“Hemming and hawing” first appeared in the late 18th century (“I hemmed and hawed … but the Queen stopped reading,” 1786), but other forms (“hem and hawk,” “hum and haw,” etc.) are a few centuries older, and the “hem” and the “haw” are both considerably older than the whole phrase.  The basic meaning of “hem,” according to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), is “an interjectional utterance like a slight half cough, used to attract attention, give warning, or express doubt or hesitation.” If this sounds vaguely familiar, that’s because it is the same sound depicted by the interjection “ahem,” the difference being that “ahem” is an actual word used to attract attention to the speaker, rather than producing the sound “hem” itself.  The verb “to hem,” meaning to make the noise, dates to the 15th century, and is “echoic” in origin, being an imitation of the sound itself.  “Hem” is also closely related to “hum,” also echoic.  “Haw,” which dates back to the 1600s, is another case of a word imitating a sound, in this case “as an expression of hesitation” (OED).  There are fashions in such things, and today we are more likely to say “uh,” “huh,” or “um” when faced with a sudden decision, but the feeling is the same.  So, put together, “hem and haw” vividly describes that moment when our mouth stalls for time while our mind attempts to assess the ramifications of our possible answers, the mental “looking” before the verbal “leaping.”  http://www.word-detective.com/2008/10/hem-and-haw/   

Windsor Castle is a medieval castle and royal residence in Windsor in the English county of Berkshire that is notable for its long association with the British royal family and for its architecture.  The original castle was built after the Norman invasion by William the Conqueror.  Since the time of Henry I, it has been used by a succession of monarchs and is the longest-occupied palace in Europe.  The castle's lavish, early 19th-century State Apartments are architecturally significant, described by art historian Hugh Roberts as "a superb and unrivalled sequence of rooms widely regarded as the finest and most complete expression of later Georgian taste".  The castle includes the 15th-century St George's Chapel, considered by historian John Robinson to be "one of the supreme achievements of English Perpendicular Gothic" design.  More than five hundred people live and work in Windsor Castle.  See picture at:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windsor_Castle   

When Glenn D. Lowry arrived 17 years ago as director of the Museum of Modern Art, he and the curator Kirk Varnedoe sat down and wrote out a list of the 10 works they most wanted.  “Canyon,” a landmark of 20th-century art by Robert Rauschenberg, was at the top, Mr. Lowry recalled.  Now that wish has come true.  “Canyon” goes on display Nov. 28 at the Modern after being captured in a contest with its uptown sister, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where it had resided on and off since 2005.  Its owners agreed to donate the work as part of a $41 million settlement with the Internal Revenue Service.  The Museum of Modern Art and the Met have never been direct competitors because their missions are different; one focuses on certain periods while the other is an encyclopedic institution.  In recent years, though, the Met has worked to bolster its traditionally weaker contemporary and modern art holdings, including a plan to lease the Whitney Museum’s Breuer building.  If the Met had won, the new space would perhaps have been the showcase for “Canyon,” an audacious combination of personal photographs, cardboard, wood, fabric, paint, string, a pillow and a stuffed bald eagle on canvas that helped redraw the bounds of postwar art.  That stuffed bird is ultimately the reason “Canyon” is being donated at all.  The presence of a bald eagle — a bird protected by federal laws — means that the work cannot be legally sold or traded.   Like all bald eagles, alive or dead, the one in “Canyon” is covered by two laws, the 1940 Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act and the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act.  Because of these statutes, it is a crime not only to buy, sell or barter a bald eagle, but also to possess one.  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/28/arts/design/moma-gains-treasure-that-metropolitan-museum-of-art-also-coveted.html?hp&_r=0

One government demands action by a company, while another government forbids it.  This uncomfortable situation, a familiar one to international lawyers, could soon hit U.S. airlines, although efforts are under way to avert a showdown.  Europe’s Directive 2008/101/EC requires all airlines, including those based in the U.S., to participate in Europe’s greenhouse-gas trading system, meaning they need to get allowances for carbon dioxide emitted during their flights.  But if U.S. airlines follow that directive, they may run afoul of the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme Prohibition Act, which President Barack Obama has signed.  The U.S. law authorizes the secretary of Transportation to prohibit those who operate aircraft in the U.S. from participating in the European program.  Airlines would need some skilled legal advice if the conflict reaches the breaking point, but diplomats may yet be able to execute an evasive maneuver.  Europe this month postponed its rules for a year, and a U.N. body is looking for an emissions program that airlines around the world could agree to.  For all its eagerness to reduce the emissions blamed for global warming, Europe isn’t likely to rush ahead with a program that threatens to ground trans-Atlantic flights.  http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2012/11/27/u-s-airlines-face-legal-pickle/ 

Irish actor Liam Neeson was chosen to play Abraham Lincoln in the film based on the book Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin.  In preparation for the role, Neeson visited Washington, D.C., Springfield, Illinois where Lincoln lived prior to being elected, and read Lincoln's personal letters.  Neeson eventually declined the role, claiming he was "past his sell date" and had grown too old to play Lincoln.  In November 2010, it was announced that Daniel Day-Lewis, an actor with both British and Irish citizenship, would play Abraham Lincoln in Steven Spielberg's film Lincoln.  The film began shooting in Richmond, Virginia in October 2011.  Day-Lewis spent a year in preparation for the role, a time he asked from Spielberg.  Day-Lewis read over 100 books on Lincoln, and long worked with the film's makeup artist to achieve a physical likeness to Lincoln.   Wikipedia 

Doris Kearns Goodwin (born Doris Helen Kearns; January 4, 1943) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American biographer, historian, and an oft-seen political commentator.  She is the author of biographies of several U.S. Presidents, including Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream; The Fitzgeralds and the Kennedys: An American Saga; No Ordinary Time:  Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt (which won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1995); and her most recent book, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doris_Kearns_Goodwin

Nov. 28, 2012  Google’s imprint on daily life is hard to ignore in Europe, where it reportedly has 93 percent of the Internet search market, more than in the United States.  Yet when it comes to its lobbying of lawmakers, Google prefers a low profile.  That all changed this week when Google fired a rare public broadside against a proposal that would force it and other online aggregators of news content to pay German newspaper and magazine publishers to display snippets of news in Web searches.  The proposed ancillary copyright law, which is to have its first reading Nov. 30 in the lower house of Parliament, the Bundestag, has ignited a storm of hyperbole pitting Google and local Web advocates against powerful publishers including Süddeutsche Zeitung, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Bild and Die Welt.  Google took off the gloves Nov. 27 when it opened a campaign urging German users to e-mail members of the Bundestag with their concerns.  Google said the proposal would shrink the free flow of information on the Internet in Germany, perhaps even forcing it to display blank links to German references.  The issue is also being debated in other European capitals.  Kevin J. O'Brien  http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/29/technology/google-fires-a-rare-public-salvo-over-aggregators.html?_r=0