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Animal Testing - Cruelty Free - Leaping Bunny
Morrisons believes that beauty should be cruelty free. We are proud to be Leaping Bunny approved. A global programme, Leaping Bunny requires cruelty free standards over and above legal requirements. All of our own brand cosmetic and personal care products are approved under the Cruelty Free International Leaping Bunny programme, the internationally recognisable gold standard for cruelty free products.
We adhere to a fixed cut-off date policy and proactively monitor our suppliers to ensure that our products continue to adhere to the Leaping Bunny criteria. Our supplier monitoring system is also independently audited. For more information about Cruelty Free International, Leaping Bunny and Leaping Bunny criteria, please visit www.crueltyfreeinternational.org.


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This post was written in collaboration with Amie Stepanovich at Access Now.
On April 6, Russian math instructor Dmitry Bogatov was arrested in Moscow and charged with "preparing to organize mass disorder" and making "public calls for terrorist activity" due to a gross misunderstanding about the operation of the Tor internet anonymization service. Bogatov is accused of authoring a series of online posts published to the sysadmins.ru discussion platform on March 29 under the username "Ayrat Bashirov." One post called for protesters to attend an unsanctioned, anonymously organized demonstration on April 2 with "rags, bottles, gas, turpentine, styrofoam, and acetone." Another post linked to the music video for Kanye West's "No Church in the Wild," described by investigators as "a video recording with insubordination to the legal demands of the police, and mass disorder."
The posts appear to have come from the IP address of a server located in Bogatov's home, but this server is a part of the Tor network—an exit node that routes anonymous traffic from all over the world and makes it appear to have originated from that computer.
There is considerable evidence that Bogatov did not post the content at issue. According to a Global Voices report, "Surveillance footage shows Bogatov and his wife leaving a supermarket four minutes before one of the posts was made on March 29. Given that the supermarket is half a kilometer from their home, it is unlikely that Bogatov could have made it home and posted online within four minutes." Additionally, "Ayrat Bashirov" has continued posting on the forum and has even exchanged messages with an Open Russia journalist explicitly denying that he is Bogatov.
Tor exit node operators mistakenly accused of crimes committed from their exit nodes is nothing new. This is one of the reasons that EFF cautions against running an exit node in your home in its Legal FAQ for Tor Relay Operators. In the past, law enforcement has always backed down once it had become clear that they had the wrong party.
But rather than acknowledge their mistake, the Investigative Committee (the main federal investigative committee in the Russian Federation), appears to be doubling down. When a judge initially ruled that the charges against Bogatov were not serious enough to justify his continued detention, the Investigative Committee added the second, more serious charge of inciting terrorism. Days later, the court upheld the additional charges, formally arrested Bogatov, and ordered that he be held until his trial date on June 8.
The arrest comes in midst of an online crackdown related to anti-corruption protests in cities across Russia on April 2. The protests have resulted in the arrest of hundreds of individuals, including Leonid Volkov, who was arrested for having livestreamed the protests. Volkov was detained for ten days, and as a result was unable to attend RightsCon, where he was scheduled to speak about Russian surveillance systems.
As global organizations working to defend human rights, Access Now and EFF condemn Dmitry Bogatov's continued detention and the detention of others by Russia or other governments for exercising their human rights or facilitating increased internet security. Put simply: running a Tor exit node is not a crime and Tor exit node operators should not be treated like criminals.

subset: commoncrawl


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Baker Perkins provides full process support to all its customers in the biscuit industry. We ensure that our equipment provides the distinct product characteristics and quality consumers require. Baker Perkins best-in-class biscuit plant is based on over 100 years experience of the special needs of biscuit manufacturers throughout the world.
Process technologists
Baker Perkins supports customers from initial concept development of biscuits, cookies and crackers. Tests using the customer's own ingredients ensure that equipment will produce both new products, and replicate an existing range with upgraded production facilities.
We help companies new to the industry, and existing customers testing novel product ideas.
Dedicated technology
Our Innovation Centre contains pilot and laboratory scale equipment dedicated to the industry. Experienced process technologists are on hand to offer help on product formulations, process parameters from mixing to cooling, and equipment selection. A wide range of doughs can be assessed to ensure they can be handled successfully.
On-site support
Baker Perkins commissions new equipment, and trains operators. We also ensure that customers can adapt their product range to changing market needs. Technologists work both in our own laboratory and in customers' factories to adapt existing products and develop new ones. They also modify recipes and processes to take account of changes in ingredients and legislation, and re-train operators.
Process optimization
Baker Perkins services include benchmarking and process optimization of installed equipment. We analyse current operation, and fine-tune machinery to maximize performance and reduce operating costs.


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Love Birds in Ballerina from the Sending Love Collection by My Mind's Eye for Riley Blake Designs.
You'll "heart" this romantic and flirty collection by My Mind's Eye. Sending Love is all hearts, flowers, and love birds in alluring shades of reds and pinks. All hearts will go pitter-patter over this dreamy collection!
Please note that fabric is sold by the ½ meter. If you enter a higher quantity the fabric will be delivered in one continuous piece.
For example:
Qty 1 = ½ meter
Qty 2 = 1 meter
Qty 3 = 1½ meters
Qty 4 = 2 meters...and so on!
Collection: Sending Love
Designer: My Mind's Eye
Print Name: Love Birds in Ballerina
Manufacturer: Riley Blake Designs
Material: 100% fine cotton
Width: 43-44"
Pins and Needles Fabrics


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EcoPayz is an alternative purchasing method which is used widely throughout Europe and Canada.
To open an account with EcoPayz visit their website at: www.ecopayz.com and click on the "Open a free account" button. You can deposit money by clicking on "Money Deposits."
For more information go to: www.ecopayz.com
Availability depends on your country


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Westwood Farm Pre-School
10.5 Parental involvement
Policy statement
We believe that children benefit most from early year's education and care when parents and settings work together in partnership.
Our aim is to support parents as their children's first and most important educators by involving them in their children's education and in the full life of our setting. We also aim to support parents in their own continuing education and personal development.
Some parents are less well represented in early years settings; these include fathers, parents who live apart from their children, but who still play a part in their lives, as well as working parents. In carrying out the following procedures, we will ensure that all parents are included.
When we refer to 'parents', we mean both mothers and fathers; these include both natural or birth parents, as well as stepparents and parents who do not live with their children but have contact with them and play a part in their lives. 'Parents' also includes same sex parents, as well as foster and adoptive parents.
The Children Act (1989) defines parental responsibility as 'all the rights, duties, powers, responsibilities and authority which by law a parent of a child has in relation to the child and his property'. (For a full explanation of who has parental responsibility, refer to the Pre-school Learning Alliance publication Safeguarding Children.)
Parents are made to feel welcome in our setting; they are greeted appropriately and treated with respect.
We have a means to ensure all parents are included - that may mean that we have different strategies for involving fathers, or parents who work or live apart from their children.
We make every effort to accommodate parents who have a disability or impairment.
We consult with all parents to find out what works best for them.
We ensure on-going dialogue with parents to improve our knowledge of the needs of their children and to support their families.
Each term parents are asked to complete a form detailing if any of their circumstances, personal details, or child's health information such as allergies have changed.
We inform all parents about how the setting is run and its policies, through access to written information, including our Safeguarding Children and Child Protection policy and our responsibilities under the Prevent Duty, and through regular informal communication. We check to ensure parents understand the information that is given to them.
A copy of our policies is available at all times to parents and staff, both in the entrance hall and on the website.
Information about a child and his or her family is kept confidential within our setting. We provide a privacy notice that details how and why we process personal information. The exception to this is where there is cause to believe that a child may be suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm, or where there are concerns regarding child's development that need to be shared with another agency. (see safeguarding policy).
We will seek parental permission unless there are reasons not to in order to protect the safety of the child. Reference is made to our Information Sharing Policy on seeking consent for disclosure.
We seek specific parental consent to administer medication, take a child for emergency treatment, take a child on an outing and take photographs for the purposes of record keeping.
The expectations that we make on parents are made clear at the point of registration.
We make clear our expectation that parents will participate in settling their child at the commencement of a place according to an agreed plan.
We seek parents' views regarding changes in the delivery of our service.
Parents are actively encouraged to participate in decision making processes according to the structure in place within our setting. They are invited to join our Management committee.
We encourage parents to become involved in the social and cultural life of the setting and actively contribute to it.
As far as possible our service is provided in a flexible way to meet the needs of parents without compromising the needs of children.
We provide sufficient opportunity for parents to share necessary information with staff and this is recorded and stored to protect confidentiality.
Our key persons meet regularly with parents to discuss their child's progress and to share concerns if they arise. We have an open-door policy, to enable this at mutually convenient times, or at parents' evenings.
Where applicable, our key persons work with parents to carry out an agreed plan to support special educational needs.
Where applicable, our key persons work with parents to carry out any agreed tasks where a Protection Plan is in place for a child.
We involve parents in the shared record keeping about their children - either formally or informally – and ensure parents have access to their children's developmental records.
We provide opportunities for parents to contribute their own skills, knowledge and interests to the activities of the setting.
We support families to be involved in activities that promote their own learning and well-being; informing parents about relevant conferences, workshops and training.
We consult with parents about the times of meetings to avoid excluding anyone.
We provide information about opportunities to be involved in the setting in ways that are accessible to parents with basic skills needs, or those for whom English is an additional language; making every effort to provide an interpreter for parents who speak a language other than English and to provide translated written materials.
We hold meetings in venues that are accessible and appropriate for all.
We welcome the contributions of parents; in whatever form these may take.
We inform all parents of the systems for registering queries, complaints or suggestions and we check to ensure these are understood. All parents have access to our written complaints procedure, which is kept with our policies, both in the entrance hall and on the website. There is also a summary in the notice board in the entrance hall.
We provide opportunities for parents to learn about the curriculum offered in the setting and about young children's learning, in the setting and at home. There are opportunities for parents to take active roles in supporting their child's learning in the setting: informally through helping out or taking part in activities with their child, or through structured projects engaging parents and staff in learning about children's learning. Parents are encouraged to contribute to their children's learning journeys on Tapestry, by sharing notes, photographs and videos.
In compliance with the Safeguarding and Welfare Requirements, the following documentation is also in place at our setting:
Admissions Policy.
Complaints procedure.
Record of complaints.
Developmental records of children.


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Heidi Montag says there's no sex tape featuring her and Spencer Pratt ... but she still wants to have a sit-down with the Prez of the biggest porn company in the world.
TMZ has obtained an email Heidi sent to Vivid Entertainment honcho Steve Hirsch in which she says, "I don't think Spencer has any footage of the two of us. I think hes (sic) making it up for publicity for a new reality show he wants me to do but I really can't tell. He can be sneaky."
But then Heidi writes to Hirsch, "I wanted to drop you a line and let you know where Im (sic) at with all of this. If you decide to come to Costa Rica I look forward to hearing your thoughts."
Spencer insists he has a catalog of XXX videos featuring him and Heidi.
It certainly has the smell of an upcoming release.


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Merlin's weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.
Merlin's weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.
"What's 43 Folders?"
43Folders.com is Merlin Mann's website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.
Dr. Contextlove or: "How I learned to stop worrying and love iCal"
Merlin Mann | Feb 27 2006
A favorite topic of GTD'ers is the contexts that we each choose to identify the times, tools, or locations by which a given task can or must be undertaken. This is a highly personalized decision, and I've learned a lot from seeing how other people are doing it. Since I see it's been a while since I've talked about how I'm using contexts, here's an update that reflects how I'm now using Kinkless GTD and iCal to keep things wrangled. Contexts, enumeratedIt's worth mentioning that a lot of my approach has been shaped by my move from Entourage to kGTD + iCal. While the actual contexts haven't changed too much, the way I organize and think about them has evolved, as we'll see a bit later. The context themselves, with a brief explanation, where it's useful or non-obvious: Actionable contexts
Unactionable or deferred contexts(Note: the "+" sign tells kGTD that these contexts don't generate next actions or iCal syncs)
So, that's a snapshot of where I am now. A number of those contexts are "on the bubble" right now -- too cute or fussy or potentially procrastinatable (is that even a word?). I comb through contexts in general every few weeks, or more often when one of them seems to have become an oubliette for the items I want to banish from thought. That's a good sign that the context is not about action at all and should be removed or refactored immediately. iCal GroupsAnd now: the sexy. iCal sucks in a lot of ways (that's for another post), but it does do one thing I love: it let's you put your separate "calendars" -- which, in our case, are the actionable contexts we've synced from kGTD -- into "groups." I'm using this to make three "meta-contexts" that mirror the very general types of work into which all my tasks (and their parent contexts) belong.
But why bother with organizing these into meta-groups? Ah, because it makes it so easy to reveal or hide all the tasks that I can work on at a given time, just by ticking the group's little click box. This makes having many contexts so much more manageable. So, if you're keeping score, here's how they break out in iCal
Which gets me to the secret point of this post. It's the basic kGTD approach that's been really useful to me: This has the effect of keeping you really focused on the doing rather than the fiddling. Once you've got kGTD set up to a point where you trust it to mind your world, try living in iCal instead. For one thing it's a lot less engrossing to play with, which might send you back to work more quickly than the amusement park ride that kGTD can be. You end up with a shorthand way to mentally gauge your "doing-to-fiddling ratio"; If you find you are spending a lot more time in kGTD than iCal you know it's time to ramp up the working and dial down the fussy meta work. POSTED IN:
Seconding Brendon most heartily. This... by communicatrix (not verified)
Very ingenious and simple method... by Thumbtack (not verified)
This is brilliant. I've... by brendon (not verified)
This is just how I... by Conrad (not verified)
Hello communicatrix... Let me reclarify:
I'm... by brendon (not verified)
ugh- sorry all, I used... by brendon (not verified)
Learning always comes from surprising... by waywest (not verified)
I use that approach, using... by xamevou (not verified)
Ditto what waywest said.
Group?! News... by Gordon Meyer (not verified)
About MerlinBio Merlin Mann is an independent writer, speaker, and broadcaster. He's best known for being the guy who created the website you're reading right now. He lives in San Francisco, does lots of public speaking, and helps make cool things like You Look Nice Today, Back to Work, and Kung Fu Grippe. Also? He's writing this book, he lives with this face, he suffers from this hair, he answers these questions, and he's had this life. So far. Merlin's favorite thing he's written in the past few years is an essay entitled, "Cranking." |
EXPLORE 43Folders | THE GOOD STUFF |


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San Francisco is a photographer's dream. Iconic architecture, world famous bridges, rolling coastal hills and beaches, each with unique qualities to photograph. It is no wonder our Marin Headlands workshop is one of the most popular courses we offer at the Aperture Academy.
Sunday, a full group met instructors Stephen Oachs and Brian Rueb on Baker Beach to attend just such a class. We had a brief orientation so instructors could get an idea where every student was with their experience, as well as find out what it was they wanted to focus on learning during the day. Within ten minutes of the class starting, we were on the beach, cameras out, and ready to learn.
We spent time with each student making sure they understood the relationship between aperture and shutter speed. Several students had questions regarding how to compose a scene, or approach a scene and scout out a composition. Stephen and Brian, while very similar in philosophy, each have unique and varied ways of explaining their approach to photography, and this dynamic is what we feel makes our classes so special. Both instructors worked the beach, helping to explain concepts in ways that made sense to the participants. Our primary goal for Baker Beach, and really the entire day, is to learn...so when the better light at the end of the day is upon us, our participants are ready to tackle the challenge with the new tips and skills they've worked the day on.
Fort Point, the second stop of the day was a treat for everyone. The old archways, and many twists and turns within the fort, provide countless opportunities for photography. Once inside, our group split into two, with Team Stephen and Team Brian setting out to work different, more intimate parts of the fort, working on composition and shutter speed. The smaller groups also ensured we wouldn't be too crowded in the more confined interiors, and everyone had the opportunity to work closer with the instructors on getting what they wanted out of their time.
There are a few areas the instructors use to work with the students that are personal favorites of theirs, but we also love to turn the group loose for a bit and really let them explore. The top of the fort, often gusting with wind, is a great place to explore looking for unique macro shots, or just taking in a spectacular front row view of the Golden Gate Bridge.
While the class was off seeking their own perspectives of the fort, the instructors wandered about helping individual students with technical questions, or showing them some special little nooks of the fort they may have overlooked. Sunday's weather was chilly to be sure, and after two hours, many were ready for a little break to get some food or drink to warm them up and give them the energy boost to finish the day.
Sausalito is a charming little town on the end of the headlands, and a perfect spot to spend an hour while we wait for the sun to drop a bit more in the sky. This group was eager as any we've had, and many students ate quickly so they could wander out to explore the marina and take more images. Our instructors love it when they get a group that is so excited to learn, and is out gathering images even when they can be relaxing.
Once the class was rested, warm, and full, we loaded back into the van and set off for Rodeo Beach...hoping to capture a nice sunset.
The tides on Sunday were a bit higher than they had been the previous night, so the military approach we had used with the other class was not an option. However, the group split up and Team Brian headed down to the beach via an alternative route, while Team Stephen chose to shoot a different composition from higher on the bluffs.
The group on the beach wandered the cove looking for a spot that would protect them from the large surf, and provide them with a good composition when the sun finally set. Brian walked the beach helping students work with higher shutter speeds and lower apertures for capturing waves in action as they smashed into the sea stacks and rocks. As the sun continued to drop, members of Team Stephen defected and came down to take their crack at capturing a good sunset on the beach.
We spent a lot of time on the beach working with filters. Graduated Neutral Density (GND) filters were passed out to let students practice a bit with balancing an exposure using the filters to hold back the brighter sky area while adding more exposure to the black sandy foreground. We also covered how the polarizing filters can be used to creatively enhance a photo.
When the sun finally set, the class was scattered throughout the rocky coastline, each with a composition they thought fit the scene. A low marine layer caused the good light to shift away from the sea stacks, and more to the headlands side of the compositions, but for a few minutes the color was spectacular, and many students were able to successfully switch their compositions to capture that fleeting color.
The time on the beach was great, but the hike back to the van was more interesting...at least for one person. Even though the tide was heading out, the waves were still too intense to make the route navigable, so all but one of us ventured the way we had come. However, one person "didn't mind getting a little wet" and ventured on her own to brave the waves...and she almost made it. However, "almost" doesn't count when dodging waves, and unfortunately, she went down...and lost her tripod. The ocean is unforgiving to camera equipment. Luckily she had a great camera bag and the agility to save it!
She gets the golden floaties award for her valiant attempt and being a great sport.
When the group was finally reassembled back at the van, the marine layer had turned into a big fog bank that descended upon the whole headlands. The bridge was not visible. However, the group was getting tired. They had spent a long day in the field, and had a lot of new information to process. Many were ready to call it a day. We went back to the meeting point and dropped off the group that was heading home, and let them know they could join us to shoot the bridge at any of our other Marin workshops. A few students weren't ready to give up, so we made one last effort to see if the Golden Gate was visible from a different vantage point. The bridge toyed with us for 20 minutes. Was it going to show? Or stay hidden in the fog?
Unfortunately, we were unable to get any shots of the entire bridge, but we used the opportunity to work on the skills we would have used had the whole span been visible, and the remaining members of the group had learned of another point from which to shoot the bridge should they come back to the city for another photographic expedition.
All said, it was a great day in the field. Students were given a ton of helpful hints and information that will hopefully benefit them in all their future photographic forays. The instructors both had a great day working with this enthusiastic group, and look forward to seeing them again on future workshops.
Until next time,
Stephen, Brian, and the rest of the Aperture Academy team
P.S. If you'd like to join us at one of our workshops, you can find the schedule/sign up here.
Other Cool Stuff→ Past Workshop Photos → 72dpi.com → How-To Articles → Photographer of the Month |
Contact Us→ Contact Us → About Us → Site Map |


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The basic structure of the beginning-of-buffer
function has
already been discussed. (See A
Simplified beginning-of-buffer
This section describes the complex part of the definition.
As previously described, when invoked without an argument,
moves the cursor to the beginning of the
buffer (in truth, the beginning of the accessible portion of the
buffer), leaving the mark at the previous position. However, when the
command is invoked with a number between one and ten, the function
considers that number to be a fraction of the length of the buffer,
measured in tenths, and Emacs moves the cursor that fraction of the
way from the beginning of the buffer. Thus, you can either call this
function with the key command M-<, which will move the cursor to
the beginning of the buffer, or with a key command such as C-u 7
M-< which will move the cursor to a point 70% of the way through the
buffer. If a number bigger than ten is used for the argument, it
moves to the end of the buffer.
The beginning-of-buffer
function can be called with or without an
argument. The use of the argument is optional.


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Talk:Joachim of Vatopaidi
This is perhaps the FIRST English translation of this Saints biography ... at least, as far as I am aware, there is no other source in English. If someone can assist me with ensuring that the grammatical aspect is correct I would greatly appreciate it. I am still at present working towards translating his bio into English so I am not quite finished. Vasiliki 01:09, November 5, 2008 (UTC)


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Chances are your stride doesn't look like that of Galen Rupp, the American distance runner who recently won the Prague Marathon in 2:06—and that's OK, because for the purposes of the layperson, running is running, right? One foot in front of the other, pumping opposing knees and arms to cover ground as quickly as our hearts and lungs can handle is how most of us understand it. Running efficiency typically isn't part of the discussion.
But science tells us it should be. A 2016 Journal of Sports Sciences study of elite Kenyan distance runners found the athletes' ground contact times were about 10 percent shorter than times previously recorded for other elite runners, which coincided with a 9 percent lower oxygen cost for the Kenyans. A Gait & Posture study the same year analyzed the postures of elite and recreational runners and discovered that while untrained runners tend to increase the inclination (forward lean) of their upper backs as they run faster, trained runners' thoraxes remain upright.
So there are indications that running technique matters, and there's scads of advice around the internet on what to do about subpar form, including running barefoot, increasing your cadence, resistance training, and more. That's a lot to think about, but Dr. Nicholas Romanov, whose research on runners spans four decades, wants you to consider this: falling forward, as you did as a toddler learning to walk, is the most important facet of running technique. You had it down by age three. With the help of Romanov and his student, running coach Valerie Hunt, let's break down the "fall" to return your technique to the biomechanics nature intended.
In teaching her full-grown running students, Hunt is adamant about the terminology of the technique. "You gotta say 'fall,' not 'lean,'" she says. "If you watch little kids learning to walk, they wipe out, and then they learn how to find the balance point for center of mass. You have to commit to the idea that [in running] you're actually falling." When you learned to walk, you fell forward until you learned to catch yourself, and you probably kept falling forward as your feet struggled to keep up as gravity pulled you down.
This seems obvious, but in the chicken-or-the-egg equation of a runner's stride, most people assume that in order to go faster, you pick up and move your legs faster, which generates the fall and subsequent speed. It's actually the other way around. "Speed is the consequence of angle of falling," Romanov says. "Cadence follows up through there. People do this subconsciously to run faster; they don't know anything about falling, but they're intuitive with it. It's a gravitational reflex."
As proof, Romanov has studied the world's fastest runners and their respective angles of fall. He says the theoretical peak angle of human ability is 22.5 degrees. The steepest angle ever recorded was Usain Bolt's; he fell at 21.4 degrees during his 9.58-second 100-meter world record. Fast marathoners achieve 17 degrees of fall, and Hunt's average American runners fall at one to three degrees. Running on the moon, Romanov explains, looks vastly different because astronauts don't fall forward as much at one-sixth the gravitational pull of earth. Romanov says he thinks that with tweaks to his stride to increase the angle of his fall, Bolt could've run even faster. (He jokes someone who doesn't run a PB for six years, even a world record holder, is unprofessional.) A runner only slows down when his or her feet can no longer cycle at the angle of fall needed to generate the speed.
The problem with many recreational runners' technique, Hunt says, is they tend to reach with their stride. That puts the foot strike out in front of the center of mass, which causes a heel strike, arresting the runner's momentum and transferring more force through the leg than is necessary. "You cannot heel strike with your foot under the body," she says. "Although we're not saying, 'Don't heel strike,' we're using gravity to fall forward, which saves your knees."
Romanov's pose method is designed to place a runner's foot strike directly underneath the center of mass, which forces a slight knee bend. A 2004 study conducted by Romanov and his contemporaries taught heel strikers and forefoot strikers (midfoot striking is an inaccurate term, Romanov says; no one strikes on their arch) the pose method. Knee power absorption and eccentric load were lower after both groups of runners adopted the method, and Romanov credits this phenomenon with saving the knees of countless runners—not to mention making them more efficient.
The method starts with the pose, in which the ankles, hips, and shoulders are aligned in a vertical S-shape. The fall motion begins as you lean forward, at which point you catch yourself with the pull, when you pull the supporting foot from the ground. "I have to pull my foot up from the ground before my other foot lands," Hunt says. "You didn't think about it, and the other foot didn't just land—it landed under your body."
Crucially, a runner practicing pose-fall-pull doesn't have to think about how high to lift his or her leg. "You only have to pull the foot up high enough to break contact with the ground at any speed," Hunt says. "The hamstring reflex will finish the height of the pull and release the foot, and gravity brings the foot back to the ground."
The technique also takes the guesswork out of cadence. "From scientific research, it's accepted that around 180 [steps per minute] is the boundary where you where you gain muscular tendon elasticity. Our pose runners—even recreational runners who run very slowly—easily pick up cadences over 200," Romanov says. By muscular tendon elasticity, Romanov means that the muscles develop greater elasticity above 180 steps per minute, which increases efficiency by as much as 50 percent.
Hunt begins her pose instruction by reacquainting her runners with their centers of mass. "I have them stand with their knees slightly bent to feel where the body weight is," she says. By practicing the bent-knee forward fall from that position, the runner can feel the pull follow the fall and begin to put the motion together.
Balance and strength exercises supplement a solid pose. "When I get them to stand and pose, standing on one foot and trying to hold it, usually they can't," Hunt says. Start by balancing on one foot in the pose position for increments of 30 seconds with your eyes closed to master the first step.
Next, work on strength. "I like to start with functional bodyweight exercises," Hunt says. Those include planks, single-leg step-ups, single-leg deadlifts, push-ups, lunges, and plenty of core. Finally, focus on mobility. "Do towel pick-ups with your toes, or walk around barefoot and pick up things that you see," Hunt says. Ankle circles help too, as most beginning runners lack mobility. (Also watch this basic drill that you can build into your warm-up.)
Thinking about your running technique isn't something that occurs to most of us, but embracing the fall and running as gravity intended can make you a faster runner now and a healthier runner for the rest of your life. "I've worked with kids as young as five and six, and my oldest runner is 92 years old. He started racing at 85," Hunt says. "It's a great way to save somebody's joints and keep them doing what they love."


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OKLAHOMA CITY – August 19, 2019 – Jasco, a leader in lighting fixtures, lighting controls, power products and consumer electronics, is pleased to announce an increase to its minimum hourly wage from $13 to $15. This wage increase – effective immediately – more than doubles Oklahoma's current minimum wage of $7.25.
In addition to the starting pay of $15 per hour, Jasco provides a monthly profit-sharing program to all team members, which averages around 15 percent additional pay each month. With the profit-sharing program and increased wage, Jasco's starting wage typically translates to $17.25 per hour. Jasco's announcement further proves the company's commitment to providing an excellent workplace for all.
Jasco strives to support a culture of creativity and innovation for nearly 400 team members. Jasco intentionally invests in the development of their team members as a whole person with an emphasis on career development, spiritual growth, physical health, relational wellness, and community generosity. In addition to competitive wages and lucrative profit-sharing incentives, Jasco offers:
Health insurance options as low as $25 per month;
6 percent company match for 401K and Roth IRA contributions;
Full scholarship and educational assistance for any accredited degree program;
An on-site fitness center and gym membership reimbursement;
Paid leave for maternity, paternity, adoption, and military service;
Fun family events and opportunities to volunteer together as a team;
Jasco donates 50% of profits to charities with matching programs to encourage generosity.
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Even before the Senate environment panel pushed through a GOP protest to approve
its climate change bill, Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Joe Lieberman
(I-CT), and John Kerry (D-MA) were working behind the scenes on a
so-called "tripartisan" plan that can win enough votes in Congress' upper chamber to make nationwide emissions cuts a reality.
Over the weekend, the first hints of the trio's potential strategy were revealed to The Washington Post -- and new pricing for transportation fuel could play a major role (emphasis mine):
According to several sources familiar with the process, the lawmakersare looking at cutting the nation's greenhouse gas output by targeting,in separate ways, three major sources of emissions: electric utilities,transportation and industry.
Power plants would face an overall cap on emissions that wouldbecome more stringent over time; motor fuel may be subject to a carbontax whose proceeds could help electrify the U.S. transportation sector;and industrial facilities would be exempted from a cap on emissions forseveral years before it is phased in.
The concept of an across-the-board tax on fossil fuels used for transport is not new. Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson backed it in October, aligning his company with the stance of some environmental groups and causing debate over his motivations.
Tillerson's endorsement proposed rebating a carbon tax back to
consumers rather than letting it "becom[e] a revenue stream for other
purposes," making it far from clear whether the three senators could
win support for giving more new money to electrified transportation.
(By way of context, electric cars received more funding in the first six months of the Obama administration than the Federal Transit Administration's annual budget.)
Physicist Joseph Romm, who blogs on every twist of the climate debate for the Center for American Progress, described
the Post story as a "trial balloon" for the senators' plan and warned
that the end of the cap-and-trade concept would hardly silence critics
who are working to re-brand emissions caps as a closet "gas tax":
My sources say that what they're proposing isn't actually a carbontax on gasoline, nor is it the original cap-and-trade proposal, butsomething in between. Since the notion is complex and confusing — andno final decisions have been made — I won't try to explain it fullyhere. ...
While some oil companies may support this approach, my guess/fear isExxonMobil/API will simply attack the new bill as a gasoline tax —indeed, that may be their plan.
As Romm points out, the devil is in the details: How would a new fuel
tax be structured? Given how many lawmakers acknowledge (if
reluctantly) that the existing gas tax is the most practice way to pay
for a comprehensive new federal transportation bill, imposing a new
motor fuel fee could hurt the three senators' chances with their
infrastructure-minded colleagues.
aside the possible merits or drawbacks of Kerry, Lieberman, and
Graham's approach, the Post story reveals a political climate that may
be ever-so-slightly shifting in favor of passage of a climate bill this
year. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) reportedly told Kerry
last week to intensify work on the "tripartisan" deal in hopes of
bringing legislation to a vote before the November midterm elections.


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Tuesday, February 21, 2012
There will be blood
12 comments:
- Thomas Henry Strenk said...
I hated that film. But I'd love to try the pudding.
- February 21, 2012 at 5:36 PM
- Claudia said...
Yeah... I know vampires are all the rage... but I'm not very trendy. It is indeed rich looking - even pretty... and I stayed away from Blood Pudding in Ireland. But I'll vote anyway - cause somewhere inside me is someone who really does like your blog.
- February 21, 2012 at 7:46 PM
- Mister Meatball said...
Thanks, C., I promise never to do this again.
- February 21, 2012 at 8:13 PM
- Thomas Henry Strenk said...
When I was in Uruguay, I ate morcilla dulce, sweet blood sausages with raisins and pinenuts, served as part of a mixed grill of meats and sausages.
- February 22, 2012 at 8:32 AM
- Mister Meatball said...
I think we're all alone on this one, Tommy.
- February 22, 2012 at 8:54 AM
- Fred said...
Whew! I'm glad that's finally over. Clear the table, MM. Time to bring out a new course.
- February 25, 2012 at 7:21 AM
- Mister Meatball said...
I hear you, Fred. A new course is coming today or tomorrow. Liquid, but not like this one.
- February 25, 2012 at 7:39 AM
- Paola said...
I with you on this one, so many good dolci why make this one? I have vague memories from childhood - a big pot a red stuff bubbling away and then poured into the lining of a pig's stomach. augh!! Then memories of my dad slicing thin pieces and enjoying it very much??? It looked like a jello mold stuffed into a balloon. I'll have to check with my Zia Lucia as she still makes certain foods depending on what saint day it is. I'll let you know...
Thanks for your blog, it's really fun to read! - February 26, 2012 at 9:54 AM
- Mister Meatball said...
Thanks, Paola, let me know what you find out.
- February 26, 2012 at 10:10 AM
- Pat @ Mille Fiori Favoriti said...
Sanguinaccio dolce is another of my husband's childhood favorites as his Mom made it every pig slaughter. It is getting hard to find the fresh pig blood for sale -- it used to be available for sale at butcher shops but it is now against the law for them to sell it, or so we've been told. We go to Arthur Ave in the Bronx to buy it at a bakery during the Easter season.
- February 27, 2012 at 12:32 PM
- Mister Meatball said...
Pat: Just when I thought I was out, you pull me back in!
- February 27, 2012 at 12:54 PM
I tasted this for the first when I was about 10 (late 60s early 70s). It was during a holiday visiting relatives in Italy. They gave us extra to bring back home (to the UK) and I couldn't wait to get stuck in. It was the most exquisite and memorable thing I have ever tasted. I know it had cocoa, I know it was sweet, I think it had raisins. That's all I can remember.
It was traditionally made around christmas when the weather was cold and the meat of the pig had less chance to spoil.
In England they have what is know as black pudding, a savory sausage made with pigs blood and lumps of fat. The memory of that first and only sanguinaccio was so ingrained that I would try to re-create it by adding sugar to my black pudding. Poor substitute indeed! Making sanguinaccio is a dying art in Italy since they have very strict rules on the sale of offal especially relating to pork. It is therefore impossible to find.
Thank you for taking me back to a bygone time! - December 6, 2013 at 5:30 PM


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My scale has gone wacky, so now I'm in the market for a new one.
Which scale do you all recommend? I had a Taylor, but the one I almost bought today is plastic and cheap, and the Weight Watchers scale has too many bells and whistle I don't need to justify the cost.
Any input would be appreciated.
I'm in P4 and have been hanging in there with low-carb living. However, since Christmas, I've been up 5-7 lbs. above LDW. I have a friend who just finished the Whole 30 and is now introducing dairy and grains, P3 style. I'm considering doing that over the 40 days of Lent. Anybody do that before? Would you recommend it? I don't want to do another round for 5 lbs...
Is a steak day okay for me to do if I have a physical challenge at 3:00?
I have to swim four laps of a YMCA pool for a Boy Scout endurance test this afternoon, but I need a steak day, too. Will the steak day make me feel drained or can I exercise vigorously while basically fasting?
My favorites are:
- gout's gone
- arthritic hips feel fine
- gums don't bleed anymore
- sleeping much better
- blood pressure is more normal (was abnormally low)
- blood sugar issues resolved
I could go on and on, but I'd like to hear from others...
Just had a physical yesterday and my blood pressure was a nice, normal 120/70. It's usually 106/60 which my doctor said was caused by stressed adrenals. He said my adrenals are normal now. Not only do I look better, but I'm healthier than I've been in years. Hurrah!
I ended P2 at 157.8 and have happily maintained for 46 days now, mostly by eating whatever I want except high starch foods and sugar (except for those occasional bites of treats my family is having). I'm basically


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The current conventional wisdom – broadly echoed by the news media and the blogosphere – is that comprehensive, economy-wide CO2 cap-and-trade legislation is dead in the current U.S. Congress, and perhaps for the next several years.
Watch out for conventional wisdoms! They inevitably appear to be the collective judgment of numerous well-informed observers and sources, but frequently they are little more than the massive repetition of a few sample points of opinion across the echo-chamber of the professional news media and the blogosphere.
Keep in mind that the conventional wisdom as recently as June of 2009 had it that – with the Waxman-Markey bill having been passed triumphantly by the House of Representatives – Senate action would follow; the only question raised by many commentators was whether the final legislation could be sent to the president for his signature by the time of the Copenhagen climate talks in December. My, how the conventional wisdom has changed!
But over the past nine months, the politics have not fundamentally changed. In June of 2009, passage of meaningful climate legislation in the Senate was already unlikely, because of the terrible economic recession in which the country found itself, and – of even greater political salience – lingering high rates of unemployment. And with the lack of Republican support for the stimulus bill, the relatively small (partisan) margin by which the House passed Waxman-Markey, the then-upcoming challenges of health care and financial regulatory reform dominating the legislative calendar, and concerns voiced about climate legislation by moderate Senate Democrats, success in the Senate was always a long-shot.
What is the likely legislative outcome?
In addition to ongoing consideration of an economy-wide cap-and-trade system, another possibility now receiving attention is a utility-only cap-and-trade system, which some members of the Congress inexplicably find more attractive than an economy-wide approach. The result of such a system would be much less accomplished (forget about the president's "conditional commitment" under the Copenhagen Accord), and at much greater cost. This would be equivalent to taking the Northeast's Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) as a model for national action. Not a good idea.
Even more likely is that the Congress would develop a so-called energy-only bill, which would – to a large degree – consist of killing the one part of Waxman-Markey worth saving (the comprehensive CO2 cap-and-trade system), and moving forward with the worst parts of that legislation – the smorgasbord of regulatory initiatives. As I've written previously, those additional elements of the legislation are highly problematic. When implemented under the cap-and-trade umbrella, many of those conventional standards and subsidies would have no net greenhouse-gas-reducing benefits, would limit flexibility, and would thereby have the unintended consequence of driving up compliance costs. That's the soft under‑belly of the House legislation.
Without the cap-and-trade umbrella, that same set of standards and subsidies will accomplish very little, and do so at exceedingly high cost. Take just one example that seems to be popular among politicians – "renewable portfolio standards" (RPS), requirements that all states or all electricity utilities derive some fixed share of their power, say 20 percent, from renewable sources. Note, for example, that such an approach does not distinguish between coal and natural gas, despite the dramatically different impacts these fuels have on CO2 emissions (and a host of other environmental outcomes). Furthermore, although an RPS may displace some new coal-fired generation with other types of generation, there is little, if any, effect on the operation of existing coal-fired power plants.
If those other, regulatory parts of the climate legislation are so ineffective and so costly, why are they so popular with politicians? The reason is simple. The costs are hidden. The government simply mandates that electric utilities or manufacturers take particular actions, employing the best technology available. Where's the cost? Unlike a cap-and-trade system, there's no analysis and debate about the cost of allowances (and the marginal abatement costs they represent); and unlike a carbon tax, there's no analysis and no focus on the dollar amount of the tax and the aggregate cost. That is the unfortunate but fundamental political economy behind much of U.S. environmental policy since the first Earth Day in 1970.
What about court-ordered regulation?
Whether "best-available-control technology standards" are crafted by the Congress or put in place by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the court-ordered mandate stemming from the Supreme Court decision in Massachusetts v. EPA and the Obama administration's subsequent "endangerment finding," such an approach will be relatively ineffective and terribly costly for what is accomplished. The EPA route would essentially apply the mechanisms of the Clean Air Act, intended for localized, "criteria air pollutants," to CO2, resulting in ineffective and costly regulations.
The White House (and most members of Congress) recognize that this is an inappropriate way to address climate change, but they seem determined to go forward, claiming that this threat will force the hand of Congress to do something more sensible instead. Unfortunately, this is akin to my telling you that if you don't do what I want, I will shoot myself in the foot – not a very credible or intelligent threat. What I am referring to is that costly Clean Air Act regulation of CO2 will play into the hands of right-wing opponents of climate action, creating a poster-child of excessive regulatory intervention that will bring about a backlash against sensible climate policies. EPA claims that there will be no such excessive regulatory actions, because it will exempt small sources through a so-called "tailoring rule." But legal scholars have noted that the tailoring rule stands on questionable legal grounds and could be invalidated by the courts. In this regard, note that the first lawsuits to stop EPA from exempting small sources are coming from groups on the right, not the left.
Perhaps Sen. Murkowski's (R-Alaska) proposed joint resolution (H.J. Res. 66), introduced on Jan. 21, 2010, disapproving (stopping) EPA's regulatory action under the endangerment finding could save the administration. The conventional wisdom is that Sen. Murkowski's resolution has no political future, but with a bi-partisan list of 40 co-sponsors, that's a total of 41 votes (more than the current total of 40 "Yes" and "Probably Yes" votes in the Senate for serious climate legislation, according to Environment and Energy Daily). And remember that the disapproval resolution requires only 51, not 60 votes in the Senate, under the rules of the enabling statute, the Congressional Review Act of 1996 (signed by President Clinton, and part of the Republican "Contract with America"). Of course, House action, not to mention signature by President Obama, would also be required for the resolution to take effect. But a positive vote in the Senate will send a strong political message.
So is there no hope for good climate policy?
Here is where it gets interesting, because as much as the current political environment in Washington may seem increasingly unreceptive to an economy-wide cap-and-trade system or some other meaningful and sensible climate policy, there is one promising approach that could actually benefit from the national political climate.
In these pages, I have expressed support for cap-and-trade mechanisms to address climate change, including the system embodied in the Waxman-Markey legislation that emerged from the House in June of last year. Although that approach is scientifically sound, economically sensible, and may still turn out to be politically acceptable, there's a modified version of cap-and-trade that could be much more attractive in this era of rampant expressions of populism, coming both from the right ("no new taxes") and the left ("bash the corporations"). Neither of those views, of course, is consistent with sound economic thinking on the environment, but it's nevertheless possible to recognize their national appeal and build upon them.
This could be done with a simple upstream cap-and-trade system in which all of the needed allowances are sold (auctioned) – not given freely – to fossil-fuel producers and importers, and a very large share – say 75 percent – of the revenue is rebated directly to American households through monthly checks in a progressive scheme through which all individuals receive identical payments.
Such an approach could appeal to the populist sentiments that are increasingly dominating political discourse and judgments in this mid-term election year. Such a system – which would have direct and visible positive financial consequences (i.e., rebate checks larger than energy price increases) for 80 percent of American households – might not only not be difficult for politicians to support, but it might actually be difficult for politicians to oppose!
Importantly, even though this is a specific type of cap-and-trade design (which has been known, studied, and proposed for decades), for better political optics, it should be called something else. How about "cap-and-dividend?"
A CLEAR answer?
What I've described bears a close resemblance to the "Carbon Limits and Energy for America's Renewal (CLEAR) Act," sponsored by Sens. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine). So, the politics of their proposal looks appealing, and the substance of it looks promising – a simple upstream cap-and-trade system (called something else), with 100 percent of the allowances auctioned (with a "price collar" on allowance prices to reduce cost uncertainty), 75 percent of the revenue refunded to all legal U.S. residents, each month, on an equal per capita basis as non-taxable income, the other 25 percent of the revenue dedicated to specified purposes, including "transition assistance," and some built-in measures of protection for particularly energy-intensive, trade-sensitive sectors (not unlike Waxman-Markey).
That's the good news. The bad news, however, is that the proposal needs to be changed before it can promise to be not only politically attractive, but economically sensible. In particular, as it is currently structured, only producers and importers of fossil fuels can buy the carbon allowances. In an up-stream system – an approach I have endorsed for years – it is producers and importers that are subject to compliance, that is, must eventually hold the allowances. That's fine. But there is no sound reason to exclude other entities from participating in the auction markets; and doing so will greatly reduce market liquidity.
Furthermore, the Senators' proposal says that holders of carbon allowances are actually prohibited from creating, selling, purchasing, or trading carbon derivatives, thereby tremendously reducing the efficiency of the market and needlessly driving up costs. While no doubt borne out of a well-intentioned desire to protect consumers (remembering the recent impacts of mortgage-backed securities on financial markets), the Senators' approach is akin to responding to a tragic airplane crash by concluding that the best way to protect consumers from air disasters in the future is simply to ban flying.
These and other important problems with the CLEAR proposal can – in principle – be addressed while maintaining its basic structure and political attraction.
An economic perspective
It is interesting to note that many – perhaps most – economists have long favored the variant of cap-and-trade whereby allowances are auctioned and the auction revenue is used to cut distortionary taxes (on capital and/or labor), thereby reducing the net social cost of the policy. Cap-and-dividend moves in another direction. This system (which was introduced several years ago in the "Sky Trust" proposal) has some merits compared with the economist's favorite approach of tax cuts, namely that the cap-and-dividend scheme addresses some of the distributional issues that would be raised by using the auction revenue to fund tax cuts (which could favor higher income households). On the other hand, it eliminates the efficiency (cost-effectiveness) gains associated with the tax-cut approach. In fact, Stanford's Larry Goulder has estimated that the tax-and-dividend approach would cost 40 percent more than an approach of combining an auction of allowances with ideal income tax rate cuts. (By "ideal," I mean focusing on tax cuts that would lead to the lowest net cost.)
In general, there are sound reasons to seek to compensate consumers for the energy price increases that will be brought about by a cap-and-trade system, or any meaningful climate change policy. But it is important not to insulate consumers from those price increases, as diluting the price signal reduces the effectiveness and drives up the cost of the overall policy. Thus, "compensation" as in cap-and-dividend is fine, but "insulation" is not.
The most politically salient question with the Waxman-Markey approach of freely allocating a significant portion of the allowances to the private sector is how to distribute (that is, who gets) those allowances which are freely allocated. In this regard, contrary to much of the hand-wringing in the press, the deal-making that took place in the House and may still take place in the Senate for shares of free allowances is an example of the useful and important mechanism through which a cap-and-trade system provides the means for a political constituency of support and action to be assembled without reducing the policy's effectiveness or driving up its cost.
The ultimate political question seems to be whether there is greater (geographic and sectoral) political support for the Waxman-Markey (H.R. 2454) approach of substantial free allocations and targeted use of auction revenue, or if there is greater (populist) political support for the full auction combined with lump-sum rebate which characterizes the "cap-and-dividend" approach. Alas, the textbook economics preference — full auction combined with cuts of distortionary taxes — appears to be a political, if not, academic orphan.


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Increase Just 12 Areas in Your Business by a Meager 1.4% and Your Profits Will DOUBLE!
Simply enter your name and email below to receive instant access to the video.
Today we'll talk about shameless self-promotion. That's right, I said it! Shameless! After all, we are learning from Paris Hilton here.
It's all about self-promotion! Self-promotion comes in many forms and you can use different tactics to get your name out there. Look at politicians! Talk about self-promotion and in some not so discreet ways, at that. But, seriously, consider some of the major superstars we all know. Madonna, Donald Trump, Howard Stern and Bill Clinton, just to name a few.
We all self promote. Did you raise your hand in class to show the teacher you knew the answer? Of course! That's self-promotion. This is the kind of self-promotion we are talking about. With dignity, class and the knowledge to back it up. If you self-promote only to prove you don't really know what you're talking about, you're going to lose business.
Natural self-promoters are the former and I want to tell you about the three major traits they have and use to build themselves and their businesses.
Also consider:
Who can help me meet my goals?
Is it a prospective customer/client? A colleague with contacts? An association with key members who may become prospects?
Don't settle into interacting with the people who are the easiest to access. You need to reach outside your comfort zone and there you will find a wealth of new connections that will bring you great success.
If you are meeting a lot of people and they don't remember you once you leave the room, you have a serious problem! This means you have an opportunity to present yourself in a more memorable way.
There are lots of little subtle changes you can make. Reassess your:
Maybe even, your hairstyle (of course, now we're back to the expensive suit, but it really works!)
You get the idea. There are lots of little ways you can work on making your image and business more successful. Also, consider how you sound on the phone and how you great people at meetings or other events. Think about your 30-sec elevator speech.
You, also, have to make multiple impressions on those you are networking with in order to build brand awareness. Repetition is in direct connection with positioning. Once you find people to network with, reach out and find hundreds more who can help in your success as well.
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R.E.M. to Release 'At the BBC' Box Set
Sessions recorded by R.E.M. for the BBC between 1984 and 2008 have been compiled for a new box set. The eight-CD, one-DVD R.E.M. at the BBC will arrive on Oct. 18.
"R.E.M. grew up with the BBC," reads a press release. "This historic relationship is lovingly celebrated across an incredible collection that beautifully illustrates the career trajectory of one of modern music's greatest bands. The collection comprises a treasure trove of rare and unreleased live and studio recordings culled from the BBC and band archives. This is a must-have collection for R.E.M. fans and an authoritative introduction for newcomers."
The set contains the audio from four concerts: a 1984 show from Nottingham's Rock City, a date on 1995's ill-fated Monster tour from Milton Keynes, their 1999 headlining set at the Glastonbury Festival and an invitation-only 2004 date at London's St. James Church. The other CDs include a 1998 John Peel session, appearances on Drivetime and Mark and Lard's show from 2003 and a 2008 set the band did for Radio 1's Live Lounge.
"Their Glastonbury performance in 1999 was a dazzling moment," BBC DJ Jo Whitley added. "The band storming through an all-killer, no-filler setlist. As a headline performance, it was a triumph and, for me, it's up there as one of the Glastonbury greats."
Included in the DVD are the complete 1998 appearance on Later ... With Jools Holland -- one of the few times the show devoted an entire episode to one act -- as well as various appearances on Top of the Pops and the Accelerating Backwards documentary. The 60-minute film from 2008 details R.E.M.'s history with the BBC and features interviews with original members Michael Stipe, Peter Buck and Mike Mills that were filmed at the South by Southwest Music Festival in August. It has been broadcast only in the U.K. and has never been commercially released.
You can pre-order the set at their web store. A condensed version of At the BBC will also be available on two CDs or two LPs. All pre-orders come with an instant download of "Losing My Religion" from a 1991 session on BBC 1's Into the Night, and more tracks will be available for each week prior to the official release.


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With his graying red hair going every which way and his designer black clothes rumpled, Michael Van Valkenburgh, 61, looks like a contradiction: an absent-minded hipster professor. A professor and designer he is—the Eliot professor in practice of landscape architecture at Harvard's Graduate School of Design (GSD), and probably the most celebrated landscape architect in America. But a hipster he isn't and wouldn't want to be. He is much too boyish and earnest for that.
On a walk through the new Brooklyn Bridge Park (BBP), which his firm designed, he effuses in numerical terms:
"In good weather, these soccer fields are used 18 hours a day. And the players are speaking in over 50 languages. I love to see them coming down the sidewalks through toney Brooklyn Heights in their soccer clothes."
"Within a week after we finished building this wetland, four types of ducks were using it. And all these plants, chosen because they could tolerate salt, survived after Hurricane Sandy covered them with 30 inches of salt water."
"Too bad you weren't here last weekend. You see those benches lining most of the path? All two miles of them were occupied. On a nice day, this place draws thousands."
It's clear that what Van Valkenburgh most cares about in this park—perhaps the most prominent project of its kind under way in the United States—is people and their daily experiences. To see how his design serves people, consider the care that went into planning the lighting. Rather than line the shore path with lights down by the water's edge, Van Valkenburgh has erected tall wooden poles some yards back and topped them with fixtures that cast an even glow, like the moon: bright enough to provide safety but dim enough to leave the water and far objects like the Manhattan Bridge visible. "I was trying to give a little dignity to looking at the views at night," he says. "At the first public meeting about BBP, a lady too old to be able to visit the countryside any more begged that I make a place where you could put your feet in the water and see a reflection of the moon on it. It was a touching moment."
The site is huge, encompassing six abandoned industrial piers in northwest Brooklyn. Most of the 85 acres in this $380-million-plus project have spectacular views of Lower Manhattan, Governors Island, and the Statue of Liberty. Piers One and Six have been open for almost four years; the others will open in stages during the next five years.
Don't go to Brooklyn Bridge Park looking for any powerful geometric order like that of the National Mall in Washington, D.C. How the park looks as an overall composition doesn't matter much to Van Valkenburgh. Its order arises instead from the efforts of its designers to realize the distinctive potentials of its many parts in resistance to "the tyranny of an overriding style," to use the phrase of principal Matt Urbanski, M.L.A. '89, of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates (MVVA). Principal Gullivar Shepard, M.Arch. '99, amplifies: "The need for one rigorous visual order is compelling in architecture, but landscape architecture is inspired by nature's diversity and complexity." Or, in this case, inspired by the (dis)order of cities themselves, where you enjoy not knowing what's around the next corner. If Van Valkenburgh has an aesthetic here, it is urbanistic: deliberately diverse.
Not being shown an overall style in the firm's design renderings can baffle or upset clients at first: they want a "snackable" image (Van Valkenburgh's term), not the long process of "tinkering" with endless givens—from wetlands and toxic waste to the pressures of abutters and the surrounding urban fabric—that they later appreciate because of its fecund results. The firm's product is its process. Its working method is to study each site in great detail and then ask, "What's the best thing that can be done here to make users' lives more enriched and pleasurable?" Thus playgrounds, for example, are placed near the two main entrances so parents can easily bring in their kids; and two large lawns are oriented to take advantage of the park's best views: of the Brooklyn Bridge and of Lower Manhattan. For Van Valkenburgh, the payoff was the inundation of visitors on Pier One's opening day in 2010.
His firm's website sums up his values: "[Our] parks are founded on the idea of the commons—democratic, inclusive open spaces that anchor neighborhoods and serve as focal points in the daily rhythms of the lives of their users, while promoting ecological, programmatic, experiential, and social diversity."
So the Brooklyn park's already evident pleasures are derived primarily from its dozens of uses, including picnicking, kayaking, people-watching, appreciating nature, playing ball games, and even watching movies on a giant inflatable screen on summer Thursday nights. It is a park of hundreds of carefully designed opportunities for providing pleasure in many forms for people in their many forms. (Which is not to say that each spot isn't made as attractive as it can be in the quality and look of its materials and construction.) The diversity within each park is striking in the firm's other work, too. Teardrop Park, occupying 1.8 acres between high-rise apartments in Lower Manhattan's Battery Park City, is a dramatic example; its 27-foot-high, 168-foot-long stacked bluestone wall sharply divides the park into a complex active play area for children and a peaceful lawn area for adults. The contrast strengthens the character of each part.
Serious contemporary landscape architects are also serious environmentalists. Van Valkenburgh's effort to promote sustainability in Brooklyn primarily entailed reusing whatever could be reclaimed at or near the worksite. This meant not only keeping the piers but also recycling huge amounts of long leaf yellow pine—a superdurable, now unavailable wood—from a demolished building on Pier One for use in benches, tables, cladding, decking, and other furnishings, plus 700 blocks of granite from nearby bridges to make a harbor-viewing amphitheater, and nearly 90,000 cubic yards of fill from Long Island Railroad tunnel excavations to create slopes, mounds, and lawns.
Another kind of sustainability at the park—also pursued by landscape architects these days—is working with nature and no longer trying to master it. Another kind of sustainability at the park—also pursued by landscape architects these days—is working with nature. They shun the use of pesticides, herbicides, and chemical fertilizers, the channeling of rivers with concrete, and the dumping of storm water into sewers (which wastes water that could be used for onsite irrigation and depletes the water table). In the Brooklyn park, Van Valkenburgh's firm makes no futile attempt to wall off the rising tides of climate change: the shoreline is made of loose stones that calm smashing waves, and the root balls of most of the trees are set above the 100-year flood plain. The plant communities installed have been planned to evolve naturally as much as possible, reducing maintenance and thus energy use.
Van Valkenburgh argues that city parks take on new importance in an era of increasing urbanization and climate change, citing facts like these:
Since mid 2009, more people worldwide have been living in urban than in rural areas—a first in human history—and by 2050, that portion is likely to be 70 percent.
Urban density is energy-efficient, mitigating climate change: New York has an annual per capita carbon footprint of 1.5 tons, the fourth lowest among the 100 largest American cities (in sprawling Indianapolis, ranked 99, it's 3.36 tons).
In 2008, more than one million city residents worldwide died prematurely because of outdoor air pollution. Urban parks, which Frederick Law Olmsted called "the lungs of the city," offer one way of reducing that pollution: "In 1994, trees in New York City removed an estimated 1,821 metric tons of air pollution at an estimated value to society of $9.5 million," writes a U.S. Forest Service researcher. Trees lessen summer heat in cities, and, by shading buildings, reduce the need for air-conditioning. All in all, gathering people in dense cities full of green is a way to be more hopeful about the future of the species.
Landscape architects play a crucial role here, and these days, their largest urban projects are along waterfronts. Sustainability again pertains: the world can no longer be so cavalier about protecting its water supply, preventing and remediating its pollution, and managing increasing flooding. Landscape architects (with hydrological engineers—among the 36 specialist firms involved in the Brooklyn project) are experts at creating ways to do this and to reduce and store storm-water runoff, replenish water tables, and remove pollutants naturally.
As the need for professionals capable of addressing environmental problems has burgeoned, so have multidisciplinary design firms focused on the landscape. One of the oldest, Sasaki Associates, founded by GSD alumni in the 1950s, is hired worldwide to do site-planning and -design with a staff of 215. Turenscape, the super-green Beijing landscape architecture (and planning and architecture) firm of GSD design critic Kongjian Yu, D.Des.'95, grew from one to 400 employees between 1998 and 2008 (see "Global Reach," May-June 2010, page 51). The colossus among such firms is AECOM, a multiservice design and engineering firm of 45,000; its projects include entire new "eco-cities" in China. At the other extreme are smaller landscape firms that focus almost exclusively on the design of beautiful gardens. MVVA is in the middle, celebrated for its design but also respected for its interdisciplinary technical and environmental competence.
MVVA's Brooklyn project is one of hundreds of urban parks that have been built worldwide since the 1980s because of the desire to "recycle" abandoned industrial and waterfront sites. (Among American examples designed by his fellow landscape architects are the immensely popular Millennium Park in Chicago and High Line in New York, as well as the huge parks coming to abandoned land on New York's Governors and Staten Islands.) In the last half of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Frederick Law Olmsted was the preeminent landscape architect for the first great era of American park-making. Van Valkenburgh is a leading figure in the second great age of landscape architecture as a major agent in American city-making. (Somewhat surprisingly, Olmsted remains probably the only widely recognized American landscape architect. Among its practitioners, the field is bemoaned for being "the invisible profession.")
So how did Van Valkenburgh rise to design eminence in this second age? He has taught at Harvard since 1982, the year he founded his firm, and chaired the design school's landscape architecture department from 1991 to 1996. In the intervening years, the firm (which now has a staff of 75, in New York and Cambridge) has designed dozens of high-profile landscapes, including the Harvard Yard restoration, Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and Tulsa Riverfront Park.
All of the firm's work—which ranges from small private gardens to 280-acre waterfronts—reflects Van Valkenburgh's drive to foster rich and delightful daily experiences outdoors. In recognition, he has received the National Design Award in Environmental Design from the Smithsonian Institution's Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum and the Brunner Memorial Prize in Architecture from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; he is a fellow of both the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Academy in Rome. Yale University Press published a book on the firm's work in 2008.
The roots of Van Valkenburgh's design impetus perhaps trace to his boyhood on a dairy farm in the Catskills and his parents' challenging struggle to make it a success. The middle of five children, the older of whom milked the cows, he was assigned, in fifth grade, the cultivation of the family's large flower and vegetable garden.
"The garden became my private paradise, where I communed with plants," he recalls. "I discovered what made things grow and what killed them; I experimented with varieties and with cold frames. I got very good it at it, so that when I was 12, my parents let me open a stand, Fresh Picked Vegetables. I would run to cut produce for waiting customers. I am surprised that I'm still alive, because I would scatter DDT on the garden with my bare hands."
At nine, he had an epiphany: "One gorgeous evening my mother dropped me off at the mountaintop pasture where our cows grazed. Cows are stupid. You have to bring them home, which I did every night for over an hour by myself. Up there were rows of sugar maples that we used to make syrup. I turned off to walk among them and was stunned by their beauty. I have been trying to recreate that experience all my life.
"Something similar happened when I was a high-school senior," he continues. "The rural public schools I went to were tiny and terrible. So I was a rube when my best friend's mother, a Czech émigrée, took us on a May trip to Europe. My first night there, I wandered into the allées of the Tuileries in Paris. 'What is this? Someone planted trees in rows in a city? It's beautiful!' Although I had no name for it, this was my first encounter with landscape architecture."
Entering SUNY Oneonta in 1969, Van Valkenburgh took a class in ecology taught by a soon-to-retire professor who had just read a new book, Design with Nature, by landscape architect Ian McHarg, B.L.A. '49, M.L.A. '50, M.C.P. '51—a passionate screed against the abuses of water, flora, and fauna caused by urban and suburban development, and a recipe for nondestructive land planning. The professor wailed that he had wasted his life by not being one of the landscape architects who were going to save the world. Thus the 18-year-old Van Valkenburgh first heard the name of his calling.
In 1970, he transferred to Cornell to pursue a concentration in landscape architecture, where an adviser turned him on to modernist Dan Kiley, then America's leading landscape architect (who'd studied at the GSD in the mid 1930s), and to Harvard's Dumbarton Oaks garden and landscape studies institute in Washington, D.C., where Van Valkenburgh first became immersed in garden history and traditions after obtaining a postgraduate fellowship there. He used his fellowship funds to drive across the United States to see Kiley's works, particularly his "astonishing" South Garden at the Chicago Art Institute, much of which (like the Tuileries and his own family's sugar maples) resembles a grove—a powerful archetype in landscape architecture.
Work with the Cambridge firm Marshall Gary followed, until he left to earn a master of fine arts in landscape architecture at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His mentor there, Robert Riley, recalls that Van Valkenburgh "worked his butt off, letting nothing get in his way. He had a wise mouth but also the grace to have a sense of humor about himself." Van Valkenburgh says Riley taught him a lesson he still repeats to his staff: "You will only be successful if you know what you don't know."
After graduate school, he began working in Boston for landscape architect Carol Johnson, M.L.A. '57, who had just fired someone for making a plant list that contained 65 spelling errors. "Find them," she told Van Valkenburgh on his first day. He found 66. She thought he was wrong. They looked it up. He was right. She appointed him, at 27, to be the person who went to tree farms to select the specimens for all the firm's projects (an activity he still loves—"If I had seven days to live, I'd spend the first at a tree farm"). Colleagues still express astonishment at his vast knowledge of plants. "I can name every plant in the Northeast from a car traveling at 30 miles an hour," he brags.
In 1982, he opened his one-man firm and was hired as an assistant professor to teach plants and design at the GSD. At the time, he was most attracted, among landscape traits, to the sensuousness of densely planted gardens—luckily, because gardens can be created much more quickly than parks, helping him build the portfolio of work necessary for pursuing tenure at Harvard.
Van Valkenburgh published three critical/scholarly books during the mid 1980s. Fiercely ambitious—"His ego and his devotion to a mission cannot be separated," says Riley—he gave himself crash courses in garden history and the newest garden aesthetics and wrote on those in Built Landscapes: Gardens in the Northeast; Transforming the American Garden; and Gertrude Jekyll: A Vision of Garden and Wood. His 1988 "Ice Walls" installation in Radcliffe Yard was a highly original and earnest work. Three 70-foot-long curving wire-mesh walls, fed by irrigation pipes on top, held glistening sheets of ice. How, he seemed to be asking, can landscape design bring pleasure into the coldest days of winter?
Van Valkenburgh did get tenure in 1988. As department chair in the early 1990s, he supported diversity of thinking among the faculty, a return to hand drawing, and an appreciation of landscape history. These last two moves were not regressive, as some of his colleagues think, because, unlike architecture, landscape architecture does not thrive on newness. "Its materials and vocabulary—soil, water, plants, paving, seating—are unchanging," he says, "as are our responding bodies.
"Some of my GSD colleagues are obsessed with novelty," he continues. "They think they are broadening the field, but I think they are narrowing it. They consider normal landscape practice passé. It's as if they wanted a music school where no one wrote or played music but instead only talked about it."
Van Valkenburgh's resistive independence is described well by Alan Shearer, M.L.A. '94, Ph.D. '03, a professor at the University of Texas and former MVVA employee: "Others at the GSD in the 1980s and '90s turned to varieties of art—abstract minimalism, pop art, and land art—as a way to infuse the profession with new ideas. In contrast, Michael's thinking—about gardens, plants, ephemeral states in natural processes, and precedents of landscape architecture—was trying to reclaim the profession's core."
In a visit to the multibillion-dollar 50-acre Novartis research campus in East Hanover, New Jersey—on which he has worked for more than a decade and where the landscape will take another 45 years to mature—Van Valkenburgh checks out the planting-in-progress of thousands of shrubs and hundreds of trees with his project managers.
"This edge is too static. What if we swooped it up to the top of this mound?" he says, marking a long curving line with his shoe.
"This building is really elegant. Don't you think we shouldn't compete with it by having pink blossoms? What about white roses instead? Should we bring them down next to the windows for the office workers to enjoy?"
His questions become rhetorical only because his perceptions are too sharp and strong for his colleagues to dispute. On the drive back to New York, he is on his cell phone: "Our ideas for the central park at Novartis are not coming together. We need to bring in some of our alpha dogs to help."
Later that day, in his office near Borough Hall in Brooklyn, as 10 people look at drawings for a competition to revive Waller Creek, which runs through the center of Austin, Texas, Van Valkenburgh is fishing for good new ideas from anyone. He turns to a colleague's visiting non-designer friend: "What do you think?" She says that it's not clear how they will design the path along the creek between the four distinctive parks they are stringing along it. Van Valkenburgh says, "You're right," and the next day a drawing of a typical path appears. For a "starchitect," his ego is pretty subdued.
Nine employees (including his four co-principals) speak of Van Valkenburgh's genius in picking, prodding, nurturing, and supporting the firm's collective talent. The highly alpha Matt Urbanski, a firm member since 1989, says, "A big idea requires a 1,000 IQ—it comes from more than one person. The notion of the guru is baloney. The janitor may be the one with a good insight. When we principals disagree, we hash things out. No one dictates."
Another long-term principal, Laura Solano, head of the firm's Cambridge office, amplifies this practice of going to anyone anywhere to find the best ideas. She recounts how Van Valkenburgh once sent two employees abroad to study what makes the public streetscapes of seven European cities so successful. He has sent other employees to eastern Europe to learn about research conducted there on the growth, production, qualities, and uses of the American black locust tree (his father told him that its wood "lasts one day longer than stone").
Obsessive enough in the 1980s to have put daily instructions on the desk of every employee at his Cambridge office before any arrived, Van Valkenburgh, say all, has mellowed. He loves spending time with his grandchildren. In his kitchen in Brooklyn Heights (a short walk from Brooklyn Bridge Park), surrounded by hundreds of cookbooks, he makes Irish soda bread for his employees. Every August at his farmhouse on Martha's Vineyard, he tries not to do office work. Still, no design proposal leaves his firm without his input.
In 1994, department chairman Michael Van Valkenburgh stood at the podium in the garden behind the GSD reading off the names of graduating students in landscape architecture. Suddenly, he stopped, smiled, pointed to the nearby Swedenborg Chapel yard, where black locust tree blossoms were filling the air with sweet perfume, and said, "Nice, huh?"


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Radiotopia . Rupert Huber & Various Artists
staubgold 34
2002. cd
The release of the Radiotopia album, compiled and edited by Rupert Huber (Tosca), is the third collaboration between the Austrian Ars Electronica Center and the Staubgold label, after Alexander Balanescu's "Lume Lume" (staubgold 16) and Vladislav Delay's "Naima" (staubgold 23). Participating artists include Alexander Balanescu, Rupert Huber, Andres Bosshard, Lukas Ligeti, Sam Auinger, Bruce Odland, Isabella Bordoni, Lorenzo Brusci and many more.
This cd documents the fascinating Radiotopia sound/network project as presented during the open air Klangpark Ars Electronica festival. The center of Radiotopia was the global sound network database designed by August Black and Norbert Math. It was a simultaneous storage bank of freely accessible sound material that transcended time, location, cultural and geographical borders. Anyone with access to the Internet was able to join in. This sound network database (with a total of over 500 submissions) was the basis of the material that the international artists invited to the festival worked with.
"To explain what this Radiotopia project is about is certainly not an easy thing. (…) Basically it comes down to a large database of sound on the internet, which Rupert Huber (of Tosca) plundered freely to built sound collages to be transmitted on the radio and the internet, together with people performing live music. (…) There is a strong element of collage in these results. Pianos play, vague electronic sounds, people talking, violins. (…) It's an anarchist, free thing here."(Vital Weekly)
"This cd serves up an edited chronicle of the Radiotopia project presented during the open air Klangpark as part of the 2002 Ars Electronica Festival. An on-site/online event, it involved live artists, contributing artists from other locations (linked over telephone or the Internet), and Internet surfers pitching in source material from a specially designed website. The cd has been compiled by Rupert Huber in a form that stands somewhere between a selection of highlights and a more faithful (as in representative) breakdown of the many phases of this five-day event. (…) The music throughout the album is made of tiny shards of sound - the shards the artists used and those Huber kept and rearranged." (François Couture, All Music Guide)


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Witch of Endor™ Series
Witch of Endor™
Back in the seventies, eighties and early nineties, I wrote a number of short stories under several pseudonyms for a series I dubbed The Black Hat Society™. As the stories grew in popularity, I broke them into subsets to help my readers differentiate between them. Sisters of the Cauldron™ were those set in the modern day. Black Swan Society™ were those set as historicals. The Witch of Endor™ stories all revolved around a character who became a fan favorite. And The Dollmakers™ were about a group of rootworkers and mystics. All of the stories were about a group of witches, necromancers, rootworkers, mystics and warlocks unlike any you've seen in fiction before. Unconventional and fun, they turn traditional lore on its ear.


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Enter your email address and we'll send you a link to reset your password.
After an amazing first date, Bea and Ben's fiery attraction turns ice cold — until they find themselves unexpectedly reunited at a destination wedding in Australia. So they do what any two mature adults would do: pretend to be a couple.
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Home to the World's Official Mortgage Metaverse™ Trademark Brand of Goods and Services
In accordance with the Government of Canada's Cabinet Directive on Regulatory Management, the National Standard of Canada for Quality Management is adopted from world-class international standards, namely, the quality management system standard ISO 9001, published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) [based in Switzerland], of which Canada is a founding member.
Since 2008, no other Canadian Bank, Financial Institution, Lender, Fiduciary and Non-Fiduciary Investment Advisor/Broker and Financial Technology Company is able to make this claim. As a consumer, investor, regulator or stakeholder in Canada's finance sector, given today's market conditions in the finance sector, we trust you agree that it's a claim worth making.
Visit www.mqcc.org to learn about the Money Quality Conformity Control Organization and its history.
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Which immediately brought to mind a card I'd created a long time ago for my hubby. Isn't it cool to personalize a card to include a special spot on this earth? I love this design for wedding or anniversary or plain ol' love cards. I went ultra CAS for today's card which also features a heart die cut from a map.
I die cut the letters using PTI Headline Alpha and adhered them. Die cut the hearts with Amuse Heart Trio die. And added a wooden arrow I painted with gold nail polish. A strip of washi adds a little punch at the bottom, bringing in the black dots of the cities on the map.
Thanks to the THD team for having me and I can't wait to see their projects!
On a personal note - as I write up this post I am waiting to depart for MI. My wonderful Mom is having serious health problems and I don't know what to expect or when I will be returning. So it'll be quiet around here for awhile. FYI. Positive thoughts are appreciated :)


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Automating web downloads and file unzipping
Andrew J. Dyck wrote a nice post on his blog on how to Download and unzip data files from Stata. He writes
Recently, I've been using Stata's -shp2dta- command to convert some shapefiles to stata format, grabbing Lat/Lon data and merging into another dataset. There were several compressed shapefiles I wanted to download contained in a directory from the web. I could manually download each file and uncompress each one but that would be time consuming. Also, when the maps are updated, I'd have to do the download/uncompress all over again. I've found that the process can be automated from within Stata by using a combination of -shell- and some handy terminal commands. …
You should read the rest of his post. He goes on to show how you can script with Stata to automate shelling out to download and unzip a series of files from a website, and he introduces you to some cool Unix-like utilities for Windows.
We here at StataCorp use Stata for tasks like this all the time. In fact, we have built some tools into Stata to allow you to do much of what Andrew described without ever having to leave or shell out of Stata.
For example, Stata can access files over the Internet. Stata has a copy command. And, as of Stata 11, Stata can directly zip and unzip files and directories.
Putting all of those capabilities to use, you can accomplish Andrew's goal by writing code directly in Stata such as
copy http://example.com/download1.zip download1.zip copy http://example.com/download2.zip download2.zip unzipfile download1.zip unzipfile download2.zip
If there were a large number of files you wished to download and unzip, and they were all named in a regular manner (say, "download1.zip" through "download100.zip"), you could bring them all down and unzip them directly in Stata with a 4 line loop:
forvalues i = 1/100 { copy http://example.com/download`i'.zip download`i'.zip unzipfile download`i'.zip }


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Naoki Mazaki san is a new blacksmith located in Sanjo Niigata, He is very young and super talented blacksmith that specialising in Kitchen knives !
He is very very new So i am one of the first to order knives from him, however he have made knives for many years under different Sanjo blacksmiths.
And have even been trained, coached by Kato and still is !
His knives is very hefty and powerfull but with amazing grind that is super easy to maintain
All his knives is made only by him self one by one !
This one is a new version with only charcoal, water quenched with new profile and better taper
This of coarse takes more time thats why also higher price then regular
Steel: White Steel (can rust !!! ) with iron Cladding
Handle: Ho wood D shape
Approx.. measurements:
Handle Length- 150mm
Handle Width- 25mm
Hell to Tip Length- 240mm
Blade Height at Heel- 53mm
Width of Spine at Handle- 4,7mm
Width of Spine Above Heel-3,9mm
Width of Spine at Middle- 2,2mm
Width of Spine 1cm from the tip- 0,9mm
wight 215g
All knives JNS cary is handmade and made one by one, so they can vary in size and thickness. Unevenness in finish can occur.