It is interesting how everyone wants respect and yet gives so little to other people. If you want respect, respect other people and respect yourself. You really can go wrong with this approach. The trouble is that some people just don't abide by expected norms of social behavior. You have to figure out how to deal with such people. In this video, I am going to show you 13 ways you can earn respect. 1. Set clearly defined boundaries. No one respects anyone who takes anything and everything, even if the people who do things you don't like are your friends. Tell them you don't like it. Make it clear that you do not want it to happen again.  This is especially important when a relationship is just beginning. Once it has begun fully, if you attempt to draw the lines, that may not work because you have become too familiar with the person. If a person holds you affectionately and you are not interested in having a romantic relationship with the person, make it clear. Do not condone it because you don't want to hurt their feelings. It will do something much worse the next time. Draw the line. The funny thing is that, when you draw your line and insist on it, your friends actually start respecting and seeing you as a principled person. If you don't want people visiting you, let them know. If you don't like taking calls at night, let them know. Don't assume that they would be reasonable. What is reasonable to you may be very unreasonable to them. 2. Respect people's time. If you set a meeting with someone, keep to time. You don't know the person's other engagement. Keeping to time shows you respect their time. When you are always punctual, people also start respecting you as a very punctual and disciplined person. You don't want a reputation as a latecomer. If you keep to time too, you can get a lot of work done. Imagine of all the meetings you ever attended began exactly at the time it was scheduled. How much do you think could have been accomplished? 3. Be kind but not overly nice. It is good to be kind and polite, but it is not a good idea to be too nice. People who are too nice can sometimes be perceived by others as not being authentic. They will therefore not like you. The better balance is to be kind, but firm. Let them know they can come to you for advice, that you can be their pillar of support, but also let them know not to mess with you.  If you want them to respect you, be approachable, but firm. 4. Learn to say no without feeling guilty. It may sound dumb to some people that may be wondering why on earth I included this. I added this because a lot of people do not know how to say no. This means that they are always doing a favor for people. They really do not want to have anything to do with it and feel guilty when they really can't help because they are occupied. You need to wake up. Your life is not meant for emotional slavery to other people. You have your own dreams, your personal aspirations and fun to do as well. You deserve a break. People will like to hang out with you if they know you like helping and can say no, but they won't respect you. They will not respect that you need time for you or that you have needs of your own.  Instead, it will make them respect you for having the balls to say no when you can't help. Saying yes to everything can make you too committed and stressed out. You may end up doing a lousy job and the favors people have asked you. Saying no would have actually served the people who asked for the favors better. Value yourself. Do you value yourself enough? When dealing with people, how much you value yourself often subconsciously also lets the person know how to treat you. If you start asking someone you just met for favors, they'll likely to write you off even before getting to know you. If you try to make conversation and get to know the person, if the person is used to people asking them for favors, they might actually find you very interesting and start to respect you. Respect for oneself sometimes means not going with the girls if you can't afford it. They don't end up paying for you. If they do that often, they may not complain but they will not respect you. 6. Keep your word. If you have given your word, the matter should be settled. Nothing brings disrespect faster than a statement of confidence that turns out to be untrue. If you will not or cannot do it, don't say you would. In those types of situations, such statements are made in public and witnesses are present. This means that if you default on your oral statement, you may raise public humiliation and general disregard. People respect people who keep their word. It is not easy to do so. Those who consistently do are rare. 7. Quit apologizing all the time. If you have done something or said something you feel is right, let others feel is wrong. Let them be. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. You shouldn't apologize for yours. If you are not wrong, don't apologize all the time. If you always apologize, it can actually lead to disrespect. 8. Stand up for yourself and others. It is easy to stand for ourselves than to stand for others. Those who stand up for others are well respected. It takes an incredible amount of courage to pull it off. A great way to do this is by volunteering for causes you love. It can endure people to you and make them feel safe around you. 9. Keep your emotions in check. If you want people to respect you, keep your emotions in line. Don't yell at coworkers or your partner in a relationship. If you are always cool-headed, people will respect you a lot. It is easier to get angry and yell than to respond calmly and walk away from a conversation that serves no purpose. Keeping your emotion in check requires patience and practice. It is a very desirable trait in people. People like this are more likely to be promoted to managerial roles than those who are not. 10. Be quick to admit your mistakes. If you have made a mistake, acknowledge it. People generally dislike highly opinionated people who never admit they are wrong. If you are open-minded and listen to other people and apologize when you are wrong, they will gain the respect of others. People who never apologized are perceived as proud. 11. Treat others with respect. Respect is very reciprocal. If you treat others with respect, they will treat you with respect as well. One way to do this is to avoid getting involved in other people's businesses. You can be friends with them, but don't ever advise on their family affairs unless asked. Let people feel comfortable and do not volunteer information given to you to others without the informer's permission. 12. Act more than you speak. One way to earn a great reputation is to be a person of few words. People who talk a lot sell them actually take action, talk less and do more. When your speech is rare, when you do speak, people listen. 13. Be the best at what you do. The best way to earn respect really is to be the best at what you do. You cannot substitute it for anything else when you are great at something, even your enemies will respect you. Make out time to hone your skills. Be or yourself that much, practice a lot and try again when you fail. In time, you would create reputation. So strong people will come to see you as formidable. Respect is something everyone yearns for, but if you don't act in specific ways, people will not respect you. Try not getting too familiar with people that are not your close friends. It can lead to disrespect. Be the best at what you do, but don't shove it down people's throats.


In 2009, I visited a small village in the region of Serra de Sipol, southeastern Brazil. At first view, the village of La Pina da Serra seems an idyllic and isolated place. However, in my first foray into the narrow streets of the village, one thing drew my attention. Some signs, handmade signs with some behavioral demands such as no cars or motorcycles allowed or bathing suits only and waterfalls. And in this first day also, I met also a skinny young boy who approached me very much interested in the camera that I had hanging on my shoulder. And Rafael, that has 13 years old, studies in the morning at school nearby the village. And in afternoon, sometimes he gets some money as a tour guide. In our first meeting, Rafael drew a simple map of La Pina da Serra and gave it to me so that I would not get lost. And he got a very close companion, inseparable companion, showing me the beauty and the challenges of his world. One day, Rafael asked me for a picture that I had taken in La Pina. And he asked it also if he could draw something on it. And he draw a flying saucer, surveying this guy, and told me that his village used to suffer from a permanent threat that comes from the future. He also told me that on dark nights, without moon, a mysterious shining woman would appear nearby a huge mango tree. He refers to her as the shining woman of the mango tree. And according to him, her appearances are to protect the village from these external threats. I'm excited about the curious way in which Rafael presented me his world. I decided to give him a camera and he got really happy. And from then on, our friendship became really close and our forays around the village were now guided by images, much more than words. And these are some images of our moments, the moments that we shared together, photographing. It was amazing days with Rafael. But one day, Rafael returned to the problems of the threats of spaceships and presented me a project to trap the flying saucers. The seriousness in which he presented me, he summarized it, his project made me realize its importance for him. Somehow, I saw that there was a close relation between the sides that I had seen in my first day, the flying saucers, and also the progress that was coming so fast to his village. So I decided to help him in that project. But I just pointed out that I did not know anything about flying saucers or traps and he was the best choice to conduct the actions. So we choose the necessary material. And in a field that Rafael pointed as the right place, we start building our project, our dream. And Rafael was really anxious because he wanted to be ready before the sun goes down. In case of this night, some flying saucers might visit the village. And so in the end of the afternoon, just before the sun goes down, we celebrate the conclusion of our project. And later on, no, from that moment, Rafael just placed himself in redness with the camera on hand, just waiting for any possible approach of a flying saucer. And later on, with some candies and soft drinks, we went to our project and we stood celebrating our friendship, the power of our friendship and the strengthening of our friendship. And that night was one of the most beautiful nights that I have ever lived, believe me. And this night I also realized that I could work with Rafael and I could help somehow Rafael with some other projects that make his village face and find a better way of facing the progress that was coming so fast. And so we photographed the shining woman of the mango tree, yeah, believe me. And then we did a poster with her image and a question. The shining woman of the mango tree, who lives in her? And we fixed in different points, different locations of the village during the night. And in the morning, when the locals saw, as the locals saw the posters, we saw the whole village revisit an old legend, almost forgotten, and the only, only Rafael used to find it to be alive. And these ghostly images, an image among, with a lot of others that Rafael produced, were made into postcards that we put it for sale in the village. And the whole money went to Rafael as the author of all the images. These are the posters. And this is Rafael really happy about his project. And during the two years that I stood in La Pina da Serra, Rafael used to give me little stones that bright as they reflect the sunshine. And he used to put them in my hand saying, take them, take them with you. It's a real treasure. It's yours and it's a treasure. And in our last day together, as I had to go, go back to my life outside the village, we climbed the mountain in front of La Pina da Serra to celebrate on its top one last time our friendship. Without telling him, I brought with me all the stones in my pocket. And up there, I asked him if we could bury them up there, hide them somewhere on the top of the mountain. And he liked that. I also asked him if he could take care of it. Till the day I could come back once again to the village. And this is what we did. Our treasure is still safe and secure in La Pina da Serra. I might tell you that it took for me a long time to understand the real meaning of Rafael's treasure. It's real value. But fortunately, now I know, and I hope that today, somehow I have been able to share at least one little part of it with you. Thank you so much.


In this presentation, we will take a look at the statement of cash flows, non-cash items. First question, why would we be looking at non-cash items when considering a statement of cash flows? We're going to go through a list of non-cash items first and see if you can recognize a trend in these and why we might be linking them to a statement of cash flows discussion. Then we will explain more fully the idea of looking at non-cash items when considering a statement of cash flows. So some examples of non-cash items would be the purchase of long-term assets by issuing a note, the purchase of non-cash assets by issuing equity or debt, the retirement of debt by issuing equity stock, lease of assets in a capital lease transaction, and exchange non-cash assets for other non-cash assets. Consider these examples and note some of the common features including that they deal with investing and financing activities and think through why we might be linking them to a statement of cash flows. We'll go more fully through this by giving an example of the purchase of long-term assets by issuing a note, an example that we can then apply out to the rest of these items. So what are we going to do with these non-cash items? We're going to report them at the bottom of the statement of cash flows or report them in a note related to the statement of cash flows. So we're going to have to say in some format or other, hey look these are some non-cash items that we're linking to for some reason the statement of cash flows. So they're going to be important things that we want to disclose to the reader of the financial statements either in connection directly to the statement of cash flows or to a note to the financial statements that will be in reference to the statement of cash flows. So that goes back to the question again as to why these non-cash things would be linked to the statement of cash flows. Why don't we just put them in a different note? Why are they somehow tied to the statement of cash flows? And to give an example of why that kind of makes sense, let's take a look at one of these items that would be a non-cash item that we would need to report. We're going to purchase long-term asset by issuing a note. Let's think about the journal entry related to that. We're going to say that the equipment would go up. We would debit the equipment if we did this, and then we would credit the note payable. So no cash is taking place here. There's no cash happening, so it would not be a cash item. We wouldn't be reporting it on the investing activities or the operating activities or the financing activities. But we can also think of this as kind of two things that really happen. We kind of cut out the middleman. We kind of cut out cash as the middle transaction here. You can consider this as two transactions that could have taken place and the same ended the same result, which would be that we had cash. If we got cash goes up, because we took out a loan. So we could take out a loan and then pay for the equipment, and we would end up in the same place. So if we took out a loan, we would increase the liability as we did here. We would debit cash, but then we would just turn around and take that cash and pay for the equipment with it. So then we would debit equipment and pay cash. So note what we did here is this transaction that would deal with cash as the medium of exchange for this transaction, we just kind of cut out the middle person. We cut out the cash and went directly to this transaction here. So you can see if this is why they're related in some format to the cash flow statement. We're basically saying it's a transaction that would have had cash as an exchange, but the cash was removed and we did some type of other exchange. These transactions will typically be including financing and investing type activities, meaning they're going to be dealing with notes, payable bonds, payable purchase of things like equipment and no cash will be exchanged. But because of this relationship, we still want to disclose them in relation to a cash flow statement. So now that we can see this transaction, let's see if we can apply that to some of the other examples we have. So we've got cash purchase for long-term asset by issuing the note. Again, you can kind of break that journal entry that you would think of when you issue a note if we bought something and you'd issued a note into two journal entries dealing with cash, receiving cash and then paying cash. Another example would be the purchase of non-cash assets by issuing equity or debt. So if we bought some type of non-cash asset, didn't pay cash, but we issued equity or debt, you can think of that same type of transaction. If we broke that up into two transactions, we got the debt, got the cash and then paid for the non-cash item. So if you can think about being able to break these things up into two transactions of getting a loan or getting equity, issuing stock, getting money and then buying the non-cash purchase for cash, then that's probably an item that we would need to report here. If we have a retirement of debt by issuing equity stock, you can think of that as the same kind of thing that's going on here. We could have had the issuing of stock, gotten cash, used that cash to retire the debt. Instead, we just retire the debt with the stock. We have the example of a lease asset and a capital lease transaction. That's basically the same thing as a purchase on financing a capital lease. A capital lease is structured as a lease, but really it's a purchase that we financed in form, substance over form or in substance. In substance, it's really a purchase that was made and then we financed that purchase. So that's going to be a similar example, a similar example as we have up here with the purchase of long-term assets by issuing a note. And then we have the exchange of non-cash assets for another non-cash asset. And again, that would just be an exchange that would happen. We gave one asset and received another. You can again think of that as well, what if we gave the asset, got cash, they gave the asset, got cash and then we exchanged for cash. So anything that you can break out and you can think, well, basically we eliminated the sale and then the cash transaction. That's going to be one of those types of issues that may be needed to be reported as non-cash items related to the statement of cash flows.


Chapter 9 of The Backwash of War by Ellen Neubald-Lamotte Chapter 9 Locomotor Ataxia Just inside the entrance gate, a big, flat-topped tent was pitched which bore over the low door a signboard on which was painted Triage number one, malade et blessé assis. This meant that those assis, able to travel in the ambulances as sitters, were to be deposited here for diagnosis and classification. Over beyond was the salle de temps, the hut for receiving the grand blessé, but a tent was sufficient for sick men and those slightly wounded.  Within, the floor was of earth, and along each side ran long, narrow, backless benches on which the sick men and the slightly wounded sat, waiting, sorting. A gray twilight pervaded the interior, and the everlasting Belgian rain beat down upon the creaking gambas, beat down in gentle, dripping patters, or in hard, noisy gusts as it happened. It was always dry inside, however, and the earth floor was dusty, except at the entrance where a triangle of mud projected almost to the doctor's table in the middle. The salle de temps was different. It was more comfortable. The seriously wounded were unloaded carefully and placed upon beds covered with rubber sheeting and clean sacking, which protected the thin mattresses from blood. The patients were afterwards covered with red blankets, and stone hot water bottles were also given them sometimes, but in the sorting tent there were no such comforts. They were not needed. The sick men and the slightly wounded could sit very well on the backless benches till the Matitsaméor had time to come and examine them. Quite a company of sitters were assembled here one morning, helped out of two big ambulances that drove in within ten minutes of each other. They were a dejected lot, and they stumbled into the tent unsteadily, groping toward the benches, upon which they tried to pose their weary, old, fevered bodies in comfortable attitudes. And, as it couldn't be done, there was a continual shifting movement and unrest. Heavy legs and heavy wet boots were shoved stiffly forward, then dragged back again. Old, thin bodies bent forward, twisted sideways, coarse, filthy hands hung supine between spread knees, and then again the hands would change and support whiskered, discouraged faces. They were all uncouth, grotesque, dejected, and they smelt abominably, these poilus, these hairy, unkempt soldiers.  They hadn't much, but all they had lay there, at their feet. Old, brown canvas sacks, bulging, muddy, worn, worn out, like their owners. Tied on the outside were water cans and extra boots and bayonets, and inside were socks and writing paper and photographs of ugly wives. Therefore the ungainly sacks were precious, and they hugged them with their tired feet, afraid that they might lose them. Then, finally, the mayor arrived and began the business of sorting them. He was brisk and alert, and he called them one by one to stand before him. They shuffled up to his little table, wavering, deprecating, humble, and answered his brief, impatient questions. And on the spot he made snap diagnoses, such as rheumatism, bronchitis, kicked by a horse, knocked down by dispatch rider, dysentery, and so on.  It was a dull service, this medical service, yet one had to be always on guard against contagion, so the surface was a responsible one. But the mayor worked quickly, sorted them out hastily, and then, one by one, they disappeared behind a hanging sheet, where the orderlies took off their old uniforms, washed the patients a little, and then led them to the wards.  There were some interests in that. But this eclopé business, these minor ailments, these streams of petty sickness, petty accidents, dirty skin diseases, and vermin, all wore, if you like. But how banal! Later in the medical wards, the mayor made his rounds, to inspect more carefully the men upon whom he had made snap diagnoses, to correct the diagnosis, if need be, and to order treatment. The chief treatment they needed was a bath, a clean bed, and a week of sleep. But the doctor, being fairly conscientious, thought to hurry things a little, to hasten the return of these old, tired men to the trenches, so that they might come back to the hospital again, as a grand blessé, in which event they would be interesting. So he ordered a ventruse, or cupping, for the bronchitis cases. There is much bronchitis in Planders, in the trenches, because of the incessant Belgian rain. They are sick with it, too, poor devils. So said the mayor to himself, as he made his round. Five men here, lying in a row, all tomein poisoning, due to some rank tend to stuff they'd been eating. Yonder there, three men with itch. Filthy business, their hands all covered with it, tearing at their bodies with their black, claw-like nails. The orderlies had not washed them very thoroughly, small blame to them. So the mayor made his rounds, walked slowly, very bored, but conscientious. These dull wrecks were needed in the trenches. He must make them well. At bed nine, André stopped. Something different this time? He tried to recall it. Oh yes, in the sorting tent he'd noticed. Monsieur Mayor, a thin hand, clean and slim, rose to the salute. The bed covers were very straight, sliding neither to this side, nor to that, as covers slide under restless pain. I cannot walk, Monsieur Mayor. So André stopped attentive. The man continued. I cannot walk, Monsieur Mayor, because of that, from the trenches, I was removed a month ago. After that I was given a four-jean, a wagon in which to transport the loaves of bread. But soon it arrived that I could not climb to the high seat of my wagon, nor could I mount to the saddle of my horse. So I was obliged to lead my horses, stumbling at their bridles. So I have stumbled for the past four weeks. But now I cannot even do that. It is very painful. André passed a hand over his short, thick, upright hair, and smoothed his stiff brush reflectively. Then he put questions to the man, confidentially, and at the answers continued to rub backward his tight brush of hair, after which he disappeared from the ward for a time, but returned presently, bringing with him a pair of surgeon who happened to be visiting the front that day. There also came with him another little doctor of the hospital staff, who was interested in what André had told him of the case. The three stood together at the foot of the bed, stroking their beards, and their hair meditatively, while they plied the patient with questions, after which they directed Alphonse, this worthy, dark orderly, who looked like a brigand and Henri, the priest orderly, to help the patient to rise. They stood him barefoot upon the floor, supporting him slightly by each elbow. To his knees, or just above them, fell a scant, gay, pink flannel night-shirt, his sole garment. It was one of many warm, gay night-shirts, pink and cheerful, that some women of America had sent over to the wounded heroes of France. It made a bright spot of color in the sombre ward, and through the open window, one cog glimpses of green hop feels, and a windmill in the distance waving its slow arms. Walk, commanded André, walk to the door, turn and return. The man staggered between the beds, holding to them half bent over, fearful. Cool summer air blew in through the window, waving the pink night-shirt, making goose-flesh rise on the shapely white legs that wavered. Then he moved down the ward between the rows of beds, moving with uncertain, running, halting steps. Upon the linoleum, his bare feet flapped in soft thumps, groping wildly, interfering, knocking against each other. The man, drawing to control them, gazed in fright from side to side. Down to the door he padded, rocked, swayed, turned, and almost fell. Then back again he flapped. Dense stillness in the ward, broken only by the hard, unsteady thumping of the bare feet. The feet masterless, as the spirit had been masterless years ago. The three judges in white blouses stood with arms folded, motionless. The patients in the beds sat up and tittered. The man, who had been kicked by a horse, raised himself and smiled. He, who had been knocked down by a dispatch rider, sat up, as did those with bronchitis and those with tomein poisoning. They sat up, looked, and sniggered. They knew. So did André. So did the Paris surgeon and the little staff doctor, and the swarthy orderly and the priest orderly. They all knew. The patient knew, too. The laughter of his comrades told him. So he was to be released from the army, physically unfit. He could no longer serve his country. For many months he had faced death under the guns, a glorious death. Now he was to face death in another form. Not glorious, shameful. Only he didn't know much about it and couldn't visualize it. After all he might possibly escape. He, who had so loved life. So he was rather pleased to be released from service. The patients in the surrounding beds ceased laughing. They had other things to think about. As soon as they were cured of the dysentery and of the itch, they were going back again to the trenches under the guns. So they pitied themselves, and they rather envied him, being released from the army. They didn't know much about it either. They couldn't visualize an imbecile degrading, lingering death. They could only comprehend escape from sudden death under the guns. One way or another it is about the same. Tragedy, either way, and death, either way. But the tragedies of peace equal the tragedies of war. The sum total of suffering is the same. They balance up pretty well. Paris 18 June 1916 End of Chapter 9 Chapter 10 of The Backwash of War by Ellen Neubold Lamotte. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 10 A Surgical Triumph In the Latin Quarter, somewhere about the intersection of the Boulevard Montparnasse with the Rue d'Iran, it might have been even a little way back of the Guerre Montparnasse, or perhaps in the other direction, where the Rue van Beek cuts into the Rue Notre-Dame des Champs. Anyone who knows the Quarter will know about it at once. There lived a little hairdresser by the name of Antoine. Some ten years ago Antoine had moved over from Montmartre, for he was a good hairdresser and a thrifty soul, and he wanted to get on in life. And at that time nothing seemed to him so profitable an investment as to set up a shop in a neighborhood patronized by Americans. American students were always wanting their hair washed, so he was told, once a week at least, and in that they differed from the Russian and Polish and Romanian and other students of Paris, a fact which determined Antoine to go into business at the Montparnasse end of the Quarter rather than at the lower end, say, around the Pantheon and at Tien du Mont. And as he determined to put his prices low in order to catch the trade, so later on, when his business thrived enormously, he continued to keep them low in order to maintain his clients. For if you once get used to having your hair washed for two francs, and very well done at that, it is annoying to find that the price has gone overnight up to the prices one pays on the Boulevard Capucines. Therefore, for ten years Antoine continued to watch hair at two francs ahead, and at the same time he earned quite a reputation for himself as a marvelous good person when it came to waves and curls. So that when the war broke out and his American clients broke and ran, he had a neat tidy sum saved up and could be fairly complacent about it all. Moreover, he was a lame man, one leg being some three inches shorter than the other, due to an accident in childhood, so he had never done his military service in his youth. And while not over military age even yet, there was no likelihood of his ever being called upon to do it. So he stood in the doorway of his deserted shop for all his young assistants, his curlers and jampours had been mobilized and looked up and down the deserted street and congratulated himself that he was not in as bad a plight, financially and otherwise, as some of his neighbors. Next door to him was a restaurant where the students ate, many of them. It had enjoyed a high reputation for cheapness up to the war, and twice a day had been throng with a mixed crowd of sculptors and painters and writers, and just dilettance, which latter liked to patronize it for what they were pleased to call local color. Well, look at it now, thought the thrifty Antoine, everybody gone except a dozen stranded students who had not money enough to escape, and who, in the kindness of their hearts, continued to eat here on credit in order to keep the proprietor going. Even such a fool as the proprietor must see sooner or later that patronage of this sort could lead nowhere from the point of view of profits, in fact, it was ridiculous. Antoine, lounging in his doorway, thought of his son, his only son, who, thank God, was too young to enter the army. By the time he was old enough for his military service, the war would all be over. It could not last at the outside more than six weeks or a couple of months, so Antoine had no cause for anxiety on that account. The lad was a fine husky youth with a sprouting mustache, which made him look older than his seventeen years. He was being taught the art of washing hair and of curling and dying the same, on the human head or aside from it, as the case might be, and he could snap curling irons with a click to inspire confidence in the minds of the most fastidious, so altogether, thought Antoine, he had a good future before him. So the war had no terrors for Antoine, and he was able to speculate freely upon the future of his son, which seemed like a very bright, admirable future indeed, in spite of the disturbances of the moment. Nor did he need to close the doors of his establishment either, in spite of the loss of his assistants and the loss of his many customers, who kept those assistants, as well as himself, busy. For there still remained in Paris a good many American heads to be washed from time to time, rather foolhardy adventurous heads, curious sensation hunting heads, who had remained in Paris to see the war, or as much of it as they could, in order to enrich their own personal experience. With which point of view Antoine had no quarrel, although there were certain of his countrymen who wished these inquisitive foreigners would return to their native land for a variety of reasons. As the months rolled along, however, he who had been so far-seeing, so thrifty a businessman, seemed to have made a mistake. His calculations as to the duration of the war all went wrong. It seemed to be lasting an unconscionable time, and every day it seemed to present new phases, for which no immediate settlement offered itself. Thus a year dragged away, and Antoine's son turned eighteen, and his moustache grew to be so imposing that his father commanded him to shave it. At the end of another two months, Antoine found it best to return his son to short trousers, for although the boy was stout and fat, he was not tall, and in short trousers he looked merely an overgrown fat boy, and Antoine was growing rather worried, as he saw the lads of the young classes call to the colors. Somewhere in one of the merries of Paris, over Montmartre perhaps, where he had come from, or at the préfecture de police, or the cité, Antoine knew that there was a record of his son's age and attainments, which might be used against him at any moment, and as the weeks grew into months, it seemed certain that the class to which this precious boy belonged would be called on for military service. Then very hideous weeks followed for Antoine, weeks of nervous suspense and dread. Day by day, as the lad grew in proficiency and aptitude, as he became more and more expert in the matters of his trade, as he learned a delicate sure touch with the most refractory hair, and could expend the minimum of gas on the drying machine, and the minimum of soap lather and, with all, attain the best results in pleasing his customers, so grew the danger of his being snatched away from this wide life spread out before him, of being forced to fight for his glorious country, poor fat boy. On Sundays he used to parade the raspia with a German shepherd dog at his heels, bought two years ago as a German shepherd, but now called a Belgian police dog. How could he lay aside his little trousers and become a soldier of France? Yet every day that time drew nearer, till finally one day the summons came and the lad departed, and Antoine closed his shutters for a whole week, mourning desperately, and he was furious against England, which had not made her maximum effort, had not mobilized her men, had continued with business as usual, had made no attempt to end the war, wouldn't do so until France had become exhausted, and he was furious against Russia, swamped in a bog of political intrigue, which lacked organization and munitions and leadership, and was totally unable to drawing off the bosses on the other frontier and delivering a blow to smash them. In fact, Antoine was far more furious against the allies of France than against Germany itself, and his rage and grief absolutely overbalanced his pride in his son, or his ambitions as to his son's possible achievements. The boy himself did not mind going when he was called, for he was something of a fatalist being so young, and besides he could not foresee things, but Antoine, little lame man, had much imagination, and foresaw a great deal. Mercifully he could not foresee what actually happened. Thus it was a shock to him. He learned that his son was wounded, and then followed many long weeks, while the boy lay in hospital, during which time many kind-hearted Red Cross ladies wrote to Antoine telling him to be brave of heart and of good courage, and Antoine, being a rich man in a small hairdressing way, took quite large sums of money out of the bank from time to time, and sent them to the Red Cross ladies to buy for his son whatever might be necessary to his recovery. He heard from the hospital in the interior, for they were taking most of the wounded to the interior at that time, for fear of upsetting Paris by the sight of them in the streets, that artificial legs were costly. Thus he steeled himself to the fact that his son would be more hideously lame than he himself. There was some further consultation about artificial arms, rather vague, but Antoine was troubled. Then he learned that a marvelous operation had been performed upon the boy, known as plastic surgery, that is to say the rebuilding out of other parts of the body of certain features of the face that are missing. All this while he heard nothing directly from the lad himself, and in every letter from the Red Cross ladies dictated to them, the boy begged that neither his father nor his mother would make any attempt to visit him at the hospital in the interior till he was ready. Finally the lad was ready. He had been four or five months in hospital, and the best surgeons of the country had done for him the best they knew. They had not only saved his life, but thanks to his father's money, he had been fitted out with certain artificial age to the human body, which would go far towards making life supportable. In fact, they expressed themselves as extremely gratified with what they had been able to do for the poor young man. Nay, they were even proud of him. He was a surgical triumph, and as such they were returning him to Paris by such and such a train upon such and such a day, and Twan went to meet the train. In a little room back of the hairdressing shop, and Twan looked down upon the surgical triumph. This triumph was his son. The two were pretty well mixed up. A passion of love and a passion of furious resentment filled the breast of the little hairdresser. Two very expensive, very good artificial legs lay on the sofa beside the boy. They were nicely jointed and had cost several hundred francs. From the same firm it would also be possible to obtain two very nice artificial arms, light, easily adjustable, well hinged. A hideous, flabby heat, called a nose, fashioned by unique skill out of the flesh of his breast, replaced the little snub nose that Antoine remembered. The mouth they had done little with. All the front teeth were gone, but these could doubtless be replaced in time by others. Across the lad's forehead was a black silk bandage which could be removed later, and in his pocket there was an address from which artificial eyes might be purchased. They would have fitted him out with eyes in the provinces, except that such were better obtainable in Paris.  However, Antoine couldn't do this, for he was civilized. He was nearly dead anyway, so it didn't much matter. Although the chance they proposed to give him wasn't even a fighting chance, it was just one in a thousand. Some of them put it at one in ten thousand. Accordingly they cut his clothes off in the salle de temps, and carried him, very dirty and naked, to the operating room. Here they found that his ten thousand's chant would be diminished if they gave him a general anesthetic, so they dispensed with chloroform and gave him spinal anesthesia by injecting something into his spinal canal between two of the lower vertebra. This completely relieved him of pain, but made him talkative, and when they saw he was conscious like that, it was decided to hold a sheet across the middle of him so that he could not see what was going on on the other side of the sheet below his waist. The temperature in the operating room was stifling hot, and the sweat poured in drops from the brows of the surgeons so that it took an orderly with a piece of gauze to swab them constantly. However, for all the heat, the man was stone cold and ash and gray, and his nostrils were pinched and dilated while his breath came in gasps, forty to the minute. Yet, as I say, he was talkative, and his stream of little vapid remarks at his end of the sheet did much to drown the clicking and snapping of clamps on the other side of it, where the surgeons were working to give him his one chance. A nurse held the sheet on one side of the table, and a priest orderly held it on the other, and at his head stood a doctor and the directories and another nurse, answering the string of vapid remarks and trying to soothe him. And three feet farther along, hidden from him, and the little clustering company of people trying to distract his attention, stood the two surgeons and the two young students, and just the tops of their hair could be seen over the edge of the sheet. They whispered a little from time to time and worked very rapidly, and there was quite animated talk when the bone saw began to rasp. The man babbled of his home and of his wife. He said he wanted to see her again very much, and the priest orderly, who wanted to drop his end of the sheet and administer the last sacrament at once, grew very nervous and uneasy. So the man rambled on, gasping, and they replied to him in soothing manner and told him that there was a chance that he might see her again. So he talked about her incessantly and with affection, and his whispered words and the cheery replies quite drowned out the clicking and the snapping of the clamps. After a short while, however, his remarks grew less coherent, and he seemed to find himself back in the trenches telephoning. He tried hard to telephone. He tried hard to get the connection. The wires seemed to be cut, however, and he grew puzzled and knit his brows and store, and tried again and again over and over. He had something to say over the telephone, the trench communication wire, and his mind wandered, and he tried very hard in his wandering mind to get the connection. A shell had cut the line evidently. He grew annoyed and restless, engaged anxiously, and perplexedly at the white sheet, held so steadily across his middle. From the waist down he could not move, so all his restlessness took place on the upper side of the sheet, and he was unaware of what was going on on the other side of it, and so failed to hear the incessant rattle of clamps and the subdued whispers from the other side. He struggled hard to get the connection in his mind over the telephone. The wires seemed to be cut, and he cried out in anxiety and distress. Then he grew more and more feeble and gasped more and more, and became almost inarticulate in his efforts. He was distressed, but suddenly he got it. He screamed out, very loud, relieved, satisfied, triumphant, startling them all. Say yes, maintenant. Say yes, c'est le bon Dieu à l'appareil. All right now, all right, it is the good God at the telephone. A drop of blood spotted the sheet, a sudden vivid drop which spread rapidly coming through. The surgeon raised himself. Finished here, he exclaimed with satisfaction. Finished here, repeated the directories. Paris, 26 June 1916. End of Chapter 11. Chapter 12 of the Backwash of War by Ellen Neubald-Lamotte This LibreBox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 12. A Citation As a person, Grameau amounted to very little. In private life, before the war broke out, he had been an acrobat in the streets of Paris, and after that he became a hotel boy in some little fifth-rate hotel over behind the Guest in Le Zard. That had approved his undoing, for even the fifth-rate French traveling salesman and sharpers and adventurers who patronized the hotel had money enough for him to steal. He stole a little, favored by his position, as a garçon d'hôtel, and the theft had landed him, not in jail, but in the Batallion d'Afrique. He had served in that for two years, doing his military service in the Batallion d'Afrique, instead of jail. While working off his five-year sentence, and then war being declared, his regiment was transferred from Morocco to France to Flanders to the front-line trenches, and in course of time he arrived one day at the hospital with a piece of shell in his spleen. He was pretty ill when brought in, and if he had died promptly, as he should have done, it would have been better. But it happened at that time that there was a surgeon connected with the hospital who was meant on making a reputation for himself, and this consisted in trying to prolong the lives of wounded men who ought normally and naturally to have died. So this surgeon worked hard to save Gramein, and certainly succeeded in prolonging his life, and in prolonging his suffering over a very considerable portion of time. He worked hard over him, and he used on him everything he could think of, everything that money could buy. Every time he had a new idea as to treatment, no matter how costly it might be, he mentioned it to the directories who sent to Paris and got it. All the while Gramein remained in bed in very great agony, the surgeon making copious notes on the case, noting that under such and such circumstances, under conditions such as the following, such and such remedies and treatment proved futile and valueless. Gramein had a hole in his abdomen when he entered about an inch long. After about a month, this hole was scientifically increased to a foot in length, rubber drain stuck out in all directions, and went inwards as well, pretty deep, and his pain was enhanced a hundredfold, while his chances of recovery were not bright. But Gramein had a good constitution, and the surgeon worked hard over him, for if he got well it would be a wonderful case, and the surgeon's reputation would benefit. Gramein bore it all very patiently and did not ask to be allowed to die, as many of them did, for since he was of the Batallion d'Afrique, such a request would be equivalent to asking for a remission of sentence, a sentence which the courts have heard he justly deserved and merited. They took no account of the fact that his ethics were those of a wandering juggler turning somersaults on a carpet at the public fests of Paris, and had been polished off by contact with the men and women he had encountered in his capacity of garçon d'hôtel in a fifth-rate hotel near Montmartre. On the contrary, they rather expected of him the decencies and moralities that come from careful nurture, and these not being forthcoming, they had sent him to the Batallion d'Afrique, where his eccentricities would be of no danger to the public. So Gramein continued to suffer over a period of several long months, and he was sufficiently cynical owing to his short experience of life to realize that the surgeon who worked over him so constantly and solicitously was not solely and entirely disinterested in his efforts to make him well. Gramein had no life to return to, that was the trouble. Everyone knew it. The surgeon knew it, and the orderlies knew it, and his comrades in the adjoining beds knew it. He had absolutely no future before him, and there was not much sense in trying to make him well enough to return to Paris, a hopeless cripple. He lay in hospital for several months, suffering greatly about greatly patient. During that time he received no letters, where there was no one to write to him. He was an Apache. He belonged to a criminal regiment, and he had no family anyhow, and his few friends tattooed all over the body like himself were also members of the same regiment, and as such unable to do much for him in civil life after the war. Such it is to be a joye, to belong to a regiment of criminals, and to have no family to speak of. Gramein knew that it would be better for him to die, but he did not like to protest against this painful prolonging of his life. He was pretty well sick of life, but he had to submit to the kind treatment meted out to him, to twist his mouth into a wry smile when the directories asked him each day if he was not better, and to accept without wincing all the newest devices that the surgeon discovered for him. There was some sense in saving other people's lives, but there was no sense in saving his. But the surgeon, who was working for a reputation, worked hand in hand with the directories who wanted her hospital to make a reputation for saving the lives of the Grand Blessé. Gramein was the victim of circumstances, as usual, but it was all in his understanding of life, this being caught up in the ambitions of others, so he had to submit. After about three months of torture, during which time he grew weaker and smelled worse every day, it finally dawned on the nurse that perhaps this life-saving business was not wholly desirable. If he got well in the mildest acceptation of the term, he would be pretty well disabled and useless and good for nothing. And if he was never going to get well, for which the prospects seemed bright enough, why force him along through more weeks of suffering just to try out new remedies? Society did not want him, and he had no place in it. Besides, he had done his share in the trenches in protecting its best traditions. Then they all began to notice suddenly that in bed Gramein was displaying rather nice qualities such as you would not expect from a joyeux, a social outcast. He appeared to be extremely patient, and while his face twisted up into knots of pain most of the time, he did not cry out and disturb the ward as he might have done. This was nice and considerate, and other good traits were discovered too. He was not a nuisance, he was not exacting, he did not demand unreasonable things or refuse to submit to unreasonable things when these were demanded of him. In fact, he seemed to accept his pain as God-given, and with the fatalism which in some ways was rather admirable. He could not help smelling like that, for he was full of rubber drains and of gauze drains, and if the doctor was too busy to dress his wounds that day, and so put him off till the next, it was not his fault for smelling so vilely. He did not raise any disturbance nor make any complaint on certain days when he seemed to be neglected. Any extra discomfort that he was obliged to bear, he bore stoically. All together, after some four months of this, it was discovered that Grimond had rather a remarkable character, a character which merited some sort of recognition. He seemed to have rather heroic qualities of endurance, of bravery, of discipline. Nor were they the heroic qualities that suddenly develop in a moment of exaltation, but on the contrary they were developed by months of extreme agony, of extreme bodily pain. He could have been so disagreeable had he chosen, and as he cared so little to have his life saved, his goodness could not have been due to that. It seemed that he was merely very decent, very considerate of others, and wanted to give as little trouble as he could, no matter what took place. Only he got thinner and weaker and more and more gentle, and at last, after five months of this, the directories was touched by his conduct and suggested that here was a case of heroism, as well worthy of the Qua de Guerre, as were the more spectacular movements on the battlefield. It took a few weeks longer of gentle suggestion on her part to convey this impression to the general, but at last the general entered into correspondence with the officers of the regiment, to which Grimond belonged, and it then transpired that as the soldier Grimond had displayed, the same qualities of consideration for others and of discipline that he was now displaying in a hospital bed. Finally one day the news came that Grimond was to be decorated. Everyone else in the ward who deserved it had been decorated long ago, naturally, but they had not belonged to the Batallion d'Afrique. Their services had been recognized long ago. Now however, after these many months of suffering, Grimond was to receive the Qua de Guerre. He was nearly dead by this time. When told the news, he smiled faintly. He did not seem to care. It seemed to make very little impression upon him. Yet it should have made an impression, for he was a convicted criminal, and it was a condescension that he should be so honored at all. He had somehow won this honor, this token of forgiveness, by suffering so long, so uncomplainingly. However a long delay took place, although finally his papers came, his citation in which he was cited in the orders of the regiment, as having done a very brave deed under fire. He smiled a little at that. It had taken place so long ago, this time when he had done the deed, received the wound that kept him suffering so long. It seemed so little worthwhile to acknowledge it now, after all these months, when he was just ready to leave. Then more delay took place, and Grimond got weaker, and the orderlies said among themselves that if the general was ever going to decorate this man, that he had better hurry up. However, so long a time had passed, that it did not much matter. Grimond was pleased with his citation. It seemed to make it all right for him somehow. It seemed to give him standing among his fellow patients. The hideous tattoo marks on his arms and legs, chest and back, which proclaimed him an apache, which showed him such, every time his wound was dressed, were about to be overlaid with a decoration for bravery upon the field of battle. But still the general did not come. Grimond grew very weak and feeble, and his patients became exhausted. He held on as long as he could, so he died finally after a long pull, just twenty minutes before the general arrived with his medals. Paris. 27 June 1916. End of Chapter 12. Chapter 13 of The Backwash of War by Ellen Neubald Lamotte. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 13. An Incident. At the intersection of the Rue Debac and at the Boulevard Saint-Germain rises the statue of Claude Char. Rising like a rock in the midst of the stream of traffic, and like a rock splitting the stream and averting it into currents which flow east and west, north and south, smoothly and without collision. In guiding the stream of traffic and directing its orderly flow, the statue of Claude Char was greatly assisted by the presence of an agent, a police, with a picturesque cape and a picturesque sword, and who controls the flow of vehicles with as much precision as a London policeman, although there are those who profess that a London policeman is the only one who understands the business. Before the war when the omnibuses ran, the agent de police was always on duty. Since the war when the Paris omnibuses are all at the front, carrying meat to the soldiers, there are certain times during the day when the whole responsibility for traffic regulation falls upon the statue of Claude Char. It was at one of these times when Claude Char was standing, head in air as usual, and failed to regard the comings and goings of the street that this incident occurred. Down on the quay, an officer of the French army stepped into a little victoria, a shabby little voir tour de place, which trotted him up the route back and then assayed to take him along the Boulevard Saint-Germain to the Meniste de la Caire. Coming along the Boulevard in the opposite direction was a little Lad 15, bending low over the handlebars of a tricycle delivery wagon, the box of which contained enough kilos to have taxed a strong man or an old horse. Men are scarce in Paris, however, and the little delivery boy, who could not possibly have been available for the army for another three years, was doing a man's work or a horse's work, as you please. The French are a thrifty race, and the possibilities being that the war will all be over before that time, it mattered little whether this particular boy developed an hernia or tuberculosis or any other malady which might unfit him for future military service. At present he was earning money for his patron, which was all that really mattered. So the little boy on the tricycle, head down, ran squarely into the horse of the chaby Victoria, conveying the French officer and the agent a police was absent, and the statue of Claude Charpe stood, as usual, head in air. Quite a melee ensued, the old horse, which should long ago have been in a butcher's shop, avoided the tricycle with true French thrift, but stepped squarely upon the face of the little boy, sprawling under his hoofs. Another hoof planted itself on the fingers of the boy's right hand. War itself could not have been more disastrous. The youth rose to his feet, screaming. The cabbie cursed, a crowd collected, and the officer in the little carriage leaned back and twirled the ends of his neat moustache. The agent de police, who should have been on duty at the statue, arrived hastily from a nearby café. He always took two hours off for lunch, in good Parisian fashion, and he was obliged on this occasion to cut his lunch hours short by fifteen minutes. Everyone was frightfully annoyed, but no one was more annoyed than the officer in the cab on his way to the minister of war. He was so annoyed, so bored, that he sat impotervable, one arm lying negligently on the back of the seat, the fingers of the other hand caressing the cross of the Legion of Honor upon his breast. His eyes rolled upwards as if seeking the aeroplane, which was not, at that moment, flying over Paris. The cabbie got down from his seat, and with much vociferation, called upon the officer to witness that it was not his fault. The crowd, which had not witnessed the accident, crowded round the policemen, giving testimony to what they had not seen. The sobbing boy was led into a chemist. Still, the people did not disperse. They pressed round the cab and began shouting to the disinterested officer, the officer who cared not where the old horse had stepped, the officer who continued to law back against the shabby cushions, to look upward at the sky, to remain indifferent to the taximeter, which skipped briskly from eighty-five song themes to ninety-five song themes, and continued ticking on. Women crowded round the cab regarding its occupant. Was this one, who commanded their sons at the front, who had therefore seen so much, been through so much, that the sight of a little boy, stamped on, meant nothing to him? Had he seen so much suffering on grove, that it meant nothing to him on detail? Or was this his attitude to all suffering? Was this the nation's attitude to the suffering of their sons? Or was this officer one, who had never been to the front, an ambusque, one of the protected ones, who occupied soft snaps in the rear, safe places from which to draw their pay? The crowd increased every minute. They speculated volubly. They surrounded the cab, voicing their speculations. They finally became so unbearable that the officer's boredom vanished. His annoyance became such, his impatience at the delay became such, that he slid down from the shabby cushions, and without paying his fare, disappeared in the direction of the minister de la guerre. End of Chapter 13. End of The Backwash of War, The Human Wreckage of the Battlefield, as witnessed by an American hospital nurse by Ellen N. Lamont.


Have you ever thought of playing your Xbox on your phone, on your tablet, right? Well, that is Project XCloud, and I'm just gonna show you how it actually works. Let's jump in. So the very first time we saw Project XCloud was at E3 2019. We've got a video on that. It was smooth, it was also choppy at times, but we finally got it in-house. Now, you can go ahead and sign up for our Project XCloud preview. I'll have a link for you guys down below, but I've been using it for about a month or so, and I have to say I've enjoyed the experience and I've enjoyed what Microsoft has done with this. So the very first thing you need is an Android device. There's no app available for iOS, but once you get it and you download the application, it is a very straightforward process. You sign into your Xbox account and boom, you're good to go. Now here's the funny thing.  So moving your Xbox from your console to here, right? Now, all you can do on Project XCloud now is stream games and they have a bunch of games, 50 games in total. Yes, Microsoft said, take that Project Stadia, or Stadia from Google, that we've got more games than you do, but that's besides that point, there are ton of games there. There's Gears 5, there's Halo 5, there's Original Gears, there's Forza Horizon 4, there's Devil May Cry 5, Just Course 4, Madden 2020, there's also WWE 2K 2020. So a lot of games, and it looks like you're gonna be adding more and more games to that list. So I like that. When I first started, it was only four games, but going into the application and looking at what the application has, once you actually sign in, you've got your list of games. It says all games you can kind of jump through and scroll through, or you can search for games with a search icon. At the very bottom, you've got your home, your feedback, and then you've got your account information. Thunder Emperor, so follow me on Xbox. At the top left-hand corner, there's a little three-bar icon. You tap on that, and that can switch you into console streaming. Currently, that option is not available, but it allows you to stream directly from your console. So if your games are not available on Project X Cloud, you can stream that directly. So if it's a third-party game that, say, Microsoft hasn't actually put on X Cloud and you own it, then you can stream it directly from your console. Now, also, Microsoft stated that Project X Cloud next year, 2020, will have streaming for Xbox Game Pass, which is one of the best services ever. If you don't have Game Pass, go ahead and get it, especially Game Pass Ultimate for PC, you can stream those e-cups or download those games on PC as well. But that will be coming in the future. So what's the gameplay process here? You pick a game you want to play, and let's say we go to Gears, sorry, Devil May Cry 5. We click on that, and you have the option to play. Now, when you press play, the first time, if you haven't connected a controller, it will say, set up good Bluetooth sensors and connect to controller. Now, currently, an Xbox controller is what I'm using. I'm using the brand new Elite controller. It is absolutely dynamite, lovely controller. Check out my video on it. I truly like it, but it makes the gameplay process pretty easy because it's a standard Xbox controller. I think Microsoft went away from on-screen controls, and I think that's a smart thing, to give you the same experience. They did say that they will also support multiple controllers in the future. All the Razer controllers, including, as well, the Sony PlayStation 4 DualShock controller. Yes, so you can actually have a DualShock controller on playing Xbox games, which is pretty cool. Now, the Razer Jungle Cat, which I have, I haven't done my video on yet, is truly the perfect Xbox controller. I like the look of this bad boy, and I can't wait for that update to play my games because it makes the whole process really portable and easy to take around with you. But once you have your controller, you jump into the game, it's just a setup process, and boom, you're good to go. You start playing, and I've got to say the gameplay experience has been really good. Well, when I initially started a month ago, there was some choppiness, I will agree, and I'll mention that, but they've been fixing this, and there's actually a lot of feedback questions on here. But the gameplay process now is smooth. I was playing Devil May Cry 5, I was playing Gears. Gears still is the one that gives me a little bit of choppiness, I will agree, but Forza Horizon 4, that just ran pretty smooth. I was actually on my data plan, and you realize that until later on, that, oh, wow, I wasn't on Wi-Fi. And it runs fairly the same on data and Wi-Fi, you don't notice it drops. There's an icon that'll tell you that, hey, look, you're losing signal, your signal's getting worse, that kind of thing in there. And I think that because it's also 720p, that helps. Now a lot of the other companies are claiming 4K or mobile streaming, and I don't think it's possible on LTE. And I'm sure maybe Microsoft will mention that, hey, look, when 5G is more accessible, we're going to have that 5G option. But it feels like playing in Xbox on your phone. And you can do this also on a tablet as well. So you've got a tablet that makes a lot of sense. I see this as making it look the portable Xbox experience. You look down in the future, Microsoft says, look, we're gonna have an app for iOS. I'm sure they will also have apps for TVs as well.  Now think about it. If you want to play Xbox game, your buying is literally what device you already have. That makes it easy. A controller, most likely you might have one, if you're not, then it's a $50 purchase. Then the biggest purchase of yours in the future would be Xbox Game Pass with streaming. And that's probably about $60 a year or so, and boom, you're done. You're paying a smaller price to jump in. Now the other services out there, the Stadia that's coming out, and Stadia has a founders pack of 129, but you have to pay for every game. So right now, Project X Cloud is free, by the way. There's no payments available. You can sign up, the link will be down there for you guys below, but you get to enjoy a lot of these games. And the experience is truly nice. It's getting better. There's some kinks, like when you have notifications and you get into that notification, it kind of freezes the games. You're gonna have to back out and do things again. What I would like to see them is add a game mode so that actually blocks all notifications off or tie into game modes for any smartphone, like Galaxy devices have it, gaming phones have it. So once you click on game mode and you click on the application Xbox Game Streaming, then you have that ability to just block out all notifications and enjoy your gameplay sessions right there and it does actually affect your gaming experience. That is what I would like to see. But so far, it's been good. I'm loving the improvements. I can't wait to try out more controllers. Trust me, that Jungle Cat is calling me, saying this is my mobile gaming experience. I was joking with Daniel that, hey look, I'm most likely will finish Gears 5 while playing on my phone and instead of my TV, which to me is insane. I love massive TVs. I do a lot of TV coverage and I like playing games on TVs but I'm enjoying this experience and even though it's a beta experience, it's gonna turn out well. So go ahead, use the link down below to check it out. If you have any questions, any comments about this, let me know. I'll have more videos about this on my gaming channel. I'll do a review of that Jungle Cat controller on the gaming channel as well. It's Board Gamer. Go check it out. Otherwise, check out more content here from Board at Work. If you have any questions, any comments, let me know. Subscribe and always enjoy entertainment.


Hi, I'm Richard L. Bianca, and July's What's Neat starts right now. The What's Neat show is sponsored by Lombard Hobbies, your value hobby shop for over 40 years of modelers helping modelers, big inventory, value pricing, fast shipping, and great service. Additional support is provided by Walthers Trains, everything you need to build a great model railroad. Check out their website at Walthers.com. And by American Limited Models, the relentless pursuit of accuracy. Check out their website at AmericanLimitedModels.com. And thank you for helping us support the best hobby in the world. This is What's Neat for July 2021. I'm your host Ken Patterson, and this month we really do have a good show. First of all, we start out with an end scale project layout that we started in the first quarter of this year, whereas we're going to run it through the entire year where we build this end scale layout that's about three and a half feet by eight feet, something very manageable. And for this first part, we show how to lay the track and build the initial bench work for the layout. Also this month, we've got some great drone footage from our drone pilot, Dan Scheidel, where he shares with us the Feather River Canyon with some beautiful bridges, great photography from the air and modeling ideas from above. This is what you really need to see what models should look like on your layout. All the answers are in this footage. Also this month, we've got a great interview from Robert Steers from San Juan Model Company and American Limited Models, whereas him and his partners have purchased various companies in our industry that were going to be retired or going out of business and otherwise saved some of these great companies for us in the best hobby in the world. Also this month, I'd like to thank Lombard Hobbies very much. I actually placed an order with them for these beautiful SD80 max, which I actually photographed from for Athens sometime back and had to send them back to Athens and I kind of missed these models. So I called up Andrew at Lombard Hobbies in Lombard, Illinois, and I placed a phone order with him and they had exactly what I wanted in stock. Plus when you place an order with them, they send you this great business card. Rand Hood told me about this when he placed his order and I actually really wanted one of these because this doubles as a track gauge for N scale and H.O. scale for your wheels and your track. It's a pretty neat metal business card. Also in the box, there were some fruit snacks and in there was a note that said Lombard Hobbies, sweet to you. Thank you for being a great customer. So rock and roll, really appreciate that. Also be sure to check out the What's Neat This Week in Model Reroading podcast that we record every Saturday night, keeping you updated every week on what's new in the hobby with special guests, great interviews, and various subject matter where we talk about model reroading every single week. And so with that, let's continue on with the rest of this July 2021 What's Neat. For this segment of What's Neat, we're going to build an end scale layout. So this is going to be an ongoing project as it snows outside. And there's nothing better than do to build something really cool. Now I want to build this layout so it'll fit on a simple sheet of foam. And that's a four by eight sheet of two inch foam. We're going to double it and make it actually four inches thick for stability, wrap it in oak and design it the way I traditionally do a lot of the layouts that you see me build on What's Neat. Now I'm going to use code 55, microengineering track throughout the entire project. And I want a minimum radius, I believe, of about 19 inches. I don't want to go any tighter than that. And that'll fit adequately on the sheet of foam, allowing three inches of space all the way around the layout in the event that something flips over or something goes wrong, we won't end up with a train on the floor. So to start this project, I simply took a yard stick and I put my finger in the hole that's in it. And I set it up and I drew two circles because it's always the radius that dictates how the layout is generally designed. This is for a small layout and this is also for a great big hole layout. It's always the curvature of the radius that generally is the first thing that I lay out on a piece of paper when I'm designing a layout so that then that dictates where the main lines go in between the radius. So in this case, I've drawn two circles on the foam, 19 inch circle here, 19 inch radius circle here, which will then dictate with three inches all the way around about the size of the layout. Now I arched my arm to join the two circles with a french curve, a bit of a transition into the curve so that the two circles can be joined. I don't think I want to have a lot of main lines that are straight on a layout. I really enjoy curving the main line. It makes for more of an interesting run. Now on this side here, I took a simple yard stick. Actually, this is a five foot long stick and I joined the two circles together anticipating that we'll put in some turnouts, build a holding yard on this side of the layout and on the other side of the layout, just let it be traditional curvature, scenery, dot, dot, dot. So as we continue on this project, I will document and share with you the process that I go through to design this very simple, very attainable, small end scale layout. So we've got a total of 13 turnouts on this end scale layout and I'm presently running jumper wires on the turnouts. I've got my table set up here where I've got a soldering iron. I've got some 32 gauge fine wire and I'm using this wonderful solder, this 60, 40, very small fine solder. And what I'm doing is the rails on a microengineering turnout. Well, this is an end scale code 55 turnout. The power is brought to the rails through the points. So the points are what give me my conductivity of power up to the frog. The frog is a dead frog and then beyond that are two more rails. And these rails are also not powered. Once the power goes beyond the frog that's diverted through the points right here, it stops. So what I'm going to do is power up these two rails right here. And I do this at an age of scale to all of my turnouts. And so what I've done is I've taken the 32 gauge wire and you can see I've jumpered it from this rail over to that rail and then from here over to here. OK, so that gives me power to the center two rails, which makes our entire turnout hot and the DCC power runs through it. I'm doing this to all 13 turnouts so that when we drop in power feed wires for this layout, we can do that from just one spot. And then as we cut our blocks, I'll notch out the rail. We'll put on our switches so that all the siding tracks, we can turn the power off in those tracks in the event that we have a train or a locomotive sitting on those tracks and we want them simply to have no power whatsoever. So that's what I'm doing to all 13 turnouts. It's taken just a few days to do this. I'm taking my time listening to the TV in the background as I work on this part of the project. Curving microengineering code 55 and scale track that is pre weathered is pretty easy. Starting at one end and working the curve a few inches at a time until you have the radius that you desire. I've decided to make the layout have a double track main line with the outside track for main line running and the inside track having access to all the sightings and storage tracks. I've used inner mountain auto racks to measure and make sure that the trains don't make contact with each other on the 19 inch inside radius and the 21 inch outside radius curves. It's very easy after you've curved your track to test fit and lay everything into place, giving the outside shape of the basic layout track form that I want. I've kind of decided on this project to go ahead and lay the entire outside main line first just so that I can get things running right away and have a better feel on how this layout would lay out on the foam. Let me show you how to join the track sections together and have good electrical contact between the track sections. I use a Dremel with a wire brush attachment to remove the weathering solution or better put the darkened finish on the rail as this will interfere with good electrical conductivity. I also remove the first tie on the ends of each three foot section to track to make space for the rail joiners. For projects in the past, you have seen me use Atlas and scale rail joiners in HO scale and N scale and O N 30. But for this project, I've elected to try micro engineering and scale rail joiners. These are smaller and more flat. I also cut the tips off of the ends of the micro engineering rail joiners to make them a little bit shorter to have more space when putting the track together, then pressing them onto the rails and joining our rail sections and our track together. I used a three foot straight edge to ensure that the code 555 track was absolutely straight. I put the straight edge against the rail and laid everything into place and taped things down as I moved along so nothing would shift and get out of position. I also started to lay out the tracks for a switch yard and also on the other side of the layout, I started to lay out some tracks for where I think I'm going to put a grain elevator. This is all going together very quickly and no drawings. Just laying it out on the foam to see what we have to work with. Now that I've got the switch structure for this segment of the layout taped down into position, I'm getting ready to solder everything together so nothing's going to move, nothing will shift. So I'm putting a little flux on all of the joints at the rail joiners and then I'm going to solder this all together as one piece.  One thing that I will say upon doing this project and I've modeled end scale in dioramas in the past for photo shoots. But there's something about end scale that I will tell you from this project I have a whole found new respect for end scalers because this stuff is so small. It's very difficult to get everything to be absolutely precise. This is much more difficult than O scale or H O scale or O N 30 or H O N 3, which I've built plenty of layouts in the past up. So I have a whole new found respect as we do this project for end scale folks. And just so like this, I've got it. The temperature is set for 842 degrees on this soldering iron. I'm using the same pencil point that I use for all my H O scale track and O N 30 track and H O N 3 track. I'm using 60 40 Rosin core solder and it's flowing into the joints very nicely. Just a little touch of the rail, a little solder goes a long way. And this will be permanent now where it's not going to shift and move around. I'm using DAP quick seal plus silicone. This is actually not silicone. But what this is is a great clear glue from DAP. It's called quick seal plus. And I'm using it to glue down this section of track that we've just completed so that this part will not move at all. As we lay the rest of the main line for this first segment. Now, this glue will dry completely clear. And the nice thing about this glue is the fact that ballast will stick to it. You've seen me use this on H O scale and H O N 3 projects a lot. So that's we're going to use on this just to glue down this segment, which will dictate pretty much the rest of the parameters of the layout. So I'm using a Ross painter's knife to just apply a little bit of this material underneath the track. And I'm avoiding the area where the switch points are so that none of the switch points will get any of the glue in those areas so everything will move freely. When it's ballasted and glued down with woodland scenic cement, it'll further adhere everything to the fall. And just as you saw me do on all the turnouts a few moments ago, I'm now soldering all of the track together on the main line. The outside main line so that this will all hold together into one big piece. Again, solid so that I simply have to only glue everything down and keep the layout shape exactly the way I've got the track laid out. That's the beauty of micro engineering track is that when you bend a curve, it retains its shape which helps facilitate designing and building a layout. So as soon as I solder together the last couple of joints right here, one or two more, then we can test the train on this and let it run all the way around. So a couple of alligator clips. And I got the NCE power cap connected to this layout on the outside loop that we just laid main lines not glued down yet. Of course, all of this section here is glued down and the train is running perfectly. So what the next step is, I'm going to glue down the main line with a quick seal adhesive from DAP. And then I'll start laying the inside main line and I'll start laying the yard tracks. We'll have this thing to the point where we start cutting the shape of the foam. So a couple more steps here in the process, another, say, day of work. And we should have a roughed in and scale layout. That's ready to do scenery on after that and wrap all of it in oak and still have to double up the foam. I want to make it a full four inches thick. Of course, I still got to work all the electronics and block switches in. But it's neat to see something running right now temporarily, just to know that so far the effort that we've made is working. Using a metal ruler, I drew a line around the curve of the main line, designating where the layout's curved edge will be. I allowed for three inches from the track to the edge of the layout. Once the outside edge of the layout was drawn all the way around, I used a drywall saw to cut the foam following the line. I used a square steel block with 80 grit sandpaper glued to one flat side, working it around the foam edge to square the foam perfectly. So the side of the layout will have a square and uniform outside edge. So now it was time to add a second layer of foam to the layout, to add structural integrity to the whole layout so that doesn't flex. Also, this is going to allow us to carve a groove under the layout in various areas so that we can run our blocks for track power to the yard sections in the areas where we'll control blocks on and off. Now I use great stuff foam pro to glue this together. The reason that I do this is because it dries in about 30 minutes and there's not very much expansion to it. As opposed to the canned great stuff that you get from the hardware store that comes out more of a cream color, that takes about nine hours for it to set up and there's a lot of expansion on that. So the orange stuff works better for building the layouts in my opinion. Once the foam is down, we then put the two halves together and then I use my weight of my body to kind of press things down, squishing the foam flat in between both sections. So the orange foam is now oozing between the two sections. And then I put weights all over the top of the layout evenly to weight down the foam in the event that there is any expansion at all. And once this is completed, we've got a four inch thick layout that doesn't flex very much at all. But when we wrap it in oak, it'll be stiff as a board. Once the great stuff foam pro set up and cured, I took all of the weights off the top of the layout and then I used the same drywall saw to cut the bottom layer of foam matching the top layer. I also followed this up with the square block just to make sure that everything was square and perfect, ready to accept our wood outside wrap at some point. With that, we've got a completed outside main line. We've got a four inch thick layout that's ready to have its additional sightings and yard trackages for storage laid, plus the inside main line laid. And a future episode of What's Neat, we will continue on with this project, laying the rest of the track, filling in the missing ties at each joint and then adding a multitude of buildings, roads and other scenery effects to finish off the top side of this layout. If you figure the size of this and end scale, it's close in relation to a layout in HO scale that would be about six feet by almost 16 feet long, which as I know, is a lot of real estate to cover with scenery. So just because it's end scale doesn't mean that this project is small or fast. So look forward to an upcoming episode of What's Neat as we continue on with this wonderful end scale layout project. For this segment of What's Neat, I'm with Robert Steers from San Juan Model Company all the way from Colorado. Welcome to our studio here, Robert. I want you to tell us about San Juan Model Company, American Limited Models, your passion for trains. Introduce yourself to the viewers of What's Neat. Thank you, Ken. It's a pleasure to be here. I really appreciate it and appreciate the chance to show what we're offering now, as well as the background of how all this came to be. My business partner, Doug Junda and I have been building model trains, playing with model trains, hanging out in hobby shops since elementary school, basically. And I've been friends and modeling associates for many years. In 2018, we discovered that some wonderful venerable companies, Grant Line, San Juan Car Company and some others, we're going to be closing up their closing their doors. We just felt terrible about that because so many of those parts offered by these companies were fundamental to our love, which was building and scratch building model trains. So we got together, talked with our wives, went out to the Bay Area, went out to Los Angeles, Ken several times, talked with these folks and ended up putting them all together, purchasing them all these companies and putting them all together into the umbrella company of San Juan model company. So within that is Grant Line products, San Juan car company, San Juan decal company and the Leadville shops. All of these companies cater to a different aspect of the model railroad building hobby. And we really wanted to make sure that our love of building model trains, scratch building, modifying, kit bashing was still alive and well with all of these products available to the modeler. During that process of getting all these companies together, we moved them to Denver, Denver metro area. My partner Doug Junda manages our fabrication machine shop. Does a great job. I live in Billings, Montana, and I do a lot of the design work dealing with our manufacturers and working with Stephen Priest, who's our design consultant on many of these most of these projects, I should say. On the table here are just some of our new projects. We have we have projects coming all the way for the rest of 2021 through 2022 and almost almost completely through 2023. All of our ready to run products are an H of scale, high fidelity and wonderful prototype models, many of which have never been modeled before in high fidelity plastic. Right in front of me are some cars that are dear to my heart and to many narrow gauge modelers hearts. We've done these in both American O scale, North American O scale, and they're available with O and three and O and 30 wheel sets. These are the wide frame tall dome conical tank cars in four different liveries representing the four different lettering styles that each car had during its service life extending from 1927 to 1945. In the U.S. 1945, they were sold to Mexico. The will be a bring in 10 different car numbers. Each car number in both O and three slash O and 30 and an H O and three will have each of these lettering styles and liveries, so to speak, available. These are please note, these are pre-production models. There have been changes on the production just for the narrow gauge enthusiasts out there. This little two green, we've had that darkened up a lot. The safety placards are on these pre-production models are going to be upgraded to accurate 1920s, 1930s. Colorado and Southern, Denver, Rio, Grand Western and Conoco safety placards as the prototypes were able to obtain those. We're very excited about these. These will be arriving in July, mid July, 2021. And the front of the table are projects that have just recently arrived. This is our second run of H O scale, high detail, tank cars made for the Santa Fe and also some other railways, which I'll speak about in a minute, Ken, the Santa Fe bought hundreds of these in 1949. And then in 1952 said, well, we need more, so they bought several hundred more. They have very colorful, very colorful lettering styles, excuse me, with these different colored bands on the car ends and on the domes, each color represents a certain product that was only to be loaded in the car. And also we think that the color banding was used to assist in case of an accident, so somebody would know exactly what the car was carrying. Of special interest to Santa Fe and all modelers is the gray band here. They had hundreds of these cars which are dedicated to hauling diesel fuel. When imagine the transition era when moving from oil or steam or oil or coal, pardon me, and steam locomotives to the diesel area era, they needed a lot of diesel fuel. So what the Santa Fe and other railways would do was simply go around the country in their system and say, where is diesel fuel the cheapest? Texas, Louisiana, Southern California, what have you? Ship these cars in a unit train to that area, fill them all up, bring them all back, drop them off at their various facilities and then turn right around and find out where is cheapest again and send them all back down in a unit train to the next place for diesel fuel is the cheapest. Other ones, the yellow band is gasoline. Orange band is car journal oil. This mixed band is solvent. There are many other different band colors that are that are out there that have not been done yet. New to this run are Northern Pacific tank cars, which are nearly identical. And SPNS, Spokane, Portland and Seattle tank cars also made by GATC in 1949. All of these models have railroad specific changes, prototype changes that are different from the Santa Fe. These cars in their operating in the Northern US also had steam heating, which we represented on the cars to keep crude oil warm enough to flow for emptying. All of these have metal, chemically blackened wheel sets with McHenry couplers and all of these are available now at your favorite hobby shop or directly from us online. That's amazing. And you can also find all the wonderful. I know I did this. We've used Grantline nuts and bolts for so many episodes of what's neat, building trestles, different projects for Athern. And those are all available. I used to go through my Walthers catalog and be able to go through the parts and just find out what it is that was available. We have almost 1900 different different Grantline parts, 1900 different molds, all of those parts we can make. They're still available. They're literally all handmade, but they're still available, still there and still at a very, very reasonable price for the quality and for what you get. Those are all available directly on our website. That's Grantline products or our website for that particular line is SanWonDetails.com. The Grant family wanted to retire the Grantline product name, which we are happy to do, although, as you know, it's it's always going to be called Grantline, right? But it's it's the web. These are available on the website as SanWonDetails. But all of these products are available, including the HON3 kits. We have little locomotive kits. We have building kits. It's it's amazing. The artistry of the Grant family over more than 50 years of producing this hobby. Part of this I'd like to mention also is that my partner, Doug, Junda and I were amazed at the history that Grantline played in the model railroad business hobby. They were they were there at the beginning. And we've preserved a lot of all of Cliff Grants, wonderful work and tremendous resource libraries, etc., which we are preserving now as part of our company to really honor the rightful place of the Grant family in this hobby and the fundamental the fundamental part they played in bringing this hobby alive and being able to make nut bolt washers for all of our all of our various needs. It's those little things and it's all the details. It's a great thing that you've done for our hobby by saving these companies. I would look forward to bringing the what's neat cameras out to Colorado and maybe checking out your place of business sometime. You'd be very welcome, Ken, but I must warn you, it's a it's a very busy operating fabrication and metal shop. So you may have to wear some safety glasses. Well, you'll have to wear some safety glasses in a hard hat, perhaps, to come in because we're working like working like crazy to produce these parts. Well, soon we will be going through some upgrade tooling to produce them even faster. And you could also probably expect to see many of our grant line products in a ready to run form, be it buildings or HON3 models in the near future. That's news. That's awesome. Guys, this is the best hobby in the world. And it's because of folks just like Robert and his partner and what they're doing for our hobby. And so we'll get out there. We want to visit with you and thank you so much for sharing your new endeavor and what you've done with the viewers of what's neat. Oh, it's my pleasure. And we'll be back with a couple new offerings that are coming in by Labor Day and by Thanksgiving that we're very happy to announce on what's neat this week. That's right. Check out the what's neat this week podcast for the weekly updates and what's going on. Thank you for helping us support the hobby. Thank you, Ken. Very much. All of the products seen on this episode of what's neat are available from Lombard Hobbies in Lombard, Illinois, or order online at LombardHobby.com. Wothers Trains, supporting hobby retailers across the world since 1932. Check out their website and learn more at Wothers.com. American Limited Models, available at your local hobby shop or online at AmericanLimitedModels.com.


Well, I was with Muammar Qaddafi when Qaddafi insert in 1999 advanced, coming out of the OAU to the African Union with a vision of the United States of Africa. Muammar Qaddafi spent, listen to me, billions of dollars to create the African Union. Did you know that Qaddafi gave 300 million dollars and the other African nations gave 100 million to put up a satellite so that we who call Africa don't have to go through Europe to get to Africa? And Europe was getting 500 million dollars a year just by our telephone calls to the continent. Now we can call directly to Africa and that 500 million is in the hand of African people. Do you know that Muammar Qaddafi was setting up an African Development Bank with 70 billion dollars in the African Development Bank from Libyan oil money that we would not have to borrow money from the IMF and the World Bank at these exorbitant rates of interest under Islamic non-usury teachings? I just left St. Kitts and in the island of St. Kitts he was going to set up a Caribbean Development Bank. He told the prime minister there and he was going to put a billion dollars in that bank for Caribbean development. Why do you think they killed him?  Hell no.  He touched my nerve with that question. In Libya has either home or an apartment they call it a flat. Did you know education in Libya is free? From kindergarten through college and did you know that if a Libyan wanted to come to America to be educated the government in Libya paid for their education? Did you know that? I was there when he opened a 500 million dollar hospital with 18 theaters for operation. I was there and we went when he was making their own medicines. This was a man that gave free medical attention to all the citizens of Libya and if Libya did not offer that kind of medical attention they could fly anywhere in the world and get it and the Libyan government would pay for it. Did you know that? No you didn't. Did you know that from the oil money every Libyan citizen got a stipend every year? And did you know that that man had no debt? Everything in his country was paid for. Now when you got a man that did that for an African nation and was trying to do that for all Africa how do you think Europe felt about it?