Ever fantasized about eating cheesecake on a lanai in nothing but your underwear?

If so, thank Candice Pugh for being a friend.

Pugh's Etsy shop, Bulletsandbees, is currently selling "Golden Girls" panties glamorous enough for the likes of Sophia’s cross-dressing son, Phil.

“I've been day dreaming about making these for a while,” Pugh, who lives in Salt Lake City, told The Huffington Post in an online message. “I finally just found time to whip them up.”

Bulletsandbees ("NOT YOUR GRANNIES PANTIES," the tagline declares) is selling four fabulous "Golden Girls" designs, each one dedicated to a different lovely liver-spotted lady from the NBC sitcom. Pugh had all the girls’ personalities in mind when she created the frilly briefs, and she's delighted that some fans recognize it.

“I think that's what makes them stand out so much,” she said.

The Rose negligee is innocent and white, the Sophia-inspired undies have a sensible support top and Dorothy’s design is black -- obviously a nod to the character’s dark sense of humor.    

And Blanche -- who is Pugh’s favorite Golden Girl, thanks to an outlook that Pugh sums up as “life's short, get fucked” -- has her pretty face emblazoned upon a flashy lime-green number.

The underwear-centric shop, which Pugh initially started because she was sick of “a lack of comfortable and flattering lingerie for women of all sizes,” doesn’t only sell "Golden Girls" goodies. Other panty designs include a horde of adorable kittens, a fallopian tube and Ryan Gosling’s face, because obviously.

Pugh said the "Golden Girls" undies have been her top sellers since she introduced them last week. She's gotten about 90 orders in the past 24 hours alone. But don’t fret -- she’s planning on making more.

“I’m already thinking of new designs for the girls,” she said.

Language has been added to clarify when Pugh first began selling the "Golden Girls"-inspired products.

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All year round, we're grateful for talented wedding photographers who beautifully capture one of the most momentous days of a couple's life. 

This Thanksgiving, we decided to turn the tables and ask a group of photogs for the one picture that makes them grateful to be doing the job that they do. Check out some of their most meaningful photos below:  

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Most of the 102 passengers who traveled on the Mayflower in 1620 had names like John, William, Mary and Elizabeth, but there were some more unique names on the passenger list as well. Here are some of the most interesting ones -- for possible baby name inspiration.

Bartholomew

Bartholomew Allerton arrived on the Mayflower at the age of 7 or 8 with his parents, Isaac and Mary, and a brother named Remember; he later returned to England. New Testament name Bartholomew -- one of the 12 apostles -- has been rarely used in modern times but could get some attention as one of the newly trending long names.

Constance

Constance Hopkins was a teenager when she arrived on the Mayflower with her family. A virtue name, Constance was a popular choice from the 1930s to '50s -- number 82 in 1942 -- but nickname Connie has stood in the way of a revival. 

Damaris

Damaris Hopkins came on the Mayflower as a toddler with her parents, Stephen and Elizabeth. Another rarely used New Testament name, Damaris saw some use a few decades ago, possibly via supermodel Damaris Lewis.

Giles

Another Hopkins sibling was Giles. Pronounced Jiles, this neglected British-accented name was on the U.S. Top 500 list at the turn of the last century, but hasn’t been heard since around 1950.

Jasper

Jasper More was only 7 when he tragically died onboard the Mayflower, which was anchored in Provincetown Harbor. The charming name Jasper has been scooting up the charts and is now number 218 nationally and an astonishing number 11 on Nameberry.

Love

Love Brewster came to Plymouth on the Mayflower when he was a child. Though today it's more traditionally associated with girls, the name Love can make an endearing name for boys as well.

Myles

Myles Standish is one of the most famous Mayflower Pilgrims and played a leadership role. An alternate spelling of the popular Miles (number 108), Myles was used for their sons by celebrities Eddie Murphy, Sherilyn Fenn, Lars Ulrich -- and Marlon Brando.

Oceanus

Oceanus Hopkins was born on the Mayflower during the voyage. Giving a child a unique name like Oceanus, commemorating a major event surrounding the birth was not unheard of, even at a time when most names were either inherited, Biblical or royal. Oceanus makes a distinctive Latinate spin on the growing-in-popularity Ocean.

Peregrine

Peregrine White was the second baby born on board the ship and the first Englishman born in New England. Peregrine is an elegant, aristocratic, literary name, which is at 448 on Nameberry.

Priscilla

Priscilla Mullins, later wife of John Alden, is known in literary history as the unrequited love of Myles/Miles Standish in the Longfellow poem The Courtship of Miles Standish. Priscilla has managed to hold a place in the top 500, reaching a high of 127 in 1940.

Remember

The word name Remember could make for a nice middle name today. Other Mayflower passenger word names include Humility, Desire and Resolved.

Susanna

Susanna White, the mother of Resolved and Peregrine, wedded her second husband Edward Winslow, which was the first wedding at Plymouth. Spelled with or without a final H, Susanna is one of the loveliest of girl classics.

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When Australian mom Mel Rymill met with a personal trainer, she was struck by the first thing she heard.

"Obviously you want to get back to your pre-baby weight," the trainer told her -- a statement, not a question. Rymill's experience prompted her to write a powerful Facebook post about body image, along with an intimate photo of her own postpartum body.

Rymill wrote that the trainer's comment "pissed" her off, but that in the moment, she simply replied, "My goal is to regain my core strength and endurance ... I'm not worried by how my body looks, only how it functions ... it can be pretty badass."

Still, the exchange made her stop and think about body image in general. "Post pregnant women are told they look good if they return to their pre-baby body quickly leading to the assumption that they look bad if the keep the extra weight," the mom wrote, adding that "voluptuous women" and even "skinny people" face shaming, social pressure and hurtful labels. 

Reflecting on the many harmful comments people of all body types face, Rymill said, "What we should be worrying about is if people are ok, not what they look like."

"So here I am. I may not be magazine ready, my nana undies and bedtime nursing bra are certainly not going to be rocking a runway anytime soon, my hair is greasy, I have no makeup on, my body is squishy and plentiful, I'm not even sure I'm totally ok," she continued. "But I am strong. My body is healthy."

Rymill's post has been shared over 6,500 times. The mom concluded her reflection with an invitation to others to share their own body image photos with the hashtag #badassundies. Many people heeded the call on Facebook and Twitter.

In a followup post, Rymill wrote that while she didn't expect her post to go viral, it is "empowering" to see others sharing photos of their bodies. 

"It's not about whether you are big, small, lumpy, cuddly, boney, shaped like a dodecahedron, a man, a woman, anywhere on the gender scale or anything else you can think of. It is about reclaiming the world we live in and flooding it with real bodies, no, REAL PEOPLE," she wrote.

Right on!

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A window frame stands on the side of a hill, framing the lush valley below as its thin white curtains dance in the wind. A tiny house covered in circular mirrors reflects the rich greens and blues from the sky, trees and grass surrounding it. A patch of a rice field overflows with mundane objects such as tires, soda bottles and televisions, all made of porcelain.

No need to take out your dream dictionary -- these aren’t scenes from a richly symbolic vision you had last night. If you happened to be in Japan this year, these are just a few scenes you might run into at the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale, one of the largest contemporary art festivals in the world by geographic area. 

Every three years since 2000, the festival has been staged in the Echigo-Tsumari Art Field, an area of terraced rice fields and forests of native beech spanning 760 square kilometers (approximately 290 square miles) of the Echigo-Tsumari region of Japan. Guided by the idea that “humans are part of nature,” the Triennale’s events and artworks attempt to deepen regional exploration and build community through art.

The relatively remote agricultural region, inhabited by 70,000 people, has attracted approximately half a million visitors from all corners of the world since the festival’s debut. The artworks at Echigo-Tsumari are site-specific, meaning they were created to exist in a certain locale.

The artists have given the location deep consideration, attempting to integrate their art into its surroundings and to explore its relationship to the environment. Participating artists must create their artworks on someone else’s land, requiring interaction and collaboration with locals. The installations are dotted across approximately 200 villages rather than displayed in a single center, an “absolutely inefficient” approach deliberately at odds with the rationalization and efficiency of modern society.

Take a few quiet moments to experience the most impressive installations from the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale. They might even inspire you to wander around your own pocket of nature today.

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Misty Copeland is a black ballerina, and she doesn't want you to call her anything different.

The dancer, who was named the first black female principal dancer at American Ballet Theatre, sat down with HuffPost Live on Monday and explained why she proudly embraces being called a black ballerina.

"[I embrace the title] because it's so rare and because it's an issue and because it's been my path and my struggle. I'm not going to deny or pretend that that's not who I am," Copeland told host Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani. "And I think that just because I'm now in this position as a principal dancer doesn't mean all of a sudden I'm going to drop the fact that I've had all of these obstacles and so many are continuing to have it. Just because I'm here doesn't mean racism goes away in the ballet world."

While Copeland said that her colleagues at American Ballet Theatre have been "nothing but supportive," disparaging comments from the depths of the Internet still get to her. 

"It's usually coming from people that I can't see or can't see me behind a computer screen or a blog, in comments," she said. "It's difficult, but I'm proud of my journey and the struggles as well as the accomplishments, and I'm going to forever stand by that title."

Click here to watch the full HuffPost Live conversation about Copeland's work with MindLeaps.

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Let's be honest: The real world is harsh.

So it should come as no surprise that hundreds of people out there are willing to shell out hundreds of dollars to spend three days in a  magical Harry Potter-esque world for three days of wizardly bliss. 

"New World Magischola" launched a Kickstarter for a live-action roleplaying session (READ: LARP Camp for adults) this summer at the University of Richmond. The campaign launched on Monday at 7 p.m. EST with an initial goal of $35,000 -- within an hour, it raised over 100,000.  

"Clearly people were excited about the world and the opportunity," New World Magischola President Maury Brown told HuffPost.

As we published this story, the campaign had received $231,207 from eager wannabe wizards. 

For $450 a ticket, "students" who attend the event spend three days living on campus and pretending they attend a real school of witchcraft and wizardry. They'll learn spells from real "professors", interact with "magical" creatures, and even mix their own potions. 

"If you want to un-magic it, it's basic chemistry," Brown said. 

 Or, you can buy Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone on iTunes for $14.99.

Though the Hogwarts comparison is easy to make, there's actually no relation.

"Harry Potter is fantastic, but it's very British," Brown said, "This universe we created is for North America, so we intertwined it with colonialism." Hence, the college campus setting, which is pretty much the closest you can get to a castle in the U.S.

New World Magischola is the brainchild of Brown and Ben Morrow, who run a live action role play company called Learn Larp LLC. The duo attended a LARPing event in Poland last year called Wizard College and wanted to replicate the experience in the U.S.  

Students will also take a quiz to determine which house they belong to (sorry, no Sorting Hat):

New World Magischola announced two more events after the success of the first, both of which have already sold out. But don't worry, you haven't missed your chance just yet: The fourth event will launch Wednesday at 7 p.m. EST on their Kickstarter page. 

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“Unlike critics who write about film or food or music, book critics are rarely required to engage with popular material,” Jennifer Weiner wrote in The Guardian on Tuesday with blithe confidence.

Like anyone who engages in book criticism professionally, I imagine, I bridled at this opening salvo. How dare you, Jennifer Weiner! But maybe she had a point. Unlike all those food critics penning thoughtful meditations on Applebee’s and Hot Pockets, perhaps I and all the other book reviewers out there were living in a fantasy world, an ivory bubble floating far above the real, earthy reading landscape.

Swallowing my pride, I soldiered on. In the article, Weiner argues that book critics are entirely divorced from what the majority of readers -- most of whom are women -- actually read and enjoy. Not only that, but when a critically acclaimed book does somehow achieve enormous popular success through word of mouth, she says, prominent critics hasten to “take back” the earlier approval through what she calls Goldfinching.

“It’s the process by which a popular and previously well-regarded novel and, more importantly, its readers, are taken to the woodshed,” Weiner writes. (Donna Tartt’s 2013 smash hit The Goldfinch is a prominent example and the namesake.) 

This phenomenon, she suggests, is bound up in our culture’s disdain for what women traditionally enjoy and create. Critics focus on what we deem literary fiction -- for the purposes of this piece, fiction that doesn't conform to the tropes or formulas of specific genres, and that generally aims to be artful or experimental in its prose and structure. On the other side, traditionally, are genres: romance, sci-fi, fantasy, crime, mystery.

Genres typically follow templates and employ familiar archetypes and tools, such as romance's surly bad boy who needs a good woman's love. There's absolutely nothing wrong with this; it means that readers know how to find exactly what they're looking for, just as I know to look for Katherine Heigl's face on Netflix when I'm in the mood to chill with a rote rom-com. (No shame.)

Readers, Weiner argues, who are mostly women, are not paying any mind to literary fiction. They're reading... well, genre fiction, presumably. In practice, the best-selling single adult genre is romance, but the bestseller lists are reliably a mix of literary and genre fiction of all types. 

Weiner isn't so sure. Books that cross over from critical acclaim to real-world popularity are, she insists, rare. When they do, she says, they're not only universally written by women, they will be taken down for sexist reasons. “First: the book’s writing will be blasted as sloppy or sentimental. [...] Next, the work will be dismissed in specifically gendered terms,” Weiner says. The current target: Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life, which she notes was initially well-reviewed, but has recently seen snide reviews.

Weiner’s piece arrives shortly after Claire Vaye Watkins roiled the literary world with a long, thoughtful piece examining the white and male privilege that silently governs the canon and the book community. Weiner references Watkins’ piece, glancingly, but absorbs little of its self-reflectiveness or subtlety.

It’s understandable that the chauvinism of her field infuriates Weiner, but her polemic doesn't lend clarity to the situation. Instead, in the course of lambasting the entirety of the profession as a sexist, pretentious cabal bound up in ensuring nothing a woman ever likes be allowed to stand, Weiner makes several claims about book criticism and literary fiction that are demonstrably false or misleading.

Book critics rarely need to engage with popular material? What then of the Mary Gaitskill review of the smash hit Gone Girl, which Weiner then complains Gaitskill shouldn’t have written if she didn’t enjoy the book?

True, reviewers are less likely to write in-depth reviews of straightforward genre reads, as readers will seek them out regardless for their formula components. But there's more to literature than obscure avant-garde fiction and formulaic mysteries, and both reviewers and the public tend to pay attention to books that fall in between. The Girl on the Train, a literary thriller published in January, was widely reviewed and instantly became a mainstay of the bestseller lists. If certain authors become popular enough, even perceived lack of quality won’t shield them from critical attention. The New York Times’ Janet Maslin even reviewed E.L. James’ artistically disastrous but popularGrey: Fifty Shades of Grey As Told By Christian.

What’s more, Weiner entirely dismisses the possibility that positive book reviews might increase the popularity of certain books. “Critics ignore the books that people are actually reading; readers ignore the critics and the books they tout; everyone goes home happy,” she states glibly. Instead, she attributes any correlation to a hidden wave of “word of mouth” that sweeps certain well-reviewed books onto the sunny beach of success.

Word of mouth isn’t so easily separable from book reviews. What is a good review from Michiko Kakutani but a recommendation directly from a reader to hundreds of thousands of her closest non-friends? As with word of mouth, it’s tough to measure the impact of a glowing review on sales numbers. Still, one study showed that reviews do influence libraries’ purchasing choices. Another suggested that New York Times reviews swayed sales. In 2010, GoodReads pulled charts showing massive spikes in certain books’ activity after the books were reviewed or recommended on major platforms.

It’s easier to quantify the effect of another form of critical selection: book awards. And major book awards -- like the recent National Book Awards -- often do result in a significant bump in sales.

Of the evidence that exists, it all seems to point to this conclusion: Readers don’t simply read whatever critics tell them to read, but it’s a factor, and a factor that can be significant for certain books. For books that won’t simply be devoured by genre faithful -- experimental books, books that redefine the borders between genres, books from small presses with fewer publicity resources -- strong review attention can mean the difference between being ignored and hitting solid sales benchmarks. (An NPR story from last month pointed out that, for literary fiction, solid sales might mean only 20,000 copies.)

With so many books being published every year just in the U.S. -- well into the thousands -- it’s counterproductive to ask critics to fulfill the same functions that well-funded publicity machines, book clubs and genre-of-the-month roundups do so well. Readers have no trouble finding the latest Patricia Cornwell or a steamy new romance, or the type of book that their best friend happens to also enjoy. Besides, as art critics and food critics also know so well, criticism of formulaic work -- Thomas Kinkade, Olive Garden -- is boring and generally pointless; there isn't much, if anything, new to say about what's being done, and the audience already knows whether they want the product and why.

What critics can do, and should do, is look at another side of the book industry, one that might offer something more surprising, more difficult to get into, perhaps more challenging. There are far too many books out there for Christian Lorentzen and Mary Gaitskill to carefully consider them all. Their task is to pull out the books that might otherwise escape the readership’s attention. It's all too easy for books, even very good ones, to be entirely lost in the fray.

Or, possibly, to reconsider the merit of books that have continued to linger in the ether. If The Goldfinch had fallen into the publishing world with a deafening thud, there would have been no tasteless Vanity Fair article musing on whether the book even qualified as art, complete with Lorin Stein’s atrocious quote suggesting that even readers who thought they liked it, deep down, didn’t. (Sorry, Mr. Stein: I really did.)

Yanagihara’s A Little Life earned some glowing early reviews, and some more mixed, but later reviews necessarily reacted to the growing award buzz (it was a finalist for the National Book Award and shortlisted for the Man Booker) to question whether it merited such glorification. The purpose of a critic is, after all, to examine culture critically, not simply to reiterate what’s going on out there. (“People really like A Little Life, you guys!”)

Weiner’s assessment of which literary books have become hits seems selectively geared to fuel accusations of sexism among critics. The Goldfinch, A Little Life: “Those juggernaut books have a few things in common,” she says, one of them being that “they’re written by women.” But it seems more that she’s choosing to look at the ones written by women. Plenty of literary books find popular audiences without female authors. What about Jonathan Franzen’s Purity, which received rapturous reviews (and some critical teardowns) and hit the bestseller list, as his books tend to do? What about Anthony Doerr’s All The Light We Cannot See, which still lingers around the list well over a year after publication, despite being a critical darling? What about Marlon James’ A Brief History of Seven Killings, a hefty, challenging read, which hit the paperback bestseller list after winning the Man Booker Prize in October?

When, she says, these books become popular, "some highbrow critic will announce that they are not literature at all but, in fact, sentimental trash." Well, we’re still waiting for the critical savaging of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels, which are selling like hotcakes, or of Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies, a buzzy novel that’s drawn love from critics this fall as well as hitting bestseller lists. When Celeste Ng’s literary thriller Everything I Never Told You came out last year, it got raves from critics; it’s currently on the paperback bestseller list.

As for that “juggernaut,” A Little Life, it’s hard to argue that it’s far outside the norm for a literary hit. In October, NPR listed its sales numbers in the U.S. as between 15,000 and 20,000 -- roughly the same as A Brief History of Seven Killings.

Weiner, as always, has a point -- the same one Watkins did: The literary world still has a huge problem with women. The critical treatment of Tartt’s The Goldfinch and of A Little Life have been troublingly disdainful at times, most notably in the thorough trashing literary critics gave The Goldfinch in Vanity Fair. 

She also critiques reviews that target the self-harming, delicately lovely and culinarily gifted hero of A Little Life, Jude. “You can smell the subtext, like burning cornmeal gingersnaps: real literature does not wear oven mitts, and real literary heroes do not spend large portions of a long novel baking gougères or bleeding in bathrooms,” writes Weiner. “That’s what girls do.”

But criticism of books written by women -- especially ones that have risen to cultural prominence -- is fair game. A character can be deemed, by a critic, over-the-top for being a talented patissier, amateur vocalist, lawyer and tormented self-harmer just as he might be for being a motorcyclist, amateur bullfighter, bounty hunter and given to taciturnly promiscuous behavior. (Personally, I find both a bit absurd as character sketches, but strict realism wasn't exactly Yanagihara's imperative.)

What The Goldfinch and A Little Life largely have in common is not popularity, or length, or even having been written by women: it's a very distinct fairy-tale-esque quality, an exaggerated reality with heightened highs and deepened lows. It's not an approach that appeals to everyone, and there may very well be a gendered aspect to the dismissal of the narrative style. But many women write in other styles, and the conflation of these two authors with "women writers" serves no purpose. It doesn't teach us anything about what's really going on with these books, or why people love them or hate them.

Rehashing these easy generalizations about critics and literary fiction might feel satisfying, but the real problems here can't be diagnosed in such satisfyingly black-and-white fashion. Watkins' personal, nuanced essay on her struggle with writing to a white male audience not only touched on a more true, profound point, it also provoked a larger discussion about the tangled mess of privilege and bias and silent prejudice that still infests the book world. Other women writers, women of color and white women shared experiences that differed from Watkins, that brought new concerns to the fore.  

Marlon James's own reaction suggested there's a complex interplay of racial and gender politics at work in the book world. His provocative take was prompted by Watkins' own essay but would be entirely foreclosed by a simplistic women vs. the world approach like Weiner's.

If only the problem with the literary world were so simple as "the critics are out to destroy women." It's not. Reducing the myriad class, race and gender issues of the industry to such a simple theory -- one that, by the by, entirely ignores the historical function of the critic in every field -- unfortunately leaves us with no more answers about how to make the book world more welcoming for everyone. 

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Ballerina Misty Copeland has made a name for herself breaking barriers for black dancers in the United States, and she's taking her passion abroad to do the same in Rwanda.

This month, Copeland teamed up with MindLeaps, a nonprofit organization that brings dance instruction, vocational training and academics to the children of developing countries. Copeland traveled to Rwanda to launch the MindLeaps Girls Program and documented her journey via YouTube and Instagram.

Copeland looked back on her experience with the Rwandan children in a HuffPost Live conversation on Monday.

"There's really no way to really understand the state that a lot of children are in and living on the street -- literally not having homes, illiterate, dying. I feel like unless you're there, you don't really see the severity of it," she said.

MindLeaps founder Rebecca Davis described the thinking behind her innovative organization and why she connected with the kids through dance.

"In order to work with street kids, we had to find something that the kids love to do," Davis said. "Street kids are fighting every day to survive, and the only thing that these kids really feel attached to is something that they think is fun and something that they think is worth giving up two hours living on the street for. And in this case, that's dance."  

The organization brings children ages 9 to 18, many of whom are descendants of genocide survivors, from their makeshift homes "under sewers" and "under the overhangs of buildings" into the classroom to learn both dance technique and traditional academics. Davis explained that the effects of Rwanda's 1994 genocide still reverberate through the country today, which is why the work of MindLeaps is so crucial.

"The problem in Rwanda is we're 21 years after a genocide and it's just a crippling situation where people who survived that atrocity now have to support their own children," Davis said. "But this is a country that's still recovering, a country that's still building, a country that's still creating jobs, a country [in which] everyone's education was interrupted. So it's not really fair to ask those parents to provide for children when they didn't even complete their own self-development."

Watch the full HuffPost Live conversation with Misty Copeland here. 

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In June, I began a feature on "Inside Out" thusly: "Everything we need to know, we learned from Pixar." That movie, one of the year's best, taught us that humans cannot understand joy if they don't also experience occasional sadness. It was a profound nugget of wisdom that led to one of Pixar's most lucrative films yet. Fast-forward six months: For the first time since the studio began making features in 1995, Pixar boasts two releases in the same year. Following up the beloved "Inside Out" isn't easy, but it's even more unfortunate that the movie to carry that burden is "The Good Dinosaur," which doesn't feel like a Pixar product at all.

What we've come to love about Pixar's storytelling, and the reason I began my "Inside Out" feature with the aforementioned sentiment, is its world-building. Cars and toys and fish talk when we aren't paying attention, monsters are friendly thespians, an aspirational rat is responsible for a French restaurant's best dishes and a cross-generational exploration can yield the most surprising discoveries. If the universe in "Inside Out" introduces the anthropomorphic emotions stationed in an 11-year-old girl's head, what revisionist landscape does "The Good Dinosaur" posit? Well, not much.

"The Good Dinosaur" is built on solid ground. It redrafts history by showing the asteroid that supposedly annihilated the dinosaurs 65 million years ago bypassing Earth. In this turnabout, the Jurassic era marched safely forward. When the movie picks up millions of years after that, a family of dino famers lives on a vast plantation where two of the three children adapt to agrarian life quite well. The youngest, Arlo, is our main character. A small, fearful 11-year-old who struggles to match his siblings' dexterity, Arlo is tasked with guarding the family's crops after his father dies in a flood. When he is knocked unconscious far from home while chasing a caveboy he catches stealing corn, Arlo must find his way back to his mother's warm embrace. The wide-eyed, non-verbal little cave orphan is actually kind of sweet, so with him in tow, Also's journey becomes a Western -- a rather quiet one that plies vast terrain.

There's promise in that premise, but the movie doesn't live up to it. Instead of introducing a dinosaur society to navigate or a series of clever creatures to encounter, "The Good Dinosaur" simply traces Arlo's rather un-fantastical trek home. After the inciting incident, a deus ex machina sets Arlo on the proper course -- in this case, a trio of Tyrannosauruses who help him evade ravenous Pterodactyls and then disappear from the film -- before a series of typical obstacles interrupts his pilgrimage. 

If, say, Fox or DreamWorks had made "The Good Dinosaur," it might seem like one of the year's more thoughtful animated releases (no offense, "Minions"). It has a lesson at the center -- overcome fear and you'll "make your mark" -- and a devotion to capturing the mystifying beauty of nature, but it lacks the story elements for which Pixar is known. Even for a studio that has defined itself so singularly over the course of two decades, not everything can be "Toy Story" or "Finding Nemo" -- and, for that matter, it's unfair to say Pixar can't do something "different." But "The Good Dinosaur," which relies on the characters' doe-eyed expressions for humor, betrays the dynamic "wow, imagine that!" essence of the studio's fare. Arlo must travel far, so the villains are fleeting (no Hopper or Lotso here) and any surrounding society is never seen (I didn't think we'd miss the Axiom this much). No matter how gorgeous the mountainous landscapes may be, the story is flat and simplistic -- everything Pixar isn't.

We may never know the full truth of where "The Good Dinosaur" fell short. Originally slated for 2013 and quickly delayed to 2014, the project fell victim to development hell when Pixar removed director Bob Peterson, citing trouble with the story's third act. On the surface, that's not as controversial as it may sound, considering "Toy Story 2," "Ratatouille," "Cars 2" and "Brave" all switched directors midcourse, too. But as John Lasseter and other studio honchos stepped in to make revisions, the movie was delayed again to November 2015, resulting in company layoffs and making 2014 Pixar's first year without a new release. Peter Sohn, a frequent Pixar story artist, took over the director's chair in October 2014. Much of the original cast -- including John Lithgow, Neil Patrick Harris, Bill Hader and Judy Greer -- was replaced along the way, and "Inside Out" scribe Meg LeFauve walked away with the screenplay credit.

Would "The Good Dinosaur" have lived up to its Pixar imprint had the development process been more seamless? It's hard to tell, especially because the bones of the story as they now exist mirror the way Lasseter described the film in 2012. But even the shallow, noisy "Cars 2," the studio's categorical worst movie to date, at least feels at home in the Pixar canon. It doesn't have much to say, but it expands upon a world novel enough to draw attention. As a narrative, "The Good Dinosaur" feels aimless. Where do other dinosaurs live? How does this revisionist panorama work, even? Pixar's settings manage to establish political vistas, which gives their world-building a uniqueness that appeals to an array of audiences. We see ourselves in them, or at least we'd like to. "The Good Dinosaur" is entertaining enough, but its surprising lack of wit and limited perspectives make it feel like a stranger in the familiar land that is Pixar. 

"The Good Dinosaur" is by no means bad. Far more middling animated features open every year, and as The Atlantic's Christopher Orr suggests, perhaps it's just Pixar's first movie meant exclusively for kids. But even if munchkins delight in it, the film probably won't leave them with the same fascination we've come to expect. At least adults can look forward to a bizarre scene where Arlo and his caveboy pal enjoy a miniature acid trip after eating hallucinogenic fruit. That's about as inventive as these good dinos get.

"The Good Dinosaur" is now in theaters. Read about its many Easter eggs here. 

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It’s that most special time of year: Thanksgiving, a holiday commemorating English settlers being welcomed to North America by the American Indians they’d ultimately decimate in the greatest known display of ingratitude. (Thanks for all the corn and fish, here are some smallpox blankets and gun-fueled massacres!) Nevertheless, it's the most American holiday, a time to give thanks for the land we live in, regardless of our race or creed. 

This year, following the horrific attacks in Paris which left well over 100 dead, many Republican and some Democratic politicians have responded, just in time for Thanksgiving, by proposing anti-democratic, divisive measures they argue will guard against such attacks happening on American soil.

Presidential candidate Jeb Bush suggested only allowing Christians from Syria, not Muslims, to enter the country, as millions of refugees flee the Syrian conflict. The mayor of Roanoke, Virginia, invoked Franklin Roosevelt’s internment of Japanese Americans during World War II as a template for how Syrian refugees should now be treated.

These exclusionary responses show an ignorance of two aspects of American history: the value we’ve hoped to place on being welcoming and inclusive to all “your tired, your poor,” and the shameful consequences that have historically followed when the nation failed in its ideals. But those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, and the best antidote to another embarrassing episode like the Japanese internment camps is making sure we all learn more about the trauma caused by these lapses in the so-called American way.

As author Celeste Ng tweeted, “I grew up w/ books on internment like FAREWELL TO MANZANAR and JOURNEY TO TOPAZ, thanks to my mom. Maybe they should be required reading?”

Maybe so! For Thanksgiving, here are 10 more books about the most shameful episodes in America’s past, to remind us all how carefully we have to guard against backsliding into divisiveness and hate. On Thanksgiving, of all holidays, let’s give thanks for a country that aspires to be, and should be, full of equal opportunity for everyone.

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While traveling, it's easy to get swept up with what's directly in front of us. But don't forget that sometimes the best view is right above your head.

The below images of dazzling ceilings are masterpieces in both design and function, from the ornate wonder that is the ceiling of La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, to the massive LED rooftop screen that hovers above a shopping center in China. Check out some of the world's spectacular sights below.

Have you taken great photos of ceilings? Feel free to share them on Instagram with the hashtag #huffpostgram and we might use the photo in an upcoming story or regram you!

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When a spur-of-the-moment mix-up forces Dongjoo -- a protagonist in one of Adam Johnson’s National Book Award-winning short stories -- to hurriedly defect from North Korea, he acclimates quickly enough to the modern comforts of the South. He even changes his name to something hip-sounding, something with that Gangnam air of exportable cool: DJ. He doesn’t know that the letters carry meaning other than a shortened version of his given name until a South Korean teen explains it to him: “The DJ, he’s a kind of artist. He takes different kinds of music , you know, funky and strange and old-fashioned, even bad music you wouldn’t normally like. Then he mixes it all together. That mix, that’s the DJ’s brand, that’s who he is.”

Contemporary South Korean mash-up culture, with its warring influences of fast food joints and traditional, uniformed school kids, is simultaneously alluring and off-putting to DJ, who’s mostly thankful to no longer rely on unscrupulous acts -- printing and selling lottery tickets with no winner among them -- in order to eat each night. He feels indebted to his close friend and mentor Sun-ho, who got caught up in the last-minute act of defecting, and who isn’t as enthusiastic about his new home as DJ.

Johnson writes about their relationship, and the brutal beauty of their previous lives in North Korea, in the third-person. Necessarily, he observes from a distance, and so his characterization of the place and its people is almost clinical. Through DJ he brings harsh North Korean winters to life in scenes peopled by women in fur coats and students full of naive hope about their country’s future. But each scene glistens with the sheen of globalization, with references to wealthy Gangnam and greasy burgers. Sun-ho’s reverence of centuries-old patriotic music wraps these details in a thin foil; his character never feels warmly realized, but instead works as a composite of imagined beliefs meant to generate empathy for the North. As a peek into a place we seldom hear much about beyond bold, trumpeted headlines, it’s an interesting read.

The titular story of Johnson’s collection isn’t the only one in which the author works as a sort of mashup artist, expertly weaving together experiences outside of his own. In “Interesting Facts,” a dying woman explains that she feels like a ghost, either because she actually is one, or because her husband and children have emotionally drifted away from her since her cancer diagnosis -- it's up to the reader to determine which interpretation is accurate. 

Here Johnson, whose wife is a writer and breast cancer survivor, breaks from the narrative to offer pithy pop culture commentary. Why is it, his female narrator asks, that in Hallmark movies it’s the dead wife’s job to grant her husband permission to move on? It’s a thoughtful and affecting question, but again, one that might be more warmly explored by a writer who's experienced its effects more directly. Instead, the narrator of “Interesting Facts” is a mash-up of the insecurities she airs to her lovingly dopey husband -- her inner life is made up of little else. 

There’s a similar character in the first story of Fortune Smiles, a woman whose persona is an assemblage of quirks and neuroses. She’s been hospitalized with Guillain-Barre, a rare syndrome that attacks the nervous system, and the outlook for her recovery is bleak. So, her incessant worry about her husband’s faithfulness overshadows her former individuality in what feels like an honest characterization of the emotional pain that accompanies illness. That it's narrated by her optimistic husband, who seeks solutions and solace from an AI he programed to mimic the speech of the recently assassinated president, makes the plot feel truer to Johnson’s style. 

The husband in the story is an outsider looking in on a world he doesn't understand, the world of a permanently disabled woman. He does his best to piece together fragments of their conversations with conventional wisdom to make sense of her experience. The result is a little like a DJ set -- a synthesis of thoughtful originals combined to make something simultaneously more complex and less evocative.

The bottom line:

Johnson's short stories are an amusing, if sometimes clinical, peek inside seldom-explored worlds, from the depths of the inner lives of aging, terminally ill women to the oppressive yet beautiful corners of North Korea. 

What other reviewers think:

The New York Times: "The men in these tales are so trapped by their situations that reading one story after another made me feel as if I had been locked in a room with six intense and unpredictable strangers, all starved for my attention. When comedy is applied to tragedy over and over, it can start to take on an element of defensiveness; cumulatively, it can feel as if Johnson is holding the reader at arm’s length by how cheery his darkness can be."

NPR: "This new collection, while not flawless, showcases Johnson's immense creativity and intelligence, and his admirers will find a lot to love in most of these six stories."

Who wrote it?

Adam Johnson is the author of the Pulitzer-winning novel The Orphan Master's Son. He teaches English at Stanford University. 

Who will read it?

Anyone interested in speculations about the near future, and how new technologies will impact the ways we connect on a human level. 

Opening lines:

"It's late, and I can't sleep. I raise a window for some spring Palo Alto air, but it doesn't help. In bed, eyes open, I hear whispers, which makes me think of the president, because we often talk in whispers."

Notable passage:

"DJ studied the losing ticket. He scratched away the remaining top coating and saw that South Korean tickets were different. If he had picked a diamond, a sapphire and an emerald, the card would have paid twenty thousand won. Every ticket was capable of winning if you played it right, which meant your fate was no one's but your own."

Fortune Smiles
by Adam Johnson 
Random House, $27.00
Published August 18, 2015

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This school has some truly stand-up students. 

A group of kids at McIntyre Elementary School, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, have created a special bench to make sure their fellow classmates aren't left out on the playground. Called the "Buddy Bench," students can use the seat as a safe and supportive place to let others know they'd like to be included in playtime, but may be too shy to ask. 

"The school community, students, parents, and faculty understand that the buddy bench is a tool for kids to use to advocate for themselves, to always include others and to promote a safe, respectful and responsible environment for all children," Regina Farrell, school counselor at McIntyre Elementary, told The Huffington Post. 

The concept of the Buddy Bench is simple: Students who want to partake in playground games and activities, but may feel hesitant, can take a seat, which signifies to other children on the playground that they may need an extra boost to participate. 

"The bench is a powerful anti-bullying tool," Farrell explained. "It builds kid’s self-esteem to ask others to play with them. Likewise, reaching out to a peer who is feeling left out is significant as well."

The idea for the bench came about last year, when Farrell was conducting a leadership group to help students overcome shyness and gain confidence. Four fourth-grade students came up with the idea for the Buddy Bench in this workshop, and worked with Farrell to draft a letter to present to the Parent Teacher Staff Organization to make the bench a reality. The PTSO approved the students' pitch, and designated funds to install a bright metal bench with a cheerful sign that reads "Buddy Bench" on the school's playground. 

Since it was installed on Nov. 16, the bench has been effective. The simple concept has resonated with the students, and already has created a more inclusive environment within the school community. 

"Each day, I go to recess and see the buddy bench working," Farrell said. "The lessons they are learning now will benefit them their entire lives. It is simply a beautiful example of kids wanting to be kind and continue to be kind every day."

H/T TribLive

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The holidays are finally here, bringing an onslaught of family, food and, for many of us, stress on stress. Whether you're dreading endless conversations with your great aunt Judith or getting anxious over the prospect of impending New Year's resolutions, may we humbly suggest you let your creative side serve as a sort of internal massage.

Art therapy is a form of therapy predicated on the belief that artistic expression has the power to help us in healing, in self-esteem or simply in chilling out. It's unique in that most other forms of therapy rely on language as the foremost mode of communication, whereas art requires something different, something harder to define.

We're not art therapists, and the techniques below are only suggestions based on practices familiar to the art therapy community. But for those hungry for a creative outlet to relieve the tension that tends to build up this time of year, the practices below may help. They require few materials and no artistic background -- in fact, the less art you make, the better. The following suggestions are less about the final product, and more about the transformation that occurs along the way.

Behold, 37 art therapy techniques to help you relax this season.

1. Design a postcard you don't intend to send

Whether it's a love note to someone you're not ready to confess your feelings to, or an angry rant you know is better left unsaid, sometimes enumerating all the details helps deflate the issue at hand. While writing the text can be therapeutic in its own right, designing the postcard gives even more value to the object. It also allows you to activate different portions of your brain while relaxing in a manner similar to coloring in a coloring book. Once you toss that signed and sealed letter in the trash (or tuck it away in a drawer), you'll find its message has lost some of its power.

2. Cut and paste a painting to create a collage

Create a painting on a material like paper or cardboard. When you're finished, cut or tear it up. Then use the pieces as building blocks for a new artwork -- a collage. See how your original artwork transforms into something new and exciting, something unpredictable. This exercise illuminates the close proximity between creation and destruction, encouraging us to take risks to push ourselves creatively and in other aspects of life.

3. Build an altar to a loved one

Take inspiration from folk art and create an altar honoring a unique relationship between you and another person, living or not. Decorate the shrine with photographs, letters and relics of memorable times spent together, as well as new art objects you've created in their honor. Anything can become artistic material, from gifts you've exchanged to a candy wrapper you know your subject would love. Building a totem to another person awakens memories and creates a physical manifestation of a relationship that can provide comfort in tough times.

4. Draw in total darkness

So much of the stress we experience when making art comes from the judgments and criticism that seem unavoidable every step of the way. Try creating artwork in total darkness to make art free from that art critic inside your head. Think of it as a form of blind contour drawing. You're suddenly freed up to create lines, shapes and patterns simply because you feel like you should. When you turn back on the lights, we suspect you'll be surprised by what you find.

5. Watercolor your bodily state

Lie down and close your eyes. Visualize your body as you breathe in and out. Try to imagine your breath as a particular color as it enters your body, another color as it exits. What do you see? Draw an outline of a body on a large sheet of paper, and inside, create a watercolor based on your bodily state. Think about what these colors mean to you, where they are densest, where they are most opaque. Think of this as the most relaxing self-portrait you'll ever create.

6. Create a Zentangle-inspired creation

Zentangle is a drawing method invented by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas, designed to make drawing meditative and accessible to all. To learn the official method you must be taught by a Zentangle Teacher, but you can recreate the basic idea on your own. Use a piece of paper, cut into a 3.5-inch square piece, and draw a freehand border around the edge in light pencil. Then use your pencil to draw a curved line or squiggle within the border, called a "string."

Now switch to a pen and begin drawing a "tangle," a series of patterns and shapes around your "string" and voila! You got yourself a Zentangle. The process is designed to encourage deliberate, ritual creation and allow room for human error -- no erasing, that's against the rules. Traditional Zentangles are always black and white but we fully support experimenting with color. The entire process shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, and can be repeated whenever you feel the urge. Keep some squares handy so you can always create when inspiration strikes.

7. Produce a permission slip

Think of the societal and self-imposed pressures you feel on a day-to-day basis, the personal traits you see as faults, the natural slips you see as errors. Choose one of these things and give yourself, in ornamental detail, permission to do just that. Turning one simple defeat into an accomplishment can minimize feelings of self-hatred, allowing you to achieve more of your important goals. Remember, it's an art project, so make it pretty.

8. Write a found poem

Don't consider yourself a poet? Let someone else do the hard part of coming up with the words by grabbing your material from old books, magazines, newspapers or even letters. Cut out words that jump out at or inspire you. Collage your found materials just as you would a visual collage. You can have a topic or story in mind at the beginning, or just get started and see where your word collaging takes you.

9. Craft a mark-making tool unique to you

Instead of spending the majority of your time on an actual painting, why not focus a little of that attention on crafting an alternative paintbrush all your own? You can make a mark-making tool out of nearly anything, whether it's a row of toothpicks glued to a cardboard base and dipped in paint, or a DIY paintbrush made from pom-poms and yarn. When you finally get around to actually making a piece with your new tool, you will have relinquished some of your artistic control to your distinct artistic medium, which, of course, is a work of art in itself.

10. Make a forgiveness box

If there is a certain person -- including yourself -- you don't want to harbor negative emotions toward any longer, try making him or her a forgiveness box. Decorate a small box with soothing images and words that can be either specific to an individual or catered to your desired inner state. You can write the person's name on a slip of paper and include it in the box if preferred, and the name can be removed and exchanged if needed. The act of making the box will bring up happy memories of whomever the box is for, as well as help you physically work toward a place of forgiveness.

11. Create a color collage

Color has the ability to affect our moods. Sometimes, however, instead of using color to transform our current state of mind, it's helpful to take a moment to delve deep into the color you're currently experiencing. Feeling hot-tempered and uninhibited? Cut and paste orange images that fit your mood. Working within your current emotional state can help you make sense of why you're feeling the way you're feeling and realize that, perhaps, it's not such a bad place to be.

12. Make a power mask

Most often we think of wearing a mask as a way to hide something about ourselves, but sometimes this layer of protection and anonymity makes us feel liberated and actually aids in expressing something true, difficult and real. Create a power mask, filled with symbols that make you feel strong (think of an actor's costume or athlete's helmet). You can put it on when preparing for a rough situation -- whether it's dinner with the extended family or giving a speech at work -- and prove to yourself you can accomplish the task at hand with or without the mask. 

13. Construct a holiday "anti-calendar"

All too often calendars are jam-packed with chores, obligations and responsibilities, making the coming days a point of stress more than solace. Try making a DIY advent calendar, which we've dubbed an anti-calendar. Instead of giving yourself a chocolate each day, treat yourself to a compliment, a doodle, an inspiring quote or an encouraging mandate such as "eat breakfast in bed today." If all goes according to plan, you could find yourself bouncing out of bed each morning like a kid on Christmas.

14. Start a doodle chain

Fact: It's impossible for a doodle to look bad. Once you give in to the endless possibilities that occur when wiggly line meets unidentified shape, you'll find it dangerously hard to stop drawing. Start a doodle-centric take on exquisite corpse with a friend or loved one to loosen your attachment to your creation. It's pretty magical to watch your lone squiggle blossom into a spindly beast before your eyes. You can also try this with a pen-pal for a more productive spin on chain mail.

15. Draft a portrait of a past self

We're not talking about past lives here, but versions of yourself you feel like you've either lost touch with or outgrown. Whether you're revisiting a phase of innocence, ignorance or just plain difference, using the space between memory and imagination as your subject helps illuminate how malleable your self really is. It feels almost like reading your old diary for the first time in years.

16. Build a wishing tree

Take a cue from her majesty Yoko Ono and build a physical object to hold your wildest dreams. Use either a real plant or a tree-like object you create yourself, write your wishes down on paper and hang them, one by one. You can invite others to do the same. Writing your hopes and dreams on paper brings you a small step closer to making them real. Not to mention, the little papers resemble blossoming flowers from far away.

17. Paint your own personal set of Russian dolls

Though we're built a little differently -- mainly, not out of wood -- we too have different layers nestled inside us at all times. What is the self you portray to others? What about to your most trusted loved ones? What remains hidden underneath? You can either purchase a set of dolls and paint over them or paint atop a set of cardboard gift boxes or other stackable objects. Feel free to use images and words to recreate the layers you envision when you think of yourself.

18. Add on to a masterpiece

Intimidated by a glaring sheet of blank paper? Yeah, us too. Instead of starting from scratch, try adding onto a canvas you already know and love to boost your confidence and lower the risk. Whether you're applying makeup to the Mona Lisa or filling in the blanks of a Paul Klee paintings with your own brand of alien creatures, we're sure the original artists would be honored by your tribute. Who knows? You could become a famed appropriation artist in the process.

19. Assemble a safe space

This is for the architects among us. Remember building a pillow fort as a kid? That cozy, secret space for you and only you? Take inspiration from the five-year-old inside and build yourself a grown-up fort -- ahem, an art installation. You can create a full-blown tent if you wish or simply arrange meaningful items in a closet or under the bed. Incorporate nostalgic objects, old toys or blankets, twinkly lights -- anything that makes you feel removed from the world around you. Put on a soothing song and let the good feelings wash over you.

20. Use crayons

Yup, it's that simple. There's something about the crayon's blunt tip and uneven method of coloring that is at once frustrating and liberating. Yes, it's hard to draw a straight line. Yes, it's nearly impossible to color in a space without it looking patchy. But that's exactly the point. Allow your artistic imperfections to float to the surface and learn to cherish every human error in your creation. Whatever work you create will be distinctly yours, even if it's not quite museum-worthy.

21. Make an invisible New Year's resolution visible (and beautiful)

New Year's resolutions. How did something so seemingly restorative turn into something so incredibly stressful? Instead of promising yourself to floss more or eat less, focus some attention on an invisible accomplishment, something that's either too big or too small to see with your eyes. Instead of writing it in the notebook with the rest of your resolutions, devote some time to making your personal goal into a beautiful object, a visual mantra that inspires you just upon seeing it.

22. Create a memory jug

Memory jugs originated with members of Africa’s Bakongo communities, who believed the physical world was connected to the spiritual world by water. They often decorated graves with water-centric items like jugs to connect deceased spirits to the waterways that would lead them to the afterlife. The ritual was revived recently as a form of found art sculpture, or 3D scrapbooking. Use lacquer to adhere found objects to a vase, jug or pot -- whether they remind you of a specific person, recall a certain time in your life, or just make you smile.

23. Do a doodle a day

You know what's hard? Taking time out of a hectic schedule to create a work of art when you have absolutely no idea where to start. You know what's easy? Taking a few minutes to break from your day and scribble out a little weirdness, just for the sake of keeping that hand moving. Divide each page of a sketchbook into fourths and create one simple drawing every day -- really, if you draw a happy face as your falling asleep it's okay. Just getting into the creative rhythm will get your imagination churning. Soon you'll feel more comfortable with your artistic style and be struck by inspiration during your daily routine. You may even want to spend more than five minutes on a drawing someday. But worry not, doodles always look good.

24. Shed your old skin into a sculpture

Okay, this is far less creepy than it sounds. This suggestion is for those doing some early spring cleaning or getting rid of old belongings -- be they clothes, papers, glasses, buttons, defunct technologies. Instead of tossing away your old junk, use the materials to create a sculpture of a former self, immortalizing the (insert appropriate adjective here) year that was 2014. The sculpture does not have to (and probably won't) look like you; it can be abstract, geometric, organic or all of the above. Even if the materials seem meaningless now, they'll become treasures with the passing of time, and the ceremony of creating the sculpture provides great closure in moving on to the new year.

25. Use your non-dominant hand to create

You know that Pablo Picasso quote, "All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up"? Firstly, make that "he" a "he or she." Now, channel this Picasso-ian sentiment by unlearning anything you've ever learned about style, control and discipline by passing your pencil to the other hand. Before you know it, you'll have the uncertain, wiggly, unfettered stroke of a child -- and thus, by the transitive Picasso principle, of a bona fide artist.

26. Craft an intention stick

Whether you call them intention sticks, prayer sticks, wish sticks or talismans, their purpose is the same: to provide a physical object for you to wrap your hands around and bring you strength as well as peace of mind. Intention sticks, which have roots in Hopi and Tibetan traditions, gain their power from the positive energy posited in the stick during its creation -- so basically, make sure you're in a good mood when you make it! Find a stick that fits perfectly in your hands, think of it like a magic wand, paint it and decorate it with mantras or intentions close to your heart. Add string, feathers, glitter, beads and whatever else you wish and keep the stick in a secret place for when you need it most.

27. Make your own stencil

If you're having trouble embarking on an artwork itself, how about starting with the artistic medium instead? You can make a DIY stencil from a cardboard box, playing card, cereal box -- the list continues. Use scissors to cut out a shape all your own and you can make your imprint, quite literally, on any future artworks or random pieces of paper you happen to encounter. Don't worry about straight lines and perfect proportions; with a handmade stencil, the more rugged the better.

28. Turn your fears into a (literal) monster

Sometimes the only way to lessen your fears is to face them head on. Think about something that frightens you, whether it's "spiders," "being a bad artist," "going broke" or "losing my way." Give this fear a shape, a color and a texture; it can be as abstract or symbolic as you wish. Creating the beast outside of you will strip your fear of some of its power, especially when comparing it to the (now often silly) fears we all had as a child.

29. Craft your own dream guardian

You've heard of a dreamcatcher. We're tweaking the tradition a little bit, thus freeing up the possibilities of what shapes your new dream guardian can take. Create a dangling sculpture to hang above your bed that will watch over you while you sleep. Feel free to use the traditional willow hoop with feathers and beads, or veer off track and get experimental with fabric, bells, photos, or whatever brings you peace of mind. Soon you'll have a new friend to keep an eye on you as your dreams sweep you off into another world.

30. Make a painting with no tools but your body

Don't have the time (or the funds) to invest in a new batch of art tools? No worries, all you need to get creative is your own beautiful body. Explore the possibilities of your own anatomy -- the plush curves of your fingertip, the sharp edge of your nail, the capabilities of hand and foot and even hair, if you're feeling bold. Not only will your canvas end up looking unexpectedly magnificent, but you'll probably resemble a work of art yourself.

31. Revamp a stuffed animal

We've been dying to give this one a go since we caught a glimpse of Jenny Ottinger's latest exhibition, in which she conducts slightly botched surgeries on stuffed teddy bears, producing jumbled creatures at once adorable and creepy. We'd recommend a less frightening version for a therapeutic result. Take a beloved childhood toy and transform it into a work of art, either by patching its holes, replacing its ragged parts or going a more avant-garde route. You'll finally be able to return your beloved teddy to its rightful spot on your bed, while proudly displaying an original objet d'art.

32. Craft a memory rock

Next time you have a special day, take a home a free souvenir in the form of a rock -- or a receipt, or a brochure, or a leaf; anything will do the trick really. Call it your new canvas. Decorate your new keepsake with memories from throughout the day -- however abstract or concrete your creative self desires. If you're feeling painter's block, use the natural creases and edges of the rock to guide your aesthetic decisions. A few memory rocks down the road, you'll have a rock garden that instantly conjures recollections of your most joyous days, to help with the glum ones.

33. Channel Giuseppe Arcimboldo

Brief art history primer: Giuseppe Arcimboldo was a 16th century Italian painter primarily known for his surreal self-portraits made from painted objects like fruit, veggies, books and fish. Channel good ole Giuseppe with objects that mean something to you. Whether you draw, paint or collage, create a version of that precious punam of yours made from the objects that help define you or make your heart flutter -- whether it's your dog, sunflowers or the In-N-Out logo.

34. Make an ephemeral artwork

Practice the art of letting go by creating a work of art with an expiration date. Work with a material that erodes with time -- whether it's a sand castle that washes away in the sea, a chalk mural that fades in the sun, or a drawing attached to a balloon and set into flight. You know what they say, f you love something, set it free!

35. Paint a mirror or window

Overhaul the concept of a blank canvas by selecting a surface that already tells a vivid story. Apply pigment to a mirror or window, and let your brushstrokes mingle with whatever's already gracing your uncanny canvas -- be it a snowy day or your own reflection. Just think of it as makeup's way artsier second cousin.

36. Turn a journal entry into a work of art

Whether you're drawing inspiration from last week's misadventure or your third grade trials and tribulations, why not creative a visual adaptation of your own first-person narration? Take an old journal entry -- one that was especially poignant, difficult, joyous, or totally arbitrary -- and recreate the text as imagery. Feel free to draw, paint, collage, whatever can best express the atmosphere of that one day.

37. Design your (artsy) spirit animal

Do you have a spirit animal? Have you never been quite satisfied with the classic genus and species currently available to you? Here's your chance to craft the imaginary hybrid creature of your wildest fantasies. From a liger to a jellyfish-dragon to a pegasus-zebra, the only limit to the wildlife available to you are the zoological limits of your mind.

This post is based on a series of art therapy roundups we've published throughout the past year.

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Adele's new bodyguard is setting fire to the rain.

The British singer has been getting a lot of media attention with the launch of her new album "25" on Nov. 20.

But it's her security detail who now appears to be making collective hearts flutter by constantly showing up at her side.

His name is Peter van der Veen and he previously worked security for Lady Gaga for five years, according to Metro.

The former bodybuilder from Holland was crowned Mr. Europe in 2005, reports the Mirror.

Fans of the "Hello" star appear to be thrilled with the new addition to her team, with dozens professing their love on Twitter:

Adele's new album broke UK chart records Friday after the Official Charts Company confirmed it had recorded the biggest opening sales week in history, according to Billboard. The album sold 800,307 copies in Britain alone.

The star's whirlwind promo tour over the last two weeks has seen her prank impersonators for a BBC show, perform "Hello" with classroom instruments on "The Tonight Show" and become BFFs with former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

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J.K. Rowling must be using her Remembrall again.

For some reason lately, the Harry Potter author seems to finally recall that she left fans of the series with more mysteries than there are flavors of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. The author has been slowly revealing the answers to some of those mysteries through Twitter, and on Friday she was at it again.

After a fan asked why Rowling would name one of Harry's kids after Snape, Rowling initially responded by saying that Harry was paying Snape tribute since he died for Harry out of love for his mother, Lily.

After that, the next great Battle of Hogwarts began. The author's response opened the Twitter floodgates, causing heated debate between Snape lovers and haters alike. 

Rowling joined the debate, too, getting even more revealing about Snape. The author explained that Snape did have genuine hatred for Harry. 

Then she took a deep dive into Snape's character, discussing how he has shades of gray; revealing how Harry hoped to honor him and the other deaths from the Battle of Hogwarts; and explaining Snape's one true tragedy.

After a short respite, Rowling came back to Twitter and found the debate still going strong.

She joined in once again. Rowling explained how Snape's last moments with Voldemort were truly heroic.

The author also got back to the main issue at hand: why Harry named his son Albus Severus after Snape instead of some other person who died at Hogwarts.

For Albus Severus, the names to be remembered were Severus Snape and Albus Dumbledore.

Case closed.

Rowling thanked the fans who participated in the debate and then apparated out of there. And with that, the author ended the great Twitter debate of why Harry named his son after Snape.

But you can bet fans have more questions and are just waiting for whenever the next Harry Potter debate takes over.

H/T MTV/Buzzfeed

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For almost three years now, a seasonal queer party series in Brooklyn's underground has acted as an amalgamation of the different shades and hues of the queer community navigating this outer NYC borough.

David Sokolowski and DJ Econ's "Psychic" party series is much more than an event to mark the change in our climates or an excuse to drink excessively. These parties are an experience -- and an experiment -- in queer community building and self-actualization that aim to transport their attendees to a higher spiritual plane.

And for years they've done just that, while continuing to change and evolve.

We've brought you many different installments of Psychic over the years -- Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall. For the 2015 Psychic Fall, curators Sokolowski and Econ sat down with HuffPost Gay Voices Deputy Editor JamesMichael Nichols for a candid conversation about Psychic and what exactly this queer experience has grown into and what it represents for the queer community of Brooklyn.

Check out the conversation above.

Video courtesy of Bill Pappas/Silly Productions and photos courtesy of Tinker Coalescing. Head here for more tickets and information or check out the slideshow below for photos of past Psychics.

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Madeleine L’Engle entered the world at the tail end of November, on this very day in 1918, so it makes sense that the book she’s most beloved for, A Wrinkle in Time, begins with a classically chilly scene: a dark and stormy night.

Awkward middle-schooler Meg Murry, her precocious little brother Charles Wallace, and their beautiful scientist mother have gathered by chance in the warm kitchen to take comfort during the storm. Their relatively normal, and popular, twin brothers Sandy and Dennis remain asleep upstairs. That very day, Meg has drawn rebuke from her teachers, been sneered at by her classmates, and gotten into a fight to protect her nerdy little brother. Her mother gently examines a bruise she’s acquired on her cheek. Full of resentment at her lot in life, 12-year-old Meg stews, “I hate being an oddball.” Her mother responds, “Just give yourself time, Meg.”

In short, A Wrinkle in Time announces itself immediately as a book for the oddballs -- the normies, Sandy and Dennis, may continue to slumber offstage.

Every young adult book is, basically, for the misfits. Navigating adolescence without suspecting that, on some or every level, one is incapable of operating "normally" in society may be impossible. It’s an age of confusion, identity formation and reformation, trying to fit in and wondering why we can’t. Coming-of-age books often aim at this confusion, offering an alternate mythology: that we can’t fit in, perhaps, because we’re just too special. That one day, we’ll be the one everyone else will envy. (Harry Potter, for example -- you’re unpopular because you’re a wizard, Harry!)

L’Engle’s Wrinkle in Time quintet isn’t just for the oddballs, though. It’s for the oddball in every single one of us. In L’Engle’s books, there’s no one standing onstage who’s simply normal, accepted, whole. Reading the series is a course in learning that every person faces their own path to feeling normal, and their own obstacles to feeling special.

Poor gawky Meg, whose proclivity for shortcuts in math class has also marked her as “dumb” among her teachers, feels like the greatest outcast. Early on in the book, her fortunes seem to take a turn when she befriends Calvin O’Keefe, a cute, popular classmate who excels at school and in athletics. But, as it turns out, Calvin is jealous of her -- her loving family, her financial security. He might be able to fit in with his classmates, but at home, he’s the misfit in a down-on-its-luck family that cares little about him.

Throughout four of the five books in the series, Meg and Charles Wallace form a dynamic Murry duo, the misfits who have dramatic, earthshakingly important adventures. They save lives. They change history. It’s enough to make you wonder: What would it be like to be their siblings?

In Many Waters, L’Engle puts the normal Murry twins -- normal grades, normal popularity, normal everything -- into focus, and what materializes isn’t so simple as might have been expected. Sandy and Dennis might seem totally normal, but they’re oddballs, as well; in a family full of geniuses, including both of their parents and both of their siblings, they’re on the outside looking in. Worse, they’re more than smart enough to know they’re not really a part of their family's world.

Sandy and Dennis actually stumble into their own sci-fi adventure, accidentally triggering a time machine while goofing around in their parents’ lab and finding themselves in the Middle East, living with Noah’s family shortly before the great flood. Suddenly, without ever choosing their fate, they’re reckoning with being caught up in a historical disaster, as well as with their conflicted feelings about their family and about being treated as one unit -- SandyAndDennis. While having each other, and their popularity, has made their lives simpler in the short term, they both know those are stopgaps for a real identity. So who are they? Where do they fit?

L’Engle’s most beloved series contains travel through time and space, battles inside mitochondria and romances with beautiful biblical women, but her sympathy for the oddball powers her magic. Not just the oddball as we might think of him or her -- the nerdy Meg Murry, the uncanny Charles Wallace -- but the little part in each of us that feels rejected or unworthy.

Every adolescent, even every adult -- whether a Dennis or a Charles Wallace -- sometimes struggles to fit in. Maybe growing up is about learning that no one can be all things to all people, but if anyone knows that’s a tough pill to swallow, it’s Madeleine L’Engle.

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The Statue of Liberty was originally conceived of as being a peasant Muslim woman in traditional Islamic dress, according to the Smithsonian Institution's magazine.

She would have stood guard over the Suez Canal in Egypt instead of New York Harbor, were it not for the economic prudence of the reigning Egyptian Khedive of the time, the museum reports.

French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi initially wanted to place an 86-foot-high statue of an Egyptian woman in Port Said on the northern approach to the man-made waterway connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea, the Daily Beast reports.

The statue -- named at the conceptual stage as "Egypt Carrying the Light To Asia" -- would have been a symbol of "progress" and the lantern in her upraised hand would have acted as a lighthouse, according to the National Parks Service.

But Egyptian ruler Isma'il Pasha dismissed the project, inspired by Bartholdi's visit to the Nubian monuments in Abu Simbel in 1855, because it was too expensive, writes Edward Berenson in "Statue of Liberty: A Transatlantic Story."

Bartholdi modified his designs, which the Musee D’Orsay in Paris, France, said was influenced by the mythical Colossus of Rhodes. The copper statue was finally built in France by lead structural designer Gustave Eiffel -- creator of the Eiffel Tower.

It was shipped to the United States in crates, assembled and unveiled on Oct. 28, 1886, as a gift to the U.S. from the people of France.

From ground to torch, "Lady Liberty" stands about 305 feet tall -- almost four times the height of Bartholdi's initial design.

It is 125 feet higher than the 180-foot lighthouse later constructed in Port Said. The Suez Canal was completed in Nov. 1869.

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