The Mammalian Daily

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Lovely to look at - Book by Noreen

Archives for August 2015

Don’t forget: Park ART Walk’s “Art Against All Odds” is on tomorrow

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PAW logoThe organizers request the honour of your presence at the following event:

Park ART Walk
Saturday, August 15, 2015
10:00 am – 7:00 pm

Entitled, “Art Against All Odds,” the 2015 Park ART Walk will focus on the art of The Park’s endangered species. The organizers of PAW 2015 wish to thank its partner and collaborator, the Extinction Anxiety Clinic, for its support.

The Park ART Walk is a one-day, juried art exhibition that showcases the artistic expression of Park residents. Showings will take place at participating art galleries, shops, theatres and cinemas. This year’s jury will include curators from the Park Museum of Contemporary Art and the Tortoiseshell Gallery.

————————————————————————————-

The Park ART Walk wishes to thank its sponsors:

         
  The Nut Bar       LeTwiggery     Amoltrud’s Aesthetics

       Department of Holidays, Festivals, and Celebrations

 

FF
 Founding Families Financial Corporation
ASCCBAll Species Credit and Commercial Bank
  The Tabby Club
You’ve Earned Your Stripes™

Park Museum, ISML end feud over ownership of beloved tome

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Park Museum

The Park Museum will host a permanent display of The AutoZOËography of ZoëCat

The Park Museum and the Institute for the Study of Mammalian Life (ISML) have ended their long battle over the establishment of a permanent home for one of The Park’s most iconic literary works.[pullquote]The citizens of The Park deserve to be able to visit the work in the building that was constructed to house our history.—Sakura Rhinoceros, member of the Board of Governors, The Park Museum[/pullquote]

The AutoZOËography of ZoëCat has been housed in a protected display in the lobby of the ISML since it was recovered in 2013 by workers excavating at the site of what is now The Park Museum. It had previously been displayed at the front of the Ancient, Open-Air Theatre, until a storm toppled the display and it went missing.

Because the excavators brought their precious find to the Institute for verification, the ISML decided to keep the beloved Park tome and to display it in the Institute’s lobby. Early last year, however, as The Park Museum neared completion, its Board of Governors initiated a series of meetings with the ISML aimed at convincing them that the museum was the only logical place to house the AutoZOËography on a permanent basis.

“Every one of the 6,975 pages of her book is a part of Park history and the citizens of The Park deserve to be able to visit the work in the building that was constructed to house our history,”  Sukuta Rhinoceros, one of the founders of the Museum and a member of its Board, said at the time.

The ISML held fast to its view that it had the sole right to display the work until last week, when the two institutions came to a “joint custody” agreement.

“We are happy to report that both The Park Museum and the Institute for the Study of Mammalian Life have agreed to act as joint official custodians of The AutoZOËography of ZoëCat, one of the most important works in Park history,” said a press release issued today by both institutions.

The agreement, which will be signed next week, names The Park Museum as the book’s official home, but allows it to be moved to the ISML for one month every Winter for the purpose of display and study. Throughout the other eleven months, the ISML will display a facsimile in the space that it built for the book two years ago.

According to sources close to both institutions, the agreement was hammered out late Sunday night, with the assistance of the Park Historical Society and members of a number of faculties and departments at the University of West Terrier.

“All parties are pleased with this agreement and we plan to move forward with the logistics as soon as possible,” the press release says.

The Park Museum’s press release may be read here.

Fur flies at UWT journalism conference

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UWT COATThe fur was flying this past weekend as The University of West Terrier’s Cuthbert School of Journalism hosted the largest print media conference in Park history.

Virtually all print media organizations and associations were represented at the conference, which was jointly chaired by the Cuthbert School’s dean, Gertrude C. Owl, and journalism professor Ludwiga Saimiri, the former director of the Centre for the Incorporation and Integration of Interspecial Values in Journalism (CIIIVJ).

Attendees pinpointed a baker’s dozen of hot button issues, ranging from ensuring fair coverage, recognizing equality of species, maintaining journalistic integrity, and finding new tools for recruiting the young, to financial issues, opening up new revenue streams, and more. But most agreed that the number one issue at this year’s conference was transparency. And, in that respect, The Mammalian Daily came in for some heavy criticism, particularly from the Association of Non-Mammalian Park Newspapers (ANMPN).

Nathan R. DiPressa, Editor-in-Chief of The Reptile Register and the Association’s Executive Director, spoke at length about the need for Park newspapers to be transparent in their coverage and asserted that certain major outlets had failed miserably in that regard. As an example, he cited The Mammalian Daily, whose reporters have been working, as he called it, “undercover in plain sight.”

“The era of anonymous reporting is over,” DiPressa declared. “If you are hiding your journalists’ identities, you are hiding their biases, and you are not being forthright with your readers. We can smell your fear [of transparency] and it is turning us off reading your newspaper,” he declared.

Priscilla Weevil, Editor-in-Chief of The Serangga Star Adviser, not only agreed with DiPressa, but went further by issuing a challenge to The Mammalian Daily:

“We call on you to open up and start including the names of your reporters in your bylines by the beginning of 2016. We can think of no valid reason to obscure them.”

Although Mammalian Daily managing editor Orphea Haas was in attendance, she declined to comment on the accusations, nor has she given any indication that she will consider adding names to TMD bylines.

The conference wrapped up late Sunday night with a celebratory dinner at which both Owl and Saimiri spoke candidly about the practice of journalism in The Park.

“This has never been an easy profession and it is not an easy one now, but I know no journalist who would not say that the rewards far outweigh the challenges,” said Saimiri.

PMoCA offers sneak peek at its new exhibition, “Art of the Domestic Feline”

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The Park Museum of Contemporary Art (PMoCA) offered the public a sneak peek at its new exhibition, “Art of the Domestic Feline” today in the above slide show.

The museum will host a gala this evening. The exhibition will open tomorrow.

Majority of new Park jobs are in field of security, law: Department of Statistics

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Clam Security Guard

The majority of new Park jobs are in security and law, statistics say

The majority of The Park’s newly-created jobs lie in the fields of security and law, says a new report released today by the Department of Statistics and Records.[pullquote]These types of service jobs–parapolicing, for example—are creating a false impression that life in The Park is dangerous. That impression could become a destabilizing force and…lead to the need for these jobs.—Dr. Anneliese Cissa, Livingstone School of Economics and Social Science, UWT[/pullquote]

The report, which is known as, “Statistics Related to Job Creation in The Park: 2014,” is the latest in a series of reports that have been commissioned annually since 2007 by the sitting Archons.

The state of employment as depicted in the report is troubling in many ways, says Dr. Anneliese Cissa, head of the Livingstone School of Economics and Social Science at the University of West Terrier. Dr. Cissa, who has written extensively about the Park’s economy and its effect on employment, says this latest report shows concrete evidence that we are “spinning” in terms of high level job creation.

“This report shows that The Park is not just failing to generate new, high level jobs; it is still creating too high a number of service jobs. But even more than that, these types of service jobs–parapolicing, for example—are creating a false impression that life in The Park is dangerous. That impression could become a destabilizing force and could, in turn, lead to the need for these jobs,” she says.

According to Dr. Cissa, nothing has changed significantly since she wrote the report, “Seeking Greener Pastures: The Exodus of the Unwilling and Able,” in 2012. At that time, she warned that The Park was not generating sufficient jobs to keep the skilled and most diligent among us from leaving to seek employment elsewhere. Now, she says, the situation has become even more dire.

“We must allocate funds in the new budget for high level job creation. Otherwise, we will have nothing of substance to offer our young.”

PIFF 2015 sneak peek: Noon Nuttiness

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Park Interspecial Film FestivalThe Park Interspecial Film Festival (PIFF) may be many weeks away, but today, at least, we got a sneak peek at what’s going to tickle our funny bones come October.

At a short press conference this morning, PIFF Communications President Leola Ocelot announced three of the films that will screen during the Noon Nuttiness portion of PIFF 2015:

SEARCHING FOR THE SPITMAN: A JOURNEY THROUGH FOAM, FROTH, AND FUN
Directed by Ernesto Santiago Camello
The Park | 23 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

We’re all familiar with our friend Stan the Spitman’s signature phrase, “Spitballs from Heaven!” Yet how much do we know about the Spitman, himself?

Not a lot, as it turns out. But writer and director Ernesto Santiago Camello has set out to change all that in this alarmingly candid short film about one of The Park’s funniest citizens engaged in one of the world’s oldest professions: spitmaking.

WOODRUFF DALMATIO: FINE LINES AND WRINKLES
Directed by Ludmilla Ptak
The Park | 26 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

Not just a hastily put together version of his award-winning book of the same name, but a film that shows the outrageous Dalmatio at work and at play, which for him appears to be the same thing.

NOT FOR POLITICAL PORPOISES
Directed by Cong Da Jiāngtún
The Park | 35 minutes | Noon Nuttiness Première

It takes a certain kind of mind to create humour out of adversity, and there’s no doubt Cong Da Jiāngtún has it.

Jiāngtún, whose own species is endangered, has written and directed this “tour of the everyday life of the almost extinct.”

“Life on the out and out,” he says in the film, “can be extraordinarily amusing.”

The Park Interspecial Film Festival runs 1-5 October 2015.

Glass shape made of nuts with strawNoon Nuttiness gratefully acknowledges the support of The Nut Bar, the most trusted nut shop in The Park.

UWT to investigate allegations of unethical experimentation on Humans

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UWT COATBREAKING NEWS

The University of West Terrier announced today that it has initiated an investigation into allegations of unethical experimentation on Humans.

The announcement came in a statement signed by the President and Governors of the University and posted on the university’s web site.

According to the statement, the allegations under investigation stem from research conducted by the Department of Human Studies. No researchers or areas of research are named and the statement emphasizes the broad nature of the investigation:

The university wishes to emphasize that this is an investigation into alleged misconduct and that no particular member of our faculty or student body is under investigation at this juncture.

The investigating team consists of several UWT faculty members who serve the university independently of the Department of Human Studies. These include Dr. Chloris Cougar, Dr. Fionnula L. Fox, Dr. Hume T. Goat, Dr. Luule Aednik, and Dr. Simone Gibbon. Other team members are Dr. Berthilidis Strix, Inspector Antonia T. Fossa of the Interspecial Investigations Unit, and Mr. Justice Augustus Dindon. Dr. Milada J. page4image31040Goose, head of the Honking Hollow laboratory at the University of West Terrier and a senior member of the Committee to Oversee Scientific Research in The Park (COSRIP) will oversee the team and the investigation.

Although no time frame for a final report by the investigating team was mentioned in the statement, a spokesAnimal for the university told The Mammalian Daily that the administration is committed to conducting the investigation in a fair and timely manner.

Park Museum to host major exhibition dealing with rôle of sport in Park life

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Park MuseumThe Park Museum announced today that it will host a major exhibition dealing with the rôle of sport in Park life.

In a post on its web site, the museum said the exhibition, entitled, Flyball and the Importance of Balls in the Everyday Life of Park Animals, will feature more than five hundred works including oil and watercolour paintings, photographs, sculpture, works in metal and glass, and textile impressions, “all celebrating balls and the way they inform Park life.”

Co-curated by The Park Museum’s resident curator, Dorika Pumi, and Mammalian Daily Balls columnist and sports historian, Bailey, the exhibition is scheduled to open in the Spring of 2016.

“This is the first exhibit of its kind anywhere in The Park and I am honoured that we have been invited to assist in its assembly,” said Clark Cascanueces, president of the Park Historical Society, in an interview on Mammalian Daily Radio this morning.

Cascanueces praised the museum for its “foresight” and called the upcoming exhibition a “major breakthrough.”

“For the most part, we have ignored the importance of sport—and of leisure activities— in the lives of Park Animals, “he said. “We’ve chosen to focus on survival and prosperity, but sport has great historical importance to Animals and, I would venture to say, is a necessary component of a good life.”

More information on the exhibit will be available in the new year.

Zorro verdict likely this month; court transcripts to be released in October

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Raimundo Zorro

SplotchWatch owner Raimundo Zorro

Closing arguments were heard Friday in the trial of SplotchWatch web site owner Raimundo Zorro and the verdict of Mr. Justice Augustus Dindon will likely come down this month, experts say.

Zorro faces two counts of “inciting hate” and one count of “inciting discord.” The former charges refer to the intent of his web site; the latter refers to its effects.

Zorro, whom some have described as a disgruntled former journalist, was represented in court by his lawyer, Pernilla Varghund. Varghund is a junior partner in The Park’s oldest law firm, Terrier, Terrier, Wolfhound and Shepherd.

During the trial and in closing, Varghund argued vehemently that Zorro’s only intent in running the web site was to encourage “openness and honesty” and to let Park Animals know who among them had removed their stripes or spots.

The issue became of major concern this year when The Park’s major grooming houses reported that stripe removal had become their most sought-after service. This is likely due to both social and financial concerns, as numerous reports and studies have indicated that striped and spotted Animals do not receive equal treatment in The Park.

After almost six months of police surveillance, Zorro’s web site was shut down last March and he was subsequently charged. The original trial date was set for June 25, but it was held over until July 13 due to the temporary absence from The Park of several key witnesses.

A spokesAnimal for The Park’s court system confirmed that, in the interest of openness, the transcripts of the trial will be made public in October.

One last time: Barkettes announce final Park date of Bring Your Own Bone tour

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BARKETTES final ticketThisbe and the Barkettes have announced the final Park date of their “Bring Your Own Bone” tour. That date is August 22.

The announcement came in the form of a letter to their longtime fans and fellow Park citizens:

Dear friends, fans, and fellow citizens:

It is with a mixture of anticipation and sadness that we announce that our final Park concert will take place on August 22, at the Ancient, Open-Air Theatre.

We cannot fully express the joy that this leg of the tour has brought us. The Park has always been our home—not just our first home, but our only home. And over the course of the years, our fellow Park citizens have become members of our family. Every time we leave, a piece of ourselves remains here and when we return, we are made whole again.

The gratitude that we feel for the way that you all have received us after such a long hiatus is immense and overwhelming. You have touched our hearts and renewed our spirits and our love of this place and its extraordinary Animals.

Although we cannot say for sure when we will meet again, please know that you are foremost in our minds and that we will make every effort to come home as soon and as often as possible. In the meantime, we look forward to an amazing concert full of surprises on August 22 and one last opportunity to see you on this tour and thank you with our music.

All our love always,

Thisbe and the Barkettes 

heart

 

 

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