text:
front row
eventually people will stop seeing men and women and terms of these destructive dichotomies.
fashion elite
I used to wear high all all the time and everywhere, but now i only wear them in special occasions. They do make your life more difficult, the same way women in the old days had all sort of complicated outfits that really prevented them to do anything than look static and pretty, we have our Killer heels. Yes I felt prettier and more self confident, but is it worth it? A big fat no. My lifestyle and the city i live now is totally anti-heels, you need to be a able to move and fast if you actually want to do something worthwhile. The last thing I want is a pair of heels preventing me from doing the things that my male counterparts do without having to think if some walking is involved.
It actually makes me laugh when bloggers come to cities like London expecting to walk around all pretty and poised in their high heels and then find out that they are unable to walk to the end of the street with them, have to stop everywhere to sit down and are unable to go to anywhere at the end of the day because their feet are destroyed.
I think heels have a place, and no one should forbid a women to wear them to work if she feels like it, but for me they have no place in day to day activities anymore.
front row
In order for two components to be equal in every aspect, they must be the same, which men and women are not and never will be regardless of how much certain so-called "feminists" try to argue that women are simply men with different reproductive organs. Please. There is nothing "regressive" about holding men to different standards than women and vice-versa if men and women ARE different.
front row
lots of bad things have existed throughout history but we've been doing a decent job of working through them in modern society. humans don't just come into the world as decent functioning members of society - we're naturally inclined to all sorts of destructive tendencies. racism, sexism, heterosexism, mysticism, war.
maybe 100 years ago we all should have just thrown up our hands and said "**** it, women have always been dominated by men in every culture (which isn't actually true but for the sake of argument I'll go with it), so let's just relinquish power in every sector of society". there is great diversity amongst women, I'd venture to say between me and you, and I don't care to be grouped in with you as if we fall under the same umbrella as human beings with the exact same nature, the same wants and needs etc.
we need to keep fighting for a humanistic view of every individual instead of acting like what is "natural" is always good.
where do you draw the line for when we should give up? how far is the expectation that we wear heels in the office from the expectation that we just stay out of the office altogether? I'm for expanding choice for both men and women in how they live their lives, and I know it's worth pursuing because we've not stopped progressing yet.
In Bloom
I don't think sexuality (feminine or masculine) has a place in the professional world at all, so I'm with the article. Kind of. If it wasn't so lame and poorly written.
ten days of perfect tunes
the colors red and blue
we had a promise made
we were in love
In Bloom
BTW I don't think there's anything wrong with being a feminist.
ten days of perfect tunes
the colors red and blue
we had a promise made
we were in love
backstage pass
Lite Brite what you are articulating is a very Western, first generation feminist movement statement. Many other types of feminists have different views of the matter including the views that PinkGoddess stated.
Race is not equal to gender. Its not racist to say that women are different then men, its biological. Its also not necessarily evil or bad or downputting as many seem to think. Women bear children, men don't. In this and other ways I think its more anti-women to not acknowledge those biological truisms by pretending we are the same.
fashion insider
^^^ ITA it's actually pretty regressive to deny/reject specific feminine characteristics. these characteristics do not in any way mean we are not better than men.
backstage pass
I'll stick to my high heels.
I can literally run in high heels, so I don't have any problems walking in them.
My feet don't hurt either.
I can wear heels for hours on end.
I wear them because they make me look good, feel good and are my favorite kind of shoe.
front row
I'm aware that there exists more than one type of feminism although I really do not consider what PinkGoddess said to be one of those types. you're likely referring to cultural feminism? difference feminism maybe?
if you really would like to bust out scientific journals and start accounting for the biological differences between men and women, which obviously exist to a degree that we may or may not agree upon, I'd love to. but I don't think this is the thread.
what we're really talking about here is people (women or men or etc) being forced to behave one way or another. I sport 4 inch heels, it's no problem. I like it and embrace many popular notions of femininity while rejecting others, just as anyone should be free to do.
my main point is that PinkGoddess' summary of femininity/masculinity is incredibly reductive and, frankly, sounds ignorant to my ears. a larger number of people than she accounted for reject the almighty 21st century concepts of who should do what based on sex/gender. not everybody wants to live in this hypersexual hetero normative world where women are reduced to their image and men to their strength. those who do like that are free to do so in their little slice of life, but to take issue when people complain about being forced into little boxes is ridiculous.
I also liked The_Ida's point that the workplace should not be such a sexual environment. human beings certainly take their sexualities with them wherever they go, but that doesn't mean we have to make them the center of every activity.
front row
omg LOL!! i feel sexy when im wearing high heels and high heels makes your legs look very very long haha they look great on our legs. hahaha those shoes are made for confidence booster. hahaha
✬ sergeantkero.com ✬ kim won ✬ tae hwan ✬ soo joo ✬ noma han ✬ sung jin ✬
front row
Women are not inferior to men overall, just different. I never even brought up inferiority (and I don't see how valuing women for their beauty can even be taken that way).
front row
There is nothing at all wrong with being a feminist, that is why I referred to particular feminists as "so-called".
front row
|achieve, ambitions, heels, high, won't
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text:
Trae Blumhorst wears his basketball genes well.
The Mendota senior was named as the MVP of the Colmone Classic.
He scored 20 points to lead the Trojans to a 67-59 win over three-time defending champion Fieldcrest in Saturday's championship game.
Blumhorst comes by his talents naturally. His father, Brian, a MHS assistant, is the all-time leading scorer at the old Malden High School, scoring 1,498 points from 1977-81.
Dad is quick to note he had four years to collect his scoring; Trae's has had just two years with the varsity.
• All-tournament: Blumhorst was named on the All-Tournament team with teammate James Carroll, Hall senior Brett Fanning and junior Miguel Villareal, Bureau Valley sophomore Parker Neuhalfen, St. Bede seniors Brad Groleau and Joe Pszycka, Plano junior Elijah Wallace, Fieldcrest senior Brady Sanders and freshman Drew Barth.
• Knight in shining armor: Fieldcrest's Sanders cracked the 1,000-point plateau in the Knights' 70-41 win over Hall. He had 21 points in that game and 22 vs. Mendota, Saturday.
• Real home cooking: When Hall coach Mike Fillippini talks about having homecourt advantage in the Colmone Classic, he's not kidding. His mother, Joanne, added some home cooking by providing the mostaccioli to the hospitality room menu to go along with Rip's chicken, Saturday night.
• First for Trojans: Mendota won its first Colmome Classic championship, becoming the 13th different school in the 39-year history of the event. Buda Western won the first three (1974-76) and Fieldcrest has won 11 of the last 20.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Or simply an older man who likes to fondle you?
Do you have a link for you uncles web page ?
Just over 2 hours.
I want my old Internet back.
content will be loaded before you click!
Sounds like those "dialup accelerators" from back in the '90s
Which of course led to quite amusing results when some failure of a web developer made an app that performed actions from GET requests. I've heard anecdotes of entire databases being deleted by a web accelerator in these cases.
From RFC2616:
Implementors should be aware that the software represents the user in their interactions over the Internet, and should be careful to allow the user to be aware of any actions they might take which may have an unexpected significance to themselves or others.
In particular, the convention has been established that the GET and HEAD methods SHOULD NOT have the significance of taking an action other than retrieval. These methods ought to be considered "safe". This allows user agents to represent other methods, such as POST, PUT and DELETE, in a special way, so that the user is made aware of the fact that a possibly unsafe action is being requested.
Naturally, it is not possible to ensure that the server does not generate side-effects as a result of performing a GET request; in fact, some dynamic resources consider that a feature. The important distinction here is that the user did not request the side-effects, so therefore cannot be held accountable for them.
Yes. thedailywtf.com has such stories. I specifically remember one, where the delete button of database entries was a GET link from the list page. So Google's little spider went there, and crawled the entire list. Requested every single delete link address on the page. I think it was not even linked from anywhere. The crawler got there by reading out the referrer addresses from when the developers came to Google from a link on that site.
And if I remember correctly, it of course was a non backuped production database. The only one in fact. Must have been fun.
>>>Sounds like those "dialup accelerators" from back in the '90s
Hey I still use one of those you insensitive clod! It's called Netscape Web Accelerator, and it does more than just prefetch requests - it also compresses all text and images to about 10% original size. How else would I watch 90210 streaming videos over my phoneline?
Why I can almost see what looks like a bikini. Man Kelly is hot...
But seriously...
the accelerator (compression) is really useful, and I couldn't imagine using dialup without it. It makes those slow 28k or 50k hotel connections look as fast as my home DSL hookup. (Except for the blurry images of course.)
Its not the same, really...
SPDY could do prefetching (in which case it'd be server push, instead of a new pull), but mainly what it does is it lets a lot of requests use the same connection, and does compression on the HTTP headers.
Thats essentially almost all of the current performance advantage (for today).
In the future, the content will be loaded before you click!
Wouldn't you have to have some thiotimoline [wikipedia.org] and water in your mouse for that to work? Thiotimoline ain't cheap, you know.
remove flash, java applets ad's
20X faster!
You could also remove images, CSS, Javascript, and text, imagine the time savings!
Remove the content too. It's all meaningless stuff like this post.
Ye are joking, but ye are correct. Take this slashdot page. I used to be able to participate in discussion forum with nothing more than a 1200 baud (1kbit/s) modem. If I tried that today, even with all images turned off, it would take 45 minutes to load this page, mainly due to the enormous CSS files
It would be nice if websites made at least *some* attempt to make their files smaller, and therefore load faster.
So save the CSS to your HD and put a filter in an extension/proxy/etc to replace the CSS URL with your local file. Wait, isn't that what the cache is for? Hmm...
I heard of a program called DeCSS. Maybe that's what it does!
Cache headers are set to one week so unless you're clearing your cache every page load it's amounts to nothing.
If anything the scripts are bigger, but again, cached. Besides AJAX comments were a huge improvement for those of us on dialup- no more loading the whole page every time you did anything.
CSS and JS, when used correctly make things faster for users, even (and sometimes especially) for those of us on slow connections.
The new slashdot is way easier to participate on from dialup.
Shhh...If people start thinking
I think Flash should be made illegal. Yesterday I visited a website 100% made in Flash. I had to wait for it to load and then none of the links worked. Many Flash sites' links don't work in Firefox, I have no idea why. I suspect incompetent developers.
I sent a furious email to the company saying I was going to choose one of their competitors just because of the lousy website. I got a reply from their CEO basically saying "go ahead, we don't give a fuck".
Flash is like cake icing. A little bit tastes and
If only the Google engineers can do something about Slashdot's atrociously slow Javascript.
I've noticed a discernible difference in
They need start with practicing what they preach...
http://code.google.com/speed/articles/caching.html [google.com]
http://code.google.com/speed/articles/prefetching.html [google.com]
http://code.google.com/speed/articles/optimizing-html.html [google.com]
They turn on caching for everything but then spit out junk like
http://v9.lscache4.c.youtube.com/generate_204?ip=0.0.0.0&sparams=id%2Cexpire%2Cip%2Cipbits%2Citag%2Calgorithm%2Cburst%2Cfactor&fexp=903900%2C903206&algorithm=throttle-factor&itag=34&ipbits=0&burst=40&sver=3&expire=1258081200&key=yt1&signature=8214C5787766320D138B1764BF009CF62A596FF9.D86886CFF40DB7F847246D653E9D3AA5B1D18610&factor=1.25&id=ccbfe79256f2b5b6 [youtube.com]
Most cache programs just straight up ignore this. Because of the '?' in there. It ends up being a query to static data.
Then never mind the load balancing bits they put in there with 'v9.lscache4.c.'. So even IF you get your cache to keep the data you may end up with a totally different server and the same piece of data just served from another server. There have been a few hacks to 'rewrite' the headers and the names to make it stick. But those are just hacks and while they work they seem fragile.
The real issue is at the HTTP layer and how servers are pointed at from inside the 'code'. So instead of some sort of indirection that would make it simple for the client to say 'these 20 servers have the same bit of data' they must assume that the data is different from every server.
Compression and javascript speedups are all well and good but there is a different more fundamental problem of extra reload of data that has already been retrieved. As local network usage is almost always faster than going back out to the internet. In a single user environment this is not too big of a deal. But in a 10+ user environment it is a MUCH bigger deal.
Even the page that talks about optimization has issues
http://code.google.com/speed/articles/ [google.com]
12 cr/lf right at the top of the page that are not rendered anywhere. They should look at themselves first.
How is this different from Web servers that serve up gzipped pages?
Well, for one, gzipping output doesn't have any effect on latency.
Like maybe they can remove the sleep() statements.
The technical term for that is a Speedup Loop [thedailywtf.com]. All good software developers use them... for certain values of 'good'.
From the link
We downloaded 25 of the "top 100" websites over simulated home network connections, with 1% packet loss. We ran the downloads 10 times for each site, and calculated the average page load time for each site, and across all sites. The results show a speedup over HTTP of 27% - 60% in page load time over plain TCP (without SSL), and 39% - 55% over SSL.
1. Look at top 100 websites.
2. Choose the 25 which give you good numbers and ignore the rest.
And all other "add this piece of Javascript to your Web page and make it more awesomer!"
Yes, yes, they're useful. And you can't fathom a future without them. But in the meantime I'm watching my status bar say, "completed 4 of 5 items", then change to "completed 11 of 27 items", to "completed 18 of 57 items", to "completed... oh screw this, you're downloading the whole Internet, just sit back, relax and watch the blinkenlights".
Remember when a 768kbps DSL line was whizzo fast? Because all it had to download was some simple HTML, maybe some gifs?
I want my old Internet back. And a pony.
And all other "add this piece of Javascript to your Web page and make it more awesomer!"
Yes, yes, they're useful. And you can't fathom a future without them. But in the meantime I'm watching my status bar say, "completed 4 of 5 items", then change to "completed 11 of 27 items", to "completed 18 of 57 items", to "completed... oh screw this, you're downloading the whole Internet, just sit back, relax and watch the blinkenlights".
Remember when a 768kbps DSL line was whizzo fast? Because all it had to download was some simple HTML, maybe some gifs?
I want my old Internet back. And a pony.
That's why smart web developers put those scripts at the end of the body.
That's why smart web developers put those scripts at the end of the body.
It's also why smart users filter them outright with something like AdBlock - anything that I see in the browser history that looks like a tracking/stats domain or URL gets blocked on sight. Come to think of it, I could probably clean it up publish it as an AdBlock filter list if anyone's interested; there's only a few dozen entries on there at the moment, but I'm sure that would grow pretty quickly if it was used by a more general a
That's why smart web developers put those scripts at the end of the body.
It's also why smart users filter them outright with something like AdBlock - anything that I see in the browser history that looks like a tracking/stats domain or URL gets blocked on sight. Come to think of it, I could probably clean it up publish it as an AdBlock filter list if anyone's interested; there's only a few dozen entries on there at the moment, but I'm sure that would grow pretty quickly if it was used by a more general and less paranoid userbase.
What's paranoid about insisting that a company bring a proposal, make me an offer, and sign a contract if they want to derive monetary value from my personal data? Instead, they feel my data is free for the taking and this entitlement mentality is the main reason why I make an effort to block all forms of tracking. I never gave consent to anyone to track anything I do, so why should I honor an agreement in which I did not participate? The "goodness" or "evil-ness" of their intentions doesn't even have to be a consideration. Sorry but referring to that as "paranoid" is either an attempt to demagogue it, or evidence that someone else's attempt to demagogue it was successful on you.
Are some people quite paranoia? Sure. Does that mean you should throw out all common sense, pretend like there are only paranoid reasons to disallow tracking, and ignore all reasonable concerns? No. Sure, someone who paints with a broad brush might notice that your actions (blocking trackers) superficially resemble some actions taken by paranoid people. Allowing that to affect your decison-making only empowers those who are superficial and quick to assume because you are kowtowing to them. This is what insecure people do. If the paranoid successfully tarnish the appearance of an otherwise reasonable action because we care too much about what others may think, it can only increase the damage caused by paranoia.
It's not "free for the taking". It's "free in exchange for free content on the web".
(Note, I'm not arguing against ad blockers or the like.. just like I 30 second skip through the vast vast vast majority of commercials on my Tivos, and FFed through them on my VCR before that.)
What's paranoid about insisting that a company bring a proposal, make me an offer, and sign a contract if they want to derive monetary value from my personal data?
Because the costs of doing so would outweigh the benefits, leading to no one agreeing to the use of their data, no ad revenue, and ultimately no professional web sites (except those that charge a fee to view). This situtation is termed a "market failure", in this case because of high transaction costs. Therefore, society standardizes the agreeme
Instead, they feel my data is free for the taking and this entitlement mentality is the main reason why I make an effort to block all forms of tracking.
What about your sense of entitlement to get their content under your conditions?
I want my old Internet back. And a pony.
You forgot to yell at the kids to get off your internet.
I want my old Internet back. And a pony.
If Slashdot does OMG Ponies again will that satisfy your wants and needs?
Remember when a 768kbps DSL line was whizzo fast?
Jeebus. I remember when my 1200 baud modem felt whizzo fast compared to my old 300 baud modem.
And, yes, I can already see the "get off of my lawn" posts below you, and I'm dating myself.
I want my old Internet back. And a pony.
LOL. I'd suggest disabling javascript and calling it a day.
Alternatively, use a text-based browser. If the webpage has any content worth reading, then a simple lynx -dump in 99% of cases will give you what you want, with the added bonus of re-formatting those mile-wide lines into something readable.
On the other hand, I suspect most people don't want the "old internet". What was once communicated on usenet or email in a few simple lines, for example, now increasingl
The problem isn't pushing the bits across the wire. Major sites that load slowly today (like Slashdot) typically do so because they have advertising code that blocks page display until the ad loads. The ad servers are the bottleneck. Look at the lower left of the Mozilla window and watch the "Waiting for
Even if you're blocking ad images, there's still the delay while successive "document.write" operations take place.
Then there are the sites that load massive amounts of canned CSS and Javascript. (Remember how CSS was supposed to make web pages shorter and faster to load? NOT.)
Then there are the sites that load a skeletal page which then makes multiple requests for XML for the actual content.
Loading the base page just isn't the problem.
IAWTP. With NoScript on and off, the web is a totally different place.
With NoScript on and off, the web is a totally different place
Usually this is followed by an assertion that the site's developer is a clueless knob--which may be true, but doesn't help at all. This is the Web we deserve, I suppose: 6 megabit cable connections and dual-core 2.5 gigahertz processors that can't render a forum page for Pokemon addicts in under 8 seconds.
So if Google sped up the non-ad web, they would have more room for their ads?
I think you mean SNKY
How am I going to wipe up this mess now? And
No. Neither can I. It will let them *push* adverts at you in parallel though... *before you asked for them*
Google wanting more efficient advert distribution... No, never...
Remember how CSS was supposed to make web pages shorter and faster to load? NOT.)
What, you think after the first load that CSS file isn't cached in any way? Inline styles slow down every time, CSS just the first. CSS was supposed to make styling elements not completely braindead. You want to change the link colors with inline styles from red to blue? With inline styles - enjoy your grepping. You're bound to forget some of 'm, too.
Bitching about ad loading times and huge JS libraries? Sure, go ahead.
So... when you try to load slashdot, the requests that fetch the content don't get rolling until the request that fetches the ad finishes... and SPDY allows all of the requests to be processed concurrently so the content doesn't have to wait for the ad...
How is that solving the wrong problem again?
CSS can make things shorter and faster if they just remember to link to it as a static file.
You can't cache something that changes, and anything, like CSS and Javascript, that's caught in the on-the-fly generation of dynamic and uncacheable text in spite of actually being static, is just going to clog up the tubes.
In fact, thanks to slashdot's no-edits-allowed policy, each comment itself is a static unchangeable snippet of text. Why not cache those?
Sending only the stuff that changes is usually a good optimization no matter what you're doing.
CSS and javascript themselves aren't bad. Failing to offlink and thus cacheable-ize them however, is.
Doesn't that mean that both the client and the server have to be running this new application to see the benefits of this? Essentially either one or the other is still going to be using HTTP if you don't set it up on both, and its only as fast as the slowest piece.
While a great initiative, it could be a while before it actually takes off. To get the rest of the world running on a new protocol will take some time, and there will no doubt be some kinks to work out.
But if anyone could do it, it'd be Google.
A plugin gets it into something like firefox. Then, as long as there is a way for a webserver like apache to allow both requests (http or spdy), it shouldn't be that hard because you arn't storing your web pages in (static or dynamic) in a different format so it shouldn't be that much work to add the [apache] module once it is written.
Yes, it means that both sides have to speak the protocol.
That is why we want to engage the community to start to look at this work!
Am I the only one imagining a ventriloquist controlling a snarky dummy that counters all the points in the summary with dubious half-truths?
So which ports are you planning to use for it?
It may be noble in goal, but AOL's implementation makes things hell on sysadmins trying to load-balance AOL users' connections. In a given session, even a page load, I can expect connections from n number of (published) AOL proxies, *and* the user's home broadband IP. It's not possible to correlate them at layer 3, so nasty layer-7 checks get used instead, and AOL users wind up getting shoved into non-redundant systems.
I mean reinventing the wheel, well why not, this one is old and let say we have done all we could with HTTP...
But why, WHY should you call that with a stupid name like SPDY?!? It's not even an acronym (of is it?).
It sound bad, it's years (decade?) before it is well supported... but why not. Wake me when it's done ready for production.
I guess they start to get bored at Google if they are trying not rewrite HTTP.
While we're at it, let's also make processing web pages faster.
We have a semantic language (HTML) and a language that describes how to present that (CSS), right? This is good, let's keep it that way.
But things aren't as good as they could be. On the semantic side, we have many elements in the language that don't really convey any semantic information, and a lot of semantics there isn't an element for. On the presentation side, well, suffice it to say that there are a _lot_ of things that cannot be done, and others that can be done, but only with ugly kludges. Meanwhile, processing and rendering HTML and CSS takes a lot of resources.
Here is my proposal:
- For the semantics, let's introduce an extensible language. Imagine it as a sort of programming language, where the standard library has elements for common things like paragraphs, hyperlinks, headings, etc. and there are additional libraries which add more specialized elements, e.g. there could be a library for web fora (or blogs, if you prefer), a library for screenshot galleries, etc.
- For the presentation, let's introduce something that actually supports the features of the presentation medium. For example, for presentation on desktop operating systems, you would have support for things like buttons and checkboxes, fonts, drawing primitives, and events like keypresses and mouse clicks. Again, this should be a modular system, where you can, for example, have a library to implement the look of your website, which you can then re-use in all your pages.
- Introduce a standard for the distribution of the various modules, to facilitate re-use (no having to download a huge library on every page load).
- It could be beneficial to define both a textual, human readable form and a binary form that can be efficiently parsed by computers. Combined with a mapping between the two, you can have the best of both worlds: efficient processing by machine, and readable by humans.
- There needn't actually be separate languages for semantics, presentation and scripting; it can all be done in a single language, thus simplifying things
I'd be working on this if my job didn't take so much time and energy, but, as it is, I'm just throwing these ideas out here.
e have a semantic language (HTML) and a language that describes how to present that (CSS), right? This is good, let's keep it that way.
But things aren't as good as they could be. On the semantic side, we have many elements in the language that don't really convey any semantic information, and a lot of semantics there isn't an element for. On the presentation side, well, suffice it to say that there are a _lot_ of things that cannot be done, and others that can be done, but only with ugly kludges. Meanwhile, processing and rendering HTML and CSS takes a lot of resources.
The problem is that worrying about semantic vs presentation is something that almost no one gives a s**t about, because it is an artificial division that makes sense for computer science reasons, not human reasons. I don't sit down to make a web page and completely divorce the content vs the layout; the layout gives context and can be just as important as the content itself in terms of a human brain grasping an attempt at communication.
I know I shouldn't use tables for presentation but I just don't care. They are so simple and easy to visualize in my head, and using them has never caused a noticeable slowdown in my app, caused maintenance headaches, cost me any money, etc. The only downside is listening to architecture astronauts whine about how incorrect it is while they all sit around and circle-jerk about how their pages pass this-or-that validation test.
This kind of crap is so frustrating and wastes MILLIONS upon MILLIONS of man-hours year after year, yet we can't even get the major browser vendors to agree to HTMLv5 and what little bits (though very useful) it brings to the table. So please spare me the semantic vs presentation argument. If just a few people gave a s**t and stopped stroking their own egos on these bulls**t committees and actually tried to solve the problems that developers and designers deal with every day then they wouldn't have to worry about forcing everyone to adopt their standard (IPv6), the desire to adopt it would come naturally.
How about we don't use HTTP/HTML for things they were not designed or ever intended to do? You know, that "right tool for the right job" thing.
"right tool for the right job"
Fair enough.
What's the right tool to deliver to your users rich applications which are
I don't know of any tool other than HTTP/HTML. I can imagine something with ssh and X forwarding, but windows boxes don't come with X preinstall
It's not all rosy as the short documentation page explains. While they are trying to maximize throughput and minimize latency, they are hurting other areas. 2 obvious downsides I see are:
1. Server would now have to keep holding the connection open to the client throughout the client's session, and also keep the associated resources in memory. While this may not be a problem for Google and their seemingly limitless processing powers, a Joe Webmaster will see their web server load average increase significantly. HTTP servers usually give you control over this with the HTTP keep-alive time and max connections/children settings. If the server is now required to keep the connections open it would spell more hardware for many/most websites;
2. Requiring compression seems silly to me. This would increase the processing power required on the web server (see above), and also on the client - think underpowered portable devices. It needs to stay optional - if the client and server both play and prefer compression, then they should do it; if not, then let them be; also keeping in mind that all images, video and other multimedia are already compressed - so adding compression to these items would increase the server/client load _and_ increase payload.
As a server implementor I can tell you that I'd rather have 1 heavily used connection than 20 (that is a LOW estimate for the number of connections many sites make(!!!!!!!)). Server efficiency was one of my goals for the protocol, in fact!
When we're talking about requiring compression, we're talking about compression over the headers only.
In any case, as someone who operates servers... I can't tell you how many times I've been angry at having to turn of compression for *EVERYONE* because some browser advert
The good news is that SPDY seems to build on the SMUX ( http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-mux [w3.org] ) and MUX protocols that were designed as part of the HTTP-NG effort, so at least we're not reinventing the wheel. Now we have to decide what color to paint it.
Next up: immediate support in FireFox, WebKit, and Apache -- and deafening silence from IE and IIS.
Cache control 4tw. A lot of the user perception problems SPDY is trying to solve can be solved by utilizing already-existing protocol features and the farms of cache servers at ISPs for your active content.
The latency differences between a user going all the way to your server and grabbing your content vs. going to ISP's cache server to get it can be huge when you consider a separate connection for each part of the page. When coupled with the decreased response time (checking a cache file and responding with a 304 is a lot easier on your server than pulling your content out of a database, formatting it and sending the entire page) makes a huge end-user perception difference. It also frees resources on your web server faster because you are sending 20-30 bytes instead of x kb. The faster your server can get rid of that connection the better.
Doing this reduces the load on your server(especially connection utilization), your bandwidth utilization, speeds up the download of your page (since it avoids the need to leave the ISP for your content download) and generally makes you a better network citizen.
Of course this requires developers that understand the protocol.
What I want to know is will ISP cache servers will have this implemented?
Absolutely the 304 response won't work anymore under that new proposal. And 304 already saves a lot as most external references are static.
There is only one exception, advertisements. One can only asume that Google wants this to effectively push advertisements on the user.
If they really wanted a faster web, they would have minimized the protocol name. Taking out vowels isn't enough.
The protocol should be renamed to just 's'.
That's 3 less bytes per request.
I can haz goolge internship?
In less than a century, computers will be making substantial progress on ... the overriding problem of war and peace. -- James Slagle


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"Pedestrian and bicycle fatalities at highway-rail and pathway-rail crossings have remained constant over the past 10 years, in contrast to a marked decrease in vehicle collisions with trains," said P.S. Sriraj, director of UIC's Metropolitan Transportation Support Initiative. Sriraj led the study with Paul Metaxatos, research assistant professor.
"Education and enforcement would convince pedestrians and cyclists that it is both dangerous and illegal to cross railroad tracks while signals are activated or to cross anywhere but at designated crossings," Metaxatos said.
The researchers' review of signage and electronic warning devices nationwide showed "a distinct lack of consistency in standards to analyze/quantify pedestrian risk and design effective treatment."
They found that signals at many crossings did not comply with professional standards.
Criteria for the choice of devices at each grade crossing include pedestrian volumes, weather, train speeds, train volumes and surrounding land uses, but few methodologies allow for assessing tradeoffs among those factors, the researchers wrote. States like California, with substantial passenger and freight rail operations, are developing guidelines for safety improvements.
Compliant warning signs in use include pavement markings, audible tones, verbal messages, vibrating surfaces, fencing, gates, flashing lights and "second train coming" electronic warning signs. Survey respondents paid the most attention to pedestrian gates, which were the most frequently suggested signal improvement.
The study found that several other factors affect crossing safety:
• Age: All ages noticed train-activated devices more often than passive signs, but older users more often noticed passive signs.
• Gender: Women survey respondents "appeared to be more safety-conscious than men," the researchers wrote. Men under 21 were the only group that reported crossing against activated warning signals.
• Regular use: Pedestrians and cyclists who use grade crossings more often were less likely to cross illegally.
• Distractions: Talking on a cell phone, pushing a stroller or listening to music on headphones can limit awareness when approaching a crossing. Awareness also diminishes with age.
• Crossing in groups: Groups of pedestrians and cyclists, as at train stations, often exhibit "platoon behavior," with individuals following the crowd rather than checking for signals on their own. This can be especially dangerous when a second train is coming from the opposite direction, the researchers noted.
• Quiet zones: In communities where local authorities have established quiet zones, train horns are restricted or banned, rendering warnings less effective for distracted pedestrians
• Funding for improvements: The "vast majority" of funding for rail crossing safety improvements is allocated to rail-highway crossings. Little funding is earmarked for pedestrian crossings.
The research team surveyed pedestrians at 10 "hot spots" in Chicago and collar counties; monitored the actions of non-motorized users through video surveillance; surveyed state regulatory agencies and industry professionals and reviewed published studies on rail crossing safety.
For further reading, see "Pedestrian/Bicyclist Warning Devices and Signs at Highway-Rail and Pathway-Rail Grade Crossings."


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Have fun and earn prizes with the St. Jude Math-A-Thon, a fundraiser that improves students' math skills and teaches the importance of helping others.
It's easy to bring the St. Jude Math-A-Thon to your school. We provide resources to help your class have a fun and successful event.
Use the St. Jude Math-A-Thon Funbook, developed for grades K–8, to get your students excited about math while fundraising for the children of St. Jude.
Get started as a coordinator by registering your school for a St. Jude Math-A-Thon.
Parents and Students
Have fun and make a difference by participating in your school's St. Jude Math-A-Thon.
Earn great prizes while helping kids who are battling cancer and other life-threatening diseases.
Complete math activities in your Funbook, and share your fundraising page to raise support for St. Jude.
Sponsors — give your support
Donate on behalf of a St. Jude Math-A-Thon student to help them reach their fundraising goal.
You're helping kids like Jordyn
At age 11, Jordyn was a champion gymnast when she began treatment at St. Jude for acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Families never receive a bill for treatment, travel, housing or food — because all a family should worry about is helping their child live.
"We knew St. Jude was the best place for childhood cancer. We knew that when families go to St. Jude, they have no worries. They're going to be taken care of." - Chastity, Jordyn's mom
Ready to do the math? Get started
Parents and Students
Questions? Please contact the Coordinator Support Team at (800) 386-2665 or email@example.com.


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|Tarzan (Special Edition) (1999)
|Tuesday, 18 October 2005
It's surprising that this is the first animated feature about Tarzan of the Apes. The durable creation of Edgar Rice Burroughs has been done in almost every other medium from books (beginning in 1912), to radio, to movie features and movie serials, TV series, etc. etc. The story is a natural for animation -- and it's been done splendidly by the Disney team. The good parts of "Tarzan" (the first movie to have that one-word title) are so exhilarating, entertaining and exuberant that it's not hard to overlook the weaker parts. "Tarzan" is not the equal of "Beauty and the Beast" or "The Lion King," still the two high-water marks of recent Disney features, but is instead at the top of the second tier, far better than weaklings like "Pocohontas" and "Hercules," but perhaps just a shade under "Mulan."
In rough outline, "Tarzan" follows the plot of Burroughs' first Tarzan novel, Tarzan of the Apes. The screenplay is credited to Tab Murphy and Bob Tzudiker & Noni White, though it's probable that the script was the product of many more hands than theirs. The film was directed by Kevin Lima and Chris Buck.
The best part of "Tarzan," almost without dialog, is the first half hour or so, in which Kala (Glenn Close!), a mother gorilla, loses her own baby and finds a human child in the treetop cabin where his parents lie dead, victims of a marauding leopard. Kala adopts the baby, but Kerchak (Lance Henriksen), leader of the gorilla clan, refuses to acknowledge the cheerful infant as his son.
As years pass, Tarzan becomes friends with gorilla child Terk (Rosie O'Donnell) and a young elephant, Tantor (Wayne Knight). The other gorillas tend to tease Tarzan, but his innate courage and greater intelligence keep impressing them over the years. Even as an adults, Tarzan is still convinced he's a gorilla. He even walks on all fours (until Jane gives him a reason to stand upright), something that no other screen Tarzan has ever done, and he races through the treetops both by the vines prescribed by Burroughs and long-standing movie tradition, and by sliding along tree limbs like Santa Monica skateboarders.
Tarzan was animated by the great Glen Keane, who brings to the character not just grace and elegance of movement, but an entire range of characterization in stance, gesture and motion. The design of Tarzan leaves something to be desired, with a long, chin-dominated face that's somewhere between Jay Leno, Stewart Granger and a Zanti Misfit. Tony Goldwyn does very well by Tarzan's voice, and even gets to thunder out the famous yell, which originated in the MGM movie series.
Jane (voiced by Minnie Driver) is also animated superbly, by Ken Stuart Duncan. She's a lively, athletic young woman, once again British, as in the MGM series. Duncan has managed to make her move like a young British woman of intelligence, good humor and a warm openness. She's not a figure of fun, but is consistently very funny, both in gesture and movement, and from Driver's fine, witty vocal performance. (She also did great and very different vocal work in "Princess Mononoke.")
Disney needs to learn that not every feature cartoon requires comic sidekicks who sound like they just blew in from Manhattan. The comic sidekicks are indeed funny, but every time they turn up, we're jerked out of the reality of the adventures of the central character, and plunged back into funny cartoons. Rosie O'Donnell has a brassy but ingratiating personality that comes through like a lightning bolt, even when she's a gorilla -- but the problem is that Terk is a great deal more Rosie than she is a gorilla. The same is true of Wayne Knight as Tantor; Wayne Knight is a great second-banana comic, but "Tarzan" would have seemed more unified, and possibly greater, if both Tantor and Terk had been more like the animals and less like the comics.
Clayton (voiced boomingly by Brian Blessed) is an example of a direction they could have gone. He is also comic, with big gestures, giant grins and a huge wedge shape -- but he's also rendered in the same style as Tarzan, so that when the time comes, he's as believable a villain as he was a parody of a great white hunter.
Lance Henriksen was a good choice for the voice of Kerchak; he sounds deep, commanding, and very, very serious. Glenn Close might seem to be a surprising choice for a voice in a Tarzan film, but she redubbed all of Andie McDowell's lines in "Greystoke." Here, she sounds warm and maternal without ever seeming fussy.
At its best, not only is "Tarzan" entertaining, but it's very different from most other Disney cartoon features; the central character's crisis is more of the heart than deriving from danger, Tarzan is more serious and less jokey himself than most Disney characters, and he's also more masculine, more powerful, more adult than most. He is, in fact, at once dangerous, amusing and sexy, unheard of for a male Disney cartoon lead. If the company had shown a little more daring in their handling of the comic sidekicks, "Tarzan" could well have been one of their very best animated features. As it is, it's fine entertainment, but the compromises have weakened the final result.
The DVD is typical of the Disney studio: beautifully produced, bedecked with extras aimed more at children than adults (such as a trivia game), though Phil Collins, who did some songs for the movie does appear twice. Once is the rock video he did of his "Strangers Like Me" song from the movie; the other is a kind of behind-the-scenes short about recording another song, "Trashin' the Camp." The disc opens with trailers that, at first, cannot be fast-forwarded through, a sinister development.
As usual with Disney, this DVD release is scheduled to be followed by a much more elaborate version, with drawings, a documentary, interviews and the like. If you loved "Tarzan," wait for that one; if you merely liked it, this is the preferable purchase


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Calendar information to 30 E. First Ave., email it to email@example.com, or mail it to The Calendar, The Dispatch, P.O. Box 908, Lexington, 27293 so it is at The Dispatch one week prior to its publication date. Include an address for the event. Events listed below are in Lexington, unless otherwise noted. For publication of church and nonprofit yard sales, please call classified advertising at 249-1637.
Calendar information to 30 E. First Ave., email it to email@example.com, or mail it to The Calendar, The Dispatch, P.O. Box 908, Lexington, 27293 so it is at The Dispatch one week prior to its publication date. Include an address for the event. Events listed below are in Lexington, unless otherwise noted. For publication of church and nonprofit yard sales, please call classified advertising at 249-1637.
Tyro Elementary School, 450 Cow Palace Road, will have its fall festival from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday. Individual booth rentals cost $10. Inflatables, games, cotton candy, popcorn, dunking booth, silent auction, hot dogs, drinks, and much more will be part of the event.
The Women's Fellowship of Hedrick's Grove Reformed UCC, corner of Allred Road and Old Highway 64 East will hold its annual fall bazaar from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday in the church fellowship hall. It will feature a country store and bake shop, craft items, ham and sausage biscuits, coffee and juice.
First Wesleyn Church, 1405 Winston Road, will have a fall festival from 4 to 7 p.m. Saturday. Chicken stew, vegetable soup, chili beans, crackers, corn bread, drinks and desserts will cost $6 for adults and $3 for children. There will be games and prizes and silent auction. Proceeds will benefit Crisis Ministry and Pastor's Pantry.
A food drive will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at Big Lots parking lot, Winston Road, for Love of Salvation United Full Gospel Church to help those in need of food.
The American Legion Banks & Miller Post 255 will sponsor a pancake fundraiser breakfast at Applebee's, 71 Plaza Parkway from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. Saturday. Plates are $7 each and you can eat in or carry out. Proceeds will go to helping homeless and disabled veterans.
Fairview United Methodist Church, Old Greensboro Road, will hold its annual fall bazaar from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday. Events for the day include sausage or ham biscuit breakfast, country store, chicken pies for sale, a bake sale and a hot dog lunch. Money raised will go for mission projects for the coming year .
First Baptist Church, 210 Village Dr. will have a chicken sandwich sale from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday in the church's fellowship hall.
The United Methodist Men of Center United Methodist Church, 186 Center Church Road, Welcome, will sponsor a community breakfast at 7 to 10 a.m. Saturday in the New Christian Fellowship Center at the church. The full breakfast menu will include tenderloin as one of the items. Tickets are $6 in advance from any UMM member, or $7 at the door, with proceeds going to various church and mission projects. The church phone number is 731-6616.
Banks Miller Post 255, 1 Arthur Drive, will host the celebration of one of the two of the last survivors of the Buffalo Soldiers — Junior Anderson of Lexington at 3 p.m. Sunday at the post. All Davidson County post members and residents are encouraged to attend. Donations of $5 will be accepted at the door. All proceeds will go to Anderson.
The Edward Berrier reunion will be at 1 p.m. Sunday at Shiloh Methodist Fellowship Hall. Bring food basket. Drinks and utensils will be provided.
Central Davidson Class of 1988 will celebrate its 25th class reunion from 2 - 6 p.m. Oct. 19 at Top of the Rock. The cost is $15 per person. Checks should be mailed to Tricia's Catering at 408 Piedmont Drive, Lexington, NC 27295 with a notation "CDHS Class of 1988 Reunion" as soon as possible. There is a facebook page for more information: Central Davidson Class of 1988, or you can contact Greg Brafford at 239-0741 or email email@example.com. Class members are encouraged to attend the CDHS Homecoming Football Game on Oct. 18. Also, those interested in running as a group in the Lexington Barbecue Festival Hawg Run, to be held on Oct. 19, should contact Greg Brafford for information.
Meadowview's fall festival will be from noon to 5:30 p.m. Oct. 19 with food, games and prizes for all ages.
Amity Baptist Church, at the corner of Highway 109 at Franklin Drive, Wallburg, will have a poorman's supper from 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 19. Cost is $7. Call the Rev. Ron Haines at 787-4779 for more information.
First Baptist Church, 210 Village Dr. will have a clothes give away from 8 a.m. to noon Oct. 19 in the church's fellowship hall.
Spring Arbor of Thomasville is hosting a fall festival from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Oct. 19. Games, inflatables, face painting, fire truck and more will be part of the event.
Also we will be giving out candy to any Trick-or-treater October 31 from 3 to 4:30pm Please join us if you can.
Family Fun Day at Central Baptist Church, 1347 N.C. Highway 47,will be from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Oct. 19. Games, inflatables and food, are free, but there is a cost for the pumpkin patch.
The Lexington Senior High School Class of 1973 will hold its 40th reunion at Sapona Country Club on at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 26. Direct any questions to Tom Eller at 243-1077.
Al Khattab Shriners Temple is sponsoring a trip to Harrah's Cherokee Casino on Saturday Oct. 19. A bus will leave Lexington at 6 a.m. and return around 9:30 p.m. Cost is $45 and you will receive $20 in free slot play at arrival. If you are interested, call 239-1301 for more details.
Central Davidson High Class of 1973 will have its 40th reunion beginning at 5 p.m. Nov. 2 at Becks Reformed Church, Becks Church Road. Dinner will be at 6 p.m. Cost is $20 per person. Send checks to Judy Beeker Wimmer, 983 Welcome-Bethesda Road or call 731-6875.
The Lady's Guild of Our Lady Of The Rosary Church will have a handcrafted Christmas market from 9:30 to 4:30 p.m. Nov. 2 in the Gondek Parish Center, 711 S. Main St. Handcrafted items include assorted jewelry, scented soaps, dolls, tin men, silk flowers in frames, greeting cards, Christmas ornaments and decorations, quilts, afghans, pickles, jams, wreaths, art work, friendship bracelets and stained glass. There will be a photography room where your Christmas and non-Christmas portraits will be done by a professional photographer. Santa will be available for photos and a bake sale.
The church women of New Jerusalem United Church of Christ, 4104 Jerusalem Road, Silver Valley, will hold a fall bazaar on from 5 to 7 p.m. Nov. 3. Food will be served from 5-6:30 p.m. consisting of hot dogs, chips, pickle, dessert and drink. Cost is a donation. Also during this time there will be crafts, bake sale items and a silent auction. In addition, raffle tickets are available for a beautiful handmade quilt, tickets are $1 each or six for $5. At 6:30 p.m. the quilt will be given away and all leftover craft and bake sale items will be auctioned off.
The free Salem Glen Fall Bazaar will be held from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 9 at 1000 Glen Day Drive in northern Davidson County. A free raffle and 25 participating vendors with a wide variety of specialties are part of the event. The 400-recipe Salem Glen cookbook. The Clemmons Food Pantry is the recipient of all proceeds from the book. Salem Glen Pro Shop will have Fall Bazaar sales. Call 712-1010 for lunch reservations.
The Lexington Community Candlelight Service rehearsals are from 3 to 4:30 p.m. each Sunday at the First Lutheran Church fellowship hall, State Street. There will be one performance on Dec. 8 at the Smith Civic Center. Everyone is invited to sing with this community choir. For additional information, call Bob Redwine at 250-2496.
Linwood United Methodist Church, 4700 Old Linwood Road in Linwood, will have a fall bazaar and bake sale in the church fellowship hall from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 9. Hot dogs will be available for sale at lunch. A 32-inch Sony TV and a portrait package from Tommy's Photography's will be raffled. Tickets are $1 for each item. Homemade baked goods, canned goods, fall and Christmas handmade crafts will be part of the event.
Run Run Rudolph 5K Race & Fun Run will be at 4 p.m. Dec. 8. The Fun Run at 3:30 p.m. The event is open to all. Cost is $25 for 5K, $10 for Fun Run and includes T-shirt with registration prior to Nov. 1. After Nov. 1, cost is $30 for 5K, $15 for Fun Run. Support the J. Smith Young YMCA Strong Kids. Visit our website for Registration www.lexingtonymca.com.
Governments and Groups
The Veterans of Reeds American Legion Post #No. 62 will be selling chicken pies on Saturday mornings beginning Aug. 24 from 9:30 a.m. until noon. The pies are frozen and ready to cook. Mixed meat pies are $9 each and all-white meat pies are $10. Gravy and cooking instructions are included. For more information, to place an advance order or to schedule a pick-up appointment outside regular Saturday hours, call 247-2488, 225-6881 or 853-7212. Proceeds from the sale of the pies go to veterans projects in the West Davidson area and to the State Veteran's Home in Salisbury.
The Friendship Club meets from noon to 2 p.m. every second Saturday of the month at the Robbins Recreation Center, 512 S. Hargrave St. The members of The Friendship Club have been meeting for over 25 years and ask visually impaired individuals to join the meetings for food, fun and fellowship.


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This is just beautiful...
Welcome to Ultimate Subaru Message Board, my lurker friend!
|Welcome to Ultimate Subaru Message Board, an unparalleled Subaru community full of the greatest Subaru gurus and modders on the planet! We offer technical information and discussion about all things Subaru, the best and most popular all wheel drive vehicles ever created.
We offer all this information for free to everyone, even lurkers like you! All we ask in return is that you sign up and give back some of what you get out - without our awesome registered users none of this would be possible! Plus, you get way more great stuff as a member! Lurk to lose, participate to WIN*!
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Guest Message by DevFuse
EJ20G RX Leone Rally Car Build
Started by SubPar , Jun 13 2008 02:19 PM
5 replies to this topic
Posted 13 June 2008 - 02:19 PM
Posted 13 June 2008 - 04:14 PM
Very cool! Lots of intercooler on there.
Posted 13 June 2008 - 07:45 PM
Looks like a smaller fmic in the tmic spot. Very fun looking car.
Posted 14 June 2008 - 01:20 AM
I think it's the lack of trim.... it looks odd, but fun.
Looks like a smaller fmic in the tmic spot. Very fun looking car.
Posted 15 June 2008 - 09:41 AM
thats kinda what i wanted to do with my rx.
Posted 17 June 2008 - 11:21 PM
I'd like to know how long it took to make that hood, and how difficult it was.......sweet looking.
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0 members, 0 guests, 0 anonymous users


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Plans for a rooftop farm are the largest in the world.
Brooklyn Grange Farm is Expanding to a 45K Square Foot Rooftop in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. This is a stunning example of urban agriculture designed to produce local food, even with limited spatial resources. There is also a 3.5 minute video clip attached to the article.


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The roof will be open for Opening Night tonight at Marlins Park.
How many fans actually come into the building to watch baseball remains to be seen. But Marlins players and coaches say they are not worried about any of that. They're job is simply to win games.
"We were wondering if we were going to get little Brazlilian girls bringing us out today," joked right fielder Giancarlo Stanton, obviously making a reference to last year's Opening Night when players were accompanied to the field by women wearing carnival outfits.
"[As for the fans] they're not going to be negative towards us. I don't know how many will be here. But I expect a positive reaction."
Unlike Ozzie Guillen who got a chance to manage few a games at Marlins Park in the preseason a year ago, skipper Mike Redmond will be managing his first game at Marlins Park tonight. He said his club is excited about making its home debut -- regardless of the negativity the franchise has faced since the dismantling of last year's club.
"I know it's tough," Redmond said. "All I can do is focus on the 25 guys in the clubhouse... I feel like we can get this back in the winning direction, the direction we're all use to and accustomed to. I just want them [the fans] to hang in there and watch the Stantons and these exciting young players -- the [Jose] Fernandezes."
> Braves (5-1): 1. B.J. Upton CF, 2. Jason Heyward RF, 3. Justin Upton LF, 4. Evan Gattis C, 5. Dan Uggla 2B, 6. Juan Francisco 3B, 7. Chris Johnson 1B, 8. Andrelton Simmons SS, 9. Paul Maholm LHP.
> Marlins (1-5): 1. Juan Pierre LF, 2. Placido Polanco 3B, 3. Giancarlo Stnaton RF, 4. Greg Dobbs 1B, 5. Justin Ruggiano CF, 6. Rob Brantly C, 7. Adeiny Hechavarria SS, 8. Donovan Solano 2B, 9. Kevin Slowey RHP.


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Wedding is really a special day. Each and every bride-to-be must appear your very best in your big day. After that Wishesbridal may be the correct location and you'll discover the very best a person. All of us will change your own dream in to actuality by giving outstanding couture plus size green evening dresses as well as flawless style from inexpensive costs. All of us just utilize the greatest high quality supplies to produce incredible plus size green evening dresses. Types of dresses are created within the entrance associated with style. The styles tend to be usually following an action associated with pattern. Right now store your own gowns!


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Second: These are INCREDIBLY soft inside! The lining is just oh, so soft. I kinda wanted to cuddle them...
Third: I wonder how they get bigger and smaller? ~At the top of the front of the diaper there is a little opening. Inside is elastic with a knot in the top. I pulled on it for a while, not sure what to do then decided to look at the directions. Further down, next to the leg gussets, there were two "toggles," one on each side. They are very small and in no way would bother the baby. To size the diaper you only have to push in the toggle button, pull the elastic the direction that you would like and release the toggle button...VERY EASY!
A great thing about these diapers is that there are SO many different sizes you can have! Sarah V (creator of this amazing diaper) recommended that I size it a little bit tighter then I think it should go to prevent leaks. She said that if there are red marks on the baby after a change then it is TOO tight, so loosen it about 1 inch. When first sizing them, it was trial and error, but after finding that "Perfect Fit," I simply matched up the elastic on the other diapers to make them all the same size.
The insert is REALLY long! But when put in the diaper and folded to add absorbency to where Kinsley needed it the most, it did not seem long or bulky at all! (A smaller insert can be used when the baby is on its tiniest setting.) Now that Kinsley is rolling all over the place it can be a bit tricky at times to get it to lay flat, but make sure it is flat or else there will be leaks!
One thing that I have always felt bad about when cloth diapering is how it often looks like Kinsley is sitting on a horse or something because of the wideness of the diapers. These diapers are so trim and skinny that I feel much better about it! (Kinsley seems to notice the difference as well and is rolling MUCH more than before).
LESS room in the diaper bag!!! These diapers take up a bit less room in the diaper bag than prefolds and TONS less room than pocket diapers.
These diapers are great for the environment. And I don't just mean better for the environment because they are cloth, but better because there is less material. The covers are used more than once, so you need less so there is less items being created and therefore being wasted in production. Plus, there is less in the wash than if pockets would be used (and if you have a washing machine that adds water, spins, etc based on weight then less energy is being used.)
Now that I have used these diapers for a few weeks, I am pleased to say that I am VERY happy with them. They fit Kinsley great. It did take a little bit to figure out the perfect size, but all that meant is a bit of wicking around the legs, which never even reached passed Kinsley's base layer. I have never had any trouble with them in the wash (no diaper trains here) and they still look brand new (and I wash all of them every two days or so).
Overall, I really like these diapers. My husband likes using them a lot more than prefolds and covers due to their quickness and my mom likes them better because she was scared of snappis. I love them the most because they are trimmer AND because I finally allowed myself to get a pink diaper:) The one thing I would change is to include another snap to help keep the liner in place while changing a baby that is doing crocodile death roll and have the PUL go a little further into the diaper to prevent wicking.
Thanks for the great prize!
- By Sara M.


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WOCCU Brings Handheld Transaction Technology to Rural Mexico
PDAs Increase Efficiency and Security in Delivering Financial Services
December 09, 2008
MORELIA, Mexico—In an effort to expand efficient and secure financial services to people living in rural, marginalized areas of Mexico, World Council of Credit Unions (WOCCU) has teamed with Caja Morelia Valladolid, one of Mexico's largest credit unions, in a pilot project to utilize personal digital assistants (PDAs) to perform financial transactions during field visits to their members.
The PDAs (handheld computers) enable credit union field officers to transmit account data through cell phone towers to the credit union's central database in real time while visiting members in remote rural communities. The new technology reduces the risk of error in manual record keeping on field visits, helps provide faster, more secure service and builds member trust.
"In rural areas of Mexico, people have few options for access to financial services," said Brian Branch, WOCCU's executive vice president and chief operating officer. "Branch offices and ATMs do not have the population density or infrastructure to support them, but cell phone signals extend deep into the rural areas. The use of PDAs enables the credit unions to reach much deeper into the rural areas to provide financial services to people who have previously never had access."
Field officers previously recorded transactions manually in Caja Morelia's accounting books and in members' passbooks, then took the records back to the credit union to process. Through PDA technology, handheld printers immediately produce receipts while member accounts are updated in real time. PDA applications shorten transaction times, which reduce the length of waiting time for members and enable credit union representatives to serve more people during field visits.
The technology, introduced in November, is a new addition to the semilla cooperativa (cooperative seed) rural outreach methodology WOCCU pioneered in the states of Michoacan, where Morelia is located, and Veracruz five years ago with funding from the Mexican Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fishing and Food (SAGARPA). An additional US$24.8 million from SAGARPA's Proyecto de Asistencia Técnica al Microfinanciamiento Rural (PATMIR) project has allowed WOCCU to expand its successful outreach approach to rural markets through 55 credit unions in 22 Mexican states.
Through semilla cooperativa, credit unions train rural field officers from the area to regularly provide credit union services to communities up to 30 km. (19 mi.) from branch offices. The service approach involves attracting new members, extending financial education, approving small loan applications and bringing credit, savings and remittance services directly to people living in remote rural areas. It is the first of its kind offered by Mexico's financial institutions. The program allows rural members to save money on transportation and put more time and resources into income-generating activities rather than spending a day traveling to the nearest branch office. The PDAs are designed to make the service more efficient and secure.
"The PDAs will help credit unions minimize the risk that exists in providing this service by transmitting data to the financial institution online so that field officers can see members' up-to-date balances in their accounts," explained Luis Jara, director of WOCCU's program in Mexico. "The field officer also reduces personal risk by not having to transport as much money among the communities."
WOCCU plans to increase its PDA distribution to the other credit unions participating in the program over the next year. The technology will enable representatives to reach people from more than 11,000 villages in 22 states. The WOCCU program also will implement the use of point-of-sale (POS) devices in semilla cooperativa communities in the coming year, allowing members and field officers to make credit union deposits at local shops and outlets. The POS devices also further reduce the field officers' risk of transporting funds and will allow members to access their accounts on a daily basis in their own communities.
"The field officers' services are becoming even more valuable to the communities they serve," Jara said. "The new technology will enable credit unions to more efficiently and effectively serve the growing ranks of rural members."
World Council of Credit Unions is the global trade association and development agency for credit unions. World Council promotes the sustainable development of credit unions and other financial cooperatives around the world to empower people through access to high quality and affordable financial services. World Council advocates on behalf of the global credit union system before international organizations and works with national governments to improve legislation and regulation. Its technical assistance programs introduce new tools and technologies to strengthen credit unions' financial performance and increase their outreach.
World Council has implemented 300+ technical assistance programs in 89 countries. Worldwide, 68,882 credit unions in 109 countries serve 235 million people. Learn more about World Council's impact around the world at www.woccu.org.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Walter and Nellie
As a bride on June 28, 1906, Nellie Leonhart was gowned in white Persian lawn trimmed with lace. Her dress would probably have had a silhouette like the one to the right - Gibson Girl style with poufed front, narrow waist, and bustle in the back. Nellie was 21 when she married Walter Meinzen, my grandfather's brother. They were married at 4:00 in the afternoon in Steubenville, Ohio, at the home of Nellie's parents, Louis and Anna Mary Leonhart.
I think it's interesting that Walter's sister, Mina, was the bridesmaid, and Nellie's brother, Phil, was the best man. Had siblings been friends with siblings for a while? Mina and Nellie were about the same age. Perhaps they were friends and Mina introduced Nellie to her brother. Or perhaps Walter and Phil were friends, and Phil introduced Walter to his sister.
With only 25 at the home for the wedding supper, it seems a small wedding, probably with family and close intimate friends. Walter's family alone, parents and 10 siblings, could have accounted for 12 of the attendees.
Walter and Nellie went to Columbus for their wedding journey. I wonder whether they travelled by train or by car, and if by car, what kind. And how long did the trip take? In today's cars with today's roads, it's a 3 to 4-hour drive. Because they went on to Youngstown after their wedding trip, they probably took wedding gifts and other necessities to furnish an apartment with them.
As a stationary engineer in Youngstown, Walter would have been an operator of a boiler or some power plant, perhaps for a factory in Youngstown. He probably worked long hours with little time off.
Walter and Nellie remained in Youngstown less than a year. By May of 1907, they had returned to Steubenville and Walter was working at the LaBelle Iron Works, again as an engineer, with little time off and an irregular schedule. They'd been married less than a year. Were they still getting to know each other well, still settling into married life?
Less than a year after their marriage tragedy struck! An unusual accident. The first of its kind. A box around a spindle broke off, which sometimes happened. But this time, the spindle also flew off. And Walter was dead.
It is the news no wife ever wants to hear, and perhaps the worst news a young bride could ever hear.
My heart grieves for Walter, Nellie, and Walter's family. Poor Nellie. I especially grieve for Walter's mother, Elizabeth, who had already lost 4 of her 15 children. Little did she know what the future would hold for her son, Jacob, who also lost his life at the LaBelle factory.
Walter's next youngest sibling was Mina. His next youngest brothers were my grandfather, W. C. Robert, age 14; and Jacob, age 13, at the time of Walter's death. My grandfather, 24 when Jacob was killed in another accident, never spoke about any of his brothers. As I learn about the history of their family, I can see that he would not want to recollect the tragic accidents and deaths.
Newspaper articles tell us that Walter was well-liked and had many friends. He was a member of the Knights of the Golden Eagle, who published a tribute in his honor.
Walter was born on November 13, 1883, and died on May 31, 1907. He was just over 23 1/2 years old.
How I wish he had had the opportunity to continue his marriage with Nellie, have children, and grow old with her.
Nellie eventually remarried and had children. She passed away in 1969.
Walter and Nellie, you are remembered.
2 comments:
That is a tragic story, but one that is often repeated.ReplyDelete
My grandfather died in 1921 just after four years of marriage. My grandmother was left with two children and no means of support except housecleaning. My father had insisted that his three daughters be educated because he said he did not want us to have to go through what his mother did to support he and his brother.
My two sisters and I all went to Nursing School, and none of us has ever been unemployed.
He was very wise.
Your father was indeed very wise. In those days, I suppose people rarely had life insurance. Sad for your grandmother and your father to lose husband and father.ReplyDelete
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I just bought one of those burger shapers; not sure if it's worth the bother..
Chip2's recipe with sauteing the onions and garlic before adding to the meat mixture is a great thought. Plus the idea of sliders, instead of full out burgers is a wonderful idea (except I've never seen bison available at my local grocery.)
This is my recipe: One pound of hamburger (you can use chuck, sirloin, whatever you want) One onion minced finepaprika (About a tablespoon maybe?) garlic powder (tablespoon of this too) Onion powder (a tsp) salt and pepper (1/2 tsp of each) Mix and form into patties and cook to desired doneness. I just use a skillet. You can put cheese on it or whatever you like. I like making a black n blue burger and put blue cheese on mine, and put lettuce on top and a bunch of mayonnaise. Messiest thing ever.
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The Denver Broncos released linebacker Joe Mays on Tuesday.
Mays started 21-of-24 regular-season games played for the Broncos during the last three seasons, totaling 124 tackles, with 1/2 sack.
Mays was selected by Philadelphia in the sixth round (200th overall) of the 2008 NFL Draft and played two seasons for the Eagles before being acquired by the Broncos in a trade in 2010.
In five NFL seasons, Mays played in 47 regular-season games with 22 starts and recorded 131 tackles.


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History of Universities
Volume XX/1
Date published:May 2005
Volume XX/1 of History of Universities contains the customary mix of learned articles, book reviews, conference reports, and bibliographical information, which makes this publication such an indispensable tool for the historian of higher education. Its contributions range widely geographically, chronologically, and in subject-matter. The volume is, as always, a lively combination of original research and invaluable reference material.


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Find Our Latest Video Reviews on YouTube!
If you want to stay on top of all of our video reviews of the latest tech, be sure to check out and subscribe to the Gear Live YouTube channel, hosted by Andru Edwards! It's free!
Monday September 24, 2007 1:12 pm
NBC Direct Allows Free Downloading
Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Corporate News, Home Entertainment
NBC has announced that their new service, NBC Direct, allows users to download many primetime and late-night shows up to one week after airing. Beta testing will begin in October and includes shows such as "Heroes," "The Office," "Life," "Bionic Woman," and "Late Night with Conan O'Brien." In the future, the company will be offering a free subscription option for pre-selection of specific programs. The DRM downloads will work on PCs, Macs, as well as other handhelds. This is good news to those of us who still watch analog TV, but not so good for those with outdated computers who may not be able to handle the overload.
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What's the flu like this holiday season? Highlights may be vomiting, diarrhea, and fever, going by advance reports from Loyola University Health System, Chicago. It's also unusually early and aggressive.
"Loyola documented several cases of the flu before Thanksgiving – and we now have confirmed more than 27 cases of patients with the flu, which is early to start and also a high number," says infection prevention and control director Jorge Parada, MD. "If you haven't gotten your flu shot yet, put it at the top of your to do list and get it now."
Like construction workers wearing hard hats, all employees, students, volunteers & even vendors at LUHS are required to receive the seasonal flu shots to protect patients and themselves, Dr. Parada explains.
If you have doubts about getting a flu shot…
• See the facts about 'flu folklore' below.
• And if you have ME/CFS, fibromyalgia or a related illness to consider, see also "Should You Get a Flu Shot?" by ME/CFS & FM specialist Dr. Charles Lapp.
Flu Folklore & Facts
• "I got the flu already so I don't need a flu shot."
"Typically there are three strains of flu that circulate during the flu season and the flu vaccine protects against all three. So, even if you've had the flu, get your flu shot so you do not get the flu a couple of more times," says Dr. Parada.
• "It's too late; the flu is already here."
"The flu season usually peaks in early February and lasts well into April, so it is not too late to get a flu shot."
• "I got a flu shot last year."
"Just like everyone can catch the flu every season, everyone needs to get a flu shot every year. The immunization lasts for one season -and also the formula changes. This year's flu vaccine is different than that of last year, for example."
• "The flu shot makes you sick."
"It takes about two weeks to build immunity after receiving the flu shot, so if you catch the flu around the time of your flu shot it wasn't because the vaccine gave it to you. Rather it was because you caught the flu before the vaccine had time to kick in and protect you," says Dr. Parada. "I have been an infectious disease specialist for more than 25 years and I have never seen evidence of anyone catching the flu from the flu shot."
Source: Based on Loyola University Health System news release, Dec 10, 2012


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Examining the rising cost of equine health insurance
Why is the cost of insurance rising?
Advances in technology such as nuclear scintigraphy, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), digital radiography and ultrasonography now offer clinicians many newer, more sophisticated modalities to choose from when pursuing a diagnosis. Advances in surgery and medicine—including the rapidly expanding field of regenerative medicine—provide an ever-expanding number of treatment options as well. Colic surgery is offered at many more clinics nationwide. Treatments such as stem cell injections, platelet-rich plasma therapy, tiludronate injections, shock wave therapy, thermography and others are all more readily available and increasingly used. These positive advances and options in equine veterinary healthcare should be a plus for horses and their owners, but it is precisely this increased level of care that is being blamed for the rising cost of equine insurance.Increased levels of claims and increased costs of treatment are largely responsible for the ever-increasing premiums for horse insurance, according to the KBIS Guide to Riding and Sport Horse Insurance. KBIS is one of the leading equine healthcare providers in Britain. Cornish Mutual, another major British equine insurance agency, agrees and cautions that "veterinary treatment fees are pushing up the price of horse insurance premiums with the increases well ahead of the retail price index (RPI) at approximately 7 percent per year." Similar concerns are being voiced in equine communities worldwide, with some countries feeling like the increases are nearly out of control. According the KBIS guide, the veterinary fees often exceed the value of the horse.
Client demand as a factor
While no one questions that veterinary fees for equine health care are increasing, the reasons are multifactorial, and some practitioners, such as Doug Thal, DVM, Dipl. ABVP, of Thal Equine LLC in Santa Fe, N.M., thinks it is time that this issue is fairly addressed.
"Any service provided by modern and well-equipped equine veterinarians is costly," says Thal. He further explains that it is clients who have led the way toward increased offerings of veterinary diagnostic and treatment options, but it is these same clients who often seem uncomfortable with the reality of what that care costs.
"The trend toward specialization and expensive services in private practice is driven, to a great extent, by better-informed horse owners who demand the best healthcare for their horses," Thal says. These specialty equine practices require costly equipment, facilities and support staff.
Alan Goddard, managing director of Cornish Mutual Insurance Company, also acknowledges the increased level of care now available for horses and directly links this care to increasing insurance premiums.
"We are seeing a definite rise in the cost of treating a horse for lameness or injury," Goddard says. "Improved techniques and equipment mean that horses can get the very best treatment, but of course that comes at a high cost—bills often run into thousands of pounds."
The average cost of an insurance claim in Britain, including veterinary fees for treating an ill or injured horse, is about the equivalent of $2,325 U.S. dollars, according to the British Equestrian Trade Association.
"There are top-class referral centers, equine hospitals and universities available now for the treatment of horses," Goddard says. "And while some costs have come down because surgical procedures and equipment are becoming more common, an MRI scan of one limb, for example, can still cost between 600 to 800 pounds ($900 to $1,250), and colic surgery will cost in excess of 3,000 pounds ($4,500)."


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ZAO, Japan (Feb. 10) - A weekend of erratic winds and constant restarts came to a close Sunday with a doubleheader FIS Ski Jumping World Cup. Sarah Hendrickson (Park City, UT) led a strong USA effort with three Americans in the top eight in the second of two events Sunday in Zao. Lindsey Van (Park City, UT) was sixth with Jessica Jerome (Park City, UT) eighth. In the opening event early Sunday morning, Hendrickson was fourth, Jerome fifth and Van seventh. Japan's Sara Takanashi swept both wins. The circuit now heads back to Europe with a pair of events in Ljubno, Slovenia before the FIS Nordic Ski World Championships in Val di Fiemme, Italy.
QUOTESSarah HendricksonThere have been a lot of delays during the past days and we did not know how the weather would look like today. Nice to see that everything worked out well and that the conditions were so fine. For our team it was not an easy week because our coach had to leave Japan (death in family), but right now I am really happy about my result.
Jessica JeromeBecause of all the snow and wind, we were all really glad that the comp was canceled yesterday (Saturday) even though that meant we would have two comps in one day. We managed fine with everything. Today was great and we were able to get off four jumps with no problem at all.
RESULTSOfficial Results
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Today I finally made myself gossip with one of the other general surgery residents about the neurosurgery program. Turns out there was a lot I didn't know. The program has been in turmoil the last few years. No wonder I couldn't figure out who was senior to whom. No wonder I couldn't figure out what their hierarchical structure was. And no wonder a couple of them are so bitter. One of the neurosurgery residents told me he wakes up every morning praying, "God, please don't let me get fired today." I couldn't live with pressure like that. Resolved, to make a few more excuses for their behavior. (Although, even knowing that, and knowing that my dumb questions must be a tremendous nuisance to him, it's still hard to work with a guy who bites your head off every time you open your mouth. Still, I'd rather ask dumb questions, than make an assumption, and hurt one of the patients.)
What he especially hates is me being reluctant to talk to family members who come asking about prognosis, and instead forcing him to talk to them, when he's got a million other things to do. I know what everyone says, "you're the doctor now, you do it," but I'm honestly not competent to go and give definitive answers to people who want to know whether their father or mother is going to live or die. They're going to decide whether to withdraw care based on what we tell them; and I don't know enough to honestly go and tell them, this is how it is. I would be cheating them. No matter how annoying it is to the neurosurgery guys, I refuse to say that stuff.
They don't explain enough to me, anyway. They talk in shorthand to each other (as I'm sure general surgeons do, to our med students' annoyance). The trauma guys ask me what neurosurgery thinks of the CT scan. I can only shrug my shoulders. "They pointed out a couple of spots that were different from yesterday, and they said this scan isn't enough to explain the clinical picture. But what the name is of what they were looking at, I couldn't tell you. All I know is, they said the patient needs to stay in the ICU." How am I supposed to talk to families like that?


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Feb 24, 2011
NEW HAVEN, Conn. - Following Yale's 187.450-185.850 victory over Southern Connecticut State, Yale freshman Nicole Tay was honored with the ECAC's Rookie of the Week Award. Tay, from Singapore, was only able to compete in two events due to a tendon tear, but she made her impact felt on both the balance beam and uneven bars.
Tay finished second on the balance beam with a 9.650 and second on the uneven parallel bars with a 9.500, both career highs.
Report Filed by Trey Chandler '11, Yale Sports Publicity


text: Mike Shanahan, Possible- Todd Haley, very possible- Paul Pasqualoni, Hmm, maybe- Kirk Ferentz, I don't think so- Bill Parcells, this ain't gonna happen and Jon Gruden, PLEASE NO- Bill Cowher, I don't think so, at least not this year but again, who knows for sure. Jason Garrett, He was the highest paid assistant coach in the history of the NFL. He may want too much money, Chan Gailey, oh man I hope not. I think Haley would be the best fit in the Chiefs Club but at the same time Shanny I'm sure has a score he would Love to settle as the Chiefs new HC and again what about Cowher. If not this year, what about next. Would Pioli hire a new HC and cut him next year to get Cowher? I think by firing Edwards Cowher is pretty much ruled out.


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Finland's emphysema rates hold steady
Finland's prevalence of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a group of serious lung diseases closely related to smoking, has held relatively steady in recent decades, a new study finds.
The findings, researchers say, are in line with what has been seen in the nation's smoking trends.
COPD refers to a group of progressive lung diseases that includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. They arise when damage to the lungs causes symptoms such as shortness of breath, chronic cough, chest tightness and wheezing.
Cigarette smoking is the most common cause of COPD, and the global impact of the disease is expected to increase, according to the researchers on the new study -- because worldwide, smoking continues to be a major problem and the elderly population in many nations is growing.
For their study, published in the European Respiratory Journal, the researchers compared the findings of two Finnish national health surveys, from 1978-1980 and 2000-2001, to see how the prevalence of COPD may have changed over time.
They found that the prevalence of COPD changed little among men and women over two decades.
Among men, 4.7 percent had some stage of COPD in the 1978-1980 study, based on tests of lung function. That figure was 4.3 percent 20 years later.
Among women, 2.2 had COPD in the earlier study, versus 3.1 percent in 2000-2001 -- an increase that was not statistically significant.
These findings conform well to the trends in smoking among men and women since the early 1970s toward the end of the century in this country, write the researchers, led by Dr. Vasankari M. Tuula of Turku University Hospital in Finland.
Among Finnish men, they note, the smoking rate peaked in the 1970s, reaching a high of 50 percent in some areas of the country. It has since gradually decreased, and stood at just above 30 percent in 1997.
Since COPD emerges as a long-term consequence of smoking, the benefits of this more recent decline in smoking would not yet have been apparent in 2000.
In contrast with men, Finnish women's smoking rates have increased over time -- from 10 percent in the 1970s to 20 percent in 2002, Tuula's team notes. Whether that trend will mean more cases of COPD among women in the future remains to be seen.
Not surprisingly, smoking was a key risk factor for COPD in both study periods and among both men and women. In 2000-2001, current smokers had six times the risk of COPD that never-smokers did, while former smokers had a three-fold higher risk.
The findings underscore the importance of quitting smoking, or preferably never starting, according to the researchers.
In the U.S., a 2008 government health survey found that 1.7 percent of adults living outside of care facilities had ever been diagnosed with emphysema. Just over 4 percent had been diagnosed with chronic bronchitis in the past year.
SOURCE: link.reuters.com/mub58n European Respiratory Journal, online August 6, 2010.


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American Bank of St. Paul made a profit in its first quarter, which would be unremarkable except that the last time it did so was in 2007.
It's got a long way to go to earn back the roughly $60 million it has lost since then, but CEO Tom Palmer is optimistic that the rest of 2013 will show more progress and 2014 will be even better. "It's been good to get the word out that we have turned the corner," he said.
That a bank like American is still upright in 2013 is perhaps a bit remarkable, too. It's had more than its share of bad news, and if you recall 2009 and the depths of the Great Recession, a lot of smaller community banks were not expected to make it out alive.
It was in early 2009 when an RBC Capital Markets analyst made a splash for estimating that 1,000 U.S. banks might fail in the following three to five years, as losses mounted on commercial real estate loans. He was far from alone in offering such a gloomy outlook, and even a Florida bank CEO went on TV that summer to predict 1,000 upcoming bank failures.
Turns out they were too pessimistic. From the start of 2009 through last week, there have been 448 bank failures. It was much worse during periods like the savings and loan crisis of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Regulators seized 534 banks and thrifts just in 1989 alone.
The higher-than-expected survival rate this time can be explained in part by the actions of regulators. Edward Drenttel, a prominent bank attorney with the Minneapolis firm of Winthrop & Weinstine, said "there may have been an element of de facto capital forbearance," meaning bank regulators would be aggressive enforcers on issues such as lending practices but give bank management time to rebuild capital.
Many smaller community banks were well capitalized as the Great Recession hit, and even if stung by losses they were largely able to get additional capital from their shareholders. Low interest rates helped, keeping costs low for banks and borrowers and helping the recovery of asset values that secured loans.
"Even now we're talking about the real estate market in the Twin Cities already being strong again," said Ron Feldman, the senior vice president for supervision, regulation and credit at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. "Admittedly, it's been four years, but my point isn't that the housing market has come back really quickly. My point is that relative to some extremely dire predictions that we had tens of years of property in the [supply], the worst of those predictions didn't come true."
Oak Ridge Financial senior adviser and analyst Ben Crabtree noted that the speculative lending that kills banks was largely a disease with local or regional hot spots, tied to the most speculative real estate markets. About 45 percent of the nation's bank failures from the start of 2009 through 2012 took place in just the states of Illinois, Georgia and Florida.
To erode a community bank's capital to the point of failure in a place like the Upper Midwest, Crabtree said, "it takes either really bad luck or really bad management."
American Bank, with headquarters in St. Paul and branches in Twin Cities area and southern Minnesota, likely had some of both. Evidence of the latter would have to include financing Florida entrepreneur Louis Pearlman's plan to acquire a British music television show.
To say this deal of Pearlman's didn't work out is an understatement, as the Federal Bureau of Prisons said Pearlman is still a guest of the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana, Texas.
Pearlman was once best known for creating the popular "boy-band" acts Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync, but much of his business empire was revealed to be a fraud. He has a long prison stay still ahead of him.
By the time the current CEO of American, Palmer, came to the bank in 2011, it had entered into an agreement with the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis to strengthen its management practices in lending and in a number of other areas, including producing a strategic plan.
But it was given time to dig its way out of the hole, and it used the traditional means of doing so, by shrinking the balance sheet and the cost structure and working to recover the value of its loans. It closed branches and now has about 90 employees, down from 125 in 2011. It had $714.3 million in assets at the end of 2005, and today that has shrunk has about $350 million. Palmer bemoans losing good employees through layoffs, but added that "it was better than losing 125" jobs.
Palmer said the first-quarter profit resulted largely from backing out reserves it had previously booked for anticipated loan losses, and the bank is now conservatively reserved. Now comes the challenge of growing loans in a very competitive market.
Palmer noted that for the many banks that came through the Great Recession mostly unscathed, "there must have been times when they had to have the fortitude to say no" to some loans, he said.
Like, he volunteered, the Pearlman deal. Palmer said litigation related to Pearlman still has not been fully resolved, five years after Pearlman pleaded guilty.
"What do I know about the music business?" Palmer said. "Not enough to make a 5 or 6 or 10 million-dollar loan. That is craziness."
"Maybe Prince," he continued, referring to the Minnesota popular music icon. "If it was Prince and you had a hook on his building. Even if it was Prince, you'd think twice. Three times."
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