Category: Uncategorized

Uncategorized1 Comment

World’s first Agony Aunt column about love, sex and relatonships

rrn69

The Athenian Mercury – a London-based broadsheet, one-page, two-sided periodical, brainchild of John Dunton, a printer, not a therapist whose main aim was to make money. Walking in a London park one day, it occurred to him that the (male) patrons of London’s fashionable coffee houses might like to gin up their intellectual discussions with questions posed to a panel of experts – just Dunton and his brothers-in-law- and would pay to see the answers. Published and advertised as “Resolving all the most Nice and Curious Questions Proposed by the ingenious of Either Sex”, in 1690s London which included the … Continue reading World’s first Agony Aunt column about love, sex and relatonships

Uncategorized1 Comment

Prada buys Versace for $1.4bn

rrn69

Luxury fashion brand, Prada Group has acquired crosstown Milan fashion rival, Versace from the U.S. luxury group, Capri Holdings Ltd, (parent company of Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo) for $1.38 billion. Capri Holdings is restructuring after a failed merger with Tapestry (owner of Coach, Kate Spade and Stuart Weitzman), which was blocked by the US Federal Trade Commission in last November. The deal includes Versace’s debt, is a big discount to the $2.15 billion debt that Capri, then known as Michael Kors, paid for Versace in 2017 when the Versace family and Blackstone sold it.  The acquisition strengthens Italy’s position in … Continue reading Prada buys Versace for $1.4bn

Uncategorized1 Comment

Seven turbulent decades of Global finance

rrn69

Professor of economist at Harvard and former chief economist at the IMF, Kenneth Rogoff explores the global rise of the U.S. dollar and reveals why the future stability is far from assured and argues that America’s currency might not have reached today’s lofty pinnacle without certain amount of good luck. The sharp sell-off of US Treasury bonds following Trump’s April 2 announcement of America’s highest tariff wall for a century confirmed Rogoff’s view that the recently prevailing belief that real interest rates will be “lower forever” is a dangerous myth. He sees America’s, and hence the dollar’s, “Achilles heel”, as … Continue reading Seven turbulent decades of Global finance

Uncategorized1 Comment

Surviving to become the biggest toy company in the world

rrn69

Lego A/s  (The Lego Group), a Danish construction by production company based in Billund, Denmark, manufacturer of interlocking ABS plastic and rubber bricks. The company founded in 1932 by Ole Kirk Christiansen,  a carpenter whose primary business of producing household goods had suffered due to the Great Depression.  He produced initially wooden toys, and developed interlocking bricks by 1947, naming it Lego, based on a Danish phrase leg godt, meaning “play well”. The name also means in Latin either “ I collect”, “ I compose”, “I choose”, “ I read”. After a fire in the woodworking department, Ole’s son, Godfred, decided to stop … Continue reading Surviving to become the biggest toy company in the world

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Imagine when John met Yoko

rrn69

One to One John and Yoko – in cinemas now! Directed by Kevin Macdonald.  With Executive producer Brad Pitt. A Plan B film. Not only famous for being in The Beatles and being a groundbreaking performer, composer and songwriter, John Lennon met Yoko Ono in London at her art show and swept her off her feet. The Beatles broke up and John and Yoko took a two room apartment in Greenwich Village New York in the USA for 18 months  and enjoyed their romance and new life though continually campaigning at the same time against the American  Right Wing in particular the issue … Continue reading Imagine when John met Yoko

Uncategorized1 Comment

Feast of Memory and Trauma

rrn69

German Novelist Judith Hermann weaves together themes of psychology and friendship, unconventional childhoods, summers of the North German Sea shore in a series of three interconnected stories. Children are born and grown up, careers established and abandoned, love affairs, marriages and friendships made and dismantled.  Contemporaries sicken and die, parents get old. “Every story has its first line. Not the line with which the story begins in the book; the line with which it begins in my mind”. This is a literary narrative reflection on when life becomes fiction, now dependable memory can be, and how close one’s dreams can come … Continue reading Feast of Memory and Trauma

UncategorizedLeave a comment

Pope Francis (88) dies on Easter Monday morning

rrn69

Latin American traditional Pope who changed Catholic Church, dies aged 88, triggering a centuries-old process of electing a new Pope.  The Pope who has unhindered power over the entire Catholic Church, followed by 1.3 billion Catholics, is the head of the Roman Catholic Church, representing a direct line back to Jesus Christ, a living successor to St Peter, who was chief among Christ’s initial disciples, the Apostles,  Francis was the first Pope from the Southern Hemisphere. He was also the first Jesuit to be elected to the throne of St. Peter. He presented himself as a compromise candidate appealing to … Continue reading Pope Francis (88) dies on Easter Monday morning

Uncategorized1 Comment

Roman Woman who broke all rules “a living breathing flesh-and-blood”

rrn69

Charismatic Fulvia amassed a degree of military and political power that was unprecedented for a woman in Ancient Rome. Married three times to men who moved in powerful circles, including Marc Anthony, Fulvia was not content to play the usual background role that was expected of wife – instead she challenged the Roman patriarchy and sought to increase her influence in the face of determined opposition. Fulvia is a relative of Julius Caesar, Augustus’s mother-in-law, and a love rival to Cleopatra, She was according to Pultarch, “a woman who took no thought for spinning or housekeeping”, and instead became a … Continue reading Roman Woman who broke all rules “a living breathing flesh-and-blood”

UncategorizedLeave a comment

World’s richest who makes the world go round

rrn69

Meet Top Ten Billionaires according to Forbes. Elon Musk (53), (United States), $342 Billion, who co-founded seven companies including electric car maker Tesla, rocket producer SpaceX and Artificial Intelligence startup xAI. Mark Zuckerberg (40), (United States), $215 Billion, started facebook in 2004 for students to match names with photos of classmates Jeff Bezos (61), (United States), $215 Billion, who founded e-commerce giant Amazon in 1994 out of his Seattle garage. Larry Ellison (80) $192 Billion, Chairman, CTO and co-founder of software giant Oracle of which he own 40 per cent.   Bernard Arnault (76), (France), & family $178 Billion, oversees the … Continue reading World’s richest who makes the world go round

Uncategorized1 Comment

Correlating rigid thinking to political extremes

rrn69

  Political Neuroscientist attached to Cambridge University, Dr Leor Zmigrod discovers the biological factor that drive ideologies to extremes and her research into the physical and psychological origins of extremism. Her definition of ideology is a rigid and dogmatic way of thinking that discourages thought in favour of a pre-determined and hermetically sealed belief system. Her findings “Prejudiced children’s rigidities were not constrained to one domain: they were everywhere. Rightly spilled into every response, every reasoned thought and miscalculation.” Zmigrod reveals the hidden mechanisms driving our beliefs and behaviours. She using powerful tools of neuroscience to show that our political … Continue reading Correlating rigid thinking to political extremes