Serial Experiments Lain (シリアルエクスペリメンツレイン, Shiriaru Ekusuperimentsu Rein) is an avant-garde anime series directed by Ryutaro Nakamura, with character design by Yoshitoshi ABe, screenplay written by Chiaki J. Konaka, and produced by Yasuyuki Ueda for Triangle Staff. It was broadcast on TV Tokyo from July to September 1998. The series is influenced by themes such as reality, identity, and communication, and it demonstrates them by using philosophy, computer history, cyberpunk literature, and conspiracy theory.
The series focuses on Lain Iwakura, an adolescent girl living in suburban Japan, and her introduction to the Wired, a global communications network similar to the Internet. Lain lives with her middle-class family, which consists of her inexpressive older sister Mika, her emotionally distant mother, and her computer-obsessed father. Lain herself is somewhat awkward, introverted, and socially isolated from most of her school peers, but the status-quo of her life becomes upturned by a series of bizarre incidents which start to take place after she learns that girls from her school have received an e-mail from Chisa Yomoda, a schoolmate who had committed suicide. When Lain receives the message herself at home, Chisa tells her that she is not dead, but has merely "abandoned her physical body and flesh", and is alive deep within the virtual reality-world of the Wired itself where she has found the almighty and divine God. From this point, Lain is caught up in a series of cryptic and surreal events that see her delving deeper into the mystery of the network in a narrative that explores themes of consciousness, perception, and the nature of reality.
Weird is a series of travel guides written by various authors and published by Sterling Publishing of New York City. Started by Mark Moran and Mark Sceurman with a magazine called Weird N.J., together or separately, they often write, collaborate, edit and/or write the forward of the other guides. As of July 2011, all but seventeen states (Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming) have been covered within individual books.
The franchise now includes calendars and spin-off books.
Hilary Duff is the self-titled third studio album by American recording artist Hilary Duff. It was released on September 15, 2004, by Hollywood Records. Duff cited the album as being more mature than her previous albums, stating "Basically, I'm not Lizzie McGuire anymore". The seventeen-track album saw Duff collaborating with the same producers she did on Metamorphosis, saying that it was more comfortable for her that way. Recording sessions for the album took place during May to August 2004, partially between filming of Raise Your Voice (2004) and The Perfect Man (2005), both in which Duff had starring roles.
It received generally negative reviews from music critics, many of whom compared the album to the music of Avril Lavigne and Ashlee Simpson. The album debuted at number two on the US Billboard 200 chart, selling 192,000 copies in its first week. To date, Hilary Duff has sold 1,800,000 copies in the US. It became her second consecutive number one debut in Canada and produced two singles that were not major hits. It was eventually certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Hilary Duff was number sixty-five on Billboard magazine's year-end top albums chart in November 2005.
Mira (/ˈmaɪrə/, also known as Omicron Ceti, ο Ceti, ο Cet) is a red giant star estimated 200–400 light years away in the constellation Cetus. Mira is a binary star, consisting of the red giant Mira A along with Mira B. Mira A is also an oscillating variable star and was the first non-supernova variable star discovered, with the possible exception of Algol. Mira is the brightest periodic variable in the sky that is not visible to the naked eye for part of its cycle. Its distance is uncertain; pre-Hipparcos estimates centered on 220 light-years; while Hipparcos data from the 2007 reduction suggest a distance of 299 light-years, with a margin of error of 11%.
Evidence that the variability of Mira was known in ancient China, Babylon or Greece is at best only circumstantial. What is certain is that the variability of Mira was recorded by the astronomer David Fabricius beginning on August 3, 1596. Observing what he thought was the planet Mercury (later identified as Jupiter), he needed a reference star for comparing positions and picked a previously unremarked third-magnitude star nearby. By August 21, however, it had increased in brightness by one magnitude, then by October had faded from view. Fabricius assumed it was a nova, but then saw it again on February 16, 1609.
Miraí is a Brazilian municipality located in the state of Minas Gerais. The city belongs to the mesoregion of Zona da Mata and to the microregion of Muriaé.
Brejo was its first name. The agriculture sector is pointed as one of the most successful of the region Zona da Mata.
The city territory is located in a region of easy access due to the presence of Rio-Bahia highway, also called BR-116.
The first village was set up on the margins of the Muriaé River.
Around 1840, attracted by land fertility, the first explorers came to Miraí's region.
Finding land and good water, they spread the news and eventually other farmers arrived.
At 1852, a group of farmers acquired part of the land belonging to the farm named Três Barras,
in the place they built a chapel to Santo Antônio and around grew a village called Brejo.
Later, the village became the District of Paz, with the name of Santo Antônio do Muriaé, belonging to Freguesia de Santa Rita de Meia Pataca.
At 1883, the district was turned into Freguesia de Santo Antônio do Camapuã.
The name was changed to Miraí, which means "wet land" in Tupi, by 1895.
The municipality was created in 1923, separating itself from Cataguases.
Mira is a 1971 Dutch-Belgian drama film directed by Fons Rademakers. It was entered into the 1971 Cannes Film Festival. The film was selected as the Dutch entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 44th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.