This Line About How Even The Other Gay People You Find Annoying Or Sell Outs Or Who Live Their Life In

“Country singer Dolly Parton wrote the songs "I Will Always Love You" and "Jolene" on the same night. When the first song was at the top of the charts in 1974, Elvis wanted to record his own version of the song. Dolly was interested until Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis' manager, said that it was standard procedure that when the king of rock and roll covered a song - half of the rights to that song would go to him in the future.

She refused it.

"I said, 'I'm really, really sorry' and cried all night. It was terrible for me, on the one hand, it's Elvis. People told me: "You are crazy." It's Elvis Presley...' but I just couldn't do it. Something told me in my heart not to do it and I didn't. I know he would rock with that song. But I couldn't. And then Whitney Houston came along with her version and I made enough money from the rights to buy Dollywood."

She grew up in severe poverty and no one famous has done more for the education of the poor than her.

In 1990, the percentage of students who did not graduate from high school in her hometown was over 30%. She introduced the "Buddy Program", where all high school graduates received a nice sum when they graduated. It wasn't just a waste of money, she personally came and explained the concept to them - everyone should find a buddy, and whoever doesn't succeed she will find one for them. Everyone had to sign that they will graduate and do everything in their power to ensure that their buddy also graduates. She taught young people about friendship and helping.

The number of school dropouts dropped to below 6% and has remained so until today.

When 900 families lost their homes in the 2016 fires, she paid each family $1,000 for the next five months. When she came to the bank to finish the paperwork, she gave each family another $5,000 to find. A total of nine million dollars.

Also, her work - Imagination Library from 1995, was inspired by her realization that young people in rural areas and poor families already fall behind when they start school and that this prevents them from pursuing higher education. The goal of her program was for every child in her district to receive one book, once a month, from birth to school, completely free of charge, without any conditions. It started as an initiative in her hometown and has spread to a huge number of countries around the world.

By 2018, over 100 million books were distributed in this way.

She is also known for her witty statements, at the beginning of her career she said: “I'm not offended by jokes about stupid blondes because I know I'm not stupid... and I'm not really blonde either.”

Anonymous

Dolly is a national treasure.

"All I do know is as we age, the weight of our unsorted baggage becomes heavier. With each passing year, the price of our refusal to do that sorting rises higher and higher...Long ago, the defenses I built to withstand the stress of my childhood, to save what I had of myself, outlived their usefulness, and I've become an abuser of their once lifesaving powers. I relied on them wrongly to isolate myself, seal my alienation, cut me off from life, control others, and contain my emotions to a damaging degree. Now the bill collector is knocking, and his payment'll be in tears."

- Bruce Springsteen

I've finally finished this one! An untidy, yet cosy fantasy/sci-fi bookshop, with a stack of old paperbacks on the counter.

Prints available here

Thank you Supreme Court.

Hugh “Lumpy” Brannum as Mr. Green Jeans, Bob Keeshan as Captain Kangaroo, and Cosmo Allegretti inside the Dancing Bear costume. An early color publicity still from Captain Kangaroo (CBS, 1955-84).

boop the kbity

Me & the other drivers were really impressed when you swerved around all of us at high speeds & got to the red light before anyone else

Brennan Center for Justice

The Campaign Finance System Americans Could Have Had

Canada shows how democracies can regulate campaign finance for the common good.

End Citizens United !!

The Spanish surnames of many Filipinos have often misled foreigners here and abroad, who are unaware of the decree on the adoption of surnames issued by Governor-General Narciso Clavería in 1849. Until quite recently in the United States, the Filipinos were classified in demographic statistics as a “Spanish-speaking minority,” along with Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Mexicans, and other nationals of the Central or South American republics. The Philippines, as is well known, was a Spanish colony when Spain was mistress of empires in the Western Hemisphere; but the Americans were “hispanized” demographically, culturally, and linguistically, in a way the Philippines never was. Yet the Spanish surnames of the Filipinos today—García, Gómez, Gutiérrez, Fernández—seem to confirm the impression of the American statistician, as well as of the American tourist, that the Philippines is just another Mexico in Asia. Nor is this misunderstanding confined to the United States; most Spaniards still tend to think of “las Islas Filipinas” as a country united to them through the language of Cervantes, and they catalogue Philippine studies under “Hispano-America.” The fact is that after nearly three-and-a-half centuries of Spanish rule probably not more than one Filipino in ten spoke Spanish, and today scarcely one in fifty does. Still the illusion lives on, thanks in large part to these surnames, which apparently reflect descent from ancient Peninsular forbears, but in reality often date back no farther than this decree of 1849.

Somehow overlooked, this decree, with the Catálogo Alfabético de Apellidos which accompanied it, accounts for another curiousity which often intrigues both Filipinos and foreign visitors alike, namely, that there are towns in which all the surnames of the people begin with the same letter. This is easily verifiable today in many parts of the country. For example, in the Bikol region, the entire alphabet is laid out like a garland over the provinces of Albay, Sorsogon, and Catanduanes which in 1849 belonged to the single jurisdiction of Albay. Beginning with A at the provincial capital, the letters B and C mark the towns along the coast beyond Tabaco to Tiwi. We return and trace along the coast of Sorsogon the letters E to L; then starting down the Iraya Valley at Daraga with M, we stop with S to Polangui and Libon, and finish the alphabet with a quick tour around the island of Catan-duanes. Today’s lists of municipal officials, memorials to local heroes, even business or telephone directories, also show that towns where family names begin with a single letter are not uncommon. In as, for example, the letter R is so prevalent that besides the Roas, Reburianos, Rebajantes, etc., some claim with tongue in cheek that the town also produced Romuáldez, Rizal, and Roosevelt!

Excerpt from the 1973 introduction to Catálogo de Alfabético de Apellidos by Domingo Abella

Tiffany couldn't quite work out how Miss Level got paid. Certainly the basket she carried filled up more than it emptied. They'd walk past a cottage and a woman would come scurrying out with a fresh-baked loaf or a jar of pickles, even though Miss Level hadn't stopped there. But they'd spend an hour somewhere else, stitching up the leg of a farmer who'd been careless with an axe, and get a cup of tea and a stale biscuit. 

It didn't seem fair.

“Oh, it evens out,” said Miss Level, as they walked on through the woods. 

“You do what you can. People give what they can, when they can. Old Slapwick there, with the leg, he's as mean as a cat, but there'll be a big cut of beef on my doorstep before the week's end, you can bet on it. His wife will see to it. And pretty soon people will be killing their pigs for the winter, and I'll get more brawn, ham, bacon and sausages turning up than a family could eat in a year.”

“You do? What do you do with all that food?”

“Store it,” said Miss Level. 

“But you-”

“I store it in other people. It's amazing what you can store in other people.” Miss Level laughed at Tiffany's expression. “I mean, I take what I don't need round to those who don't have a pig, or who're going through a bad patch, or who don't have anyone to remember them.”

“But that means they'll owe you a favour!”

“Right! And so it just keeps on going round. It all works out.”

“I bet some people are too mean to pay-”

“Not pay,” said Miss Level, severely. “A witch never expects payment and never asks for it and just hopes she never needs to. But, sadly, you are right.”

“And then what happens?"

“What do you mean?”

“You stop helping them, do you?”

“Oh, no,” said Miss Level, genuinely shocked. “You can't not help people just because they're stupid or forgetful or unpleasant. Everyone's poor round here. If I don't help them, who will?”

"A Hat full of Sky" - Terry Pratchett