One of the best family films I’ve ever seen and such a delight! If you have little ones take them to see this. It’s really such a treasure! (And if any of you all know where to find Nanny McPhee please ask her to come to our home! Really. How can we get ahold of her?)

Amor y luz,

Layla

Quality films are hard to come by. And they’re harder to come by when they’re genre flicks. “Nanny McPhee Returns” is such a delightful SURPRISE. Films of this caliber almost never find their way to multiplexes. The script is amusing, the acting (including that by the children) pitch perfect, and the heart and whimsy of the story is as moving and joyous as you can find.

The story is fairly simple. Isabel Green (Maggie Gyllenhaal) is a frazzled mother raising her three children — Norman, Megsie and Vincent — while her husband is away fighting some unspecified war (it appears to be 1940s England). Meanwhile, her brother-in-law, Phil (Rhys Ifans), is trying to convince her to sell the family farm so that he can pay off gambling debts. When Isabel’s bratty niece and nephew, Cyril and Celia (think Augustus Gloop and Veruca Salt), come to visit, she’s pushed over the edge, and that’s when magical, frightful, snaggle-toothed, warted-up, cruel-to-be-kind Nanny McPhee (Emma Thompson) descends to help get things in order.

This is nothing we haven’t seen before storywise, but the way it plays out is so charming and so full of childhood wonder, it would take an ogre to not fall under its spell with its belching birds and flying pigs (who also synchronize swim!). This harks back to classic live-action Disney films from the ’60s and ’70s (“Pollyanna,” “Freaky Friday” and, of course, “Mary Poppins”), films that fired the imagination of children and revived the imagination of adults. This pastoral England is the stuff of fairy tales, a place where magic is surprising but also just half a step out of the realm of possibility. You’re surprised there’s an elephant in your bed but, somehow, it also just makes sense. And despite the war and the strife, it’s utterly safe. And don’t we all need to feel that way sometimes, no matter our age?

Director Susanna White brings an effervescent lunacy to the proceedings without letting them devolve into idiocy. Thompson (who also exec produces) dexterously allows the family to take center stage while also retaining the spotlight herself. Gyllenhaal has never been so warm or so (seemingly) comfortable in her own skin, and her British accent is one of the best you’ll find by an American in film these days. The children are adorable without being too pretty or precocious, especially Eros Vlahos, who, as spoiled, supercilious cousin Cyril, brings nuanced hauteur to his pouting and pratfalls. And Ralph Fiennes in a one-scene cameo brings a stark reality to the proceedings, reminding us all that, despite the quaintness of rural England and the frivolity of seeing Dame Maggie Smith sit on a cow patty, there’s still a big, bad world out there. Which makes the haven Nanny McPhee furnishes that much more cherished.

Review by Brian Buss

DREAMER

Story Unfolded by Layla Rose Presant

Artwork Created by Lennon Presant

Layla and Lennon are creating together! Lennon is FIVE years-old and his first book is out!

Dreamer will gently encourage your child to turn their dreams into reality. The seeds of the story are inspired by music that we all know and love. Lennon’s illustrations, richly symbolic in their own right, complement and deepen the lyrical quality of the book. Dreamer comes with an interactive workbook for children and grown-ups to discuss dreams, reality and what it means to care and contribute.

Download for FREE at: http://www.lulu.com/product/file-download/dreamer/12110002

Happy 5th Birthday Lennon.

I love you so much.

xo,

Mommy

Amor y luz,
Layla

The following list of 100 open courseware projects are designed to offer readers access to supplementary materials for education. They are free (hence “open”) and available to anyone who has access to the Internet.

1. Berklee Shares http://www.berkleeshares.com/: Here you will find free music lessons that you can download, share and trade with your friends and fellow musicians. These lessons are all excerpts from their twelve-week, instructor-led, online courses.
2. Berkman Center for Internet & Society http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/: This center, located at Harvard University, has a number of online initiatives including the release of the H20courseware software as open source project material.
3. Carnegie Mellon http://oli.web.cmu.edu/openlearning/forstudents/freecourses: This college’s open learning initiative provides free learning materials for courses such as engineering statics, modern biology, French and physics. The materials provided enact instruction for an entire course in an online format.
4. Center for the Study of the Public Domain http://www.law.duke.edu/cspd/: The law department at Duke University has compiled an amazing resource for those interested in the realm of material – ideas, images, sounds, discoveries, facts, texts – unprotected by intellectual property rights and free for all to use or build upon. This is the most amazing of all the centers and program materials offered by Duke Law.
5. Columbia Interactive http://ci.columbia.edu/ci/: This is the gateway to selected electronic learning resources developed by Columbia University. Browse through courses listed from architecture to science and take advantage of their learning tools.
6. Harvard Medical School http://mycourses.med.harvard.edu/public/: Browse through hundreds of online resources offered by this open courseware initiative. You’ll discover everything from medical student handbooks to a number of resources under the “Virtual Patient” category.
7. London School of Economics and Political Science http://www2.lse.ac.uk/PublicEvents/eventsTranscripts.aspx: Listen to podcasts and watch videos of past events at LSE.
8. MIT http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/: MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) is recognized for innovation and discovery in many academic fields of study, and their open courseware project is considered a monumental feat in making all 1800 courses offered at MIT available online. This link takes you to their index of courses, which range from aeronautics and astronautics to writing and humanistic studies.
9. Project Gutenberg http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page: No list of open couseware projects would be complete without mention of this site. No matter which course you delve into, Project Gutenberg may have materials for you to use. There are, after all, over 27,000 free books available at this site and over 100,000 titles available at their partner, afilliate and resource sites.
10. Yale http://oyc.yale.edu/: “Open Yale” courses provide free and open access to a selection of introductory courses that reflect a liberal arts education. All lectures were recorded in the Yale College classroom and are available in video, audio, and text transcript format. Registration is not required and no course credit is available.

The driving force behind seduction, Prioleau says, is the seductress archetype, a mythic figure “incised in the human collective unconscious and resistant to change, despite fluctuations in sexual tastes and mores.” This archetype established itself very early in human history, during the 25,000 years in which our forebears channeled their religious impulses into goddess cults. Stone-age Venus figures, the snake goddesses of Crete, the Babylonian goddess Ishtar, and the Greek goddess Aphrodite are all incarnations of this archetype. And when a real-life seductress has her way with a man, it is often because the man is beguiled by the ancient archetypal figure embodied in the living woman.

Although the idea for this book, Prioleau says, came out of a college course on the “Seductress in Fiction,” it is not a fusty work of scholarship. She has positioned it as a how-to for aspiring mantraps, less crude than, say, The Rules, but informed by a similar ethos. For those who want “beaux at their bidding and the upper hand in sex,” she counsels, the “know-how is there for the taking.” You just have to analyze the female masters’ methods.

Prioleau is a funny writer and a thorough researcher, and I enjoyed her deft recounting of these exemplars’ lives. She divides her seductresses into six categories: “Belles Laides” (homely sirens), “Silver Foxes” (old sirens), “Machweiber” (sirens in politics), scholar-sirens, siren-artists, and siren-adventurers. I was most impressed by the Belles Laides, who, despite frightful looks, managed to rack up admirable conquests without assistance from a plastic surgeon. These notables include American philanthropist Isabella Stewart Gardener (with her “fisted-up simian face”), Second Empire courtesan La Pavia (“thick waisted and grim visaged), and early-twentieth-century French writer Colette (who “barreled around Paris in Grecian sandals like Hagar the Horrible with a bad perm”).

For Prioleau, seduction is about power, of which women, despite feminist breakthroughs, still don’t have enough. Men, she points out, continue to “hold the whip hand: They have numbers on their side (48 percent women to 43 percent men nationwide); they age better and cling like crotch crabs to their historic prerogatives of the initiative, double standard, promiscuity, mate trade-ins, domination, and domestic copouts.”

Seduction, however, is a way to even the score; it “riles and dismantles patriarchal domination.” In the thrall of seductresses, men can be made to do stupid things–such as, in the case of the Duke of Windsor, abdicating one’s throne for the cunning likes of Wallis Simpson. Often, men do even worse things when a seductress jilts them. Ernest Hemingway, for example, never recovered from being ditched by the sexually voracious, scholar-siren Martha Gellhorn. “He stalked and harassed her throughout Europe, once hysterically breaking into her bedroom with a bucket on his head,” Prioleau writes.

Prioleau has no patience with vamps who allow themselves to be mistreated by the men they have seduced. She calls such women “pseudoseductresses,” and has pointedly excluded them from her book. They include “the eaten and colonized Marilyn Monroe, the oft-dumped flunky Pamela Harriman, and such gofers to male geniuses as Alma Mahler.”

Despite the cleverness of Prioleau’s prose, and her positioning of the seductress as a figure of strength, her thesis was irksome. It was difficult to get beyond certain retrograde assumptions that she brought to her writing. She takes for granted that the whole world is heterosexual and that heterosexual liaisons come about through feminine conniving. Men who don’t respond to feminine wiles are somehow lesser; she calls them “siren-resistant, cryptogay, or scared.” She also shrugs off the bisexuality of some seductresses because the only relationships that matter are those between men and women. Colette’s significant six-year relationship with the Marquise de Belboeuf (known as Missy), for example, is not mentioned in the book; Prioleau dismisses it as an episode during which the French writer “experimented sexually and bisexually.”

Yet if one isn’t offended by Prioleau’s thesis–and doesn’t mind that her subjects’ lives are cut to fit that thesis–the book can be a lively read. And for aspiring manslayers, it will also be a source, no doubt, for some useful techniques.

Hello Lovely Reader!

Here’s a recent post I enjoyed on HBR. I like the part about taking a deep breath and asking yourself if, in the last hour, have you been the person that you would like to be.

This is the direct link if you’re hungry for more:

http://blogs.hbr.org/bregman/2010/06/a-ritual-to-help-you-keep-your.html

Enjoy!

Amor y luz,
Layla

A Ritual to Help You Keep Your Focus and Your Temper

John McCaffrey is a great guy. The CEO of a professional services firm, he’s been successful by any measure. He’s financially secure. He’s happily married with several children. He’s active in his religious community. He’s smart, well read, reasonable, and likable. He’s the kind of guy you’d enjoy talking with at a dinner party.

Then again, the other day, in anger, he threw a telephone across the room, nearly hitting someone.

“That’s not who I am,” he told me. And it’s true. I know him well and I’ve never seen him act anything like that way.

Now, throwing a telephone is pretty extreme. But, if you take it down a notch, John is not alone. Jane Pennelton is another incredibly successful leader in a different company — someone who I like and respect tremendously. She’s recently been receiving feedback that she’s rude, abrupt, uncommunicative, and harsh. When I discussed it with her she said the same thing: “That’s not who I am.”

John and Jane are mostly right. It’s not who they are. Usually, anyway. And it’s certainly not who they want to be.

But under the wrong conditions, it is who they are sometimes.

While most of us would resist the temptation to throw a phone, many of us still lose our tempers more easily than we’d like. This morning, I yelled at my kids for fighting with each other at the breakfast table. And then a little later, I was on the line with an AT&T representative, and after 45 minutes of getting nowhere, I lost it again.

Anger isn’t the only problem. We blow people off. Don’t return phone calls. Don’t pay attention when they’re telling us something important. Many of us, at times, act in ways we don’t like and don’t recognize as ourselves.

And I think I’ve figured out what’s causing it: we’re overwhelmed.

We have too much to do and not enough time to do it, which results in two problems:

1. Things fall through the cracks. We don’t answer all our emails. We don’t return all our calls. We don’t really listen. And this insults and disappoints others.
2. We live in a constant state of dissatisfaction. We feel ineffective and insufficient. And so we disappoint ourselves.

In both cases our tempers get short. There’s nothing more frustrating than having good intentions and not living up to them. It feels unjust. Like a child who spills something and then cries, “But I didn’t mean to do it,” we don’t mean to be mean. But we lose all tolerance for anything that slows us down. Or that makes demands on us that we can’t fulfill. And we get angry at others for our own feelings of inadequacy.

I wasn’t angry at the AT&T guy for wasting my 45 minutes. I was angry at myself for having stayed on the call that long. And I wasn’t angry at my kids for fighting as much as I was overwhelmed with cooking waffles and pancakes and oatmeal and setting the table and getting the syrup and the orange juice and making a nice breakfast. But I was so intent on making a nice breakfast that I ruined it.

Managing our time better, doing less, and resisting the temptation of multitasking are all good — and important — long-term solutions. But we need something more. We need a discipline — a ritual — that can help us stay centered and grounded throughout the day. We need something to remind us who we really are and who we want to be.

For me, that something is a beep.

In An 18-Minute Plan for Managing Your Day, I suggested setting a watch, phone, or computer to ring every hour and at the sound of the chime, taking one minute to ask yourself if the last hour had been productive. Then, during that pause, deliberately committing to how you are going to use the next hour. It’s a way to keep yourself focused on doing what you committed to doing.

But there’s another way to use that minute as well. Take that deep breath and ask yourself if, in the last hour, you’ve been the person you want to be. And then, during that pause, deliberately recommit — not just to what you are going to do but also to who you are going to be during the next hour. It’s a way of staying recognizable to yourself. And to others.

If we’re going to reverse the momentum, we need an interruption. When I yelled at my kids I immediately regretted it, which interrupted my self-defeating behavior. That interruption was all I needed to remind myself that I was not that kind of father. I stopped everything I was doing, sat and held them, and apologized for raising my voice.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the interruption were a chime rather than a yell? And if it came before I lost my temper?

But, most likely, your chime won’t come at exactly the right time. How many of us lose it exactly on the hour?

It doesn’t matter. Losing control, becoming someone you’re not, happens over time. It builds throughout several hours. That once-an-hour reminder, that one deep breath, that question about who you want to be, keeps you stable. It keeps you you.

Ask yourself if you’re trying to accomplish too much or focusing on the wrong things. In other words, disrupt the source that destabilizes you. Reduce your feeling of being overwhelmed. Reconnect with the outcome you’re trying to achieve, not just the things you’re doing. Then you’ll react less and achieve more.

When John threw the phone he immediately regretted it. And he’s still working to make up for it. Because, unfortunately, one dramatic disruptive act outside the norm quickly becomes a story that defines the norm.

There is a way to change that story, but it’s not dramatic. It’s deliberate and steady, and it takes time.

We need to remind ourselves who we really are, and then we need to act that way. Consistently, predictably, minute by minute and hour by hour.

Peter Bregman speaks, writes, and consults on leadership. He is the CEO of Bregman Partners, Inc., a global management consulting firm, and the author of Point B: A Short Guide To Leading a Big Change.

Read this book so you don’t hit the PATRON and end up tagged on Facebook! The powerful practices are actually useful and you will begin to experience a shift immediately. Cross my heart.  “If this is life, I’ll take Tequila!” is available in print and as a FREE eBook right now.

For the computer challenged (Mom) click on the button that says BUY NOW. You will be prompted to select either a PRINT copy that you pay for (you can use it to rest your drink on!) or DOWNLOAD a copy for FREE!

If the button is not working click use this link:

http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/if-this-is-life-ill-take-tequila/8409683

Be excellent to each other!!!
Layla

LOVE. LOVE. LOVE.

I saw these guys driving around in their black truck covered in skulls and bumper stickers and THEY REALLY DO ROCK! Next time you need to move use them instead of a regular lame moving company.

“The vision of REAL Rock ‘n Roll is to have a company that provides quality services to the L.A. community while also providing flexible employment opportunities to the hardworking musicians of Los Angeles. As a musician himself, Owner/Operator Scott Quist has an appreciation for the struggles any musician faces in regards to maintaining an income while pursuing a career in music. The goal is to help those musicians who have a good work ethic but can’t maintain a regular work schedule due to touring, recording sessions and so on. We provide them with a chance to make some extra cash to help keep the RnR dream alive. Anyone who uses the RRnR services can know they will get quality, friendly, reasonably priced service and are also helping artists support themselves. When it comes down to it…Everybody wins!”

2 Rockers and a Truck = $75 per hour – 2 hour minimum

$30 per hour for each additional Rocker

Go ahead and give them a shout! REAL Rock ‘n Roll really does ROCK!!!

http://realrocknrollmovers.com/

Movers@realrocknroll.com

Phone #: 323-254-ROCK

Amor y luz,

Layla

Bebe Buell And Stiv Bators At Fiorucci's 1978

I JUST FINISHED THE MOST AMAZING INTERVIEW WITH OUR MAY 2010 REVOLUTIONARY MAMA OF THE MONTH MISS. BEBE BUELL!!!! You may know the lovely Miss. Buell as fashion model, singer (her new album SUGAR rocks!), Playmate of the Month, perhaps? Oh! She’s also known for dating and marrying rock musicians and happens to be the Revolutionary Mama of Liv Tyler!

Our interview has just been posted! Click on Revolutionary Mama of the Month (above).

An unexpected collaboration between the leader of the mythic band Talking Heads and DJ Fat Boy Slim, “Here Lies Love” is a disco-pop opera on the life of Imelda Marcos, wife of the Filipino dictator. Special limited edition box set with a double CD, a book of 126 pages and a DVD with videos of the project.

•••
David Byrne – Concept, lyrics & music
•
With Musical Contributions by Fatboy Slim
•
Original production for “Here Lies Love, A Song Cycle”
developed with Marianne Weems
•••

Here Lies Love – A Song Cycle deals with the life of Imelda Marcos, co-ruler of the Philippines in the 70s and 80s, as well as the life of Estrella Cumpas, the woman who raised her.

Through a series of songs written by David Byrne, with musical contributions from Fatboy Slim (Norman Cook), Here Lies Love – A Song Cycle presents Imelda Marcos meditating on events in her life, from her childhood spent in poverty and her rise to power to her ultimate departure from the palace. In particular, the production looks at the relationship between Imelda and a servant from her childhood, Estrella Cumpas, who appeared at key moments in Imelda’s life.

Something fun. Unexpected. Why not shake it up a little? It’s on Amazon if you want it.

Amor y luz,

Layla

HP presents its new Mini PC, in collaboration with New-York designer Vivienne Tam . Inspired by the Chinese love story “Butterfly Lovers” which was behind the designer’s 2010 Spring/Summer collection. This new collection evokes nature, romanticism and inspiration! If you’re a design person, you won’t believe your eyes, and if you’re a sound person, you won’t believe your ears thanks to an audio system built in collaboration with BeatsTM by Dr Dre TM.

Yours for only $450.00. I think I might ditch my Mac for this one. It’s really pretty, right?

Amor y luz,
Layla

The Fahey/Klein Gallery is pleased to present Jazz Giants, the mural-sized photographs by Herman Leonard. This exhibition is a photographic journey through the golden years of the Jazz, Blues and Bebop eras that documents the larger-than-life legends that comprise the visual album of America’s music. Focusing on the life and times of famed artists such as Billie Holiday, Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk among countless others, this exhibition features a selection from Leonard’s extensive photographic history.

Little ones.

Despite the devastating loss of his New Orleans home, studio, and darkroom in the wake of the 2005 Hurricane Katrina disaster, Leonard’s definitive archive, as well as his spirit, remain strong. Though over 6,000 of Leonard’s original photographs along with many of his exposure records were lost in the hurricane, Leonard, at the age of 83, continues to shoot, develop and exhibit his comprehensive archive. Timeless and true, Herman Leonard’s photographs continue to serve as the iconic portals into Jazz’s rich culture.

Using a unique lighting approach, Leonard’s signature “backlighting” style gives his portraits a dramatic quality that is highly humanistic, capturing the illuminating personalities behind the music. Regarding his technique Leonard has said, “I wanted to do with light what artists do with a line sketch, show the whole character” (Departures, 2006). Using elements such as smoke and strobe lighting, Leonard undoubtedly presents his subjects in a softer ambiance, allowing each personality to shine beyond his/her stage personality. Leonard’s rare ability to connect with his subjects-from Charlie Parker to Miles Davis-made him a much-loved and welcomed figure among Jazz’s musicians, giving Leonard the permission to pervade and interpersonally document the Jazz scene from the 1940s through today.

“The musicians appreciated his discretion, his respect for their work, and it is from their complicity-an unchanging aspect of his style-that his images derive their originality. These unprecedented documents radiate the musicians’ humour and philosophy, but also their emotions, melancholy or delight. It would be tempting to say that Herman is revealing the soul of the jazzmen to us” (Francis Paudras, Jazz Memories).

Herman Leonard was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1923. Discovering the camera at the age of 11, Leonard began his career by photographing friends in school. As a teenager, Leonard discovered that the camera could grant him access into many concert venues. Leonard attended Ohio University to pursue a bachelor’s degree in photography–a relatively new course of study in the 1940s. In 1943, World War II interrupted his studies and Leonard joined the Army Medical Corps in Burma, but continued his affair with the camera, developing film late at night in his combat helmet.

Lennon and friends.

After the war, Leonard continued his coursework and graduated in 1947. Undergoing a series of projects throughout his early years, Herman Leonard studied under Canadian portraiture photographer Yousuf Karsh for a year which granted Leonard the invaluable opportunity to photograph the likes of Albert Einstein, Harry S. Truman and Clark Gable among others. In the 1950s, Leonard became the personal photographer to Marlon Brando and later moved to Paris where he worked fashion and advertising jobs for magazines such as Playboy, Life, and Time.

Most recently, Herman Leonard was honored by the Smithsonian Institution by housing his entire collection in the permanent archives of musical history.

SUCH A GREAT NIGHT! SO MUCH FUN!! We heart Herman Leonard!

AMOR Y LUZ,

LAYLA

Love.

Lennon with the valet ticket at the end of the night. Something for the baby book, right?