannon’s signature song, “Let The Music Play;” its unique sound, called “The Shannon Sound,” would later come to be known as “freestyle.” Let The Music Play would also be the title of Shannon’s debut album, which she released in 1984.
Lisa Lisa (born Lisa Velez, January 15, 1966 and her band Cult Jam are an urban contemporary band and one of first freestyle music groups to emerge from New York City in the 1980s. Cult Jam consisted of guitarist/bassist Alex “Spanador” Moseley, and drummer and keyboardist Mike Hughes. They were assembled and produced by Full Force.
Velez is of Puerto Rican descent and grew up in New York City and attended Julia Richman High School in Manhattan, NY. The group released their debut album Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam with Full Force in 1985. She was signed by Columbia Records and the label released their single “I Wonder If I Take You Home” to the European division of CBS Records for the compilation album Breakdancing. Stateside club DJs began playing the single from the import LP, and thus the U.S. division of CBS, Columbia Records, released the record. It quickly became a chart-topper on Billboard’s Hot Dance/Disco chart. It then crossed over to the R&B chart where it peaked at #6, and then to the pop chart, peaking at #34 in summer 1985. The single eventually went gold.
“I Wonder If I Take You Home” was followed by another club hit, “Can You Feel the Beat”, which also went to #40 on the R&B chart in late 1985. A sampling of the lyrics of this song would later be used by Nina Sky for their hit single “Move Ya Body” in 2004. Their third single, the ballad “All Cried Out”, also went gold, going to number #3 R&B and #8 pop in summer 1986. “All Cried Out” was later covered by Allure in 1997 and was a hit in 1998. Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam with Full Force went platinum.
Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam – Head To Toe
Lost in Emotion
I Wonder If I Take You Home
nature for the win
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https://twitter.com/Interior/status/559479997350830080/photo/1
I would STILL be running towards the door screaming
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https://twitter.com/Learn_Things/status/538789737633689601/photo/1
Propane Jane @docrocktex26
Brown skinned man with the middle name Hussein bridges a ton of gaps overseas that someone like Willard Romney just can’t comprehend. Facts.
Koch brothers set staggering 2016 spending goals
By Eric Bradner, CNN
Updated 4:35 PM ET, Mon January 26, 2015
Washington (CNN)-The conservative Koch brothers’ political network plans to spend $889 million during the 2016 election cycle, according to media reports out of the network’s donor meeting being held early this week in California.
The massive investment planned by groups founded by Charles and David Koch was announced in a Monday morning meeting at the Rancho Mirage Ritz Carlton, The Washington Post and Politico reported
It means the Kochs’ investment could rival the $1 billion that the Republican and Democratic nominees are each expected to raise and spend on the 2016 campaign — and is more than double the $407 million their groups spent in 2012.
It would be more money than any private network has ever spent on an election cycle, with money coming from both the Koch brothers themselves and other donors.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/26/politics/koch-brothers-889-million/index.html
‘Selma’s’ Ava DuVernay, David Oyelowo Teaming on Hurricane Katrina Movie
“Selma” director Ava DuVernay and star David Oyelowo are teaming with Participant Media to develop a feature film chronicling a love story and murder mystery during the time of Hurricane Katrina.
DuVernay will write, produce, and direct. Oyelowo is in negotiations to produce and star in the untitled project. A start date has not been set.
The project will mark the third collaboration between DuVernay and Oyelowo after “Selma” and Participant’s “Middle of Nowhere,” which won the 2012 Sundance Film Festival Best Director Award for DuVernay. Participant Media’s Jeff Skoll and Jonathan King will serve as executiveproducers.
“Hurricane Katrina is one of the most important social and environmental stories of our time,” said King. “Ava DuVernay has shown herself to be highly skilled at bringing intimacy and contemporary urgency to epic events. We have been looking for the right way to get back in business with Ava, and with David Oyelowo, and are proud to re-team with them on her original idea, which we believe will be a powerful film.”
DuVernay said, “The story we’re interested in will explore the complexities of intimate relationships within times of chaos, while also examining the chaos itself. I’m looking forward to the journey.”
http://variety.com/2015/film/news/ava-duvernay-david-oyelowo-teaming-on-hurricane-katrina-movie-1201415200/
this weather report – HILARIOUS!!
but, I do wish safety for all in the eye of the storm
OOP!
https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/559813587922092033
https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/559856593752567810
S&P downgrades Russia’s sovereign credit rating to “junk”, sees virtually no growth over the next 4 years
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL6N0V53RT20150126
but Putin stay winning, if you talk to the GOP
Sam Smith forced to pay Tom Petty royalties for song ‘Stay With Me’
Sam Smith is paying Tom Petty songwriting royalties for his single ‘Stay With Me’ after listeners noted a similarity between the song and Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers’ 1989 classic ‘I Won’t Back Down’.
Though details of the case have just come to light, The Sun reports that Smith and Petty settled out of court in October – an arrangement that included a 12.5 per cent writing credit to both Petty and singer-composer Jeff Lynne.
Read more at http://www.nme.com/news/sam-smith/82462#ULfvlE3wtibjD7IM.99
https://twitter.com/APDiploWriter/status/559816474899275777
https://twitter.com/WilliamsJon/status/559819314430492672
https://twitter.com/WilliamsJon/status/559815826694356992
A fence jumper makes it inside the WH doors, a drone found on the WH grounds, shots fired off by VP’s residence. WTF’s going on?
https://twitter.com/jamiedupree/status/559789123335389185
https://twitter.com/AFP/status/559798365215817728
Breaking:
https://twitter.com/TPM/status/559795048406347777
What we’re learning about the GOP’s 2016 field
01/26/15 12:59 PM—UPDATED 01/26/15 01:16 PM
By Steve Benen
A debate for the Republican presidential candidates in August 2011 featured one of the more memorable moments of the race. Eight GOP hopefuls shared the stage and were asked an interesting question: would they accept a debt-reduction deal in which Democrats would give up $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases? Every Republican on the stage said they’d reject the deal.
Jon Huntsman later conceded he regretted how he handled that moment and wished he’d answered differently, but what about his party? As the 2016 cycle slowly starts to get underway, the question still seems relevant, and at a Koch brothers’ donor forum last night, ABC’s Jonathan Karl put the same challenge to Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).
All three senators indicated that they would reject a deal that would cut $10 in spending for every $1 in new taxes, though none of them directly answered the question…. “When and if any of the people up here run for president, there should be an absolute rule: No yes or no answers,” Paul said. He then indicated that he wouldn’t like such a deal. “I think we have plenty of taxes in this country.”
Cruz said that while it’s a question “the media likes to ask,” it represents a false choice. “That trade-off has proven historically to be a fool’s errand,” Cruz said. “It’s a little bit like Lucy and the football. One element of the promise never happens.”
Rubio chimed in: “The only way you can get out of this problem is spending discipline, holding the line on spending, and rapid and dynamic economic growth.”
A lot of people forget this, but in March 2011, following the big Tea Party wave of 2010, Republicans on the Joint Economic Committee released a report on deficit reduction. In it, House GOP officials outlined their ideal cuts-to-revenue ratio, and concluded that “successful” attempts to cut the deficit meet a specific goal: “85% spending cuts and 15% revenue increases.” Roughly speaking, that’s about a 5-to-1 ratio in Republicans’ favor.
Four years later, however, leading Republican presidential candidates are apparently well to the right of where House GOP officials were in 2011. The fact remains that a Democratic 10-to-1 offer would never happen – there’s nothing fair or just about a “compromise” tilted so heavily in the GOP’s favor – but the point is most leading Republicans wouldn’t accept the gift anyway.
Why does this matter? Because this weekend was arguably the unofficial kickoff of the 2016 presidential race, and as the process gets underway, it’s already clear just how far to the right the GOP candidates intend to be.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/what-were-learning-about-the-gops-2016-field
https://twitter.com/PzFeed/status/559756127114899456
https://twitter.com/Newsweek/status/559747892299067393
http://youtu.be/5S4RqvwMwGo
“Scientists Discover the Way to Unboil an Egg”
http://www.scienceworldreport.com/articles/21615/20150126/scientists-discover-way-unboil-egg.htm
Excerpt:
“Yes, we have invented a way to unboil a hen egg,” said Weiss. “In our paper, we describe a device for pulling apart tangled proteins and allowing them to refold. We start with egg whites boiled for 20 minutes at 90 degrees Celsius and return a key protein in the egg to working order.”
Obama advances U.S. goals in India
01/26/15 10:00 AM
By Steve Benen
One of the more common criticisms of President Obama’s foreign policy from the right is that he’s scaled back U.S. efforts to influence the world, withdrawing America from its traditional leadership post. The Republican whining has always been more ironic than credible, largely because Obama has spent six years doing the exact opposite.
For example, consider this New York Times report covering the president’s trip to India and his attendance at India’s massive, annual Republic Day celebration.
The parade was the visual centerpiece of Mr. Obama’s three-day trip, a colorful mélange of modern-day military hardware, soldiers in traditional turbans and costumes riding camels, and a series of floats from myriad states capturing different aspects of India’s rich and complicated cultures. The invitation to Mr. Obama to attend in the position of honor was an important diplomatic gesture. […]
Mr. Obama’s decision to accept the invitation to be chief guest was seen here as a great tribute to India, heralded by politicians and the news media as a sign of the country’s importance on the world stage. An announcer told the crowd that it was “a proud moment for every Indian.”
Of course, Obama’s diplomatic emphasis – he’s the first sitting president to ever visit India twice during his term – was about more than symbolic celebrations. As msnbc’s Benjy Sarlin reported, Obama and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced “progress on nuclear energy and climate change negotiations during their talks in New Delhi,” with the U.S. president declaring a “breakthrough understanding” on the former.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/obama-advances-us-goals-india
Four reasons so many Republicans are running in 2016
excerpt:
(3) The Obama Effect: Many conservatives are confounded by the idea that Barack Obama, someone who had so little experience before running, could win. (Remember, he was just a state senator four years before running for president.) Many Republicans wake up and look at themselves in the morning and say, “Hey, if he could do it, why not me?” But that can be a dangerous takeaway from Obama’s election. Catching lightning in a bottle twice is nearly impossible. And the fact is, for as much as conservatives have underestimated him, not everyone is Barack Obama — with his personality, oratory, campaign skills, ability to raise money, and perhaps most importantly, an ahead-of-its time campaign.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/four-reasons-many-republicans-running-2016/
Because Barack Obama, a Black Man, won the Presidency, they’ve got every clown thinking that they can run. It’s why they push forth that a racist grifting nitwit like Sarah Palin is qualified to be a heartbeat away from the Presidency. It’s why they push a fucking college dropout like Scott Walker as a plausible ANYTHING. They amuse me at the level of nothingness that they now say is ‘qualified’ all because Barack Obama won. They simply will not accept that he is smarter than them all the way around. Nobody will EVER convince me that if Sarah Palin were Black, she wouldn’t have already been laughed off the national stage, never to be heard from again.
They would rather push forth White Mediocrity than validate Black Excellence.
Unexpected critics pan GOP/Netanyahu gambit
01/26/15 09:15 AM—UPDATED 01/26/15 09:25 AM
By Steve Benen
When House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) announced last week that he’d invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to deliver remarks to Congress, it quickly became an important international controversy. Not only had Republican lawmakers ignored U.S. protocol, circumventing the executive branch to partner with a foreign head of state, but the GOP had hatched a plot to sabotage American foreign policy, siding with a foreign government over the White House – just weeks in advance of Israeli elections.
Last week, Obama administration officials, the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, and the Anti-Defamation League’s Abe Foxman all criticized the Boehner/Netanyahu scheme. Over the weekend, Michael Oren, Netanyahu’s former ambassador to the U.S. urged the Israeli leader to cancel. “The behavior over the last few days created the impression of a cynical political move, and it could hurt our attempts to act against Iran,” Oren said.
Even some Fox News anchors are siding with the White House’s position (thanks to reader F.B. for the heads-up).
[T]wo prominent Fox News hosts, Chris Wallace and Shepherd Smith, harshly criticized Boehner and Netanyahu on Friday for secretly arranging a Netanyahu speech to Congress that is transparently aimed at undermining President Obama, and set up without the White House’s knowledge.
The White House, State Department, and many foreign policy observers, including prominent former US ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk, expressed outrage over the move. And, in a sign of just how many lines Boehner and Netanyahu crossed, so did the two Fox News hosts. “I agree 100 percent,” Wallace said when Smith read a quote from Indyk criticizing the Boehner-Netanyahu maneuver.
Wallace, hardly an ally of President Obama, noted that Secretary of State John Kerry met on Tuesday with Ron Dermer, the Israeli Ambassador to the United States, for two hours, and Dermer never mentioned the Boehner/Netanyahu scheme announced a day later. The Fox News host said “this whole thing” is “wicked.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/unexpected-critics-pan-gopnetanyahu-gambit
A drone found on the White House grounds.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/26/politics/white-house-device-secret-service/
WHAT?
https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/559727203777519616
https://twitter.com/AmichaiStein1/status/559724385058033664
RiWired @riwired
Follow
Violent extremist attack leaves 80% of Islamic Republic of #Pakistan without power: http://news.sky.com/story/1414477/attack-leaves-80-percent-of-pakistan-without-power … #UniteBlue #tcot #CanPoli #AusPol
9:18 PM – 25 Jan 2015
https://twitter.com/KennettDems/status/559391855209889793/photo/1
https://twitter.com/AustralianOpen/status/559575029940105218/photo/1
https://twitter.com/Mediaite/status/559561641730113536/photo/1
https://twitter.com/JarettSays/status/559556485525413888/photo/1
More from the WaPo series on Prince George’s County
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Broken by the bubble
In the Fairwood subdivision, dreams of black wealth were
dashed by the housing crisis
Fairwood is a sprawling 1,800-home subdivision in Prince George’s County built on a former slave plantation that was once owned by the state’s 34th governor, Oden Bowie. It should have been a success story for black Americans.
The decade-old neighborhood is 73 percent black and its residents have a median household income of more than $170,000, according to the census. Some houses there once sold for more than $1 million.
But half the loans on newly constructed homes in Fairwood during the housing boom in 2006 and 2007 wound up in foreclosure — 723 of 1,441 so far, according to a Washington Post analysis of private and public mortgage
data.
On some blocks in Fairwood, nearly every house went under. On Burkes Promise Drive, an arcing street of broad lawns, 20 of the 34 homes fell into foreclosure. Neighbors awoke each day to the tell-tale signs: rental trucks in driveways and piles of old furniture, strollers and garbage bags dumped on the curbs. A neighborhood security guard papered hundreds of houses with notices that homeowners were being sued for outstanding association dues and would soon be locked out of the pool.
Nationwide, the disproportionate impact of the mortgage crisis on African Americans has been well documented.
Less understood is how the crisis played out block by block and continues to reverberate in Prince George’s, the wealthiest majority-black county in the United States. It was also the epicenter for mortgage failures in Maryland. Today, far fewer blacks are getting home loans in the county, foreclosures are on the rise again and the African American share of the population has started
to decline there for the first time since the civil rights movement.
Fairwood, one of the nation’s most aspirational black communities, is a symbol of what blacks lost in the crisis. For all its wealth, the community had the second-highest foreclosure rate in the county for a neighborhood with more than 100 loans, behind only one in Adelphi, which had a much-lower median income of $64,398.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/01/25/in-fairwood-dreams-of-black-wealth-foundered-amid-the-mortgage-meltdown/
Jindal finds new ways to pander to far-right
01/26/15 08:00 AM
By Steve Benen
Why would Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) spend several days repeating discredited nonsense last week? Because it’s apparently working for him. Byron York reported over the weekend:
You know what Bobby Jindal said about Muslim “no-go zones” in Europe, a statement that resulted in Jindal being criticized and mocked by mainstream commentators? It turns out many social conservatives in Iowa really liked it…. [Jindal] not only did not suffer from his remarks but instead benefited from them.
This is, alas, how the game is played in the Republican presidential nominating contest – say things that aren’t true in order to impress activists who don’t know better. It’s creates an unfortunate set of incentives in which cynical would-be presidents are encouraged to make stuff up, confident that electoral rewards will follow.
But for the GOP governor, the question is not how to deal with the fallout of getting caught making ridiculous allegations, but rather, what Jindal can do for an encore. Over the weekend, the dynamic led the governor to turn his attention to marriage equality.
The broader context is worth appreciating, because as recently as Tuesday, President Obama noted in his State of the Union address last week, “I’ve seen something like gay marriage go from a wedge issue used to drive us apart to a story of freedom across our country.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/jindal-finds-new-ways-pander-far-right
Palin sees Obama as ‘an overgrown little boy’
01/26/15 08:35 AM—UPDATED 01/26/15 08:55 AM
By Steve Benen
Sarah Palin knows a little bit about generating attention for herself. The former half-term Alaska governor surely realized, for example, that when she declared she’s “seriously interested” in running for president – of the United States, no less – it’d cause a stir.
And that’s arguably a shame. There’s literally nothing to suggest the right-wing personality is serious about a political campaign, and Palin very likely makes comments like these as a sad little ego exercise.
But more important was Palin’s cringe-worth speech at Rep. Steve King’s (R) Iowa Freedom Summit, fairly characterized as a “bizarre improvised rant,” in which the Alaska Republican came up with a new condemnation of President Obama.
“An impatient president doesn’t just get to trample our Constitution and ignore Congress just because he doesn’t get exactly what he wants every time he wants it,” Palin said. “It’s like an overgrown little boy who’s just acting kind of spoiled. And moms, we don’t put up with that, do we?”
Republican rhetoric that infantilizes the president is more common than it should be. It’s also creepy.
Palin’s latest word salad was awfully similar, for example, to Rep. Joe Walsh’s (R-Ill.) rhetoric a few years ago about the president being “like a teenage boy.” House Republicans, Walsh added at the time, effectively played the role of Obama’s “parents.”
Rush Limbaugh has referred to Obama as “the little black man-child,” and compared him to “a little boy” that women voters “want to protect.”
More recently, the Wall Street Journal ran a piece last year from a former Bush/Cheney administration official that accused the president and his team of being “self-obsessed teenagers.” (In all, the piece referred to Obama and his team as “teenagers” six times in nine paragraphs.)
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/palin-sees-obama-overgrown-little-boy
Palin wants PBO soo bad, and the other infantile WHITE rightwingers want to be like BARACK!
ALL.OF.THIS.ALL.DAY.LONG!
<b."They would rather push forth White Mediocrity than validate Black Excellence."
I’d tell Sarah I got your boy right here. But my name’s not Glen.
For those in the eye of the storm – be safe.
Good Morning, Everyone :)
“Temple resident recalls taking part in civil rights trek”
http://kdhnews.com/news/temple-resident-recalls-taking-part-in-civil-rights-trek/article_21684b40-a51e-11e4-bf8f-fb989a47323e.html
http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/kdhnews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/8/28/828b6b78-a51e-11e4-be3e-2b0df510ad8f/54c5d4a574e0a.image.jpg?resize=300%2C227
“Norma Withers poses for a portrait at her home in Temple on Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2015. As a young woman 50 years ago, Withers skipped school to participate in the march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery, the state capital.”
A shattered foundation
African Americans who bought homes in Prince George’s have watched their wealth vanish”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/01/24/the-american-dream-shatters-in-prince-georges-county/
Excerpt:
African Americans for decades flocked to Prince George’s County to be part of a phenomenon that has been rare in American history: a community that grew more upscale as it became more black.
The county became a national symbol of the American Dream with a black twist. Families moved into expansive new homes, with rolling lawns, nearby golf courses and, most of all, neighbors who looked like them. In the early 2000s, home prices soared — some well beyond $1 million — allowing many African Americans to build the kind of wealth their elders could only imagine.
DASHED DREAMS: This is the first part in a series looking at the plight of the black middle class, particularly in Maryland’s Prince George’s County, the nation’s highest-income majority-black county.
Part 2: Half of the loans on newly constructed homes in one Prince George’s County subdivision during the housing boom in 2006 and 2007 wound up in foreclosure.
Part 3: The plight of the Boateng family, who face more than $1 million in debt, shows how some of the people swallowed up by the easy credit era have yet to reemerge.
But today, the nation’s highest-income majority-black county stands out for a different reason — its residents have lost far more wealth than families in neighboring, majority-white suburbs. And while every one of these surrounding counties is enjoying a strong rebound in housing prices and their economies, Prince George’s is lagging far behind, and local economists say a full recovery appears unlikely anytime soon.
The same reversal of fortune is playing out across the country as black families who worked painstakingly to climb into the middle class are seeing their financial foundation for future generations collapse. Although African Americans have made once-unthinkable political and social gains since the civil rights era, the severe and continuing damage wrought by the downturn — an entire generation of wealth was wiped out — has raised a vexing question: Why don’t black middle-class families enjoy the same level of economic security as their white counterparts?……
The recession and tepid recovery have erased two decades of African American wealth gains. Nationally, the net worth of the typical African American family declined by one-third between 2010 and 2013, according to a Washington Post analysis of the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances, a drop far greater than that of whites or Hispanics.
The top half of African American families — the core of the middle class — is left with less than half of the typical wealth they possessed in 2007. The wealth of similarly situated whites declined by just 14 percent.
Overall, the survey found, the typical African American family was left with about eight cents for every dollar of wealth held by whites.
“African-American lawmakers surprised by redistricting suit”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/african-american-lawmakers-surprised-by-redistricting-suit/2015/01/25/6e2a7a82-a4a3-11e4-a162-121d06ca77f1_story.html
Excerpt:
RICHMOND, Va. — A recently filed lawsuit seeking to redraw Virginia House district boundaries has surprised and sparked concern among some of the Democratic African-American lawmakers.
Filed in December by a law firm with ties to both national and state Democrats, the suit argues that state Republicans illegally packed black voters into a dozen House districts when it drew new district lines in 2011.
But many of the African-American lawmakers who represent those districts said they weren’t consulted about the lawsuit before it was filed.
“We certainly weren’t told. It would have been good if someone had shared with us that they had this great concern,” said Del. Delores McQuinn.
The lawmakers said they wanted to make sure any effort aimed at redrawing is comprehensive, not focused solely on areas with large minority populations.
Good Morning Everyone :)
Good Morning, yahtzee & Everyone! :-) Thanks for the articles & links.
Good Morning, Ametia. You are welcome :)
Good morning, Yahtc & everyone!