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Lord God, during this Lenten season, teach us to come before you in humility, lamenting the signs that your kingdom has not yet come in its fullness. Help us to acknowledge our finitude and failings, and guide us into a journey of remembering rightly, repenting honestly, and responding faithfully. We long for the coming of your mosaic kingdom in Jesus Christ, our Lord, and invite your Holy Spirit to lead us now.
THIS DAY IN HISTORY: March 19, 1929
Mexican Repatriation
Between 1929 and 1936, the Mexican Repatriation forced between 500,000 to 2 million Mexican nationals from the United States to return to Mexico. This mandate was carried out without due process, targeting Mexicans in California, Texas and Colorado because of "the proximity of the Mexican border, the physical distinctiveness of mestizos, and easily identifiable barrios." Justification for this forced return included saving money on the costs of welfare and a belief that immigrants were to blame for the negative effects of the Great Depression. Independent groups such as the American Federation of Labor and the National Club of America thought deporting Mexicans would free jobs for U.S. citizens, thereby pressuring the government into this Repatriation Movement.
Scholars estimate that as The Great Depression took hold — and many Americans believed Mexicans were taking away scarce jobs — the U.S. deported about 2 million Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. Many of them had been lured by the booming economy during much of the '20s. Adrian Florido wrote about the mass deportations of the 1930s and 1940s, and California formally apologized in 2012 for its role in illegally deporting hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens.
Later, as the U.S. entered World War II, it found itself in need of agricultural labor and instituted the Bracero Program, which allowed about 4.6 million Mexicans to cross the border legally to provide manual labor. By the early '50s, as tens of thousands of U.S. service members were coming home to a postwar recession, President Truman ordered an inquiry that eventually placed much of the blame for the country's social ills at the time on immigration.
When Eisenhower took over, his immigration commissioner unveiled "Operation Wetback," a short-lived, military-style operation where the government rounded up more than 1 million people. Many of these people were deported by ship, in conditions comparable to that of an "eighteenth century slave ship" and hundreds of thousands of other braceros were dumped across the border. It was the second wave of mass deportations of Latinos undertaken by the U.S, and continued until the fall of 1954, when funding began to run dry and the government claimed the border had "been secured."
21 "You are to distribute this land among yourselves according to the tribes of Israel. 22 You are to allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the foreigners residing among you and who have children. You are to consider them as native-born Israelites; along with you they are to be allotted an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. 23 In whatever tribe a foreigner resides, there you are to give them their inheritance," declares the Sovereign Lord."
RESPONSE OF LAMENT AND CONFESSION: Please spend some time in personal response, crying out to God with prayers, poems, songs, or art that expresses your lament and confession. If you feel led, please share these responses with others, using #lentenlament #day19
You may close with the following:
Lord have mercy,
Christ have mercy,
Lord have mercy.
CLOSING PRAYER: Prayer for Migrants and Refugees (Nouwen Network)
God, no one is stranger to you
And no one is ever far from your loving care.
In your kindness watch over migrants, refugees and asylum seekers,
Those separated from their loved ones,
Those who are lost
And those who have been exiled from their homes.
Bring them safely to the place where they long to be,
And help us always to show your kindness to strangers
And those in need.
We ask this through Christ our Lord,
Who too was a refugee and migrant
Who travelled to another land
Searching for a home.


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Making a House a Home
In Loving Memory of My Dad
This past February, I lost my dad to Alzheimer's. He was a vibrant man with a gentle soul, full of life, and loved making others laugh. He fought a hard battle, but was just no match for the devastating effects of the disease. The last six months of his life were especially difficult and it was during this time that he experienced a rapid decline, and to those of us that loved him dearly, we felt a complete sense of helplessness.
Yet during that time, as my family and I spent time with him each day, it gave me time to reflect on the powerful impact he had on my life. We all had cause to celebrate the man he used to be before the disease took him away from us. He was a kind and compassionate man that above all else loved his family. My sisters and I were so fortunate to have him as a father because he truly made our house a loving and caring home…filled with the warmest of memories. He supported everything we ventured out to do and nurtured our creative spirits…at least that's how I felt as a child growing up wanting to be an artist.
So, could it be that my passion for painting home portraits stems from my own experiences growing up? I'd like to think that because of my dad, I am pursing my passion and life long dream of painting while at the same time, helping others to cherish the memories being made in their own homes, where they gather with their families. It goes beyond just capturing the beauty of the facade...it's about how you feel when you live your life in it. For this dad, I will always be grateful.
A recent house portrait commission, pastel, 11 x 14 on UART pastel board.
Leave a Reply.
Lisa Cunningham
December 2019

subset: commoncrawl


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At Twin Oaks Veterinary Hospital we Provide Veterinary Services for horses, dogs and cats. This includes Western (standard) Veterinary Medicine, Eastern (Acupuncture and Herbal) and Holistic (Animal Chiropractic). Below is a list of services we provide. Please feel free to contact us for more information regarding any of the pet health services you need, we will be happy to assist you.
- Dogs, Cats and Horses
- Medical, Surgical and Dental
- Acupuncture
- Herbal
- Chiropractic
- Vaccinations
- Parasite Control
- Preventative Care
- Pain Management
- Diagnostic Testing
- Radiographs and Ultrasound
- Hospital Facilities
- Farm/ Ranch calls for Horses
- Saddle Fit
- Equine Dentistry
- Equine Lameness
- On Site Service available for Horses
- Microchip
Our receptionists and team will attempt to accommodate all requests to the best of our ability. If possible it is best to call before coming in so that a staff member can advise you on your particular emergency.
We provide mobile veterinary services to Central Oregon as well. Please contact us to learn more.


text: The Package includesBalili House welcomes you to a week of yoga and surf on the sunny coastline of Portugal. Our program is designed for all levels of experience. 7 night Shared double room Healthy breakfast everyday Welcome Dinner Snack lunches 10 restorative yoga sessions with our certified teacher 1 SUP Session in the beautiful Lagoa de Óbidos 1 Dinner in Yoni's Organic Farm 5 fresh snack lunches to go PricingFlights are not included 1 PERSON590€ 7 NightsLow season: 16 set / 14 junBook Now1 PERSON665€ 7 NightsHigh season: 15 jun / 15 setBook Now


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Feeling a little distracted? We're here to help you build healthier technology habits so you can cut back your screen time and spend more time on what matters most.
It's not an easy thing to quantify but we can help you figure it out.I'd like to know
Technology impacts many aspects of our life, from relationships to mental health to sleep.
Technology surrounds us at work, and can either help or hinder our performance.
My journey from struggling with distraction to creating a healthier state-of-mind.
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It is not difficult to find cheap unsecured loans these days. The sources are several and thus you have to decide which loan type you are to choose for the proper handling of cash in time. In order to get cheap unsecured loans you don't need to keep any sort of collaterals. Getting money for something is no more the process these days. You can opt for cheap unsecured loans whenever required and in this way you have every right to save yourself from acute financial suffering. When you are suffering as a homeowner you have all possible chances to get hold of cheap unsecured loans and save your future from all nearing impediments.
You can apply for cheap unsecured loans even if your credit records are not fine. Such a person would not be ill treated in any way. He would receive the same advantages as others in matters of securing cheap unsecured loans. Now, you should have the confidence for this like home remodelling, making arrangements for a holiday, repaying debts and meeting with other responsibilities in life.


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Léalo en: Español
Consumer tires are manufactured and sold under a wide variety of brand names such as the ones you see below.
The following list is an extensive sampling of what tire brands may be found on the market with links to further information about the manufacturer, if available.
With the constantly changing world market, it's certain that our list is incomplete ... if you know of any brands we should add, tell us about it in the space to the right.
If you like to shop on line we suggest you consider the manufacturer's promotions available from The Tire Rack's Special Offers: You may be able to save on quality tires that will suit your needs.
Do you have personal experience with any of these brands? You can share your experience with others, or learn what experience others have had with a brand that interests you at our Tire Brands Forum
Did you know that Amazon has tire tools and accessories? At my last count there was 3244 tools and accessories.
Your experience can provide a valuable guide to others who are considering buying tires you've used.
Even if you don't consider yourself a great writer, or a demanding driver, what you know can help. As I mentioned above, if you want help in doing a review click on this easy Tire Review Wizard instead of using the form below. When you use it, you'll be brought back here to finish with the box already filled.
Click below to read reviews which other users, like yourself, have posted about their experiences.
Info from a engineering intern at Goodyear
I interned at Goodyear in Gadsden, AL a few years ago and would like to contribute a piece to the puzzle. I know for a fact that most plants don't exclusively …
Sailun Ice Breaker WST2 LT Studdable Light Truck Winter Tire
Sailun Ice Breaker tires are second to none. I have them on my wife's suv (second winter) and I am in the process of putting six of them on my Chevrolet …
Return to:
Tire Brands and Makers
Tire Information World's Home Page
Visit Tire Information World's Exclusive Tire Care and Accessories Store.
Click Here to Download your free Portable Treadwear Calculator Now!


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Posted on October 30, 2018
Happy trick or treat!
Everyone loves a good scare on Halloween, but the occasion doesn't come without potential dangers. Especially, when it comes to geriatric patients who are suffering cardiovascular problems, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), food allergies or diabetes.
We're here to help you get ready for the best Halloween ever. We make sure you will have a festive holiday while avoiding the Halloween sugar rush, reducing the risk of injury, or alleviating your anxiety.
Call us today at 623-374-7774 to quickly prepare for your safety.
Happy Halloween from #MD24HouseCall.
We are now opening for Nurse Practitioner, Physician Assistant, Physical Therapist, and Occupational Therapist positions. If you're interested and happy to relocate in AZ, please feel free to either email us at firstname.lastname@example.com or contact us at 623-322-4537. We welcome you to MD24 family!


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Bully Online
Tim Field's site, one of the most comprehensive on bullying, analyses effect of bullying on health. It has a page for teachers, children and schools and details the legal procedures available, such as the Public Disclosure Bill. The site also lists support groups for teachers.
Bullying Online
Don't Suffer in Silence
Lucky Duck Publishing
No Bully Website
Schools Out
The Scottish Council for Research in Education
Scotland Online/Bullying: What every Parent Should Know
Taking the Bully by the Horns


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Here is a card I have made for *Sara* (no blog info). Her favorite Sketch is this one from SCS.
I have never participated in this SC and I tought it would be great to make a card with it...- it is a awesome Sketch!!!
You guys really keep me on my toes.... I have really learned so much from the Sketch Challenges that this has become my favorite Challenges.
For this card I have used the *Always* Set. I have started out with stamping the image first with Chocolate Chip *Classic* Ink and then again with Chocolate Chip *Craft* Ink. The Craft Ink image was embossed with *Clear* EP and I have cut it out and raised it with Stampin Dimensionals on top of the first stamped image.
The half circle was cut with the round Coluzzle Template and I have used the gorgeous *Afternoon Tea* DP from the Occasions Brochure. The scalloped rectangle was cut with the Nestie and I have used Groovy Guava CS. The sentiment was also stamped in CC Ink and I have pierced right underneath it.
Of course I had to add the yummy Satin Chocolate Chip Ribbon plus some Silver Brads.
Sara I hope you like your card??? Stay tuned the *BLOG CANDY WINNER* is coming up!!!


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Force Projection Bear Shake
Yesterday CCP rolled a stick of dynamite into the crowd and we all got a chance to watch it explode. The long anticipated first round of changes arrived with a DevBlog from CCP Greyscale and BOOM CHAKKA BOOM!!
After essentially lying dormant for the past few years post-Incarna CCP finally exposed the beginnings of what is going to be significant changes to the "way-things-have-been" and have shaken the ant farm up a little bit. As you can imagine, this has not gone over well with the louder elements of New Eden. Especially those that have exploited the failings inherent within the established system for years. Those people are very mad bro.
If this heralds a return to a more pre-Incarna CCP then I for one welcome the return of our Overlords. While I've appreciated Tiericide and Small Changes and UI improvements and new ship skins and star flares and cloaking effects, it is also incredibly important for Eve to sometimes take giant leaps forward... or, at the very least, a big step in one direction or another. This is something that vital, growing, important and engaging games must do to stay relevant.
The great thing about Eve has always been an often overlooked fact of single shard, shared universes - rules apply to everyone. If your Dread fleet can't jump across the universe in five minutes, neither can the other guys. We all live under the same roof in this house and we all have to play by the same rules. It is a lesson the Wormhole players learned recently after getting so upset when it was their turn to eat the change bullet. As my WH guys said yesterday, we learned, we adapted, and we moved on. HTFU, it used to be Eve's un-official motto.
Having said all of that I'd also be the last person to tell anyone to just take and accept everything that CCP gives us. If you've followed this blog for any length of time you should know better. And there are things within the Dev Blog that concern me. And that we shall have to keep a close eye on as hopefully more and more details emerge. For one thing, I'm not sure the new fatigue system is the most elegant solution to a complex problem - not to mention yet another timer - but it does seem to achieve a certain objective.
After months and years of whining and complaining about Force Projection and Cap Proliferation ruining the Null experience - it shouldn't come as a surprise. CCP was, for all intents and purposes, obligated to make drastic changes to a region that has become rather bland, boring, predictable, and carebeary. If anything, those that have been willingly and knowingly exploiting that system for the past few years have no one to blame but themselves. Those of you that chose the easy way, that joined the herd for the sake of monetary convenience and safety - will get no sympathy from me. Those of us who have sat on the sidelines of Null have watched as one after another power-bloc gave up and gave in to the powers that be. CCP didn't do that, you did.
Personally I hope this is only the opening salvo in a long and determined string of changes aimed squarely at shaking up the status quo. And from all indications it is.
For those of us in Low Sec, WOOT! The proposed changes actually make me excited for a wide variety of reasons. Carriers using Gates? Doomsday in Low? Heck yeah, bring it on.
Suddenly Eve feels vital once again. This reminds me of the heady days leading up to Dominion and the hand-wringing that led up to the changes in Sov that have directly led us to this day. As Eve players we should know better than anyone how to adapt, learn and exploit any new system of rules that CCP throws at us. I for one look forward to figuring out what this all means, how to take advantage of it, and then how to explode all the other people trying to figure it all out.
This is good for Eve. This is good for us. Keep shaking CCP and watch as we scurry about rebuilding.
HTFU. Oh yeah.
PS: Let's all be honest with ourselves here, these changes alone are going to do nothing to break up Null, or fix the issues that Null may or may not have (depending on your perspective). They are an interesting first step and anyone who is rage-quitting over this is welcome to do so. How easy are you? Changes are coming!?!?? I friggin' quit man! Sheesh. What a pussy.
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I wholeheartedly agree that Eve feels vital again. There are a lot of unknowns and it's essentially going to be a new puzzle for us all to figure out.ReplyDelete
That's not to say that I agree with all the changes, though. And take all of this from the perspective of someone who has never sat in a capital ship before. I for one think that jump fatigue needs to be looked at closer. In combination with the drastically reduced jump range it's practically suffocating those players that have invested a lot of time and money (both in game and out of game) from using the tools they have worked hard to acquire. From numbers I've seen so far, the fatigue timer can get wildly out of hand extremely fast. CCP wants to liven up null sec with this? It's only going to make people use capitals for ratting and very short jumps for fear of being stranded in the middle of nowhere with an outrageous fatigue timer. I'm indifferent about reducing the jump range, though a flat 5 LY range seems asymmetrical with how the game is right now, but both reducing the jump range (making players jump more to get to the same destination) while penalizing them for jumping more seems ludicrous to me.
"But wait, you can use gates with your caps now! Just slowboat like the rest of us!"
Second, I feel as though Jump Freighters need to remain untouched. I've never flown one (only talked to those who have) and logistics sounds like enough of a nightmare the way it is now. Messing with Jump Freighters messes with the economy, and I strongly believe that prices for near everything will increase as a result.
So what would I do? Completely remove jump fatigue, or reduce its drawbacks substantially. I think it's a terrible mechanic that will do much more harm than good. I saw someone on Reddit who proposed cutting each ship's jump range in half, which I think is pretty fair. Cutting a Carrier's max jump range by ~66% is simply too much.
But hey, what do I know? I've never sat in anything bigger than a battleship before and I could be off my rocker. I just fear that CCP taking drastic action for the sake of doing so is going to set a bad precedent.Replies
I don't disagree with anything you've said and I believe CCP must be willing to take a hard look at these proposed changes. Fairly, I believe that is why they put the devblog out so early in the cycle, to gauge response and hear our concerns. At least I hope that is why. These are big changes and they will require some tinkering along the way to get them right, but I also believe that they are least thinking in the right direction.Delete
Agreed, I think it was a wise move of CCP to put the devblog out just after the launch of Oceanus. It gives the community a lot of time to give them feedback and they can adjust the details accordingly.Delete
- AnonymousOctober 2, 2014 at 11:24 AM
As a merc the proposed changes kind of swing both ways in the Pro's & Con's.ReplyDelete
Logistics vrs risks of being hot dropped.
I agree with the need for changes and much of what is being proposed. I'm a super builder in a major alliance not a pvper like you guys, but from my perspective there are a few relevant impacts.ReplyDelete
- the (in)famous power projection - good riddance and I'm all for it.
- null logistics - worst nightmare possible. It happens on all areas so I'll use one example I saw in the threadnought: Etherium Reach to The Forge - today a JF pilot with JDC 5 needs to jump 2/3 times to get to lowsec from null and vice-versa. With the changes it goes to 12. But that is not the bad part as this all large alliance will easily adapt. today this trip with the correct cynos in place can be done in less than 20 minutes round-trip. With the "Fatigue" it will be a 7 hours job. That means for casual players it won't happen. If you ever been in a huge fight with thousands of players you know that most can't stay that long. So, it becomes inefficient to use JFs or carriers for a logistic approach. If this was associated with better resources in null, that would not be an issue, but most nullsec can't survive without resources from empire. End result, only the very large alliances will be able to live in null while the small alliance that are supposed to benefit from this change are screwed.
And if anyone decides to take a titan through gate, blue or not, I want to be there to gank it alongside with the entirety of eve.
- For lowsec, there will be impact, most positive for PVP
- For newbies - do you really believe any of this impacts them? Except for a small change of being part of a gang ganking a titan using a gate?
- All my capitals and my supers are being moved to safe lowsec systems and will stay there. They will stay in dry-doc or will be sold or scrapped. not worth the time consumption to fly capitals.Replies
Quick note on myself: When I wrote about the 7 hours. Remember that Thousands of players for 7 hours do happen but not often. The logistics guys will have to do this in a daily basis to keep null supplied. Or manufacturing in null will stop to a crawl. In my case from building 4 titans plus assorted Moms and Capitals a month to 1 or two capitals a month and 1 titan every 6 months or so.Delete
Krull - I hear you but I wonder if that is only part of the story. Again, I haven't thought this all the way thru yet (not being a mover/builder myself) but it seems as if trying to compare the old way to the new way is where some people are missing the point. Jumping from Null into Low or Empire is one thing, but jumping from Null to the edges of those regions might be another shorter thing. From there it is a standard freighter run, which is faster and uses less fuel anyway. Again, this needs more thought, but I'm suggesting that maybe we are all so confined by what we've been doing that we can't see other ways of doing the same thing.Delete
Or maybe I'm nuts. I have been before.
lol. I hope it is only part of the story and as I said the power projection (from one end of eve to the other in 30 minutes) is one area good to get rid of.Delete
And as said CCP needs to think better about how to go about it as this proposal will have repercussions all over.
Alone the proposed change solves nothing only adding annoyance and off course some more oppty for pvp. But, the large nullsec alliances/coalitions wont change their accords and blue settings because of it. Thus status quo in null won't change much.
But, I'm really looking forward for the oppty to gank a titan using a gate. :-P
Agreed. I honestly think they'll back off this position somewhat and hurriedly add some missing pieces to the longer term plans for null sov, at least let us know where this is all heading in even general terms might be enough to assuage some fears.Delete
- AnonymousOctober 3, 2014 at 2:03 AM
Hmmmm. One wonders how much of the cap and super cap build is dependent on materials from high sec, and how much of it can be sourced locally...Delete
Don't tell me the null sec overlords are going to have to be >gasp< nice to miners and indy corps...?!?!?
Globalement, il est bon. Juste besoin de quelques ajustements/ReplyDelete


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adventures in tech, electronics, programming, cartography, geology, data, and augmented realities
Sunday, 8 January 2012
Modular Origami - Truncated Cube Hexahedron and Small Stellated Dodecahedron
Today, DBBD's new hobby interest is modular origami. The construction of these models is a calming, repetitive task that also requires some degree of precision. I constructed the following out of white A4 paper that I had cut into squares of about 7cm x 7cm.
The truncated cube is created by truncating ends of a cube one third of the way into each edge. There is a bit of string attached to it as I was going to hang it up. (Assembly instructions for the modular parts for a truncated cube polyhedra can be found here.)
The small stellated dodecahedron is basically a normal dodecahedron (12 sided polyhedra) with 5 pointy isoceles triangle bits sticking out. (Assembly instructions for the modular parts of a small stellated dodecahedron can be found here.)
Posted by debbie ding
Labels: dodecahedron, modular origami, polyhedra, truncated cube
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August 28, 2015
I can't wait to get to know more about the people that follow us and will be part of our journey, but first off, I thought I'd share this article that came across my path. It truly inspires me to do the things I do in life and follow the path less trodden. I hope it resonates with you too and help you to understand a little more about the people behind CAYA.
Next week, I'l fill you in on our never-ended search for the perfect premisis. A roller coaster ride that I'd not really anticipated!
Enjoy, npx
Choose the riskier path and follow your dreams
By Dan Oswald
Comedian Jim Carrey is well known for his high energy and incredibly silly impressions and comedic routines. His movie roles have included characters such as Ace Ventura, the hapless pet detective, Lloyd Christmas, one-half of the Dumb and Dumber duo, and the Grinch from Dr. Seuss fame. When a colleague shared this clip from a commencement speech Carrey gave at Maharishi University, I was expecting to get a good laugh.
Instead, I found myself mesmerized by Carrey's message to the young college graduates—so much so that I went back and watched the entire speech after watching this one-minute clip. What does Carrey say in just 61 seconds that so captured my attention? He had me with these two sentences: "So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect, so we never dare to ask the universe for it."
Do you remember being a child and dreaming about what you might become one day? I do. I can remember my mother asking me at a very young age what I aspired to do as an adult. Maybe you dreamed of being an athlete or a movie star. Or maybe you wanted to be an astronaut, ballerina, or even president of the United States. Whatever your childhood dream was, where did it go?
Often we write those dreams off as the silly fantasies of a child, but here a man known for his silliness is telling us that so many of us give up on our dreams out of fear. That our dreams and aspirations seem so ambitious that we are scared into taking a path that appears more practical. Safe.
When you think about people you really admire, how many of them took the road less traveled? How many of them dared to dream and had the courage to chase those dreams? Sometimes we look at people and wonder how they achieved so much. Call it envy or curiosity or even amazement, but you just wonder what's so different about them that they could have done so much. And as we wonder, we speculate. They must be smarter, more talented, or really lucky.
Have you ever stopped to think that maybe the people who seemingly have the world by the tail were willing to just go for it? That they had intestinal fortitude to follow their dreams when others succumbed to fear and took an easier path? For every successful entrepreneur, there are 100 people who shared the dream of starting their own business but instead went to work for someone else. For every congressperson, there are thousands of people who don't want to put their ideas about governing forward or commit to public life. For every successful doctor, there are hundreds of people who thought med school would be too tough or the process would be too gruelling.
It's often said that 80 percent of success is just showing up. Maybe we need to rethink that. Maybe success is about being willing to follow our dreams, regardless of how ridiculous they may seem. Because what's really the alternative to following your dreams? Settling. If we aren't willing to follow our dreams, no one is going to do it for us, so we're just plain ol' settling. Carrey captures it perfectly when he says, "You can fail at what you don't want, so you might as well take a chance at doing what you love."
We are told that if we find something we love to do, we won't work a day in our life. Do we really believe it? When your husband tells you he wants to quit a perfectly good job to follow his dream, do you respond out of fear or do you encourage him? When your child announces she wants to pursue her passion, do you support her or caution her about the bleak prospects her chosen path may produce? It's so easy to talk about doing what we love and loving what we do, but chasing dreams comes with risk. Are we just choosing our path—or encouraging others to choose theirs—out of "fear disguised as practicality," as Carrey so aptly put it?
Let's not forget there is a risk in choosing practicality, too. Doing so can produce a life filled with "what ifs" and "could have beens." A life of regret based on giving up on your dreams to do something that seems so much more practical. A life in which you wonder why others are living your dream—and it may just be that they were willing to reach for the impossible.
I don't know about you, but I think Jim Carrey nailed it. To really succeed, to really be happy, you need to follow your dream—whatever it may be. Success comes from happiness, and happiness comes from success. The beautiful thing is that we get to define what success is for us. It's achieving our dream. What's your dream?


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103 days to my open day and approximately another metre has been added to the formation today. Looks like nothing else is going to happen this week as the weather forecast is for rain, rain and more rain. Still it's off to the G Scale Society show this weekend to collect more concrete viaduct sections.
|The gap in the thermlite block embankment has been filled in
|The thermalite block embankment has been extended by two blocks


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Discussion in 'Clubs' started by gimp, Dec 17, 2013.
Any members, what's the schedule over Xmas/New Year?
How often does the club shoot?
Been thinking about popping down and giving the range a go.
It's nice. Organised shoots every second Sunday. There's one this weekend I'll be going to
What's the access to the range like? i.e. can you only shoot on 'shoot days'?
Cheers for the reply _b
Edit: Also what kind of shooting is it? long range sort of stuff? I ask as most of my rifles are old military ones, which have iron sights.
There's open range access to club members every Saturday and every other second Sunday
Separate names with a comma.


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Christina Topacio
Founder and CEO, JIG+SAW
is the Founder + CEO of JIG+SAW, a global creative community for female entrepreneurs and creatives. Her vision for JIG+SAW was inspired by her own personal need for a creative and communal workspace and community for herself. Prior to creating JIG+SAW, Topacio led global marketing campaigns for leading consumer brands as a Senior Marketing Executive.
Previously (1):
SERENDIPITY: Presented by The Guild
Join us for a session as part of SERENDIPITY, a unique, two-day summit where we unite 500 women across ages and industries to learn, connect and get inspired!


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Seco de Cordero (lamb stew)
- 1 Kg. of boneless leg lamb (approximately 2 lbs.)
- 1 bunch of cilantro
- 6 cloves of garlic
- 1 medium size onion
- 1 teaspoon of aji amarillo paste
- 2 cups of beef broth
- 4 potatoes, cut in quarters
- 4 carrots, sliced in rounds
- 1/2 cup of green peas
- 1/2 cup of oil
- 1 teaspoon of cumin
- Salt and black pepper
Cut the lamb in 4 cm. cubes (approximately 1.5 inch cubes) and season them with salt and pepper. In a large pot, heat the oil over medium-high and brown the lamb. Remove the lamb when done. Reduce the temperature to medium and add to the pot the minced garlic, diced onions, aji amarillo and cumin and cook for 2 minutes stirring frequently. Add the lamb, the cilantro (previously pureed in 1/2 cup of water) and the beef broth. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover the pot and let it cook until the lamb is tender (approximately 30 minutes). Add the potatoes, carrots and green peas and let it simmer until the potatoes are cooked (approximately 30 minutes). Add more salt if needed and mix well.
Serve with white rice.


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Considering A Luxury Home On The Big Island? Best Places To Live
While you might think living anywhere on the Big Island would be a dream come true, just like anywhere else there are neighborhoods and resorts that offer a more relaxed lifestyle and enhanced way of living. Whether you live an active life or prefer quiet, privacy, solitude and spectacular views of the beach, ocean, and mountains, we're convinced you'll find the perfect destination in one of these communities.
With its volcanoes, majestic mountains, waterfalls, rainforests, and of course the spectacular beaches, all of the island is beautiful; it's the most diverse island in the state, which means incredible options when it comes to luxurious living. Our Hawaii luxury property professionals believe you'll find the best living along the Kohala Coast, in Kamuela (Waimea), Kailua-Kona, and Hualalai.
Kailua-Kona (also referred to simply as Kona) is in close proximity to the Keahole airport and offers a slower way of life for those who prefer living in a smaller city that's not far away from a larger community. The atmosphere is charming with unique art galleries, fine dining, entertainment, shopping, and of course ample opportunities to enjoy the white sand beaches. There's lots of high-end housing in Kailua-Kona, where you'll find your tropical fantasies come to life.
North Kohala is where you'll find Kohala Ranch, and plenty of solitude if you prefer to get as close as possible to "off grid" as there is in Hawaii. The beautiful countryside offers rolling green hills, opportunities to grow your own fresh produce or raise cattle, and of course a spectacular coastline. Upscale "green" living, enjoying the amazing temperatures and landscape, freedom – it's all in North Kohala.
Kamuela, or as some call it Waimea, is where you'll find it all from golfing, hiking, and horseback riding to scuba diving, impressive waterfalls, some of the best beaches, farmers markets, rodeos, and one of the most scenic places you could imagine, nearby Waipi'o Valley, with its black sand beach, hidden waterfalls, and spectacular vistas. Let's not forget the fabulous Mauna Kea Resort and the ultimate in luxury homes and estates found within the Mauna Kea community!
Hualalai is described by some as a lush gated community of wealth, and it's where you'll find the Four Seasons Resort and perhaps more than a few affluent neighbors. With the Kukio community located next to the Hualalai Resort, you can only imagine how spectacular and majestic some of the homes and estates in this community are, and the activities available to those who enjoy an active lifestyle. While the amenities are plentiful, you'll also enjoy the traditions, culture, and sense of family you only find in Hualalai.
Every person has different opinions on what the "best" life should be. Only you can determine where the best place to live on the island of Hawaii is! At Mauna Kea Realty, our real estate brokers are happy to help you find the perfect luxury home on the Big Island. Contact us today, and let us help make your dreams come true.


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SPF50 Color Control Cushion Compact - #204 Tan Gold
- Instructions for use:
- - Apply on a freshly cleansed face by pressing the puff applicator into the moistened sponge and patting the puff across the face
- - Reapply as desired for touch-ups throughout the day
- - 15g/0.52 oz
- Ingredients: Phyllostachis Bambusoides Juice, Cyclopentasiloxane, Cyclohexasiloxane, Peg-10 Dimethicone, Phenyl Trimethicone, Butylene Glycol, Butylene Glycol Dicaprylate/Dicaprate, Alcohol, Arbutin, Lauryl Peg-9 Polydimethylsiloxyethyl Dimethicone, Acrylates/Ethylhexyl Acrylate/Dimethicone Methacrylate Copolymer, Polyhydroxystearic Acid, Sodium Chloride, Polymethyl Methacrylate, Aluminium Hydroxide, Stearic Acid, Disteardimonium Hectorite, Triethoxycaprylylsilane, Ethylhexyl Palmitate, Lecithin, Isostearic Acid, Isopropyl Palmitate, Phenoxyethanol, Polyglyceryl-3 Polyricinoleate, Acrylates/Stearyl Acrylate/Dimethicone Methacrylate Copolymer, Dimethicone, Disodium Edta, Trimethylsiloxysilicate, Ethylhexyglycerin, Dimethicone/Vinyl Dimethicone Crosspolymer, Aqua/Water/Eau, Silica, Camellia Japonica Seed Oil, Camillia Sinensis Leaf Extract, Caprylyl Glycol, 1,2-Hexanediol, Parfum/Fragrance, Titanium Dioxide, Iron Oxides (Ci 77492, Ci 77491, Ci77499)
AMOREPACIFIC delivers SPF50 sun protection, instant hydration and complete, flawless coverage all in one easy-to-carry compact. The exclusive Long-Lasting Complex™ fills fine lines and ensures the soft golden color builds into even layers. We love how the non-absorbing ruby-cell puff cools and soothes your skin, making application feel more like a spa experience than daily routine.
- Comes with refill packet - Formulated for skin with yellow undertones - Lightweight texture with light to medium coverage - Brightens and reduces puffiness and redness - Named as a beauty essential by ELLE Magazine - Also available in: Tan Blush
Find out the shipping options available for your destination
Arrange your return for an exchange or refund within 28 days using our free collection service


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Wordless Wednesday
5 comments:
So excited for you! Love them both!!ReplyDelete
Oh my gosh!!!! Wow, so cool!!!! Also, I wanted to thank you for the Amy Butler bag that you made me...it is so gorgeous, and it's the perfect size! I love it so much, and you really made my week! Thank you! :*)ReplyDelete
Congrats on the quilt!ReplyDelete
Wonderful!! (Also, thank you for my Patchwork book I won, got it quickly and love it!)ReplyDelete
I saw that quilt in flickr last night, from quilt market. Amazing! And so is the pouch.ReplyDelete
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Information for Schools
From the 2015-16 academic year, eProgressFile versions of Getting Started, Moving On and Widening Horizons will be available to schools. Further information and training presentations can be accessed from the Progress File website.
CCEA is no longer able to provide Progress File presenters or hard copy manuals for schools to order. Schools wishing to continue using the manuals can now download them.
Information for Training Organisations
Training organisations may submit orders as normal throughout the academic year.
Ordering Support
If you experience any problems placing your order or wish to have any aspect of the process clarified, please contact the CCEA Distribution Team on (028) 9026 1273 or email email@example.com.


text:
This Great 2/2 Is Waiting For Its New Owner. L...
- $109,900
- Pending
- On Top Of The World
- 2292 Costa Rican Dr #46
- Clearwater, FL 33763
- 2 BD 2 BA 1400 Sq Ft 0.00 AC
- Residential
What Is Your Bradenton Home Worth
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Did you know if you Register you have access to free search tools including the ability to save listings and property searches? Did you know that you can bypass the search altogether and have listings sent directly to your email address? Check out our how-to page for more info.
This unit is being offered for the first time by the ORIGINAL OWNERS. who only used it seasonally as snowbirds! This Eldorado Model is in the Capistrano building. 2 BR/2BA on the third floor. Located directly across from the Westside Recreation Center, Swimming Pool and Dog Park. Beautifully furnished and truly move in ready. The 55+ community has two activity centers, and two private golf courses with 9 and 18 holes, free exclusively for resident owners. There are two swimming pools; one is heated. The remodeled Cardio Gym has the latest exercise equipment. There are hobby studios, a dog park and many other amenities for the exclusive use of the residents. The many indoor activities include fitness classes, dancing, clubs, cards, billiards, entertainment, classes, and much more. The on-site Good Karma Café has take & bake meals and snacks. Close to beaches, transportation, shopping, entertainment, and fine dining. All room sizes, floor plans and square footage are approximate. This property is being transferred by a leasehold estate deed. Association approval is required. If financing, 35% down is required. Assigned parking.
|Price Range:
|$99,900 - $117,900
|Current Listings:
|Avg Price/SqFt:
|Price Range:
|$99,000 - $134,900
|Current Listings:
|Avg Price/SqFt:
|Price Range:
|$99,000 - $134,900
|Current Listings:
|Avg Price/SqFt:
Listing information courtesy of On Top Of The World Re.
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Listing information is provided for consumer personal, non-commercial use, solely to identify potential properties for potential purchase; all other use is strictly prohibited and may violate relevant federal and state law.
Listing data comes from My Florida Regional MLS DBA Stellar MLS.
Listing information last updated on January 27th, 2020 at 9:15am EST.


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All's Well That Ends Well
Zoom View
The authoritative edition of All's Well That Ends Well from The Folger Shakespeare Library, the trusted and widely used Shakespeare series for students and general readers, includes:
Essay by David McCandless
Edited by Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine
Visit Folger.edu for more resources, including overviews of each play, information about Shakespeare's world, and teaching modules.
William Shakespeare, 2009, Paperback, 336 Pages. ISBN-13: 978-0-7434-8497-8.


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In the face of NASDAQ delisting, Digital Angel trims $2m in fat
Via Business Wire
"Digital Angel announced today changes to its corporate structure as part of the Company's strategic turnaround plan. These changes address Digital Angel's growing focus on Destron Fearing, the Company's animal identification business, and include the elimination of its "corporate structure", and the associated costs of a separate headquarters and several management positions. The new streamlined structure will result in cost savings of approximately $2 million per year."
In a letter to shareholders on June 7th, Digital Angel CEO Joseph Grillo initially hinted at the company's NASDAQ issues (which would come to light two days later).


text: Ethiopia FTO Dry Process Worka Sakaro is what fans of naturals have been waiting for, this lot is so heavily fruited that our entire warehouse smells like ripe coffee cherry just from the aroma of the green beans; expect strawberry, mango and milky body in the cup, works well across the roast spectrum. Guatemala Antigua Finca Cabrejo has a profound sweetness that intensifies as it cools, berry and malic notes round out one of our top Central arrivals of the year. Guatemala Antigua Retana Red Bourbon is a clean, well-structured cup with a bright acidic snap, great at all roast levels and as SO espresso. Guatemala Finca La Florencia is a very juicy cup with tea-like acidity and a nice balance between bittersweet and sweet. Happy Fourth of July everyone, be safe.


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These taxicabs could be found in various dimensions and also forms as well as are qualified of fitting around thirteen individuals with each other. These taxicabs likewise have drivers that have a wonderful suggestion about all the important locations.
The services provided by these 7 seater transportation include the flight terminal arrivals as well as departures, the f


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I hate to break it to you, but following rules doesn't get you into Heaven.
– Jesus Christ.
What does? Hard spiritual work – the evolution of body, mind, and soul.
Why did the Creator get busy? To experience something. Every experience, however ecstatic or beautiful, will get boring eventually. Boosting experience is top priority and that calls for the evolution of body, mind, and soul. That's why we evolved from protozoa to Homo sapiens – to have more glorious experiences.
The phrase "my works unfinished" is a key to the whole philosophy of good and evil running through these meditations. In the thought of the author, we live in a dynamic, growing organism, which we call "the universe". The purpose for which that organism has been projected into relative manifestation is not yet fully achieved. It is not a finished mechanism, a thing made, once and for all. Rather it is a living Being, whose life includes innumerable lesser lives and lesser degrees of knowledge.
– Paul Foster Case, The Book of Tokens, Comment on Aleph.
Mankind is a work unfinished and evolution is the name of the game. Not the evolution of races, but the evolution of individuals. We can't inherit a spiritual state of mind, nor can someone award it to us. The teacher reveals the path, you walk it. The teacher explains the great work, you do it.
No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path: Buddhas only show the way.
– Karma: A Story of Buddhist Ethics, by Paul Carus.
The entire universe sizzles with the drive to evolution. Nothing is more real than change and progress. That's the law. That's karma. Do you already have the eye to see that karma is beneficial and that reality liberates? But the Creator also guides us from within. Inside us, He instructs us how to cope with increasingly challenging karma. Do you already have the ear to hear His small still voice inside you?
Evolution is not an escape into Heaven. Evolution turns us into living gods. And evolution is holistic, we need to evolve on all levels:
• Maintain a healthy body
• Cultivate a beautiful mind
• Unbias our intelligence and knowledge
• Develop a high EQ (emotional IQ)
• Practice to love unconditionally
The stakes are high, but success is inevitable. No-one will be left behind. The Light has already won, the darkness just didn't get it yet.
What Is Spirituality?
Here are a few quotes to inspire you:
Spirituality is conversation with God, everything else is religious custom.
Know Your Self And God!
Christianity is an attitude, not a dogma.
You can have an intimate and loving relationship with God.
Nobody will be left behind!
You are not a drop in an ocean, you are an ocean in a drop. – Rumi
Drop us a message:


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Compiling programs for OpenWRT
When I was trying to compile my first OpenWRT program I searched around the web, but didn't found any useful (at least to me) tutorials/guides that would help me. After spending a few hours behind a computer and figuring out how to do this I found the easiest way to do it.
The are two ways of compiling:
- simply compiling your application
- building a package for it
Differences? If you have a package it's easier to install and uninstall it, and probably easier to update it. However, in most of my cases I just simply want to compile my source code to a single executable and copy it to the device. Here I will show you the easiest way to do it and go from source code to final executable in a few minutes.
What you need?
- Linux distribution
- OpenWRT Toolchain for processor which is in the target device
I'm currently focused on tiny routers called TP-Link WR703n, so my toolchain is available at: http://downloads.openwrt.org/attitude_adjustment/12.09/ar71xx/generic/ For others please visit www.openwrt.org and search for toolchain for your device.
Create folder and put create Makefile similar to this:
export STAGING_DIR= CC=gcc all: clean program cc: CC=$(STAGING_DIR)/bin/mips-openwrt-linux-gcc cc: clean program deploy deploy: scp program firstname.lastname@example.com:/path/to/where/you/want/to/put/your/executable/ program: main.o $(CC) main.o -o program main.o: $(CC) -c main.c clean: rm -rf *.o program
Change path to your toolchain, your device's IP address, path to where you want to put your executable and name of your C file. If you want to include additional files just copy main.o to something.o, add it to program: section, and change the names accordingly.
If you need to link your program with additional library (e.g. pthread), you can add that to CC variable (e.g. gcc -lpthread).
What can I do with this Makefile?
- command make – compile program for your PC (compile with the toolchain available on your computer and be able to test it out on it)
- command make cc – compile program for OpenWRT device and deploy it to the device
- command make deploy – deploy compiled application to your device
Example file from one of my projects:
export STAGING_DIR=/home/dean/Downloads/OpenWrt-Toolchain-ar71xx-for-mips_r2-gcc-4.6-linaro_uClibc-0.9.33.2/toolchain-mips_r2_gcc-4.6-linaro_uClibc-0.9.33.2 CC=gcc -pthread all: clean lightning-service cc: CC=$(STAGING_DIR)/bin/mips-openwrt-linux-gcc -pthread cc: clean lightning-service deploy deploy: scp lightning-service firstname.lastname@example.com:/apps/ lightning-service: serial_port.o main.o $(CC) serial_port.o main.o -o lightning-service main.o: $(CC) -c main.c serial_port.o: $(CC) -c serial_port.c clean: rm -rf *.o lightning-service
This is an example of Makefile for a program that I use to control stairway lights at home. Lights are connected to my router via Launchpad MSP430 microcontroller, and I can communicate with them through TCP. I am also linking pthread library because I need threads (one for listening/communicating with serial port and one for TCP connections).
This is probably the simplest way you can compile your own programs without having to bother with creating your own packages.
Compiling OpenSSL and OpenSSL.Net for Windows
If you need fast way to hash passwords with MD5/SHA1, or to encrypt and decrypt data with AES I recommend OpenSSL library. This library supports more than 25 algorithms for ciphering, hashing and public-key cryptography. It's open source and supports most platforms, including Linux, OS X and Windows. To use OpenSSL from C# you need to use a wrapper. I hadn't had much problems with OpenSSL.Net and it's supposed to be cross-platform.
Building OpenSSL on Windows
What you need?
- OpenSSL source code http://www.openssl.org/source/
- Perl interpreter http://www.perl.org/get.html
- Visual Studio compiler (should also work with MinGW or similar)
You can build library with assembly optimizations or without them. Optimizations provide faster code execution, according to some benchmarks they can speed up execution by up to 4 times, depending on selected algorithm. To successfully build them you need Visual Studio Professional or better, because VS Express doesn't offer assembly compiler NASM.
To build x64 version start Visual Studio Command Prompt (x64) and run:
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perl Configure VC-WIN64A --prefix=C:\openssl-x64-build ms\do_win64a nmake -f ms\nt.mak nmake -f ms\nt.mak install
To build x32 version start 32bit Visual Studio CMD and run:
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perl Configure VC-WIN32 --prefix=C:\openssl-x32-build ms\do_ms nmake -f ms\nt.mak nmake -f ms\nt.mak install
If you don't have assembly compiler add no-asm to perl Configure call (e.g. perl Configure VC-WIN64A no-asm –prefix=C:\openssl-x64-build).
If everything went without a hitch you should find built library in folder specified with –prefix.
Building OpenSSL.Net
What you need?
- Visual Studio or VS Express for C#
- OpenSSL.Net wrapper library http://sourceforge.net/projects/openssl-net/
Download wrapper library and open it with Visual Studio. Choose x32 or x64 platform and press F5. Solution also includes tests (you need NUnit to run them) and example Console application.
The only problem you might have is hard coded version of supported OpenSSL library. Wrapper specifies which version it supports in Core/Native.cs on line 228:
public const uint Wrapper = 0x00908000;
If you have different version of library you need to modify this value and hope that all calls in library stayed the same.
Alternatively, you can disable consistency check by commenting it in Core/Native.cs on lines 160-166:
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Version lib = Version.Library; Version wrapper = Version.Wrapper; uint mmf = lib.Raw & 0xfffff000; // if (mmf != wrapper.Raw) // throw new Exception(string.Format("Invalid version of {0}, expecting {1}, got: {2}", // DLLNAME, wrapper, lib));
After that you shouldn't have any problems.
- OpenSSL 32bit library (built with debug-VC-WIN32 no-asm): openssl.zip
- OpenSSL 64bit library (built with VC-WIN64A and assembly optimizations): openssl64.zip
- OpenSSL.Net 64bit with appropriate OpenSSL library: OpenSSL.Net
Monitoring electricity consumption
I was always interest in knowing how much energy am I using and have been experimenting with different approaches to measure consumption. My favorite way to measure electricity consumption is the use of current transformers/clamps around wires coming into the house. Sadly, I don't have any space left in electrical box to p ut them in.
About a year ago I found a solution, which is to direct web camera to electricity meter, watch blinking LED and calculate consumption. I made a simple prototype in the form of gluing webcam to outside electrical box (where we have electricity meter) and simple Forms application made in C# with bindings to OpenCV library.
The problem was that this prototype consumed almost whole core on older dual core AMD Turion laptop, which consumes more than 40 Wh. That is not a cheap solution and I also need that laptop for other purposes.
After a week or two of testing, I finally removed laptop and kinda forget about everything this idea. Later, I tried two different ways to capture blinking LED but neither worked as it should.
Two days ago I remembered about it and wanted to port everything to Raspberry PI, and in the future maybe even to a small router.
Over the last two days I tried two different approaches:
1.) Capture frames using v4l2 (in my opinion this was the best idea, and it should be as much as possible lightweight)
Capturing frames with v4l2 seemed like a hard thing to do, and it would actually be really hard, should I not use code from mjpeg-streamer. I went through the source of mjpeg-streamer, quickly found most interesting module – input_uvc and searched for usable source code.
After I successfully got frames, I needed to process them in figure out when the LED blinked. For debugging purposes I also added code to measure performance (frames per second) and to save captured frames.
Project is available at: https://github.com/deanrock/electricity-monitoring
Application runs in background (it's a console application), watches captured frames for change of color intensity in specified area of interest, and makes http request to server to save results.
How it works?
- Main function gets raw frames in YUYV format from web cam.
- Function do_my_thing uses two for loops to iterate over received frame and get the average intensity of red color in specified area of interest.
- If current intensity level is larger than average intensity level of previous 10 frames + 10 levels (to discard noise) then we mark it as blink of an LED.
- We wait for a frame that has intensity level lower than the one marked as blink, and then make a http request to web server. (Single blink can be captured on multiple frames)
- Simple PHP script running on web server saves data to database.
I should also mention my genius idea of how to keep intensity levels of last 10 frames – circular buffer. When it gets full it replaces oldest position with a new intensity level – that way I always have last 10 intensity levels and don't need to move any data around.
I need to test this solution in the following week to see if there are any problems with capturing LED, but only improvement I could see right now is to add threads. One thread for frame capturing and processing, and another for sending http requests. Currently http request blocks capturing new frames and this may introduce a slight delay or lower fps.
Here is a picture of my current "GUI":
MySQL Workbench running a query which counts reported blinks in the last minute. Now I need to make a web app that will show statistics and current consumption of electricity.
2.) Capturing and processing frames done with OpenCV library (should be the easiest)
I also tried this approach, and it really reduces the number of lines of code written, but Raspberry PI captures about 1 frame per second via OpenCV library, and about 15-20 with v4l2 API.
Ubuntu 13.04
Recently I have been working on some personal projects where I need to use Linux – from building OpenWRT packages to programming apps with libraries that are Linux only. Sometimes I just work on Linux because it's easier to set up any kind of libraries, doesn't matter if it's for C/C++ or Python development, in both cases nothing can beat apt-get install libwhatever-dev and additional flag when invoking a compiler.
( Few days ago I spent more than half an hour setting up paths for OpenGL project in Visual Studio to use glfw and similar libraries. On Linux that can be achieved in less than 1 minute by adding additional flags. )
However, I still prefer Windows environment for everything but programming, because it's hardware support is supsrb, GUI (even Metro) is cool and most of the work I do on Linux can be done in virtual machine.
Sadly, my latest project needs v4l2 library to communicate with webcam and every time I tried connecting USB webcam through VirtualBox VM it would stop responding. Only viable solution was to use native installation on Linux. Since I removed my Crunchbang installation about a month ago, I needed to install new OS. I promptly went to Google and searched for Ubuntu download and downloaded 13.04 thinking that it was still in beta.
After installation, which went smoothly, I saw a lot of visual as well as technical improvements. I didn't really follow development of this version so I was really surprised. A quick visit to OMG Ubuntu quickly helped me realize that I actually installed final version and not beta as I thought.
Why was I so pleasantly surprised?
- Very nice looking design changes. 🙂
- Graphics support out of the box. What what?? It actually worked for the first time (for me) without any tearing. Connecting and disconnecting external monitor correctly resized my desktop.
- Waking from suspend without any problems? Yeah.
I just might use native Linux a bit more in the following months than I used to.
Pan & Tilt Servo bracket
Recently I bought Pan & Tilt Servo bracket set that looks like this:
Servo motors are not robust as I am used to them, but they will be good enough to hold a light web cam.
Servos are controlled by PWM (pulse width modulation) and they need special hardware support. Thankfully, ordinary Arduino supports 6 PWM channels which should be enough for most projects.
Arduino already has a library called Servo to support these motors and there are a lot of articles explaining how it works, so I won't go into details.
In my case I want to control it from a computer (or in the future from Raspberry Pi or some router running OpenWRT) and therefore need a way to communicate with Arduino.
Servos can be set to a fixed angle where they will stay no mater what (if you don't put too much force to them) and this angle is from 0 to 180 degrees – half a circle.
Communication between Arduino and computer is usually in the form of data transfer through USB emulated serial port. Serial port communication is intended for transferring text so you must send/receive chars – which are represented by bytes. Byte consists of 8 bits and therefore can represent 128 different states or numbers.
Since 180 degrees is a bit bigger than 128 we need to find another way. I chose to separate data about each angle into two bytes.
First byte holds number from 0 to 127, and second one holds the reminder to 180. For example 160 degrees angle is sent as 127 and 33 – together they represent number 160.
Final format looks like this:
[first motor 0-127] [first motor 0-53] [second motor 0-127] [second motor 0-53]
The only remaining question is how do we know when byte from first motor starts? What if communication is interrupted before sending every byte? We need a unique identifier identifying the start of this sequence.
I decided to firstly post 127 and after that our sequence. However, we need to change the first byte for both motors from 0-127 to 0-126, so that 127 is never send anywhere else except at start.
Final Arduino code looks like this:
#include <Servo.h>
Servo s1,s2;
void setup() {
int angle0=90, angle1=90;
void loop() {
if(Serial.available()>4 && Serial.read()==127) {
int ss = Serial.read()+Serial.read();
int ss2 = Serial.read()+Serial.read();
At the start motors are at 90 degrees, and then we wait for 5 available bytes with first of them equal to 127. After that we simply add bytes and change global variables which will be latter sent to Servo library.
Example C# code with serialPort and two trackBars on form looks like this:
private void Form1_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
private void Send()
int x1 = trackBar1.Value,x2=0;
if (x1 > 126)
x2 = x1 – 126;
x1 = 126;
int y1 = trackBar2.Value, y2 = 0;
if (y1 > 126)
y2 = y1 – 126;
y1 = 126;
byte[] buf = new byte[5];
buf[0] = 127;
buf[1] = (byte)x1;
buf[2] = (byte)x2;
buf[3] = (byte)y1;
buf[4] = (byte)y2;
string a = "";
for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
a += Convert.ToString((int)buf[i]);
a += ",";
label1.Text = a;
serialPort1.Write(buf, 0, buf.Length);
private void trackBar1_Scroll(object sender, EventArgs e)
private void trackBar2_Scroll(object sender, EventArgs e)
Now I might use this for a webcam controlled by Wii Nunchuck or via web page.
DS18S20 and MSP430
Couple of weeks ago, when I was thinking about what temperature sensors to use with my heating controller, I remembered DS18S20 and instantly order samples from Maxim.
Today I finished programming software for main controller – MSP430 chip and I want to show you, how I got those sensors working by bitbanging data pin. Sensors are connected in parasitic mode (which may not be such a good idea since turning oil burner/water heater on and off causes some unwanted interference, and it certainly doesn't help that data & ground wires are near AC cables). I also found out, that chip's internal pull-up isn't powerful enough to drive temperature sensor while it's converting temperature.
How to talk to one-wire DS18S20 / DS1820 sensor?
- Reset
- Check if there is a device present
- Send skip ROM command
- Send convert command
- Reset
- Send skip ROM command
- Send read scratchpad command
- Read byte from the bus
Firstly, we need to reset the device, then it's necessary to sample bus to see if device responded and after that we send skip command, because we only have one sensor connected to the line and don't care about it's unique ID and then we request from sensor to convert (take temperature).
After that we do another reset, then skip ROM and read scratchpad commands, and after that we read received data – scratchpad from the device.
I talked more about specific commands and which data scratchpad contains previously on this blog, but I will nonetheless paste code which converts temperature to human readable float number:
int16_t temp = (((int16_t)scratchpad[1]) << 8) | scratchpad[0];
float temp2 = temp*0.5 – 0.25+((scratchpad[7]-scratchpad[6])/scratchpad[7]);
How to reset the bus?
P2OUT &= ~bi; //drive bus low
delay_us(480); //delay 480 us
P2OUT |= bi; //release bus
delay_us(70); //delay 70 us
P2DIR &= ~bi; //input
We drive bus low for 480 us, and the release it and change pin from output to input. (bi is data pin bit)
After that we can check if device is present on the bus by sampling the bus. Device pulls data line high after reset for about 410 us.
How to send a byte?
Well, the better question is how to send a bit. Every byte contains 8 bits and when dealing with that low level of controlling the device with big banging you will need to send bits instead of bytes.
Bit can be presented as logical high '1' or logical low '0'. Logical low can be send with the following code:
P2DIR |= b;//output
P2OUT &= ~b; //drive bus low
P2OUT |= b; //release bus
You need to drive bus low for 60 us and then release it (drive it high) for 10 us.
On the other hand, logical high can be represented as driving bus low for 6 us and then high for 64 us:
P2DIR |= b;//output
P2OUT &= ~b; //drive bus low
P2OUT |= b; //release bus
With the help of those two functions we can write bytes to the bus like this:
for(int i = 0;i<8;i++) {
if(b&0x01) {
If I understand this right (I mostly overslept class about bytes, bits, bitwise operators and other low level stuff about computers), you write byte to the bus by shifting bits to right and comparing them to 0x01 to decide if we want to write logical high or logical low.
Let's for example take hexadecimal number 0xCC which indicates temperature sensor to skip ROM check:
0xCC is 204 in decimal and 1100 1100 in binary format.
Firsly, we check if this is true: 0xCC & 0x01. Ampersand (&) represents bitwine AND operator which checks every single bit of both numbers and results in 1 if bits in same place in both numbers are 1. Otherwise it results in 0.
For example:
0010 1011 &
0100 0010 equals:
0000 0010
because only second bit from the right side is true in both numbers.
0xCC & 0x01 equals:
1100 1100 & 0000 0001 which returns 0000 0000 because there the last bit in first number is not positive. Because 0000 0000 equals logical false, the condition of if statement is false and we use function to write 0 on the one-wire bus.
Secondly, we right shift bits for one place and get 0110 0110.
This repeats eight times, to write all bits of the byte to the bus. This type of bit shifting means that device receives byte from least significant bit (LSB) or right-most bit to the most significant bit.
Now we have taken care of resetting and writing bytes to the device. Only thing left to do is to read received byte to actually read the temperature from the sensor.
Reading byte from device
Again, we need to read byte from device bit by bit and here is the code for reading a single bit:
P2DIR |= bi;//output
P2OUT &= ~bi; //drive bus low
P2OUT |= bi; //release bus
P2DIR &= ~bi;//input
boolean x = (P2IN & bi);
We make pin an output, drive bus low for 6 us and release it for 9 us. Then we change direction of the pin to input and read bit's state. After that we need to wait 55 us before reading another one.
I like to complicate things so here is my code for reading a whole byte (I'm quite certain that there is a better way to doing this, but this is what I came up with):
byte j=0x01;
byte r=0x00;
for(int i = 0;i<8;i++) {
if(read_bit(bi)) {
r=r| j;
r=r& ~j;
So, what we do here is to define two variables, first equals 0x01 or 0000 0001 and the second is 0. After that we check is we read logical true or false as current bit and modify variable r accordingly with the help of variable j, which is shifted left after every turn.
Again, we are dealing with byte represented from the least significant bit forward.
r = r | j represents bitwise OR which compares each bit of both bytes and results in 1 if bit of either one of bytes is 1 or true.
If, for example, we are trying to read 0xAC (1010 1100) we start with the rightmost bit/LSB and go to the left:
1.) First bit is 0, so we execute r & ~j which means:
0000 0000 & ~0000 0001 and ~ (tilde) inverses all bits, so we get:
0000 0000 & 1111 1110 which leaves alone every bit except the rightmost bit, which is set to 0.
2.)After that we shift j to left by 1, which gives us: 0000 0010.
Second bit is 0, so we again clear that bit from the final byte by using 0000 0000 & 1111 1101 to get: 0000 0000.
3.) Third bit is 1 and by using 0000 0000 | 0000 0100 we get: 0000 0100.
4.) Fourth bit is 1: 0000 0100 | 0000 1000 equals 0000 1100
5.) Fifth bit is 0: 0000 1100 & 1110 1111 leaves byte unchanged
6.) Sixth bit is 1: 0000 1100 | 0010 0000 equals 0010 1100
7.) Seventh bit is 0, byte stays the same
8.) Eight and the last bit is 1 which means that: 0010 1100 | 1000 000 equals 1010 1100 and we get our final number 0xAC.
That is all you need to know to communicate to a single one-wire temperature sensor from DS1820 family. It actually seems a lot easier than it seemed when I read this from different datasheets.
Here is the link to code containing all functions needed to get temperature data from this sensor: ds18s02
You need to call function get_temp to get the temperature and it's only argument is bit from second port of the micro controller. Code was written and tested using Energia IDE (which has the same crappy IDE as Arduino, but libraries are excellent) so it should work fine with msp430 gcc compiler.
Old Epson "Printer"
Today I was searching for something at home and stumbled upon old printing calculator, that hasn't been in use for a few years.
Firstly, I plugged it in the wall socket and tried pressing different keys to see what it can do. Since I don't really know how to use it, only thing I got were some random numbers printed on paper.
Secondly, I started thinking what I can do with it … well, I can at least open it to see what's inside.
Picture below shows how it looks inside. On the upper right there is a mains transformer which has two outputs, first one is probably for micro controller and logic circuit and outputs about 6V, and the second one has output of approximately 22V and might be used to drive printer and display.
On the upper left there is a numeric printed which is surprisingly made by Epson.
On the middle/bottom part there is a logic board with the screen and a second board which holds keys.
Logic board has Mitsubishi 8-bit micro controller MS50754-125SP which has (according to datasheet) 6144 bytes on ROM and 160 bytes of RAM and apart from supply circuit it also features three Mitsubishi Darlington transistor arrays M54531P which are used to control numeric printer.
I don't really have any use of screen and keyboard, but printer looks quite interesting. I don't really know how much time will I have in the near future, but I would really like to control this printer from micro controller/computer.
Click here for more pictures of the printer
Heating controller – Triac board
I successfully designed, etched and build triac board for my central & water heating controller.
Board is divided into two parts:
- Triac & optocoupler part
- Power supply part
Board features four BTA12 triacs that are driven by MOC3063 optocouplers and have snubber circuit. Optocouplers input will be controlled via MSP430 microcontroller.
Power supply part supplies 3.3V and 5V voltages to micro controller and WR703N Linux router. I decided to use low dropout regulators so that I can drive it from 6V transformer.
Central & water heating controller
About a year ago I decided to replace analog heating controller at home with something a bit more advanced. I have designed circuit and PCB at that time, but haven't made until recently. It consisted of ATmega328 microcontroller, 4 relays and ENC28J60 breakout board for network connection. When I was writing source code, I thought about noisy relays and my distrust to using ENC28J60 (I previous had problems with AVR hanging after too much requests).
I quickly scrapped the plan and started thinking about more reliable approach, something like separating controller logic from network access. That day (or maybe day before) I got 3 MSP430 Launchpad boards I ordered online a few weeks ago. I heard about those boards quite frequently before, but did't want to jump on that bandwagon = frankly, I didn't have a good reason for buying it. But when I saw ad or something about it, I said what the heck and bought it. So I instantly saw an opportunity to use it for heating controller in combination with WR703N wireless router.
So my plan is like this:
– WR703N provides web interface, logs statistics in combination with USB flash drive, and fetches temperature from Ethernet temperature module
– MSP430 controls optocoupler-triac board according to temperature sensors, and reports data about current state of sensors/triacs back to router (it should also be possible to put it in a manual mode and circumvent control logic)
– optocoupler-triac board featuring 4 BTA12 triacs controlled by MOC3063 optocoupler
Cost of this setup:
– controller box and PCB: 10€
– DS18s20 temperature sensors: 0€ (samples from Maxim IC)
– triacs, optocouplers and similar stuff: < 10€
So for about 40€ I will have a really powerful controller with data logging capabilities.
I need to control 4 devices:
– electric boiler for heating water in summer
– oil burner for heating water boiler and central heating
– pump for heating water boiler
– pump for circulation of water through radiators
Electric boiler and oil burner have additional temperature sensors to prevent overheating of water, so even if my system screws up, it won't cause any unwanted behavior except a bit warmer water and rooms in the house.
STM32F4 Discovery board
I bought STM32F4 Discovery board from Farnell two months ago, but I got to it only two days ago. After testing some examples and trying to interface with ENC28J60 Ethernet Controller, I quiclky found out, that free versions of development tools cannot build executables bigger than 32KB. So I decided to install toolchain on Ubuntu 12.04.
I found installation procedure for 11.04 at http://cu.rious.org/make/stm32f4-discovery-board-with-linux/, but some things have changed since than, so here is installation guide for latest Ubuntu version:
$ sudo apt-get install flex bison libgmp-dev libmpfr-dev libncurses5-dev libmpc-dev autoconf texinfo build-essential libftdi-dev zlibc libmpc-dev
$ git clone https://github.com/esden/summon-arm-toolchain.git
$ cd summon-arm-toolchain
$ sudo ./summon-arm-toolchain
$ cd ..
$ sudo apt-get install libsgutils2-dev libusb-1.0-0-dev
$ git clone https://github.com/texane/stlink.git
$ cd stlink
$ ./autogen.sh
$ ./configure
$ make
More info about using ChibiOS on it:
My first project? Internet radio player. More about it soon.


text:
The WRLA is proud to faciliate events for our members across Western Canada. Events vary from the WRLA Buying Show to local networking functions to education courses for career development.
Our networking events are designed to provide a venue for business development. Individuals in the lumber and home improvement industry from across Canada meet at these social events to take advantage of building business relationships, discussing new products, renewing old friendships, and fostering new relationships.
Education courses are provided to develop skills within the LBM industry. Many courses are taught by Stan Burkholder, highly recognized industry instructor and 2018's WRLA Industry Achievement Award Recipient.


text:
Waveform: rectilinear biphasic. Defibrillator charge hold time: 30 seconds. Energyselection: automatic pre-programmed selection (120, 150, 200 joules). Patient safety: all patient connectors are electrically isolated. Charge time: less than 10 seconds with new batteries. Built in defibrillator self test included. CPR: metronome rate: variable 60 to100 CPM. Defibrillator advisory: evaluates electrodes connections and patient's ECG todetermine if defibrillation is required. Shockable rhythms: ventricular fibrillation with average amplitude>100 microvlts and wide complex ventricular tachycardia with rates greater than 150 bpm. Patient impendence measurement range: 0 to 300 ohms. Defibrillator has protected ECG circuitry. Display format: optional LCD with movingbar. Size 2.6" x 1.3". Viewing time: 2.6 seconds. Battery capacity: typical new = 5 years or 300 shocks or 1.5 hours continuous monitoring/defibrillation. End of life designated by a Red X (typical remaining shocks = 100 or 0.5 hours continuous monitoring/defibrillation)
Size: (h x w x d) 5.25" x 9.50" x 11.50"; 13.3 cm x 24.1 cm x 29.2 cm. Weight: 6.7 lbs;3.1 kg. Power: replaceable batteries. 10 type 123A photo flash lithium manganese dioxide batteries
CPR-D Padz
shelf life: 4 years. Conductive gel: polymer hydrogel. Conductive element: tin. Packaging: multiplayer foil laminate pouch. Impedance class: low. Cable length: 36" (91 cm). Sternum 6.1" (15.5 cm) length x 5.6" (14.1 cm) width. Length of conductive gel: 3.5" (8.9 cm); width conductive gel: 3.5" (8.9 cm); Area, conductive gel: 12.3 in² (79cm²) Complete assembly: folded length: 7.6 in (19.4 cm); Folded width: 7.0 in (17.8 cm);Folded height: 1.5 in (3.8 cm)


text:
Cyber criminals getting smarter and harder to catchBy Derek Sooman
Cyber criminals are growing increasingly sophisticated, and the cost of catching them is rising, according to IT security experts.
E-criminals are getting younger and smarter and often have computer science degrees, according to Tony Neate of the Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca), speaking at InfoSecurity Europe in London on Tuesday.
Tony Neate claims that companies are now facing cyber crime threats on a daily basis, and that organised crime is becoming more sophisticated and targeting new industry sectors. Viruses, spyware and phishing threats are becoming of increasing hazard to the 11,000 people who sign up to use ecommerce sites and internet banks each day.


text:
This page compiles tools that community members have built to access, analyze, and visualize datasets. If you have a resource you'd like to share, please send a note to the OOI Helpdesk. Please note that these sites are not maintained by the OOI program, as they are supported by outside resources.
Data Status and Data Visualization Tools
- Data Team QC Database – Built by the Data Team to enable organized quality control testing, this site is hosted on a non-OOI server, but provides status and data availability information on an instrument and data stream level, as well as a full list of platforms, nodes, streams,
and parameters across all arrays. This site is a non-production prototype tool that is constantly under construction, and data are not guaranteed to be synced continually.
- Data Team GitHub Repository – Data Team download and plotting tools, continually updated and annotated, including:
- A Python toolbox that allows any user to set up a real-time, continually updating display of OOI data.
- Python scripts to plot OOI netCDF datasets
- A toolbox used by the OOI Data Review Team at Rutgers University to check data accuracy.
- A repository containing a dictionary of OOI data streams and corresponding science parameters.
- Data Team M2M Tutorials – A set of step by step instructions and sample code that can be modified to request data from the OOI Machine-to-Machine interface via a RESTful API.
- OOI Endurance Array Data Access and Plotting – Examples of data download, processing, and organization provided by OOI Endurance Array operators to share with the user community the tools and processes developed to work with OOI data. This list will continue to grow at user request, and as we continue to refine processes and understanding of the data (added 2/13/18).
You may also find the following lists on this site helpful in translating OOI instrument and platform codes.
Derived Datasets and Collaborations
- Seismometer and Hydrophone Data on IRIS – Data from the OOI broadband and short-period seismometers and low frequency hydrophones at Axial Seamount, Slope Base, and Southern Hydrate Ridge and bottom pressure sensors in Axial caldera installed between July-October 2014 are available through the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS). Data may be pulled hourly and are available in a variety of formats. While searching within IRIS for OOI data, use the two-letter IRIS network designator "OO." Original announcement and more information can be found here.
- OOI Glider Data in the IOOS Glider DAC – OOI glider data are now a part of the Glider Data Assembly Center (DAC) resource collated by the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS). As new gliders are deployed, the near real-time data are added to the DAC, while older glider data are available for download, and glider tracks can be visualized using the map viewer.
- Cabled Array tilt meter, co-located temperature plots, and inflation forecast – Courtesy of Dr. Bill Chadwick (Oregon State University/CIMRS). This site has been updated to add an inflation forecast created by Dr. Chadwick and Andy Lau (Oregon State University/CIMRS). These plots use OOI pressure data to extrapolate the average rate of inflation over the last 12 weeks and calculate the date when level of inflation at Axial Seamount will reach or exceed the pre-2015-eruption level. Note that the average rate of inflation changes with time, and reaching the threshold does not guarantee an eruption, but the volcano is likely to erupt within a year after reaching that threshold. The plots are automatically updated once a day using the latest inflation rate. (edited 05/16/18)
- OOI High Definition video camera system (CAMHD) Python module – Courtesy of Dr. Timothy Crone (LDEO). The module can provide information about remote CamHD files, or retrieve individual still frames from these files, without having to download the entire file first. The module is still under development, which should be considered if using it to develop additional code (which is actively encouraged).
- Broadband Hydrophone (HYDBB) Python module – Converts audio MSEED files from the OOI hydrophones into FLAC or WAV format, filters the data, and creates spectrograms – Courtesy of Pete Cable (Raytheon).
- Axial Seamount Hydrothermal Vent Time-Lapse Videos – A new computer vision routine, developed by Aaron Marburg at UW-APL and aided by Tim Crone at LDEO and Friedrich Knuth at Rutgers, is now able to correctly identify and tag scenes of scientific interest in the CAMHD video stream. These scenes were previously being manually identified by students at Rutgers University. A new set of time-lapse videos has been created with this enhanced metadata record, displaying one frame captured every three hours from November 2015 to July 2016. (edited 09/07/17)
- Axial Seamount and Coastal/Slope Biology Catalogs: View images and video of the many different organisms observed over the years of Cabled Array expedition cruises. The first catalog relates to Axial Seamount, a deep-sea volcano on the Juan de Fuca spreading ridge, and the Coastal catalog contains animals seen at Hydrate Ridge, Slope Base, and Coastal Endurance cabled sites. These archives, compiled by students at the University of Washington under the guidance of Deborah Kelley (UW) and Leslie Sautter (College of Charleston), are designed to be living documents, and will be continually updated to include information from future cruises and additional details provided by experts. (edited 08/29/18)
- Axial Seamount Earthquake Catalog – Courtesy of Dr. William Wilcock (UW). This web site provides access to a near-real time catalog of earthquake detections and HYPOINVERSE locations for the Ocean Observatories Initiative cabled observatory at Axial Seamount. Support for this work comes from the National Science Foundation. (added 10/20/17)
Don't see your event or resource listed? Let us know! Contact the Help Desk and we will add your relevant Community Resources to the website. Thanks!


text:
USAID BEST to help Ammon Applied University College achieve excellence and boost women interest in hospitality education
The USAID Building Economic Sustainability through Tourism Project (BEST) officially awarded a grant to Ammon Applied University College (AAUC) on October 30, 2016, to support the university's efforts to achieve excellence in higher education and to garner greater interest in hospitality and tourism studies among young women in Jordan. AAUC Dean Dr. Muhsen Makhamreh recently stated, "AAUC (formerly JAU) is proud of its continuous partnership with USAID. USAID has offered valuable assistance to AAUC over the years and this assistance contributed to the development of the college in the various aspects of its operations. I hope that this partnership will continue in the future to the benefit of all." With BEST assistance, AAUC will update the 'Tour Guides Techniques' program curriculum, incorporating international best practice along with input from Jordan's tourism sector to improve local guiding skills and better align them with sector requirements. The university will also run a tourism awareness campaign to reach out to approximately 5,000 students from 40 girls' schools and colleges around Jordan with messages about the benefits of studying hospitality and tourism, the programs available and the job opportunities that will be open to them. Furthermore, AAUC seeks to obtain the UNWTO TedQual Certificate for a renewal period as an international stamp of excellence for their hospitality and tourism projects. The university will also implement a 'Back to Industry' program for AAUC instructors, whereby participants undergo industry internships to get up to speed on the latest skills and knowledge of the industry. The USAID Building Economic Sustainability through Tourism project continues to work diligently with both the public and private sector to enhance institutions that are dedicated to improving the efficiency, effectiveness, and growth of Jordan's tourism and hospitality industry. Ammon Applied University College offers specializations such as Bachelor degrees in Hotel Management, Tourism Management, and Events Business Management, a diploma in Hotel Management, and Training Diplomas in Culinary Arts and Hotel Management. Offering a wide variety of programs allows for students entering the field to cater their AAUC experience to their needs.


text:
Nikko-Kanaya Hotel, Japan Pillow P1029
This Japanese hotel label is unusual, vintage, hand drawn....with a palette that is really current. Charcoal, orange and yellow predominate, in the Japanese style.
In our medium 14x20" size, filled with our luxe down and feather blend, this pillow will look great on most chairs, and nested with other pillows on a larger sofa or bed. Beautiful and comfortable!
- Printed on 100% European linen
- Filled with a lush 10/90 down/feather blend
- Approximately 14" high x 20" wide
- Backed with natural linen
- Every pillow back is embroidered with our 'oh' monogram
- Impeccably crafted in the USA
- Spot or dry clean only
- All good things take time; please allow 2-4 weeks for your order to ship
Click add to cart to order now.


text:
Nothing is as it seemed in calm, quaint Legley Bay.
Famous novelist, Constance (last name) lived a seemingly straightforward – if private – and somewhat predictable life. Friends, beloved daughter Sutton, a beautiful home, and all the success an author could wish for. A perfect life….but was it? When a hit and run accident suddenly takes her mother's life, Sutton finds hidden secrets with her heartbreak. Emotional walls she assumed Constance had built to protect her privacy may have been to protect something – or someone – else entirely.
Family and friends return home for support, including her own lost-love, Declan. He's the first thing she craves to help her cope with her loss and the questions she's left with, but he's also the last person she wants to see. Will he be able to put down roots at last?
Can the loss of true love be the making of a life or is it destined to be the undoing of everything? When money, power and love combine across time, anything is possible.
About Tess:
Tess Thompson is a novelist and playwright with a BFA in Drama from the University of Southern California. In 2011 she released her first novel, Riversong, which subsequently became a best seller.
Like her main character in the River Valley collection, Tess is from a small town in Oregon. She currently lives in a suburb of Seattle, Washington with her two young daughters, Emerson and Ella, and their puppy Patches. She is inspired daily by the view of the Cascade Mountains from her home office window.
Tess is working on her next novel and regularly blogs about her journey as a mother, author and friend at www.tesswrites.com.
Check her out on Twitter and Facebook
And especially for you, here's the Prologue as a sneak peak!
and the book on Amazon, Barnes & Nobles and Itunes!
When the doorbell rang, Sutton Mansfield at first thought it was part of the music on the radio. She hummed to her favorite country station, set loud as she moved about her bungalow, sipping hot, black tea and unpacking from her overseas trip. She was looking forward to lunch with her mother, who had used her contacts in the publishing industry to arrange the dream trip for Sutton's thirtieth birthday. Sutton had studied for two months with a master baker in Paris.
She pushed open her front window; the familiar scent of the seaside entered the room. It was an ordinary morning in Legley Bay: the sound of seagulls in the distance; the familiar view of her street, lined with modest houses built mostly in the 1940s; and, just beyond, the Pacific Ocean a paler blue than the August sky. Legley Bay was a one-stoplight kind of town, the unwanted stepchild of the northern Oregon coast. There were no tourist temptations here, no stretch of beach with famed rocks like Cannon Beach or Manzanita or Arch Cape. No one opened shops or restaurants to tempt wealthy city dwellers. It was nothing more than the ordinary here, buildings sagging and faded from damp, salty air, and small businesses struggling to survive against Wal-Mart and Costco thirty or so miles in every direction but west.
Opening the window a little farther, she took in a deep breath through her nose and felt grateful for the familiar. Home is home. It was good to return. She turned away from the view and back to her cozy bungalow, decorated with eclectic pieces she'd gathered over the years, antiques and shabby chic, all very French countryside, like the artisan and rustic baked goods she made: crusty breads, buttery pastries, soft cookies.
She'd conquered the croissant while in Paris. She smiled, thinking of it, but instantly sobered. There was nowhere to debut her new skills but her own kitchen. She had no job. Six months ago she'd left her assistant baker position at a well-known bakery in Portland, where she'd apprenticed for the better part of five years, to move home to Legley Bay. It was her dream to open her own shop, but so far the courage to do so had been as elusive as the perfect croissant.
The sound of the doorbell came again. Yes, it was the door, not a note in the music. Who could it be? No one but her mother knew she was back in town. She turned down the radio; her mobile phone was buzzing—Roger. She tossed the phone on the couch; it bounced on a cushion and fell onto the soft rug. Voicemail. Just go to voicemail, she thought. I need time to think. Not yet. She needed to speak with her mother first. Her mother would help her sort it through. Mom, I'm having doubts about the wedding. That's all she would need to say. Then they would hash it out over a glass of wine or a walk on the beach. Is it just that I'm afraid or do I not love him enough? Her mother would know the answer.
The doorbell rang again just as she reached for the doorknob. Opening it, she saw Tim Ball, the town's Chief of Police. He was the same age as her mother, in his mid-to-late fifties, and his lined face was still handsome, hinting at the town's football star he once was. But today his skin was gray and his features pinched. She backed away from the door, as if he were going to hurt her. What was the matter?
"Sutton, can I come in?"
She nodded, backing into the room. Don't say it.
He guided her toward the couch. "Please sit, sweetheart."
She did so, clasping her hands together on her lap. "Is it my mom?"
"I'm so sorry." He stopped; his eyes reddened. "She was killed this morning."
Doesn't that sounds exciting? I think it sounds pretty good!