text:
New Yorker, A Knife in the Back
Annals of Medicine
A Knife in the Back
Is surgery the best approach to chronic back pain?
By Jerome Groopman
Surgeons have often touted procedures that ultimately- proved to be disappointing. In the nineteen-fifties, many patients with angina and coronary-artery disease had an operation that involved tying off an artery that runs under the sternum. The idea was that it would increase the flow of blood to a heart that was being starved of its normal supply. Then, at the end of the decade, a clinical trial demonstrated that patients who underwent a sham operation did just as well as those who had the real one; the placebo effect apparently accounted for the fact that so many patients felt better afterward.
The radical mastectomy, pioneered a century ago, used to be routinely performed, too. Physicians believed that breast cancer spread in a contiguous, step-wise fashion from the primary tumor, and that the only way to eradicate the disease was to remove the entire breast and the underlying muscles. By the nineteen-eighties, it had become clear that tumor cells could spread throughout the body early in the disease, through lymph channels and blood vessels. A lumpectomy, followed by local radiation, proved as effective as a radical mastectomy in treating the cancer, and was far less traumatic to the patient.
Last year, approximately a hundred and fifty thousand lower-lumbar spinal fusions were performed in the United States. The operation, which involves removing lumbar disks and mechanically bracing the vertebrae, is of tremendous benefit to patients with fractured spines or spinal cancers; more frequently, however, it is performed to alleviate chronic lower-back pain. But how effective is it? That's a question that many of the doctors who perform the fusions, and the insurers who pay for them, appear reluctant to ask.
Roughly two-thirds of all Americans will experience significant lower-back pain at least once during their lives; some will also have sciatica, a pain that follows the nerve running from the lower back down the leg. In the United States, current estimates of the cost of medical care for those who have been disabled by severe back pain range from thirty to seventy billion dollars annually. Back pain is most likely to occur between the ages of forty-five and sixty-four, and, over all, nearly one in four Americans claims to suffer chronically from the problem. Many of these people are being told that fusion surgery is the solution.
Trisha Bryant (her name has been changed) is a former marketing executive in her mid-thirties. Two years ago, while working in a home-furnishings store, she helped a floor manager move some inventory and developed sciatica in her right leg. She continued to work but the pain persisted, and she eventually went to the emergency room for an MRI scan, which showed a small rupture of the disk below the fifth lumbar vertebra. Disks-"the spine's shock absorbers-are sheathed in a fibrous casing called the annulus, which protects their gelatinous core, and when a disk ruptures bits of it break through the casing. The MRI scan showed that the protruding edge of Trisha's ruptured disk was just touching the right nerve root as it exited the spine. It also showed some narrowing of the disk immediately above-an early sign of the wear and tear of aging, or "degeneration."
Trisha was given Percocet and told to stop working. For several months, she also received epidural steroid injections, but her discomfort persisted. About nine months after Trisha injured herself, an orthopedic surgeon performed a relatively simple procedure called a discectomy, in which a fragment of the ruptured disk is removed. For more than three-quarters of patients with sciatica who undergo discectomy, the procedure helps relieve pain. Trisha's sciatica went away, but the pain in her lower back increased. Another MRI showed that the disk the surgeon had operated on was protruding again, this time toward both the right and the left nerve roots. The surgeon told Trisha that the next step would be to fuse her lower spine, which had become "unstable." He planned to remove the degenerated disk or disks that were causing the pain and mechanically brace the spine with metal rods and bone grafts. First, however, he wanted Trisha to undergo discography, a procedure that was supposed to determine how much of her pain was coming from the lower protruding disk and how much from the upper, narrowed one. This information would help him decide whether one or two disks should be removed.
Trisha Bryant assumed that the procedures her surgeon recommended were necessary and had been validated by research. I, too, made that assumption when I suffered from recurrent lower-back pain twenty years ago and elected to have a fusion. If Trisha had explored the medical literature, however, she would have discovered that every aspect of her case-the interpretation of her MRI scan, the diagnosis of spinal instability, the rationale for fusing vertebrae, the impending discography-was controversial among spine specialists. Indeed, many doctors might recommend that she avoid any further surgery.
For the discography, which was performed at a Boston hospital, Trisha was asked to lie on a long metal table with her lower back exposed. A radiologist trained in the technique, explained that he would be applying increasing amounts of pressure to her disks, and that Trisha should try to discern whether the pain she felt during the procedure was "familiar," or "different" from her current symptoms. Then he administered some anesthetic just under the skin and inserted a needle called a trocar into Trisha's lower back. Following his progress on a fluoroscope monitor, he slowly advanced the trocar until it reached the edge of the disk above the ruptured one. He then inserted a fine-gauge needle into the trocar and pushed it into the disk itself. Trisha gasped. "There are lots of nerve fibres in the annulus," the doctor said. "I'm sorry."
He took an instrument resembling a huge syringe which was attached to a digital monitor, fastened it to the fine-gauge needle, and began to press on the plunger. "Now, tell me if you feel any pain," he said, "and whether the pain you are feeling is the familiar pain that you are suffering from." If Trisha did not feel her familiar pain, this disk would serve as a control. A series of red neon digits raced across the monitor-20, 25, 28, then 30-representing the pounds per square inch of pressure that he was applying within the disk; Trisha squirmed with each new increment. At 100, the doctor withdrew the trocar, while the technician recorded her reaction.
The doctor then repeated the procedure an inch or so down Trisha's spine, on the adjacent disk that was protruding. This time, when the pressure hit 30 on the monitor, Trisha cried, "Oh, God! Oh, God!" "Is that your familiar pain?" the doctor asked. Trisha said that the pain was viselike, and that she also felt a few electric shocks in her buttocks and her thighs. At 40, Trisha, sobbing, said it was familiar pain.
"It's over," the doctor said. He told Trisha that she had done very well. This radiologist performs discography three hundred times a year. He says that it is his least enjoyable procedure, because patients are intentionally subjected to pain. More troubling, however, is the fact that the results it provides may be dangerously misleading.
Much of the recent research into the limitations of discography as a diagnostic tool was done by Dr. Eugene Carragee, the director of Stanford's Orthopedic Spine Center, who has received four national prizes in recognition of his work. One study was an assessment of patients who, like Trisha Bryant, underwent discography after having had some form of back surgery. He found that forty percent of patients who had no back pain after surgery still experienced significant pain during discography; on the other hand, nearly forty percent of those with persistent back pain after surgery reported no pain during the procedure. In other words, there was no meaningful correlation between pain suffered after surgery and pain suffered during discography.
A related study examined the responses of patients during discography who had other kinds of aches and pains; some of them had somatization disorder, a psychological condition that expresses itself in physical symptoms. Eighty-three percent of those with somatization disorder experienced significant pain during the procedure. In general, Carragee found that patients who suffered from depression or anxiety were more likely to find discography painful, and some reported lower-back pain for at least a year afterward. For these patients, not only did discography fail to provide clinically useful data but it risked causing long-term pain as well.
CT and MRI scans, which usually precede discography, are often used to make the case for surgery, but the correlation between damaged or degenerated disks and lower-back pain is far from conclusive. A recent study of CT scans showed that twenty-seven percent of healthy people over the age of forty had a herniated disk, ten percent had an abnormality of the vertebral facet joints, and fifty percent had other anatomical changes that were judged significant. And yet none of these people had nagging back pain. Another study, using MRI scanning, showed that thirty-six percent of people over sixty had a herniated disk, and some eighty to ninety percent of them had significant disk degeneration in the form of narrowing or bulging. Given that degenerated disks are often found in people who are fully functioning, it shouldn't be assumed that they are always the cause of the trouble.
If disks aren't necessarily the source of lower-back pain, where else might the pain come from? The various muscles, tendons, bones, joints, and ligaments of the lower back all contain sensory nerves that can transmit messages of pain through the spinal cord and up to the brain; so can organs within the abdomen and the pelvis when they become inflamed or diseased. With so many potential sources of pain, how do doctors arrive at an accurate diagnosis? It turns out that the kinds of diagnostic tests ordered for back patients depend upon the type of physician they consult. A 1994 research study entitled "Who You See Is What You Get" demonstrated that each group of specialists favored the diagnostic tools of their discipline. Neurologists ordered electromyograms (EMGs)-tests in which the integrity of the neural-conduction system is assessed by inserting electric needles into muscles and along nerve tracks. Rheumatologists, who are experts in arthritis and other joint disorders, ordered serologies-blood tests that identify relatively rare autoimmune conditions that affect the spine. And surgeons requested MRI scans, which reveal the anatomy of the disks and vertebral bones and may suggest a surgical solution.
"Each approach to diagnosis and treatment is essentially a franchise, and there are too many franchises battling for control," says Dr. Seth Waldman, who is the chief of the Division of Pain Medicine at New York's Hospital for Special Surgery, a major referral center for bone and joint disorders. "In medicine, if you are able to stick a needle into a person, you are reimbursed at a much better rate by the insurance company. So there is a tremendous drive to perform invasive procedures." Discography is one of them. "At the hospital where I was a fellow training in 1993, discograms were rarely done," Waldman went on. "Over the last few years, they have come into vogue. Surgeons and others order them routinely."
In the end, however, about eighty-five per cent of patients who suffer from lower-back pain cannot be given a precise diagnosis. The pain is usually vaguely attributed to a "strain" or "sprain" in the lumbar region. Whatever the diagnosis, though, the outcomes tend to be similar. In a study that followed patients who consulted their doctors within three days of experiencing acute lower-back pain, ninety percent improved within two to seven weeks, without specific therapy. Even patients with an acute ruptured disk have a good prognosis, although their recovery is usually slower: some ninety percent will feel significantly better within six weeks, without surgery. Over time, the disk gradually retracts, so that it is no longer pressing on the nerves, and the inflammation subsides. If you have acute sciatica, discectomy will make you feel better more quickly than you would if you did nothing. But if you have chronic lower-back pain, the case for surgery-particularly fusion-is far more tenuous.
I recently met with a surgeon who performs two or three spinal fusions a week. I will call him Dr. Wheeler. (Like some of the doctors I spoke with, he was concerned that candid answers would damage his standing in the medical community and reduce patient referrals.) "Spinal instability is routinely given as a diagnosis to these patients with chronic lower-back pain," Wheeler said. "It is a term used to justify an operation. And it's a great diagnosis, because it can't be directly disproved."
For many years, Wheeler recommended that his patients with back trouble avoid fusion surgery unless it was absolutely necessary. (Fusion is clearly recommended when vertebral bones that have been dislocated or damaged by disease are endangering the spinal cord or the nerves.) But there are considerable forces weighing against his conservative advice, particularly when patients have had an accident or an injury on the job, and stand to benefit financially from persistent disability. "In my community, there is a group of neurologists who work directly with lawyers," Wheeler said. "The lawyers refer the patients to these neurologists after an accident or a work-related injury leaves them with back trouble. The neurologists charge up to fifteen hundred dollars for EMGs, then get five hundred dollars for their report to the attorney. In more than twenty years of practice, I have never seen them read an EMG as negative in an accident case. These patients are then told by the neurologists that they have severe disk disease. This enhances their perception of pain. And if they get operated on they don't necessarily have to go back to work."
Wheeler says that he is put in a difficult position whenever one of these referring neurologists tells a patient that tests or scans indicate there is something seriously wrong with his spine. "The neurologist, when challenged, says, I am pro-patient. I am a patient advocate.' Someone should audit the EMGs that they are doing-they're all read as positive, and its nonsense."
Of course, most doctors do not engage in such egregious behavior, and many clinicians believe that they are providing their patients with the best advice available. Nevertheless, the culture of medicine fosters lucrative networks of referrals and procedures which discourage a critical examination of their value. For patients, the system of benefits also favors the trend toward surgery: they generally receive greater disability payments if they undergo back surgery, and higher benefits are paid for fusion operations than for discectomies. Eventually, Wheeler discovered that nearly all the patients he turned away ended up being operated on by other surgeons in his area. If his patients were going to have surgery, he reasoned, he may as well be the one to do it; at least he would know that the operation had been performed competently. Nor could he ignore the fact that, where he practices, the surgeon's full fee for a simple discectomy is between five and seven thousand dollars, and some twenty to thirty thousand dollars for a fusion.
Dr. Wheeler recently performed a spinal fusion on a forty-five-year-old U.P.S. worker. A year earlier, the patient had injured his back while lifting a package on the job, and although he had followed his doctor's recommendations, he was still experiencing severe pain. "Something needs to be done," he told Wheeler. The MRI scan showed disk degeneration, with narrowing and bulging between the fourth and fifth lumbar vertebrae and between the fifth lumbar and the first sacral vertebrae.
The patient was anesthetized and lay on a Jackson table, a large translucent platform that supports the chest and the thighs but allows the abdomen to hang free; this diminishes the pressure on the spinal veins and reduces hemorrhaging. After taking X-rays, Wheeler made a vertical incision some twelve inches long in the patient's lower back, exposing the taut sheath of connective tissue called fascia and the underlying paraspinal muscles. He then used a cutting cautery to burn through the tissues that lie above the spinal column. Acrid smoke wafted up from the patient's back.
"Periosteal elevators," Wheeler said to a resident, who picked up a large metal instrument that resembled a straight spoon with a sharp tip and used it to pull back the bulky muscles surrounding the spine. Wheeler continued with the cutting cautery, and blood flowed into the open wound. Once the muscles had been stripped from the spine, the yellow-white bone of the spinous process-the protruding ridge of the spine that you feel when you run your hand down your back-was exposed. Using rongeurs, which look like hedge dippers, Wheeler snipped at the spinous process while the nurse collected the bone chips-approximately the size of matchsticks-in a sterile basin. After about twenty minutes of cutting, the dura covering the spinal nerves became visible: a gray-blue tube speckled with blood and slivers of bone. This was one of the most sensitive points in the operation. A tear in the dura would cause the spinal fluid to leak out, and a surgical slip could permanently damage the spinal nerve. Using a high-speed drill with a very fine bit, Wheeler made holes in the vertebral bones on either side of the spine. "It looks like we are construction workers, not surgeons," he said. He then inserted titanium screws into the holes with a screwdriver.
There are several types of lumbar fusions; Wheeler was performing what is termed a PLIF, a posterior lumbar interbody fusion. After removing the degenerated disks, he would insert bone grafts, which had been harvested from the tibia of a cadaver and customized to fit between the patient's vertebrae. Then the titanium screws and rods would be joined together on each side of the vertebrae, with a connecting rod between them, in the form of an H.
The disk is on the front side of the spinal cord; to expose it, the resident retracted the nerve and the dura. Wheeler was handed a scalpel with a small blade. He gingerly cut into the annulus and, using a curette, scooped out pieces of the disk, which looked like the yellowish gristle at the end of a drumstick. Then, with a fine chisel he scraped the undersurface of the vertebra; the remaining cartilaginous disk came off with bloody pieces of bone. "You want raw, bleeding bone," Wheeler said to the resident. "It has all sorts of growth factors and substances that facilitate the fusion of the grafts." He then took the cadaver grafts and inserted them snugly between the vertebrae. Wheeler repeated the procedure between the fifth lumbar and the first sacral vertebrae. Now the titanium rods, each of which was five and a half millimetres in diameter and some fifteen centimetres in length, had to be cut to fit the patient's anatomy.
Because more bone is needed to complete a fusion than can be harvested from the spine, Wheeler then used the cautery to tunnel through the patient's right buttock to the crest of the iliac bone. Using an osteotome, a long, thin, chisel-like instrument, he chopped deep into the bone, producing additional chips. "The bone from the iliac crest of the pelvis is potatoes, and what we have from the spinous process of the vertebrae is just the gravy," Wheeler explained.
Wheeler showed the resident how to secure the titanium rods with the screws. A crossbar was then attached, completing the H Figure. "Wring out the pads," Wheeler said to the resident. The resident picked up the blood-soaked gauze and squeezed the liquid into the metal basin that contained the bone chips. The slurry of bone chips and blood was layered along the sides of the titanium rods. Over time, this mixture would solidify, further supporting the spine. Finally, the retractors that held back the paraspinal muscles were ratcheted down, and the muscles and skin were sutured and stapled together. The procedure had taken nearly five hours.
What are this patient's prospects for a future that is free from back pain? Fairly poor. Dr. Eugene Carragee, at Stanford, performs the operation only on a select group of patients who have been carefillly screened. Even so, he estimates that less than a quarter of the operations will be completely successful. For the majority of patients, the surgery does not have a dramatic impact on either their pain or their mobility.
Many patients end up going back to their surgeons; a study of workers injured on the job in the state of Washington who received fusions for degenerative-disk disease reported that twenty-two percent had further surgery. Dr. Waldman, at New York's Hospital for Special Surgery, regularly sees spinal-fusion patients who experience persistent pain after multiple operations. Yet few patients facing spinal surgery seem to have any idea that the statistics are so unfavorable, and within the surgical profession itself there's a curious gap between rhetoric and reality. Last December, the journal Spine published the results of an award-winning study from Scandinavia in which patients who underwent fusion surgery for chronic lower-back pain were compared with those who had had no surgery. In this randomized controlled trial, only one out of every six of the patients in the surgical group was rated by an independent observer as having an "excellent" result after two years. It's a measure of how weak the empirical support for fusion surgery has been that this study is seen as bolstering its legitimacy within the profession.
When you look at the recent history of back surgery, in fact, you can't help wondering whether many surgeons simply don't want to subject their practices to rigorous review. In 1993, the federal Agency for Health Care Policy and Research convened a panel of twenty-three experts in back pain from a wide spectrum of disciplines-neurology, orthopedics, internal medicine, radiology, chiropractic, rheumatology, psychology, nursing. Among its members was Richard Deyo, an internist and an expert on back pain at the University of Washington. Deyo had recently published a statistical analysis of existing research which suggested that spinal fusion generally lacked scientific rationale, and also that it had a significantly higher rate of complication than did discectomy. The panel was to formulate guidelines for the clinical management of acute lower-back pain by evaluating the scientific evidence concerning its diagnosis and treatment. Although the panel did not discuss coverage, it seemed likely that Medicare and private insurers would consider these guidelines when determining reimbursement for different diagnostic and treatment approaches.
Fusion surgery was not explicitly addressed by the panel, since it was considering treatment options for patients only in the first three months after the onset of back pain. Nevertheless, almost as soon as the panel convened, it came under attack. Contending that the deliberations were not an open process and that the panelists were biased against surgery, a group of spine surgeons, led by Dr. Neil Kahanovitz, an orthopedist who was then a board member of the North American Spine Society, lobbied Congress to cut off A.H.C.P.R.s funding. Deyo recently told me that the line taken by the opponents of the panel was "'These guys are anti-surgery, they're anti-fusion.' But we really had no axe to grind," he went on. "Our aim was to critically examine the evidence and outcomes of common medical practices."
After the November, 1994, elections, the lobbyists found the newly configured House of Representatives receptive. "It was the time of Newt Gingrich, and the Contract with America," Deyo recalled. "Although the American Medical Association, the American College of Physicians, and the American Hospital Association all tried to save the A.H.C.P.R., the House zeroed out its budget." The lobbying battle moved to the Senate, and though the federal agency ultimately survived, its funds were drastically cut. Sofamor Danek, a company that manufactured hardware used in fusion suigery, sought a court injunction to block publication of the committee's findings. The guidelines that were eventually published were medically conservative, but the furor surrounding the panel tainted its credibility, and its recommendations have had little impact on surgical practice.
Kahanovitz still defends his earlier actions. But even he admits that he is worried by what he views as a proliferation of spinal fusions. "When I began in spine, there were a handful of fellowships in the country," Kahanovitz said. "There are now over eighty fellowship programs in spine surgery. That means each year more and more specialists are being trained." And those specialists, of course, seek opportunities to use their training. The technology, too, has rapidly developed. "We have new toys to play with-all sorts of screws, rods, and cages." These instruments are aggressively marketed, and generate high profit margins-both for the manufacturers and for the hospitals that use them. At the same time, Kahanovitz said, "We still don't have a clue where the pain is coming from in the vast majority of chronic sufferers."
Like most patients who have undergone spinal fusions, I continued to have persistent lower-back pain afterward: I couldn't run, I couldn't drive for long stretches, I couldn't carry heavy grocery bags. When I returned to my surgeon to report on my poor recovery, he offered to perform the operation again. I declined, but I never questioned his medical rationale-that fusion, although it is a major operation with a high rate of complication, had been my only chance to be free from pain. I simply assumed that I had been very unlucky.
In the past few years, however, reports of other treatment options have begun to circulate. In 1999, the Physicians Neck and Back Clinic, in Minnesota, conducted a study in which sixty patients whose doctors had recommended back surgery agreed to participate in a ten-week program of aggressive strengthening exercises. Forty-six completed the program; thirty-eight of those were available for follow-up, and only three elected to have surgery. The study concluded that many patients who had been told they needed surgery were able to avoid it in the short term by following an exercise regimen, and suggested that doctors needed to reassess their definition of "adequate conservative care" for back pain. Shortly after the study was published, a friend suggested that I attend a similar program at the New England Baptist Spine Center, in Boston. A first-time visitor to the Baptist Spine Center is greeted by the sight of a large exercise room, full of men and women of all ages engaged in just the sorts of activities that most people who suffer from back pain have been warned against: running on treadmills, lifting weights with their knees, stacking milk crates filled with steel bricks. In addition to the machines that one finds in an ordinary gym, there are specially designed "multihip" machines, back-strengthening machines, and a Roman chair, which braces your lower legs, knee-down, at a forty-degree angle from the floor as you attempt to hold up the rest of your body. Each patient's level of strength and degree of flexibility are carefully monitored. Records are also kept of the patient's capacity to execute ordinary activities: pick up a child, sit at a desk, have sexual intercourse. Each patient's regimen is designed to make the muscles strong again, the ligaments elastic, and the vertebrae well supported.
Dr. James Rainville, who is the head of the Spine Center, explains to his patients that although their pain is debilitating it is not a sign that they are doing themselves any harm. Like many rehabilitative physicians, he believes that chronic pain originally has a physical cause but that it may become magnified and imprinted along the sensory pathways of the central nervous system. The solution, Rainville thinks, is to try to change the sensitivity of the neurofibres by "reeducating them" through strenuous exercise. In fact, the more the patient exercises correctly, the higher his pain threshold becomes. The hope is that his sensory circuits will be rewired to transmit signals of the healthy aches of exercise rather than the terrifying pain of debility.
Rainville's program of aggressive rehabilitation exercise has been supported during the past decade by prospective studies. A recent analysis of sixty-seven patients with long-standing back pain, nearly all of whom had had prior surgery or other forms of treatment, showed that the regimen improved physical capacity and reduced pain. Between twenty-five and forty per cent of the patients for whom performing flexion and extension maneuvers was painful when they entered the program were free from pain by the time they were discharged; the others experienced a marked reduction in the intensity of their pain. Still, Rainville argues, it will be impossible to properly compare the results of such nonsurgical interventions with surgery until both options are included in a well-designed randomized study.
Doctors often describe the treatment of lower-back pain as "an industry," and as long as patients are confronted with an array of conflicting advice, that's unlikely to change: the desperate patient sitting in the doctor's office is especially vulnerable to the persuasive recommendations of whatever professional he happens to be consulting. Nine months after meeting Trisha Bryant at the time of her discography, I called her to find out how she was doing. She had undergone fusion surgery in early December. "I'm actually in worse pain now than before the fusion operation," she told me. "My sciatica has returned." She has not been able to go back to work, and the pain prevents her from sitting, driving, or walking for extended periods of time. I'm thirty-five years old," she said, "and I feel like I have the body of an eighty-year-old."
Dr. James Weinstein, the head of orthopedic surgery at Dartmouth and a leading expert in back pain, believes that there needs to be a radical improvement in the way doctors approach treatment: patients must be given unbiased information on what is known and not known about back pain and the various ways of treating it. Instead of informed consent, Weinstein advocates what he calls "informed choice"-a comprehensive understanding of all the options and their possible risks and benefits.
Weinstein is now leading the first prospective, randomized investigation of discectomy for ruptured lumbar disks to be conducted in nearly thirty years. This trial, which is sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, will cost more than thirteen million dollars. Even so, it will not address fusion surgery for chronic back pain; the participating physicians couldn't agree on diagnostic criteria and forms of treatment. For the tens of thousands of patients facing lower-lumbar fusion each year, no rigorous, government-sponsored study is forthcoming.
In the meantime, Dr. Seth Waldman, who sees the consequences of failed fusions at the Hospital for Special Surgery every week, wishes that the medical profession could be persuaded to show a little restraint. "If you have a screwdriver, everything looks like a screw," he said. "There will be a lot of people doing the wrong thing for back pain for a long time, until we finally figure it out. I just hope that we don't hurt too many people in the process." •


text:
Back To ACC
Florida State Handles Maryland with Ease
By Southern Pigskin Staff
Follow us at Twitter.com/SouthernPigskin. Become a fan at the SouthernPigskin.com Facebook Page
Maryland never got anything going and was lost after quarterback C.J. Brown left the game with an injury in the second quarter.
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Eighth-ranked Florida State stayed undefeated in Atlantic Coast Conference play with a 63-0 victory over No. 25 Maryland on Saturday.
The Seminoles (5-0, 3-0) rode the arm of quarterback Jameis Winston, who completed 23-of-32 passes for 393 yards and a career-high five touchdowns. He's now thrown for 1,441 yards, 17 touchdowns with two interceptions and a 73.3 completion percentage.
Tight end Nick O'Leary had 55 yards receiving and two touchdowns and receiver Kelvin Benjamin added 60 yards and two touchdowns. The Seminoles put up 614 yards of total offense.
Maryland (4-1, 0-1) never got anything going and was lost after quarterback C.J. Brown left the game with an injury in the second quarter. The No. 2 total offense in the ACC was held to 234 yards.
The Florida State defense was the concern throughout the week after giving up 34 points to Boston College seven days ago. Defenders got out of their lanes and missed tackles — something the Seminoles couldn't afford against a Maryland offense that averaged 498.5 yards per game.
That was not a problem.
The Terrapins were held to 121 first-half yards and Florida State gave up a season-low 11 yards rushing on 10 attempts in the first half. Maryland punted on its first three possessions of the game, a Florida State first this season. The Terps converted just 1-of-7 third downs in the first 30 minutes and 2-of-15 all game.
Things became even worse for Maryland when starting quarterback. Brown went down late in the second quarter with the Terrapins trailing 14-0. Brown released a pass downfield just before Dan Hicks hit him around the waist and Jaccobi McDaniel followed with a blow to the chest. Brown lay on the turf for several minutes before he immediately headed to the locker room with a member of the medical staff. Maryland announced that Brown was taken for X-rays and he did not return in the second half.
The Maryland offense was held to 234 yards and 33 yards rushing on 25 attempts.
It was the Florida State offense that started slow this week, but that didn't last long. The Seminoles scored on their first drive, a Karlos Williams 1-yard touchdown run, and then punted on the next three consecutive drives. That's when the Winston show began.
The Seminoles scored touchdowns on their next eight consecutive possessions as Winston reaffirmed his Heisman Trophy candidacy.
The weekly highlight came late in the third quarter when the pocket collapsed and Maryland linebacker Yannik Cudjoe-Virgil jumped on Winston's back. The quarterback ducked and slid out of the sack, rolled right and threw a 12-yard touchdown pass to O'Leary.
The 63 points were the second-most scored during the Jimbo Fisher era. The Seminoles beat Murray State 69-3 in 2012.
Williams added another touchdown from 17 yards out in the fourth quarter and backup quarterback Jacob Coker ran for a 24-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter.
Florida State has a bye week before it travels to No. 3 Clemson on Oct. 19.
Maryland hosts Virginia next week.
Notes: Florida State starting center Bryan Stork suffered a concussion in the second quarter and did not return.
Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Vancouver Canucks icon Trevor Linden hates NHL lockout as a fan, past NHLPA president
Hastings hero returns to Pacific Coliseum on Saturday
Trevor Linden at Club 16 located at the Vancouver Convention Centre. Linden will be honoured by the Vancouver Giants on Saturday when they face the Tri-City Americans at Pacific Coliseum.
Photograph by: Kim Stallknecht , PNG
VANCOUVER — He was a hero on Hastings Street a long time ago, but the Vancouver Giants will formalize that honour for Trevor Linden before their junior game Saturday night at the Pacific Coliseum.
The 42-year-old — and, yes, that number is hard to believe because what does that make us? — was heroic in several ways during his hockey career, most importantly for his devotion as a Vancouver Canuck to charity and community. It wasn't a computer glitch or patronage that earned Linden The Order of Canada a couple of years ago.
He should have been honoured for saving the National Hockey League eight years ago, working through back channels to broker peace and build an exit lane from a destructive dispute that scuttled the 2004-05 season. Instead, Linden was vilified by some as the traitor who toppled NHL Players' Association czar Bob Goodenow and "caved" to league owners, who got their salary cap.
Caved? Really? After a full season lost and no end in sight to the labour war? How many winters without the NHL needed to pass in Canada before it would have been honourable to devise a Plan B?
It was clear then, as it is now, that not enough owners care enough about hockey and its fans to view the NHL as anything other than a business to enrich themselves.
Not only did Linden, as the union president, get the NHL back on the ice, the NHLPA just about ran the table on contract items. The players' "defeat" was so complete they collected $12 billion US in salaries over the life of a Collective Bargaining Agreement that enabled owners to generate record revenues and dramatically escalate the value of their franchises, as evidenced by Forbes' current valuation of the Canucks at $342 million and the Toronto Maple Leafs at $1 billion.
The owners, led by their commissioner-general Gary Bettman, are at war again with players because their "victory" last time didn't quite work out as expected.
Unfortunately, not only is Linden not involved this time, there is no player with his former stature or title to work behind the scenes for a resolution. The NHLPA, during its gong-show period after Linden left, restructured and eliminated the role of player-president.
Instead of that check-and-balance in the system, executive director Donald Fehr was allowed to hire little brother Steve as his top deputy in the NHLPA. And instead of a small, president-led player executive providing oversight, 31 players from a negotiating committee rotate in and out of bargaining sessions and any of the other 700 union members can sit in whenever they wish. With so many people in a charge, no one is in charge, except Fehr.
Linden hasn't anything to say about this.
"I hate what is happening to the game, just like every fan does," he said Wednesday. "But I'm just a fan now; I can't offer any insights. I realize how hard it is on the people involved and how much people are missing hockey. Like everyone else, I hope to see the NHL back soon. But nothing I can say is going to help the sides reach an agreement. It isn't my fight any more."
Linden has other negotiations to worry about. Linden's Club 16 fitness chain is opening a fourth branch in Surrey to go with gyms in Coquitlam, Burnaby and downtown Vancouver. He has real-estate development projects in Victoria and Kitsilano and is in demand as a corporate speaker.
Four years since his retirement as a Canuck, Linden continues to chase adventure. He competed in a Germany-to-Italy bike race last summer, did cycling trips to Bend, Ore., and Santa Cruz, Calif., in the fall and is planning a spring race in the Alps, where he will ski-hike from Chamonix, France, to Zermatt in Switzerland.
Somehow there wasn't time for that when he played, and he wouldn't have time for it now if he worked in hockey management or operations. He has had opportunities to pursue NHL jobs, but isn't willing to leave Vancouver or give his life back to hockey.
He's looking forward to seeing the Giants play the Tri-City Americans on Saturday. The Giants are honouring him as part of the Western Hockey League club's Heroes of Hastings series.
"I'll never forget the first time I was there," Linden said of the Coliseum, where he played seven seasons before the Canucks moved downtown. "It was the summertime after I was drafted and I came out in July for a camp. I had to go to the Coliseum to get equipment ... and just across from the dressing room were storerooms. They had all this equipment in there; I'd never seen anything that incredible in my life. It was brand new equipment and I could take anything I wanted.
"This was the NHL! I couldn't believe it. Then walking out into the bowl, to be in a rink that big was really cool. I was just so in awe of the big rink."
He seemed suited to the big stage, in hockey and beyond.
His dream as a boy was to play in the WHL.
Linden was part of the Medicine Hat Tigers' dynasty in the late '80s, when his hometown team won back-to-back Memorial Cups. The Canucks drafted him second overall in 1988.
"Growing up in the 1970s, there was no Edmonton Oilers, no Calgary Flames and the NHL was a TV show on Saturday night," Linden recalled. "But the Medicine Hat Tigers, they were real. I remember going to my grandpa's house and he had an actual Medicine Hat Tigers' puck, which I was blown away with. My aunt told me she saw Kelly Hrudey at a movie once and I didn't believe it. I actually thought these guys didn't really exist, they just lived at the arena. My dream was to play for the Tigers."
Linden overshot his goal a little bit.
On Twitter: Twitter.com/imacvansun


text:
Meryl Streep Speaks Out About Kids, Toxic Chemicals and Going Green
Meryl Streep Speaks Out About Kids, Toxic Chemicals and Going Green
"When you become a parent, you start to notice what they're eating, what they're breathing, and children are like canaries in the mine." Meryl Streep.
Meryl Streep is not just a great actress. She has also been carrying the green flag for more than 20 years. In 1989, having read a Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) report about pesticides on fruits and vegetables, Ms. Streep founded Mothers and Others. A concerned mother herself, Ms. Streep and a few neighbors she recruited started handing out informational flyers in the neighborhood and making pests of themselves in local grocery stores demanding they do their part in keeping kids safe.
This humble beginning eventually changed laws, and Ms. Streep continued as an activist. She became a staunch supporter of several other causes and foundations, including Healthy Child Healthy World. In fact, she wrote the forward to the book Healthy Child Healthy World: Creating a Greener, Cleaner, Safer Home and has info about the organization, and several others, on her website.
In case you are unaware of this, Naturepedic crib mattresses are the only brand recommended by Healthy Child Healthy World. I would bet Ms. Streep would really like our toddler and baby mattresses!
Ms. Streep also lives a personally 'green' life.
She was recently interviewed by the Natural Resources Defense Council about her beliefs, her lifestyle and her experiences. Check out Beyond Acting: Meryl Streep, Activist Mom on the NRDC's Simple Steps website. The interview also includes several brief video clips.
Ms. Streep is a prime example of the influence mothers can have on the health of our children, ourselves, and the environment. Check out the interview.
Photo credit: Brigitte Lacombe


text:
Tuesday, 14 September 2010
Staff Reading Pick
Here is another reading pick from the Logan Library Staff.
Book: Henry Clay: The Essential American by David S. Heidler and Jeanne T. Heidler
Recommended by: Ronald Jenkins, Library Director
For most of us, when we hear the name Henry Clay, we think of the Great Compromiser. We would be correct, but he was much, much more than that. He served in Congress for 49 years, served as the Secretary of State under John Quincey Adams, and ran for President on five different occasions. He was also very much a family man, married to Lucretia Hart, having eleven children, seven of whom died while young. This new biography by David and Jeanne Heidler captures the life of Henry Clay like no other. A truly fascinating look back at a man whose influence on American history was profound.
Want more reading suggestions? View previous staff picks.
Posted By Logan Library at 12:05 PM in Category:Staff Picks
The Latest News!
Oct 16, 2018
» Community Book Discussion Oct 10, 2018
» The Dead Awaken Oct 5, 2018
» Library Closed Columbus Day


text:
Feld Entertainment Inc.
Feld Entertainment® is the worldwide leader in producing and presenting live touring family entertainment experiences that lift the human spirit and create indelible memories, with 30 million people in attendance at its shows each year. Feld Entertainment's productions have appeared in more than 75 countries on six continents and include Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey®, Monster Jam®, Monster Energy Supercross, Nuclear Cowboyz®, AMSOIL Arenacross, Marvel Universe LIVE!, Disney On Ice and Disney Live!
Redemption Instructions
Sharing Options
Participating locations include:


text:
I'm exploring the web to find sites I like
KM 18.5, Cabo San Lucas 23400, Mexico
"best romantic getaway of all time"
Posted by: janet on Dec 4, 2014
see all reviews
Our open-air hacienda-style architecture offers spacious luxury suites in varying sizes, all with ocean views from your private and furnished terrace.
Share your experiences with others. Don't forget to send your review to Debbie by using an easy form.
"best romantic getaway of all time"
Posted by:
janet on Dec 4, 2014 >
1 contribution(s) GERMANY
Visited on: Sep, 2014 | Leisure | With Spouse/Partner
523 people found this review helpful
We came here on a visiting theme because a colleague of ours was celebrating his wedding anniversary but it was such a great vacation for us and we vowed to come back again to enjoy the completeness of this hotel. We went as a couple too and we had the most romantic getaway ever in the history of our getaways. The warm welcome we got on arrival was so heartwarming and the trip from the airport wasn't that stressful or far from the hotel. The hotel environment is adequate and the place is quite easy to walk around in. Everything in the room we stayed in was functional; the room was clean and had everything we could have needed, even those that weren't present, when we asked for it, it was quickly given to us. Most of the time we stayed in for breakfast and had it on the balcony that had a great ocean view. It is an all inclusive resort that had lots of restaurants and we ate from most of it, there was no complain at all. The foods come in great portions so we had enough to eat and the staff members at the restaurants were great. The room service is great and the resort has about two pools and they are all clean. From the pool, you could get an amazing view of the ocean, it was great and if there was anything we enjoyed on the beach the most, it was surfing.
"Solid family vacation but not quite a five-star, although pretty awesome."
Posted by:
Barbara on Dec 30, 2011 >
2 contribution(s) Canada
Visited on: Dec, 2011 | Leisure | With friend
729 people found this review helpful
We were there Dec 18-25 2011, two females from Toronto. The travel to Calgary then to SJD was a nightmare with a 13 hr layover, but basically our fault for misreading it as 3 hrs! 3 flights arrived at the same time and the airport was a madhouse, but eventually we got on the bus and were at the hotel within half an hour. We had asked for 5th floor adult side double bed, but they gave us a king bed, so we asked for double and were given a great room overlooking the main pool, close to everything. Great room, spotless, lots of amenities and a microwave. Beach was gritty so take water shoes, and you cannot swim in the ocean due to riptides. We swam in the adult pool, with great bar service and you could also order food. The Rendezvous lobby bar was always hopping and they served Herradura, Hornitos, Jose Tradicional tequilas. The morning buffet had lots of options and it's wonderful to overlook the sea while dining on chilaquiles. Oceania and Seaside Grill had fresh food. Yes, the tortilla chips did have a Cheez Whiz kind of sauce, but I stuck with the fresh guacamole and pico de gallo, which was delicious. Room service was fantastic, esp the tortilla soup and grilled chicken breast; eggs benedict and 3-eggwhite veggie omelette in morning. Bartenders such as Moises, Jorge and Pepe kept the drinks flowing and us in high spirits. Juanito the Westjet rep was great in arranging our whalewatching tour with Cabo-adventures.com - $85 US to go in a Zodiac inflatable boat that seats 20 (I am terrified of water but this was very safe); 3 hours at sea with Beth, the Welsh guide who speaks fluent spanish, and Michelle her sister who is the photographer; we saw sea lions, El Arco del Cabo, dolphins, sea birds, and yes, humpback whales. We bought the CD of our pics for $35USD and it also includes a ton of National Geographic quality photos. I recommend Caliente Casino at Puerto Paraiso Mall where I walked out each time with more money than I walked in with. For tequila shopping, I suggest La Europea at Puerto Paraiso Mall as their prices are cheaper than Duty Free.
We liked Dreams and would return - they have a six dollar shuttle into either town on a regular schedule - but unfortunately it is the other side of the country for us. We are more likely to go to something on the Caribbean side of the world. The kids Explorers Club looked fantastic, they had bungee jumping, face painting, and the kids looked happy and busy. Who could want more than that? There's also a dolphin experience in San Jose Del cabo for about $110 pp. I did not participate but you could watch the interaction from an observer area. Every single person walked out of there with a giant grin on their face.
In sum, it is a solid four-star - not quite five star in terms of turn-down service, chocolates on pillow, luxury like The Royal in PDC, but good value and very beautiful. Thanks to Raj, Elizabeth and Yana for making happy me
Room Number:


text:
Augustana at a glance
Ranked in the top tier of U.S. News, Augustana College offers 90 majors and areas of study, and 25 varsity athletic teams. The beautiful campus is located along the Mississippi River in Rock Island, Illinois.
Augustana is a selective, private liberal arts college, founded in 1860 by Swedish settlers.
The 115-acre wooded campus is part of the Quad-Cities (population 400,000), and about 165 miles west of Chicago.
2,600 students
90 majors and related areas of study
Augie Choice: Gives $2,000 to every student for an internship, research or study abroad.
Student-faculty ratio 12:1.
Average class size: 18. All classes taught by faculty (no graduate teaching assistants).
Varsity athletics teams: 13 men's and 12 women's
Music ensembles: 13
Augustana is a residential campus. First-year and sophomore students live in residence halls; juniors may choose transitional living areas (apartment-style housing on campus); seniors live on campus or in the neighborhood.
Student activities include music groups, theatre, debate, publications, broadcasting, student government, local Greek system, and a wide variety of professional, religious, departmental, political, social and service organizations.
Augustana traces its roots to the Old World universities of Uppsala and Lund in Sweden: read about our mission and history.


text:
Rascal Flatts vs. Aaron Lewis – The Showdown
Rascal Flatts are on a roll. The group cracked a third-straight win yesterday and last night on Taste of Country Nights radio, leaving Mumford & Sons in a trail of country dust. Today, they'll face a new challenger in Staind frontman Aaron Lewis.
Lewis has been spreading his name in country for nearly two years now, and before that, he learned the ropes as a radio-successful rockstar in his own right. His single 'Forever' describes his time as a constant road warrior. Will it be powerful enough to overstep the painstaking vocals of country favorites the Flatts in their latest harmonizer, 'Changed'? That's up to you.
Listen to clips of both Rascal Flatts and Aaron Lewis' songs and vote for your favorite here. You can vote once every hour online, so come back and vote often to be sure your artist wins. Hear the full versions of the songs tonight after 10PM on Taste of Country Nights. Help your favorite song win by placing additional votes at (888) 678-9995. You can listen to the show online through any of the 41 radio stations that carry it. Voting will end tonight at 10:40PM CT.
Listen to a Sample of Rascal Flatts, 'Changed'
Listen to a Sample of Aaron Lewis, 'Forever'
Showdown Rules: The song with the most votes wins, and the winner goes on to face a new challenger in the next Showdown. Vote as much as once per hour online, and again by calling (888) 678-9995. If a song wins five days in a row, it will be retired into the Taste of Country Showdown Hall of Fame to allow for new songs to compete. Some songs will be considered for a second Showdown if voter turnout is healthy in a losing effort.


text:
OTTAWA — Federal fisheries officials were having "troubling" disagreements with Enbridge Inc. over the company's interpretation of its responsibility to protect fish habitat along the Northern Gateway oilsands pipeline route before the company submitted its project proposal in 2010, according to internal documents.
Enbridge was concluding some of the crossings, over an estimated 1,000 waterways, were low risk when fisheries biologists felt the same were medium or high risk to fish and fish habitat, according to emails obtained through the Access to Information Act.
"There is not much movement (by Enbridge) for avoidance of sensitive areas," said one biologist at a February, 2010 meeting, according to a record of that gathering of four officials with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO).
"Sometimes the proponent is pushing for the cheapest option," said another meeting participant in his reply.
The clash between Enbridge and DFO took shape more than two years before the Harper government, which had been heavily lobbied by Enbridge over concerns about DFO demands, tabled Fisheries Act amendments in its budget implementation bill in April.
Those changes, which according to critics would "gut" DFO's ability to protect habitat, have become a flashpoint in the opposition's battle against bill C-38 during a marathon voting session Wednesday and Thursday in the House of Commons.
Enbridge said one of the biologists, during the 2010 meeting, was designating stream crossings as "low risk" of habitat damage "that should have been medium or high risk."
There were also concerns, cited in documents obtained by Postmedia News, about Enbridge's approach to streams known for having important spawning channels or for wildlife species listed under the federal government's Species at Risk Act (SARA) or under the B.C. government's endangered species list.
A third biologist at the same meeting "stated concern on how the proponent is proposing the crossing methods through streams with SARA-listed species, spawning channels, with no hesitation. This is a concern and was raised at the last meeting with Enbridge."
A week prior to that meeting one of the participants sent an email to colleagues expressing concern about Enbridge's "approach" to habitat.
"The most troubling aspect of Enbridge's approach to deciding pipeline crossing techniques is the lack of consideration to our Hierarchy of Preferences to achieve no net loss of productive capacity," wrote the biologist, referring to the department's longstanding policy to avoid a "net loss" of habitat.
Enbridge's decision-making process doesn't "directly consider" the crossing of highly sensitive habitat, like a spawning area, to automatically trigger consideration of alternative — and usually more expensive — methods of getting a pipeline across the stream, the biologist wrote.
"'Redesign, relocate' does not seem to be automatically considered for designing a pipeline to avoid HADDs (harmful alteration, disruption or destruction) to spawning habitat."
The formal and informal information exchanges with Enbridge, which included joint fly-overs of the 1,177-kilometre Northern Gateway pipeline route from Alberta to the B.C. coast in helicopters, ended when the company filed its application later in 2010 to the joint National Energy Board-Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency panel now considering the controversial $5.5 billion megaproject.
But those concerns are still at play even though the regulatory landscape is dramatically changing as a result of bill C-38, the government's omnibus budget legislation now before Parliament.
The legislation includes sweeping changes to the Fisheries Act, considered Canada's most important and powerful environmental protection law.
The differences between Enbridge and fisheries biologists has become the subject of the joint panel review, with the panel asking DFO on May 27 to provide a list of "important" salmon-bearing waterways where the company and department disagree on risk assessment.
The department responded on June 6 to say it was unable to provide the list, as it hasn't yet done a complete review of all crossings.
"While there may be differences in opinion regarding the risk categorization for some proposed watercourse crossings, DFO will continue to work with Northern Gateway to determine the appropriate risk rating and level of mitigation required," the reply stated.
"DFO is of the view that the risk posed by the project to fish and fish habitat can be managed through appropriate mitigation and compensation measures."
Enbridge, which maintains its proposed pipeline crosses 773 watercourses (from small creeks to major rivers) and not more than 1,000 as DFO states, says on its website that 83 crossings are considered to be highly sensitive based on DFO guidelines.
The company said the pipeline will be buried deeper under sensitive crossings and will use pipelines with thicker walls in those circumstances.
"We will continue to work with the DFO on an ongoing basis and are highly confident that any differences of opinion can be resolved. As DFO has not conducted a complete review of all proposed crossings, it's premature at this time to speculate on future issues that may be raised. It's not appropriate for Enbridge to comment on internal communications between DFO personnel," Jennifer Varey, Enbridge's director of corporate communications said in an email.
"Both the DFO and Northern Gateway have expressed their willingness to work together to the Joint Review Panel and it's clear from DFO's evidence submissions, as well as from our interactions with them, they have confidence that any risk to fish and fish habitat can be mitigated through appropriate measures. It is our understanding that the DFO will continue to participate in the regulatory process and its findings will be included in the final risk assessment. DFO has stated, that in their view, Northern Gateway's approach is flexible enough to be updated if new information becomes available."
Enbridge, according to 2011 briefing notes obtained by the Access to Information Act, complained the department had made "onerous" demands to provide information on its pipeline plans.
And from January 1 to the tabling of recent Fisheries Act amendments company lobbyists met with a little more than100 government and opposition MPs, cabinet ministers and senior political and government officials, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper's chief of staff, Nigel Wright.
One of the items on the company's wish-list, according to the federal lobbyist registry, was the desire for "improved efficiencies in the government secondary permitting processes for Department of Fisheries and Oceans permits . . . for pipeline construction."
Bill C-38 will replace the current ban on any activity that results in "harmful" alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat. The government and any observers, especially from industry but also from the environmental movement, say some fisheries officers have been overzealous in enforcing this provision.
It is being replaced by a prohibition against activity that results in "serious" harm to fish that are part of a commercial, recreational or aboriginal fishery, or any fish that supports one of those three fisheries.
"Serious harm" is defined as the "death of fish" or any "permanent" alteration to, or "destruction" of, fish habitat.


text:
Send flowers with confidence from a Teleflora florist. All of our arrangements are professionally hand-arranged using the freshest flowers available and personally delivered in a vase.
People found this florist while looking for: St. Clair Shores flowers
Copyright © 2020 Teleflora – Fresh Flowers Hand Delivered Daily. All rights reserved.


text:
The Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints minors who were seized from the cult's Texas compound will be Yearning For Zion no longer — the Texas Supreme court has upheld a lower court's decision, and declared that the removal of children from the FLDS stronghold was unwarranted. Church spokesman Rod Parker says, "at this point there is no legal basis to hold anyone," and he wants the children to be reunited with their parents as soon as possible. What happens next is not entirely clear, according to the Los Angeles Times, because while the removal of the children was ruled unwarranted, the state is still allowed to "take other measures to protect [the children] while [the trial court] deliberated." Those measures, legal experts believe, could include requiring parents to stay in the area and/or move out of the Yearning For Zion ranch in addition to further DNA testing, the L.A. Times reports.
Three of the Texas Supreme court members wrote in a dissenting opinion that while the Department of Family and Protective Services was wrong to take all the children, there was proper evidence given in order to remove adolescent girls from "a pattern or practice of sexual abuse."
While the Department of Family and Protective Services clearly abused power, some of the evidence presented by the Department was incredibly damning. According to the Texas Supreme Court decision, "the Department presented 'Bishop's Records'- documents seized from the Ranch - indicating the presence of several extremely young mothers or pregnant 'wives' on the Ranch: a sixteen-year-old 'wife' with a child, a sixteen-year-old pregnant 'wife,' two pregnant fifteen-year-old "wives," and a thirteen-year-old who had conceived a child." The expert witness from the FLDS themselves "confirmed that the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints accepts the age of 'physical development' (that is, first menstruation) as the age of eligibility for 'marriage.'"
Texas Court Upholds Polygamist Removals Ruling [Reuters]
FLDS Ruling Upheld By Texas Supreme Court [Los Angeles Times]
FLDS Ruling [Texas Supreme Court]


text: Top Football Grounds OF The World It is often true that fans visit stadiums to enjoy matches by watching extraordinary skills of players. In any game the appearance of superstar players attract huge number of crowd and increases overall attraction of the game. However, at the same time it is also true that the beauty and capacity of stadium also ...Read More »


text:
Share this blog
DVD Catalyst 3
With DVD Catalyst, putting movies on your video-capable device (iPod, iPad, Blackberry, Droid etc) is easier than ever.
Click Here!
What day?
July 2020 M T W T F S S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Free to download it!
What are you looking for?
Cell Phone Treasure
Tag Archives: Gulf of Mexico
!!!!!TYRANNY ALERT~UNs Law of Sea Treaty!!!!!!!!!!
Thirty states will be encroached upon by Obama's Executive Order establishing the National Ocean Council for control over America's oceans, coastlines and the Great Lakes. Under this new council, states' coastal jurisdictions will be subject to the United Nations' Law … Continue reading
Posted in Activism, Home, Libety Ed Tagged Agenda 21, American, BP Oil spill, carbon dioxide, Chief executive officer, CLEAR Act (HR 3534), congress, Department of Commerce, Department of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano:, Ecoscience, ecretary of theDepartment of Interior, emergency, Endangered Species Act, EPA administrator, evidence, Great Lakes, Gulf of Mexico, John Holdren, Ken Salazar, Law Of Sea Treaty, LOST, Minerals Management Service, MMS, National Ocean Council, new council, The Department of Interior's BLM (Bureau of Land Management), The US Forestry Service, UN, UN Small Arms Treaty, United Nations, United States, US Fish & Wildlife, USDA co-owns the Terminator Gene patent with Monsanto Leave a comment


text:
It is time for Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge FTTC106! Today's Challenge is to make a Birthday Card. I decided to ink up my A Guiding Light stamp set for a Masculine Birthday card. For my Sentiment I used Tag Lines. I used several Spellbinder Dies, some ribbon and a Martha Stewart Border Punch . Down the sides I did some zig zag stitching.
We hope you can play along, check out the Timeless gals for more Inspiration!!
Hugs Cindy XXOO


text:
- Home › Flower Growers › Growers Directory
The Directory
Flower Growers
Welcome to the Flowers Canada Growers directory. Here you will find a complete list of our Growers, Associate Members, Non-FCO Members, Suppliers, and Wholesalers.
Directory Search
Use the tools below to filter the Flowers Canada Growers directory.
Indicates member is an Exporter.
Viewing Growers in Ontario


text:
if not tried in the midst of cooking ever answered a call
or in other words cooked and talked at the same time
i did yesterday and this is what happened
forgot to add lentil to the Khichdi and the result u guys can imagine
had to reopen the pressure cooker to add the lentils and by then rice was done
so the rice was overdone just because i had to cook the lentils.
but then i had to add lentils because i was preparing khichdi
( hope hubby is not reading this , i was too embarrased to tell him )
so yesterdays lesson - never to talk on phone while cooking and if the call is important just turn off the flame and speak ,or i wont know what i am cooking and what i have added or not added while talking .
Coming back to todays post this one is simple meal,doesnt require much cooking,prepared this with leftover rice for tomorrows lunch,this one is bit spicy but i liked it ,we call this onion fried rice,reminds me of childhood.
Recipe Name Egg and Onion Fried Rice
Leftover rice one cup
onion one chopped
green chili one chopped
cumin seeds half tsp
salt as per taste
egg one
oil one tsp
garam masala powder half tsp
Heat oil in wok,once once oil is hot lower the flame
add cumin seeds and once it starts spluttering
add chopped onion and green chili
increase the flame ,onions should turn brown
mix and remove from flame.
In non stick pan add few drops of oil and prepare fried egg
mix fried egg with the onion rice.
Serve warm,this dish doesnt need any side dish,i liked the taste of crispy onions with green chili.
thats all friends,wish you all happy weekend,
for glimpse of my kitchen please click here
cee u all soon,tk care and happy blogging.


text:
I honestly believe you'd get better results if there was a tax reduction for corporations/firms who meet certain diversity factors. I don't say I necessarily agree with this policy, but can guarantee the end goal of diversity would be reached much more quickly than trying to push the agenda at the university admissions level.Ever see Boeing, Intel, Microsoft, or Lockheed recruiting high school students? And yes, this would go closer to the source of problem.
I don't blame my grades (well deserved) on my urm status. I just hope that the question continues to change from urm to economically disadvantage and WHY.
If your numbers are borderline for a school, you're hoping something beyond the numbers will make them want you. Race is that factor for people who benefit from AA. Geography might be that factor for others. A family connection for another. It may not be something you have any control over and it may seem unfair that these things are more valuable to law schools than the things you do have control over, but... those are the breaks. What you're saying, essentially, is that life isn't fair -- so suck it up. And I tend to agree. But I also think that life should be as fair as possible. I have just as big a problem with legacies as I do with AA. But I think your argument that geography is as important as race in admissions is specious at best. I understand life isn't always fair. But institionalized injustice should be stopped wherever it occurs. I'm not just talking about not getting into one of your reaches either. I'm talking about how unfair it is that a significant portion of those applying to law schools have a substantial boost before the process even begins. And you say that I shouldn't complain b/c white people aren't underrepresented in law schools, firms, etc. Alright, it's true that they aren't. But what if I don't want to just be known as another white person?! As far as I'm concerned, there's only one of me -- and I'm underrepresented in law schools


text:
The Bay Area is enduring a parched summer, with profound implications for life and livelihoods.
The list of towns and water districts with water restrictions — both mandatory and voluntary — is growing rapidly. Officials worry about key reservoirs. Farmers are reeling from severe cuts in water supply, which could mean a half-million acres taken out of production. And firefighters are braced for a long and difficult wildfire season.
Dry times call for better approaches. How can we boost conservation? Are there long-term fixes, such as recycling or desalination projects? What's the health of our groundwater? Why are our rivers so overcommitted? Should water be bought and sold on the open market? And what are the prospects for yet another dry year?
Come hear expert panelists offer their perspectives, and ask questions.
This newspaper will host a free public forum, entitled "Dry Times: An in-depth discussion about Bay Area water issues," scheduled for 6:30 p.m. July 17 at the Lucie Stern Community Center, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto. The event is open to the public and aimed at informing the community about complex water issues. The discussion will be in the facility's Community Room.
Joining the discussion will be: Jim Fiedler, Santa Clara Valley Water District chief operating officer; Arthur R. Jensen, former chief executive officer of the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency; and San Jose Mercury News reporters Lisa Krieger, who covers science, medicine and water; and Paul Rogers, who covers the environment and science.
Space is limited, so to reserve your spot, please register at this link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/July17drought.
If you have any questions, please contact Martin G. Reynolds, Bay Area News Group senior editor for community engagement, at firstname.lastname@example.com or by calling 510-390-1779.


text:
As some of you might be sick of hearing about (when I'm sad, I make my friends' shoulders wet), over the past couple of weeks, I've been (unhealthly) preoccupied by tensions between me and my guild. Well, actually, my guild is probably blissfully unaware of such tensions. Either that or it's ignoring them in hopes that they'll go away.
So in reality, we could say that I've been preoccupied with tensions between me and my perception of my guild.
Which triggered a reflection on how us players view our relationships with our guilds. Some of us take our guilds for what they are: social/hobby clubs, comparable to a garage hockey team or bird watching club. To others, guilds are just a means to achieving in game goals of collecting nice gear and seeing content. At the other end of the spectrum, some (and I tend to fall into this trap a lot) compare their guildies to family, and sometimes even to romantic partners.
Let's take a look at some of these perceptions of relationships between players and their guilds.
1- The Random People Who Do Stuff
Not everyone bonds with the people they play with. Not everyone wants to bond with the people they play with. And that's totally fine- as long as you're upfront about your goals, pull your own weight and don't step on others to get what you want, there's no obligation to be more socially involved than necessary.
2- The Social/Sports Club
As intense as some of us players can get about the people we play with, this is what guilds really are: a group of people who share a common hobby. It's also the key to guild shopping: finding other players who share the same approach and goals about the game.
Even roles within a guild are comparable to real life clubs. Guild officers are like the guy (or girl for the politically correct) on the amateur sports team who sets up the competitions, the guy (or girl) in the running club who orders the t-shirts and so on.
3- The Academy
I've never seen guilds described as a school, but the thought occurred to me as I was talking to a friend from my old casual guild who wanted to play at a higher level. "OMG!" I exclamed, "You and I, we graduated! We're casual guild alumnae!"
I guess this way of seeing guilds only applies to us learning junkies who get our kicks from slowly perfecting our play. After all, it's totally cool to be content playing the game to relax or hang out with buddies. But I felt that "graduating" from a casual guild felt more positive than the more common perception of "breaking up" with a previous guild.
Using "guild as a school" also keeps me focused during more stressful times with my own guild. When you're spending several hours a week with these people (and in the video game world, "these people" often have varying levels of social skills), rough patches are inevitable. But when frustration builds, the realization that I still have a lot to learn about my class and about my gameplay from my guild reminds me that I'm still in the right place.
4- The Workplace
I see this one a lot. Guilds get compared to businesses and work environments all the time. After all, you sort of have levels of hierarchy (amusingly, my GM loves to be called "boss"…which of course is the exact reason I NEVER call him that), you have objectives, you have a group culture and so on.
Obviously, a group of humans is a group of humans is a group of humans. Organization (workplace) psychology applies to guilds the way it applies to social clubs because it's all about making individuals better at achieving the group's goals.
But businesses and guilds have their differences. In one, you're dealing with employee's money, careers and lives. In the other, you're dealing with people's spare time. As anyone who's ever had to deal with a young guild officer who's never had a job before knows, the required management standards aren't really the same.
5- The Family
"My guild is like my family." There's another one that comes up a lot. Like any group of friends that you get along well with and that you spend a lot of time around, strong bonds can form. Before you know it, you're sending each other Christmas cards, going to each other's weddings and dialling each other's number whenever something big happens.
This kind of relationship with one's guild can be great and it can be devastating. Many of us have long term friends we've met playing MMOs and many of us have been lucky enough to receive support from friends we've met online during tougher times. Some of us don't have good relationships with our real families and have found some sort of replacement in the people we play with.
The danger in this is that relationships online often seem more intimate than they really are. They develop quickly, they're easy to be dishonest in (the naivety of people online never ceases to amaze me) and they make it easier to hide from problems with real life families. And while you're hiding, problems grow.
6- The Romantic Partner
Those who don't play MMOs and who've never been involved in online communities probably think this is the weirdest perception ever. Yet, I've seen and heard a lot of gamers compare gquiting to breaking up with someone. And that was exactly the feeling I had when I left my old guild: the alternating feelings of relief and regret, of freedom and loneliness. I've also seen someone compare talking about an old guild to talking about exes: you can do it a little if flatters the new guild/significant other, but never if it flatters the old guild/significant other.
I do often use romantic relationships as metaphors a lot when talking about my guild. Mainly because it makes for great dirty jokes… But I am someone who gets really attached and who doesn't like to move on. The dangers of this? Having trouble knowing when I've overstayed my welcome, having too high expectations and being overly affected by arguments or incidents.
Conclusion: Looking at things from a step back
Lately I've had this feeling of exhaustion whenever I log into the game and I've had my internet time cut down quite a bit due to busy busy real life. So I'm limiting my playtime. My character is geared enough that I don't really need to play much outside of raids. Since I was frustrated by inefficient communication within guild, I cut down on my socializing on Mumble. I focused more on my gameplay, on analyzing fight damage patterns and on raid parses. Basically, I reminded myself of the "academy" or player personal progress take of a guild relationship.
And it feels good. My expectations dropped: after all, since I'm at roughly the same level of skill as the rest of my guild, the only person I'm depended on to reach my player improvement goals is myself. The stress has been a lot less and I've been able to channel more energy on Blog Azeroth. Which I hope I can keep up because Blog Azeroth is like my family. Err… Um… Yeah… Never mind….


text:
The goals you set for yourself and the strategies you choose become your blueprint or plan. Strategies are like recipes: choose the right ingredients, mix them in the correct proportions, and you will always produce the same predictable results: in this case financial success. The success strategies for managing money and building wealth are called Money Strategies. By learning to use money strategies as a part of your day-to-day life, financial frustration and failure will become a thing of the past.
Charles J. Givens quotes


text:
To best view this page, please turn off Compatibility View.
2015 Annual Security Report
Evaluation, Emergency & Safety Procedures
Vehicle Evacuation Route
RVCC Safety & Security
Raritan Valley Community College is concerned about the safety and welfare of its students, faculty and staff and is committed to providing a safe and secure environment. In accordance with Section 485(a) and (f) of the Higher Education Act, also known as the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act, below is summary ofinformation concerning security procedures and crimestatistics.
The Campus Security Department, with thes upport of local, county, and state law enforcement organizations, provides for public safety and facility security. U.S Security Associates, Inc. provides to the College uniformed, unarmed, and qualified security officers who are professionally trained in the College's accepted procedures and policies. The security force functions as an observer and reports individualswho violate campus regulations. The security guards are instructed never to engage in physical contact or force. Where there is criminal activity or endangerment to person or property, Security is instructed to contact Branchburg Police.
Daily reports are submitted to the College, recording all incidents that occur on every shift the times that building checks are performed, any outdoor lights which are not functioning, detailed accounting of all vehicles found to be inviolation of College parking/safety regulations, and all vehicles which have been towed.
Campus Crime Statistics
Pursuant to the Crime Awareness and Security Act, the following statistics reflect the number of criminal offenses reported to for the Branchburg, Bridgewater and Somerset campuses. Statistics are include for all off site locations.
Click here to view statistics from all RVCC Campuses
Registered Sex Offender
According to NJ Attorney General's guidelines. Information about registered sex offenders in New Jersey can be found by accessing this website: http://www.njsp.org/info/reg_sexoffend.html.
Weapons & Explosive Policy
Weapons, ammunition, fireworks, and other explosives are prohibited on College property, or at any other location where the College offers courses or sponsors events. Off-duty law enforcement officers, who are required to carry their firearms while attending classes, must contact Campus Security for a determination as to how their firearms are to be secured.
This policy does not apply to active law enforcement personnel or to other individuals whose authority and/or requirement to carry firearms is regulated by a federal, state, or local law enforcement agency.


text:
Joe Biden hasn't told Obama about new gun plans
By REID J. EPSTEIN| 5/3/13 5:02 AM EDT Updated: 5/3/13 1:04 PM EDT
Vice President Joe Biden is planning a new gun control offensive — he just hasn't told the president yet.
Biden told a group of law enforcement officials Thursday that he is planning even more travel, with trips around the country to stump for a renewed push on expanded background checks and gun-trafficking laws that failed to pass the Senate last month.
But Biden volunteered that he "hasn't really discussed" his plans with President Barack Obama and plans to lead the gun control charge on his own, according to two law enforcement officials who attended the meeting. The 90-minute meeting in Biden's office was an attempt to move forward after the failed effort on background checks.
Biden will appear Friday night at a South Carolina Democratic dinner that's his first stop in a key 2016 primary state. He told the law enforcement officials Thursday that he is planning even more travel, with trips around the country to stump for a renewed push on the failed gun measures.
The vice president rattled off poll numbers of senators the White House and its gun control allies think they can win over and said he'll lead the effort to tweak legislation to give recalcitrant senators the cover to vote for expanded background checks.
"He was talking like he was going to be leading it," a person who was at the meeting said. "He didn't mention any other senators in terms of leading the charge."
Biden's suggestion that he hasn't informed Obama of his plans echoes statements he made in December and January when he held a series of meetings with advocates interested in curbing gun violence. At that time, Biden said he would gather gun control proposals and determine which ones to take to the president.
Biden, of course, also has a history of getting himself ahead of Obama on issues, most notably on gay marriage. Biden last year told "Meet the Press" that he supported gay marriage before Obama had himself announced he supported it.
Days later, after a frenzy of criticism, Obama announced that he too supported gay marriage, but not without signaling his frustration with Biden, who he said got "a little bit over his skis."
White House officials said Obama had planned to finish his "evolution" — as he famously described his gay marriage position in 2010 — on the issue later in the year but said Biden forced his hand.
The meeting in Biden's ceremonial office followed a similar session last week for leading gun control groups. Like that meeting, Thursday's gathering focused more on what will happen next than what mistakes led to the failure of the background checks bill offered by Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.).
"His candid request was for us to tell him what can be done differently," said Jon Adler, national president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association. "His sense was not to go back to the drawing board with the same thing that just lost."
Adler added: "You bet on a horse and lose, you're not going to bet on the same exact horse in the same race."
People who attended the meeting also said Biden agreed with a characterization that the White House and gun control allies failed to properly educate the public about what was in the Manchin-Toomey bill.
The White House referred questions to Biden's office, which declined to comment on the meeting.


text:
Office Chair:uchair by Johnathan Wu
Johnathan Wu Exhibits The Uchair Office Chair
Johnathan Wu, the creator of the displayed work uChair by Johnathan Wu spells out, uChair is the most "personalisable" PC and office chair in the world. It allows the sitter/ owner to easily customise the back banner and armrest toy/tool to reflect their personality. Our design is crafted to be comfortable, stylish and affordable. Considering its price point, we believe uChair is a breakthrough over the traditional office chair design. uChair brings a fun, as well as functional, aspect to modern furniture design. uChair is available for US$200 and can be ordered from http://www.ctzone.com.au from Q2 2013. .
Office Chair:uchair by Johnathan Wu Images:
End of the article, click here to go back to previous page, or alternatively go back to DZGN Design Blog homepage.


text:
General practitioners are medical doctors who diagnose and treat
most types of health conditions or diseases and do not specialize in any
particular area of medicine. They provide basic medical service for males and females of
all age groups.
General practitioners usually complete a 1- to 2-year residency
following medical school. There is no board certification for general
Last Revised:
August 17, 2012
Healthwise Staff
Medical Review:
Anne C. Poinier, MD - Internal Medicine & E. Gregory Thompson, MD - Internal Medicine
This information does not replace the advice of a doctor. Healthwise, Incorporated disclaims any warranty or liability for your use of this information. Your use of this information means that you agree to the Terms of Use. How this information was developed to help you make better health decisions.
To learn more visit Healthwise.org
© 1995-2012 Healthwise, Incorporated. Healthwise, Healthwise for every health decision, and the Healthwise logo are trademarks of Healthwise, Incorporated.


text:
Visit Our Stores for Availability and Amazing Deals!
Complete your home with the 3401 Cocktail Table. Featuring an intricate and incredibly creative crisscross base, this cocktail table lends a sense of shape, movement, and style to any home with its presence. The woodwork features a deep brown finish, while an oval glass table top adds a formal touch while also providing plentiful accent and decorating space. Pair with the matching end table and sofa table for a complete living room set.
The 3401W Oval Cocktail Table with Glass Top by Homelegance at A1 Furniture & Mattress in the Madison, WI area. Product availability may vary. Contact us for the most current availability on this product.
Add a contemporary look and feel to your home with the 3401W Occasional Grouping. Including a sofa table, cocktail table, and end table, all three pieces work together to fashion a living environment that is unique and visually appealing for your home. With details like crisscross bases, glass table tops, and intricate shapes, you can make your home truly yours with this occasional collection.
The 3401W collection is a great option if you are looking for Contemporary furniture in the Madison, WI area.
These images are representative of this group as a whole and may differ from this item.
Browse other items in the 3401W collection from A1 Furniture & Mattress in the Madison, WI area.
This item has been tagged as: Living Room Furniture, Accent Furniture, Occasional Furniture, Cabinet, Cabinet Tables, Storage Tables, Small Storage Cabinet, Chairside Cabinet, Short Cabinet, Accent Cabinet, Commode, Cocktail Tables, Lift – Top Cocktail Table, Storage Table, Cocktail Coffee Table, Cocktail Table with Storage, Coffee Table, Lift – Top Coffee Table, Coffee Table with Storage, Couch Table, Magazine Storage, Sitting Room Tables, End Table, Chairside Table, Coffee and End Tables, Furniture End Tables, Accent Table, Lamp Table, Pedestal Table, Hall Tree, Storage Hall Tree, Hall Tree with Storage, Coat Rack, Hall Tree Coat Rack, Entry Hall Tree, Hat Rack, Hall Trees with Benches, Bench and Hall Tree, Clothes Tree, Hall Tree Furniture, Entry Furniture, Foyer Furniture, Sofa Table, Furniture Sofa Table, Console Table, Sofa Console Tables, Sofa End Table, Secretary Desk, Table Desk, Wine Rack, Wine Glass Rack, Wine Storage, Wine Bottle Storage, Wine Storage Rack, Wine Bottle Rack, Cabinet Wine Rack, Wine Glass Storage, Wine Storage Cabinet, Larder, Kitchen Storage, Dining Room Storage, Occasional Tables
Nothing on this page may be copied or reproduced without explicit permission.


text:
Now showing items 1-1 of 1
An institutional approach to appropriation and provision in the commons : a case study in the Highlands of Eritrea Habteab Sibhatu, Adam (Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2006-12)The natural resources mainly land, forests, and grazing lands in the Highlands ago-ecological zone of Eritrea are in a severely degraded state. And much of these common pool resources comprise commons i.e. they are managed ...


text:
City of BuckeyeHome Menu
Calendar Month View
Bookmobile Stop (Buena Vista)
- Date: 02/15/2020 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
- Location: Buena Vista
21064 W Main St
Buckeye, Arizona 85326
Return to full list >>
When you can't make it to your library because of distance, the library comes to you with the Bookmobile. You can check-out books and DVDs, return books, register for a library card and learn about other library services. The Bookmobile will be parked in the parking lot to the left just as you turn into Buena Vista off of Apache Road.


text:
Chuck Prophet "Temple Beautiful"
Today's Cool Album of the Day (#679 in the Series) is Chuck Prophet, Temple Beautiful (Yep Roc Records)
Chuck Prophet has carved out exactly the type of career he would have envisioned when he joined the psychedelic roots rock band Green on Red in the early 80's. Since then with his musical collaborations with Cake, Kim Carnes, Solomon Burke, and most recently with Alejandro Escovedo where he played guitar and wrote half of the songs for the fine album Real Animal, Chuck has set out on his own uncompromising roots rock journey creating musical masterpieces along way.
Between writing credits for Warren Zevon, Kelly Willis, Jewel, and Heart among others, Prophet has released several critically acclaimed albums on his own that while they may be much different in theme and texture, rather than genre hopping, they all seem to be genre enhancing and artistically pure. Developing his style of Lou Reed speak-singing along the way his solo material has included a political album iLet Freedom Ring!, a series of suburban noire tunes with Homemade Blood, and an album of cover songs, Dreaming Waylon's Dreams, that was only available on his 2008 tour and recorded as a tribute to one of his idols.
The evolution continues with the latest release Temple Beautiful, a 12 track homage to San Francisco, made in San Francisco, by San Franciscans. While Chuck Prophets' somewhat alternative perspective of the history of "The City By the Bay" may not be my grandmothers pre-earthquake San Francisco, my parents cable car, play land at the beach, Cliff House San Francisco, or even my own Fillmore West, Cow Palace, Candlestick Park San Francisco. It is however, a brilliant people-centric sort of man on the street historical montage of one of the most beautiful, eclectic, and often misunderstood cities in the world.
Stylistically and musically the record does not take the easy route and pay tribute to the musical epicenter that was San Francisco in the late 60's, and in fact there is hardly a direct reference to The Summer of Love, Jefferson Airplane, Haight Ashbury, or the Grateful Dead. There is some jangle pop present, but mostly the vibe is Lou Reed style vocals and lyrically dense word smithing with Chuck Prophets's signature telecaster providing the real bones of the soundtracks.
The Subject matter that was chosen for these cliff notes version history lessons include "Willie Mays is Up at Bat" that talks the real SF Giants home king Willie Mays, where the baseball Icon is compared to that other buxomly endowed San Francisco treat stripper Carol Doda, who was the first topless, and then the first bottomless stripper in America, and held court for decades in the Condor room on Broadway. Let that settle in for a moment, yes I said decades. "And meanwhile Carol Doda stood up and said "I won't be ignored" she showed them everything she had and then she showed them all a little more."
"White Night, Big City" is a beautiful, poignant tribute to slain civil rights leader Harvey Milk who was killed along with Mayor George Mosconi in 1978. The song along with the official video that includes historical footage from those tumultuous times in The City is a somber, reflective tribute to a man that stood up for what he believed in despite what turned out to be insurmountable odds.
"He Came From So Far Away" (Red Man Speaks) obliquely references the occupation of Alcatraz Island, and "Emperor Norton in the Last Days of his Life (1880)" referneces a famous old-time San Francisco eccentric character of a man that would wander the streets of the city providing brilliant oratory to anyone who would listen. Although seemingly homeless he was so well known and entrenched in city life that he would have an open seat at all of the operas and playhouses and have a free ticket to any show that he chose to attend. Chuck Prophet really did his homework with this one.
Once again Prophet takes us to the seedier side of San Francisco with "The Left Hand and the Right Hand" the story of Jim and Artie Mitchell, two brothers whose relationship makes the Ray and Dave Davies sibling rivalry seem like a Donny and Marie Love-Fest. The onetime owners of the O'Farrell Theatre and producers of one of the first "big budget" XXX rated movies Behind the Green Door, whose empire came to a crashing end when Artie Mitchell committed fratricide by breaking into his brothers' home in 1994 and shooting him with a .22 rifle. You know your life must have taken a wrong somewhere when Marilyn Chambers stands up for your defense at your murder trial and Charlie Sheen, in one of the most spot-on examples of type casting since Pee Wee's Big Adventure, plays you in a movie as he did in the movie Rated X alongside his own brother Emilio Estevez.
And of course, no journey through the Streets of San Francisco is complete without a nod to some of the eclectic neighborhood bars scattered the city, and two of Chuck's favorite watering holes are represented here in The Albion Bar and The Temple Beautiful the bar that also happens to the former home of Jim Jones' Peoples Temple and also a defunct punk club. For the record, my favorite hang outs are Geno and Carlo's and Cap's Corner in North Beach, and The Buena Vista Café on Grant street near Fisherman's Wharf. Take a listen to the song "Temple Beautiful" and see why it is on heavy rotation on the Little Steven Underground Garage satellite radio broadcast where it is considered "One of the Coolest Songs in the World".
To provide that extra dose of S.F. Rock and Roll authenticity legendary bay area drummer Prairie Prince, who has played with both Journey and The Tubes, appears on the album along with Roy Loney of the famous San Francisco –centric garage band The Flaming Groovies.
Even if the subject matter were not so close to my heart this record would still be considered by me to be one of the best albums of the year, if not one of the best in recent years. It is thoughtful, introspective, and handles important subject matter with an artistic delicate brush that warrants careful and frequent listens to fully appreciate and understand the historical and socio-political landscape that is presented.
On February 7th 2012, the day the album was released, a guided bus tour was offered of the sights and sounds presented in Temple Beautiful. Those lucky enough to be on that bus were treated to a an almost first person voyage back in time via the way-back machine courtesy of the perspective of a brilliant artist and a brilliant album.
I just wish I could have been there.
Track Listing
- Play That Song Again 2:43
- Castro Halloween 4:12
- Temple Beautiful 3:34
- Museum of Broken Hearts 3:56
- Willie Mays Is Up at Bat 4:58
- The Left Hand and the Right Hand 3:45
- I Felt Like Jesus 2:57
- Who Shot John 3:47
- He Came from So Far Away 3:31
- Little Girl, Little Boy 2:08
- White Night, Big City 3:23
- Emperor Norton in the Last Year of His Life (1880) 3:44
- Chuck Prophet – Guitar, Vocals
- Chris Carmichael – Cello, Violin
- Stephanie Finch – Vocals
- Jim Hoke – Flute, Woodwind
- Brad Jones – Piano
- Roy Loney – Vocals
- Rusty Miller – Bass, Vocals
- Prairie Prince – Drums, Percussion
- Official Chuck Prophet Website.
- Official Yep Roc Records Website
- See more 2012 New Release Reviews
- Walt Falconer's The Falcon's Nest
- Back to the Cool Album home page