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The changed politics of late-night TV
The curtain rose this week on a new era of late-night TV — altering the terrain for politicians who frequent the shows and complicating life for Republicans, who have lost their most comfortable seat in front of the camera.
"The whole landscape's about to change," Arsenio Hall, the recently reincarnated late-night host, said in an interview. "Jay [Leno] going home is going to change it for a lot of people."
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Jimmy Fallon replaced Leno — who was seen as the one late-night host with a welcome mat out for the GOP — and moved "The Tonight Show" back to New York City after decades in Hollywood. Beyond the location, expect another big departure from Leno: Not nearly as many heavy-hitting political jokes or guests.
( WATCH: Jimmy Fallon makes debut as Tonight Show host)
Fallon, who is eyed a bit warily by some Republicans, had first lady Michelle Obama on Thursday — they have a chemistry between them — after launching his new show on Monday. He said recently that his show will not be the place to go for in-depth interviews with politicians and candidates.
Obama and Fallon's only foray into politics during her appearance was a pitch about Obamacare's provision that allows children to stay on their parent's health insurance until age 26, with a quick quip from Fallon about the problem-plagued HealthCare.gov finally working.
"(The website is) working now. It's so much better when it's working," Fallon said.
As part of the new late-night lineup, Seth Meyers is taking over Fallon's old spot on "Late Night," and the former "Saturday Night Live" head writer has said he does plan to focus on politics. In fact, Vice President Joe Biden will be one of his first guests on Monday, when the show debuts. Meyers and his team declined an interview request.
(Also on POLITICO: Jimmy Fallon responds to Rahm Emanuel plunge)
With the 2014 midterms not far off and the 2016 presidential cycle already in motion, a seat on a late-night host's couch is an important place for politicians who are looking to soften their image, reach a young-ish audience and prove they have a sense of humor like any average Joe.
But there will definitely be less pure politics without Leno, experts said. While Leno and "Late Show" host David Letterman have relied heavily on politics in their monologues and had many politicians on as guests, Fallon turns political only when there's a story so big it can't be ignored, said Robert Lichter, director of Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University and the author of the forthcoming book "Politics Is a Joke: How TV Comedians Are Remaking Political Life."
"[Johnny] Carson initiated political humor on late night, but Leno put it on steroids," Lichter said. "Leno always told far more political jokes than anyone else. With folks like Fallon and others, you've got political humor when something big happens … so, for Fallon, politics is just one of many areas. For Leno, it was a major part of his arsenal."
( PHOTOS: The late-night talk show circuit)
Fallon's slimmed-down diet of politics may not be a bad thing, said Erik Smith, Obama's senior adviser for advertising and message development during the 2008 and 2012 campaigns. As opposed to what Smith called a "sense of cynicism" toward politics that Leno and Letterman exhibit in their monologues, Fallon's skits and stunts — like the "slow jam" — bring out a softer side of a candidate and are more likely to go viral.
"The type of stuff Fallon does, from a [political] strategist point of view, will be a lot more helpful, because you're actually showing a side of a politician most people can't see, which is really fun," Smith said. "When Obama slow-jammed with Fallon, he was talking about student loans. He got his message across. That was more effective than going on a talk show."
Sen. John McCain, one of the most prolific political late-night guests, said he often tries to encourage his fellow members of Congress to hit the late-night circuit but that it can be a hard sell.
( POLITICO Playback: The best of last night's late-night)
"I've always encouraged my colleagues to go on as many of these shows as possible, because it's a unique way to touch an audience that generally you never are able to reach under any other medium or format. And don't think a lot of them aren't scared," the Arizona Republican said in an interview.
While the entertainment world has always had a liberal veneer, and the political leanings of the late-night hosts have been hotly debated for years, one thing seems clear: It is Republicans who will miss Leno most.
Calling Leno his favorite late-night host, McCain said Leno would do little things like making sure there were cupcakes in the green room (McCain's favorite) or show the senator around his car collection.
"That's just the kind of guy he is," McCain said. "Another reason I like him so much is he uses humor but he doesn't have the sharp edge that some others do, the kind of put-down that is popular with some others."
Longtime Republican strategist Mark McKinnon, who has advised the presidential campaigns of McCain and George W. Bush, said losing Leno is a loss to "bipartisan political comedy."
"Conservative candidates are justifiably going to be more cautious about other [late-night] platforms," he said.


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This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2013, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
The Chinese zodiac may have 2013 down as the "Year of the Snake," but, according to Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker's reading of the lunar calendar, it's the "Year of the Bike."
Or so he said in his State of the City address last month. But what exactly that entails remains somewhat vague.
That Becker is a fan of bicycles is not news. It's not uncommon to see him roll up to City Hall or an out-of-the-way news conference in a suit and tie astride a two-wheeler. He's also fond of creating new bike lanes and touts the bicycle as a key to future urban transportation strategies.
In his State of the City speech, he made reference to the Bike Share program fostered by the municipality that will be operated by the private, nonprofit Downtown Alliance business organization.
That $1 million program is slated to debut in March and will include 100 bicycles and at least 10 stations. It works through memberships that range from $5 a day to $75 a year. Participants can take a bike for 30 minutes at a time and drop it off at any station.
Such transportation schemes have been successful in many U.S. and European cities, according to the mayor.
The city has also launched a new "bike-dedicated" website, http://www.bikeslc.com, which offers information on bike trails and safety.
What else is in the offing for the Year of the Bike?
The mayor's office is playing that close to the vest, although it announced this week an "Open Streets" program that will close a downtown road to automobile traffic on the first Saturday in May to encourage bicycling and a festive atmosphere.
Becker's administration may have several more tricks up its sleeve.
But as much as anything, the Year of the Bike looks to reiterate the mayor's dedication to a two-wheeled future and a call to action for individuals, groups and businesses of like minds.
City Councilman Soren Simonsen said he could imagine 2013 as the Year of the Bike "because various things that we have been planning for years are coming on line in 2013."
New bike lanes have been created on North Temple to complement the new TRAX line. And two new sections of Parleys Trail should be completed this year that will allow bike navigation from 1700 East to 200 West.
The western segment of that route will parallel the Sugar House streetcar line, scheduled to begin operation in December.
One thing the Year of the Bike won't include is the 25-year-old independent citizens group called the Mayor's Bicycle Advisory Committee. That long-standing ad hoc group was cast aside last year, said David Everitt, the mayor's chief of staff, because it had become counterproductive.
However, the administration has proposed a new bicycle committee under its Transportation Advisory Board. That proposal has yet to be finalized. But City Council Chairman Kyle LaMalfa said the mayor's proposal, or one very much like it, will be approved soon.
Residents interested in sitting on the panel are invited to apply by 5 p.m. Thursday online at http://www.bikeslc.com and click on the "Get Involved" link.
LaMalfa said incorporating a bicycle committee within city government would guarantee its "staying power."
But Polly Hart, the former vice chairwoman of the Mayor's Bicycle Advisory Committee, said she hopes the new structure will allow the committee to be proactive, rather than simply reactive to the mayor's agenda.
"I would like to see a bicycle advisory committee led by its members," she said, "not just responding to the Transportation Advisory Board."
If he had his druthers, avid cyclist Luke Garrott, who also sits on the City Council, said that during the Year of the Bike he would like to see more bike lanes protected from traffic lanes, such as Becker's pilot project on 300 East between 600 South and 900 South.
"I see one major barrier for more people in Salt Lake City riding bikes," he said. "And that's safety. I really hope in the coming years that we will have substantially more separated bike lanes."
But Dave Iltis, the former chairman of the independent Mayor's Bicycle Advisory Committee, said the Year of the Bike could serve to propel Salt Lake City "to become a great American cycling city."
The ultimate goal, Iltis said, is to incorporate cycling into the fabric of the city so that it functions as transportation and recreation, as well as a tool for community and economic development.
"We have made incredible strides," he said. "But we still have room to grow."
Salt Lakers invited to join new bike committee
Mayor Ralph Becker and the City Council will select 13 people to sit on the Bicycle Advisory Committee. Visit http://www.bikeslc.com to apply. The deadline is 5 p.m. Thursday.

subset: commoncrawl


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How can I photograph the moon so that I see detail of the craters and mountains?
I have a Canon EOS 550D (T2i) and tried "No Flash", "P" as well as creative auto mode, but to no avail. Every time I get a completely white moon.


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Welcome to Aqua, the home of modern Italian cuisine where our menus are thoughtfully tailored to meet our guests' tastes and expectations. Our aim is to ensure that you have a memorable experience, with impeccable service and great food.
Aqua has open kitchens in all of its restaurants to create that sense of theatre. All of our food is fresh and freshly prepared to create those wonderful Italian flavours day-in day-out. We like to use the best of produce so that our guests can experience the best of creations. We source all of our cured meats and Italian produce from Italy and use our local suppliers for all of our butchery, fish and veg requirements.
We like to produce menus that are unique and produce dishes that you would not necessarily cook at home. These are our point of difference items that we continually work on to produce flavours that excite the senses. Being Italian, we like to use a range of big bold flavours.
Aqua is a wonderful neighbourhood restaurant where you can pop in at any time. Our menus cater for every occasion, whatever your appetite. Pop in for a chat with friends over coffee, or enjoy some of our lighter bites. You are welcome to enjoy our relaxing and stylish interiors all day. We serve coffee and cake in the morning and food from 12pm, so whether you're in a rush or want to indulge yourself, Aqua is the place to be.
Founded in Bristol in 1998, Aqua has grown and evolved over the years but remains a great independent, local Italian restaurant. It is proprietor Richard Smithson's goal to deliver contemporary Anglo-Italian food to local neighbourhoods and encourage diners to pop in at any time to experience our tailored services and food. The success of Richard's vision today is thanks to our team of talented chefs and charismatic managers. We have built our reputation on our guests' satisfaction and strive to deliver and exceed their expectations every day. This has been our motto from day one.
The Restaurants
Our first restaurant on the waterfront, Welshback in Bristol, is a great success of ours. It still remains at the top of the listings in Bristol and offers unique dining over the waterfront. It has a great city centre location and is perfect for all occasions. The light and stylish restaurant and bar opens onto the riverside piazza.
In 2007 Aqua went on to open its second restaurant in Bath. A beautifully restored church house, this restaurant offers magnificent dining experiences from the moment you walk through the door. Based in the city centre of Bath, it offers locals affordable dining on their doorstep.
Our restaurant on Whiteladies road was opened in Bristol in 2009, following the successful opening of the restaurant in Bath. A grade II listed building that has been wonderfully restored to create a warm and inviting dining experience with high ceilings and dramatic architecture.
2013 saw the opening of our restaurant in Portishead. The restaurant sits right on the marina and has a fantastic piazza for those long summer days – you can just sit and unwind with a drink of your choice watching the sun go down. Inside the restaurant is light and airy with great views of the marina.
All of our restaurants have their own individual character. We encourage our teams to stamp their own mark on their restaurants and build their own relationships with their guests with our guidance along the way.
Our Team
Without our talented and professional team we would not be able to do what we do today. We all like to work together as a family and this has stood us in good stead over the years as we have grown internally and externally. You need a great support network within to help you grow your restaurants and this is what Aqua has today.
We work very closely with all of our team members to help develop them as individuals so that Aqua can operate as a successful restaurant. We provide great training for all of our team, which in turn helps us achieve what we want to deliver. The dedication of the senior members of each restaurant helps us achieve the status we enjoy today.
Cook Book
Emelia Smithson's passion for food began in early childhood; her enthusiasm encouraged by an already culinary-adept family. Her abilities and knowledge were further honed in some of London's most prestigious hotels and restaurant kitchens.
Today, alongside her husband Richard, Emelia is involved in the development of the ever-expanding Aqua restaurant group. Emelia takes you on what has been a sixteen-year journey through one of the West Country's most popular and revered restaurant kitchens. Disclosing the recipes, techniques and skills acquired along the way.
Her informed, relaxed, yet concise approach enables you to achieve professional results, effortlessly.


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Study puts a new spin on ibuprofen's actions
Ibuprofen, naproxen, and related non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) the subjects of years of study still have some secrets to reveal about how they work.
Vanderbilt University investigators have discovered surprising new insights into the actions of NSAIDs. Their findings, reported Sept. 25 in Nature Chemical Biology, raise the possibility of developing a new class of inflammation- and pain-fighting medicines.
NSAIDs block the activity of the cyclooxygenase enzymes, COX-1 and COX-2.
"Until about three years ago, we thought we knew everything there was to know about these enzymes and these inhibitors, but we were unaware of some of the details of how they work," said Lawrence Marnett, Ph.D., director of the Vanderbilt Institute of Chemical Biology and professor of Biochemistry, Chemistry and Pharmacology.
COX-1 and COX-2 oxygenate (add oxygen to) the lipid arachidonic acid to generate biologically active prostaglandins. Marnett and his team discovered about 10 years ago that COX-2 (but not COX-1) also oxygenates endocannabinoids naturally occurring analgesic and anti-inflammatory agents that activate cannabinoid receptors (the same receptors that marijuana activates).
The investigators then made a puzzling observation. They found that ibuprofen was a more potent inhibitor of endocannabinoid metabolism compared to arachidonic acid metabolism.
"This was the same drug inhibiting two substrates of the same protein differently," Marnett said. "We didn't understand it."
In the current report, the researchers surveyed a series of different types of NSAIDs for inhibition of COX-2. They included the "mirror-image" versions of ibuprofen, naproxen and flurbiprofen (these drugs come in two different chemical configurations a "right hand" (R) version and a "left hand" (S) version over-the-counter ibuprofen is a mixture of both forms). It had previously been assumed that only the S-forms of these NSAIDs (S-profens) were able to inhibit COX-2.
Marnett and colleagues found that the R-profens inhibited endocannabinoid, but not arachidonic acid, oxygenation.
The researchers also determined that R-profens selectively block endocannabinoid metabolism in isolated dorsal root ganglia (neurons and glial cells from the spinal column). They found that treatment of these cultures with an inflammatory stimulus increased expression of COX-2 and stimulated release of arachidonic acid and endocannabinoids, which were oxidized by COX-2. The R-profens inhibited metabolism of the endocannabinoids (and increased their concentrations), but not arachidonic acid.
The findings offer a potential explanation for the reported observation that R-flurbiprofen is analgesic in people and that it inhibits neuropathic pain in a mouse model.
"We're proposing that R-flurbiprofen is effective in this neuropathic pain setting because it is preventing the metabolism of endocannabinoids by COX-2; so it's maintaining endocannabinoid tone and that's the basis for the analgesic activity," Marnett said.
"It's exciting because you will only see this effect at sites of inflammation where COX-2 might play a role in depleting endocannabinoids. Selective inhibitors like the R-profens could represent a new way to target analgesia without having the GI, and maybe cardiovascular, side effects of traditional NSAIDs."
Marnett and his team will pursue this idea by studying in vivo models of neuroinflammation to determine if these drugs and new compounds they are developing work to inhibit endocannabinoid oxidation and maintain endocannabinoid tone.
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"Toy Story 3" is a dark, thoughtful and at times terrifying meditation on God, the role of government, the environment, and Man's obligations to his fellow Man. Your kids will love it.
The film begins 11 years after the last one ends, with Andy just days away from heading off to university. Before he goes, he must go through his things and sort them into three destinations: college, attic, trash. One thing leads to another and Woody leaves the rest of the gang behind at Sunnyside, a day care that at first blush is a toy's paradise.
"Let's get played with," one toy shouts at being introduced to their new home. But soon it becomes apparent that Buzz and the others have been dropped into a dystopian nightmare and it's up to Woody to rescue them.
Part of the genius of the franchise began with the casting of Tom Hanks and Tim Allen as Woody and Buzz Lightyear. Nobody of his generation does "aw, shucks everyman earnestness" better than Hanks, and Allen's entire career has been built on macho bluster. The inspired casting continues in this installment. Ned Beatty shifts seamlessly from paternal assurance to menacing as Lotso; Michael Keaton may have been born to play Ken, what with his "Hey, babe" charm best ; and Timothy Dalton brings all his Royal Academy of the Dramatic Arts training to bear in his role as Mr. Pricklepants.
The animation is as stunning as we've come to expect from Pixar, with a 3-D vision so fully realized that you almost don't notice it. The depth of vision the art offers is beautifully natural -- the 3-D isn't a gimmick meant to make you recoil or cover your eyes, it's a fully-realized view of the world.
What's most impressive about the story that Michael Arndt, John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and director Lee Unkrich have crafted is how serious and philosophically inquisitive things get, while remaining relatively fun and plain ol' adventure-y.
"Authority should derive from the consent of the governed," shouts Barbie (of all people), and she's not joking.
"Where is your Andy now?!?!" growls another toy, a riff on Micah 7:10, "Where is the LORD your God?," more commonly uttered in cyberspace as "Where is you god now?"
These -- and others in the film -- are serious grown-up questions that the toys grapple with. But even when they speak directly to them, your kid won't be left staring blankly at the screening wondering WTF is going on, a testament to both the writing and Unkrich's pacing.
The movie is not without it's problems, as it is at times deafeningly loud and the film's end gets a little "Lord of The Rings and the Six Finales," but they're minor issues.
Despite talk in some corners that this is the franchise's grand finale, Tom Hanks said at the premiere that he would happily sign up for "Toy Story 4." Which of course is no reason to keep cranking out more sequels, because if this is in fact the end, Buzz, Woody and the rest have gone out on top.
A glorious mish-mash of "The Giving," "The Great Escape" and some Orwellian nightmare, "Toy Story 3" is a ripping good yarn that any adult would happily watch, even without their kid.


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The last Sony TV we reviewed with superb picture quality was the ultra-expensive KDL-55XBR8 from 2008, which also and not coincidentally featured the company's last example of a full-array local dimming LED backlight. That TV's spiritual successor, equipped with a similar backlight, is the ultra-expensive XBR-HX909 series, but all told, its picture quality fares less favorably against the competition. It does deliver deliciously deep black levels but they come with too many compromises, including issues with blooming and color accuracy, for a TV at this price level.
If you extend your investment to include a pair or more of 3D glasses, an IR emitter, 3D content, and a device to play it, the Sony XBR-HX909 will deliver that third dimension to your brain. Many other 2010 TVs at this level are also 3D-compatible, and compared to the two we've tested, the HX909's 3D image quality falls squarely in the middle. Its other notable attributes, including best-in-class design and oodles of streaming video, will appeal to many of the buyers able to afford it, but those seeking the best-available home theater picture quality will probably want to look elsewhere.
Series information: We performed a hands-on evaluation of the 52-inch Sony XBR-52HX909, but this review also applies to the 46-inch XBR-46HX909. Both sizes have identical specs and, according to the manufacturer, should provide very similar picture quality.
The XBR-HX909 series looks almost exactly like the company's KDL-NX800 series we reviewed earlier. Both use Sony's "Monolithic" design scheme, and we really like the effect.
The TV is featureless black slab when turned off, dominated by a single pane of glass that extends almost to the edge of the panel on all sides. A sliver of black metal edges the glass and wraps around the edges, so when seen from the side or top it complements the subtle brushed silver of the low-profile stand. The logos and indicators are nearly invisible, at least until the word "Sony" lights up after power-on (the light can be turned off). The stand can both swivel and tilt back slightly–we're not sure why you'd want to tilt it however, since TVs are rarely mounted lower than the seating position.
Sony includes one of the best remotes we've ever used. The logically sized and placed, flush-yet-still-tactile keys emit a satisfying low-pitched click. The concave shape along the clicker's length seems to send the thumb to the Home key and the middle of the big cursor control. We like the ability to control other devices via infrared or HDMI, but we wish the blue backlight also illuminated button labels other than "Home."
The game-console-inspired XMB interface arranges the TV's many Internet services, settings, inputs and miscellaneous doodads in an intuitive fashion, and while we'd love to see more customization and less clutter (how about the ability to "hide" unwanted interactive services or even entire verticals, such as the TV channels section, which is useless for cable-box users), the snappy navigation makes up for a lot. Shortcuts include a Favorites section that remembers oft-accessed inputs (you can also manually add items, like Netflix) and a context-sensitive Options section with quick access to scene modes, MotionFlow settings and Netflix options. In all, Sony's interface is the most polished of any TV maker.
Although certainly well-equipped, the Sony XBR-HX909 lacks 3D glasses and an emitter, as well as built-in Wi-Fi, all of which are standard on the similarly-priced, flagship Sony XBR-LX900 series. On the other hand, the HX909 has our favorite type of LED backlight, known as full-array with local dimming (it uses standard white LEDs, not the Triluminous scheme found on 2008's XBR8 series), while the LX900 is stuck with a traditional edge-lit LED backlight. That's probably why the 52-inchers from each series cost the same–although at the HX909's price, it's still annoying to have to buy a separate IR emitter to sync the TV to the glasses. Every other non-Sony 3D TV we've seen, regardless of price, has the emitter built-in.
Sony offers a 2D-to-3D conversion system that can convert any video to 2D, while Panasonic's 3D plasma does not. And unlike Samsung's system, the one on the XBR-HX909 will also convert streaming 2D video, such as Netflix, YouTube, and yes, "Ford Models" et al, to 3D.
The array of mainstream (pun intended) video-streaming services is more comprehensive than most makers', and while we'd like to see Vudu, with its high-quality streams, added to the list, Sony's Qriocity service and Amazon, which also offers HD streams on demand, help make up for the lack. Sony has also fixed the video quality of Netflix streaming on the XBR-HX909, so now it performs as well as we expect for that service.
If mainstream isn't your bag, Sony's plethora of lesser-known video services, most of which are not found on other Internet-connected TVs, might appeal. The list includes names like the Minisode network, blip.tv, style.com, howcast.com, Dr. Oz, Michael Jackson, Dailymotion, Golflink.com and numerous video podcasts like Attack of the Show, Gadget Pron, CNN Daily and NASACast–and yes, "Ford Models." Most are simply portals to the same videos found on the parent Web sites, and general video quality is poor. Sony offers a keyword search that covers most of the niche services, which reflect a similar zeitgeist to the web at large; there were 142 video results for an "iphone" search, for example. Unfortunately the search doesn't cover YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, and other major services.
Audio is extensive as well, aside from the lack of Rhapsody, and NPR fans will appreciate the up-to-date service offering hundreds of audio snippets. There's also a pay-per-listen classical music audio/video service from the Berlin Philharmonic.
3D picture quality: We compared the 3D picture quality of the HX909 directly to the two other 3D TVs we have in-house, the Panasonic TC-P50VT25 and the Samsung UN55C8000, and the Sony fell about in the middle. Our side-by-side comparison was helped by Panasonic's DMP-BDT350, which can output two full-HD 3D signals simultaneously via HDMI, and hampered by the fact that we had to switch between the three companies' glasses.
There were differences caused by picture settings (we again preferred the Panasonic's Cinema, which seems to have better shadow detail and color balance than the Sony's default Cinema, although of course both can be adjusted significantly) and screen size (bigger is better for 3D), and many of the 2D characteristics detailed below spill over into 3D, too. Sony does disallow more adjustments than Samsung and Panasonic; in all 3D picture modes local dimming, MotionFlow, and CineMotion are all disabled and impossible to adjust, while Backlight is pegged to Max.
As before, the basic 3D experience was very similar across the three TVs. The 3D effect was immediate and undeniable, and when watching "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs," the sense of detail and depth was very impressive. The rain of burgers seemed to pop off the screen, and fine details like Clint's spiky hair were rendered beautifully. The computer-animated presentation wasn't as impressive to our eye as the stop-motion action of "Coraline," but in any case the Sony's 3D effect was as good as that of the other sets. That said, as before we still preferred to watch in 2D as opposed to 3D.
One main reason is the presence of an artifact known as "crosstalk," which appears as ghostly doubled images along the edges of the main image. Crosstalk was less noticeable on the HX909 than on the Samsung; but it was still visible, and to a significantly larger extent than on the Panasonic. One example came during the sequence beginning at 12:06 in "Cloudy" the microphones of the mayor showed the ghostly doubles on the microphone and teal top of Sam Sparks; the ghosts on the Sony were less obvious than the Samsung, but more-so than the Panasonic. In "Coraline" the differences were similar in areas like the bedpost in Chapter 4 or the letters on the Spink & Forcible sign. In the spiraling mice from Chapter 3 the Sony actually evinced less crosstalk than the Panasonic, with none of the amber ghost images seen on that plasma, but in most areas the plasma won.
On the Sony we also noticed some minor flicker in bright fields, like the overcast sky behind Bobinsky from Chapter 5. We felt the same occasional disorientation with the Sony as with the others, including some minor queasiness, especially when putting on the glasses initially–although never as bad as when we watched simulated 3D. We did find Sony's glasses the most comfortable of the three, and their wraparound style was effective at shutting out our peripheral vision–which can be a distraction itself with 3D.
Sony also offers a 2D-to-3D mode that, as mentioned above, can add a 3D effect to all 2D material, including streaming video like Netflix. We compared it directly that of the Samsung's system, and while the Sony's was a bit better in our view, both had enough issues, despite introducing more of a visible 3D effect than we expected, to prevent us wanting to ever engage the system. Watching "Avatar," for example, the effect of simulated depth was more pronounced on the Samsung at the midpoint of its Depth control than it was even on the Sony's High setting, but more depth tended to introduce more visible crosstalk and, worse, more nausea as we watched, especially with camera movement. As with true 3D, crosstalk was lessened on the Sony but still clearly visible in many scenes. In short, while simulated 3D may appeal to some viewers, we'll leave it turned off, thank you.
2D picture quality: In its favor, the XBR-HX909 delivered some of the deepest shades of back we've seen on any display, darker than the other local dimming sets and nearly as dark overall as our reference Pioneer plasma. It also handled 1080p/24 sources well. Its other issues however, namely excessive blooming, color drift over time, and a bluish cast to the image, spoiled its chance to unseat the best LCD and plasmas available.
Compared to other high-end TVs we've tested recently, the default picture settings available on the Sony XBR-HX909 were relatively inaccurate. Specifically, its grayscale in the most advantageous setting (Cinema, Warm 2 color temperature) was quite red overall. After our user-menu calibration, grayscale measured quite close to the standard and we recorded solid (2.18) average gamma. Linearity still suffered a bit however, with the bluish dark areas typical of LED, along with a tendency toward bluer highlights.
Our biggest issue setting up the HX909 was that its grayscale characteristics drifted quite a bit as the TV warmed up. The above measurements were taken after more than an hour of warmup time; prior to that time the TV measured redder, and steadily got noticeably bluer as time progressed (the 80IRE window, while maintaining the same light output, went from 6,251K to 6,713K over the course of 90 minutes of normal viewing). We did not perform more extensive testing of the grayscale drift, but suffice to say color is significantly more of a moving target than we've noticed on other TVs. We contacted Sony's reps for an explanation and will update this section when they get back to us.
We used the Custom mode for our calibration, as opposed to Cinema, because you have to manually select the latter (or any other Scene memory) when you turn the TV on. For some reason, however, Custom disables LED local dimming by default, so obviously we turned it on (under LED Dynamic Control) for our calibration.


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It is still an unknown fact if a seaweed diet could really help people lose weight. It is possible that seaweed could have benefits that people wanting to lose weight can benefit of. However, while some evidence and studies prove that seaweed could really help these people, others state that seaweed cannot help people to lose weight. On the other hand, seaweed has numerous health benefits, as it contains antioxidants and vitamins that the human body needs. Nowadays, you can find on the market some seaweed supplements stating that th... Read More


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On the same day California's Supreme Court decided to hold up the ban on gay marriage, an East Bay school district voted in favor of a plan to teach LGBT tolerence to elementary school students.
The Alameda Unified School District is supporting a controversial plan to teach tolerance for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
An overflow crowd gathered Tuesday night as the Alameda Unified School Board voted 3 to 2 in favor of the new curriculum, which means teachers will begin using the terms "gay" and "lesbian" in 4th grade classrooms.
The district says teachers asked for the curriculum to help prevent bullying and supporters say it's time to end hate speech.
Some say the lesson plan focuses too much on sexual orientation and not enough on other minorities.
"I'm urging you, the board of education, to vote 'no' on this curriculum," Alameda Pastor Deion Edmonds argued, "Not once has the school taken the time to teach her or her classmates about Malcolm X and Marcus Garvey."
Parents will not be allowed to opt thier children out of the class like they can with some health and sex education classes.


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Putin on the Couch
Washington is infuriated, outwitted and just plain befuddled by him, so we asked America's leading Putinologists to get inside the head of the Kremlin strongman.
He's crazy, calculating and somehow capricious all at the same time. A playground bully who'll wilt at the first sign of resistance. Or perhaps he just wants us to think he is, and he's really a master strategist, a latter-day Metternich moving countries and armies around the chessboard of Eastern Europe with a steely determination and an autocrat's free hand.
Why are we so utterly perplexed by Vladimir Putin?
Story Continued Below
From the moment he became president of Russia in a surprise handover from the ailing Boris Yeltsin on New Year's Eve at the turn of the new millennium, Putin has by turns confused, infuriated, outwitted and just plain befuddled the West. And never more so than in recent days, as Russia has invaded neighboring Ukraine and taken over the Crimean peninsula in the prelude to what could be a full-scale annexation of the territory on the Black Sea, the first time such a maneuver has been pulled in Europe since the blood-soaked end of World War II.
Immediately, however, this much became clear: Putin had shocked everyone by his lightning-fast takeover, and with his small inner circle, KGB officer's penchant for secrecy and near-complete power, managing the crisis would come down to what we make of Russia's pugnacious president. Which is why we are once again finding our geopolitics laced with psychoanalysis: This is a crisis whose resolution depends very much on one man.
And, it must be said, when it comes to understanding Vladimir Putin, Washington's been getting him wrong as often as right for more than a decade now.
Not long after I arrived in Moscow at the beginning of 2001 as a correspondent for the Washington Post, I attended the very first presidential interview Putin gave to the American press, a small roundtable at the Kremlin after his first summit meeting with President George W. Bush (the one where Bush looked in his soul). Putin kept us waiting for several hours, then proceeded to impress by reeling off facts and figures from his briefing book; he wasn't friendly, but he maintained a brisk professionalism until we got about two-thirds of the way around the table. The question of the war in the Russian breakaway republic of Chechnya still hadn't come up, and I felt obliged to ask about the brutal mayhem and rampant human rights violations in the conflict that had launched Putin on his unlikely path to the presidency the year before. His demeanor quickly changed, and while he didn't curse or vow to "rub them out in the outhouse" as he had done previously when asked about the Chechen rebels, it was as if an entirely different person was speaking. The modern technocrat of a few minutes earlier vanished, replaced by the threatening tough guy.
But at the time Washington saw mostly the reforming technocrat, a misreading of the man the White House calls VVP—Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin—that would persist in various forms for years. While Vice President Dick Cheney immediately took a strong view of Putin—"KGB, KGB, KGB," he told one visitor who asked what to make of the onetime Soviet spy—that was not the prevailing analysis in the Bush National Security Council, which forcefully pushed the view of Putin as a liberal economic modernizer out to undo the damage of Russia's chaotic 1990s. This was when top U.S. officials believed, or at least wanted to, that Putin was there to create a new capitalist Russia, which required ignoring or minimizing that other Putin, the one who ruled with a small cadre of fellow KGB veterans, spoke in messianic terms of Russia's greatness and fervently—and publicly—expressed the view that democracy was an insidious foreign transplant unsuited for Russian soil. "We still had too many illusions that Putin had been chosen by Yeltsin and was fundamentally an extension of Yeltsin," recalled one senior U.S. official who dealt with Russia in this period. "We were wrong."
But already some U.S. diplomats on the ground took a different view, and once Putin began dismantling democratic institutions, cracking down on the media and, eventually, jailing Russia's richest man for defying him, a sense of Putin as " one cold dude," as Bush privately told British Prime Minister Tony Blair, became established wisdom. Internal battles still raged for years, though, over what to do about him. When Putin publicly bemoaned the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union as "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century," some analysts insisted we should take him seriously, that Putin really meant to restore what he could of the Russian empire; others saw it as mere rhetoric from a calculating realist with whom America could do business.
"There were all kinds of misreadings," recalled Fiona Hill, who would serve as the top intelligence analyst for Russia at the National Intelligence Council under Bush and later co-wrote the book Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin. "A lot of wishful thinking that Russia has changed."
By 2008, Bush and Putin were barely on speaking terms in the wake of Russia's invasion of its tiny neighbor Georgia. But as he won the presidency later that year, Barack Obama again adopted the pragmatist's view and looked for ways to engage Russia. His "reset" benefited as well from Putin's temporary hiatus from the Kremlin; unwilling to change the constitution to allow himself to rule for life, he simply traded places with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev for a few years, allowing Obama a more congenial if unempowered interlocutor. When Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili warned a visiting top U.S. official that "he expected Russia to follow its 2008 invasion of Georgia with intervention in Crimea," as the secret State Department cable recounting the meeting drily noted, no one really took it seriously, and indeed we only know about Saakashvili's prescient analysis because it was made public with the vast trove of WikiLeaks documents.


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Reporting to the Executive Director of Research and Innovation, Sponsored Programs and Research (SPAR) operates as a faculty and administration resource and gateway for the development and submission of proposals for external funding.
The services offered, staff qualifications, and associations with Academic Affairs make SPAR a complete personal marketing department for faculty, staff, and administration seeking outside funding for research activities, community outreach, or service programs.
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While Yammer CEO David Sacks is reportedly preparing to celebrate his 40th birthday in style, his professional social network has agreed to be acquired by Microsoft.
Microsoft will reportedly purchase the San Francisco-based social network for business for $1.2 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal.
It is unclear when the deal would close, according to the paper.
Yammer was launched in 2008 and it has been used by companies to create an internal social network.
It has been called the Facebook for companies because they can control who signs up for the service by using corporate email domains as a form of identity.
Yammer has about 400 employees.


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Consumer bankruptcy is divided into two types of bankruptcy: Chapter 7 and Chapter 13. Chapter 7 bankruptcy lawyers work on liquidation bankruptcies (also known as "straight" bankruptcies, where most of your debts are discharged or liquidated under bankruptcy law. Chapter 13 bankruptcy lawyers instead work on reorganization bankruptcies, where the individual filing for bankruptcy sets up a repayment plan to resolve his or her debt. You can learn more about bankruptcy advantages and disadvantages by speaking to bankruptcy lawyers.
Business Bankruptcy
Reorganization bankruptcy (or Chapter 11) involves filing a plan with the bankruptcy court suggesting how you will repay your debt. Some debts must be repaid in full while others require only a percentage or nothing at all. Chapter 11 Bankruptcy is available to individuals, corporations, and partnerships. It has no limits on the amount of debt, again, like Chapter 13. Chapter 11 is the typical bankruptcy choice for large businesses seeking to restructure their debt and become profitable again. Chapter 11 is the most flexible of all the bankruptcy chapters, which makes it generally more expensive to the debtor. The rate of successful reorganizations is very low.
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After Bright Horizons Family Solutions placed first among large employers in the Globe's Top Places to Work survey last year, chief executive Dave Lissy gave a speech at the reception honoring the best workplaces in the state.
"The only difficulty about becoming number one is staying there,'' he told the crowd. "If we're not number one again, we'll have to talk about why.''
Lucky for Lissy, he doesn't have much explaining to do. His 25-year-old Watertown company, which operates 800 child care centers around the world, was the number one large employer again this year. In our survey, Bright Horizons employees cited an engaging environment that promotes individuality and flexibility, which has created a deep loyalty among the company's 19,000 workers.
Marilyn Crone got a taste of how far Bright Horizons was willing to go to keep an employee happy a few years ago, when she mentioned to her supervisor that she was feeling restless. Crone, who oversaw eight Boston area child care centers for Bright Horizons, liked her job but was ready for a change. The next week, Crone's supervisor told there was a similar position - regional manager - open in London.
Crone, who is in her early 60s and has worked for the company for 12 years, was elated: "I said 'Holy cow, yes.' ''
When Crone's first grandchildren were born two years later, Bright Horizons found a position that allowed her to return to her home office in Newton Highlands.
"I literally get teary because of the extraordinary experience that I have been able to have,'' she said.
Treating people well has paid off in loyalty for Bright Horizons. Nationally, the annual turnover rate in child care facilities is more than 50 percent, Lissy said. At Bright Horizons, it's less than 20 percent.
Lissy said he can get more out of people when they feel inspired and engaged. "It allows people, when they pull into the parking lot, to not leave behind half of who they are,'' he said, adding that if employees don't feel they can be themselves at work, "you as an employer aren't getting the full contribution of that person.''
Lissy and chief operating officer, Mary Ann Tocio, visit more than 100 centers each year to meet with employees and address their concerns. Lissy invites all the new center directors to his home four times a year, where he grills swordfish for them, and then hosts a bus tour of facilities in the area. The company offers online classes to help staff members advance, and calls its teachers faculty members.
"The people who choose the profession in our field don't get the respect they deserve in society all that often,'' Lissy said, adding that they should. "Children spend more time in our centers than they will in elementary and middle school combined, and we can make a pretty profound impact on getting them future success in school and in life.''
Mary Bresadola, a 21-year employee from Acton, felt that respect when Bright Horizons managers implemented one of her ideas. Before she started her job as an education and training manager, Bresadola worked in human resources, recruiting center directors. She ran the orientation program for new directors, a task she enjoyed so much that she asked if she could move the program with her to the education department. Bright Horizons managers said yes.
They also said yes when she needed to go on medical leave for a few months, letting her take on a solo project and work as much or as little as she could manage.
"They were there for me,'' said Bresadola, who is in her 50s, and whose two daughters attended Bright Horizons from the time they were infants through kindergarten.
"Trying to be a great place to work is not a one-year strategy,'' Lissy said - and winning the Top Places award for two years in a row isn't enough either. "This is something that we strive to sustain forever.''
Katie Johnston can be reached at email@example.com. Follow her on Twitter @ktkjohnston.


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Me and the Fangs: A Loose History of VampiresThe vampire — monster, metaphor, lifestyle choice, high school crush. Love 'em or not, their persistence as a cultural meme seems as immortal as the wacky critters themselves. Be it coincidence or a desperate attempt to cash in before the craze dissipates in the rays of the rising sun, I've recently penned not one, but three vampire tales, ranging from the paranormal thriller, Blood Prophecy, to Nancy Drew: Vampire Slayer, and last but not least, Breaking Down, a graphic novel parodying the popular Twilight saga.
But where do these creatures of the night come from? Why are they here? Will they loan me some money? Through all this writing, I couldn't help but ponder the question. What follows is one man's admittedly narrow view of a phenomena that will no doubt outlive us all.
Though variations appear in ancient Rome, China, and (dubiously), Native American mythos, the undead we know and love began in the Balkans (yep, Transylvania) as a plague metaphor, enjoying spates of popularity in Europe and colonial New England. Short version – someone dies from disease, returns by night, and infects the rest of their family until staked, decapitated, or both. They were dead, they wanted to kill you, they had to be destroyed — the ethical equivalent of Uncle-as-zombie, sans flesh-eating.
The earliest fictional vamp, Lord Ruthven from Polidori's The Vampyre (1819), is tad different. Like a more famous Count, and in a similar idiom, this nobleman spends his time sucking blood, seducing virgins and returning from apparent death to attempt feasting on our poor narrator's sister.
It was a start. More interesting is the 1845 penny dreadful, Varney the Vampire, generally credited to James Malcolm Rymer, though sometimes to Thomas Preskett Prest (your guess is as good as mine as to why). Penny dreadfuls, btw, were the British comic book of their day, fast, cheap and out of control, featuring oft-serialized tales that were as sure to corrupt the youth as today's video games.
Varney, a precursor to Barnabas Collins, actually tries to get out of his curse. He even commits suicide. In a scene out of the Frankenstein movies, Varney's brought back to life via galvanic energies (electricity to you) by a Dr. … wait for it… Chillingworth.
The two elephant-corpses in the room remain Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla (1872) and Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897). I've tried reading Dracula, I think I finished, and, yeah, it's a seminal horror text and all, but the story, in any form, bores me to tears — with two exceptions. Browning's 1931 Universal film version has Dwight Frye's unforgettable portrayal of the Count's genuinely creepy assistant, Renfield. I also enjoyed a little-known BBC adaption starring Louis Jourdan, but mostly because of Frank Finlay's totally whack Van Helsing. Beyond that, though, I just don't really care about anyone in the story, least of all Dracula, be he Lugosi, Lee, Langella, Oldman, or my own fetid imagination. He's kind of just this great idea without flesh and blood. (Well, that makes sense, doesn't it?)
For my money, the female vampire Carmilla, steeped in plague imagery, is much more intriguing. Yeah, sure, there's the barely concealed lesbianism, which I love as much as the next guy, but really, the relationship between the titular vampire and Laura, her lonely victim, is genuinely touching. After the forces of goody-goodness win, Laura is forced to see Carmilla as a lifeless predator, yet she still misses her, and this is clearly not the effect of a curse, but a genuine emotion.
But Dracula got the sales, the stage play, the movie franchise, and it's his name that's all but synonymous with the beast itself. Something of course must be said for sheer survival. So, hooray.
Acquiring a kind of Marvel-superhero sheen in the later Universal films, (the rib-tickling mash-ups House of Frankenstein and House of Dracula), Dracula went from dull to cliché faster than it takes to charge an electric car (originally available at the time the novel was written!). As a character, he was most interesting in the spoof, Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein, where at least he had a magic ring, some surgical skill, and a quest – to transplant Costello's brain into the creature. Why? Supposedly to make him a better servant, but really, I think it was just for yucks.
Skipping a few decades, the thickest nosferatu-root, for me, remains the 1960s soap opera, Dark Shadows. As a writer, I've been fortunate to work with several iconic characters, from man-made monsters to the world's first girl detective, but the main reason vampires own a special place in my heart is that moment when I was eight and first glimpsed Barnabas Collins baring his fangs – an affection I blog about at length here.
Yes, it was cheaply made. Sets wobbled, actors blew their lines and the blooper reel is nearly as long as the series. Yet Barnabas, a tortured Byronic hero, owes as much to Wuthering Heights' Heathcliff as he does to Varney or Dracula. Laugh if you will, but without him, the works of Anne Rice, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Twilight, would not be possible.
It's in him the notion of vampire as someone trapped reaches fruition. Barnabas had a soul, and thanks to it, whined constantly. He even planned to turn his betrothed, Josette, into a vampire like himself, but she threw herself off a cliff, setting in motion our hero's long-lasting obsession.
Does he ever get on with his un-life? No. The fiend finds one chick after another whom he believes to be Josette's reincarnation. Eventually, he didn't even care if the woman looked like Josette. He was just fine finding someone he could dress up in that musty old wedding gown.
And that concept neatly fulfills an essential trope of the old-style vampire – being completely, hopelessly, eternally stuck. Old school Vampires do not change. They do not progress. They do not grow, not emotionally, not spiritually. They do not let it go. They keep checking Facebook even if they have no friends. That's because they're dead. Static. Their hunger for blood is a clear symbolic yearning for lost life.
Which brings me to my own Blood Prophecy, which on the one hand harkens back to the notion of vampire as plague, embodied by the evil Skog, but also to the Dark Shadows idea of salvation, through the protagonist, Jeremiah Fall. Rather than a rich Collins, though, Jeremiah is a simple farmer, a pious Puritan.
Puritanism crystallized a lot about vampires that I wanted to say. They had an intense distrust of not only their own hungers, but of the physical world itself (it is the Devil's, after all), yet they knew they had to live in it. Their quest for salvation drove them stiff and twitching to wonderful innovations (the idea that each person had to read for themselves, for instance) as well as horrific cruelties like the Salem Witch Trials.
Speaking of the real world, 1972's Night Stalker TV-movie, produced by Dark Shadow's Dan Curtis, remains one of my favorite vampire films, and not so much because of the vampire. The baddie, Janos Skorzeny, at least so far as we get to know him, is a sheer predatory monster, characterized by feats of strength more in keeping with the Frankenstein monster than a sly seductor.
The film works for different reasons, primarily because of a 16mm, grainy, noir-ish, holy crap it's real feel. That zeitgeist giddily takes us giddily all the way into The X-Files and its cagey and equally delightful bastard-child, Fringe. Moonstone Books has since kept Carl alive with a series of graphic novels. (I was happy to have contributed The Devil in the Details, which was nominated for a Stoker Award.)
Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire and its sequels certainly earned their following, but for me, steeped in Dark Shadows, it all had a been-there-done-that feel. I did enjoy Claudia, in both book and film, but the whole vampire-coven thing never did much for me. It always seems to dilute the sense of a more personal hell. One demon is terrifying, a bunch of them is, well… kind of a party.
Stepping up to more recent times, there is the oft-brilliant Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When Joss Whedon is on his game he is a master. Now, as co-author of the popular Nancy Drew graphic novel series (along with Sarah Kinney and artist Sho Murase) I'd like to say the Buffster's a direct descendant of the girl detective, but that's not completely true.
As intellectuals have discussed to death, Buffy's a reversal of the vampire's victim, the historically abused female taking control. The popular image of the vampire leering over the sleeping blonde virgin takes a huge turn when the sleeping blonde has a stake in her hand and knows how to use it. And Joss, bless him, plays around with the whole reluctant-vampire thing. While most of his vamps are generic monsters, some are "cursed" with souls (another reversal), drawing a neat line from Angel to Barnabas and back to Varney.
Buffy certainly has Drew in her blood though. Nancy, first published in 1930, is the original mass media girl power figure. Like Buffy, she doesn't accept a passive role. She speaks truth to power. She has abilities far beyond the norm (in her case, brain-power). She goes after baddies, no matter the risk, a role she seems born to, and her personal life suffers because of it. Sound familiar?
When the first series of graphic novels from Papercutz came to a close after 22 books, Sarah and I were asked to help re-launch Nancy. That meant thinking about what made the character tick in the first place, taking a look at the history and pondering wither she's wandered since.
Of course Buffy came to mind, and the two-part Nancy Drew: Vampire Slayer was born. Having our girl appear on the cover with a cross-bow in hand and the devilish, handsome Gregor hanging upside behind her may seem like a wild departure, but it's really tapping back into the myth that'd kept the character going all these years. Without giving away too much, of course we remain true to what Nancy Drew is, though she does share a kiss with the purported vampire, and seems to like it. The books are a lot of fun, a wild ride, and embrace that oxymoronic element the public insists on with beloved characters – exactly the same, only different.
As for vampires, like Nancy, in order to survive, they need more than just blood, they have to adapt. Sadly, of late, to my mind, they seem to be losing what made them monsters in the first place. Far from cursed souls or soul-less monsters, 21st century nosferatu are often played as having the same growth-potential as humans. They're more like misunderstood mutant superheroes, blessed with powers, plagued with weaknesses. They're not bad – just life-challenged. I suppose it can be an equally interesting trope, but it's not particularly monstrous. Which brings us to… ahem… The Twilight saga.
Now, I certainly don't intend to trash Twilight … no, wait, I do.
With the help of Maia, my talented teen daughter, who, at a younger age devoured the books, and artist extraordinaire Rick Parker, that's exactly what the new graphic novel, Breaking Down does. The promo text for our fifty-page parody describes it as "for fans sick of glittery vampires and wonky werewolves," and it's all that, but it's also not particularly mean-spirited or disrespectful… much.
But… how can I take the vampire so seriously on the one hand and mock it with the other? Putting aside the fact that I just love making fun of things, earlier I mentioned how Dracula ultimately became a self-satire in the later universal films. And many long-lived franchises have gone through the same – witness Star Trek IV or the introduction of Jaws in the James Bond films. Having taken something so seriously for so long, it seems almost natural that there comes a time to… well, poke it with a stick and see if it's still alive. It's a breath of fresh air, a chance to take a look at things from another angle, to see what's working and what's not.
It's also an opportunity to analyze the darn thing. Humor, after all, at its best, reveals truth. One of the reasons parody is a protected form under copyright law is because it doesn't present the further adventures of beloved popular characters, it expresses an opinion about them, in a narrative form. In that sense parody is the same as a book or movie review, only with pictures, and a lot, lot funnier.
As for the original books, I admire them, I really do. Though the writing strikes jaded old me as a poor man's Buffy, I've actually defended Twilight on a number of occasions. That's partly because I can't help but think think anything that gets people reading (as long as it's not preaching genocide) is a good thing. Across the globe, folks who generally might not otherwise pick up a book eagerly plow through thousands of pages of Bela (gee, wonder who she was named after…), Edward and Jacob (who really is the better choice for a lover since he's not dead). If nothing else, it can be seen as a gateway drug to heavier literature.
And it's more than that. The old vampire is still in there, lurking around. Edward, after all, is Heathcliff, sans Barnabas' mean-streak, and some of the vampires are bad and kill people. Maybe, in an era of safe sex, it's appropriate to have a romantic hero who doesn't seem at all dangerous beyond a creepy stalker-thing.
The biggest objection many critics have is the flipping of Whedon's wonderful innovation, the pro-active Buffy, back into Bela's passive virgin. The girl not only doesn't fight evil, or anything else, she wants to become a vampire herself, wants it bad, because, well, she never really fit in as a human anyway. If Buffy is the classic victim concealing a stake, Bela is opening the window and dragging the beast inside and toward her neck. Now there's a role model! What if our daughters want to become like her? Gasp!
Thing is, maybe I'm naïve, but I don't think most reader see Bela as a role model. I suspect she's more like she's an escape from having to have a role model in the first place, a respite from real life. A little terror, sure, but not the big stuff, thank you, and can someone please take care of me? That aspect of literature, escapism, is certainly as valid as any other. And Stephanie Meyers fills the bill nicely.
As for the vampire itself, I have no worries. Dress him (or her) up as sweet as you like, they're still lurking out there, just beyond the shadows, along with all that terror – just like death. Poke it with a stick. You'll see.
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman


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I'm not sure if this story is true or apocryphal but I was assured that a Polish shop, in Mansfield, displayed a sign which stated that no English people would be served.
The story continued explaining how a complaint was made to the Police and the sign was taken down as it was promoting blatant discrimination and was therefore totally unacceptable.
As I say, I don't know if this story is true but the principles and morals are clear in that somebody was offended by the act of discrimination, reported it and hopefully prevented further abuse.
The funny thing about this story is that the same person who was so in favour of the Police being called to the Polish shop went on to tell me how much they support the right of another shop keeper to act in a discriminatory manner towards their customers.
This is the case of the Irish baker who refused to bake a cake celebrating gay marriage as it offended their religious beliefs.
So it's OK to discriminate against gay people in Ireland but not against the English in Mansfield?
And before I'm accused of attacking religious belief - I'm not. If I saw a shop which displayed a sign refusing service to Jews, Catholics, Muslims, Christians ( I hope you get the idea) I would complain to whoever would listen!
Nobody should ever be discriminated against if they are going about their lawful business: because the truth is, if you are willing to discriminate against someone just because of who they are or what they believe, then that makes it OK for you to be the victim of discrimination just because of who you are and what you believe.
How would that make you feel?
DREW BAXTER, Humanist


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This activity was selected for the On the Cutting Edge Reviewed Teaching Collection
This activity has received positive reviews in a peer review process involving five review categories. The five categories included in the process are
- Scientific Accuracy
- Alignment of Learning Goals, Activities, and Assessments
- Pedagogic Effectiveness
- Robustness (usability and dependability of all components)
- Completeness of the ActivitySheet web page
For more information about the peer review process itself, please see https://serc.carleton.edu/teachearth/activity_review.html.
This page first made public: Nov 22, 2010
Think Globally, Act LocallyThe lab activity described here was adapted by Erin Bardar of TERC for the EarthLabs project.
Summary and Learning Objectives
Students are introduced to four major components of the Earth system: the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and pedosphere. They start to apply this knowledge as they visit the local study site to identify elements of these four spheres and infer connections among them. The investigation concludes with students making predictions about ways that a change in the characteristics of one component of their study site might affect the characteristics of other components.
After completing this investigation, students will be able to:
- identify the four major components of the Earth system (atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and pedosphere), and give examples from their local study site;
- infer connections among elements of the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and pedosphere by describing connections at their local study site; and
- predict some ways that changes in one element of the study site might affect changes in other elements.
Activity Overview and Teaching Materials
In Part A: Students are introduced to four major components of the Earth system and some of the ways in which they shape the planet and its environment.
In Part B: Students visit the study site where they take photographs to document the site, identify components and elements of the Earth system, and then describe some of the ways in which the elements and components of the Earth system are interconnected. Bring a digital camera for documenting the study site. Also consider bringing gloves and/or hand-washing supplies for students who may wish to get their hands dirty while exploring the local study site.
In Part C: Students strengthen their developing sense of the interconnectedness of elements and components of the Earth system by predicting how changes in one element or component would affect others (e.g., How would a change in water level affect plants and animals at the site?).
For more information about the Earth system, read the section titled Background Information under Additional Resources below
Printable MaterialsTo download one of the PDF or Word files below, right-click (control-click on a Mac) the link and choose "Save File As" or "Save Link As."
- Local Study Site Work Sheet (Acrobat (PDF) 73kB Sep13 10)
- Stop and Think Questions (PDF (Acrobat (PDF) 37kB Jun11 10) and Word (Microsoft Word 2007 (.docx) 20kB Aug7 18)
- to Stop and Think QuestionsSuggested Answers
This file is only accessible to verified educators. If you would like access to this file, please enter your email address below. If you are new to the site, you will be asked to complete a short request form. If you have already been verified by the EarthLabs project, you will be taken directly to the file download page.
Teaching Notes and Tips
In Part A:
- You may want to introduce the hydrosphere first, since it's likely that students have some level of understanding about the water cycle and may be able to identify most of the elements of the hydrosphere.
In Part B:
- Students visit the local study site to start to apply their new knowledge about the components of the Earth system and the way in which those components interact. Ask them to explain their reasoning for each statement they make. If it is not possible for students to complete all of their observations while at the study site, be sure they document the study site with photographs. Students can then continue their observations after they return to the classroom, using the photographs. Digital photos can be viewed on a computer or printed and distributed to students.
- As students describe the interconnections, have them do so using phrases or short sentences such as, "Water evaporates from the stream," or "Heat from the soil warms the air."
In Part C:
- A key point for students to understand is that while interactions between the elements are an essential part of maintaining an ecosystem, those same interactions can also lead to change in an ecosystem. For example, when one flux changes in any significant way, it will set off a chain reaction that changes reservoirs, fluxes, and interactions in the greater environment.
- Encourage students to consider changes that may occur that are two, three, or more steps past the original cause. (A change in "A" causes changes in "B", which causes changes in "C", which causes changes in "D". In each case, ask students to explain their reasoning behind their statements.
Review students' lists describing the interconnectedness between and among components of the Earth system. Have they explained their reasoning?
You can assess student understanding of topics addressed in this Investigation by grading their responses to the Stop and Think questions.
State and National Science Teaching Standards
Lab 1 activities have been correlated to Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) standards.
(1) Scientific processes. The student conducts laboratory and field investigations for at least 40% of instructional time using safe, environmentally appropriate, and ethical practices.The student is expected to:
(A) demonstrate safe practices during laboratory and field investigations.
(2) Scientific processes. The student uses scientific methods during laboratory and field investigations. The student is expected to:
(E) demonstrate the use of course equipment, techniques, and procedures, including computers and web-based computer applications;
(G) organize, analyze, evaluate, make inferences, and predict trends from data;
(I) communicate valid conclusions supported by data using several formats such as technical reports, lab reports, labeled drawings, graphic organizers, journals, presentations, and technical posters.
(3) Scientific processes. The student uses critical thinking, scientific reasoning, and problem solving to make informed decisions within and outside the classroom. The student is expected to:
(A) in all fields of science, analyze, evaluate, and critique scientific explanations by using empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and experimental and observational testing, including examining all sides of scientific evidence of those scientific explanations, so as to encourage critical thinking by the student;
(B) communicate and apply scientific information extracted from various sources such as current events, news reports, published journal articles, and marketing materials.
(13) Science concepts. Fluid Earth. The student knows that the Fluid Earth is composed of the hydrosphere and atmosphere subsystems that interact on various time scales with the biosphere and geosphere. The student is expected to:
(D) discuss mechanisms, such as atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, major volcanic eruptions, changes in solar luminance, giant meteorite impacts, and human activities that result in significant changes in Earth's climate.
Lab 1 activities have been correlated to the following National Science Education Standards.
Science as Inquiry (12ASI)
Abilities necessary to do scientific inquiry
12ASI1.2 Design and conduct scientific investigations. Designing and conducting a scientific investigation requires introduction to the major concepts in the area being investigated, proper equipment, safety precautions, assistance with methodological problems, recommendations for use of technologies, clarification of ideas that guide the inquiry, and scientific knowledge obtained from sources other than the actual investigation. The investigation may also require student clarification of the question, method, controls, and variables; student organization and display of data; student revision of methods and explanations; and a public presentation of the results with a critical response from peers. Regardless of the scientific investigation performed, students must use evidence, apply logic, and construct an argument for their proposed explanations.
12ASI1.4 Formulate and revise scientific explanations and models using logic and evidence. Student inquiries should culminate in formulating an explanation or model. Models should be physical, conceptual, and mathematical. In the process of answering the questions, the students should engage in discussions and arguments that result in the revision of their explanations. These discussions should be based on scientific knowledge, the use of logic, and evidence from their investigation.
Earth and Space Science (12DESS)
Geochemical cycles
12DESS2.1 The earth is a system containing essentially a fixed amount of each stable chemical atom or element. Each element can exist in several different chemical reservoirs. Each element on earth moves among reservoirs in the solid earth, oceans, atmosphere, and organisms as part of geochemical cycles.
Additional Resources
Background Information
The Earth System
What is a system? A system is generally described as a set of components that interact within a boundary. A clock is a good example of a system. Mechanical and often electrical components work together to display the time. In recent years, scientists have started to consider Earth, from the very top of the atmosphere to the core at its center, as a system with four major components or spheres that interact in very complex ways. Those spheres include:
- The geosphere (sometimes called the lithosphere) includes the solid part of Earth, the interior, and the pedosphere, which is the thin, outermost soil layer. NOTE: In this unit, we'll be concentrating only on the pedosphere.
- The hydrosphere is all of Earth's bodies of water, including groundwater and Earth's frozen water (the cryosphere).
- The biosphere is all living things, plants and animals, from microbes to humans.
- The atmosphere is the blanket of gas that surrounds Earth, and includes the precipitation, clouds, and aerosols (tiny suspended particles) that are found in air.
In this curriculum unit, the focus is on spheres that are most accessible to most students: the portion of the geosphere called the pedosphere; the hydrosphere; the biosphere; and the atmosphere.
NOTE: The terms we will use as we describe the earth system are as follows:
- Each of the spheres (e.g., the biosphere) is a component of the Earth system. Sphere and component (of the Earth system) are used synonymously.
- Each sphere or component is made up of elements (e.g., a bird is an element of the biosphere; a pond is an element of the hydrosphere).
- The term chemical element is used whenever referring to an element in the periodic table (e.g., carbon)
The pedosphere (soil) covers approximately 10%* of Earth's surface and deeply affects every other part of the ecosystem. Soil holds air, water, heat, and nutrients and is the medium in which we grow food and fiber. Soil supports billions of plants, animals, and microorganisms, it filters water, and it facilitates the decomposition of wastes. *Some scientists also consider the sediments that lie below Earth's bodies of water as part of the pedosphere, so there is some debate over the exact figure for soil coverage.
The hydrosphere covers about 75% of Earth's surface, and includes all bodies of water (oceans, lakes, rivers, streams, groundwater) liquid and frozen, fresh and salt. The oceans help regulate climate by absorbing large amounts of solar energy, particularly near the equator, and circulating heat towards the poles. Water constantly circulates between the hydrosphere, the pedosphere, the biosphere, and the atmosphere.
The biosphere is intimately connected with and dependent on the other spheres. Through processes such as photosynthesis, respiration, decay, and human activity such as burning forests or fossil fuels, the biosphere continuously exchanges gases with the atmosphere. Human activities can also cause changes in land and water use. To the extent that the biosphere modifies the other components of the Earth system, it can also modify Earth's climate.
The atmosphere distributes rain and traps some of the heat radiated by Earth to help keep us warm. It also protects us from harmful solar radiation, and plays a role in driving ocean currents that redistribute Earth's heat. Atmospheric aerosols from both natural causes (sea salt, pollen) and human activity change the composition of the atmosphere.
At any moment in time, all matter and energy on Earth is part of one or more of these spheres, and across time, all of Earth's matter cycles through two or more of these spheres.
Interconnections and Processes
Matter transfer
At the local level, there are many simple examples of the interconnections between components and elements of the Earth system. The roots of plants (biosphere) draw water and nutrients from the pedosphere, exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide with the atmosphere through the process of photosynthesis, and send water into the atmosphere through the process of transpiration. Plants also die and decompose to become part of the pedosphere. Water evaporates from rivers (hydrosphere) and the soil (pedosphere) to become part of the atmosphere. Oxygen in the atmosphere dissolves in a river (hydrosphere). Fish (biosphere) draw dissolved oxygen into their bodies from the hydrosphere.
There are also connections between elements within a component of the earth system. Birds eat plant seeds; flowers attract insects; rivers flow into lakes or oceans.
Energy Transfer
In addition to the exchanges of matter, the transfer of energy is a key process of the Earth system. The sun warms the pedosphere, which transfers its heat to the atmosphere; warmed air transfers heat to cooler land surfaces; evaporation from a lake (hydrosphere) transfers heat to the atmosphere; rivers and ocean currents redistribute heat energy; precipitation can warm or cool the pedosphere on which it falls.
Change Leads to Change
Because of the interconnectedness, changes in one sphere bring about changes in the others. Sometimes these changes are dramatic. Droughts (atmosphere) can cause severe changes in the hydrosphere, the biosphere, and the pedosphere. Frequently these changes are more subtle. Every rain changes the soil moisture and the amount of water in lakes and rivers. Increased water level in a lake has an impact on the plants and animals that inhabit the shoreline. An increase in air temperature decreases the amount of moisture in the pedosphere by increasing the rate of evaporation and the rate at which vegetation loses water (transpiration) to the atmosphere.
Content Extension
Much of this curriculum unit is drawn from the GLOBE program's "Earth as a System" unit. The 40-page Introduction to that unit provides extensive background information about the Earth system and can be downloaded using the link below.
To download the file, right-click (control-click on a Mac) the link and choose "Save File As" or "Save Link As."