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By JOHN FERREIRA, Managing Director, Accenture's North American Manufacturing Practice, & STEPHEN LAAPER, Senior Manager, Accenture's North American Manufacturing Practice
If you're like most operating executives at firms that manufacture goods, you've been running hard just to keep pace in recent years. You've embraced innovations in automation and cost management, leaned out operations without sacrificing quality, extended the supply chain to low-cost sources globally, and made inroads to serving customers in emerging markets.
Yet despite all these smart moves, there's that nagging tug in your gut: it's not enough. Manufacturing's traditional focus on cost efficiency and quality has become table stakes; the real opportunity now is for manufacturing excellence to enable profitable revenue growth and competitive advantage.
Indeed, you no doubt realize that the manufacturing group is not always in sync with the rest of the organization, and the metrics are not always aligned. You lack clear visibility upstream into product research and development (R&D) and customer research, and downstream with marketing programs and channel initiatives. You're contending with volatility in many different variables, from energy and material input prices to foreign exchange rates to political instability.
The global recession, for example, had a disproportionate impact on manufacturing: in the G8 countries, the decline in manufacturing output was three to four times the decline in GDP. Now, many investors and economists in the larger, developed economies worry about stagnation and deflation, while inflation is an immediate worry in many emerging economies and, over the longer term, in the rest of the world.
Your customers, meanwhile, have grown more demanding, sometimes even fickle. Customer segments are proliferating, and each segment wants more tailored products and supporting services to suit their specific needs and priorities. Customers expect you to be flexible enough to address the dynamic nature of their own operations — whether through shorter lead times, smaller and more frequent orders, customized bundles of goods and services, or setting up in-plant or co-location facilities. Ubiquitous Internet access now means that business customers and consumers have product comparison information at hand virtually anywhere and anytime. Faster launches and higher quality thus have become expected — and of course everyone wants the "right" price.
Greater Challenges Ahead
Manufacturers will continue to face these and many additional challenges over the next 15 years. Managing a global supply chain is more complicated than some companies predicted, requiring visibility and robust management tools, including the ability to extract and analyze data from disparate technology systems. Beyond this, manufacturers need to be pursuing risk management initiatives to minimize potential disruptions to manufacturing, which is far more difficult with a global operation. The need for secure supply chains, i.e., tighter controls over all aspects of the operations and production process, are required to insure consistent and safe production and to combat grey and black-market leakage. Another financial consideration is developing a tax-efficient supply chain and manufacturing model, from engineering labor to raw materials to production. Additionally, as multiple stakeholders — customers, shareholders, governments — scrutinize companies' sustainability practices, organizations will need to revisit sourcing, production and distribution resources.
Global operations are increasingly challenging as the current and emerging "low cost" sources are shifting. The rate of change as to which country has the comparative advantage will likely continue to accelerate over the next 15 years. The labor market in China is changing as the country experiences wage growth; at the same time, unions appear to be crumbling in more developed markets. One country may currently have an abundance of engineers but may be predicted to have a shortage within a decade. For manufacturers, the timeframe to identify the next "low cost" country or resource — and to make capital decisions — is collapsing. As different countries compete with different capabilities, which will change over time, manufacturers need to be oriented toward short-term trends and resulting structural changes.
Driving Execution Excellence Aligned Toward Customer Value Creation
All these pressures on manufacturers will undoubtedly intensify over the next 15 years. Manufacturers will need to develop new, effective ways to sense and respond to customer demands and market fluctuations, while simultaneously working smarter with their supply partners. Better yet, manufacturers will want to be able to predict shifting customer priorities and competitor moves, to quickly deliver the right solutions to high-value customers in the right places. That's how high performers position themselves ahead of their competition.
We believe this is a pivotal time for manufacturing. The same factors that create challenges also create opportunities for manufacturing to enable sales and marketing effectiveness. Beyond cost containment, companies that create flexible, agile operations to meet customer needs can realize a competitive advantage.
How can a company seeking high performance leverage its manufacturing prowess, so that the function of manufacturing shifts from being just a cost center to being a true means of competitive advantage? To thrive by 2025, manufacturers will need to excel along five dimensions that have just begun to unfold.
Winning Manufacturing Attributes for the Next 15 Years
1. Segment of one: Will you be able to suit customers' increasingly specific needs?
The migration to highly customized products is accelerating in both consumer and business-to-business markets. The trend started first in high-technology markets such as personal computers. Dell's website, for instance, was one of the first to allow customers to configure their PCs with the components they wanted before placing the order. At the back end, advanced manufacturing and logistics technologies allowed for just-in-time assembly and delivery.
- Customize products (and ancillary services) to serve customer's unique, specific needs and priorities — both spoken and implicit.
- Differentiate by integrating the product with a compelling customer experience.
2. Ready to produce anywhere: Can you move operations every few years to balance local customer expectations with local supply capabilities?
In the past, global sourcing and location decisions centered on chasing low-cost labor, as long as quality was acceptable. But the real, total cost of managing extensive manufacturing networks has risen. Many manufacturers moved too much production capacity off-shore to places quite distant from the centers of demand — driving up costs with complex network management, and reducing their agility in responding to customer needs. After all, North America remains the largest market for many manufactured goods. Now, some firms have reversed their offshoring moves to return to domestic facilities, where they can respond more quickly to customer needs and shifts in local demand: they are rebalancing regional supply with regional demand.
- Design the network footprint according to total "landed" value chain costs and customer service needs.
- Balance regional demand with regional supply.
- Learn to migrate modular components of the operation to the next new low-cost, appropriate-quality country or countries.
- Ensure that the global network has excellent visibility and high service levels.
3. Extended family: Can you truly rely on strategic partners for your most sensitive activities? If so, they might be your new secret weapon.
Many suppliers to the manufacturing process, especially those that are strategic partners, have become integral in delivering the value proposition, rather than being arms-length vendors. As such, they require more information and tight business process alignment in order to be able to respond faster and with flexibility.
- Adopt differentiated models and processes to support increasingly diverse channel and customer needs.
- Shift fixed costs to variable costs, in order to accommodate market changes.
4. The shop floor and beyond: Are you executing for agility?
The strategic activities and new models that we anticipate manufacturers will need to adopt can never be static.
- Use reliable, efficient equipment that is highly configurable and easily transportable.
- Leverage advanced analytical capabilities to build predictive business knowledge.
- Determine and obtain the right mix of skills and resources.
5. More than environmentally-friendly: Are you preparing methods of sustainability that will differentiate your brand?
Despite the recent recession, environmental and social sustainability remains a high priority among many major companies. One key motivation is that heightened customer awareness about sustainability increasingly influences purchasing decisions. Investors, too, are demanding greater corporate attention to sustainability, as they file more and more shareholder resolutions involving issues related to "responsible" business practices, climate change, health, and safety. Another motivation is reducing operational costs: when implemented in conjunction with operational efficiency programs that help firms minimize waste, sustainability initiatives can also help reduce costs over the long-term by reducing usage of water, electric power, transportation fuel, or other commodities.
- Give customers visibility into the complete product lifecycle, from design through disposal.
- Learn to negotiate and 'partner' with governments and regulators in nations that control key materials and commodities.
Stay tuned tomorrow for part two of this series. For more information, please visit www.accenture.com.


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When Mary Schapiro took the helm as CEO and chairman of the NASD last September, it was a moment of relative calm before the storm. Since then, she's been the guiding light in the effort to dissect and rewrite the rules of the NASD and NYSE into a single rulebook for all 5,100 broker/dealers, and to merge the regulatory arms of NYSE and NASD into a single self-regulatory organization–which Schapiro will lead.
The sweeping changes to regulation that are underway now are likely to influence, for years to come, everything from how broker/dealers conduct their businesses, to how individuals invest, and ultimately, how comfortable many Americans will be in retirement–and whether they can retire at all. For those reasons, the editors of Investment Advisor agree that this year, Mary Schapiro leads the list of the IA 25 in the pages that follow, the most influential individuals in the industry.
As Schapiro took over at NASD on September 1, "we were already deep into the discussions with the New York Stock Exchange," she said in a interview in her New York office in March. "I haven't yet had a normal period of being the NASD CEO–it's been really kind of a whirlwind." A lawyer by training, Schapiro, 51, has a long career as a regulator, including a stint as an SEC Commissioner, and being named acting chairman of the SEC in 1993. She began her tenure with NASD in 1996, becoming vice chairman in 2002.
Now that the widely lauded NYSE-NASD regulatory merger is scheduled to close sometime in the second quarter, Schapiro has a moment to discuss its impact on the industry: "It's been incredibly exciting, I feel so good about having been able to move this forward in such a positive way, because this is so much in the interest of good public policy, of investors, and certainly of the industry, to get this simplification of our regulatory regime done."
That said, Schapiro is a touch wistful about being less involved in the details of policy-making. "I miss getting to the nitty-gritty of a lot of policy discussions and decisions because that's what I really loved." Now, however, she gets to set the entire agenda for the NASD and the combined SRO. Recently that has meant speaking about three principal issues: the education and safety of investors, especially those saving to retire; moving away from "one-size-fits-all rulemaking," by clarifying the rules and helping firms comply; and changing the B/D examination process, moving to a more risk-based approach.
There still are many challenges for the industry, especially those that "revolve around the change in demographics. There is a tremendous desire among the public for advice and for solutions to their financial problems," she argues. "The challenge is going to be developing products that are very sound–I'm not talking about taking the risk out out of investing; we'll never do that nor should we even attempt to do that–but tapping into these changing demographics with products that are in the investors' best interests and ensuring that they are sold appropriately."
Schapiro says the outlook for the industry is very positive. "The future of this country in some ways is very much dependent on the success of the financial services industry, and the success of citizens–their ability to retire well, to educate their children, to take care of their healthcare needs–this industry is an enormous component of that all happening."–Kathleen M. McBride
Rudy Adolf
One of the clear signs of the growing value of advisory firms is the number of acquirers of such firms, and one of the fastest-growing such firms is Focus Financial Partners, headed by CEO Rudy Adolf. However, Focus is not a rollup firm, stresses Adolf with some heat in his voice, "rollups are an excuse for overpaying for underperformance." Focus Financial Partners, he says, only invests in "very, very successful firms" who retain control over the advice they give to their clients. Among those very, very successful firms is St. Louis-based Buckingham Asset Management, which was acquired by Focus Financial earlier this year. With that deal–the 10th since Focus Financial opened its coffers in January 2006–Adolf says Focus is now the largest independent fiduciary wealth manager in the country, with $17 billion in client assets. Only Ken Fisher's Fisher Investments is larger, with $35 billion under management, but Adolf points out that Fisher's is an asset management model, not wealth management. Adolf, a 44-year-old former McKinsey consultant, says Focus Financial helps its acquired partners to recruit senior talent and in business development and public relations. That business development could take the form of organic growth plus sub-acquistions by its partners, to which Focus Financial may deploy some of its own capital. Focus Financial is itself well capitalized with $2.5 billion in venture capital funding from its private equity and VC investor, Summit Partners.
Partners in those acquired firms retain day-to-day operating responsibility have "direct ownership in the cash flow their own businesses,"Adolf notes, "and have an economic interest" in the other partners. Adolf stresses that Focus Financial is not for everyone. For one thing, firms need at least $300 million in assets, must pass an extensive due diligence process, and be focused on growth. "The partners are making a bet that they'll continue to grow," he says, "and they have to make a bet on the Focus business model."–James J. Green
Robert Arnott
The biography on the Research Affiliates Web site about company chairman Robert Arnott mentions his "willingness to challenge conventional thinking," and that's no exaggeration, considering that he's shaking up the world of index-based investing with his firm's fundamentally weighted indexes, which use companies' sales, cash flow, dividends, and book value to determine the companies' weightings in the indexes, rather than companies' market caps, as cap-weighted indexes like the S&P 500 do.
Charles Schwab launched three new fundamental index-based mutual funds on April 2, based on Research Affiliates Fundamental Indexes (RAFI), with Chairman and CEO Charles Schwab himself calling the indexes "simply better than our old version of indexing." It's pretty clear that he'd use this as a central strategic initiative for the next few years," says Arnott, tickled that Chuck Schwab was so interested in the new kind of indexing. "Chuck has personally been a pioneer in this business," Arnott notes, "and to have him enthusiastically embracing this idea is just really exciting."
Public pension funds are already investing in the fundamental indexing strategy, including CalPERS, Sweden's largest pension fund, "one of the three largest pensions in Australia, and one of the three largest pensions in Canada," according to Arnott.
He sees the main challenge to advisors as being able to provide "spending power to investors for as long as those clients need spending power. That means that the number one challenge has nothing to do with investments whatsoever: to get investors to spend at a pace that they can sustain without running out of money." He says taxes, and helping investors keep more of what they earn are the number two and three challenges for advisors. "Look to the clients' bottom line net of all expenses and taxes and find ways to improve what the clients keep, not what they earn."
Looking toward the future for advisors and firms, he says that the next bear market will "shake out the weak players" in the industry and that the "defining characteristic of the winners will be the ones who put the client's interests first, the classic definition of a fiduciary.
One of the things Arnott loves to do and misses as he trots around the globe turning the index world upside down is writing; he is an award-winning writer and has been editor of the Financial Analysts Journal. "I think that's the one, big, missing item out of my schedule."–Kathleen M. McBride
Max Baucus
The senior Senator from Montana took over the chairmanship of the Senate Finance Committee when the 110th Congress convened in January and has a number of items on his agenda that are likely to affect the advisor community. High among his priorities are dealing with the AMT, reform of estate taxes, and expanding federal funding of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP).
The 65-year-old attorney from Helena, who spent two years as a legal assistant with the SEC early in his career, is not known as an ideologue but rather a conservative populist who reflects the population of his home state and often drives his Democratic colleagues to apoplexy, as when he supported President Bush's 2001 tax cuts or when he was one of only two Democrats invited to participate in "closed-door Medicare talks."
After initially pushing for a total AMT repeal, Baucus is now in favor of a two-year patch, also favored by Senate Budget chair Kent Conrad, which would keep an estimated 20 million taxpayers from being subject to the AMT over the next two years. According to a Joint Committee on Taxation report released in March, without the patch, 49% of Americans earning between $75,000 and $100,000 a year would have to pay the AMT without the patch; with it, the number drops to 1.6%.
The big question with the AMT is where to get revenue to replace that which would be lost by eliminating the tax. He'll also have to go toe to toe with House Ways and Means Committee chair Charles Rangel who wants a permanent repeal of the AMT.
Whether the AMT patch is used, with a loss of $90 billion in revenue over 10 years, or the tax is repealed, with $1 trillion in lost revenue, Baucus has his work cut out for him. And that's before even considering the $50 billion in funding he's looking to give S-CHIP over the next five years.–Robert F. Keane
Walt Bettinger
A new president at Charles Schwab & Co. would always be news. But the impact gets ratcheted up significantly with two other factors that accompanied the naming in February of Walt Bettinger, 46, to the position of president and COO of Schwab. The first is that 2007 marks the 20th birthday of Schwab Institutional, the division of the San Francisco-based firm run by two-time IA 25 honoree Debby McWhinney that is the business partner of 5,000 RIAs who custody slightly more than $500 billion at SI. The second is that as president, Bettinger becomes the heir apparent to founder, chairman, and CEO Chuck Schwab in the chief executive's position; Schwab turns 70 this year. Since 2005, Bettinger has been executive VP and head of Schwab Investor Services.
While he's still getting his feet wet as president, Bettinger responded to a number of questions by e-mail. As to biggest challenges for advisors, he lists "clients' desire for broader services like trust and alternative investments; the challenges inherent in managing their strong organic growth as investors increasingly look for the independence and objectivity a professional investment advisor can deliver, and long term succession planning." Bettinger believes that boomers and subsequent generations expect their advisors to be objective, a faith that benefits independent advisors, and they also "appreciate that investment advisors are often visible and active members of the communities in which their clients live and work." As for where Schwab Institutional fits into the bigger picture at Schwab, Bettinger pledge that strategically, "our business serving investment advisors is core to our efforts to meet the needs of affluent investors," while financially, "our advisor business is key, making up about 25% of our revenue and slightly more than that percentage of our profits."–James J. Green
Dale Brown
A top his perch as executive director and CEO of the Financial Services Institute (FSI) in Atlanta, Dale Brown has a bird's-eye view of the independent broker/dealer world. The lobbying group he leads has been active and very effective as an advocate for independent B/Ds.
Brown, 45, lists "navigating the increasingly complex and burdensome regulatory environment" and its "consequences, unintended and otherwise," as the industry's greatest challenge as well as "an impediment to growth." "Every independent broker/dealer CEO understands that creating, implementing, and pursuing a culture of compliance in his firm is essential to his business success." The overturn, in March, of the SEC's broker/dealer exemption rule will undoubtedly affect members of FSI, even though, he explains, "the independent broker/dealer was never really the intended target." Regulatory challenges aside, FSI supports combining the NASD and NYSE into one self-regulatory organization, asserting that FSI members are "big proponents of healthy self-regulation."
The future of the independent B/D is "very bright," believes Brown, adding that investors "need financial advice more than ever before," with the enormous transfer of wealth from one generation to the next, boomers readying for retirement, and the shift from accumulating assets to distributing them.
Brown and his wife have four children, ages 6 to 14, and, as he puts it, his biggest personal challenge–as well as his greatest joy–is in "fulfilling my first priority to be a good husband and father, and not allowing anything else to get in the way of that."–Kathleen M. McBride
Mark Casady
To say that Linsco/Private Ledger (LPL) Chairman and CEO Mark Casady has been busy would be a serious understatement. On the heels of the sale last year of a majority stake in Boston and San Diego-based LPL to private equity firms Hellman & Friedman LLC, and Texas Pacific Group, LPL bought UVEST, acquiring 1,300 advisors who provide third-party brokerage services to banks and credit unions, as well as a third base of operations, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Now, LPL is in the midst of a deal to buy three Pacific Life broker/dealers, adding more than 2,000 advisors from Mutual Service Corp, Associated Securities; and Waterstone Financial Group. Once the PacLife deal closes as expected in June, LPL will have about 10,000 advisors.
"We see the industry consolidate, we see that scale is critically important to being successful, and we think diversification of ability or capabilities is really important. Those are our three drivers," Casady, 47, explains, "and the journey we're headed on is to keep pushing those drivers hard." Those three issues–consolidation, diversified firm capabilities, and scale–will "define the next three to five years pretty well," he argues.
One of the biggest issues facing independent B/Ds is to "continue to educate lawmakers," he says, "and consumers, about the value and the power of independent advice." Advisors ought to consider how to "give back to their community," through providing that advice to investors, as well as in other community-minded ways, and to think about how to provide their services "more efficiently and effectively" so they can serve more clients.
On a more personal note, Casady says "having a great family" is his finest accomplishment, while "finding the right balance between family and work," is his personal challenge: "both are demanding." Being able to spend time with his wife and four children, who range in age from 10 to 23, is very important to him. He's looking forward to spending more time on the Cape, boating, and "getting up to speed with the latest groups" in music.–Kathleen M. McBride
Bob Clark
Ask Bob Clark what role he thinks he plays in the advice business, and for a second–but just a second–he's lost for words. Then he's off and running. "I think I provide some historical basis, some context, a collective memory–we forget what happened in the past–a broader perspective, a broader context." Clark, 52, provides that perspective for Investment Advisor each month as the latest stop in a long journalism and consulting career, railing one month about the CFP Board, the next about how to value practices, the next about the virtues of smaller practices. Here are some recent (unpublished) nuggets. On independent B/Ds: "They're extremely adaptable to what their reps want. Eventually, they'll all be custodians, but with twists–like you'll still be able to do annuities." On which firms he valuess. "I have a great deal of respect for Raymond James, since it's still essentially a family-owned business. On the FPA's big win vacating the Merrill Lynch Rule. "We all love winners. The biggest challenge is that the majority of people–and journalists–don't grasp the difference" between a stockbroker and a fiduciary advisor. On the biggest challenge to the profession: "Sooner or later there's going to be re-regulation of the advisory business. It's important for independent advisors to position themselves as the good guys, so that whoever is writing the regs looks to the independent advisors as the pinnacle of the profession."–James J. Green
Christopher Cox
In the less than two years since Christopher Cox took the helm at the Securities and Exchange Commission, he has strived to make the financial world more transparent and less risky for investors. Certainly his tenure so far has been a surprise to those who expected his appointment to signal an easing of demands for increased corporate accountability.
Among the achievments of which the 54-year-old Cox is most proud is the reform of disclosure on executive compensation, which beginning this year will make it much easier for shareholders to determine what the various forms of compensation add up to. Big on his agenda for this year is an increase in the Commission's efforts to protect senior citizens from fraud, taking full advantage of technology to help investors and simplifying disclosure statements so that they are in plain English.
In a speech to the Mutual Fund Directors Forum Seventh Annual Policy Conference in Washington last month, Cox addressed the use of 12b-1 distribution fees by mutual funds and the adequacy of disclosures by mutual funds and other investment vehicles in 401(k) plans. Cox feels that the use of 12B-1 fees has strayed from the original purpose of covering a fund's advertising and distributions costs and have become a way for fund companies to advertise as "no load" while still in effect charging a commission to investors. "The transformation of the 12b-1 fee from a distribution subsidy to a sales load drag is now so nearly complete that the primary purpose to which the $11 billion in 12b-1 fees last year were put to was to compensate brokers," he said. He also noted that some funds have been using the fees to pay for administrative expenses and that even some funds which are closed to new shareholders continue to collect 12b-1 fees.
"With an emphasis on both the disclosures by the constituent investments in the 401(k), and the aggregate disclosures by the plan, we aim to make it far easier for busy Americans to understand the expenses they're being charged in connection with their investments, and the after-tax, after-inflation returns they're actually getting compared to an appropriate index," he continued.
Roundtable discussions on both issues are planned for the next few months, with formal rule proposals to follow later in the year.–Robert F. Keane
Peter F. Drucker
If the only contribution that Peter Drucker ever made to the business world was his assertion that labor should be viewed as an asset, not a cost, his exalted place in the consulting firmament–and on the advisor's bookshelf–would be assured. But the wisdom of Drucker, who died at age 95 in November 2005, has so much more to offer a profession filled with passionate practitioners who are nevertheless struggling to build businesses. For instance, in the first page of his seminal 1967 management classic, "The Effective Executive" (republished in paper last January), he wrote that "effectiveness can be learned," and he constantly preached the value not just of time management, of documenting how you spend your time, but of where you spend your time–too many executives (read principals, if you'd prefer) spend too much time completing functions that someone else could do just as well. He also railed against the tendency of organizations to become complacent, especially when it came to technology, and argued that to stay competitive, you had to use new technology. But perhaps his greatest passion point had to do with building systems that could efficiently address recurring issues that a business faces. Such issues are generic in nature, and "could only be solved through a rule, a principle." He was not impressed with leaders who laid claim to "pragmatism," which he argued was simply a "refusal to develop rules." Finally, Drucker wanted to develop "effective" executives, not "brilliant" ones. Not all of us can be brilliant, but we all can be more efficient.'–James J. Green
Bill Gross
There's little mystery why Bill Gross is called the Bond King. As founder and CIO of Pacific Investment Management Co. (PIMCO), Gross is still the undisputed champion when it comes to bond investing for both his outperformance over his bond money manager peers over time, his keen insights, backed up by the research strength of PIMCO's analysts, into where to find total return within the fixed income universe, and his sheer success in attracting investors of all stripes to his flagship PIMCO Total Return Bond fund, which had about $102 billion in its coffers in April. That universe will loom even larger for advisors as their clients age and look for income as well as portfolio appreciation (and as they become more risk averse), and as the equity risk premium shrinks (as most experts expect will be the case). But Gross would perhaps put it a little differently. Last October in one of his investment outlooks, he wrote that "Bond managers are paid not to lose money and it will probably ever be thus; but they're also paid to outperform and justify their fees–returning more to clients than themselves." Then he paints a picture of a brave new world of investing: "In a low yield/single digit return world, increased daily volatility which, with skill, leads to increased Alpha should be considered by bond managers and accepted by clients as a wave of the future should they choose to outperform in the same magnitudes as in prior years."–James J. Green
Angela Herbers
Angie Herbers has come a long way since her first business–a lemonade stand she started at 14 years old that expanded into six concession stands across Western Kansas by the time she was 21, when she sold the enterprise to fund her college education. Now, at 29, Herbers has already run four businesses, including her current company, Financial Advisor Resource Inc.–a Web-based recruitment firm specializing in independent financial planning companies. "I discovered that there was a need for young talent; a need for employees to be managed and trained," Herbers explains. "I started the company four years ago with the primary goal of helping advisors hire, train, and create a successor in the financial planning practice, using the next generation of talent." Herbers now works with ten companies, representing over $1 billion in client assets, calling herself a virtual COO. "We manage, hire, train, and retain talent and do practice management," she notes. "Hopefully in the next 7-10 years, those company owners will be able to retire and their successors–employees that we cultivated and trained in the company–will be able to take over the practices."
According to Herbers, there's a huge opportunity in connecting the two generations. "The biggest mistake the industry would make is not educating the young or seeing their ability, and on top of that, losing the wisdom of the older generation. You have to connect them. I'm living proof that if you take the wisdom of the older generation and transfer that wisdom, there's a lot of success to be had." Herbers attributes her success to other people in the industry that have guided her, naming previous IA 25 honorees Bob Clark and Sheryl Garrett. "I consider it an honor to be mentored and guided by some really unique personalities in the industry. If you had asked me three years ago where my company would be today, it would be nowhere close to where it is now. We have a ten-year plan and we already exceeded it. The point that I want to drive home is that I couldn't operate a company in such a huge industry without having the guidance, support, and mentoring that I have. The older generation has helped me and that's what the younger generation is looking for."–Kara P. Stapleton
Mark Hurley
After selling Undiscovered Managers, LLC, his mutual fund company, to JPMorgan in 2004, Mark Hurley quickly realized many of his former advisor clients were faced with a similar problem: how to prepare for their own retirement. "Unless they wanted to cash out," he says, "there were really no other options."
At 48, Hurley is credited with developing a unique buy/sell structure for investment advisors who don't want to close up shop upon their retirement. His new firm, Dallas-based Fiduciary Network, LLC, helps RIAs gradually transition their practice to the next generation of planners.
"We aren't selling the firm. We are simply filling the gap from one generation to the next," he says. "It's a very complicated process and emotional for both the owner and buyer." Hurley says it can take years to draw up the specifics of a transition. "It's a very capital effective structure," he says. And even though Fiduciary fronts the money for the purchase, it has no voting stock in the firm. As a result, Hurley only selects businesses with "quality people and a solid foundation."
In fact, his structure is so appealing that two of the most recognizable RIA firms in the business have penned deals with Fiduciary: Evensky & Katz Wealth Management in Coral Gables, Florida, and Regent Atlantic Capital LLC in Chatham, New Jersey, and he's got several other deals underway.
"I love the guys I work with. Do you know how great it is to work with people who genuinely care about their clients? They are so pure they're almost missionaries," he laughs. "You know they are always going to do the right thing and take their time making decisions."–Megan L.F. Robert
John Iachello
"You take some of the knowledge and you take some of the experience and you tailor it to the situation and the environment that you've been given. That's exactly what I've done," notes the COO of Pershing Advisor Solutions, John Iachello, who has been at the custodian for RIAs for four years and also serves as managing director of Pershing LLC and on the executive committee of Pershing. Under Iachello's direction, Pershing Advisor Solutions (PAS) has been growing rapidly. At the end of 2005, PAS had $41 billion of advisors' assets under administration, which had grown by year-end 2006 to $59 billion, and to about $69 billion as of early April. At age 52, Iachello's commitment to assist more RIAs continues unabated. "It's becoming pretty obvious to us that the RIA community needs to break the back of the operating inefficiency that they are subject to. Right now, there's no question that they have less and less return on their investment as they bring in new clients, since they have greater operational overhead," he points out. "We need to free them up by giving them operational functions that we can support, leaving them free to manage their clients' assets and worry about their [current] clients and new clients. If we can do that successfully, we will allow them to bring on more clients, particularly the smaller, baby-boomer clients. That's the key to the future. "
Iachello is a firm believer in servicing RIAs regardless of where an advisor keeps securities. "Traditionally, custodians have done very well with training and performance reporting where the securities are custodied, but once the advisor custodies securities in various places, [custodians] wash their hands of it and it's up to the advisor to run their own front-end trading system and aggregation system. That's where the inefficiencies come in," he says. "We have to reach past the assets that are only kept with us and be able to offer a full package of services to let those RIAs have a better-run business." As part of the this belief, among other products, Pershing provides interactive data feeds to third-party systems so the advisor can report back to a client, independent of where some of the client's assets are held. "It is a way of being a better partner and helping them build a more effective and efficient business. That's exactly where we are."–Kara P. Stapleton
Deena Katz
"I feel that it's time for us older advisors to stop complaining about the next generation and start being invested in their future–which means the future of our companies," says Deena Katz, chairman of Evensky & Katz. The 57-year-old recently joined Texas Tech University as an associate professor where she teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses, and is in charge of the internship program. "If you just take a look at the Pension Protection Act of 2006, you'll see that we're probably 60,000 planners short of helping this next generation of the public get to where they want to be," notes Katz, "That means we're going to have to educate, train, and mentor the next generation to take this responsibility sooner rather than later." Katz believes her current challenge is to bring the corporate world together with the academic world to help build educational and experiential learning programs for the industry. "At Texas Tech, we're planning a big effort to build our program and invite the academic world into the profession and vice versa. I think we spend a lot of time on parallel paths," she points out. "We do a lot in the profession that the academics aren't aware of, and the academics are doing some research that will help us grow our practices that we don't necessarily know about. I'm looking to get those parallel paths intersecting." Katz likens the financial profession to that of the medical world, saying that it takes an old doctor and a young physician to provide really good medical care. "I advise the next generation to find an 'old doctor'–someone who has been in the financial profession for a long time with a lot of experience and brings a lot of expertise to the table, but needs that new invigorating energy, ideas and, creativity to help the practice move along."
As for the future of the profession, Katz believes advisors have a responsibility to educate the public, and believes it won't be long before a mandate from the government directs that planners get involved in the education process and improve financial literacy in the country. "We just need a huge force of planners and it's a wonderful position to be in, but it means we will have to do a lot of work getting the next generation attuned to this profession."–Kara P. Stapleton
Tim Kochis
Don't call Tim Kochis a financial planner. As the CEO of Kochis Fitz in San Francisco, his wealth management firm instead focuses on both financial planning and investment management for individual clients. "We do comprehensive planning for first-generation wealth creators," he explains. "[Our clients] are accomplished in their own lives and have very complex needs."
Serving corporate executives and the like for the majority of his career, Kochis, 61, has a thorough understanding of the ins and outs of this specialized niche. "[Corporate execs, bankers, and so forth] tend to make a lot of transactions [regarding their wealth]," he offers. "And they need and value help with those decisions."
With a thoughtful approach, Kochis tackles any issue his clients have. "People today have accumulated more wealth [than previous generations]," he continues. "They are looking at additional opportunities for philanthropy and ways to effectively transfer their wealth to members of their family." However, like most investors, they are concerned with possible changes in tax and regulatory laws, something Kochis believes "will not be as favorable as it has been in the last few years."
Today, Kochis, who founded his firm in 1991, has plans to install a successor and step down as CEO. "I don't think it's appropriate for anyone to be CEO for life," he explains. "It's not healthy for any organization." This past year, Kochis was the winner of the inaugural Charles R. Schwab Impact Award, in recognition of this decades-long commitment to the profession both in this country and abroad. But we haven't seen the last of Kochis just yet, he promises, saying he intends "to continue working for the indefinite future."–Megan L.F. Robert
Ellyn McColgan
Fidelity Brokerage Company hopes to realize its own future success by being a one-stop shop for millions of Americans preparing for the years ahead. "Our goal at Fidelity is to make it easy for investors to plan for their financial futures, whether they choose to use an investment advisor, a broker, or to come to us directly," Ellyn McColgan, Fidelity Brokerage's 53-year-old president, told IA recently. "We want to do everything we can to help our intermediary clients grow their businesses. That's why we continue to invest aggressively in our platform of products, services, and tools for the intermediary market."
McColgan has directed the top execs of Fidelity Registered Investment Advisor Group (FRIAG), as well as those of Fidelity Personal Investments and National Financial, to make the retirement market their top priority.
For FRIAG that strength of the company's commitment can be evidenced by the growth in the number of advisors using FRIAG for wealth management and custody–378 fee-based advisors were added last year alonw, more than any other firm which didn't acquire another company. FRIAG custodies more than $183 billion for advisors, second only to the behemoth known as Schwab.
As part of its effort to bring additional advisors into its fold, Fidelity has come up with a wide array of tools and services to help make the advisor's job easier. Under a deal announced in late February, FRIAG advisors and the reps who clear through National Financial will have access to IPOs through JPMorgan. Another recent move is a pilot matchmaking program that will pair up Fidelity-affiliated RIAs with high-net-worth investors who need more sophisticated products and customized services than they can get from Fidelity's retail division. The program is touted as a win/win/win–there's no charge to the RIA for participating, Fidelity is paid only for the assets in its custody, and the investor gets the advice she needs.–Robert F. Keane
Joe Moglia
While he is a relative newcomer to the independent advisor space, as CEO of TD Ameritrade (TDA), Joe Moglia, 57, has already made an impression on his new colleagues. Formerly of Merrill Lynch and CEO of Ameritrade, Moglia wholeheartedly supports his RIAs. "Joe fully recognizes the importance of our investment advisory business," says Tom Bradley, TDA Institutional's president. "He has a good understanding of the difference between stockbrokers and investment advisors, and the [fiduciary] responsibilities they have."
"Our position is unique and advisors recognize we are on their side," Moglia prides. "No other custodian took the position we took in terms of the exemption rule," referring to the broker/dealer exemption rule, aka the Merrill Lynch rule.
TDA has three client segments, Moglia explains: "the independent advisor, the long term investor, and the individual who wants to buy or sell stocks as a trader." With RIAs representing 25% of the firm's AUM, Moglia is especially focused on this segment. "At Ameritrade, the RIA business was still in the "embryo" phase," he says. "Doing the merger [with TD Waterhouse] advanced us a number of years in that space." As a result, TDAmeritrade is the third largest participant in the RIA custody market today.
Emphasizing personalized service and technology for their advisors, Moglia says he believes technology will further enhance portfolio management. "The Internet has made trades faster and cheaper and portfolio management will become the next step," he explains. "That is certainly going to allow RIAs to provide customization and choice for their clients and at the same time do it on a scalable basis. Our job at TDA is to help them do that."–Megan L.F. Robert
Dan Moisand
Dan Moisand has done a great job quietly and consistently driving home all the points that the D.C. District Court of Appeals seemed to agree with in vacating the SEC's Merrill Lynch rule at the end of March after a long legal battle by the Financial Planning Association, which Moisand is serving this year as chairman. Along with the other leaders of the largest association of planners, Moisand has carefully crafted the FPA's argument to focus on clearly defining the best way to meet the needs of consumers, not surprising for this 39-year-old client-centric planner who is a partner in the Florida firm of Spraker, Fitzgerland, Tamayo & Moisand. "This certainly brings to the forefront yet again the idea of what an appropriate standard of care is when dealing with the public," he argues in discussing the court decision, and since "we are talking about people's life savings, the standards should be appropriately high."
Moisand also likes to place the issue into a broader cultural and historical context: "As Americans we love to categorize things and people and parties into nice little neat corners of the world so we can understand all the complexities that are coming at us every day." So with the court ruling eliminating fee-based brokerage accounts, consumers will understand that "if there's a fee charged, the underlying regulatory structure is that of an advisor. They may not understand everything that comes along with that, but there's a bright line standard there." As for those who worry that the FPA has shot itself in the foot by forcing change on wirehouses that may now pose more competition to planners, Moisand is sanguine. "So? That's the way it's been since I got into this business 17 years ago. All those people out there who need help are willing to pay for it, and they're just looking for somebody who knows what they're doing and who they can trust."
He's not worried about the clout of Wall Street at the SEC or on Capitol Hill, either, saying the market-based move toward financial planning is a "a fundamental juggernaut that the best lobbyists in the world can't stop." Moreover, he suggests that if those big firms move in the direction of providing true advisory services, everyone will benefit. So in the end he counsels his peers to "just take care of your clients. Do a good job, everything else is a bunch of garbage, and you'll be perfectly fine."–James J. Green
Charles Rangel
As chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Charles Rangel lists dealing with the AMT as his top priority. The 76-year old, 19-term Congressman who represents New York City's 15th Congressional district definitely has his work cut out for him. While nearly everyone in Washington agrees that the AMT presents a major problem, that's where the consensus ends. Democrats and Republicans can't even agree on how much revenue will be lost over the next decade by eliminating the tax, with figures ranging from $250 billion to $1 trillion, never mind how to make up for the loss. For years Congress has been coming up with temporary patches to protect Americans who were not intended to be the targets of this tax, but since it has not been indexed for inflation, are now subject to it. This year it's estimated that 4 million taxpayers will be hit with the AMT, although the number would have been 11 million if not for 2006′s temporary fix. Unless further action is taken, that number could be as high as 23 million for the 2007 tax year.
So far in this session of Congress, Rangel's committee has held two hearings on the AMT and others are expected to follow. He's said he hopes to have a bill ready to bring to the House floor by the end of June. According to published reports, Rangel has "all but decided" on a plan to reform the AMT so that only those earning more than $250,000 a year would have to pay it. Those earning more than $500,000 a year would have to pay an additional amount.
As far as making up lost revenue, Rangel has said that Congress may "rearrange" tax rates so that the wealthiest households pay more, thereby easing the burden on middle-income families. Possible solutions include raising the top marginal tax rate, lowering the income threshold subject to the top rate (currently $336,550), or eliminating deductions.–Robert F. Keane
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Arnold Schwarzenegger may have used his action hero popularity to move from Planet Hollywood to the governor's mansion in Sacramento, but that's not why he made the IA 25. He's on the list because after years of waiting for Congress to deal with the nation's looming healthcare crisis, he's taken matters into his own enormous hands.
In announcing his comprehensive plan to reform California's healthcare system plan in January, the 59-year-old, Austrian-born governor noted that, "Unpaid medical bills mean billions of dollars in hidden taxes for the rest of us because those services all have to be paid for. So we pay higher deductibles, costs for treatment, premiums, and co-pays…We have to aim high and attack the entire system from top to bottom. We can create a model the rest of the nation can follow."
That model calls for everyone in the state, including illegal immigrants, to be covered by healthcare insurance and has an estimated price tag of $12 billion in the first year. It also calls for the elimination of the estimated $1,200 a year that the average family pays in "hidden taxes" to cover the cost of treating the estimated 6.5 million Californians who go uninsured for at least part of every year.
The California plan is based on the idea that individuals, employers, and government has a shared responsibility when it comes to health. Under the proposal, everyone in the state will be required to have sufficient coverage to protect against the catastrophic costs of a major illness, which will help minimize the "cost shift" that occurs when large numbers of people are receiving care without paying the full cost. Insurers will also be required to guarantee coverage so no one has to fear losing their coverage shoul they lose their job. Very low-income individuals will be provided with expanded access to public programs like Medi-Cal and low-income working residents will receive financial assistance to help with the cost of coverage through a new state-administered purchasing pool. Health plans will be required to spend 85% of every premium dollar on patient care. For those employers who do not offer their employees coverage, a "4% fee," which the state is careful to avoid calling a payroll tax, would be imposed.
To underwrite the cost of his plan, Schwarzenegger is looking for $3.7 billion in new federal funding, to which California says it is entitled under current Medicaid regulations, and which would bring the total to $5.5 billion.–Robert F. Keane
Jeremy Siegel
"We have too many investors give into the fear and enthusiasm that strikes the markets," explains veteran financial expert Jeremy Siegel. "Investors will frequently buy and sell the wrong stocks at the wrong times instead of focusing on long term investing. If an advisor can keep impressing a long-run perspective on his or her clients," he continues, "it would serve a very valuable purpose."
A finance professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and senior investment strategy advisor to Wisdom Tree Investments, Siegel, 61, believes keeping clients focused, especially baby boomers, is one of an advisor's most important responsibilities. "Baby boomers will be very well served in concentrating on high dividend-yielding stocks," Siegel offers. "The popularity of dividend yielding funds, stocks, exchange traded funds, or mutual funds is in response to baby boomers nearing retirement. They realize they have to think about building their portfolio and focusing on their retirement income."
Siegel also suggests most investors should replace some of their capital weighted funds with funds that are fundamentally weighted. "That might serve them well given their investment objectives," he says. Additionally, Siegel says that on the basis of risk premium, stocks are very attractive today relative to bonds. "The long term normal equity risk premium will be a bit smaller at 3% than it is today at 4%," he adds, suggesting a move toward stocks for longer term investors. "It is very favorable for stocks at the present time."
There is, however, some concern among investors regarding inflation. "Although inflation is not good for stocks or bonds, it is better for stocks than for bonds," Siegel says. This is a good time, he suggest, to have a mix of domestic and international equities.
In the coming years, Siegel says investment advisors should be cognizant of the lower capital gains and dividend tax rates that are set to expire. "We should all be very active in terms of what kind of tax code we want," he says. "We have to be ready to find what we think is right and to be able to encourage people to save, invest, and re-invest, and to encourage firms to pay dividends so there will be income for the baby boomers when they retire."–Megan L. F. Robert
John Simmers
John Simmers may just be the busiest man in the financial services business, as CEO of ING Advisors Network in El Segundo, California; chairman of the Financial Services Institute, the independent broker/dealer advocacy group; and a governor of the NASD, which is undergoing enormous change this year as it combines with NYSE's regulatory arm and morphs into a super SRO. "I'm just very lucky," he says, "to be actually playing a role in the formation and development of three financial services industry organizations."
Looking at financial services on all of those levels gives Simmers, 57, a broad view of the independent broker/dealer industry and how it's evolving. "Customers are changing in terms of what their needs are, i.e., societal changes; the industry is changing in terms of its regulatory focus," perhaps to regulation that's "more interpretive; there is confusion; there's conflict, inter-industry. The challenge is putting all this together and coming out of it as an industry that is more transparent and effective in terms of establishing its credibility."
All this change is creating "unprecedented opportunity" for advisors, Simmers notes. But one issue that he says he finds particularly challenging is "enforcement actions that I don't understand, that are designed to effect change but seem to be hurting one person over everyone else. The top three firms get penalized, according to Simmers, "and everyone else gets a free ride–they just get the change. I think there's a better way."
The March 30 rollback of the broker/dealer exemption rule is "very interesting that it turns the clock back and lets us do over. Not many times you get a do-over." However, it won't affect most of ING's advisors because, as Simmers explains, "most of us already operate as investment advisors; very few of us deal with fee-based brokerage." His advice to advisors is simple: "Always put the customer's interest ahead of your own or what he perceives as his own; do the right thing. If the customer is looking for advice, give him advice. If he's looking for a recommendation, give him a recommendation–but be sure it's the right advice and the right recommendation."–Kathleen M. McBride
Lou Stanasolovich
It's certain that he wasn't thinking of himself when naming his firm Legend Financial Advisors, but in fact, the naturally modest Lou Stanasolovich is somewhat of a legend among advisors, which is but one of the reasons why for the third time in the five years that the IA 25 has been compiled, the 50-year-old Pittsburgh native has made the list.
Stanasolovich founded his firm in 1994, ten years after receiving his CFP designation. He's a co-founder of The Alpha Group, and a member of a variety of advisory boards including: TD Ameritrade President's Council; TIAA/CREF Institute's Advisory Council; the FPA National Convention Program Advisory Board; and the IA Leaders Council.
He might have an impressive resume, but Stanasolovich is not one to rest on past laurel.s. He's constantly using verbs such as "striving" and "struggling," when talking about making his business better, sounding more like a young man trying to change the world than an industry pro who's helped make the advisory profession what it is today.
Lots of people talk about the importance of building the next generation of advisors, but at Legend the talk is put into practice. Stanasolovich hires interns for paid positions in finance, business administration, marketing and communications, and information technology that run 18 to 20 hours during the school year, and he offers the best of them jobs upon graduation. He makes it clear that the reason the intern program works is because the firm is strongly committed to educating everyone who works there. He's also developed a clear career track for every position in the firm to the point where even he wouldn't qualify for some jobs. "I can't be a Senior Wealth Advisor in my own firm, because I don't have a CFA designation," he recently told IA. That doesn't make him any less of a legend.–Robert F. Keane
Mark Tibergien
Most observers of the investment advisory/financial planning universe, and its practitioners, would agree that building businesses out of practices would help advance the profession and provide the principals of those firms with more buck for their sweat equity bang. But only Mark Tibergien positions the issue as a moral one. "We have to learn to be more responsible as an industry," he argues. "You just can't create co-dependency" with your clients–"you have so many people depending on you"–"and then say 'Good Luck.'"
Tibergien believes it's one thing to have "a nice practice, a nice lifestyle, you can make a nice living and your clients can appreciate you. Now whether they can appreciate the fact that you haven't provided for any continuity if something bad happens to you . . ."
For Tibergien, 55 and the only five-time honoree on the IA 25, putting on the mantle of a fiduciary requires that you build a business that will endure not simply so you have as lucrative an exit strategy as possible, but to continue to serve your clients when you're no longer around. He calls it a "gross mistake on the part of so many people, in this day of fiduciary responsibility, where people agree we have an obligation to clients, how people don't appreciate the hypocrisy of the message: 'It's okay to build a business not to last.' It's hypocrisy that's maddening and confusing. It drives me crazy that people think this is responsible behavior."
In his writing, Tibergien says he tries to make the point that "if you're serious about running a business, here's what you have to do. If you're not serious about it, that's okay, too, that's the choice you're making, but quit trying to delude yourself that you're building an entity of great value. It's either one or the other."
Tibergien speaks easily and confidently on a number of topics of interest to independent advisors, but he's not glib. His fingertip control of Moss Adams's vaunted data, his hands-on work with hundreds of advisory firms around the country, and his keen analytical mind allow him to speak with quiet authority on everything from the Merrill Lynch rule to the culture of accountants to the prices being paid for advisory firm these days. That's why he has been on the IA 25 for every year it's existed.–James J. Green

subset: commoncrawl


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Inside story: Fetus has enough light to read
Q. On a bright sunny day, who just might be the most surprising sharer of the light? Think "womb with a view." –U.G. Turner
A. It has long been known that fetuses can smell, taste and hear, prompting Marco Del Giudice of the University of Turin to wonder if they couldn't see as well, says New Scientist magazine. In particular, is there sufficient light for them to do so?
So he measured how much light could penetrate a typical woman's tummy and found that up to 1 percent of ambient light got through. In bright sunlight, this is light equivalent to that found in a typically lit house, enough that "The fetus may develop vision in the final two months of pregnancy."
Q. According to scientists, a Ouija board is not all trickery or illusory correlation. What's the real physiological effect to help explain its workings? –L. Channing
A. In case you've never used one, it allows players to ask questions of the spirit world and get answers from a planchette, or marker, that moves across a board marked with letters, numbers, and the words "yes," "no," "maybe" and "good-bye," say Stephen Macknik and Susana Martinez-Conde in Sleights of Mind.
It's believed that the players themselves unconsciously move the planchette via the "ideomotor effect," where voluntary muscles make tiny movements outside conscious awareness that can cause the marker to drift toward one letter, then another, and so on.
Though the movements are self-generated, the illusion of an outside force is compelling. Now not to be killjoys, but, "If you want to expose the illusion of the Ouija board, ask the players to put on blindfolds as they move the planchette. Their spelled out messages will be gibberish."
Q. You take your date out to dinner at a nice restaurant. Under what circumstances might you think twice before holding her hand? –D. Simpson
A. Can you believe this has actually been studied? Understandably, people conform to social norms more when others are watching (or they think others are watching), hoping to gain acceptance and approval, say Roy Baumeister and Brad Bushman in Social Psychology. This includes people washing their hands in a public restroom after using the toilet.
One study found that most women washed up (77 percent), but only if they thought someone else was in the restroom. Among loners, the number dropped to 39 percent. So if your date goes to the bathroom alone in an almost empty restaurant, you might want to hold off on hand holding until later.
Q. What's the new view on why champagne fizzes, an estimated 250,000 bubbles in a typical bottle? –R. Harlee
A. Recent science has revised the old theory of what puts the fizz into this "fizzy wine," says John Lloyd and John Mitchinson in The Book of General Ignorance.
It was long argued that the tiny imperfections in the glass prompted the bubbles, but new photographic evidence reveals the nicks and grooves are too small for the bubbles to latch on to; rather the microscopic particles of dust and fluff in the glass serve as condensation nuclei for the dissolved carbon dioxide.
And for a few final words on the subject: "My only regret in life is that I did not drink more champagne," declared the economist John Maynard Keynes.
The Russian author Anton Chekhov's last words were, "I haven't had champagne for a long time." Reportedly, German medical etiquette at one time even demanded that when there was no hope, the doctor would offer the patient a glass of champagne.
Send Strange questions to brothers Bill and Rich at email@example.com


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I made molded rice balls which are yummier than they sound, and pretty child-friendly. Just cooked and cooled basmati rice, cream cheese, and fresh steamed white corn. Actually, I just mixed it up, Supergirl molded most of them in the (vaguely) bear-shaped onigiri molds I provided.
I also made a pile of shaped sandwiches this morning - ham, turkey, cheese, and cream cheese + jam.
But my favorite contribution was the platter of jello orange wedges. I was looking for something really fun and child-friendly to make, and came across this idea on the internets. The ones I saw were based more on a jello-shots kind of thing, so of course I omitted the vodka!
They came out so jewel-like and deceptively fun! What is it that I find so entertaining about watching people be fooled by surprising food? Cracks me up.
5 thick skinned navel oranges, cut in half, carefully juiced and cleared of all pulp.
(reserve the juice and strain it for the jello)
1 box of orange Jell-O -- (3 oz.)
1 C. boiling water
1 C. freshly squeezed orange juice
2 Envelopes Knox gelatine dissolved in 1 c. cold water
1/2 C. sugar
Mix the above ingredients until the gelatin is dissolved. Scraping the oranges was the hardest part of this (part of the problem may have been that I used valencias instead of the recommended navels. At any rate, set your scraped orange shells in a muffin tin or custard cups to make the next part easier and keep them balanced. Pour the liquid into the shells, filling them as close to the top as you can. Chill overnight. To slice them into wedges, I found the easiest way was to put the orange, cut side down, on a clean cutting board. Hold the shape of the orange as you slice through the skin and jello center. I found that a large, serrated knife was the best for this job. Then go fool someone and laugh!


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After the success of the ultra-tepid and mega-overrated "Paranormal Activity", Paramount is hoping that lightning will strike twice by starting Insurge Pictures, an in-house effort that will distribute films budgeted under $100,000. While this sounds awesome at first glance, we all know this'll just become another home for Hollywood vanity project for the likes of Steven Soderburgh and George Clooney to "get back to their roots" by using digital cameras to make scathing indictments of the US military complex starring porn stars and cameos from former teen-stars trying to shed their pretty boy image. On the plus side, you might get to see James Van Der Beek's dong.
Eric Roberts has signed the dotted line to star in the SyFy movie "Sharktopus". I know that I've been a champion of these movies in the past, but, after the release of "Mega-Shark vs. Giant Octopus", I find it hard to give a damn anymore. These movies used to be reviled and spit on, which, for me, added to their charm, but, for some reason, with the release of "MS v. GO", they became a part of the hipster culture and they became "cool" bad movies. "Hey bro, I can't make it to our Brooklyn-based indie art-rock collective band meeting tonight! SyFy has Cyndi Lauper is taking on a Spider-Megalodon!" (And, even more, am I the only one who feels like a total dick actually writing "SyFy"? That channel has gotten so pretentious I'm surprised they haven't done a Phillip K. Dick miniseries yet, with a soundtrack by Joanna Newsom.)


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Good Reads ~2012
The past year was a good year for reading. As in past years I try to read a book a week. This year I exceeded that goal slightly, having read 58 books. Much of that was due to rationing my internet intake, little to no blogging, little tweeting and even less Facebook, all massive timesucks.
Here is the list:
1. The Operators by Michael Hastings: non-fiction
2. Oranges by John McPhee: non-fiction
3. Jerusalem by Simon Sebag-Montefiore non-fiction
4. Bismarck by AJP Taylor non-fiction
5. The Dark Angel by Mika Waltari fiction
6. Alexander at Worlds End by Tom Holt fiction
7. Lars Porsena by Robert Graves non-fiction
8. The Witness and the Other World by Mary Campbell
9. Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott non-fiction
10. Travel Writing by Carl Thompson non-fiction
11. The Lawless Roads by Graham Greene non-fiction
12. Whatever by Michel Houllebeck fiction
13. Theogony by Hesiod non-fiction
14. The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje fiction
15. Digenis Akritas fiction/epic
16. The Making of Goodbye To A River by John Graves non-fiction
17. Stones of Aran by Tim Robinson non-fiction
18. In an Antique Land Amitav Ghosh non-fiction
19. The Cloud Forest by Peter Mathiessen non-fiction
20. The Road To Oxiana by Robert Byron non-fiction
21. Butcher's Crossing by John Williams fiction
22. Herodotus by James Romm non-fiction
23. Names on a Land George R. Stewart non-fiction
24. Poets in a Landscape Gilbert Highet non-fiction
25. Hadrian The Seventh Fr. Rolfe (Baron Corvo) fiction
26. Byzantine Grand Strategy Edward Luttwak non-fiction
27. Vortex Robert Charles Wilson fiction
28. Pandora's Star Peter F. Hamilton fiction
29. Silk Road Valerie Hansen, non-fiction
30. Why Marx Was Right Terry Eagleton, non-fiction
31. Judas Unchained Peter F. Hamilton, fiction
32. Christianity Diarmid MacCulloch, non-fiction
33. Pre-Ottoman Turkey Claude Cahen, non-fiction
34. A Long Ride Across Texas John Riddell, non-fiction
35. Coronado's Children J. Frank Dobie, fiction
36. Grailblazers Tom Holt, fiction
37. The Peregrine J.A. Baker, non-fiction
38. Augustus John Williams, fiction
39. Roumeli Patrick Leigh Fermor, non-fiction
40. Memoirs of Hadrian Marguerite Yourcenar, fiction
41. East of Trebizond Michael Pereira, non-fiction
42. The Old Ways Robert Macfarlane, non-fiction
43. The Artist . . . Warrior, H. Strathern, non-fiction
44. The Narrow Road North, Matsuo Basho, non-fiction
45. Mysterium, Robert Charles Wilson, fiction
46. The World of Odysseus, M.I. Finley, non-fiction
47. Gardens of Light, Amin Maalouf, fiction
48. Rome on the Euphrates, Freya Stark, non-fiction
49. Second World War, Anthony Beevor, non-fiction
50. Way of the World, Nicolas Bouvier, non-fiction
51. Goodbye to a River, John Graves, non-fiction
52. Fall of Roman Empire, Peter Heather, non-fiction
53. Our Southern Highlanders, H. Kephart, non-fiction
54. Aladdin's Lamp, John Freely, non-fiction
55. Here Be Dragons, Sharon Kay Penman
56. Trial of Socrates, I.F. Stone
57. Crucible of War, Fred Anderson
Are there any themes? I read a lot of history this year—and as with most years there's always a fair amount of classical history like Fall of the Roman Empire, Aladdin's Lamp, Trial of Socrates, The World of Odysseus and others. The real standout was M.I. Finley's The World of Odysseus, a revisionist take on the history of the era that when it was published, changed our views of the Odyssey and Iliad greatly. I think Peter Heather was hoping for something similar in his book The Fall of the Roman Empire but it doesn't work. While an often-times interesting tome at the end of the book I had to ask myself, "what was the argument he was making?"
The highlight of non-fiction books? The Lawless Roads by Graham Greene and Bismarck by AJP Taylor. The Lawless Roads is a travel book written by Greene during his source material gathering for The Power and the Glory. I found The Lawless Roads to be richer and much more interesting, especially his portrayal of San Antonio, my hometown, and Monterrey, Mexico. But damn, the entire book was fantastic. Bismarck by AJP Taylor? Well, damn, what does one say about AJP Taylor? If you consider yourself a student of foreign policy and you have not read any Taylor you simply don't know shit. Of course The Struggle for Mastery in Europe is his masterpiece.
Non-fiction overwhelmed fiction last year. But the standouts of fiction were Butcher's Crossing and Augustus, both by John Williams. The worst fiction book and worst book of the year was Grailblazers, by Tom Holt, who usually writes laugh out loud parodies of myths and legends, think two battling law firms in London, one of werewolves and the other vampires. Alas, Grailblazers was about the search for the Holy Grail by pizza delivery boys. It failed. Butcher's Crossing, by John Williams is an excellent anti-dote to the mythologizing pulp-Westerns by authors like Louis L'Amour. There are no shootouts. There are no Indian battles. There are no maudlin love scenes. What does it have then? Well, the characters are rich, the scenery magnificent and the story heartbreaking.
Most disappointing book? Garden's of Light by Amin Maalouf. Just not up to his usual standards like Samarkand and Leo the African.
Slowest read? Christianity by Diarmid McCullough. Jaysus, 1,000 plus pages of Christian history, all of it, the good, the bad, the pedophiliac.
Most surprising book? The Peregrine—about the author's tracking of a Peregrine falcon for a year in the United Kingdom, a masterpiece of movement and beauty even though so very little happens.
Shortest read: Lars Porsena by Robert Graves.
Best science fiction: Pandora's Star by Peter F. Hamilton.
Most bizarre book: Hadrian VII, by Baron Corvo, written by an obscure Brit who fantasizes he's now the Pope and changes the world. Quite a roller coaster read. And worth it.
With a new job and a new wife and all these changes I doubt I'll read a book a week, but I'll be back this time next year to repeat.
What did you read this year and what stood out?


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|"Are you a wizard or not?"
The title of this article is conjectural. Although it is based on canonical information, the actual name is a conjecture and may be supplanted at any time by additional information released from canonical sources. If this occurs, please move this page to the appropriate title.
The Arrow-shooting spell (incantation unknown) was a conjuration spell which fired arrows from the caster's wand.
The spell was often used by Appleby Arrows supporters at Quidditch matches to show their support for their teams. However, the British and Irish Quidditch League Headquarters banned the use of the spell at matches when referee Nugent Potts was pierced through the nose with a stray arrow in 1894.[1]
Known practitioners
- Supporters of the Appleby Arrows
- Quidditch Through the Ages (First mentioned)
Notes and references
- ↑ Quidditch Through the Ages, Chapter 7 (Quidditch Teams of Britain and Ireland)


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My DM wasn't sure how to handle this so I figured I'd ask here and see what people think. I used Mage Hand to pick up a burning log from a fire and drop it on an enemy. Because it was a magical attack, we used Wisdom vs Reflex to see if the log hit the enemy, or if they dodged.
My question is basically: Does that sound about right? Would you do it differently?


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Foreign countries have representation in Canada for several reasons:
The embassies for each country are usually in Ottawa (with some exceptions),
our capital city. Embassies are run by an "Ambassador". Consulates are offices
in other cities, depending on the needs of their travellers, business sector and expatriates.
Consulates are managed by a "Consulate General". Offices solely to promote business and trade
(without personal consular services) are called a "Trade Commission" and are usually managed
by a "Trade Commissioner".
Here is a list of Canadian Embassies & Trade Offices abroad. Here is a list of US Government services to Canadians.
We also have contact information about embassies and high commissions in Ottawa, the nation's capital.
If you do run into problems abroad, contact the nearest Canadian embassy or consulate immediately. If you're unable to make contact and require immediate assistance, place a collect call (where service is available) to the Emergency Operations Centre of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, at 613-996-8885. You can also contact us by e-mail at [email protected] More Info...


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Man killed in fiery crash on U.S. Highway 50 identified
The man killed in a collision early June 23 on U.S. Highway 50 has been identified as Mark Allen Flora, 59, of Texas.
According to the Nevada Highway Patrol:
A Nissan Altima driven by Jason W. Cloutier, 34, of Carson City entered the westbound lanes of the road going the wrong way. It collided with Flora's Ford Taurus, killing him. Also killed was Sierra Grace Woodward, 26, a passenger in the Altima.
Cloutier was flown to Renown Regional Medical Center with critical injuries; he remains there in serious condition.
Alcohol use is thought to have played a role in the crash.
The crash was reported about 3:28 a.m. just west of Dump Hill in Carson City.
Woodward was an Oakland native and mother who attended Carson High School and Western Nevada College, according to her Facebook page.
Trooper Chris Kelly of the Nevada Highway Patrol's Major Accident Investigation Team is investigating. Anyone with information is asked to contact him at 775-689-4661 or firstname.lastname@example.com regarding case NHP-130602135.


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Follow RFF News on your cell phone. Text follow rff to 40404 you will receive txt messages with RFF News
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
makz3d, didn't Phil say "this is the second of only two fast forwards on the race..." while introducing the Chas FF in hong kong?
Landing in Hong Kong with a sizable lead, Oswald & Danny's only troubles stemmed from a cash shortage as they paid their taxi at Sun Wah Kiu Laundry. After Danny negotiated a discount on the fare, the best friends opened their clue to find the second of two Fast Forwards on the race.
Danielle and Eric have to the luckiest damn people in the whole world if they win this race I will vomit. C/M and D/K have kicked ass throughout. I hope to god the spoilers are wrong.
MEETING WITH GLENN WEBER AND MARIE LIZAMAGlenn is expecting to become a local celebrity on Guam as soon as the relevant episode airs (usually within about 10 hours after U.S. East Coast due to time difference). He got a lot of camera time when the F3 teams booked their flights to Honollulu via Tokyo-Narita on the afternoon of Saturday Dec. 16. The previous day was a big day at Guam International Airport as Uchenna/Joyce, the Guidos and Danny/Oswald all departed with Phil on CO904 through Nagoya Japan to Honolulu. Glenn told me he got a brief opportuntiy to chat with Uchenna and Joyce. Dec. 16 had Glenn as the only NW individual on the 2 ticket counters, I believe by choice since he knew what would be happening. First up was Dustin/Kandice, who booked NW 81 mid-afternoon to Narita and NW10 from there to Honolulu. Charla/Mirna actually booked the same flights through Continental's ticket counter. Last was Eric/Danielle, who had run into a NW 747 pilot who convinced them to take the 20 minute later NW73 to Narita to get the comfort of the 747. After Dustin and Kandice heard about this, they decided to change their booking to do the same. The connect time to NW10 was still quite adedquate. Their production crew of cameraman and soundman just barely made it through customs with their equipment to get on the later flight.
Quote from: BballKates on April 23, 2007, 06:51:00 PMDanielle and Eric have to the luckiest damn people in the whole world if they win this race I will vomit. C/M and D/K have kicked ass throughout. I hope to god the spoilers are wrong.
Obviously someone who isn't paying actual attention to the show.
All guesses on if theres a Fast Forward or who places where etc..can go here.puddinI'm just throwing this out there.I have this gut feeling that the B-52 package drop screams FF. This is the same as when I felt the van roll-over in HK was a FF due to the fact that TAR would not pay to roll up to 4 vans.B-52 has much connection with the local Wright Patterson Air Force Base (WPAFB) in Dayton Ohio. They are HUGE and maybe there are 4 planes loaded & ready to go except for the box or 2 the team packs for inclusion.Would a FF fit at this stage of the race? Could there be 3 FF? Right now I'm sticking with FF although I feel I'll probably change my mind before the end of the week.
Not sure if this is where to put this.I've seen both Promo Videos. I am quite irked because it almost seems as if Dustin & Kandice were ignored. There is only a few seconds of them and I didn't try real hard to find them but they don't seem to be in the cube of 4 finalist. Even if you check the screen captures there's only 3 or 4 pics of a BQ.I just felt the need to bring this up.Is CBS trying to tell us something?
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This morning Google Reader brought up this
blog post about a technique used internally by the MS CLR
version 4.0.
It is basically a way to share complex code between different architectures, thus reducing the maintenance burden and allowing better compatibility in the tricky area of marshalling (when the runtime goes from managed code to unmanaged code it needs to perform many operations, including massaging the data exchanged between the two worlds).
At the beginning Mono had specialized x86 chunks of code to
do the work, but we soon realized the problems with that.
At the time I proposed to use a small, specialized bytecode set (after all the operations involved are very few), which would have been great for the interpreter I was working on.
Dietmar instead pushed for the use of IL bytecode: this would have been a slower solution for the interpreter, but it would allow access to a wider set of operations and it would reduce the burden on the JIT backend, which, after all, already had an IL frontend.
We went for the IL solution (the time frame was the beginning of 2002) and we're glad to see that MS choose to adopt the same technique a few years later.
There are two important considerations about this story in
the context of Mono development
- we started to always choose techniques that would favour the JIT against the interpreter, both in the case of speed and maintenance burden. This was a path that eventually lead to the discontinuation of the interpreter.
- we built a codebase that is easily portable across architectures, to the point that we consider a JIT port only slightly more complicated than an interpreter port (because of the many features of Mono/CLR even an interpreter needs quite a bit of very low-level knowledge about how an architecture works)
As an extension, we later used the same IL-based technique
to implement many other runtime helper methods that would
otherwise have been to be written in low-level
architecture-specific code: remoting helpers, garbage
collection fast paths, delegate runtime methods etc.
For the curious, most of this code is in metadata/marshal.c in the Mono source code.


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Humsterland (Groningen, Netherlands)
Humsterland is a district in western Groningen, Netherlands, where Anabaptists have lived from the beginning. In 1574 an agreement was formulated here between the Frisians and the Flemish, known as the Peace of Humsterland (Humstervrede). In 1578 another meeting was held here after fruitless discussions at Emden. There were in Humsterland two groups, the Old Flemish and the Flemish, which extended over several villages. The Old Flemish congregation was always small. In about 1775 it united with the Flemish, which must always have been much larger, and was the center of the Humsterlandsche Sociëteit. In 1838 the combined congregation acquired a new church in Noordhorn, and in 1839 changed the name to Noordhorn.
Cate, Steven Blaupot ten. Geschiedenis der Doopsgezinden in Groningen, Overijssel en Oost-Friesland. Leeuwarden: W. Eekhoff en J. B. Wolters, 1842: I, passim.
Doopsgezinde Bijdragen (1879): 4; 1906: 46.
Doopsgezind Jaarboekje (1840): 27, 43; (1850): 60.
Hege, Christian and Christian Neff. Mennonitisches Lexikon. Frankfurt & Weierhof: Hege; Karlsruhe: Schneider, 1913-1967: v. II, 368.
|Nanne van der Zijpp
|Date Published
Cite This Article
MLA style
Zijpp, Nanne van der. "Humsterland (Groningen, Netherlands)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1956. Web. 6 Jul 2020. https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Humsterland_(Groningen,_Netherlands)&oldid=107685.
APA style
Zijpp, Nanne van der. (1956). Humsterland (Groningen, Netherlands). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 6 July 2020, from https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Humsterland_(Groningen,_Netherlands)&oldid=107685.
Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 2, p. 843. All rights reserved.
©1996-2020 by the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. All rights reserved.


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Amazon.com has EVGA CLC 120 Liquid/Water CPU Cooler w/ RGB LED (CL12-V1) on sale for $59.99. Shipping is free.
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Astro turf is a Synthetic grass Mpumalanga specialist, therefore will assist you with a professional, neat and fast supply and installation of the best quality turf on the market.
We specializes in Synthetic grass Mpumalanga, this includes the following, but not limited to the below list :Residential & Commercial Synthetic grass Mpumalanga Applications The advancement in synthetic surfaces has allowed clients to incorporate synthetic surfaces in their homes, gardens, balconies, play areas, business areas, sport pitches and offices. Synthetic grass Mpumalanga can provide a variety of synthetic surface types from a neat short pile turf to long natural field turf. We have over 15 synthetic surface types to choose from, all with a eight year guarantee. You can also visit the following pages: Synthetic Sport Synthetic Lawn
- Hockey pitches
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Our turf supply and installation will include:
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60s -Simplicity Pattern No. 1434- Boys pajamas in two lengths. Shown in summer and winter styles these pajamas may have short or long pants. All versions of pants have elastic waistline and fly front closing. Short or long sleeved top may have a button front closing with a convertible collar or may be a pullover style with band at neckline. Corded piping details view 1 and 3 tops.
Fits Boy Size 4Chest, 23
Good Condition
0.25 lbs


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The signs that winter is approaching are here: colder temperatures, shorter days and public skating! That's right – public skating begins at Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) rinks on Wednesday, November 27th. DCR owns 42 rinks across the Commonwealth and this year, many DCR …Continue Reading Winter is Coming: DCR Ice Rinks Open Nov. 27!
We want to hear from you. Connect with us.


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You are currently browsing the tag archive for the 'globalisation' tag.
Eradicating ecocide could create conditions for business to flourish, but company leaders often offer knee-jerk response to environment campaigners
▶ ERADICATING ECOCIDE: WHY BUSINESS LEADERS MUST STEP UP TO THE CHALLENGE http://sco.lt/7ExcmX
Thursday, 21, February 2013 – Guardian Sustainable Business – The Eradicating Ecocide campaign calls for ecocide – the extensive destruction of ecosystems – to be recognised in international law as the fifth crime against Peace. Lawyer Polly Higgins' compelling argument is that the abolition of ecocide requires business leadership as surely as the campaign for the abolition of slavery did.
One of the paradoxes for environmental campaigners in developed nations is that we are often fighting for the rights of others – for other species, people in other nations, people not yet born. Like the abolitionists we may not personally benefit from our victories and indeed may be disadvantaged in the short-term. This produces a complex moral and psychological field to work in, one that frequently produces unintended consequences like my conversation with the business leaders. Angry denial, studied indifference and projection of blame are just a few of the responses that leave campaigners shell-shocked and puzzled as they struggle to engage both the public and the powerful in the struggle for a truly sustainable future…. http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/eradicating-ecocide-business-leaders-challenge
▶ SHOULD COMPANIES COMPENSATE SOCIETY FOR ENVIRONMENTAL DESTRUCTION FROM WHICH THEY PROFIT? http://sco.lt/5x2tqz
June 26, 2013 Stanford Center for Social Innovation
▶ CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY IS ESSENTIAL TO ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY http://csi.gsb.stanford.edu/corporate-social-responsibility-essential-environmental-sustainability
▶ THE EVOLUTION OF BUSINESS: HOW A NEW BUSINESS ERA INSPIRED BY NATURE, NOT GREED, CAN BENEFIT US ALL http://sco.lt/6XU6Kn
-▶ THE WORLD IS SITTING ON A CONSUMPTION TIME BOMB http://sco.lt/7sR3eT
-▶ INDIA MANDATES WORLD'S FIRST CORPORATE CHARITABLE GIVING LAW. EU PASSES LAW ON CSR REPORTING http://sco.lt/6ENF8D
▶ SHOULD COMPANIES COMPENSATE SOCIETY FOR ENVIRONMENTAL DESTRUCTION FROM WHICH THEY PROFIT? http://sco.lt/5x2tqz
March 1, 2013 Global Research
▶ PREDATORY CAPITALISM AND THE RISE OF THE "GLOBAL CORPORATOCRACY". http://www.globalresearch.ca/rise-of-the-global-corporatocracy-an-interview-with-john-perkins/5329456
-▶ ECO-SPIRITUALITY: TOWARDS A VALUES-BASED ECONOMIC STRUCTURE http://sco.lt/92y1Ef
-▶ THE EVOLUTION OF BUSINESS: HOW A NEW BUSINESS ERA INSPIRED BY NATURE, NOT GREED, CAN BENEFIT US ALL http://sco.lt/6XU6Kn
-▶ HOW A SENSE OF SACRED CAN HELP SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS – RESTORING VALUES http://www.scoop.it/t/environmental-and-human-health/p/3994926408/how-a-sense-of-sacred-can-help-sustainable-business-restoring-values
▶ POPE FRANCIS WARNS ON COMING "IDOLATROUS" GLOBAL ECONOMIC COLLAPSE, PLEAS FOR ENVIRONMENT http://sco.lt/9JnutN
Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh
▶ ONLY LOVE FOR MOTHER EARTH CAN SAVE US FROM CLIMATE CHANGE http://sco.lt/8diF4z
WATCH: "HOME" An Exquisite Dedication To the Stewards of Our Planet
▶ THE NEW CORPORATE COLONIALISM — DESTRUCTION OF LIFE ALL IN THE NAME OF "GROWTH" http://sco.lt/6HLK77


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Look at What You Could be Doing this Memorial Day Weekend
Celebrate and commemorate Memorial Day weekend with a variety of events planned throughout the Hudson Valley. Here's a few highlights with links to find even more events!
Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park will be the site of a USO show on Friday, May 23 at 7 pm, you will be transported back to the 40's with comedy sketches, historic film footage, entertainment, and music from the WWII era. On Saturday and Sunday, May 24 & 25, the lawn of the library and museum will resemble a WWII encampment with period vehicles as well as soldiers in battle dress to share their love of history with you.
It's opening weekend for the Story Walk at the Wildlife Education Center at Hudson Highlands Nature Museum in Cornwall-on-Hudson. You can read your way through the trails with the children's story "Lost in the Woods" by Carl R. Sams II & Jean Stoick. You can meet one of the animals from the book, have a guided walk along the Story Walk Trail, plus enjoy crafts and snacks for the kids throughout the afternoon.
Don't miss the Woodstock & New Paltz Art & Crafts Fair at the Ulster County Fairgrounds this Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Enjoy specialty foods, entertainment, children's activities, artisans and their work and more.
The 14th Yard Sale-O-Rama is not to be missed! It runs on Sunday May 25 from 8a-5p throughout the Village and Town of Liberty. Scoop up treasures at great prices.


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Castaway back home in El Salvador
- Jose Salvador Alvarenga will have his health monitored in El Salvador
- Fisherman who moved to Mexico has not been home in eight years
- Some have doubted Alvarenga%27s story%2C but Marshall Islands officials say it checks out
Jose Salvador Alvarenga is finally back home.
The self-described castaway who said he spent more than a year adrift in the Pacific Ocean has landed in his native El Salvador, according to the Associated Press.
The arrival at the airport in San Salvador marks the end of what Alvarenga, 37, has described as a cross between a nightmare and a movie plot. The bedraggled fisherman was found in an atoll in the Marshall Islands almost two weeks ago, bearded, weak and hungry.
"We thought he was dead," cousin Marisol Alvarenga told NBC News as she awaited his arrival in San Salvador. "It's such an overwhelming joy that he's alive."
Alvarenga said he set out in November 2012 from Mexico for a one-day fishing trip with a companion — the 15-year-old son of a friend according to one report, a 23-year-old friend according to other reports. After being blown off course and losing use of their engines and radios, they spent weeks adrift, eating shark meat, raw birds and turtles, according to Alvcarenga. The companion died of starvation, Alvarenga said, and he threw the body overboard. As the weeks and months passed, he survived on raw fish and his own urine, according to various reports.
Alvarenga's hometown is Garita Palmera, a village on the Salvadoran coast.
Now clean-shaven and smiling, he looks a lot different than the man who captured media across the world after he was found. He spent more than a week undergoing health checkups and telling his story in the Marshall Islands.
It has been eight years since he's been home, according to NBC News. All his family in the coastal village of Garita Palmera knew was that he was working as a fisherman in Mexico, until his discovery made worldwide news.
Some have questioned Alvarenga's story, asking why he looked to healthy after his 6,000 mile trip across the ocean, according to Pendle Today, a news organization in the United Kingdom. His lips were not cracked, his skin was not burned and doctors pronounced him in relatively good condition, Pendle Today reports.
But officials in the Marshall Islands say they ave no reason to doubt Alvarenga, according to CNN.
An ambulance at the airport is to take Alvarenga to a hospital, where his health will be monitored, Violeta Menjivar, El Salvador's vice minister of health, told CNN.


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Bill Mickols' three-year term will contribute to promotion of membrane science and technology worldwide
Dow Water Solutions, a business unit of The Dow Chemical Co., announced that Bill Mickols, senior research scientist, has been named to the board of directors for the North American Membrane Society (NAMS). NAMS is the only professional society in North America that promotes all aspects of membrane science and technology, ranging from fundamental studies of membrane material science to process application and development.
As a board member, Mickols will work with NAMS to foster the development and dissemination of knowledge in membrane science and technology, as well as promote the collaborative efforts of researchers, technologists and end-users in the synthetic membrane community.
"NAMS is fortunate to have someone as dedicated to its mission as Bill on our board," said Ed Sanders, president, NAMS. "His leadership and vision will make a significant impact on our society and allow our organization to address the challenges facing membrane science and technology around the world while helping our society's members to achieve their business goals."


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Being a diverse and forward-thinking movement also means consistently seeking to understand and experiment with new ideas. The GBV Prevention Network, therefore, offers access to a wealth of compelling resources from both members and non-members. Here, you can keep up-to-date with thousands of the latest ideas and efforts being made to prevent VAW around the region. You can also share your own vision and practices, so others can learn from your experiences. We hope these materials will continue to expand our Network's culture of learning!
Theme Big data
Big Data and Positive Social Change in the Developing World
This white paper was produced by a group of activists, researchers and data experts who met at The Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Centre to discuss the question of whether, and how, big data is becoming a resource for positive social change in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
Author: Rockefeller Foundation
Year of Publication: 2014Read the resource here


text: This past Saturday Gateway BMW in St. Louis held its fall open house. They invited stunt rider Chris "Teach" McNeil to stop by and provide some entertainment. He gave three shows, each consisting of stunt riding on a G450 X, F GS800,and an S 1000RR. I filmed two of his shows up close and personal and put together a little video which I posted on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=su2AKgUhTto