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Canongate
@canongatebooks 5 years, 8 months ago 834 views

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I’m going to tell you a story. And hold tight, because this is an emotional one.

In 2013, Canongate republished three novels that had fallen out of print: William McIlvanney’s Glasgow-set Laidlaw trilogy, first published between 1977 and 1991.

It’s hard to overstate the influence these books had had on crime writing, but he was responsible for many of the tropes we now take for granted in that genre. @Beathhigh, @valmcdermid, @cbrookmyre, @MarkBillingham, @DameDeniseMina and others all cite him as a major inspiration.

In fact, @Beathhigh tells a lovely story about coming to one of Willie’s events in the 80s, and telling him he planned to write detective fiction like Laidlaw, but set in Edinburgh. He still has his book, inscribed “Good luck with the Edinburgh Laidlaw” and signed by Willie.

McIlvanney wasn’t just revered for his writing; he was also known for his humour, his graciousness, and his charm. I was lucky enough to work with him, and attest to the fact he was a proper old-school gentleman. I mean, just look at this photo. How could you not love him?

His novels are infused with a love of the city and language of Glasgow, the characters all multilayered and complex. Even his descriptions of weather are glorious: ‘A Glasgow sun was out, duly luminous, an eye with cataract’.

Willie passed away 5 years ago today. Having believed for years he’d been forgotten, in that period of two years after republication he was left in absolutely no doubt how revered he was by the crime writing community, and the writing world at large. It moved him hugely.

And, it turns out, it also inspired him. Because, when he passed away, he had started writing a new Laidlaw book for the first time in decades: the story of Laidlaw’s first ever case. Sadly it was left unfinished...but we knew exactly who McIlvanney would have entrusted it to.

So today, we are delighted, excited and not a little emotional to announce the upcoming 2021 publication of The Dark Remains, co-authored by William McIlvanney and Ian Rankin. https://t.co/7qZhj39DRx

This is a dream pairing and, as Willie’s partner Siobhan comments in the Guardian piece, it’s what Willie would have wanted. We think Ian has done him proud.

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$Kat \u26c4$

Kat ⛄
@kittywifclaws

@antifaBubba Once there was an angry dwarf. His family had died in a bad accident in town and he wanted retribution. The king was the one who ordered the transport of the gold, the gold carried by the horses that ran over his family. So at night he sharpened his axe and waited...

But the king never came to his town and maintaining his home with his job in the mines took a lot so he was never sure how to get to the king at all, much less get his vengeance. He sat long nights by the fire drinking meade and thinking how to get out...

One day the tax man appeared at the town, and took almost everything he had for the king. It was enough. He slashed his way through the caravan, emptying the money onto the road. But it was not enough, so he donned the robes of the tax man and headed to the king...

A dwarf in the king's court would be noticed, and he was unsure about shaving off his beard, but revenge is a dangerous game, so in a river on the way he shaved himself and worked on his child like voice. He would become a squire, or something, get close. He had to...

Years passed, he infiltrated the court as a jester, quietly working in the background making friends in the dark alleys of the king's home. So many were unhappy. He would not have to wait long. He sowed dissent where it wasn't, and fostered the anger of those like him...

Jesse Pujji
@jspujji

Bootstrapped entrepreneurs always have the last laugh.

A son of Iranian immigrants turned a single LA retail store into a $1,000,000,000+ ecommerce giant.

All with $0.00 in funding

Here’s the story 👇🏽👇🏽👇🏽

1/ Richard Saghian was born in 1982.

His family was a minority group of Jewish-Iranians who fled during the revolution.

After moving to America, they got into women’s fashion retail.

In 2006, Richard followed in their footsteps…

2/ He started his own store. His idea was simple: affordable, unique clothes to wear to the club.

His goal was to open 100, but he stopped at 5.

Early on, he had the idea of opening up an internet store...

3/ The web dev he hired quickly talked him out of it, “where will you get traffic?” was a question Richard couldn’t answer.

After a few years, the retail stores were going nowhere…

4/ In 2013, Richard noticed several stores online selling the same clothes for over twice what he charged.

He created an Instagram account, took some of his best selling styles and started posting them every day.

At first, crickets.

But then, something magical happened…

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Rachel Alter, MPH
@RachelAlter007

Good morning I want to tell you a story

Once upon a time I spent all week getting ridiculous messages from men calling me their "little friend," telling me they got publicly humiliated by their girlfriend in front of a girl they thought was me, telling me I was disrespectful...

...to a man named Aubrey Huff for responding to a tweet that literally said all old and fat people should just die, calling me "beautifull..."

yada yada yada men are trash. We know that.

But then

Then it seemed my fortune was about to change.

Enter mommyheather.

mommyheather seemed like the kind of woman you want around. She didn't want naked photos, she just wanted to talk.

Hey, it's a pandemic. We're all a little bored.

Early on, I thought I blew it. I was too enthusiastic about this covid vaccine....

Mrs. Salley
@DaRealMrsSalley

How I came to play the bagpipes

A story... and a thread

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Melodie. She liked music. In fact, she liked music so much that she made it her job! She connected with many people because of her abilities, and had many opportunities to obtain, play with, and try out many different instruments.

When Melodie was very young, she began collecting musical instruments. A flute here, a clarinet there, six trombones here, an accordion there, and the list goes on and on. As she got older, her collection grew. She got married, and her husband had his own collection as well.

Melodie developed many unlikely friends. Her personality was such that she could make friends with and talk to almost anyone. One day she made friends with a boy who played the bagpipes. He told her many wonderful stories of highland games and competitions. This did two things,

First of all, it made Melodie question whether or not the "mutt" of her father's heritage was at all Scottish in origin, but it also made her consider what playing the bagpipes must be like. Her studies led her to search for her genealogy.

Annie Gabston-Howell-
@AnnieGabstonH

On #CaturdayEve , I was thinking about telling the heartwarming story of the eye-patched curmudgeon who sits around working with a silly sword on his wall and an even sillier cat on his hat.

I doubt anyone would believe it, though. What do you think? Should I try it?

I met the old guy back when he was much younger, over 25 years ago now.

I didn't know then that he was permanent. He was sort of a stray, that I made the mistake of letting in my house and feeding.

You know how that sort of thing goes, right?

I mean, my kid liked him and he showed every indication of wanting to stick around. Next thing I knew, it wasn't just him, but his three kids, too.

Kind of nice actually.

I'm still not certain how it happened, but two more kids showed up. They looked sort of like him and sort of like me. Definitely weird, but they were cute and I let them stay, too.

But then the cats started arriving.

The first time it happened, it seemed reasonable and temporary.

The man came in, soaked from the rain, hunched over and cradling something in his cupped palms.

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IRCTC 100% Market share in Rail Network.

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SK
@sk_diary1

A #story from #Thiruvilayadal puranam-one of divine leelas of Bhagwan Shiva

#threadseries #Madurai

Story 16- it is about how Bhagwan Shiva explained the meaning of Vedas to the Rishis.

வேதத்துக்குப் பொருள் அருளிச் செய்த படலம்

Once there was a great deluge,everything in the world was destroyed.All lifeforms that existed got perished.Afterwards ,due to Bhagwan Shiva creation started.Then from Bhagwan Shiv ji's mouth-birth of 🕉 OM- Pranavam happened.From Pranavam,4 vedas appeared. Rishis learned them.

Many Rishis in Naimisharanya learned Vedas&recited them but they didn't understand the meaning&essence of Vedas. They were worried as they couldn't find any guru who can teach them the meaning of Vedas.That time,Rishi Arabhatar visited them.Rishis told him about need their worry.

Rishi Arabhatar told them that Bhagwan Shiva has given Vedas &he would be grateful enough to teach the meaning as well.But for that rishis have to rigorous penance at a sacred place.Also told them to go to Sundareswarar temple in Madurai to do tapas in front of Dakshinamurthy.

Assured them that Dakshinamurthy himself will come & teach them.Rishis proceeded to Madurai & started their tapas in front of Dakshinamurthy sannidhi for almost a year starting from Karthigai month pournami to next year Karthigai month pournami following all rituals..annadan

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$Anu Satheesh \U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3$

Anu Satheesh 🇮🇳...
@AnuSatheesh5

Magudeswarar Temple, Kodumudi
#Erode
#Tamilnadutemples 🚩

Situated on the banks of the river Kaveri, Magudeswarar Temple is one among Paadal Petra Shiva Sthalam. Kshetram is famous Parihara Sthala for Naga Dosham and for performing Tarpanam to the departed souls.

There are 3 sannidhi here for Paramashiva, Mahavishnu and Brahma Deva.

Sthala Puranam says that once Adisesha and Vayu Deva placed Meru parvat at the centre to decide who is stronger among them. Parvatam was held tightly by Adisesha and Vayu blew the wind to push Parvatham.

In this struggle, peak of meru parvatham broke into 7 pieces and fell in different places as precious gems. Diamond fell at Kodumudi as Magudeswarar. Panchamirtham abhishekam is very famous here. Vanni tree situated here is very old which contains medicinal values.

It is believed that Agasthiya Muni did Prathishta of Shiva Lingam here. As Adisesha is one of the reason for creation of the temple, this is famous Parihara Sthalam for Naga Dosham. It is believed that those who

who take a bath in the river Kaveri and worship paramashiva and mahavishnu, will be cured of diseases and will get relief from all illness.

Om Namah Shivaye
Om Namo Narayanaya
🙏🕉🙏

Nicolas
@necolas

A brief analysis and comparison of the CSS for Twitter's PWA vs Twitter's legacy desktop website. The difference is dramatic and I'll touch on some reasons why.

Legacy site *downloads* ~630 KB CSS per theme and writing direction.

6,769 rules
9,252 selectors
16.7k declarations
3,370 unique declarations
44 media queries
36 unique colors
50 unique background colors
46 unique font sizes
39 unique z-indices

https://t.co/qyl4Bt1i5x

PWA *incrementally generates* ~30 KB CSS that handles all themes and writing directions.

735 rules
740 selectors
757 declarations
730 unique declarations
0 media queries
11 unique colors
32 unique background colors
15 unique font sizes
7 unique z-indices

https://t.co/w7oNG5KUkJ

The legacy site's CSS is what happens when hundreds of people directly write CSS over many years. Specificity wars, redundancy, a house of cards that can't be fixed. The result is extremely inefficient and error-prone styling that punishes users and developers.

The PWA's CSS is generated on-demand by a JS framework that manages styles and outputs "atomic CSS". The framework can enforce strict constraints and perform optimisations, which is why the CSS is so much smaller and safer. Style conflicts and unbounded CSS growth are avoided.

Noah Smith
@Noahpinion

1/OK, data mystery time.

This New York Times feature shows China with a Gini Index of less than 30, which would make it more equal than Canada, France, or the Netherlands. https://t.co/g3Sv6DZTDE

That's weird. Income inequality in China is legendary.

Let's check this number.

2/The New York Times cites the World Bank's recent report, "Fair Progress? Economic Mobility across Generations Around the World".

The report is available here:

3/The World Bank report has a graph in which it appears to show the same value for China's Gini - under 0.3.

The graph cites the World Development Indicators as its source for the income inequality data.

4/The World Development Indicators are available at the World Bank's website.

Here's the Gini index: https://t.co/MvylQzpX6A

It looks as if the latest estimate for China's Gini is 42.2.

That estimate is from 2012.

5/A Gini of 42.2 would put China in the same neighborhood as the U.S., whose Gini was estimated at 41 in 2013.

I can't find the <30 number anywhere. The only other estimate in the tables for China is from 2008, when it was estimated at 42.8.