Architecture Wednesday: Allamanda

And here we have another house on another beach, though this one is on a private island in the Bahamas rather than clinging to the edge of California.

Allamanda is a one-of-a-kind home on the secluded island of Kamalame Cay and is elevated on stilts 14 feet above sea level, designed to maximize sweeping views and ocean breezes. Every space in the 3,175-square-foot, two-bedroom, three-bathroom home is designed to take in the beauty of the surrounding landscape, especially the large 1800 square foot covered porch and the home’s 150 feet of beachfront.

The porch has areas to dine, to socialize, to relax, to nap, all under cover with ceiling fans to enhance the natural ocean breezes.

The home’s two bedrooms—each with its own bathroom—are at opposite ends of the home; an outdoor shower outside the third bathroom provides a place to freshen up after an ocean swim.

The living, dining and kitchen, with soaring ceilings and bright white walls, sits in the center of the home and are open to that sea-facing veranda. It’s all very simple and clean and elegant and relaxing, and can be used as a private home, or as part of the resort on the island.

Residents can stay to themselves or enjoy access to the resort’s concierge services, culinary experiences—like wine-paired dining—and special events.

Personally, while I might enjoy a wine pairing feast, you’d have a hard time getting me off that porch to go anywhere.

Click to emBIGGERate ...

Dwell

Tulsa Race Massacre: We Can't Fix Racism If We Don't Learn From it

Years ago, in high school and later, in college, I wanted to be a history teacher. I have always been fascinated by history, and the fact that history repeats, especially where no lessons have been learned. But I wonder, how we can expect to learn anything from history when we aren’t, weren’t, and might not ever be, if the Republicans have their way, taught the full history of this country, the good, the bad, and the terribly ugly.

I took history classes in grade school, middle school, high school and many in college and not once, ever, did I hear the words ‘Tula Race Massacre.’ Not once. Oh, I learned about Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks and a few others, but I never heard of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, about Black Wall Street, about the murders of at least 300 Black Americans and destruction of what was, in fact, an entire thriving city.

But I have learned that the reason for this is that our history is written, at least for school textbooks, mostly by white people, who, perhaps through no fault of their own, never heard of Black Wall Street either. I only learned of the Tulsa Race Massacre last year … and only because the twice-impeached, one-term loser wanted to hold one of his super-spreader rallies in Tulsa on the anniversary of the massacre. I have, however, since then, read much about the massacre, and have seen several documentaries this past week as the 100th anniversary came and went.

And that makes me angry. I mean, I wasn’t brought up to think that I was better than anyone else, whether because I was male or white; I was brought up to believe we are all the same, even though we may look, love, or worship differently, or have different education or different socio-economic status. And I wonder if this stain on US history, which has gone silent in schools since it happened, I wonder that if it had been taught and discussed, would we have learned something new, changed our ways. Would we need a Black Lives Matter movement in 2021 if we knew what had happened to all those Black lives in 1921? And so, for anyone who doesn’t know about the Tulsa Race Massacre, let me tell you what I now know …

It began on May 31, 1921, when a Black teenager named Dick Rowland was working at a shoe-shine stand. His employer didn’t’ have a “colored” restroom, so Rowland walked down the block to the Drexel Building to take the elevator to the fourth floor and use the nearest “colored” bathroom. No one really knows what happened on that elevator—Rowland says it lurched and he bumped into the elevator operator—but at some point, the young white operator, Sarah Page, screamed and Rowland fled. The police were called, and Rowland was arrested the next morning for assault, code for rape.

During the day, white men began to gather around the courthouse where Rowland was being held, looking to lynch the teenager. Their numbers grew and grew and around 9PM a group of 25 armed Black men—including World War I veterans—arrived at the courthouse to make sure Rowland wouldn’t be turned over to the mob. The sheriff assured them that the young man would be safe, and turned them away, but as the mob of angry white men grew to over 1,500, later that night some 75-armed Black men returned to the courthouse, where they were met by the white men, many of whom were also armed. The sheriff again tried to persuade the Black men to leave the jail, assuring them that he had the situation under control, but then a shot was fired, and all hell broke loose, leaving 10 White men and two Black men dead.

The outnumbered group of Black men retreated to Greenwood and that was when the sheriff began to deputize those angry white men and provide them with firearms because there were rumors that Black people from neighboring towns were flooding into the city, but there is no evidence that this ever occurred.

What did happen was that this growing mob of angry white men poured into Greenwood on the morning of June 1, 1921, looting and burning homes and businesses over 35 square blocks. Police and firefighters arrived on scene, but did nothing to help, allegedly because rioters had threatened them with guns and forced them to leave.

And it wasn’t just white men with guns and torches and gas cans attacking Greenwood, eyewitnesses tell of airplanes carrying White assailants, who fired rifles and dropped firebombs on buildings, homes, and fleeing families. Law enforcement officials later said that the planes were to provide reconnaissance and protect against a "Negro uprising" even though it has been said that many in law enforcement were aboard at least some flights that torched Greenwood.

By the end of the day, more than 1,256 Black-owned homes were burned to the ground, with another 215 looted. In the downtown area, the two Black-owned newspapers, a school, a library, a hospital, several churches, hotels, stores and many other businesses were also destroyed. By the end of the day, Governor J. B. A. Robertson called out the National Guard and declared martial law, but the riot had effectively ended. Though guardsmen helped put out fires, they also imprisoned many Black Tulsans, and by June 2 some 6,000 people, all Black, were under armed guard at the local fairgrounds.

There were no convictions for any of the charges related to violence.

On June 3, 1921, over 1,000 businessmen and civic leaders met to form a committee to raise funds and aid in rebuilding Greenwood. Many Black families spent the winter of 1921–1922 in tents as they worked to rebuild. But then a group of influential White developers persuaded the city to pass a fire ordinance that would have prohibited many Black people from rebuilding in Greenwood. Their intention was to redevelop Greenwood for more business and industrial use and force Black Tulsans further to the edge of the. The case was litigated and appealed to the Oklahoma Supreme Court where it ruled unconstitutional but most of the promised funding was never raised for the Black residents, and they struggled to rebuild.

While the Oklahoma Bureau of Vital Statistics officially recorded 36 deaths, historians estimate the death toll may have been as high as 300. In 2001, the report of the Race Riot Commission—which has subsequently, more accurately, been renamed the Race Massacre Commission—concluded that between 100 and 300 people were killed and more than 10,000 people were left homeless over those 18 hours; property damage amounted to more than $1.5 million in real estate and $750,000 in personal property.

And yet we were never told about this because … many survivors left Tulsa, and those who stayed, both Black and White, kept silent about the terror and violence for decades, and the massacre was largely omitted from local, state and national histories. And for decades, there were no public ceremonies, no memorials for the dead or any efforts to commemorate the events of May 31-June 1, 1921. Instead, there was a deliberate effort to cover them up.

The Tulsa Tribune removed its own May 31st front-page story of the assault on a white girl by a “negro” that sparked the chaos from its bound volumes, and both police and state militia archives about the riot have gone missing as well.

Erased, Forgotten. Never taught in schools.

A bill in the Oklahoma State Senate requiring that all Oklahoma high schools teach the Tulsa Race Massacre failed to pass in 2012, with its opponents claiming schools were already teaching their students about the riot. It was not recognized in the Tulsa Tribune feature of "Fifteen Years Ago Today" or "Twenty-five Years Ago Today" and every year, on the anniversary of the massacre, no mention was ever printed in the local papers.  A 2017 report detailing the history of the Tulsa Fire Department from 1897 until 2017 makes no mention of the 1921 massacre.

In 1996, as the riot's 75th anniversary neared, the state legislature authorized an Oklahoma Commission to investigate the Tulsa Race Riot, by appointing individuals to prepare a report detailing an account of the riot. The commission had originally been called the "Tulsa Race Riot Commission", but in November 2018 the name was changed to "Tulsa Race Massacre Commission. A final report was delivered in February 2001, and recommended actions for substantial restitution to the Black residents, in the form of reparations to survivors and descendants of survivors; a scholarship fund available to students affected by the Tulsa race riot; establishment of an economic development zone in the Greenwood district; and a memorial for the reburial of the remains of the victims of the Tulsa race riot who had been placed in mass graves in a local cemetery and presumed to have been dumped into an area known as The Canes along the Arkansas River.

Lastly, in the hours after the Tulsa Race Massacre, all charges against Dick Rowland were dropped, with authorities having concluded that Rowland had accidentally stumbled into Page. Dick Rowland left Tulsa after his release and never returned.

It was all a misunderstanding that left many hundreds dead, many thousands homeless, and an entire city destroyed.

Oh, and before I go, I should also point out that I was never taught about the Slocum massacre of Black residents in Texas by an all-white mob in 1910 or the Red Summer of white supremacist terrorism in 1919.

How will we ever do better if we don’t learn from the past?

Tulsa Race Massacre

Slocum Massacre

Red Summer of 1919 

Home-o-Sexual

When we lived in Miami we lived under the thumb of an HOA [Homeowner’s Association]and it was brutal. Everything outside the fence, like the lawn, was the responsibility of the HOA, though we could do planting beds along the fence about two feet … and only two feet …wide, while everything behind the fence was ours and we could do whatever we wanted.

One year we had redone our courtyard patio at the front of the house and created a lovely path around the house to the backyard; it had a kind of Asian feel to it, and we noticed a neighbor had a new gate into his yard that looked Asian-inspired. And so we hired him to build a gate for us, and it turned out beautifully; we decided to paint the gate ed and I hired a woman who makes handmade tiles to do a tile mailbox for us. When it was all done, it was gorgeous … until the HOA told us we couldn’t have a red gate and that we needed to paint it the same color as the brown fence. We weren’t happy, but we did so, though we kept it red on the inside.

I loathe an HOA and we vowed to never live under one again, which brings me to this story …

A Reddit user, who lives in Wisconsin and goes by the username @memon17, posted about their Pride decoration in the subreddit MaliciousCompliance. In the post, they revealed that their HOA announced a new rule that allows homeowners to only fly the American flag on their properties, after some residents had put up Black Lives Matter flags, thin blue line flags to show police support and “other opinion flags”.

A day after the announcement, they received an email notifying them that someone had reported the Pride flag that they have displayed on their front porch since 2016, and that they needed to take it down; and so they did. But, after removing the flag, @memon17 looked through the new rules, only to discover that removable lights are permitted .. and so they purchased multi-colored lights to decorate their house in rainbow colors:

“We complied and removed the flag … [then] we bought six colored flood lights, and we washed our house in Pride colors. A little less subtle than our simple flag. A lot more fun for anyone complaining about the flag itself and what it represents.”

I think it looks gorgeous!

The clever bending of the rules has been met with hundreds of thousands of supportive comments, with many applauding the Reddit user for finding a way to show their support for the LGBTQ+ community and Pride month without a flag.

In a follow-up to the original post, the user added that they don’t hate their HOA, nor do they believe they changed the flag rule to “attack me personally,” but that they ultimately decided to decorate their home with rainbow-colored lights to “show [their] individuality while still following the rules”.

As for what they will do if their HOA updates the rule to also restrict lighting, the Reddit user joked that they would “have to paint the grass then.”

I’ll bring the paint.

Happy Pride.

Yahoo News

The Funny Papers

RJ Matson, Dave Whamond, Ed Wexler, Jack Ohman, Phil Hands, Clay Bennett, Nick Anderson, Michael de Adder, Matt Wuerker, David Horsey, Mike Luckovich, Ed Hall, Bill Bramhall, Adam Zyglis, Marc Murphy

I Ain'tOne To Gossip But ...

Rumor has it that Kim Kardastrophe is a billionaire, but money can’t buy you brains.

Kimmy, who has been studying to be a lawyer for some time now, has failed her baby bar exam in California and now her dreams of being a real-life lawyer might go up in flames … like her marriages.

Kim made it official on a preview of Keeping Up with the Kardastrophes, where she fessed up to flunking, but rumor has it that she failed the test months ago and saved the shame to air it on national TV.

Perhaps a little less time living your life for TV and more time actually studying, and you might pass next time.

Oh, who am I kidding …

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Another demon spawn who lives her life for social media is Kelly Osbourne—before on the left and after on the right—who took to Instagram to clap back at online haters who say she’s had plastic surgery:

“I just want to bring up a topic that you guys are all talking about, because I’m always really honest and really upfront about what I’ve done to my body, and who I am, and I have not had plastic surgery.”

Kelly, who did lose 85-pounds last year, insists  she has “never done anything to [her] face other than a couple of injections in [her] lips, in [her] jaw and in [her] forehead.”

So, every but plastic surgery.

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I guess when you really have nothing to do, you dredge up gossip about dead people? Amirite Quincy Jones?

In the first installment of The Hollywood Reporter’s Icon series of interviews, 88-year-old Jones says he refused to work with Elvis Presley because Elvis was “a racist mother…” and that he wouldn’t work with him:

“ I was writing for [orchestra leader] Tommy Dorsey, oh God, back then in the ’50s. And Elvis came in, and Tommy said, ‘I don’t want to play with him.’ He was a racist mother—I’m going to shut up now. But every time I saw Elvis, he was being coached by [“Don’t Be Cruel” songwriter] Otis Blackwell, telling him how to sing. “

Otis Blackwell told David Letterman in 1987 that he and Presley had never met. But that’s not the issue; Quincy Jones never explains why he thought Elvis was racist, just says it’s so. Now, yes, Elvis has left the building and so he cannot respond, but if you’re gonna call someone a racist you better have the tea to back it up.

Or else just sit there and be quiet.

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Is there anyone, anyone, on the planet thirstier than Jennifer Lopez?

Nope. I mean, we all know she and A-Rod broke up in January, got back together in February, split up in March, and now we find out she was with Ben Affleck in April … on the down low. Oh, not to look like she wasn't man-jumping, but because Bennifer 2.OMFG wanted to announce their reunification on Instagram before anyone knew about it because, you know, publicity.

But that plan fell apart when, just a couple of weeks after JLo called it quits with A-Rod, B-Fleck was spotted arriving at her LA home in her white Escalade where he stayed, behind closed doors, for more than a week because JLo ALLEGEDLY wanted to make the announcement that their once true love was true again on social media. But Ben ruined that by being seen behind the wheel of her car going to her house.

So plans were changed, and Bennifer 2.Oh-no-they-bettah-don’t was seen riding in a car at his place in Montana, then he was spotted on her balcony in Miami, and then, to top all that off, Ben began wearing the watch she gave him back when they were both relevant, and then packed away when they became irrelevant. Clearly, though, we are moments away from Bennifer 2.Oh-what-are-they-thinking PDA, because that’s how JLo rolls, and drags her men along with her.

True facts, though … no one knows how serious JLo and Ben are about each other, due to the fact that, as one source puts it, they’re two people who can’t ever be alone.

Sadly, the thirst is real.

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Miles Teller—whom I loathe even though I cannot think of one thing I’ve seen him and still I find him a smug prick—and his wife Keleigh Sperry went on a couple’s vacation to Hawaii with Aaron Rodgers and Shailene Woodley. And apparently Miles was punched in the face for stiffing a wedding planner of $60,000.

First things first, it wasn’t me …I wasn’t in Hawaii recently. But Miles and Keleigh are now giving their side of the story, and they are saying the attack wasn’t at all about being cheap self-entitled pricks, but that it was just a random beat up the smug prick in the bathroom kinda thing.

You see, Mr. and Mrs. Smug Prick were having dinner at Monkeypod Kitchen in Maui when Miles went to the bathroom and while in there, he was confronted by a dude who was mad at him for skipping out on that huge wedding planner bill and so the guy punched Miles in the face. Police were called and Miles, who wasn’t injured badly, vowed to press charges, but … afterwards, Keleigh told an Instagram Story to set the record straight and to defend herself and Mr. Smug Prick against the accusations that they’re entitled pricks who don’t pay their bills by claiming that Miles was not attacked over money and that two strangers jumped him in the bathroom and it’s happened before:

“The story reported about Miles being punched in the face by @TMZ over ‘MONEY’ is completely false. Miles was jumped by 2 men we have never met after they trapped him in a bathroom. It seems these same men have done this to many people and we appreciate your support Maui.  This is now a criminal investigation.”

But … gosh, this is as many buts as there are in a Keeping Up with the Kardastrophes episode … TMZ has updated their story and according to them, this was not a case of a random punching of a smug prick in a men’s room, because, ALLEGEDLY, one of Miles’ attackers is married to the woman who helped plan Miles and Keleigh’s Maui wedding in 2019 and was stiffed out of $60,000. And Tre Lovell, the lawyer for the wedding planner and her husband, told TMZ that the bathroom fight was over money:

“It is my understanding that the altercation was a dispute over money pertaining to the couple’s wedding. We are currently evaluating my clients’ legal claims that may exist surrounding the incident, statements made about the incident and the parties previous business dealings.”

Hopefully, Miles and the wedding planner’s husband will keep the fighting all the way to Judge Judy because she loves to smack down self-entitled smug pricks who don’t pay their bills; and she does it on TV and not the bathroom.

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I Didn't Say It

Billy Porter, on how he feels after revealing he is HIV+:

“I’ve been positive since 2007. And, you know, having lived through the AIDS crisis, it was heavy for me. It was a heavy year, 2007. “ I have to start in 2007. In June of that year, I was diagnosed HIV-positive. Having lived through the plague, my question was always, ‘Why was I spared? Why am I living?’ Well, I’m living so that I can tell the story. There’s a whole generation that was here, and I stand on their shoulders. I can be who I am in this space, at this time, because of the legacy that they left for me. So it’s time to put my big boy pants on and talk. I was the generation that was supposed to know better, and it happened anyway. It was 2007, the worst year of my life. “I was on the precipice of obscurity for about a decade or so, but 2007 was the worst of it. By February, I had been diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes. By March, I signed bankruptcy papers. And by June, I was diagnosed HIV-positive. The shame of that time compounded with the shame that had already [accumulated] in my life silenced me, and I have lived with that shame in silence for 14 years. I lived with the shame of it for a really long time and last week I released that shame, I released that trauma and I am a free man, honey! Free! I’ve never felt joy like this before. And, you know, we talk about it in the Black church. You know, this joy that I have—the world didn’t give and the world can’t take it away. I got it. I got some joy now. It really feels good, it really feels great.”

Once again, this proves that Silence = Death; that we are only as sick as our secrets, and we need not feel shame for a health condition, no matter what.

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Lil Nas X, honoring Sir Elton John with the Icon Award at the iHeartRadio Music Awards:

“To me, he’s a trailblazer who paved the way for people to live their lives freely and unapologetically. He’s inspired me and so many other people by just being himself, being larger than life, flashy and fearless, especially when he’s in front of that piano. On behalf of all the people around the world you have inspired, Thank you. Even if you didn’t need to be a role model, you are.”

And now Lil Nas is doing that same thing for the next generation of LGBTQ+ artists, especially those of color, who didn’t know before him that they could be out and loud and proud and successful.

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Andrew Wommack, faux-Christian, on putting a warning label on The Gays:

“Homosexuals have like a three times as much suicide [rate] as heterosexuals. And then you go into transgender and it just continues to go up. It’s a very destructive lifestyle. It’s 20 years less that a homosexual lives than a heterosexual. And you know, cigarettes take an average of seven years off your life. So homosexuality is three times worse than smoking. We outta put a label across their forehead, ‘this can be hazardous to your health.'”

First off, you dimwitted dumb fuck, if we die early because we’re gay who does the warning label help?

And if warning labels did help, perhaps God should slap one on your face as being a hypocrite and a liar and all kinds of stupid, and for spreading hate; all things far more dangerous that being gay.

Of note: Wommack claims to have he prayed away “the curse of mildew.” He says Jesus protects Christians from COVID by “turning off your virus receptors” and yet dozens of Wommack’s followers became infected with COVID at one of his own Bible retreats.

Lastly, Andrew Wommack says he knows COVID is “no big deal” because his wife and son were “raised from the dead.” But they are clearly brain dead.

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Kirstie Alley, Scientology loon and has-been actress, saying depression is not a mental illness:

“You aren’t really allowed to say this in the very liberal community because they think what you’re saying is stigmatizing mental illness. Well, this is what I’m here to say — I don’t think you’re mentally ill if you’re depressed. You know people say to me, ‘Well, you’re a Scientologist.’ I feel lucky that I’m a Scientologist. Because in Scientology what you do is you find out why you’re so screwed up. And you find out why are you depressed, there’s a reason people are depressed. The reason I don’t go to a psychiatrist is because in their bag are the drugs, that’s the main way they treat people.”

So, she uses Scientology as a psychiatrist but thinks psychiatry is a sham?

Kirstie needs to lay off the junk food because it’s rotted the part of her brain that Scientology hasn’t already ruined.

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Elliot Page, previously known as Ellen before coming out as transgender, on adopting a male identity at a very young age:

“All trans people are so different, and my story’s absolutely just my story. But yes, when I was a little kid, absolutely, 100%, I was a boy. I knew I was a boy when I was a toddler. I was writing fake love letters and signing them ‘Jason.’ Every little aspect of my life, that is who I was, who I am, and who I knew myself to be. I just couldn’t understand when I’d be told, ‘No, you’re not. No, you can’t be that when you’re older. You feel it. Now I’m finally getting myself back to feeling like who I am, and it’s so beautiful and extraordinary, and there’s a grief to it in a way. The most significant difference is that I’m really able to just exist. Just exist by myself, like be able to sit with myself. Not have some constant distraction, all these things that aren’t conscious or aren’t even overly overt. For the first time in, I don’t even know how long, [I am] really just being able to sit by myself, be on my own, be productive, and be creative. It’s such an oversimplification to say it this way, but I’m comfortable. I feel a significant difference in my ability to just exist—and not even just day to day, but moment to moment. This is the first time I’ve even felt really present with people, that I can be just really relaxed and not have an anxiety that’s always pulling. In terms of acting, I don’t think I quite know yet. I am just a lot more f****** comfortable and present, so it’s hard to imagine that that’s not affecting the work, because, really, being present’s ultimately what you’re going for—you’re just ultimately trying to crack open and be present and connect to the truth of a moment. So I’m imagining the more I get to embody who I am and exist in the body I want to exist in, there’ll be a difference.”

So many of us go into life and through life knowing who we are, even if we have to come to terms with it because it may not be the “norm,” but imagine a young trans kid? That’s a struggle for acceptance, not only from your friends and family and the world, but from yourself.

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Busy Philipps, actress, on teaching her mother about different pronouns after revealing her own daughter is non-binary:

“[My] mom is older and wants to understand the pronoun conversation more. I said to my mother, Here’s the deal: You don’t have to understand it.’ That’s how I feel about all human rights—you don’t have to understand it. You can choose to believe what you want, but you don’t get to have jurisdiction over anyone else’s body or belief system.”

You don’t have to understand why anyone would use they/them as their pronouns, but you cannot deny them their choices.

I mean, what does it hurt to use they/them? Who does it hurt? But then who does it hurt when you don’t?

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