CasaSugar

Rob's Details Interview

athena4rob — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 08:34:10 -0800

COFFEEIt's the unseasonably cold November of 2008 when I go to New York's Bowery Hotel. There's a young man sitting in the garden, wrapped in about nine black sweaters and wearing a wool hat, smoking cigarettes, sipping a latte the size of his head, and furiously making notes on a script in the bitter cold. I have read about teenage girls lighting themselves on fire in front of his hotel, but at the moment Robert Pattinson is warming his hands on a coffee cup.
Hello, I'm Jenny. I think I'm here so you can check me out."Okay. I'm Rob. Um . . . would you like some fries? With gravy?"
Allen Coulter, the director of Hollywoodland and a creative force behind The Sopranos, has sent me. He was thinking about doing this movie-it wasn't quite there yet, but I should "come meet Rob."
Rob. When he came to the United States, he slept on his agent's sofa and then got a small part in a movie called Harry Potter and the Something of Something, which grossed nearly $900 million worldwide. And then he made another one, called Twilight, which grossed $385 million in theaters and almost another $200 million in U.S. DVD sales. Box-office riches, like so much of the female population of this planet, follow him from continent to continent, nursing a raging crush.
Coulter suggested I do some rewrite work on Remember Me (for the record, there is only one credited writer, Will Fetters), the first American release in which Rob will portray a mortal, nonmagical, carbon-based life form of the earthly realm-Salvador Dalí, whom he played in Little Ashes, surely doesn't qualify. As Rob scribbles away on the script's pages, it's clear he is starting his own revision process.
Rob's face is constantly busy-especially his kaleidoscopic eyes, which are continually rolling and dilating, because he is always thinking. Over the course of that latte, he contemplates Jimi Hendrix, French fries, girls, art, beer, his cousin the philosopher, girls, truth, God, his dog, girls, and whether this week's stalker has followed him from L.A. I don't think he could turn his brain off if he wanted to.
Despite the legion of fans trailing him from hotel to hotel, laying siege to each like the Roman army, he is neither fearful nor cocky-he's hungry, curious, forever reaching intellectually. That may not sound like a big deal, but think of the context: Complete strangers want to f*ck you, shoot you, be you, buy you, sell you, run their fingers through your hair, watch you have sex, hear you pee, eat chips with you, and kidnap you and stuff you in the trunk of their car. And you? You must know more, more, more about exotic tropical diseases.
Rob and I discover we share a mutual fascination with afflictions that maim and disfigure and disgust: He brings up cancrum oris, in which bacteria eat away at your face until you get kind of a window in the side of your head and the entire world sees your teeth; I mention cyclic vomiting syndrome, a condition in which you puke literally all the goddamn time; he delights in lymphatic filariasis, where parasitic worms burrow into your lymph nodes and can make your balls swell to the size of watermelons, forcing you to tote them around in a wheelbarrow.
We come up with a blockbuster hit movie, entitled Candiru Infestation, about a tiny fish that swims up your urethra and into your urinary tract and lodges in your cock with backward-facing umbrella spikes it shoots from its spine.

"f*cking brilliant! It could be like Finding Nemo!" says Rob. "And the little candiru is lost in the balls! Think of the soundtrack!"

BEER NO. 1Fourteen months later we're in London. New Moon, the second movie in the Twilight saga, has set box-office records for largest midnight opening and biggest opening-day gross. Remember Me, Rob's young-man-in-crisis drama, has wrapped. He has 24 hours before he has to start rehearsals for Bel Ami, based on the Guy de Maupassant novel, in which he plays a bed-hopping social climber.
He is waiting to pick me up in the bar of my hotel. He has ordered himself a pint of beer and, remembering my beverage of choice, a Diet Coke for me. He has the lovely manners of the good son of a good mum.
He says he wants to take me to a particular restaurant nearby, "just a little out-of-the-way place." So out of the way, it turns out, that after wandering around nearly all of Covent Garden, we can't find it. He doesn't seem too surprised, really. Of late he's been getting lost a lot in his own hometown. But then it's been a couple of years since he's actually lived here, and London is confusing as hell anyway.
Considering alternatives, we peek into a crowded café full of the young and beautiful, but he recoils. A few minutes later, when we come to a tiny Mexican place, his hackles go up a bit. Hmm. I ask him whether, at this point, he's able to sniff out crazed fans lurking under the tables.
"Yes. Sure. But last time I was here, the guacamole was bad."
Rob has made no sartorial concessions to Britain's ugliest winter weather in 30 years. A button-down, light Carhartt-like jacket, no gloves. He does have a hat, perhaps the same one he wore in New York. I'm swaddled like the Michelin Man and I'm f*cking freezing. He's cheery, unfazed, giggling away. It occurs to me that London seems to afford him a freedom he doesn't have in New York or Los Angeles. And a London night with deserted, snow-piled streets, after an epic storm that paralyzed Heathrow and shut down the Eurostar trains, is like an unbridled romp while going commando.
Without trying, we arrive back where we started, in front of the Covent Garden Hotel. Across the street there's a high-end sex-toy-and-bondage shop called Coco de Mer. I mention that I popped in there earlier (before the National Gallery, thank you), and I tell him about this insane S&M body-harness contraption they have that allows you to dress up like a horse and have a long tail.
"That's so English. I want to do this entire interview wearing it, from an equine point of view," he says, stomping the sidewalk with make-believe hooves. "Seriously. As an experiment in public perceptions. Is the place still open?"
BEER NO. 2We're inside, at a warm corner of the hotel's Brasserie Max, and Rob is having another beer. We're talking about how he copes. "When I was 17 until, I don't know, 20, I had this massive, baseless confidence. This very clear idea of myself and how I would achieve success, which involved making decisions. I saw myself picking up the phone and saying 'Absolutely not' or 'Definitely yes.' Having control. Except you have to figure out whether the way you think at 19 or 20 has any value. And eventually I understood, with all that control, which was probably illusory, I wasn't progressing. So now I'm relinquishing a bit. I'll be a tiny bit naked. Except tonight I won't, because it's f*cking freezing and my balls will shrivel up."

He may keep his balls covered in winter, but Allen Coulter says that during the shooting of Remember Me, Rob did bare himself: "It was about control, for him, in the beginning. But he wanted forward motion more than he wanted to protect himself. Really brave-especially for a young guy with a big target on his back."
Rob does seem eager to shed some clothing, to give up the reins.
"Shall we go see about that harness? Seriously, you eventually realize you can't make every single decision. I was always building, always protecting something. At the same time, I seemed to be losing the ability to move. I'd protected myself into checkmate. Even mentally." In that moment, he has a realization: "I can barely remember the last two years. Not like a haze of partying or anything like that. Just . . . it's been crazy."
There's been surreal stuff. Like the time at a charity event in Cannes when two attendees bid nearly $60,000 combined to have Rob give their daughters a kiss on the cheek. There's been scary stuff, though the idea he might truly be at risk strikes him as absurd: "I find it really funny-if I got shot, I would literally be in hysterics. I would be like, 'Are you serious? Jesus Christ, get Zac Efron! He's got more social relevance than I do.'" He's pretty sure there was some good stuff, too. "There was this one time with some elephants on a golf course in Barcelona . . ."
He drifts into a reverie. He gets amazed easily, and at the moment he's fixated on the mysterious green bar snacks. They're sort of like wasabi peas, but not. They're covered in chili powder and look like tiny tumors. He's eating every single one.
"f*ck, these are good. What are they? I want to snort them-they'd clear up my sinuses."
BEER NO. 3Rob's hunger is more than merely metaphorical. He orders two entrees-the mini beef burgers with tomato-and-onion relish and the mini chicken burgers with mango chutney-along with another pint. "I eat so much, I'm like a compulsive eater. I've been eating room service, and I'm always really worried about it, so I choose like six things on the menu and eat them all."
He doesn't want to miss anything, which implies a hint of regret. He didn't always want to be an actor. He modeled. He's a talented guitarist and keyboard player who has toyed with following his older sister Lizzy into pop music. But he's a serious type, and his most serious aspirations involved political speech writing. "It's fascinating. You'd have two or three minutes to affect someone. Make them hear you. Get the message out and maybe it will echo. I quite enjoyed doing press for the first Twilight, because there was a similarity. But after a bit I was ladling it out. If you want people to listen to you, you'd better have something to say. I felt a responsibility to be fascinating. You're bargaining with the audience. Is this enough for them? And that affects the way you look at art."
Art. It's illogical to think he's not allowed to have ideas about it merely because he has helped a lot of people make a lot of money.
"Before, I felt like I couldn't break through anything, including myself. And now it feels a bit as though I've climbed along the side of my brain and am at least looking in. But I know it will take me at least another 10 years before I'm remotely satisfied with anything I do. But with acting you keep trying in the hopes you might be . . . great. But then I think, does wanting to be good or even great, or even just wanting to make art, cheapen the experience?"

I worry his head is going to explode. He answers questions with questions. Doors open onto more doors. This sometimes leads to trouble with scripts: Since he sees every character's point of view, he often needs some sort of distillation. The catch is that unless the distillation somehow encompasses every character's essence, it only causes his imagination to fire more wildly. It's the kaleidoscope-vision thing.
Some people can have the ocean in front of them and just put their big toe in. Rob wants to swim until he drowns, and he's going to try to drink it all up before he goes under. His striving is a source of worry because he can't really tell anybody he wants more: "Please don't make this about me complaining. Please. I'm the luckiest bastard on the planet." He worries he might be selfish. He worries maybe he's a nonhumanist-separatist-weirdo because his most profound moments have been with his dog. And he worries about whether he can be an actor who can reach the masses and still ask for anything.
"If it exists out there-this invisible-creative-spirit-idea thing-then you're the medium through which it travels so everybody can touch it. But . . . what gives you the right to be the medium? What gives you the right to claim it? And then get an agent and say I want $20 million and a fruit basket to be the medium, thank you very much.
"As an actor, you can elevate the human condition or cheapen it. I would assume it's the same with anything you do-you try to elevate and maybe someday you will." An actor may indeed have the ability to raise us, but Rob unconsciously starts speaking sotto voce each time he utters the word actor or any variation of it.
Rob, did you know that every time you say actor or acting you lower your voice to a whisper?He's genuinely startled. "I do?"Yes, so quietly it's like you're saying Negro.He laughs, lightens up. "What if we were 'acting' like 'Negroes'? Then we'd be f*cked-we couldn't hear anything. . . ."
BEER NO. 4Rob asks the waiter for another beer. He's talking about an uncle who worked in a steel mill in the Yorkshire town his dad grew up in. Rob's father and his other uncles moved away as soon as they were old enough, but the eldest brother stayed there his whole life.
"They're bulldozing houses, whole streets of houses. And my dad asked him, 'Why stay?' He said, 'Who's going to look after our mom?' And I was just thinking, Jesus f*cking Christ, there might be something wrong with my emotional sight, because I'm not sure if I could make that kind of sacrifice. The only emotional connection of relevance is with my dog. My relationship with my dog, it's ridiculous.
"I think you need to be able to break through what you think about yourself to try to make any sort of art. I used to play music all the time, and the most amazing part was the freedom that came with kicking myself in the ass, letting go, and surprising myself."
He tried to let go a little bit with the photo shoot accompanying this interview-it wasn't easy.
"I really hate vaginas. I'm allergic to vagina. But I can't say I had no idea, because it was a 12-hour shoot, so you kind of get the picture that these women are going to stay naked after, like, five or six hours. But I wasn't exactly prepared. I had no idea what to say to these girls. Thank God I was hungover."

Is your mom going to have something to say about it?"Oh, God." He puts his head in his hands, shrugs. "Well, she quite enjoyed when I got her cable." It's not that Rob's mother now spends all night watching Skinemax in her London home. "No, no! God, no! It's just that there's nakedness all over the place now. But this shoot, it's kind of eighties nakedness, you know? If you look at porn in, like, the eighties, there was something kind of quaint about it, quite sweet-like this little naked community. The people who made it liked it, they had respect for it. Not remotely like the porn that's available now. No community in it at all. It's just everything, everywhere."
CANDYIn the U.K., Smarties are made of chocolate and are kind of like M&M's in weird colors like mauve and teal but somehow more delicious. Rob's not really a dessert guy, yet he's rapidly hoovering my last packet of Smarties. "Amazing. I've eaten like 5,000 of these already. See what you have to deal with?"
In Remember Me he plays a guy whose issues are eerily like his own. Tyler is a young man who has retreated into himself, but then he meets a woman, becomes conflicted, and has to choose whether to remain in lockdown or step into life and the world.
"Tyler is so aware of his actions. But he has no idea whether they're of any value at all. Can you be a person if you live in the bubble? He's stuck in the middle. At the same time, he's lucky to have the choice. Conflict is innate in a lucky person."
What attracted you to the role?"I'm a lucky person. Thank God. And I'm conflicted. Thank God."
He tells me about a book he read called Eat the Rich, by P.J. O'Rourke (full disclosure: P.J. was married briefly to my sister, though Rob had no idea). He was drawn to a part that says something like: One man's wealth does not mean another man's poverty-and vice versa. Rob's slightly embarrassed to voice this idea.
He is unsure whether to feel guilty, to bask in it all, or both. Thing is, there aren't any rules for a life as extraordinary as his is right now. He tells me an elephant story. Not the one about Barcelona elephants-one about some he'd met recently in California.
"Did you know elephants purr? It's completely scary if you don't know what it is. They purr like cats, but their heads are so deep they sound like velociraptors. You feel it in the ground under your feet. So this big female started sniffing my foot-big female elephant, that is. She sniffed it so hard it came up off the pavement like her trunk was a vacuum cleaner. Then she took my entire body in her mouth. I was holding on to her head, and as I slowly let go she tightened her grip really carefully until I'm just upside down in her mouth and she's going through my pockets with her trunk, looking for peppermints. It was the best day of my life."
So you gave up control to an elephant, got groped, mugged, had your candy tugged at-and it was glorious? "Yeah. So beautiful you can't imagine. And the baby elephant was so excited that it sprinted out and did its routine in five seconds and then curtsied to everybody. It was actually laughing. Brilliant. Did you know they can also do imitations of other animals? A horse, a chicken, a monkey-these elephants could, anyway. They were movie elephants. One had written a screenplay, and one really wants to direct."

He laughs. He was in Los Angeles, in discussions to star with Sean Penn in Water for Elephants, an adaptation of Sara Gruen's novel. The elephants are actors like him, and he wonders if he might, on some cosmic level, be a bit like them.
"Do you know how they die? The elephant guy told me their molars get ground down from eating wood but regenerate like six times. And after that they slowly starve to death. Which is poignant, but that must also be what gives them time to get to the elephant graveyard. They're incredibly designed creatures. I mean, people hang on way too f*cking long. If I knew that when my teeth fell out, that was it . . . Wow. The best day of my life. Beautiful, beautiful day."
A few moments later, Rob announces he's going to get a cab home and excuses himself.
Can I walk you? I don't like you going out there all by yourself."I'll be okay."

Super Bowl Ads Catered to Men Feeling Henpecked?

stephley — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:59:57 -0800

So you're a guy? Poor you!

You get slapped on your bottom at birth, then spend the rest of your life being shoved around by wives and girlfriends who make you mow the lawn, listen to their friends, return their phone calls, eat fruit at breakfast, shop for lingerie instead of watching the game, put your underwear in the basket and put the toilet seat down.

Such was the state of affairs between Mars and Venus depicted in some of this year's Super Bowl ads. And in marked contrast to the fairytale that unfolded with the New Orleans Saints' thrilling victory, what a sorry state it was.

In one ad, our hero was spineless. Literally. "As you can see, his girlfriend has removed his spine, rendering him incapable of watching the game," the announcer said of the hapless Jason, lingerie-shopping with his girlfriend, a red bra slung over his shoulder. "C'mon, silly!" the girlfriend said, leading him along. The solution? A Flo TV mobile television, so Jason could watch the game with him while he considered cup sizes.

As went Jason's life, so went the rest of the night. An ad for Dove skin cream portrayed, in song, a litany of life's indignities for the male, from that first insulting slap on the buttocks in the birthing room through high school and on to parenthood, where witnessing childbirth makes you faint (because it's SO painful for the man - but we digress) and life is a series of chores.

But with age came some self-actualizion, to a point. "Now that you're comfortable with who you are, isn't it time for comfortable skin?" the narrator asked.

The most striking in the henpecked male category, though, was a Dodge Charger ad, which featured a depressing view of a man's life as he talked to his invisible partner, listing all the sacrifices and concessions he'd made.

"I will get up and walk the dog at 6:30," the man said. "I will eat fruit with my breakfast. I will say yes when you want me to say yes. I will be quiet when you want me to say no. I will take your call. I will listen to your friends' opinions of my friends. I will be civil to your mother. I will put the seat down. I will put my underwear in the basket."

"And because I do this," the man concluded, "I will drive the car I want to drive."

"Charger," the ad declared. "Man's last stand."

Geez. This champion complainer was almost enough to make Jay Leno and David Letterman seem mature - let's ponder that for a moment - in their whiny promo for Letterman's "Late Show," where the two feuding TV stars had to be mothered by an exasperated Oprah Winfrey.

The whole thing was confounding for brand expert Kelly O'Keefe. "There sure were a lot of emasculated males last night," says O'Keefe, managing director of the Brand Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. "It was loser night. A parade of people you just want to slap!"

Super Bowl ads have always sought to appeal to men, of course, and offering them a chance to vent, even subconsciously, about their perceived struggles is one way of doing that. But it's a shortsighted tactic, says O'Keefe, because Super Bowl audiences are now just about evenly split between men and women.

But creative teams at ad agencies? They may not be evenly split, says O'Keefe. (Indeed, some of the ads might lead one to think they were created by Sterling Cooper, the fictional 1960s-era ad agency of "Mad Men.")

But is there something deeper at play? O'Keefe and others speculate that in a troubled economy, these commercials are expressing a feeling many people have of losing control of the circumstances of their lives. That would also explain the unhappy-office-worker theme of a number of Sunday's ads.

The downturn may also be reflected in the sense that people seek out slapstick humor and escapism in times of economic stress. And it may be more comforting for men sitting home on their couches eating chips to watch other men doing, well, the same thing. "These ads go overboard to appeal to the slobs on the couches," quips Laura Ries, president of the Ries & Ries brand strategy firm in Atlanta.

But whatever the economic climate, Super Bowl ads have always gone for traditional sources of humor because they're tried and true, and the Mars-Venus divide, specifically with the henpecked-male stereotype, is one of the most basic, notes Ries. And with so much money at stake - Super Bowl ads cost from $2.5 million to more than $3 million for 30 seconds this year - it's hard to stray from what works.

Of course, not all Sunday's ads fell into the category of henpecked males. One ad seen by many as hugely successful was Google's first ever Super Bowl ad, which simply and deftly used its search technique to tell a charming story of love blooming in Paris.

O'Keefe thinks there will be a backlash against some of Sunday's ads. "I don't think we'll be seeing as much of this next year," he said. And already, some women's groups were complaining.

Clare Giesen, executive director of the National Women's Political Caucus, told the Politico Web site that she was "always surprised that Madison Avenue considers the old stereotype of bad, nagging women to be real a motivator for product purchase."

Though it didn't contain a nagging woman, some women were particularly offended by an ad for Bridgestone tires, in which a group of shady post-apocalyptc thugs stop a car and say, "Here's the deal. Your Bridgestone tires, or your life."

A woman is then kicked out of the car.

"I said life, not wife," the ringleader says.

Luckily, it was a pleasure to watch the actual game and see not just a thrilling Super Bowl but, at the end, a scene to warm the heart of any woman (or evolved man): Saints quarterback Drew Brees, tears in his eyes, holding up his adorable one-year-old son, Baylen, kissing him, and saying something that looked very much like: "I love you, little man."

It was enough to forget any silly images of spineless men being dragged around a lingerie store with red bras slung over their shoulders.

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory?id=9783297

Lenzr - Winners of Nov Dec 09 Photo Contests

Smojoe — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:16:22 -0800

On Januray 1st 2010 three contests ended on Lenzr, and now three winners are now being celebrated.
Macro Photos of Life photo contest on Lenzr collected over 76 photos which accrued 4021 votes. Sponsored by Shrinkray Mobile, the enterprise specializes in porting business websites into effective in mobile browsers. Shrinkray is a division of Boomboat.com which was established online in 2000. The Shrinkray website comes complete with a mighty boomblog. Smojoe has been taking an offer of free development and free hosting to mobile discussion forums looking for case studies. The winning photo was submitted by a prolific member named ve3bnw who is a nice guy named Bill Watson. The image is titled Time to BEEHAVE Total Votes: 171 Popular rating: 7.3 (132 votes) Registered rating: 7.9 (39 votes)
The prize is a free wine and breweries tour of Eastern Ontario that comes complete with one night’s stay at Timberhouse, a Brighton Ontario b&b. Look for a full report on the Lenzr next this month.
Medicinal Plants in Nature collected 17 photos that were rated by 484 votes. This photo contest was sponsored by Wellpath Clinic, a friendly natural medicine clinic located at Avenue Rd and Bloor St in downtown Toronto (and in Port Carling, Muskoka).
The winner of was a lovely picture of a plant with white blossoms by seguni that was called pretty garden… Total Votes: 42 Popular rating: 4.6 (21 votes) Registered rating: 7.0 (21 votes) This member received $330 worth of Neal’s Yard Remedies.There is a picture of Isabelle on the Lenzr blog holding the basket. And finally, Ontario Tourist Attractions 2 collected 43 photos that enjoyed 2372 votes. This web challenge was sponsored by Kanetix.ca to help get the word out about their car insurance quotes search system that makes shopping for all motor vehicle insurance easy, and rewarding. The winning photo was also submitted by ve3bnw and titled Hidden Gem Thanks guys and girls of Geek Sugar for all your support and participation.

Start new Gift Shop Business

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 09:55:40 -0800

Hello everyone. I am in the process of trying to open my own business. I make speciality gift baskets, personalized candy wrappers and custom baby bedding. I have wanted my won business for ever. I just need advice on if this is the right time in the economy. I live in Ohio. We don't have many gift shops here. If so, the ones we have are all the same..
Please advise

Sun Maid Raisin Girl gets sexy makeover

Roarman — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 06:33:41 -0800

In the annals of advertising imagery, few brand symbols are more iconic and recognizable than the Sun-Maid raisin girl.

Nevertheless, Sun-Maid recently decided to join Betty Crocker, Aunt Jemima and Mrs. Butterworth's in giving the female face of their product a substantial makeover from a young, early 20th-century girl into a buxom, modern young woman, leading some to say that the newly made-over raisin girl looks like a Barbie Doll in Amish attire

Since 1915, the face of Sun-Maid has been Lorraine Collett Petersen, who, according to the company's website , "was discovered drying her black hair curls in the sunny backyard of her parents' home in Fresno, California." Petersen was then asked to pose for a watercolor painting holding a basket of grapes while wearing a sunbonnet. In the years since, the company has tweaked its trademark design occasionally to keep up with the times, but every variation has always been based on the original pose by Petersen. The new computer-animated version of the Sun-Maid girl currently featured in television advertisements is a departure from the classic design that harkened back to a time when "life was much simpler, more rural, a lot less hectic."

Sun-Maid

Naturally, the revamped look hasn't gone unnoticed, rankling both ends of the political spectrum. The blog for conservative magazine The Weekly Standard noted that the new Sun-Maid girl looks "as if Julia Roberts decided to don a red bonnet and start picking grapes," while the feminist website Jezebel.com remarked that it looks as if she's had “some implants.”

Though the new look for the raisin girl has been garnering attention of late, the changes to the 90-year-old icon were actually introduced three years ago. At the time, Sun-Maid president Barry Kriebel said that the decision to make changes was inspired by the desire to educate consumers about healthy living choices.

"This is as good a time as any to get on the wave of health and nutrition,'' he said. Kriebel also noted that he felt the new look was a reasonable modernization, saying "You're not going to see her dancing or kicking up her heels out in the vineyard, but have her do what is appropriate for her to do, based on her history but also being a contemporary person living in the 21st century.''

Additionally, there's been talk that the new Sun-Maid girl might be given a name and featured in future advertisements doing some of the things modern women typically do, like going to the gym, shopping at the market, and speaking multiple languages, particularly languages native to countries where Sun-Maid, the world's largest producer and processor of raisins and other dried fruits, sells raisins. However, the image on all Sun-Maid product packaging will remain the same, as the new version will only be featured in product advertisements.

Source: http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/108296/sun-maid-girl-makeov...

Three new photo contests on Lenzr.com expire Jan 1st, 2010

Smojoe — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 16:23:12 -0800

There are three new photo contests on Lenzr.com for the months of October and December 2009 !

Photographers look sharp - there's something for everyone to focus on here.

Medicinal Plants in Nature celebrates botanical photography and hopes to collect images of natural medicine growing wild in the great outdoors. Botanical photography is a discipline is used to depict plants accurately with respect to their form and color. Members are expected to provide relevant information documenting each plant's medical function, and perhaps show the species in relationships with other life forms. Successful botanical photography is as much art as it is science; it requires a detailed knowledge of plants and their habitats as well as a keen eye for making attractive pictures.

Sponsored by Ontario’s premier Natural Medicine Clinic the member that uploads the highest rated photo will WIN a gift basket filled with six different Neal's Yard Remedies including Orange Flower Facial Wash, Rosewater Toner, Orange Flower Facial Oil, Yarrow & Comfrey Moisturizer, White Tea Eye Gel, Geranium & Orange Body Butter for a total retail value of $330.00

Macro Photos of Life contest hopes to amass a large display of small living things. Photographers are asked to use their camera's macro lens to capture the freckles, skin pores and whiskers of the tiniest possible subjects. Already we have seen wasps, spiders and even a humming bird!
Mcommerce happens when people shop over their phones, and this component of the 'online ecopnomy' is already worth a couple of billion dollars and everyday, as more and more people get smart phones, it gets larger.
ShrinkRay is a powerful tool built by Canada's most advanced mobile experts and used to build mobile applications and web 2.0 widgets for small to mid sized businesses. It is a Device Management System (DMS) and an Application Toolkit that can be customized to suit any business and marketing goals.
The friendly sponsor works with their clients to ensure the application delivers all necessary functionality. ShrinkRay Mobile is quite possibly the best mobile platform available.
Prize is a free deluxe Locaboire Ontario Wine Tour Travel Package for two adults, a charter bus, wine and brewery tour in Eastern Ontario. The prize package includes two meals and one night accommodation at a beautiful Brighton Ontario B&B. Contest ENDS: Jan 1st 2010
Ontario Tourist Attractions photo contest was very well received, with over seventy five photos submitted and almost 3000 registered votes collected in September and October 2009. Congratulations to the winners: Mommakoala in Hamilton, and Slimmswitch in Ottawa
The Kanetix sponsored event was a lot of fun, and the images in the archives reflect that excitement. They are sure to be enjoyed by many visitors for a long time to come. Perhaps these pictures will inspire travelers from outside Canada to visit and enjoy our attractions. Lenzr.com is thrilled that Kanetix has decided to do it again
The Kanetix.ca sponsored Ontario Tourist Attractions 2 photo contest on Lenzr.com will once again show off our province's most interesting travel destinations. The contest theme fits with Kanetix.ca, a forward thinking company that specializes in delivering the lowest car insurance quotes and the challenge is even more relevant when people submit family road trip pictures because as we all know, the less you pay for your car insurance, the more you can spend on your holidays. Of course all submissions should be crisp, clear and have a compelling caption that explains the location and essence of the picture.
The winner is the member that uploads the top rated image January 1st 2010 as determined by the quantity of registered votes + popular votes / total number of votes.
Are you paying too much for your mortgage or your insurance policies? Perhaps Kanetix can help you to find a cheaper rate. As Canada's leader in online insurance and mortgage price comparisons, Kanetix.ca can quickly provide you with competing quotes from top rated companies. Pick the company with the best rate and in most cases, arrange for coverage online. Compare mortgage rates, car insurance, life insurance, business insurance, travel insurance, health insurance, home/property insurance, motorcycle insurance, and more...

Impulse Savings

efficient susan — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:02:34 -0800

I wonder why this does not exist. Certainly the practice of "impulse buying" is alive and well, even in this tight economy. What if ....... the corollary was promoted? Let's say that there was a retail store that actually encouraged customers to not buy stuff that they don't really need. They could have signs at every check out register that said, "Do you really want all that crap? Dump unwanted merchandise in this bin. We will gladly re-shelve it for you."
Imagine the goodwill that could result from the use of this reverse psychology? Sure, it flies in the face of traditional marketing theories. But wouldn't you trust a store that was willing to forgo the practice of enticing you to buy more than you really need? Wouldn't you smile at a receipt that totaled out the amount that you just saved at the cash register? Wouldn't you feel smug about the items that stayed in your basket- why, yes, I really, really DO need these items!
A few days after this brilliant concept occurred to me, I shared the impulse savings idea with my 31-yr old son. He listened politely and then pointed out that this concept is already being practiced by many shoppers at IKEA. Haven't you seen all the random items from all departments of the store that are mixed in with gift wrap and seasonal items in that last section before the check out counters? Who in their right mind is going to traipse all the way back to the furniture department to return that seemingly clever and inexpensive wall rack? Nope. No one it seems. They stealthily dump the wall rack right amidst the boxes of 24 red, white and green candles.
While customers at IKEA may feel smug about their last-minute unburdening, they are not likely to enjoy their impulse savings without a simmering tinge of guilt. Who wants to return to a store that makes you feel guilty? Not me. I want to shop where I can feel like a winner as I walk out with less.
terzani Libertine Large Chandelier
$6,054.13$4,165.00 by Terzani at Ylighting

Walmart's Project Impact: A Move to Crush Competition

Roarman — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 10:49:03 -0700

Walmart loves to shock and awe. City-size stores, absurdly low prices ($8 jeans!) and everything from milk to Matchbox toys on its shelves. And with the recession forcing legions of stores into bankruptcy, the world's largest retailer now apparently wants to take out the remaining survivors.

Thus, the company is in the beginning stages of a massive store and strategy remodeling effort, which it has dubbed Project Impact. One goal of Project Impact is cleaner, less cluttered stores that will improve the shopping experience. Another is friendlier customer service. A third: home in on categories where the competition can be killed. "They've got Kmart ready to take a standing eight-count next year," says retail consultant Burt Flickinger III, managing director for Strategic Resources Group and a veteran Walmart watcher. "Same with Rite Aid. They've knocked out four of the top five toy retailers, and are now going after the last one standing, Toys "R" Us. Project Impact will be the catalyst to wipe out a second round of national and regional retailers."

Though that's bad news for many smaller businesses that can't compete, Walmart investors have clamored for this push. Despite the company's consistently strong financial performance, Wall Street hasn't cheered Walmart's growth rates. During the 1990s, the company's stock price jumped 1,173%. In this decade, it's down around 24% (Walmart's stock closed at $51.74 per share on Sept. 3). "Walmart is under excruciating pressure from employees and frustrated institutional investors to get the stock up," says Flickinger.

Many analysts believe that the store-operations background of new CEO Mike Duke will keep investors quite happy. Though the recession finally caught up to Walmart last quarter, when the company reported a 1.2% drop in U.S. same-store sales, Walmart was a consistent winner during the worst days of the financial crisis, as frugal consumers traded down. While most retailers are shutting down stores, Walmart has opened 52 Supercenters since Feb. 1. Joseph Feldman, retail analyst at Telsey Advisory Group, estimates that each store costs Walmart between $25 and $30 million. In order to continue the momentum that it has picked up during the retail recession, over the next five years the company plans to remodel 70% of its approximately 3,600 U.S. stores.

So what does a Project Impact store look like? One recent weekday afternoon I toured a brand new, 210,000-sq.-ft. Walmart in West Deptford, N.J., with Lance De La Rosa, the company's Northeast general manager. "We've listened to our customers, and they want an easier shopping experience," says De La Rosa. "We've brightened up the stores and opened things up to make it more navigable." One of the most noticeable changes is that Project Impact stores reshape Action Alley, the aisles where promotional items were pulled off the shelves and prominently displayed for shoppers. Those stacks both crowded the aisles and cut off sight lines. Now, the aisles are all clear, and you can see most sections of the store from any vantage point. For example, standing on the corner intersection of the auto-care and crafts areas, you can look straight ahead and see where shoes, pet care, groceries, the pharmacy and other areas are located. And the discount price tags are still at eye level, so the value message doesn't get lost.

"They are like roads," De La Rosa says proudly. "And look around, the customers are using them. We've already gotten feedback about the wider, more breathable aisles. Our shoppers love them."

The layout is also smarter. "You can kind of guess where everything is going to be," says Sharon Tilotta, 73, a shopper in the West Deptford store. The pharmacy, pet foods, cosmetics and health and beauty sections are now adjacent to the groceries. In the past, groceries and these other sections were often at opposite ends of the store, which made it more difficult for someone looking to pick up some quick consumables to get in and out of Walmart. "Under Project Impact, Walmart is providing more of a full supermarket experience within its walls," says Feldman. "The biggest complaint against them has always been that it takes a long time to get through everything. This definitely improves efficiency." De La Rosa also points out the party-supply section. Favors, wedding decorations, cards and scrapbooks are all in one area. "In the past, these products would be in three different places," he says.

And although Walmart won't admit to targeting specific competitors - "We're just listening to what our customers want," De La Rosa says - it's clear that, under Project Impact, Walmart will make major plays in winnable categories. The pharmacy, for example, has been pulled into the middle of the store, and its $4-prescriptions program has generated healthy buzz. With Circuit City out of business, the electronics section has been beefed up. Walmart is also expanding its presence in crafts. Sales at Michael's Stores, the country's largest specialty arts-and-crafts retailers, have sagged, and Walmart sees an opportunity. Stores are chock-full of scrapbooking material, baskets and yarns. "Look, they're selling the stuff that accounts for 80% of Michael's business, at 20% of the space," says Flickinger. "It's very hard for any company to compete with that."

Apparel, one of Target's traditional strengths, gets a prominent position at the center. The color palettes of the shirts and dresses are brighter and more appealing than they've been in the past. "Walmart has figured out fashion for the first time in 47 years," Flickinger says. "They've gone from a D to an A-minus." Briefs and underwear have been shuttled to the back. "That's a smart move," Flickinger says. "People know to come to Walmart for the commodity clothing. Now, they have to walk past the higher margin, more fashionable merchandise to get what they need."

Of course, Project Impact isn't perfect. You'd think that if Walmart was going to open a massive new store with a cutting-edge layout, the company would at least put a sign up. In West Deptford, it's easy to miss the entrance to the Walmart - which is buried in the back of a parking lot - while driving along a main thoroughfare. And of course, customers will always nitpick. One elderly shopper complained about a shortage of benches in the store (she needed a rest). Another had a more esoteric, yet legitimate, gripe. "Their meat is leaky," says Jeff Winter, 30, a West Deptford shopper. "And instead of giving you a wet wipe to clean it off, they give you a dry towel. How's that going to prevent E. coli or whatever?"

What analysts really want to see from Project Impact, however, is a faster pace of implementation. "The biggest hurdle facing Walmart is the speed with which they can roll this out," says Feldman. As more Project Impact stores pop up, the existing stores appear worse by comparison. For example, while the merchandise at the Project Impact store outside of Philadelphia really speaks to that particular market - there's tons of Eagles and Phillies gear - at one regular discount store outside New York City, Minnesota Twins and Seattle Mariners pajama pants wasted away on the racks. There were plenty of associates staffing the electronics section at the Project Impact store; at the discount store, five frustrated shoppers waited in line for help from a customer-service rep. Soon, it was closer to 10.

What about the friendly service? In West Deptford, the associates were sunny and bright. At the New York–area discount store, not so much. "You'll notice we've been in the store for two hours, and no one has even said hello to us," Flickinger says after he and I toured that store. He's right, we weren't feeling any love. But if Project Impact keeps picking up momentum, many more Walmart salespeople, and shareholders, should be smiling.

Free Benefit Stuff from Sephora for Beauty Insiders ONLINE ONLY

details — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 12:41:02 -0700

Hey guys,

Got an email from Sephora about a FREE Beauty Insider Deal.
It has nothing to do with points you've earned and it is NOT for samples and it's only available online.

Here's the fine print:

You have to spend $50 ( but hey that gives you free shipping)
You have to enter the promocode BEAUTYGEMS
You have to have at least 1 Benefit item that you are purchasing in your shopping basket in the same transaction.

Oh, and at the same time if you do have 100 insider points you can throw in a mini BadGal Lash in Black as your deluxe sample.

So lots of "free" Benefit is available right now.
Check it out.

National Cleaning Week

THE BIG AGOO — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 14:58:18 -0700

am not sure about you, but every week seems to be cleaning week at my house. I try to do the bedding, the spot behind the toilet, the oven and the outside deck; but things happen, life intervenes and the cleaning jobs get pushed and pushed to the following week.

I am not sure who it was that decided the end of March, first of April was designated as spring cleaning, but ladies.. .heads up, cause here it is. Spring cleaning is upon us and I for one still have Christmas cards up by the phone, the son’s Halloween art project on the mantel and winter quilts on all the beds. Where do I begin?

Go to iVillage.com for a complete check list of spring cleaning.

Visit about.com for the 5 steps to cleaning.

Find out at zenhabits.com how you can develop clean house-habits, one at a time.

Standing on my soapbox,

According to the good folks at www.gone-ta-pott.com, spring cleaning is for getting your environment clean so you can feel good about yourself and your home. It’s about making the surroundings where you spend most of your time feel clean, as well as look organized and clutter free. They think that anywhere you spend most of your time (home, at work, your shop, or basement), deserves a good cleaning so you can feel good inside and out.

Here’s what they like to do.

Cleaning Outside
We pull out the grill that’s been stored in the shed through winter and we start cleaning up the grills and adding new parts while replacing the old tank (if its not charcoal). We start organizing the potting shed and dragging out the rakes, shovels, hose and potting soils. We pull out the flower pots and get them all cleaned up because we know they are soon to be the new home of a beautiful flowering plant. We get all the old junk that has collected up on the back porch over winter and put it all away to make room for the hanging baskets and planter pots. We sweep the leaves off the bannisters that have collected from the winter winds. We pull all the matching chair cushions out of storage and put them back on the oak swing and porch rockers. Ahhhh…. knowing that once it’s all done, a nice soothing swing in the swing will be a nice reward.

Cleaning Inside
Not only do we work on cleaning up the outside but we work on cleaning up the inside as well. For some reason when we spring clean it makes us feel really good. It feels like were getting rid of the old and gloomy winter days and welcoming the new birth of spring and a new blessed season. At least that’s how I look at it. We put away all the winter clothes and happily bring out the spring clothes. We wash and pack away the winter flannel sheets and replace them with cool sheets. We open all the closet doors in each room, we open all the windows and doors of the house and we start letting the house air out. We spray fabreeze on all the cloth furniture and turn the ceiling fans on low. We welcome all the smells and new spring breezes that blow through all the windows into our house to freshen up every single corner of the house.

What do we do next? We clean, clean, clean! We wash the walls, we mop the floors, we swipe the cobwebs out of the corners of the ceiling and we clean all the air conditioner vents. Yep we sure do! We even have fun making our own homemade cleaners that we found in the Old Farmers Almanacs that we saved over the years. Click below to see homemade cleaning recipes.

Make Your Own Cleaners
WARNING: Never mix cleaning products containing bleach and ammonia as dangerous fumes will result.

OVEN CLEANER
2 tablespoons dishwashing liquid
2 teaspoons borax
1/4 cup ammonia
1-1/2 cups warm water
Mix the ingredients together, apply to oven spills, and let sit for 20 to 30 minutes. Scrub with an abrasive nylon-backed sponge and rinse well.

Scrubbing Hand General Purpose Cleaner
1 teaspoon borax
1/2 teaspoon washing soda
2 teaspoons vinegar
1/4 teaspoon dishwashing liquid
2 cups hot water
Combine all the ingredients. If you don’t have washing soda (generally found in the laundry section of supermarkets), use 1 teaspoon baking soda instead. For a more pleasant smell, use lemon juice instead of vinegar. Be sure to label the bottle accordingly.

Easy Scrub
3/4 cup baking soda
1/4 cup borax
dishwashing liquid
Combine the baking soda and borax. Mix in enough dishwashing liquid to make a smooth paste. If you prefer a pleasant smell, add 1/4 teaspoon lemon juice to the paste.

Heavy-Duty Disinfectant Cleaner
1/4 cup powdered laundry detergent
1 tablespoon borax
3/4 cup hot water
1/4 cup pine oil, or pine-based cleaner
Slowly stir the detergent and borax into the water to dissolve. Add the pine oil (available at hardware stores and supermarkets) and mix well. For bathroom cleaning, use the mixture full strength. In the kitchen, dilute it with water.

Wood Floor Polish
1/2 cup vinegar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
Mix the ingredients well, rub on the floor, and buff with a clean, dry cloth.

Rug Cleaner
1/4 teaspoon dishwashing liquid
1 cup lukewarm water
Combine the ingredients. Use a spray bottle to apply the solution over a large area, or use the solution to spot-clean nongreasy stains. (Don’t use laundry detergent or dishwasher detergent in place of dishwashing liquid, as they may contain additives that can affect the rug’s color.)

Toilet Cleaner
1 cup borax
1/4 cup vinegar or lemon juice
Combine the ingredients to make a paste. Apply it to the inside of the toilet bowl, let sit for 1 to 2 hours, and scrub.

Mildew Remover
1 tablespoon powdered laundry detergent
1 quart chlorine bleach
2 quarts water
Combine all the ingredients in a pail. Wearing rubber gloves, wash off the mildew.

Floor Wax Remover
1 cup laundry detergent
3/4 cup ammonia
1 gallon warm water
Mix all the ingredients together and apply to a small area of the floor. Let the solution sit long enough for it to loosen the old wax, at least 5 to 10 minutes. Mop up the old wax (or scrape it up, if there’s a lot of it, using a squeegee and a dustpan). Rinse thoroughly with 1 cup vinegar in 1 gallon water and let dry before applying a new finish.

Furniture Polish
1 tablespoon vinegar or lemon juice
1 tablespoon boiled linseed oil
1 tablespoon turpentine
Combine the ingredients in a glass jar with a tight-fitting lid and shake until blended. Dampen a cloth with cold water and wring it out until it’s as dry as you can get it. Saturate the cloth with the mixture and apply sparingly to a small area at a time. Let dry for about 30 minutes, then polish with a soft cloth. Note that this mixture gets gummy as it sits, so make just enough for one day’s work.

Glass Cleaner
2 tablespoons ammonia
1/2 cup alcohol
1/4 teaspoon dishwashing liquid
a few drops blue food coloring
water
Combine the ammonia, alcohol, dishwashing liquid, and food coloring, then add enough water to make 1 quart. If you prefer a nonammoniated cleaner, substitute 3 tablespoons vinegar or lemon juice for the ammonia.

Carpet Freshener
1 cup crushed dried herbs (such as rosemary, southernwood, or lavender)
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking soda
Combine all the ingredients in a large jar or other container with a tight-fitting lid. Shake well to blend. Sprinkle some of the mixture on your carpet, let it sit for an hour or so, and then vacuum it up. It will give the room a pleasant smell and neutralize carpet odors.

How can I Celebrate National Cleaning Week?

Have a Cleaning Party! - Find a great project that you can work together on and have a cleaning party. It could be a childrens park somewhere that is in need of attention. Maybe a few hands to pick up the trash would be great. After the work is over a nice picnick in the park you just cleaned up would be great. Or- Maybe you have a room in your house that you really need help with. Plan a cleaning party to get others to help you and you pay them back by feeding them a nice homemade lunch. Or- Maybe you have a friend at school or church that has been sick for a while who could use some help in doing a few little chores in the house. Have a cleaning party for that person and make them feel better. A nice clean house always brightens the spirit of those who don’t feel good.

Make your own homemade cleaners! - It’s fun to make your own homemade cleaners and it’s even more fun to make them up as gifts in a jar. Wrap the jars up with pretty bows and instructions about your homemade cleaner. They make great housewarming gifts.

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