Never in my wildest dreams did I believe things I write would come to fruition. In this case, talking about the season being a complete roller coaster. Just when we passionate Clemson baseball fans believe the team has turned a corner, they stumble in a game against inferior opposition.

College of Charleston is a very, VERY good CAA Conference team. But take a look at those letters again. They do not say ACC or SEC or any other conference known for its baseball prowess. There is some real good talent on that Cougars team, and I know its baseball is a thing. However, Clemson should have beaten the Cougars the other night.

I had a nice conversation over text with a big-time high school baseball coach in the state the other day whose son is redshirting this year for C of C, and even he believed that the game shouldnt have been close. C of C had some arms down and just didnt think they matched up. However, baseball happened and the Tigers dropped the mid-week game to College of Charleston 7-5.

Bad news Tiger fans, as Clemson travels up 85 to the great state of Virginia to take on the UVA Cavaliers this weekend in Charlottesville at Davenport Field at Disharoon Park. Even the name of the ballpark is daunting.

Early on in the season Virginia was averaging nearly 16 runs a game. Theyve since come down to Earth somewhat, but wow can they mash.

UVA is led by 19th year head coach Brian OConnor. OConnor skippered the Cavaliers to the 2015 National Championship as well as 2 trips to the final series. He has accumulated 5 trips to the College World Series and has made the tournament nearly every year of his nearly 20 years at the helm. OConnor finds himself consistently at or towards the top of the ACC standings year in and year out. He is a consummate professional and well-admired around the nation.

Virginia is currently 35-12 on the season and that includes a record of 14-10 in the ACC and a whopping 27-4 at home. The rankings have them as high as #9 (USA Today Coaches Poll) and as low as #13 (by NCBWA). I feel like I say this all too often on these previews, but THIS is a good baseball team.

Their 35 wins have come against: Bellarmine, Gardner-Webb, NJIT, VMI, Cornell (x3), William & Mary, Penn State (x3), George Washington, Duke (x2) Rider (x3) Boston College (x3), Towson, Wake Forest (x2), Richmond, Georgia Tech (x2), Liberty, Pitt, Georgetown, North Carolina (x3), George Mason, Virginia Tech, VCU, and Longwood.

Their few (12) losses are to: Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami (x3), Old Dominion, Pitt (x2), VCU, and Virginia Tech (x2).

Virginia is a well-balanced team in terms of age of the team. A good mix of all years of study. 3 Freshman, 2 Sophomores, 2 Juniors, and 2 Graduate Students round out the starting 9. Noticeably missing are the Seniors.

Offensively, this Virginia team is as good as Clemson has faced this season. Led by likely 1st Team All-ACC player (unless Max Wagner gets chosen for 3B), Sophomore 3rd Baseman Jake Gelof. Arguably the hottest hitter for the first two months of the season, Gelof is still batting .376 with 17 home runs, 15 doubles and 68 RBIs. This guy can flat out mash. His OPS is an eye-popping 1.352 (Slugging % + On-base %) Geloff hits fourth in the order. His partner in crime for the early season onslaught is/was Graduate Left Fielder Alex Tappen. Tappen is currently hitting .352 on the season with 13 HRs, 12 doubles and 65 RBIs. His OPS is slightly lower than his running mate Gelof, but still sits at a tremendous 1.060.

The rest of the UVA lineup looks like this: Batting Average/OPS (notable stats in parentheses):

Freshman Shortstop Griff OFerrall .319 BA/.815 OPS (5 2bs, 2 HRs, 16-17 SBs)

Sophomore Catcher Kyle Teel .300/.911 (9 2bs, 6 HRs, 39 RBIs)

Graduate 1st Baseman Devin Ortiz .308/.882 (11 2bs, 5 HRs, 41 RBIs)

Junior Center Fielder Chris Newell .283/.932 (4 2bs, 11 HRs, 16-18 SBs)

Freshman Designated Hitter Ethan Anderson .325/.932 (11 2bs, 3 HRs)

Freshman Right Fielder Casey Saucke .359/1.037 (10 2bs, 3 3bs, 6 HRs, 6-9 SBs)

Junior 2nd Baseman Max Cotier .277/.685 (3 2bs, 6-7 SBs)

The Cavaliers have scored 442 runs per game through 47 games for an average of 9.4 runs per game. The Tigers have scored 387 runs over 49 games for an average of 7.9 runs per game.

Neither school did me any favors this week with telling me the starting pitchers for the weekend, but Im not scared of doing a little research and giving my loyal readers an educated guess as to who we will see this weekend.

Friday night will be Mack Anglin for Clemson who looked like an ace last weekend versus Georgia Tech. Clemson is going to need another outing like that against likely starter for UVA, Junior Left-Hander Nate Savino. Savino is 4-4 on the season over 11 appearances and 11 starts. 3.86 ERA for the lefty over 60.2 innings with 66 strikeouts and 23 walks. Opponents are hitting .251 off of the Junior.

Saturday night is officially TBA vs. TBA, but I will go out on a limb and say that Monte Lee will run Geoffrey Gilbert back out there for the Tigers as hes been extremely serviceable since moving to the starting role. He will likely be faced by Graduate Left-Hander Brian Gursky. Gursky is 7-0 on the season with a 2.53 ERA over 10 starts. In 53.1 innings he has 65 strikeouts and 25 walks and opponents are hitting .226 against him.

Sunday afternoon, also officially TBA vs. TBA, but the likely starter for the Tigers will be Freshman Billy Barlow. Barlow has also been a steady force recently for the Tigers on Sunday. Not great, but certainly not terrible either. Personally, I really like his future for Clemson. Facing Barlow will likely be Sophomore Left-Hander (sensing a theme here?) Jake Berry. Berry is 5-2 with a 4.34 ERA on the season. Hes started 6 games and has 16 appearances on the season. Hes pitched 45.2 innings this year with 58 strikeouts to only 18 walks and opponents are hitting .226 against him.

I do not usually preview the bullpen, but did want to note UVAs Jay Woofolk and Dylan Bowers. Two relievers that we will most definitely see and these guys are solid out of the pen for the Cavaliers.

UVA has given up 198 runs on the season for an average of 4.2 runs per game. The Tigers have given up 254 runs through 49 games for an average of 5.2 runs per game.

Runs are going to be at a premium this weekend and Clemson is in DIRE need of a win or two in this series as every game is a playoff game. As our good friend JP Priester said last night on the Sluggo Podcast, it all starts with Anglin. That, my friends, is so very true.

Prediction:

UVA may just be too good for the Tigers to win this series. The Tigers bats have been really good as of late, and thats something fun to watch. Just think UVA has too much. As much as it pains me to do this

Friday

Prediction

Clemson Tigers

Virginia Cavaliers

Saturday

Prediction

Clemson Tigers

Virginia Cavaliers

Sunday

Final

Clemson Tigers

Virginia Cavaliers

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Clemson baseball On deck Virginia Cavaliers - Rubbing the Rock

In this weeks podcast Eli is jumping for joy after spending the past week with his shiny new Steam Deck. We talk about the things we love about the hardware, the games that play well on it, and plenty more. Is this slowly morphing into a Steam Deck podcast? Kind of! That leads perfectly into a reader email that sparks further discussion, and then we hop into a few of the more interesting mobile gaming stories of the week before capping things off yet again with some super secret Playdate spoiler-filled discussion.

Dont forget to shoot us emails with any questions, feedback, or anything else relevant or irrelevant to [emailprotected]. We read em all, and love decoding messages written entirely in emoji. As always, you can listen to us with the links below And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and/or drop us a review in iTunes. Much appreciated!

As a companion to this audio podcast, we also do a video version of the same show that is exclusive to Patreon which allows you to see us playing the games were talking about. Backers can view the most recent video episodes of the TouchArcade show by clicking here. Be sure youre logged in to see the latest content. For everyone else who is curious, you can check out our public patreon posts to see older episodes of the video podcast. If you like what you see, consider becoming a TouchArcade Patreon backer.

Show Notes:

See the article here:
A Steam Deck Verified Podcast The TouchArcade Show #529 - Touch Arcade

Soon theyll have the nerve to deck the halls / that we once walked through.

With graduation on the horizon, I havent been able to stop thinking about this line in Taylor Swifts champagne problems. I havent been able to stop thinking about the impermanence, the evanescence of our stay here on campus.

I havent been able to stop thinking about the passage of time, evidenced only by chips on the walls in dorm rooms, by the addition of post-its and newspaper copies to The Observers office walls, by eerily quiet hallways during Senior Week that scream of uncertainty and the future.

Ever since I stepped foot on campus in 2018, I havent been able to stop thinking about how this place has seen so many people come and go. And every time I think about it, its like someone is squeezing my heart dry. Its the feeling that something so mine is slipping through my fingers all the time (like the ABBA song).

But its part of the whole college thing, I guess.

How painfully bittersweet it is to have found something so wonderful that makes saying goodbye so hard. But Im going to try. This is my goodbye column, after all. And I do have some wishes for the people coming here after I graduate the ones who will deck the halls I once walked through.

To the future residents of 303 Farley Hall: I hope you find your own Abby and Isabel to hold you during your darkest times and to share your most unreserved laughs with. To the next people to have a Chipotle picnic on Irish Green: I hope you find your own Dane to crack open Mexican Coca-Colas and endless inside jokes with.

To the next people to share a pew at Milkshake Mass: I hope you find your own Sarah and Theresa to see flourish as they take on the world. To the next person doing the noon to 2 p.m. Irish Gardens shift on Wednesdays: I hope you find your own jovial Marty and your own little family in the basement of LaFun.

To the next people to frantically sign up for classes at 7:30 a.m. (because you will always get that registration time, for some reason): I hope you find your own Professors Jones, St. Martin, Cajka, Cortez, Kelly, Reifenberg, OMalley and Temple and their kindness, wisdom and boundless passion for teaching.

Of course, The Observer herself has borne witness to countless generations of tri-campus students coming and going. She has seen scores of talented student journalists learn and grow and leave on to bigger things. She has forged friendships, unbreakable bonds of trust and love that are so hard to explain to others.

On a corner of the bulletin board next to the Observer Editor-in-Chiefs office, a yellow tack holds a white sheet of paper. A cursory glance over the wall may miss the nugget of hard-won wisdom the piece of paper offers.

You stay up until three or four or five in the morning until everything gets done, and that was a really important training ground for me, to be wholly responsible for something every day and seeing it through to the end and having people in the newsroom be your best friends and totally trusting them and thats what we had to do.

This is working at The Observer, in the words of former Editor-in-Chief Michelle Krupa. And, honestly, I couldnt put it better myself, even if I tried.

To the next generations of Observer staff that get to stay up until ungodly hours in the surely haunted basement of South Dining Hall: I hope you find in this endeavor that you are part of something greater than yourself. I hope you find your own Alysa, Aidan, Manni, Gen, Allison, Abby, Maggie, Siobhan, Claire and Veronica to lead you gracefully and with love.

To the next generations of Observer editors that get to take mid-shift naps on the old, old couch in the Editor-in-Chiefs office: I hope you get fortunate enough to meet your best friends in this perfect little corner of campus, like I did. (Also, dont lift the cushions. Believe me, you dont want to see whats there).

I hope you find your own Evan, Colin, Issy and Nelisha to continually raise the bar for dedicated, fair and quality journalism at The Observer. To lead by your side and in your absence, to report alongside you, to have a way-too-personal question of the day ready before every Editorial Board meeting. To never fail to offer you thoughtful advice, a warm hug, a reprieve from a long night of editing. To trust wholeheartedly with difficult tasks that you dont even trust yourself with.

I hope you find your own Evan, Colin, Issy and Nelisha to be unhealthily codependent with. To drop first and last names with at the local Salsas. To make you cackle with glee at their quips and jokes (I dont normally do belly laughs, but they sure can get one out of me). To love you unconditionally, even when youre too mean or too annoying or you feel like the weight of the world is on your shoulders. To never judge you for your faults but show you, kindly and gently, that these are lovable too.

Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would find any of this. But I did. And I hope you find it, too.

Adriana Perez, Adri to her friends, is graduating from Notre Dame with a degree in political science and a minor in Journalism, Ethics and Democracy. Shell be in Chicago over the next six months working as a reporting intern at the Chicago Tribune. Please send pizza recommendations, your favorite John Mulaney quote or your thoughts on the most recent Taylor Swift re-recordings to [emailprotected] or @adrianamperezr on Twitter.

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.

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Deck the halls - Observer Online

Netflixs fabled culture deck, which over the years has taken on the importance of the Magna Carta in tech and business circles, has gotten some updates reflecting the streaming giants current circumstances.

The document, which is based on a PowerPoint deck created by Co-Founder and Co-CEO Reed Hastings, lays out precepts guiding employee priorities and the companys overall approach. It has been posted publicly for years, revised at various intervals, and viewed more than 20 million times. Its section headings (Highly Aligned, Loosely Coupled, Disagree Then Commit) echo some of the pillars of the companys uniquely articulated culture. Hastings elaborated on many of those tenets in his 2020 book, No Rules Rules.

In a section called Judgment, a new bullet point is phrased in the imperative tense: You spend our members money wisely. At a current level estimated at $20 billion in 2022, Netflixs content spending is under harsh scrutiny after the company posted its first subscriber declines in more than a decade in the first quarter and indicated more losses in the current quarter. More than two-thirds of its market value has vanished over the past six months. While the company is unlikely to radically slash its spending, management has signaled a new commitment to trimming the fat and some shows and employees have already been cut loose as that process begins.

Another newly updated section, Artistic Expression, indirectly references recent controversies over titles like Cuties or Dave Chappelles comedy special The Closer. The latter, released last fall, created a fierce backlash and a large-scale walkout by employees upset over Chappelles broadsides against transgender people. Netflix resisted calls for the special to be taken down from its service.

Entertaining the world is an amazing opportunity and also a challenge because viewers have very different tastes and points of view, the section says. Ratings, content warnings and parental controls are all tools aimed at helping subscribers avoid content that may upset them, the document adds.

Not everyone will likeor agree witheverything on our service, it goes on. While every title is different, we approach them based on the same set of principles: we support the artistic expression of the creators we choose to work with; we program for a diversity of audiences and tastes; and we let viewers decide whats appropriate for them, versus having Netflix censor specific artists or voices.

Variety first reported on the update to the document.

See the original post here:
Netflix Pledges To Spend Subscribers Money Wisely, Respect Artistic Expression In Newly Revised Version Of Its Fabled Culture Deck - Deadline

Branded for Beginners, Lukes ultimate Deck (sorta) for Rush Duels, Vendread, and Spellbooks!

Beginner Deck: Branded Deck Featuring Cyber-Stein

1 Cyber-Stein3 Sangan3 Witch of the Black Forest3 Tour Guide From the Underworld1 Ad Libitum of Despia3 Aluber the Jester of Despia2 Fallen of Albaz1 Despian Tragedy2 Incredible Ecclesia, the Virtuous

3 Branded Fusion1 Branded in Red3 Telekinetic Charging Cell3 Brain Research Lab3 Allure of Darkness3 Scapegoat2 Branded Opening1 Foolish Burial1 Monster Reborn1 Terraforming

2 Mirrorjade the Iceblade Dragon2 Lubellion the Searing Dragon1 Albion the Branded Dragon1 Alba-Lenatus the Abyss Dragon1 The Last Warrior from Another Planet1 Destiny HERO Destroyer Phoenix Enforcer1 Guardian Chimera2 Naturia Exterio1 Salamangreat Almiraj1 Artemis, the Magistus Moon Maiden2 Reprodocus

[RUSH DUEL] New Product Deck: Dragon Deck Featuring Void Strike Dragon Zerogygias

3 Nullstrike Dragon Zerogias3 Cladsoul Dragon Gygias1 Multistrike Dragon Dragias3 Fortitude Dragon1 Dragon Knight of Darkness3 Dragon Bat1 Dragorite1 The Fire Dragon1 Sylphidra3 Phoenix Dragon3 Sportsdragon Slugger3 Sportsdragon Pitcher

1 Monster Reborn (LEGEND)3 Tribute Doll3 Fusion1 Star Restart2 Dragons Inferno1 Dragons Return1 Ship of Seven Treasures

1 Vengeful Dragons Counterattack1 Dragonic Disorder

2 Void Strike Dragon Zerogygias1 Full Moon Dragon Umbrlancer F

New Product Deck: Vendread Deck Featuring Dragon Kings Aura

3 Vendread Scarvenger1 Revendread Executor3 Revendread Slayer3 Scar Vendread3 Changshi the Spiridao3 Alghoul Mazera1 Mad Mauler2 Vendread Revenants2 Vendread Striges2 Vendread Houndhorde1 Darkest Diabolos, Lord of the Lair

3 Ravenous Vendread2 Revendread Evolution2 Revendread Origin1 Vendread Nights3 Pre-Preparation of Rites1 Zombie Necronize

3 Dragon Kings Aura1 Vendread Reunion

1 Immortal Dragon1 Revived King Ha Des1 Shiranui Samuraisaga1 Skeletal Dragon Felgrand1 Shiranui Shogunsaga1 Red-Eyes Zombie Dragon Lord1 Shiranui Sunsaga1 Avendread Savior1 Vampire Sucker1 Yuki-Onna, the Icicle Mayakashi1 Vampire Fascinator1 Yuki-Onna, the Absolute Zero Mayakashi1 Dhampir Vampire Sheridan1 The Zombie Vampire1 Number 22: Zombiestein

My Favorite Deck: DARK Spellcaster Deck

Centered Around Reaper of Prophecy!

1 Reaper of Prophecy1 Harr, Generaider Boss of Storms1 Sauge de Fleur1 Endymion, the Mighty Master of Magic1 Witchcrafter Haine1 Dark Magician1 Apprentice Illusion Magician1 Prophecy Destroyer2 Witch of the Black Forest1 Silent Magician3 Fool of Prophecy2 Spellbook Magician of Prophecy3 Magicians Souls1 Jester Confit2 Illusion of Chaos

3 Spellbook of Secrets2 Spellbook of Fate2 Spellbook of Life1 Spellbook Library of the Crescent1 Spellbook Library of the Heliosphere1 Spellbook of the Master1 Spellbook of Knowledge1 Spellbook of Power1 Spellbook of Eternity1 Spellbook of Miracles1 Spellbook of Wisdom1 Spellbook Organization1 The Grand Spellbook Tower1 Instant Fusion

1 Artemis, the Magistus Moon Maiden1 Dharc the Dark Charmer, Gloomy3 Crowley, the First Propheseer3 Selene, Queen of the Master Magicians1 Magi MagiMagician Gal1 Norito the Moral Leader1 Constellar Ptolemy M71 Ebon Illusion Magician1 Number 11: Big Eye1 El Shaddoll Winda1 Millennium-Eyes Restrict

Master Duel (Fusion Festival):

Gladiator Beast Deck

Dragonmaid Deck

Ancient Gear Deck

Armityle the Chaos Phantasm Deck

Master Duel (Diamond):

Prank-Kids Deck

HERO Deck

Endymion Deck

Thunder Dragon Deck

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The Organization | [Deck Recipes] May 12th, 2022 - YGOrganization

Diors spring 2021 haute couture collection debuted last January with a lush short film created by Matteo Garrone that opens with a tarot reading that transports its querent to a mysterious chateau populated by sumptuously dressed figures from the card deck the Fool, the Empress, an anthropomorphized Sun and Moon who act as signposts as she travels down one corridor and then another. The short, and the looks it showcased, which were designed by the brands artistic director, Maria Grazia Chiuri, was partly inspired by Italo Calvinos 1973 novel, The Castle of Crossed Destinies, in which the characters lose the power of speech and can communicate only through tarot cards, and it nodded to Christian Diors well-documented interest in the divinatory arts, on which he particularly relied during the precarious days of the Second World War.

By the 1940s, tarot was already a centuries-old practice it is thought to have originated in Central Europe in the 1400s, and the oldest surviving cards hail from decks commissioned in the mid-15th century by Filippo Maria Visconti, the Duke of Milan, and his successor, Francesco Sforza, and feature detailed illustrations of nobility and gilded backgrounds. These and other decks became status symbols for upper-class Italians, who used them to play an early version of bridge. The practice spread to France in the 18th century, and the cards were assigned mystical meanings when occultists, among them the cleric Antoine Court, attempted to create an association between tarot and ancient Egyptian spiritual thought. The connection proved spurious, but still, tarot took on a life of its own, with more and more mystics the influential British occultists Aleister Crowley and Arthur Edward Waite among them using its decks to predict the future: the Death card, for instance, might symbolize a coming period of radical change and rebirth, while the Temperance card might suggest a need for balance. The deck Waite devised, which was first printed in 1909, has long been considered a good place to start for those just familiarizing themselves with the major and minor arcana, terms used to describe the trump and suit cards, respectively.

Its no surprise that tarot carried over into the 20th century, too along with the advances afforded by modernity came plenty of conflict and confusion or that its popularity has surged in the last couple of years, during which the pandemic has scrambled nearly everyones notions of the normal order of things. The search for meaning and direction, it seems, has never gone out of style and feels especially urgent at present. And even if we dont actually believe in the cards, they do seem to possess an imaginative power that, amid so much uncertainty, can be hard to access in ourselves. Who wouldnt welcome any kind of indication as to where we may be headed right about now?

One group consistently and particularly taken with tarot is artists. The decks are a sort of art object, after all, and artists are themselves in the business of making meaning. In the early 1970s, Salvador Dal began work on a deck featuring himself as the magician and his wife, Gala, as the Empress. In 1979, Niki de Saint Phalle began constructing her Tarot Garden, a grouping, in Italys Tuscan hills, of 22 large-scale concrete sculptures inspired by tarot imagery and adorned with mosaic and mirrored tiles. A standout is The Empress, an opulent large-breasted sphinx adorned with a crown, which served for a time as the artists living quarters.

Now, a new generation of artists and designers are channeling their creativity by making decks of their own, ones that reflect the current era. The New York-based artist Tattfoo Tan created his New Earth Resiliency Oracle Cards as a part of his New Earth project, an immersive, teaching-based work that instructs users in both practical skills and spiritual modalities intended to help them contend with climate change. While we might associate tarot with the celestial, to Tan it can be a tool for staying connected to nature and the seasons here on earth. Accordingly, his deck features minimalist black-and-white sketches of fog, winter and drought. For her part, the Indiana-based artist Courtney Alexander is linking tarot to the politics of representation. Disturbed by how many so-called Black tarot decks, or those depicting Black characters, were created by white artists, she set out to make one that felt more authentically inclusive. The result was her Dust II Onyx deck, the cards of which are printed with Alexanders ornate multimedia collage paintings, works rooted in Black diasporic histories and popular culture. She gave the King of Swords, traditionally a symbol of intellect, the name Papa Blade and the eyes of Kanye West, and the Queen of Cups, the ruler of the emotional realm, the name Mama Gourd and the eyes of the poet and activist Nikki Giovanni. The story of Blackness deserves reverence, Alexander says, and to be seen as powerful.

Other decks nod to various art movements. For the Michigan-based artists Linnea Gits and Peter Dunhams Pagan Otherworlds Tarot deck, Gits studied the work of Renaissance artists like Albrecht Drer and then did an original oil painting for each card. (Dunham did the lettering.) The overall effect, though, is rather surreal her grim reaper is a skeleton with wings made of arrows whos in the process of stepping on the head of a half-buried woman holding up a flower and recall the early 20th-century Surrealists habit of combining seemingly disparate objects in the hope of arriving at hidden psychological truths. (Gits and Dunham are among the artists included in Tarot. The Library of Esoterica [2020], Jessica Hundley, Johannes Fiebig and Marcella Krolls visual art history of the practice.) And the artist Isa Beniston began creating her Gentle Thrills Tarot deck while quarantining in her Los Angeles apartment in 2020. Unable to access her studio, and in need of a project, she picked up new supplies at a nearby store and made hyper-colorful, Fauvist-feeling versions of the cards using gouache. She also relates to the tradition of the salon, and hopes her project will inspire not just self-knowledge but togetherness. I think people are most joyful when they use the deck with friends, she says. And I love the idea that my work might be used to help build community. Thats all an artist can really hope for.

More here:
The Artists and Designers Making Tarot Decks for Today - The New York Times

SOUTHERN INDIANA Kyle Lanoue has served for the past year as the career and technical education director at Prosser Career Education Center, but recently, he filled in for several days at S. Ellen Jones Elementary in New Albany, where he previously worked as principal.

Last Tuesday and Wednesday, he assisted in a number of ways, including performing administrative roles at the school, helping out with lunch duty, covering classes, answering phones and stepping in when an extra set of hands were needed.

Lanoue is one of many staff members in New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated School Corp. to take on extra duties as the high level of COVID-19 spread in the community leads to staffing shortages. These duties include ones employees may not normally do but are needed right now, he said.

I think across the district right now, everyone is willing to do whatever we can to help out to ensure that in-person learning continues the best it possibly can, he said.

NAFCS Superintendent Brad Snyder said the school district is facing an all hands on deck situation in terms of staffing.

We are doing everything we can to keep school open, he said. Some employees are performing duties out of their normally assigned position as situations change on a day-to-day basis.

Schools across Southern Indiana are struggling with staffing shortages related to COVID-19. With the exception of eLearning days due to inclement weather, NAFCS has remained in-person so far this school year. However, districts across the area have been forced to go to remote learning.

Greater Clark County Schools and Clarksville Community Schools transitioned to periods of eLearning last week, as well as individual schools such as Silver Creek Middle School, Silver Creek High School, Henryville Elementary and Henryville Jr./Sr. High School.

Lanoue said teachers, administration and support staff in schools are really answering the call right now and working difficult, long hours to keep school operations going during the pandemic.

Last week, he called upon his experience of working for more than a decade as a building-level administrator in NAFCS as he covered for staff at S. Ellen Jones. He has since returned to his usual duties as a Prosser administrator.

We have long been a professional learning community, and we believe deeply in collaboration, Lanoue said. I think any good leader looks to know the job and the role next to you the best as possible. These are my colleagues and friends.

NAFCS teachers are helping cover for other classrooms, and administrators in the transportation department are taking on bus routes when drivers are out, he said.

Lanoue said in-person learning is important for addressing students learning gaps and helping the most vulnerable elementary school students, including those at Title I schools like S. Ellen Jones. He wants to make sure learning continues at a high level while also remaining vigilant with safety.

For students who possibly already had learning gaps, to be away from the building is incredibly difficult, he said.

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Staffing situation 'all hands on deck' for Southern Indiana schools - Evening News and Tribune

Billionaire wealth is soaring in both dollar amounts and the number of people in their ranks.

"None of that is an accident it was engineered," Peter Goodman, the global economics correspondent for The New York Times and the author of "Davos Man: How the Billionaires Devoured the World," told Insider.

Goodman's new book is the latest entry into the canon of how the world's wealth became so concentrated and the measures they've taken to maintain that. It examines the "Davos Man," a moniker created by political scientist Samuel P. Huntington, that, Goodman writes, describes those who are "so enriched by globalization and so native to its workings that they were effectively stateless, their interests and wealth flowing across borders, their estates and yachts sprinkled across continents, their arsenal of lobbyists and accountants straddling jurisdictions, eliminating loyalty to any particular nation."

According to Oxfam, the ten richest people in the world all men have more than doubled their wealth during the pandemic. Goodman says the story of billionaires over the last half century is the "story of rigging the game." It's happened through the tax code as well as hacking away at antitrust regulations that seek to prevent monopolies and encourage competition. Billionaires have undermined labor organizing, with collective bargaining a "shadow of its former self" and everything workers get at the discretion of the boss, according to Goodman.

"The result of that is just that there's fewer opportunities for everybody else to get a piece of the action," Goodman said. "Capitalism is still a great bountiful system. It's the best thing we got in terms of how to organize an economy, but it needs regulation, progressive taxation, antitrust enforcement, and the billionaires have very effectively defenestrated all of that."

Goodman's book traces how the rise of the Davos Man fueled the rise of right-wing populists and turned working-class workers against the world. Rampant inequality is an issue that's become especially prescient during the pandemic, as millions of Americans found themselves suddenly jobless as billionaires notched huge gains and vaccine inequality contributing to the rise of the omicron variant.

"It's totally fixable. The problem is that to fix it means we have to take on the people who run the system," Goodman said. He said it's not complicated, and it's been done before.

For instance, the 19th-century robber barons, who crafted monopolies of their industries often at the expense of workers, got hit with antitrust enforcement, he said. That resulted in major firms being broken up.

And, from the end of World War Two until the mid-1970's, there was much more progressive taxation, with the top marginal tax rate climbing above 90%. In 2018, it was 37%. Recent efforts to raise taxes including instituting a tax on billionaires' unrealized gains have been shot down by lawmakers. America's wealthiest have propped up a whole industry devoted to defending and hiding away wealth.

Union membership has also been on the decline for decades, which the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute notes tracks alongside an increasingly larger share of income going to the top 10%. The latest data release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed union membership numbers sliding yet again.

"We have a template there, which is antitrust enforcement, labor power, and progressive taxation," Goodman said. "If we take care of those things, we can have an economy that actually functions pretty well for an awful lot of people. The polls say this is what Americans actually want. This is not some kind of radical agenda."

But what happens if the situation goes unaddressed?

"It's very difficult to imagine that we're going to marshal an effective response to really serious issues like climate change," or the continued persistence of institutional racism and the "huge numbers" of people who don't have healthcare, Goodman said.

"These are huge problems that need to be solved, and it's very hard to see how we can solve them if huge numbers of people understand in their gut that the wealthiest people aren't willing to make any sacrifice at all."

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Davos Man author: Billionaires stacked the deck but solution is simple - Business Insider

Below Deck: Mediterranean was a beautifully dramatic successor to the already popular flagship show when it premiered in 2016. It even found the mirror image to Kate Chastain's infamous persona with chief stew Hannah Ferrier. In the subsequent second season, Captain Sandy Yawn joined the crew (after the late Captain Mark Howard decided to bow out). Ferrier and Yawn would go on to share many seasons together on Bravo that is until the former fired Ferrier in 2020 for having undeclared drugs aboard the yacht. Apparently, the franchise alum is now claiming that she and the captain weren't friendly at all whilst working on the show.

As far as fans saw, the two co-stars would sometimes butt heads, but they also seemed to have a general respect for the others position. Hannah Ferriers eventual firing obviously ended their rapport. Yet whilst on the Kyle & Jackie O Show podcast, Ferrier indicated that the Bravo editors left out the fact that she struggled with Captain Sandy from Day 1 on Below Deck: Mediterranean. She said:

So the way things can be edited. It was probably edited in a way where it looks like we were better than we were for the years before that we filmed together. We werent friendly at all. It was every season sitting down with production going, How can we get these two working together, where its an environment where they can work together?'

The former series star makes it sound like she and Captain Sandy were bitter enemies on the reality series. Which is surprising, because it truly didn't come across that way on the show, and Bravo isn't one to leave out major drama from viewers. The Mediterranean alum went on to say that the captain was evidently on her case due to preconceived notions from Season 1, saying:

Shes a micromanager. But what had happened is shed watched the show before she came on, and shed made her decision about me on a few things had happened. I think it was like about 45 seconds from our first introduction they had to stop production and be like, Sandy, you cant talk to her like that, like straight off the bat. It was something where Id literally pronounced a dish wrong or something when the chef hadnt told me and given me enough notice to remember. And also, its that competitiveness, wanting to kind of be the fan favorite.

Following her dramatic exit from the fifth season of Below Deck: Mediterranean, Hannah Ferrier would later announce that she was quitting yachting for good. But her early retirement didn't end the apparent feud with Captain Sandy, which clearly lives on. The two have gone back-and-forth about the other in the press and online, culminating, with Ferrier accusing her old boss at one point of being a hypocrite toward women. Captain Sandy maintains that she was in the right with her decision to fire the notorious chief stew, although bosun Malia White has some slight regrets for her part in the drama.

The show goes on, though. Captain Sandy is expected to return in her capacity as leader in Mediterraneans future seventh season. Meanwhile, her former co-star has since gotten engaged and had her first child with her fianc. The Bravo vet also has a pretty successful podcast show now, where she talks with reality stars, including some of her fellow franchise alums.

Hannah Ferrier has said in the past that she would only consider returning to the show if Captain Lee requested her. The slightly shady remark suggests that the old riff between the two castmates likely wont see improvement anytime soon especially if it was indeed years in the making.

Link:
Below Deck Med Alum Hannah Ferrier Explains Why She And Captain Sandy 'Weren't Friendly At All' While Working On The Show - CinemaBlend

Card-based battles can take on a new and interesting life in a video game. Each of the following games features deep strategy, imaginative art, and a clever use of, well, cards!

Even if youve never heard of the term deck-building before, the following selection may serve as a good entry point to a world of strategy and little rectangles. We hope you find something you like!

(At the very least, you wont need to lug around a binder full of cards with these games. Or, you know, trade with someone who said they had a rare holographic version of a card, but it ended up being a piece of cardboard wrapped in foil with a bad drawing taped on it. Not like that has ever happened before)

Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars

Experience an RPG set in a world of swords and sorcery, told entirely through the medium of cards. The story follows a self-proclaimed hero as they set off to slay a recently awakened dragon, presented in the manner of a tabletop RPG.

Monster Train First Class

Monster Train brings a strategic layer to roguelike deckbuilding, with a tactical twist: Defend not one, but three vertical battlegrounds simultaneously as you fight to protect the final pyre against the forces of heaven. No playthrough is ever the sameits a fresh challenge every time!

Slay the Spire

Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover relics of immense power, and Slay the Spire! You will discover hundreds of cards to add to your deck with each attempt at climbing the Spire. Select cards that work together to efficiently dispatch foes and reach the top.

Wingspan

Ok, you got usthis one is not a battle game. Instead, you take the role of bird enthusiastsresearchers, bird watchers, ornithologists, and collectorsseeking to discover and attract the best birds to your network of wildlife preserves. Each bird extends a chain of powerful combinations in one of your habitats.

Faeria

With its living board, Faeria will challenge you with truly strategic card battles. Build exciting decks and shape the battlefield as you fight epic battles. Raise mountains, build forests, fill lakes, or harness the sands of the deserts. You choose your own path to victoryliterally!

Dicey Dungeons

Become a giant walking dice and battle to the end of an ever-changing dungeon! Can you escape the cruel whims of Lady Luck? Youll play as six different characters, each with their own play styles and abilities. Master each class and figure out which one best fits your style.

Signs of the Sojourner

Signs of the Sojourner is a narrative card game about connecting with people. Your deck is your character, reflecting your experiences and shaping your relationships. Youll encounter optimistic stories, compassionate characters, and delightful surprises in a world where climate change has made life hard.

Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales

Thronebreaker is a single player role-playing game set in the world of The Witcher that combines narrative-driven exploration with unique puzzles and card battle mechanics. Facing an imminent Nilfgaardian invasion, Meve is forced to enter the warpath and set out on a dark journey.

SteamWorld Quest Hand of Gilgamech

Lead a party of aspiring heroes through a hand-drawn world and intense battles using only your wits and a handful of cards. Take on whatever threat comes your way by crafting your own deck choosing from over 100 unique punch-cards!

Griftlands

Fight and negotiate your way through a broken-down sci-fi world. Every decision is important, be it the jobs you take, the friends you make, or the cards you collect. Death comes quickly, but each play offers new situations and strategies to explore.

Shadowverse: Champion's Battle

Team up with characters from the Shadowverse anime in this card battle game. With new summoning animations and exclusive cards, take on your rivals in story mode or head online* to challenge your friends!

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Put your deck-building skills to the test with these card battle games - Nintendo